being so clever, giving the boy that huge trust fund when he turned eighteen. Now look what’s happened. They’re getting Kitty Pong as a daughter-in-law. No amount of antique-smashing is going to change that.”
Lorena giggled. “Poor Carol—she’s always been such a good Christian, but now she has to deal with having a satanic Kitty in her life!” The ladies all laughed.
“Well, at least we succeeded in stopping that Rachel Chu from getting at Nicky,” Nadine commented.
Eleanor shook her head sadly. “What’s the use? My Nicky has stopped talking to me. I don’t have a clue where he is—he’s even broken off contact with his grandmother. I tried calling Astrid to find him, but she’s missing too. Sum toong, ah. You love your children so much, you do everything to try to protect them, and they don’t even appreciate it.”
“Well, even if he doesn’t want to see you right now, at least you succeeded in saving him from that girl,” Lorena said comfortingly.
“Yes, but Nicky doesn’t realize how much damage he’s done to his relationship with his grandmother. I trained him to never, ever offend her, but he hurt her terribly in Cameron Highlands. You should have seen the old lady—she didn’t speak once all the way back to Singapore. And take it from me, that woman never forgives. Now all the sacrifices I have made will have been for nothing,” Eleanor said sadly, her voice cracking a little.
“What do you mean?” Nadine asked. “What sort of sacrifices did you make for Nicky?”
Eleanor sighed. “Aiyah, Nadine, my whole life has been spent protecting him within my husband’s family, and positioning him to be the favorite grandson. I know my mother-in-law never truly approved of me, so I even got out of the way. I moved out of Tyersall Park so there wouldn’t be two competing Mrs. Youngs. I always let her come first in Nicky’s life, and because of this he’s been closer to her. But I accepted that. It was for his own good. He deserves to be the heir to her fortune, the heir to Tyersall Park, but he no longer seems to care. He would rather be a bloody history professor. Hiyah, I always knew sending him to England would be a mistake. Why do we Chinese never learn? Every time we get mixed up with the West, everything falls apart.”
Just then, Sister Gracie came walking down the lawn toward the bedroom pavilion with Carol and her husband trailing behind. She called out loudly, “Now, what demons lie in wait here? Exodus 20:3–6 says, ‘You shall have no other gods before me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God.’ ”
Daisy glanced at the other ladies and said urgently, “Everyone grab a shopping bag and run for the doors. Don’t look at them, just keep moving!”
* * *
* Singapore’s red-light district (sadly, not as picturesque as Amsterdam’s).
20
Villa d’Ora
SINGAPORE
Peik Lin sequestered Rachel and her mother in the library, shutting the boiserie doors behind her firmly. She then padded out to the terrace bar overlooking the pool and began mixing margaritas for herself and Nick. “I think we both deserve about a dozen of these, don’t we?” she said, handing him a tall frosty glass.
Surrounded by bookshelves filled with gold-tooled leather volumes, Rachel perched on the cushioned bay-window seat and stared out at the rose garden angrily. All she wanted to do was get on that plane to China, but once again Nick had screwed things up. Kerry grabbed one of the dark green leather chairs by the reading desk and turned it around so she could sit facing her daughter. Even though Rachel wouldn’t look at her, she took a deep breath and began the story she had flown halfway around the world to tell.
“Daughter, I have never told this story to anyone, and it is something I always intended to spare you from. I hope you will not judge me, and that you will listen with an open mind, an open heart.
“When I was seventeen, I fell in love with a man who was six years older. Yes, it was Zhou Fang Min. His family was from Xiamen, in Fujian Province. He was one of those ‘Red Princelings’ and he came