Leon’s mouth tightened. Lassiter was trying to hustle him, hoping to change the terms of the deal in his favour. It would be no bad thing to let him sweat for a while—show the man that his terms were non-negotiable.
‘Tell him it’s postponed,’ he said tersely.
‘Till when?’
‘Till I get back to London—and, no, I don’t know when that will be. Next week some time. Maybe later. I’ll let you know.’ He disconnected. He didn’t want a discussion or a debate. He didn’t want anything right now except to clear his London desk this morning and head far, far away.
A change of perspective was what he needed. It might help take his mind off the woman who was frustrating the hell out of him.
Flavia was in the garden, dead-heading one of the rows of hydrangeas just beyond the open French windows leading into the drawing room. Her grandmother was in an armchair by the window, a rug over her lap, looking out at her. There was no expression in her face, but her eyes went to Flavia from time to time, and Flavia would pause and chat to her, as if she could really take in what she was saying.
‘There’s a lot of new growth coming through,’ she was saying cheerfully. ‘I think I’m going to need to do some watering, too—it’s been so dry today. Mind you, if it does stay dry I can get the lawn mown tomorrow. It’s looking quite long already.’
She chattered on, determinedly cheerful—as much, she thought with a hollow feeling, to keep her own spirits up as in an attempt to do the same with her grandmother.
It was one thing to know with her head that she absolutely must not have anything more to do with Leon Maranz.
It was quite another thing to accept it.
This is my world, here.
She looked about her. It was a beautiful day, and Flavia could feel her spirits respond to the uplifting sight of Harford’s extensive gardens. The lawn was framed by shrubberies, and fronted by a wide herbaceous border. It was a lot to keep up single-handedly, as Flavia did, but it was a labour of love.
Just as caring for her grandmother was a labour of love.
She glanced back, her smile deepening, but there was sadness in it, too, as she looked at her grandmother. She seemed so small and frail and vulnerable, sitting there so still in her chair. As if she were already living in another world.
But she was safe here—safe in the home she had known for over half a century—and this was where she would end her days, with her granddaughter at her side. Nothing would chang
e Flavia’s mind on that. If it meant putting her own life on hold—well, so be it. It was a gift she would gladly give her grandmother.
She stretched her shoulders and resumed her clipping, dropping the dried dead heads of the hydrangea into a willow basket. As she got stuck in to her task again she picked up the sound of a vehicle approaching by the front drive. Murmuring to her grandmother, she went in through the French windows and out into the front hall just as the doorbell rang. Opening it, she saw it was the postman.
‘Special Delivery,’ he said, holding out a pad for her to sign.
She did so, and took the large thick envelope wonderingly, bidding the postman goodbye and shutting the door. She stared at the envelope a moment. It had been franked, but there was a name on the frank she could not read. It was addressed to her—a typed label. Junk mail? Surely not, she reasoned, if it was a special delivery.
She started back to the drawing room, opening the envelope with her fingernail and extracting the contents. Thick folded paper—some kind of document beneath a letter. Frowning in puzzlement, she started reading.
It was from a firm of City solicitors—one she’d never heard of.
As she read, the blood started to congeal in her veins. With shaking hands she dropped the letter on the sofa and sank down beside it on wobbly legs, her eyes burning into the documents. Sickness filled her.
Then, abruptly, she leapt to her feet, seized up the letter, and plunged into the room her grandfather had used as his study. She picked up the phone. Her hands were shaking, the sickness like acid in her stomach, and she could hardly dial the number she knew she had to call.
Her father took her call—as if he were expecting it.
‘So,’ he said, ‘I’ve finally got your attention, have I? About bloody time!’
Flavia’s teeth were gritted. ‘What the hell have you sent me?’ she demanded.
Her father’s voice sounded unmoved by her agitation. ‘Isn’t it clear enough? It’s what it says it is—a loan agreement. Plus a note of the accumulated interest since the loan was made.’
‘But when—when did this happen?’ Flavia tried to keep the panic out of her voice and failed.
‘It was after your grandad snuffed it. Your gran was worried about money—funeral expenses, legal fees, house repairs, utility bills, all sorts of things. She’d never had to cope with all that stuff. So …’
He paused, and there was an unholy note in his voice. Flavia could hear it, with a hollowing of her insides.