Wealthy Australian, Secret Son

“This is a surprise, Rohan,” he said, turning to hold out his hand.

Rohan Costello took it in a firm grip. The doctor could hardly say, given the circumstances of Rohan Costello’s departure, Welcome back to Silver Valley!

“It’s good to see you again, Dr Morrissey,” Rohan answered smoothly. “You were always kind to my mother and me.”

“You were both very easy to be kind to, Rohan,” Morrissey assured him with genuine warmth. “And how is your mother?”

“She’s doing very well, sir,” Rohan responded pleasantly, but it was obvious he wasn’t going to be more forthcoming.

“Good, good! I’m very glad to hear it. Do you intend to spend much time in the Valley, Rohan?” Morrissey dared to ask. “You must have become a very successful businessman?”

Rohan gave him a half smile that bracketed his handsome mouth. “I’ve had a few lucky breaks, Doctor.”

“I think it would have more to do with brain power. You were always very clever.”

George Morrissey, the keeper of many secrets, turned back to take another look at Charlotte and her precious boy. What a beautiful child Christopher was, with those glorious blue eyes! One rarely saw that depth of colour. He had delivered Christopher Prescott, Charlotte’s baby, who had come a little early. He was sure everyone had believed him. He was the most respected medical doctor in the Valley. After the tragic death of Charlotte’s young brother Matthew, and the flight of her mother from the “haunted” Valley, he had become very protective of Charlotte Marsdon, who had gone on to marry a young man who in his opinion had simply not been worthy of her. Martyn Prescott—who himself had met a tragic fate.

Christopher too wanted to talk to the tall stranger—the man who had carried his mother so effortlessly into their house. Well, his house now. And it seemed to suit him just fine. Christopher was very thankful the right person would have ownership of Riverbend. He looked just the sort of man to look after it.

Christopher stood up, wondering why his mother was trying to grab hold of his arm. He held out his hand, as he had been taught. “Hello, I’m Christopher. We used to live here.”

“I know that, Christopher,” the man answered quietly, moving in closer.

The man’s blue eyes made contact with his own, and Christopher felt transfixed. “Do you know Mummy?” He didn’t see how the man could, yet those vibes he seemed to have inherited from someone told him this man and his mother knew one another well. It was a mystery, but there it was!

Charlotte put her feet to the floor, unsure if she could even stand, still not looking at Rohan but acutely aware that the full force of his attention was focused on her and her son. “Mr Costello is a very busy man, Chris,” she said. Christopher was so sharp. “We mustn’t keep him from mingling with his guests.”

“No, Mummy.” Christopher nodded his head in agreement, but continued with a further question. “How do you know my mother?” It seemed important he find out. Perceptive beyond his years, he felt the tension between his mother and the tall stranger. He couldn’t figure it out. But it was there. Mummy was nice to everyone, yet she wasn’t being exactly nice to Mr Costello. Something had to be worrying her.

“Your mother and I grew up together, Christopher,” Rohan explained. “I left the Valley when I was seventeen. I’m Rohan. No need to call me Mr Costello.”

“Oh, I’d like that,” Christopher said, his cheeks taking on a gratified flush. “We thought you were going to be pretty old. But you’re young!”

“Your mother has never mentioned me?”

Christopher shook his blond head. “Did you know my dad died?” He edged closer to the man. It was like being drawn by a magnet. It sort of thrilled him. He felt he could follow this man Rohan like the disciples in Bible stories had followed their Master. It both pleased and puzzled him.

“Yes, I did, Christopher. I’m very sorry.” Rohan’s voice was gentle, yet his expression was stern.

“There’s just Mummy and me now.” Christopher felt the sting of tears at the back of his eyes. He had loved his dad. Of course he had. One had to love one’s dad. But never like he loved his mother. What was really strange was that he cared for his grumpy old grandfather more than he had cared for his dad. “And Grandpa, of course,” he tacked on. “You must have known my dad and Uncle Mattie?”

“Oh, darling, not all these questions!” Charlotte spoke with agitation. He had sussed out enough already. Something had happened to Christopher of late. He was picking up on vibes, on looks and words that appeared to him laden with meaning. He was growing up too fast.

For once, Christopher didn’t heed her. “Uncle Mattie is still around,” he told Rohan, staring up at him. He was really surprised by the way he felt drawn to his man. “I often feel Uncle Mattie around.”

Rohan didn’t laugh or deride his claim. “I believe it, Christopher,” he said. “I feel Mattie too, at different times. He would have loved you.”

“Would he?” Christopher was immensely pleased. Uncle Mattie would have loved him! He was liking Rohan more and more. “Mummy said I looked like him when I was little.” He continued to meet Rohan’s amazing blue eyes. They glittered like jewels. “Do I?”

Rohan considered that carefully. “You might have, Christopher, when you were younger. But not now.”

“No.” Christopher shook his blond head, as though his own opinion had been confirmed. “I don’t look like anyone, really,” he confided.

Oh, yes, you do!

Charlotte kept her head down, her heart fluttering wildly in her breast. Christopher’s face had changed as the baby softness had firmed and his features became more pronounced. Heredity. It was all so dangerous.

It was Diane Rodgers who located Charlotte’s expensive sandals, then passed them to her in such a manner as to suggest a hurry-up. There was a faint accompanying glare as well. Charlotte bent to put her strappy sandals back on, then made an attempt to fix her hair. She felt totally disorientated. And there was Christopher, chattering away to Rohan as if he had known him all his young life. It almost broke her.

“Here’s your hat, love.” A familiar face swam into view. Kathy Nolan—a good friend to her mother and a good friend to her. “It’s beautiful.”

“Thank you, Kathy.” Charlotte took the picture hat in her hand.

“Feeling better now, love?” Kathy Nolan was very fond of Charlotte.

“Much better, thank you, Kathy. I’m so sorry I embarrassed you all. The heat got to me.”

Kathy, a kindly woman, let that go. A beautiful breeze was keeping the temperature positively balmy. Charlotte had fainted because Rohan Costello was the last man in the universe she would have expected to buy the Marsdon mansion, Kathy reckoned. To tell the truth she felt a little freaked out herself. Rohan Costello, of all people! And didn’t he look marvellous! Always a handsome boy, the adult Rohan took her breath away. Many people in the Valley—herself and her husband certainly—had been unhappy when the Costellos had left after Rohan had completed his final year at secondary school. Later they had learned he was their top achiever. The highest category. No surprise.

Poor Barbara had never made allowances for the ages of the other children when Mattie had drowned. It had been a terrible accident. With all the care in the world, accidents still happened. Yet Barbara had gone on a bitter, never-ending attack. So very sad! Loss took people in different ways. Bereft of her son, Barbara Marsdon had been in despair. That inner devastation had brought about the divorce. The marriage had been beyond repair. Barbara had told her she’d doubted her ability to be a good mother to Charlotte. She wasn’t functioning properly. That had been true enough. Charlotte was to remain with her father.

Yet here was Rohan Costello, back in the Valley. Not only that, taking possession of Riverbend. Fact is far stranger than fiction, Kathy thought.

Diane Rodgers, looking very glamorous in classic white, with a striking black and white creation on her head, spoke up. “Would you like me to help you back to the Lodge, Mrs Prescott? No trouble, I assure you.”

At the sound of those precise tones, Christopher swung back. “Mummy has me,” he said, not rudely—he knew better than that—but he didn’t like the way the lady was speaking to his mother. It didn’t sound gentle and caring, like Mrs Nolan. It sounded more like teachers at his school when the kids weren’t on their best behaviour.

“Wouldn’t you like to stay on, Christopher?” Rohan suggested. “I’m sure you have a friend with you. I’ll run your mother home.”

Christopher considered that for a full minute. “I won’t stay if you don’t feel well, Mummy,” he said, his protective attitude on show. “Peter will be okay.”

Charlotte rose to her feet, hoping she didn’t look as desperate as she felt. “Sweetheart, I don’t want you to bother about me. I don’t want anyone to bother about me. I’m fine.”

“You’re sure of that, Charlie?” Morrissey laid a gentle hand on her shoulder.

“You mustn’t let me keep you, George.” Charlotte gave him a shaky smile. “I know you and Ruth will love wandering around the grounds. They’re in tip-top condition.”

“That they are!” George Morrissey agreed. He turned back to the tall authoritative figure of the adult Rohan Costello. “I’d be delighted if you’d say hello to my wife, Rohan. She’d love to catch up.”

“It would be a pleasure.” Rohan gave a slight inclination of his handsome dark head.

The doctor lifted a hand in general farewell, then walked off towards the entrance hall.

“You must allow me to run you back to the Lodge at least, Charlotte,” Rohan said, with a compelling undernote she couldn’t fail to miss. “I’ll make sure Chris gets home.”

“Thank you, Rohan,” Christopher piped up. “Can’t take the helicopter, I suppose?” he joked, executing a full circle, arms outstretched. “Whump, whump, whump!”

“Not that far.” Rohan returned the boy’s entrancing smile. “But I promise you a ride one day soon.”

Christopher looked blown away. “Gee, that’s great! Wait until I tell Peter.”

“Maybe Peter too,” Rohan said.

“That’d be awesome! So where’s Grandpa?” Christopher suddenly asked of his mother. “Why didn’t he come into the house?”

“He may well be outside, Christopher,” Rohan answered smoothly. “Why don’t you go and see? Your mother is safe with me.”

“Is that all right, Mummy? I can go?” Christopher studied her face. His mother was so beautiful. The most beautiful mother in the world.

“Of course you can, darling.” Charlotte summoned up a smile. “I want you to enjoy yourself.”

“Thank you.” Christopher shifted his blue gaze back to Rohan. “It’s great to meet you, Rohan.” He put out his hand. Man to man.

Rohan shook it gravely. “Great to meet you too, Christopher,” he responded. “At long last.”

Many things in life changed. Some things never did.

CHAPTER THREE

THEY were quite alone. It was terrifying. Was she afraid of Rohan? That simply couldn’t be. But she was terrified of the emotions that must be raging through him. Terrified of the steel in him. Where had her beautiful white knight gone? A shudder ripped through her. This was a Rohan she had never seen.

The village ladies had gone back outside, to enjoy the rest of the afternoon. Diane Rodgers had hovered, but Rohan had given her a taut smile and told her in his dark mellifluous voice to go and take a look at the roses. They were in magnificent full bloom. Ms Rodgers looked as though she had been planning something entirely different. One would have had to be blind to miss Ms Rodgers’s keen interest in Rohan. And who could blame her?

The pulverising shock had not worn off. Nor would it for a long time. Now she felt an added trepidation, and—God help her—the old pounding excitement. He looked wonderful. Wonderful! The man who had loved her and whom she had loved in return.

Rohan.

She saw how much she still loved him. No one else had ever mattered. But now wasn’t the time to fall apart. She had to keep some measure of herself together. “I can walk back to the Lodge,” she said, although her voice was reduced to a trembling whisper. “You don’t have to take me.”

“Don’t I?”

The slash of his voice cut her heart to ribbons.

God—oh, God!

Recognition of the trouble she was in settled on her.

He took hold of her bare slender arm, pulling her in to his side. “He’s mine, isn’t he?” he ground out. His tone was implaable.

She wasn’t up to this. She was a lost soul. She was acutely aware of the pronounced pallor beneath his golden-olive skin. He was in shock too. She wanted to touch his face. Didn’t dare. She felt sorrow. Guilt. Pity. Remorse. Her heart was fluttering like a frantic bird in her breast. She had to try to evade the whole momentous issue. She needed time to think.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Rohan.” She allowed a fallen lock of hair to half-shield her face.

“Is that why you’re trembling from head to foot?” he answered curtly. “Christopher is mine. My child—not Martyn’s.”

She tried to disengage herself, but didn’t have a hope. He was far too strong. “Are you insane?” Her voice shook with alarm.

“God!” Rohan burst out, his breathing harsh. “Don’t play the fool with me, Charlotte. He has my eyes. My nose. My mouth. My chin.”

Your beautiful smile. The habit you had of flipping your hair back with an impatient hand.

“He’s going to get more and more like me,” Rohan gritted. “What are you going to do then?”

“Rohan, please,” she begged, hating herself.

He took no pity on her. It was all he could do not to shake her until her blonde head collapsed against his chest. Despite himself, he was breathing in the very special scent of her—the freshness, the fragrance. He could breathe her in for ever. He was that much of a fool.

“How could you do this, Charlotte? It’s unforgivable what you’ve done. No way is Christopher Martyn’s child.”

“Please, Rohan, stop!” She shut her eyes tight in pain and despair. She was still light-headed.

“You made the decision to banish me from your heart and your head,” he accused her. “You know you did. No love in a cottage for Charlotte Marsdon. God, no! Poor Martyn was always crazy about you. You were the ultimate prize, waiting for him. Did he know the child wasn’t his?”

Years of unhappiness, pain and guilt echoed from her throat. “How could he know?” she shouted. “I didn’t.”

“What?” He took a backward glance through the mansion, then led her away into the splendid book-lined library.

Her father had taken his pick of the valuable collection of books. Even in her highly perturbed state she could see their number had been replaced.

“You mean you were having sex with us both?” Rohan asked, looking and sounding appalled. “Oh, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know,” he groaned.

She had to turn away from the anger flashing in his blue eyes. “It wasn’t like that, Rohan. You were lost to me. Forever lost to me.’

His brief laugh couldn’t have been more bitter or disbelieving. “You’re lying again. You knew I would never let you go. I had to make something of myself, Charlotte. I had to have something to offer you. All I needed was a little time. I told you that. I believed you understood. But, no, you got yourself married to Martyn in double-quick time. Poor gutless Martyn, who went around telling everyone who would listen that I had goaded Mattie into trying to swim the river. Martyn was the golden boy in the Valley, not me. I was Mary Rose Costello’s bastard son. Yet I thought the world would freeze over before you ever gave yourself to Martyn.”

“Maybe he took me, Rohan. Ever think of that?” She threw up her head in a kind of wild defiance, though she was on the verge of breaking down completely.

“What are you saying?” There was fire in his eyes.

Rivers of tears were threateningly close. “I don’t know what I’m saying.” Her heart was labouring in her chest. “I never thought I would lay eyes on you again.”

“Rubbish!” he responded violently. “You knew you would see me again. With Martyn gone. I’ve given you enough time to recover.’

“There would never be enough time.” Her green eyes glittered. “What do you expect me to say? Welcome back, Rohan?”

A great anger was running in his veins. Whatever he had expected, it had never been this. He had learned early that she and Martyn had had a child—a boy. The agony of it, the pain of loss and betrayal, had nearly driven him mad. Day and night, month after month, year after year he had fought his demons. Charlotte and Martyn. Now he was confronted by the staggering truth. Christopher wasn’t Martyn’s at all. Christopher was his.

How terrible a crime was that? And what about the precautions she was supposed to have taken? “You’re a cheat and a liar, Charlotte,” he said, low-voiced and dangerous. “And I fully intend to prove it. You told me you loved me. You promised to wait for as long as it took. Why not? We had plenty of time. You were only eighteen. I hadn’t even turned twenty-one. I’m Christopher’s father. Don’t look away from me. Don’t attempt more lies. I will push this further.”

“A threat?”

“You bet!” he said harshly, even though to his horror the old hunger was as fierce as ever. Would nothing kill it? She was even more beautiful—her beauty more pronounced, more complete. Charlotte who had betrayed him. And herself.

“Please, Rohan, I don’t need this now.” There was anguish in her face and in her voice. “I can walk back to the Lodge.”

“Forget it. I’m driving you. Has your father the faintest clue? Or is he still hiding his head in the sand?” He compelled her out of the comfortable elegance of the library and back into the arched corridor, making for the rear of the house, where a vehicle was garaged and kept for his convenience.

“Dad loves Christopher very much.” There was a trembling catch in her voice.

“Not what I asked you,” he said grimly.

They were out in the sunshine now. The scent of the white rambling rose that framed the pedimented door and climbed the stone wall filled the air with its lovely nostalgic perfume. More roses rioted in the gardens, and lovely plump peonies—one of her great favourites.

“Chris did have a fleeting look of Mattie for a few years,” she offered bleakly. This was the age of DNA. There was no point in trying to delude Rohan. What he said was correct. Christopher would only grow more like him. Hadn’t she been buffeted by the winds of panic for some time? “Now that he’s lost his little-boy softness the resemblance has disappeared. He has our blond hair.”

“Isn’t that marvelous?” he exclaimed ironically. “He has the Marsdon blond hair! God knows what might have happened had his hair been crow-black, like mine. Or, even worse, red like my mother’s.”

“I loved you, Rohan.” The words flamed out of her.

In response he made a strangled sound of utter disgust. “You must have wept buckets after you decided to drop me. But there’s intense satisfaction in my being rich. Daddy turned out to be a real loser with his lack of financial acumen. I had nothing. Too young. Martyn stood to inherit a fortune. Must have ruined your day when you lost him. How come you’re living with your father? Didn’t Martyn leave you a rich woman?”

“Sad to say, no. It’s none of your business, Rohan.”

“I beg to differ. It’s very much my business. Martyn’s father was too smart to let go of the purse strings. And your mother? The self-appointed avenger?”

“My mother has settled—or tried to settle—into a different life. I don’t see much of her. She has little interest in my beautiful Chrissie.”

“Our beautiful Christopher,” he corrected curtly, usurping her as the single parent.

“He’s not Mattie, you see,” she continued sadly. “Really there was no one else for my mother.”

Rohan’s striking face was set like granite. “She loved you in her way. Of course she did.”

“Not enough,” she answered simply.

“I think I might find that a blessing,” Rohan mused. “Your mother keeping her distance from my son. Your mother is deeply neurotic. She would never accept me in any capacity. Not in a hundred lifetimes.”

She couldn’t deny it. Rohan had been chosen as the scapegoat. She had been the daughter of the family—a girl of twelve. Martyn Prescott the only son of close friends. It had to be Rohan Costello—Mary Rose’s boy. “My mother has been steeped in grief, Rohan. Dad has soldiered on.”

“Good old Vivian!” Rohan retorted with extreme sarcasm. “The fire’s not out in the old boy either. Did you hear the way he bellowed my name?”

Charlotte flinched, defending him quickly. “It was cruel not to let us know.”

“Cruel?” Rohan’s brilliant eyes shot sparks. “The hide of you to talk of cruelty! I can’t believe your treachery! I’ve missed out on the first seven years of my son’s life, Charlotte. First words. First steps. Birthdays. The first day at school. How can you possibly make it up to me for that?”

“I can’t. I can’t. I’m so sorry, Rohan. Sorry. Sorry, sorry. Do you want me to go down on my knees? I’ve raised Christopher as best I could. He’s a beautiful, loving, clever child. He’s everything in the world to me.”

“So that’s okay, then, is it? He’s everything in the world to you. What about me? I never held my newborn son in my arms. I was robbed of that great joy. Tell me, how did you manage to put it across Martyn? Or didn’t you? It’s common knowledge he had a young woman in the car with him. It’s a great mercy she wasn’t killed or injured as well. Tell me—did he fall out of love with you? Or did he get sick of what little affection you could show him? You didn’t love him. Don’t tell me you did.”

Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.