The Sun Sister (The Seven Sisters #6) - Lucinda Riley Page 0,276

wine – a habit she knew she should probably curb, but she looked forward to it, as it signalled the fact that Rosa was in bed asleep. She suggested to Bill that the two of them went upstairs to the living room.

‘How often is Stella home?’ Bill asked as he sat down in a chair by the fireplace.

‘Oh, it depends on her working week. She’s usually based in Baltimore, which is a three-hour train ride from here, so if she isn’t flying off somewhere, she’ll leave Sunday after supper and get home late on Friday evening.’

‘So she doesn’t see much of her daughter.’

‘No, sir, she doesn’t,’ sighed Cecily.

‘You really have rather been left to pick up the pieces, haven’t you?’

‘I’d hardly call Rosa a “piece”, Bill. To all intents and purposes, she is my grandchild, and I’m only doing what any grandmother would do under the circumstances.’

‘I can see that, but it could mean you being trapped in this situation for years to come. Surely you want something more?’

‘I would have thought that you of all people, Bill, have learnt, like I have, that life isn’t a question of what you want. But yes, you’re right: lately I have felt a little trapped,’ she admitted.

‘It seems to me that you’ve sacrificed almost everything for Stella,’ Bill said quietly. ‘Your family, your home, money, your marriage even . . . and at present, any hope of a life of your own until Rosa has grown up.’

‘It was a sacrifice worth making,’ Cecily said defensively. ‘You do anything you can for those you love, Bill, but I guess you wouldn’t understand that.’

‘Please, Cecily, yet again, forgive me, I’ve no right to come back here and start telling you what to do with your life. And I . . . well, whatever has passed between us, I still care for you and I’d like to help if I can.’

‘That’s very kind of you, Bill, but I can’t see quite how you could.’

‘To start with, by giving you some funds so you can get some childcare support. Frankly, Cecily, you look utterly exhausted and in desperate need of a holiday.’

‘I sure haven’t had one of those in a long time,’ she agreed. ‘But I can’t take your money, Bill. It wouldn’t be right.’

‘Please remember, it was I that brought this situation to your door – our door – in the first place. The very least I can now do is help out with the consequences of it. You are still my wife, after all, and as it happens, I have plenty of money to spare. Apart from the farm doing well, my older brother died last year and left me the family heap in England. I went to see it on my way to New York – it’s near that horrendously ugly hall where you met the original cad and bounder . . . what was his name?’

‘Julius,’ said Cecily with a shudder.

‘It might hearten you to know that I heard he left this world some years ago, having gone through countless wives and copious vats of brandy, leaving no progeny. Anyway, the local estate agent says he has an eager buyer for my own far smaller pile. It should bring in a pretty penny – apparently some pop star wants to put a recording studio in the wine cellar. I say, what do you think of these Beatles chaps then? I heard nothing else on the radio when I was in England, and it seems to be the same here in America.’

‘Stella adores them, obviously. I guess I like their tunes too. They’re catchy.’

‘Not exactly smooching music, though, is it? Do you remember that night with Joss and Diana when they were so desperately in love, and poor old Jock sat like the eternal cuckold in the corner watching them?’ Bill reminisced.

‘I do, yes.’

‘You and I danced to Glenn Miller. I often think back to that night. I remember it being the start of the rehabilitation of you and I after we lost Fleur. If only war hadn’t come . . .’

‘Well, it did. And here we are now,’ said Cecily. That night had been seminal for her, and she was amazed that it stuck out in Bill’s memory too.

‘Halcyon days,’ he murmured. ‘Why is it we only realise that they were in retrospect? Anyway, Cecily, whether you like it or not, I’m going to place an amount into your account and then I’m going to help you find a nursemaid – or