“I think you forgot to tell me.”
I’m no longer listening, though. I’m totally captivated by that little face with perfect lips, a tiny nose and that thin messy hair that forms a soft veil all over his head. “I’ve never seen anything more beautiful.”
“Neither have I.”
“I’ll let you visit him sometimes, if you want,” I say, softened by that tender sight.
“Are you serious?” He looks shaken.
“It’s quite a lot already, considering that I didn’t want you to know.”
“Jemma, I don’t want to see our sonsometimes. I want to raise him, and I want to do it with you. We’re not perfect and we’ll never be, but all I know is that you’re the only one I want to spend my life with. Normal people usually fall in love, get married, have a child, and, in the worst cases, they start hating each other and get divorced. You and I did everything upside down: we hated each other, we got married, we fell in love, we got divorced and, now, we have a son. We’ve never been normal. What would be the point in following the rules now?”
“In love?” I ask.
“Yes, in love. Or at least, I’m in love with you.”
“When did you realise it?”
Ashford smiles. “I think it all started at the charity fashion show, when you came out on that catwalk half naked, in front of the entire high society. That’s when I realised that there’s no other woman like you.”
I bite my lower lip, trying to hold back a spontaneous smile.
“Hey, I can see you’re smiling.” He lifts my face with a hand to make me look into his eyes. “When did you realise?”
I gulp, then start confessing, embarrassed. “Perhaps it was on the very first evening, at the restaurant, when you thought I was the waitress.”
“I was an arsehole,” he admits.
“Yes, you were.” I say, and then I can’t help but ask him that question. “What about Portia?”
“Portia was a misunderstanding, and I’m sure you know I don’t want her, you just don’t want to admit it. You can’t accept that, for once in your life, someone might choose you. You’re afraid of being hurt, and you don’t want to delude yourself by thinking that everything will be okay. Let me tell you something: these months during which I knew nothing of you and I spent my days looking for your ghost all over Denby, well, they tore my heart in two and bled me out.”
“Don’t you think that I suffered as well?”
“Then why should we leave each other?”
I shake my head, lacking conviction. “Trusting someone else is always a free fall.”
Ashford takes my hand. “But I’m jumping with you.”
The door bursts open with a violent thud, and Delphina enters the room, shouting: “An heir!”
90
Delphina’s Version
If it were not for me, this house would fall apart. I hope that God will grant me many more years to live, because nobody can keep control over the situation like I do.
Today iscrucial.
And everything must be carried out with meticulous precision.
A wedding and a baptism to be celebrated together, on the same day, with the eyes of the entire aristocracy on me, and I have planned every single detail of it with the help of Margaret.
My son is getting remarried. With Jemma, again. There’s no getting rid of her. If nothing else, her appearance has improved a lot. Not her manners, but, with her mouth shut, she’s no longer that embarrassing.
To be kind, I’d define her parents ascolourful, but Jemma, Carly and Vance are a single unit, so it’s either take them or leave them.
