Her Master's Servant (Lord and Master Book 2) (24 page)

To which Luna grinned and said, ‘Happy birthday to
you.
’ And laughed, long and hard.

Much later, when they were in his bed staring at each other, Stefan’s hand twined in her braid, he said, ‘There’s something I need to talk to you about,
flicka
.’ Before she could tense up, he hurried on, ‘It’s nothing bad, I promise. I just wonder if you and I could… spend some time at Arborage. Maybe next weekend, or when you first move down here.’

Luna was silent, and he went on, ‘I need to know if you can be happy there. John is coming home next week, but… he won’t recover, Luna, and soon I’ll need to make a choice. If you won’t be happy at Arborage, I’ll tell Augusta I’m out, and she can move on to Crispin, in Peebles.’ Formerly the fifth in line to the estate, but now second after Stefan.

Luna nodded. ‘Okay. Let’s spend some time there.’ Resting her hand on his chest, she said, ‘There’s something I need to tell you, too. I met with a recruitment agent yesterday and she’s shortlisted me for a job working for an aerospace company in Toulouse.’

‘Toulouse… France.’

‘Yes,’ Luna said, adding hastily, ‘I’m not even sure if I’m interested. It’s a company that works with counterparts in Britain, so they want someone bilingual. And it’d be more than just PA work. The pay is good and it would be a step up for me.’

He nodded, but didn’t speak. ‘I have to work, Stefan,’ Luna said, moving her hand to his neck. ‘I’ve worked ever since I was sixteen. I can’t move down here and just… scrounge off of you.’

‘As if you would ever do that.’

‘Like I say, I don’t even know if I
want
this job, or if they’d want me. I’ve told the recruitment agent I could only commit to being in Toulouse four days a week, so that might kill it. She’s coming back to me next week—’

‘We’ll make it work,’ he said quickly. And when she blinked in surprise he said, ‘If you decide it’s what you want, we’ll find a way to make it work.’

*

‘Jag arbetar. Jag arbetade. Jag ska arbeta…’

Luna was working on her Swedish tenses, sitting cross-legged on her bed. Within sight now of the end of her assignment on Shetland, she had time for a bit of study.

Time too, for other distractions. From being the man who never phoned, over the days that followed his birthday weekend Stefan unexpectedly morphed into the boyfriend who phoned all the time; to ask her a question, or share a work anecdote, or just to chat. Perhaps entirely for her benefit, though Luna began to feel that he derived as much comfort from hearing her voice as she did his.

He’d had a busy week, starting with a flying visit from his mother, Karoline. ‘She tells me there is a new man in her life,’ he revealed, sounding a little war weary.

‘Well, that’s good, isn’t it?’ Luna enquired carefully, still unsure what tack to take when discussing his mother with him.

‘It’s good if it’s true. Good for her, good for me,
great
for my father.’ His parents’ acrimonious divorce more than a decade previously continued to be a source of bitter resentment for his mother, who took every opportunity to make life difficult for Sören and his partner, Christian. Stefan went on, ‘But there have been many false dawns when it comes to my mother’s love life. She is saying, by the way, that she wants to meet you.’

‘Right.’

‘Don’t worry,
flicka
,’ he laughed. ‘What my mother says and what she does are two different things. She’s off to the Côte d’Azur on holiday now, so I think we can avoid this for a while longer.’

And just yesterday, after weeks of intense preparation, the Marquess had finally returned home from hospital, transported up to the family’s private quarters by Stefan and a small army of security guards. Stefan phoned her from his bedroom late that night, speaking in hushed tones. ‘The first thing he did was ask me to go buy him cigarettes,’ he relayed, to appalled laughter from Luna.

Almost finished with today’s Swedish lesson, Luna stretched her arms up toward the open skylight and contemplated going downstairs for a cup of coffee and a toasted crumpet. Her phone vibrated atop the bed and she smiled, answering astringently, ‘
Tyvärr, jag arbetar nu
.’

‘Luna,’ Stefan said, his tone immediately wiping the smile off her face. ‘John died in his sleep last night.’

‘I’ve been preparing for this for months now,’ a clearly shaken Caitlin said as she hugged Luna at the staff entrance later that afternoon, Luna having caught the earliest available flight to Heathrow. ‘I suppose part of me thought the old man would beat it, somehow.’ Walking through the basement toward Arborage’s east wing, the press officer explained that she’d spent much of the day with Stefan and the family, and needed to get back to them as quickly as possible.

‘But I’ve got one assistant on holiday and the other off sick. The phone keeps ringing, and I have press packs to get out…’

Luna twisted her fingers together, considering her next words, then said tentatively, ‘Look, Caitlin, would you trust me to help you?’

Caitlin stopped, turning to face her. ‘Are you joking?’ her blond friend exclaimed, reaching out to grip Luna’s hand. ‘I’d
love
your help.’

Within no time Luna was installed in the press office with Caitlin’s work mobile, her laptop and a two-page to-do list in front of her. As her friend hovered near the door, holding up her personal phone and exhorting Luna to text if she needed anything, the work mobile rang and Luna answered, ‘Caitlin Murray’s phone.’ And waved Caitlin away.

Four hours later, Caitlin reappeared at the door just as Luna was finishing a call with the obituary desk at
The Guardian
. Holding up her to-do list, Luna began, ‘Don’t worry, this is all in hand,’ when she saw that Caitlin wasn’t alone. Standing behind her was Sören, dressed in a black suit with a black band on his left arm.

‘Luna,’ he said sombrely as she rose from her chair. ‘Caitlin told me you were helping her and I’m afraid I’ve come to ask for more help.’ Gesturing for her to sit back down, he perched on the edge of the desk beside her and said, ‘It has become clear to me since I arrived this morning that we are in danger of the funeral descending into disorganised chaos. I don’t have confidence that the Events staff are on top of it, so I am going to take charge.’

Luna nodded, inwardly cringing to imagine what he had seen to prompt as dramatic a step as this. Sören smiled, and she thought fleetingly of his son, who looked so like him, who
was
so like him. And then he said the words she both feared and hoped he would.

‘Will you help me, Luna? Will you be my PA?’

*

Luna checked into her hotel at just after midnight, promptly going up to her room and logging on to her reactivated Arborage account. After sending a brief email to Emma in Events, who she understood had gone home in tears earlier that night, she began typing up her rapidly expanding to-do list. She was almost finished when Stefan rang.

‘Where are you?’ he demanded.

‘At the Lion’s Head. Are you alright?’

Ignoring her question, he said impatiently, ‘Why are you there?’

‘I…’

‘You should be here, with me.’

‘Stefan,’ Luna said firmly. ‘I can’t do that. Arborage is Augusta’s home. I can’t invite myself into the family’s private quarters at a time like this.’

He made an inarticulate noise and she could feel him preparing to give her an argument, so she added bluntly, ‘I
will
not do it.’ Waiting for him to respond, she heard only silence. ‘Stefan?’ She looked at her phone and realised they’d been cut off.

Having eaten nothing since breakfast, she called down to room service and ordered a plate of pasta and a glass of wine, then changed into a pair of leggings and one of Stefan’s jumpers. She was flicking through news coverage of the Marquess’s death on her tablet when there was a knock on the door. Stomach growling, she opened it and was immediately swept up into Stefan’s arms.

‘Hi,’ she said, kissing his jaw. Still holding tight to her, he squatted briefly and threw his duffle bag into the room.

‘I don’t want to talk,’ he said into her neck.

So she phoned down to room service and made it two plates of pasta and a bottle of wine, then sat up against the pillows on the bed with Stefan resting against her. Neither of them talking, her stroking his hair and rubbing his shoulders.

Was it like riding a bike, returning to Arborage after five months in the wilderness? Well, yes and no, yes and no. She was relieved by the fervent thankfulness with which Emma greeted her when they met in the staff cafeteria the following morning. And heartened, when she ran into Marta, ruler of Arborage’s catering realm, and the older woman immediately pulled her into a warm embrace.

‘It’s good you’re here, especially now,’ Marta said, rubbing a tear away from her eye. ‘She needs you.’

Doubly heartened, when she went to see Roland later that morning to enlist the support of his crack Tours team in mobilising for the funeral. Her favourite manager had anticipated this need and assured her he would place his entire staff at her disposal. ‘Have you seen her?’ he asked. Luna shook her head and he made a noise in his throat, looking as distressed as she’d ever seen him. ‘She is horrible to behold, Luna.’

Luna and Sören commandeered the conference room down the hall from the Marchioness’s office, meeting with the funeral director first thing that afternoon. As Luna’s to-do list stretched to a fifth page, she began to colour code urgent items, getting Sören to do a round of calls to board members while she phoned the local audio-visual company that had driven Emma to tears the previous evening.

‘I told the girl on the phone yesterday,’ said a disinterested-sounding woman who reluctantly gave her name as Sandra. ‘We won’t do anything without a purchase order from yourselves.’

‘The funeral is on Monday,’ Luna replied. ‘Your company has worked with the estate for the past five years and I expect a little latitude from you.’

‘Well, I’m afraid I can’t help unless you—’

‘Put me through to your manager, then. Or better yet,’ Luna said, scanning the company’s About Us page on her laptop, ‘put me through to Mr Evans.’ The owner.

‘I can’t do that.’

‘You can and you will,’ Luna said coolly, ‘or I can promise you, Sandra, that the next time you hear from me it will be an email to Mr Evans telling him that you’ve lost him Arborage’s future business.’

As she was speaking, Sören, who was standing beside the window drinking coffee, started laughing quietly. When she rang off with Mr Evans five minutes later, having arranged for a screen and sound system to be installed in the field adjacent to the estate chapel so staff and other overflow guests could watch a live broadcast of the service, he observed, ‘I am sometimes a little frightened of you, Luna, I must confess.’

But even as plans for the funeral began to coalesce, and despite the fact that she was glad to be amongst her Arborage friends again, Luna found herself averting her gaze from the Marchioness’s office. She knew from Roland that Lady Wellstone had gone through a few temps after she’d left, before the Marquess’s illness subsumed all thoughts of work. And now there was no one in Luna’s former role, and her desk and the Marchioness’s office were deserted.

She felt Lady Wellstone’s presence, however. She who had sworn to herself that this woman, once the bedrock of her entire world, was nothing to her now. She felt her as surely as she smelled the mixture of roses and beeswax that pervaded Arborage House, or heard the creaks and knocks the house made each evening as it wound down for the night.

She didn’t need Stefan to tell her that her Ladyship was beside herself with grief; unable to sleep, eat, or take even a cursory part in planning for the funeral. Or that the Marchioness was alone in her desolation, her daughters having failed utterly to rise to the occasion. Though, when he could be persuaded to talk as she lay holding him each night in their hotel room, Stefan painted a vivid picture of Isabelle, prostrate on a sofa in the family sitting room, sobbing disconsolately. And of Helen, gone completely AWOL, retreating to her stables and her beloved horses.

‘Little Megan and Tilly have done more to comfort their grandmother than Isabelle and Helen have,’ he said bitterly.

Luna told herself this made her angry because of Stefan, and the burden it placed on him. She told herself that she was moving heaven and earth to prepare for the funeral for his sake, and for Sören’s. She told herself this, and she focused on the job at hand, only resorting to a brief emotional appeal during the talk she gave on Sunday night to the twenty-five Tours staff Roland had selected to serve as stewards at the funeral.

‘Remember who you are doing this for,’ she said to the assembled faces, young and old, gathered around her in the portrait gallery. ‘Our job is to make tomorrow easier for her Ladyship; to take a burden off her shoulders. I know you won’t let her down.’

Despite her best intentions to stay awake for Stefan, who was meeting with Reverend Thatcher at the estate chapel that evening, Luna nodded off just after midnight. She woke sometime later to find him lying on his back beside her, still fully clothed, and reached out her hand to his.

‘You’re cold!’ she said, coming fully awake.

‘That chapel is freezing,’ he replied, shivering slightly. Luna immediately climbed on top of him, covering his body with hers. Reaching for his hands, she kissed them and held them to her cheeks, clasping her palms over them.

‘Do you think,’ he whispered after a while, ‘that he was waiting to get home to die?’

Luna’s life experiences had rendered her averse to romanticising the mechanics of death. But she knew her truths were too harsh for him, so she said quietly, ‘I think it had to have been a great comfort to him, to have been in his own bed, with Augusta beside him. No one can ask for a better death than that.’

She felt him nod against her, and again pressed his palm to her lips.

*

More than fifteen hundred people attended the Marquess’s funeral the following morning, the funeral cortège and mourners flowing like a black river from the house down the one-mile drive to the gatehouse, and briefly along the B road adjoining the estate, which police had closed to traffic.

The Marquess’s mourners included one former prime minister, twelve sitting members of the House of Lords, six FTSE 500 chief executives, luminaries from Hollywood to Bollywood, and a veritable United Nations of guests representing no less than twenty-five countries. Local folks also turned out in force, with what appeared to be the entire population of Deersley lining the road as it reached the turn off for the chapel.

There was spectacle aplenty in the funeral cortège, with twenty of the Marquess’s former comrades from his old regiment, the Household Cavalry, lining the approach to the chapel on horseback. A contingent from Lord Wellstone’s adopted home in Venice was also in attendance, including a large group of gondoliers dressed in traditional garb and several well-kept women of a certain age, former mistresses of his Lordship’s, Luna was sure.

Luna chose to join the five hundred staff in the procession, falling into step with Ashley Eccles from the stables, of all people. During the half-hour walk from the house to the chapel, she took the opportunity to quietly ask him about the imminent closure of the equestrian centre, where Stefan had initiated the redundancy process the previous week.

‘It’s not a surprise, really,’ the young man said. ‘But it’s hard. I’ve only just got on the payroll and now…’ He looked so crestfallen that she gave him her mobile number and told him to phone her later; what was the point of her connections in the house if she couldn’t give the poor lad a leg up for any redeployment opportunities?

She caught only brief sight of the Marchioness, flanked by her two daughters at the head of the cortège, and was relieved to see that Lady Wellstone had pulled herself back from the brink of collapse, carrying herself with the same grave self-possession Luna remembered from her first encounter with her, shortly after the death of her son James. Walking behind them were various members of the extended Wellstone family, including Sören and Stefan, holding hands with Megan and Tilly. Luna registered with slight regret that Stefan had been to the barber that morning and was now back to his clean-cut, mature incarnation.

Shunted to the back of the family party, the Marquess’s only brother, Florian Wellstone, walked alone. Luna forced herself to look at him, rather than surrender to her almost overwhelming desire to turn away. He had never been as debonair as his elder brother, but to her eyes he appeared unusually unkempt, like a mangy fox. His scalp was an angry shade of red under its thinning patch of russet hair, as though he’d been spending too much time out in the sun, and his face was shining with sweat above his morning suit.

John Wellstone, 16
^th
Marquess of Lionsbridge, was interred in the family’s section of the church’s graveyard at just before noon – Sören, Stefan, son-in-law Mark and three Arborage trustees who were also long-time friends of the Marquess served as pallbearers. There was speculation, Luna knew, about Florian’s exclusion from this number, and rumblings about his recent absence from the house, though as far as she could tell no firm knowledge about the events surrounding his abdication.

At the conclusion of the service, mourners began to disperse and the immediate family returned to the chapel to view the book of condolence. Luna remained stationed outside the church until three estate Range Rovers arrived to take the family back to the house. Then and only then did she make her way inside in search of Sören.

She had hoped to avoid this, she who hadn’t entered a house of God since her father’s funeral. Her hands were sweating and her breathing shallow as she struggled with the heavy wooden door at the entrance. Once inside, eyes straining to adjust to the darkened interior of the vestibule, Luna briefly clasped her hands to her upper arms. The chapel remained chilly, clammy almost, despite the fact that just a few short moments ago it had been full to capacity. It also reeked of Lilium longiflorum, a smell Luna associated exclusively with her parents’ funerals and which made her feel faint. She wanted to get out of that church, badly.

Hovering just outside the arched stone doorway at the rear of the nave, she saw Sören standing next to Augusta over the book of condolence, arm around her shoulders, and Stefan talking to Reverend Thatcher near the pulpit. Isabelle and Helen were standing near the baptismal font… no, Luna decided, she couldn’t approach them.