Tidings of Great Boys (15 page)

“When are you going to forgive him for something he did before you were ever married?”

“Lindsay Margaret Eithne MacPhail, that is ancient history and absolutely none of your business. I’m sure your guests are
looking for their hostess. You’re being terribly rude to them.”

“My guests are listening to the Queen’s speech, along with everyone else in the house. And since I nearly got blown up by
David Nelson, that ancient history is very much my business.”

“Please don’t remind me of that dreadful person.”

“But he’s the reason you won’t trust Dad again, isn’t he? You hate that he had a kid and didn’t tell you, even though he didn’t
know about David himself until five years ago. And you hate that his kid tried to hurt me.”

“I refuse to discuss this with you.”

“You don’t need to. You need to discuss it with Dad. Are you angry because I’m the only child you have and I can’t inherit
the place?”

“Of course not. We are discussing ways to keep from losing it, if you’ll recall. Poor Roger will appreciate it deeply, I’m
sure.”

My mother, the mistress of the evasion tactic. Well, I hadn’t palled round with Gillian Chang all these months without picking
up a little of her knack for honesty. In for a penny, in for a pound.

“Dad’s never going to talk about Strathcairn with you if he thinks it’s all about money. He’d rather go down with the ship
than do that. But if he thinks he’s going to lose a home you might come back to, well, that’s different.” I held her offended
and angry gaze with mine as I got up from the narrow guest bed. “Someone has to tell you the truth, Mummy. And the simple
fact is, we’re going to lose Strathcairn unless you admit to Dad that the divorce was a mistake.” I paused in the doorway.
“But first you have to admit it to yourself.”

I closed the door quietly behind me.

Which made the thump of one of her Balenciaga shoes hitting it all the more satisfying.

I FOUND ALASDAIR wandering in the gallery, looking up at the portraits. “Looking for a family resemblance?”

He stopped under a huge painting of a proper Victorian family. The mother’s blue silk skirts practically engulfed her two
children sitting at her feet, and all you could see of the paterfamilias behind it was his top half. His left hand rested
on the top of a broken pillar, and his right on his wife’s bare shoulder.

“The material in that dress could clothe an entire African village.”

“You’re probably right. That’s my great-great-grandfather on Mummy’s side. He’s the one responsible for the family fortune—including
some African villages, when it comes to that. He invested in diamond mines. I suppose the dress was his way of telling people
how much money they had.”

“Your mum doesn’t look like them at all.”

“It’s Victorian. Paintings back then conformed to some ideal of beauty, not what people actually looked like.”

“You know a lot about painting?”

I shrugged. “Just what I learned in art history, and from growing up surrounded by them.”

“Whereas I’m from the kind of family that would produce a traveling painter, too scared to do anything but paint the mistress
of the house as if she were a beauty. Otherwise he wouldn’t get paid.”

“Why didn’t you go home for Christmas, Alasdair?”

My soft question seemed to surprise him into truthfulness. “And have to pick my mum and her whiskey bottle up off the floor?
And scour the town bars looking for my aunts? No, thanks.”

Chagrined, I felt the blood surge into my face. “I’m sorry. That was rude of me.”

“Don’t worry about it. I haven’t been home since I left school. I tell people I’m on my own.”

“Well, you are, aren’t you?”

“I suppose I am. Doctors make a lot of money, though. I won’t be poor forever.”

“So do people in films. Maybe Gabe would do something for you.”

“Why should he? He’s done enough for me, and it’s only because of Lissa anyway.”

I flinched before I could control my own reaction. “I know.”

“No, I don’t think you do. Gabe only invited me because he thought Lissa and I had something going. He thought he was doing
something for her. Like I’m a gift he could present to her, all wrapped up in a borrowed jumper.” He was still wearing Dad’s
sweater. Not that I could blame him. The gallery wasn’t exactly tropical.

“Aren’t you? I’ve seen how you look at her.”

“And how is that?”

“Like you want to be her personal gift.”

“Then you’re wrong. We had a bit of a thing last year, but that’s all it was. Over as soon as she left.”

“And her dad was okay with that? She thinks she’s committed some kind of sin, having a ‘bit of a thing’ with an older man.
To hear her tell it, they’d have a cow if they found out about you.”

He huffed out a breath of air in a laugh. It wasn’t quite cold enough in the gallery for me to see it condense in front of
his mouth, but it was close.

“They know. Tell her to relax.”

“So it’s all over.”

“There was hardly enough there to
be
over, but yes.” He paused. “Are you glad?”

My breath clogged in my chest and I lost the ability to speak.

He rushed in to fill the vacuum. “I’m sorry. That was stupid. Forget I said anything. So, who’s in this picture down here?
Is this your dad?”

My thoughts tumbled like clothes in a dryer. I couldn’t reach in and pull one out, so my mouth operated on autopilot. “No,
my grandfather. The boy with him is his twin brother, who’s my cousin Roger’s granddad. Roger will inherit Strathcairn.”

If there’s a Strathcairn left to inherit
.

I pushed that thought back into the whirling dryer and slammed the door on it. “He and my uncle and aunt are coming up from
Edinburgh tonight for the family supper.”

“I feel awkward intruding on your family party.”

Finally the gears of my brain meshed and engaged my mouth properly. “I’ve discovered lately that my friends are like family.
I wanted the girls to come with me for Christmas because they’re the closest thing I have to sisters. And I want you to feel
that way, too.”

“Like your brother?” He cleared his throat. “Thank you. Not quite what I—thank you.”

“No, no, that wasn’t what I meant at all.”

“Thanks for the tour of your family, Lindsay. I’ll see you downstairs for dinner, shall I?” He looked down at himself. “Remind
me to change out of this before I turn up at the table.”

“Alasdair, listen—”

“Are those the stairs? I’ll see you later.”

And before I could get the words out, or put out a hand to stop him, he’d rushed down to the end of the gallery and taken
the stairs to the floor below, two at a time. He’d find himself in a warren of unused presentation rooms, with the furniture
covered in sheets, but he was a smart lad. He’d find his way out.

Now if only I could find my way out of the maze of my own stupidity.

What on earth was the matter with me? I could walk into a room full of diplomats and minor royalty and own it. I could take
on the likes of Vanessa Talbot on her own turf and crush her with a single sentence. So why couldn’t I simply open my mouth
and tell a boy that yes, I was glad he wasn’t in love with my friend, and no, I would never dream of thinking of him as a
brother?

I clutched my hair. “Auuuggghh!”

“Mac? Are you okay?”

I whirled to see Carly standing in the doorway at the far end of the gallery. A weight seemed to lift from my chest.

“You are exactly the person I need to see. I need some advice from an expert.”

“About what?”

“About men.”

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Date posted: 12/25/09
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