‘And your aunt and uncle, do you think they’d want you here with your cousins once they found out? An unmarried teenager with a bastard child living in their home?’ He laughed. ‘I certainly think not. That would be pushing eventheirgenerosity to its limits.’
Alexandra dug her fingernails into the covers, wishing to scream at him and hurl the pillows at his head. But instead she froze, as if she were that little girl again, the twelve-year-old who’d just lost her mother.
‘Take a moment to compose yourself, and then pack your things. We leave in an hour.’
‘I can’t,’ she whispered.
‘It will spare Elizabeth the embarrassment of asking you to leave herself, Alexandra. You’re not a child anymore, you know the right thing to do.’
Bernard. She would go to Bernard.Bernard would know what to do.
26
‘Alexandra!’ Bernard swept her into the house and up to his room. She could tell he hadn’t slept because his eyes were bloodshot and his things were strewn all over the room, but his bed was still made as she’d left it the morning before.
‘You’re packing already?’
He dropped the clothes he was holding and opened his arms, and she went straight to him, head to his chest as he held her. She slipped her arms around his waist, not wanting to let go.
‘I don’t know how, but I had the dates wrong. We’re leaving tomorrow!’
‘Tomorrow?’ She let go of him and stepped back.
‘I know, I know,’ he said, going back to his packing. ‘Apparently they wanted us to have longer to rehearse in China before our performances, somehow I missed the updated schedule, and—’ He frowned. ‘Alex, I’m so sorry, wasn’t yesterday the day you were supposed to hear about your audition?’
She forced a smile. ‘I haven’t heard yet,’ she lied. ‘But fingers crossed a letter will arrive today. You know how unreliable the post can be sometimes.’
He grinned. ‘Next time we have a tour, you will be packing too. Can you imagine, the two of us travelling the world, with no fixed abode? We will be auditioning for orchestras all around the world, just the two of us.’
Alexandra sat on the edge of the bed and watched him. It was taking all her strength not to burst into tears.
‘That sounds lovely, B. It’s a life I could have only dreamed of until now.’
He sat beside her and took her hand. ‘Something’s wrong?’
A tear slid down her cheek then, escaping from the corner of her eye. ‘No, nothing’s wrong, I’m just going to miss you, that’s all.’
He kissed her tears away. ‘I’ll miss you too. And I promise I wasn’t going to leave without telling you, I was going to come to the house on my way to the airport.’
Alexandra quickly wiped her eyes, smiling through her tears as Bernard went back to packing. She knew then what she had to do; he had his whole life ahead of him, had sacrificed so much to follow his dream, and she wasn’t going to be the one to stand in the way of that, to stop him from being the man, the musician, he was supposed to be.
When his car arrived to take him to the airport, she would stay behind and write him a note.
I love you. I’m sorry.
Because what else could she say if she didn’t want him to know the truth?
27
Alexandra gripped the door of the car as her father caught hold of her arm.
‘You can’t make me,’ she pleaded, feeling like that little girl again back in Greece, refusing to leave for London. ‘I won’t go.’
‘I don’t care if I have to carry you kicking and screaming, you are going inside.’ She knew he was barely containing his anger, red seeping into his cheeks as he glared down at her. ‘Let go of the car, Alexandra.’
‘No!’ she cried, as he tugged so violently at her arm she feared he might break it. ‘Please, don’t make me. Please!’
‘You should have thought of that before you brought shame on our family,’ he seethed. ‘You have done this, Alexandra, and now this is the price you have to pay.’
