In their room that evening, Rhys took Natalie’s news with remarkable calm.
‘No. I’m not pregnant.’
He turned to face her. ‘But how can that be? You took one of those tests, Natalie. It said you were pregnant. You showed me the stick yourself, and the blue line.’
‘I-I don’t know.’ She fidgeted with her collar. ‘I must’ve done something wrong.’
His expression was sardonic. ‘Imagine that.’ He went to the foot of the bed and sat down.
‘Well?’ Natalie asked as she dropped down beside him and eyed him anxiously. ‘Haven’t you anything to say, Rhys?’
‘What is there to say, Natalie? You thought you were pregnant but it was a mistake, and you’re not. End of story.’
‘But how do you...feel, about it? Are you disappointed?’
‘Of course I am. I know I wasn’t very keen in the beginning, but once I got used to the idea of you...of us...having a baby, I liked it. So yes, I’m a bit disappointed.’
‘I’ll make an appointment with Dr MacTavish tomorrow, just to be sure. Oh, Rhys...I was so looking forward to us having this baby.’ She sniffled and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand as tears began to leak out.
He reached an arm out and drew her close against him. ‘It’s not the end of the world. There’s no rush, after all. We’ll just let nature take its course for the next few weeks and see what happens.’
‘You mean – no pills? Whatever happens...happens?’
‘Exactly.’ He kissed the top of her head. ‘Now that I’ve got used to it, I like the idea of having a son, someone to take the reins and run Dashwood and James one day.’
‘What about a daughter?’ Natalie demanded, and lifted her face to his. ‘I could just as easily have a girl, you know.’
‘Yes, you could. And I’ll love her every bit as much as our son. We could have one of each,’ he pointed out, and leant forward to kiss her. ‘Nothing’s stopping us, Mrs Dashwood-Gordon.’
Natalie kissed him back. ‘No,’ she said huskily as she drew him down beside her, ‘nothing’s stopping us at all, Mr Gordon.’
On Saturday, Helen got a call from the mechanic’s shop. ‘Your car’s ready,’ the male voice on the other end of the phone informed her. ‘We close in ten minutes, and we won’t open again until Monday morning. Can someone bring you in to pick it up then?’
Her heart sank. ‘Yes,’ she managed. ‘Thank you. How much do I owe you?’
He paused, and named a sum nearly as large as a third world country’s budget.
‘Thanks,’ Helen said faintly. ‘I’ll see you on Monday.’
She rang off, and her expression was troubled. She didn’t want to leave Draemar yet. She hadn’t filed her exclusive on Dominic and Gemma’s wedding, nor had she gotten the answers she sought in Andrew’s death...and she still wanted to understand why Colm MacKenzie shared a more-than-coincidental resemblance to the Campbell family.
More importantly, she didn’t want to leave Colm.
The thought of returning to London – all she’d wanted when she’d first arrived at the castle – filled her now with melancholy. She dreaded going back to her old, empty life, back to the constant, heartbreaking reminders of David and their baby, back to a job she’d grown to hate.
Scotland, and Colm, were a part of her now.
Which reminds me, she thought as she headed downstairs to ask Pen if she might borrow a car, I need to go to the store and buy a tin of shortbread or a bottle of wine to take to Colm’s...it wouldn’t do to show up for Sunday dinner at the gatehouse empty-handed.
And she had to tell him she was leaving soon.
Would he even care? she wondered as she went into the drawing room in search of Mrs Campbell. He probably wouldn’t spare her another thought once she was gone.
There was no sign of Pen. She’d been here recently, though; a half-empty cup of tea with her red lipstick on the rim sat on one of the end tables, next to a basket piled with fashion magazines. Curious, Helen picked one of the magazines up. Surely, she thought as she flicked rapidly through the pages, Tom would want her to stay here until the wedding story was photographed and filed.
Her page-flicking slowed. The fashions were from the Seventies, and the models wore things like crocheted vests, bucket hats, wedge heels, and wide-legged trousers.
‘Shades of Studio 54,’ Helen murmured, and quirked her brow. Why on earth did the Campbells keep a basket of Seventies fashion magazines to hand?
Then she saw it. Pen Campbell, or Pen Park as she was known then, strode across the glossy page in a pair of wide-legged white slacks and a black crocheted crop-top, laughing. It was an ad for a women’s cologne, Insouciant.
Pen was attractive, with her green eyes and auburn hair, and she was the picture of youth and health.
Her interest piqued, Helen flipped through a few more magazines. Pen was everywhere – on a cover here, in a cosmetics ad there, gracing dozens of photo shoots and spreads – proving that she’d once been very sought after in the fashion world.
But one photo in particular caught her eye. Pen and another model were posing for a picture in Annabel’s, the fashionable London nightclub, with Graeme Longworth, candidate for prime minister. He was smiling, amused by something Pen had just said.
Helen remembered the first time she and the others had dined with Archie Campbell and his wife. He’d proudly made mention of Pen’s quasi-celebrity past.
‘Had flings with a couple of film stars, she did, and then there was that chap – oh, what was his name, darling? I always said he was sweet on you...he almost ran for prime minister?’
‘Graeme Longworth.’
Then Pen had changed the subject.
Her thoughts racing, Helen returned the magazines to the basket.
She went up to her room and shut the door, then pulled out her laptop. She typed Longworth’s name into the search engine, but nothing of interest came up, aside from a few old photos and news of his sudden withdrawal from the election for PM in the mid-seventies. There was plenty of speculation as to why, but nothing more.
Archie’s voice echoed in her head. ‘There were rumours of a scandal of some sort, and so he withdrew.’
She typed in Pen Park’s name next; again, she found little of import, only photos from her days as a model, news of her marriage to Archie Campbell, and later, articles about the drowning death of her eldest son, Andrew.
On impulse, Helen picked up her mobile and rang Tom. ‘What do you know about a chap named Graeme Longworth?’ she asked when he picked up.
There was a long pause. ‘Why do you ask?’ A note of wariness crept into his voice.
‘Well, it’s purely conjecture on my part,’ she mused as she scrolled through the list of links on her screen, ‘but I think I might know why Longworth abandoned his bid for PM. And I think her name was Pen Park.’
Instead of scoffing, or dismissing her idea out of hand, Tom let out a short breath. ‘Give me directions to Draemar.’
‘What? Why, are you coming up here to the Highlands?’ she asked, and blinked. ‘But you despise Scotland.’
‘I do. But we need to talk. Is there somewhere in the local village where we can