Lucinda waved enthusiastically at her the next morning as Anna clambered out of the car with the twins.
‘Mummy,’ Freddie said as they approached the school gates, ‘is Grandma a queen?’
‘And Auntie Dee-Dee,’ said Antonia, ‘is she a queen too?’
‘For the next week, yes, you’re going to live in a house of queens.’
Anna kissed them on top of their heads and they ran off happily chanting, ‘We live in a house of queens! We live in a house of queens!’
Lucinda joined Anna and smiled. ‘Singing Abba. That’s brave.’
‘With my family,’ Anna pointed out.
‘Sort of like the Von Trapps? Adorable,’ she cooed unconvincingly.
‘What will you be doing?’ Anna dreaded asking.
‘Ah, well, as you know, I have a wide range of interests so it was really very hard to choose, but last night I wrote down all my talents. I think I came up with roughly ninety and then I got Rupert to pick out of a hat. The man couldn’t have chosen better, to be honest. I knew it was meant to be.’
‘Yeah, so what are you treating us to?’
‘Well, I’ve run it past Mrs Beecham and she’s happy with it. In fact, more than happy with it.’ Lucinda smiled triumphantly. ‘I’ll be coming to you via a video link because I’ll be back at home in our dressage school, performing on my award-winning thoroughbred, Ima Diva, to Take That’s song Could It Be Magic.’
Anna snorted. ‘Ima Diva? Is that male or female?’
‘Female, of course.’
‘Where did you get her from?’
‘A highly recommended Polish eventer who said he had never in his whole life come across such a perfect match of horse to owner.’ She smiled. ‘She is quite special.’
‘As are you.’ Anna nodded. ‘And Mrs Beecham is really fine with you doing that whole video link thing?’
‘Yes,’ Lucinda nodded vigorously. ‘In fact, she said something about how much it would make her evening to be able to watch me from so many miles away. She was very keen.’ Lucinda dived into a bag almost as big as her to retrieve her Gucci sunglasses, which she put on despite the drizzle and cloud cover. ‘Anyway, lovely that you’ll be performing as a family… It’ll be so, um, sweet?’ She ruffled her hair up once more and twirled off towards her car. ‘Bye, Anna.’
‘Bye.’ Anna was about to head back to her own car when Horatio came over. ‘Mr Horatio, I told you I have nothing to say to you.’
‘I know you said that but I can’t let you go on believing I would tell your ex where you live. When I saw how upset he made you on Saturday, the last thing I wanted to do was tell him where you live.’
‘What did you want to do?’
‘I wanted to punch him and, Anna, I’ve never punched anyone in my entire life.’
‘But you see,’ Anna fiddled with the end of her pom-pom scarf, ‘what I don’t understand is what you and your mother are up to. I mean, don’t get me wrong… from what your mother told me, you’ve had it tough. I’m not taking that away from you. But the way you both think you own everything around here.’
‘You spoke to my mother? When?’ He rubbed his unshaven cheek.
‘Yes, I spoke to your mother, if that’s how you see her, yesterday. She invited me over for tea but I didn’t stay long because, frankly, she was very rude to me. I will not be spoken to like that. Both you and your mother have it in for me and I have done nothing.’
‘No, of course you haven’t.’ He looked confused. ‘But what did she say?’
‘She wanted my aunt’s diary.’
‘Really? Why?’
‘Well,’ Anna narrowed her eyes, ‘you of all people must be able to imagine what most of my aunt’s writing was about. Your mother’s worried I’ll show the diary to people and rumours will start up.’
‘Rumours?’
‘Yes,’ Anna said, growing frustrated, ‘about your mother, your real mother, and your father.’
‘Why? What has my mother done? What do you mean “real mother”?’
‘God, Horatio, she really has bought your silence, hasn’t she? I don’t know why you’re pretending with me.’ She shrugged. ‘But, you know, in so many ways, I forgive you now for your strange behaviour. Maybe, somehow, you blame my aunt for everything that’s happened to you, but it’s your mother who you should be blaming. No one should buy anyone’s silence.’
‘Anna, I’m really confused.’ He wrinkled his forehead.
She started to walk off. ‘Well, imagine how I felt when your mother demanded the diary off me. But I’m sure you understand how deeply in love my aunt was with your father.’
He followed her and Anna’s phone buzzed in her pocket. She picked up and listened to her voicemail.
‘Hi, Anna. It’s Simon. I’m ringing to let you know that now I want access to the children, more than ever. When I saw Freddie the other day, I couldn’t believe how like me he was and I want to get to know him – to know them. I have hired a lawyer because I plan to win what is rightfully mine.’
Her heart raced as she thought back to the conversation with Simon on her doorstep. Maybe she should have been more open to the idea then. If she had, maybe it wouldn’t have come to this.
Anna, tears in her eyes, dropped her phone back into her bag. ‘I have to go.’
‘Anna, are you OK?’ He put a hand on her shoulder. ‘You look shaken up.’
‘That was Simon and, because he saw Freddie the other night, he now wants to fight for access.’
Horatio rubbed her arm and she shook him off. ‘You see, that’s what happens when you do things without thinking. Simon was a stranger to my children and, now he’s seen them, he thinks he can just waltz back into their lives. You’re lucky your wife has allowed you to keep seeing Jeremy. But, for me, it’s not going to be as simple.’
Horatio frowned. ‘Anna, I’ve tried to tell you so many times but you haven’t listened.’
‘What? What have you tried to tell me? That you’re sorry for messing up my life?’ She got in her car, her hands trembling as she did up her seatbelt and slammed the door.
He looked at her through the glass and motioned for her to unwind her window. When she didn’t, he spoke anyway, ‘I’m not married, Anna. I was married, to a beautiful woman called Sophia.’
Anna put her window down a few inches. ‘But you left her. They all do. Men, you’re all the same. Don’t know when you’ve got something good and you should just hang on to it.’
‘No,’ his voice caught, ‘she died. Two years ago. Of cancer.’ His pained expression caught Anna off-guard and he patted the roof of the car, his face crumpling with surfacing emotion. ‘I’m sorry my mother wants that diary. She hadn’t spoken to me about meeting you. She and I don’t really speak any more. She’s become very bitter over the years. Anyway, I can see I’m causing you grief, so I’ll do as you asked and stay away. If you need me, you know where to find me.’
Anna sat back in the car seat as she watched Horatio walk slowly down the road, lost in his thoughts, and wondered if, in another world, a parallel universe, she might open her eyes and meet someone as honest and kind as he had been in that moment. Why couldn’t he be like that all the time? Her heart ached with sadness as she watched his figure disappear around the bend in the road. For a second, she thought that maybe they understood each other better than she had previously realised. She also realised, with a heavy heart, that she had been unfair on him. Guilt swept through her as she thought about the way she had accused him of having an affair when his wife wasn’t even alive.
‘As Freddie would say… Anna, you are not very nice human bean,’ she muttered and drove very slowly home, as if her own remorse was weighing the car down.