CHAPTER ONE
‘And the doctors are sure?’ William asked gravely. The cool interior of Giles’s villa was a haven against the fierce heat of the Monaco summer sun.
The old man nodded silently.
‘And you’re sure about this, Giles?’ William asked, his blue eyes flashing quickly to the old man’s face.
Giles waved a hand. ‘Yes, yes. Who else could I leave it to? You are by far the best person–and my personal choice,’ the old man stated once again.
William smiled softly. ‘Yes, but we both know I’m not your first choice,’ he reminded his friend.
Giles sighed. His eyes swung towards the portrait on the wall of his study, sweeping over the young and beautiful face of his daughter, Joyce. She had been sixteen when the portrait had been painted and about to embark on a new life. Giles had commissioned an American artist to paint it, in joint celebration of his daughter’s birthday and her betrothal. But before the wedding could take place she had vanished, and it wasn’t until much later that Giles discovered she had run away with the same American artist who was responsible for the painting. Her fiancé had been heartbroken. Naturally, Giles had looked for her, but despite his immense power and wealth he had failed to find her in time.
Sadly, Giles wondered how many times over the long, lonely years he had gazed at her portrait, wishing she was still here–still with him. So many regrets, and now he was old and weary. There was nothing he could do now. Joyce was gone. It was almost twenty-five years since she had run away, leaving him and his dreams shattered. Now, he had to look to the future, what little was left of it. His company–his empire, that should have gone to Joyce’s husband and their children still needed to be settled and William was the perfect candidate for the role. Eldest son of his dearest friend and a brilliant business man in his own right, William had finally agreed to allow Giles to name him as his sole heir. Giles’s empire would live on.
William stood behind the old man’s wheelchair gazing up at the portrait of Joyce. It was a face he was very familiar with. He had grown-up looking at that face, and over the years his friendship and love for Giles had grown too, and not for the first time, did William wonder how this man’s daughter could have been so heartless as to have abandoned such a loving father. His only real memories of the girl herself were hazy at best. He had only been a child when she ran away from home.
His eyes fixed on her delicate beauty, her long slim neck, the smooth contours of her cheeks, the soft smile that almost lifted her full lips into a real honest smile. Her eyes, unlike her father’s blue eyes were a warm hazel brown, flecked with shades of burnished gold, looked out at him with the light of health and youth.
William wondered what it would have been like to see her really smile–to see those eyes shine with warmth and life. She had been truly lovely. His attention was drawn to the pendant around her neck, a simple creamy-white heart hanging from a fine gold chain, resting against the soft swell of her delicate breasts, with the initials G~M clearly visible. The artist had managed to capture and display her in a modest, yet innocently provocative manner.
Giles broke into his thoughts. ‘The final details are being taken care of and the lawyers will have the papers ready to sign when you get back.’
William looked at his watch. ‘Then I should leave now, especially if I’m to arrive in LA in time for the awards’ presentation.’
Giles turned his wheelchair. With a quiet dignity he shrugged off the help the much younger man offered. While he still had strength he would manage as best he could. He escorted William outside. ‘And you’ll be back in three weeks?’
‘Yes, Alex’s graduation ceremony is on Monday, and then I have to work on some of my own affairs before I can return to you, but I don’t see it taking me any longer than three weeks,’ he reassured his friend.
William’s assistant met them on the helicopter pad and stored his briefcase on board. Quickly saying goodbye to Giles, William rushed to the helicopter and climbed in, thankful to be out of the scorching glare of the sun. As the chopper took off, he watched the old man in his wheelchair growing smaller and smaller. A surge of deep sadness for the dear old man’s plight filled him, and once again William promised himself he would do his utmost to see that the Rupert Giles Empire thrived and lived on for a very, very long time.
*~*~*~*~*
Summertime in LA was usually hot, and although today’s overcast and humid weather couldn’t compare to the unforgiving furnace that he had just left behind in Monaco, William was still surprised to find it was uncomfortably warm–especially as he was wearing a dark blue, business suit.
The graduation ceremony was over, but young people still dressed in the traditional black cap and gown of graduating students, milled about the grounds of the University, laughing and talking with their friends and families. Alex was in high spirits. He’d just graduated after three years of studying law. William looked at his youngest brother, acknowledging that he should look happy; he had after all just passed his class with first class honours and was looking forward to spending the next year travelling round the globe before returning to LA to begin his postgraduate degree.
William glanced at his watch, wondering if he should try and attract Alex’s attention so that he could suggest leaving him to celebrate with his friends. He felt somewhat out of place amongst all these people, neither old enough to be taken as a parent, yet too old to be mistaken for a student. Still, he was proud to be there, witnessing Alex’s success; the young man had worked hard. William only wished their parents had lived to see their youngest child obtain this achievement. And it was a shame that none of his other brothers had been able to attend the ceremony, but Liam and Luke were working on the new mergers in New York, and Wesley, whose wife Cordy, was expecting their first baby, was sticking close to her side in Monaco, refusing to leave the city until after the birth. So that only left William to attend Alex’s graduation.
As if thinking about his youngest brother conjured him, Alex appeared at his side.
‘You look bored,’ Alex complained good-naturedly.
William looked at the happy face before him and wondered if he’d looked half as happy on the day he graduated. The memory was lost in the ethers of time, but William doubted he had felt anything similar to the youthful joy and exuberance that was rolling off Alex. As the eldest of his brothers it had fallen to William at a young age, to not only run the family business, but to oversee the care and education of his siblings. Liam, the second eldest had helped, but somehow he hadn’t felt the weight of responsibility that seemed to dominate William’s life since the day their parents died.
‘I’m not bored–I merely feel out of place,’ he reassured his brother.
Alex laughed. It was an innocent laugh, full of warmth and humour, lighting up his handsome face and making his warm brown eyes crinkle with mirth. ‘Yeah, you do look a bit like the proverbial sore thumb,’ Alex said, eyeing his brother’s expensive, yet stuffy business suit. ‘You should have worn something lighter, something less austere. The least you can do is take off your jacket, loosen your tie and roll your sleeves back. How you can stand the heat trussed up in that thing is beyond me.’
William looked around him. The garden where everyone was mingling was filled with people. The women in cool, loose fitting, summer dresses and the men in lightweight suits, though ties had been abandoned once the photographs were taken. William realised he was perhaps the only male still wearing his jacket. The whole atmosphere was more like an informal garden party than a graduation.
‘You look like a politician in that suit–or worse–like you’re attending a funeral,’ Alex mocked, smiling.
William arched a dark eyebrow at his brother and glared at him. ‘Oi, watch it. But if that’s the case you won’t mind if I slip away. You can join your friends for a while–’
Alex cut him off, ‘Yeah, nice try, but you’re not getting off that easily. I haven’t seen you for months and my friends are all with their families so you’re stuck with me, at least until after dinner and then I’m meeting up with some friends.’ Alex looked at the milling crowd. ‘But we can still get out of here, and head back to the apartment for a while.’
William was in agreement and they started to make their way off the University grounds. He called his driver to pick them up and they decided to escape into a nearby coffee shop across from the University to wait. They weren’t the only members of the celebration to have the same idea. Clearly quite a few guests attending the graduation had decided to escape the heat and refresh themselves with cool drinks and ice creams. The small coffee shop was full of people dressed in their summer finest, sitting at the small tables that filled the ground floor and overflowed onto the street under the shop’s green and white striped awning. Spotting a small table in a shaded corner, they ordered ice teas and sat back to relax. William finally slipped off his jacket.
The general noise of the coffee shop was lively and cheerful. Alex recognised several faces among the crowded tables and exchanged more than one greeting with friends while William studied the framed drawings on the walls. They were all scenes of other coffee shops from around the world. He recognised one as a coffee shop near the Spanish Steps in Rome, and another of a famous coffee shop in New York. The artist was good and William found himself craning his neck to look at more of the pictures further along the wall–and that’s when he saw her.
He did a double take, blinked and looked hard, his eyes narrowing. She was sitting at a small table beside the window, squashed in beside a mixed group of men and women. William couldn’t believe what he was looking at. The cheery babble filling the coffee shop faded away to background noise as he just stared and stared. Icy chills gripped him. It was like seeing a portrait come to life.
He would know that face anywhere. Joyce Giles–but it couldn’t be! For the woman he was looking at was clearly only a young girl in her late teens or early twenties–but her face! It was almost identical to that of his old friend’s daughter.
Having had a moment to recover from his shock, William composed himself and glanced at his brother to make sure he hadn’t noticed his total absorption in the young woman. Alex was leaning back in his chair chatting to a friend behind him, oblivious to William.
William went back to studying the girl, who was unaware of his scrutiny. On looking at her a second time, William could see quite a few differences. Her hair for one, Joyce’s he knew had been a sandy brown, this girl’s was a dark honey blonde and her complexion was distinctly tanned in comparison to Joyce’s fairer skin tones. From this distance he couldn’t tell what colour her eyes were, but he’d bet good money they weren’t going to be blue or grey.
She laughed suddenly at something someone in her party said, and again William was shocked by the similarity to a face he was so familiar with, but this time it wasn’t Joyce’s face, but Giles’s. This girl laughed just like Giles. Her long, shiny hair fell forwards and she caught the unruly locks in a delicate hand and pushed them back. She was beautiful! No, stunning!
Suspicion was worming its way along the coils of his mind and a small voice was whispering to him. Could it be possible? But no, Joyce was dead and Giles would have known if his beloved daughter had had a child. Yet this woman was almost an exact clone of Joyce Giles–how could that be? William shook his head. It had to be a coincidence. This woman couldn’t possibly be related to Giles–could she?
He tried to remember the particulars surrounding Joyce’s death. He couldn’t remember much, he had only been eight-years old when Joyce had run away and only nine or ten when she died. Giles rarely talked about the accident that had killed his daughter and William had never seen a reason to pry into the old man’s grief.
William wondered if he was just seeing a similarity in the young woman, because Giles was so predominant in his thoughts at the moment. It was possible. Giles had been pressing him for months to give him a decision about his Company, and now that William had finally agreed to run it for him, William realised it was possible the whole worry was more on his mind than he realised, especially if he was seeing the face of a woman long dead, in the face of a young stranger.
‘Would you like me to ask her for her number?’ Alex chuckled.
William snapped his blue eyes to his brother. ‘What?’
Alex half turned in his chair to see who William was staring at. He saw a group of people by the window, three of them were women, a redhead, a brunette and one with dark honey blonde hair. Knowing his brother’s varying tastes in women it was anyone’s guess as to which of the three women had caught his eye. ‘So which one were you staring at?’ he asked. ‘Though if you ask me they’re all too young for you, but the brunette on the left looks as though she might be the oldest and if…’ his voice trailed off, his body tensing slightly as his eyes narrowed and he stared in the direction of the group.
William knew his brother had seen something too. ‘What? What is it?’ he asked, hoping Alex would voice his opinion quickly.
Alex glanced at him from the corner of his eye. ‘Well, I’m not sure, but somehow the long-haired blonde looks familiar, but I can’t place her…’ he trailed off again.
William felt his heart rate pick up as he looked back at the girl. She was laughing again, her whole face alight with amusement, her long hair swinging free once more as she moved. Tensing, William felt a fist grip his racing heart. He watched in mounting shock, as a delicate heart-shaped pendant slid free from around the girl’s neck, swaying gently on a gold chain.
William swore softly. Alex looked at him and seeing the deep frown on his face, asked, ‘Will, do you know her?’
Not taking his eyes off the girl he answered, ‘No–yes–I don’t know.’
‘You’re not making any sense,’ Alex told him.
William shot him a quick look and tried to explain his suspicions. ‘Well the reason she might look so familiar to you is because she bears a striking resemblance to Joyce Giles…’
Alex looked back at the girl. ‘My God! You’re right–she does.’
‘Yes, but it might not be just a resemblance she bears, it might even be possible that she’s Joyce’s daughter,’ William said softly.
Alex looked at him very directly. ‘You can’t possibly know that. I mean she does look a lot like Joyce. In fact, she looks a hell of a lot like her, but that’s not enough to suggest she’s Joyce’s daughter. Giles would know if she’d had a child. You don’t even know how old this girl is, she could be–’
William cut him off abruptly, ‘Look at the pendant around her neck and tell me, does that look familiar to you too?’
Alex froze and fixed his gaze on the pendant. Then without warning, he abruptly stood.
Alarmed, William stared at him. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m going to get a better look at that pendant,’ Alex said bluntly.
‘No wait,’ William ordered.
Alex ignored him. ‘Don’t you want to know for sure?’
‘Yes, of course I do, but I’ll contact my security team and have her followed,’ William replied harshly.
‘And who’s to say she won’t have left before they can get here? If I can get a closer look at that pendant you’ll know for sure if you need to have her followed. It could just be an ordinary pendant.’ He stepped away.
‘Bloody hell, Alex, no, I forbid it,’ William hissed.
Alex wasn’t listening. ‘Don’t worry, I won’t give us away…relax, I know what to say.’
William cursed again as Alex quickly headed towards the girl. He pulled his phone from his pocket and calmly ordered a security team to his location. He watched in dread as his brother reached the table and engaged the girl in conversation. Her smiling face became guarded as Alex drew her attention to the pendant. She shrugged her slim shoulders and William studied her serious expression. It was so like Giles’s that it shocked him again. Within sixty seconds Alex was back in his seat. William glanced at the girl; she was looking straight at him. Something indefinable passed through him and he felt his breath still in his chest as their eyes locked, and then her companions drew her back into conversation, breaking the spell.
William stared at Alex.
‘I think you’d better call security,’ he said softly.
‘I already have,’ William replied tersely. ‘What did you say to her?’ he demanded.
Alex looked at him steadily. ‘I gave her a line about wanting to buy my girlfriend a present. I told her, I admired her pendant and wondered if she could tell me where she’d bought it.’
William sighed, grateful for Alex’s quick thinking. ‘And?’ he growled.
‘She told me she didn’t know where it was originally bought, as it had belonged to her mother. And yes, before you ask, I did get a good look at it–and yes, it’s Joyce’s pendant without a doubt… The carving is quite clear.’
William was staring at his brother’s face, disbelief and shock evident in his expression.
‘And William, you won’t believe it, but her name’s Elizabeth. I heard her friend call her that,’ Alex whispered in shocked awe.
This last piece of information stunned William, and once again he couldn’t help looking over at the young woman. Somehow, unknown to Giles, Joyce had given birth to a daughter and not only left her a pendant that linked her back to her grandfather, but she’d also named her after her grandmother, Giles’s wife, adding more strength to the link that tied her to one of the richest men in the world.
His phone buzzed. The security team were positioned and awaiting orders. In a hushed voice, he discreetly snapped a few short commands and told them to stand by. When she left the coffee shop he would have her followed, and with luck, he would know everything about her in the next forty-eight hours.
*~*~*~*~*
Elizabeth sat in the waiting room of the plush offices of Redding, Carter and Brown. As lawyers’ offices go, it was top notch and Elizabeth wondered for the thousandth time why they had summoned her there. The letter sitting in her bag wasn’t very forthcoming about the reasons as to why her presence was required, but her curiosity was piqued and since she only had a dental appointment scheduled for this particular morning, she felt she could safely cancel it in favour of finding out what this was all about.
She glanced up and half smiled at the receptionist behind her desk. The chilly blonde smiled back, cool and polite, but from her tight expression, she seemed to find something lacking in Elizabeth’s appearance or at least that was the impression Elizabeth got from the way the other woman’s eyes flickered dismissively over her pale green, summer dress and low heeled sandals. Elizabeth scanned the chilly blonde as her attention turned back to her computer. Like all the staff going about their work, she was dressed for business. Elizabeth refused to feel inferior in comparison to the other woman’s expensively tailored suit, killer heels and groomed appearance.
So what if she looked dressed for an afternoon in the park? It was after all where she was going once she’d found out what this was all about.
Her thoughts turned to her friends. They were meeting for a picnic lunch to discuss the last minute details of Willow’s farewell party. Elizabeth sighed, it was painful thinking about Willow heading off to Australia, but after the terrible year she’d had, Elizabeth didn’t blame her for wanting to make a clean start somewhere new. But it still hurt knowing how much she was going to miss her best friend. She comforted herself with the thought that she still had Riley.
Thinking about the reason behind Willow’s desire to leave brought to mind the disastrously failed relationship and the subsequent heartache her friend had suffered. For Elizabeth it was yet another reminder of the perils of getting too heavily involved with unsuitable men–and Elizabeth should know. She’d had her own share of disappointment in that field. Shaking off the unhappy thoughts, she allowed her gaze to sweep over the waiting area again. Impatience was beginning to build. Mildly irritated, she glanced at her watch.
*~*~*~*~*
William had never, until now, suffered from nerves. He had run his father’s company since he was twenty-one and for the past twelve years he had held the reins of power with a firm grip, confident and calm in all situations. Yet today he felt nervous. Elizabeth Buffay was sitting outside the office he had borrowed from his business associate Jake Carter.
No, he reminded himself…not Elizabeth Buffay–Elizabeth Giles! The information staring up at him from the surface of the desk still shocked him, but he was ninety-nine percent certain the young woman he’d first seen just over a week ago was none other than the daughter of Joyce Giles. How the young woman would take the news, was what was making William nervous. According to the information his security team had gathered, this girl was going to be something of a shock to her grandfather…unless, he hid the worst of it.
He glanced once more at the information. It was full of facts and details, listing her age, where she’d been born, her adoption details, where she had gone to school, and even the death of her adoptive mother at the age of eleven. After that trauma, her adoptive father, had placed her in a well known boarding school, where she had seen out the rest of her education until she was eighteen, then she had enrolled at University and completed a three year degree.
His highly efficient team of fact finders had also managed to find out some of the more obscure details about Elizabeth Buffay. She was a keen artist–a detail that wasn’t lost on William–Joyce had also been a budding artist and from the lost details of her life, he’d discovered she had even attended art-college for a short while before marrying her artist lover.
The details of her life after that were a little sketchy, but William was loath to ask Giles to help clarify the lost portions of Joyce’s short time in the States, they weren’t important anyway. Joyce was dead, but her daughter was here…sitting in the waiting room.
William knew the cold facts written on crisp sheets of expensive paper, couldn’t tell him everything about the girl whose life he was about to change for ever, but they still told him enough, and some of those facts gave him cause for concern. He knew he would have to handle this situation carefully.
Should he just hit her with the facts and take command before she had a chance to think things through, or should he break it to her gently and hope she saw things from his point of view…or more importantly from Giles’s point of view.
William wasn’t sure he trusted this young woman to look at things through her grandfather’s eyes. The young woman whose life was depicted on paper was by all accounts, a proven gold-digger and would-be home wrecker. When he’d first read about her affair with the rich business associate of her father’s, he’d frankly been shocked. Yet the truth couldn’t be hidden and according to his sources, Elizabeth Buffay had met and openly pursued Billy Ford while in her first year at University. Ford was a man ten years her senior, wealthy and with a reputation as a man whose only interest in women was for one purpose–to make them his mistress. He’d had four short term live-in mistresses by the time he met Elizabeth and a string of casual affairs. For eight months Elizabeth had been involved with Ford, and the affair had only come to an end when Billy’s wife announced she was expecting a baby. By all accounts, Ford had paid Elizabeth off with a large sum of money to persuade her to leave his life quietly.
Elizabeth hadn’t wasted any time, and within days of her break-up with Ford, she had moved on to her next rich lover, Riley Finn. He was the second son of the prominent and highly ambitious politician, Richard Finn III. Before the dust had even settled on her affair with Ford, she’d moved into Riley’s LA penthouse, and she was still there three years on.
However, Finn had never married her, and William suspected his reasons for not doing so, had as much to do with her affair with Billy Ford, as with the reality that she wasn’t exactly exclusive to him either. It would seem Elizabeth wasn’t above seeing other men, and the report in front of William listed at least four other men she had dated while living with Finn. William thought Finn must be mad to allow his mistress such liberties, though he believed the arrangement suited Finn. William grimaced, open relationships left him cold.
William wasn’t sure Elizabeth was the kind of woman Giles would want to claim as his granddaughter, but that really wasn’t for him to say. This was a dilemma that William wasn’t sure he was willing to deal with, even for his dear friend. Things could get very messy. Yet it was thoughts of his dear friend that had prompted his actions in bringing about this meeting. The facts of Elizabeth’s life, however distasteful to him, shouldn’t deter him from bringing her existence to light. When it came down to it, it was the right thing to do–for Giles–and for his granddaughter.
William made a decision. Elizabeth Buffay was clearly a woman of the world; at twenty-three she’d already had an affair with a married man and was openly living with another man, while dating yet more men. He might not be her moral judge, but he would protect Giles from these truths, and to do that meant that from this day on, Elizabeth was going to have to put up with him taking charge of her life. He didn’t doubt she was going to object to this turn of events, but if he acted quickly she’d be tucked away in her grandfather’s Monaco villa before she had a chance to draw breath. Once there, he’d work on prying her away from Finn and establishing her permanently in Monaco, but first he needed to break the news to her and persuade her to take a DNA test. With Giles’s billions at risk there should be absolutely no doubt as to her parentage, anything else would be foolish in the extreme.
William smiled coldly to himself, it wasn’t everyday that he had the chance to make a woman a billionaire and given Elizabeth Buffay’s track record, he was sure the inducement of money would be enough to have her rushing home to pack and kiss Riley Finn a swift goodbye–if she even bothered with that.
Rising out of his chair, William brushed down his already immaculate suit, irritated to find that he was still nervous at the thoughts of coming face to face with her. This is ridiculous–she’s just a woman, and no matter how beautiful she is, she’s still just a cheating, little gold-digger and unfortunately for her, I know exactly how to handle conniving, greedy little users.
William walked to the door and pulled it open with determination. Quickly, he strode into the waiting area. She was there, sitting small and dainty on a big leather couch looking like a fresh spring flower, in a pale green dress and white sandals that showed off the shapely turn of her slim legs. His breath caught in his throat as she quickly lifted her head to look at him.
William told himself it was only because she looked even more like her mother with her hair caught up in a simple twist, lifting it off her lovely shoulders that momentarily robbed him of speech.
Elizabeth looked up at the strikingly handsome man filling the doorway of the next office. She didn’t usually feel overwhelmed by handsome men, but this man was probably the most handsome man she had ever seen and instantly she realised she’d seen him before, though only briefly. She’d been in the coffee shop a week ago, across from the University, when his companion had crossed the crowded room to ask her about her pendant. Elizabeth gazed back at him, noting his striking features, his sharp high cheekbones, his intelligent blue eyes, his full generous mouth and the stock of blond hair that was lighter than hers. It was a face made for magazines. He was tall and from the way his shoulders filled the doorway he was obviously very well built.
‘Miss Buffay?’
Elizabeth nodded as his smooth English accent rolled over her.
‘Would you follow me please?’ William asked indicating for her to join him in his office.
Elizabeth noticed the name J. Carter, painted in gold letters on the door and assumed he must be one of the senior partners of the firm. She turned as she heard the door close behind her.
‘My name is William Montague-Smyth,’ he introduced himself and offered her his hand.
Elizabeth shook his hand, an expression of confusion on her face. She wasn’t sure she’d caught his surname properly, but she was certain it wasn’t the same as the one on the door. ‘Oh, you’re not Mr Carter then?’ Her eyes darted to the name on the frosted glass door.
‘No–Mr Carter is an associate of mine and agreed to allow me the use of his office for the purpose of this meeting,’ he informed her.
‘Oh.’ She glanced at their clasped hands. The image of his larger hand enveloping her smaller hand jolted her.
He released her abruptly. ‘Please take a seat, Miss Buffay,’ he said seating himself behind the desk.
Taking a moment to compose herself, Elizabeth took a seat opposite him and carefully arranged the skirt of her dress, waiting patiently.
The silence stretched out as he stared at her, then he leaned forward, his blue eyes fixed intently on her face. William was momentarily mesmerised by her bewitching, green eyes.
Elizabeth had the strangest feeling she was being measured in some way. She felt the tell-tale flush of heat in her cheeks as his eyes lingered on her face with a burning focus, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away from his, there was something so magnetic about him that she failed to control her own desire to look away. A tingling began to stir in the pit of her stomach and her muscles clenched involuntarily. Whoa! She swallowed nervously and finally managed to avert her gaze.
Surprised by her reaction, William wondered if she could control the very appealing blush that was colouring her cheeks.
Irritated at his wandering thoughts, he forced himself to concentrate. ‘I’m sure you must be wondering why you’re here, Miss Buffay and I apologise for any inconvenience or confusion this might have caused you, but I’m not really sure how to impart the information I have and not cause you a certain level of distress,’ he said seriously.
Elizabeth frowned. ‘Then maybe you should just say it plainly, Mr. Monty…erm…Monysims–’
William nearly laughed as she stumbled over the pronunciation of his name, and if she was anyone else he would have, but she wasn’t anyone else–she was Elizabeth Giles, Joyce’s daughter and Giles’s granddaughter. Giles’s blood flowed in her veins and it was criminal that the granddaughter of such an intrinsically proud English man couldn’t even pronounce a simple English surname. A sudden flash of irrational anger surged inside him, but he quickly hid his annoyance.
He waved away her awkward attempts with a quick gesture. ‘Please call me William–and yes, perhaps you’re right and it would be best to speak plainly.’
Twisting her hands on her lap, Elizabeth nodded anxiously.
Folding his hands on the desk, William asked, ‘Could you please tell me what you know about your mother?’
‘She died when I was eleven,’ she answered without hesitation, then tensed when she noticed his eyes drop to the pendant around her neck. Suddenly, Elizabeth knew he wasn’t talking about Jenni Buffay. Simultaneously, she remembered the day in the coffee shop when his companion had asked her where she had bought the heart-shaped pendant. A ghostly chill slithered along Elizabeth’s spine. Squaring her shoulders, she met his gaze. ‘That is, my adoptive mother died when I was eleven, but something tells me you’re not talking about her–are you?’
William had noticed her slight flinch, but he was relieved to hear that he didn’t have to tell her she was adopted. This was going to be hard enough without adding that particular bombshell to his news. He shook his head unsettled by the look of anxiety on her face.
‘No…I’m sorry. I’m talking about you’re birth mother,’ he said gently.
Elizabeth’s eyes widened. ‘Then I can tell you, I know next to nothing about either of my real parents,’ she admitted. ‘I’ve always known I was adopted, though it didn’t make any difference to me, my parents never made me feel unloved or unwanted. Though they weren’t able to tell me much, except that my name–Elizabeth–is the one my birth mother gave me. When I reached eighteen my father encouraged me to find out anything I could.’ She shrugged her slim shoulders, her expression guarded. ‘The adoption agency gave me what details they had, but there wasn’t much. Their names were Joyce and Hank Summers and they were both killed in a car accident when I was a baby. My father was an artist and my mother was a student.’ She scowled at him suddenly. ‘And I clearly remember telling your companion in the coffee shop that this pendant belonged to her. This…’ she said, holding up the pendant, ‘…and a small collection of sketches, are the only things I have that belong to either of them.’
William was oddly gratified that she remembered him. ‘You’re right…that’s not very much, and while I can’t tell you anything about your father, I can tell you a great deal about your mother and even more about your grandfather.’
Elizabeth just knew she should have kept that dental appointment–it would have been far less painful compared to this. She hung her head for a moment before looking back at him.
‘Mr. Mony–’
‘Montague-Smyth. But call me William, please,’ he said quickly.
Whoa…double-barrelled fancy English name, she thought licking suddenly dry lips. ‘I’m sorry, but I think you’ve wasted your time, there’s really nothing for you to tell me about my mother.’ She saw him frown. ‘I’m sure that seems strange to you, but my parents are dead. What would be the point in telling me anything about their lives? My parents are Jenni and Donald Buffay, they’re the people who raised and loved me. Frankly, you’re a perfect stranger to me, why would you think I’d want a stranger telling me meaningless details about people who are long dead, people I’ll never have the chance to meet?’ She shook her head and inched to the edged of her seat, preparing to rise. Breathing deeply, she held onto her sense of calm, while inside she was feeling completely churned up by this unexpected upset.
Seeing the cool and indifferent expression on her face, William halted her. ‘All true, Miss Buffay, but what about your mother’s family–your grandfather?’
She froze and looked at him sharply. ‘The adoption agency told me that I don’t have any family.’
‘The agency was wrong, Miss Buffay. You do have a family–you have a grandfather, and I’m sure once a few details have been cleared up, he’ll most certainly want to meet you.’
Elizabeth didn’t hear anything else as she felt the room suddenly spin. Quickly grabbing the sides of her seat, she steadied herself. I have a grandfather? The words echoed in her head.
*~*~*~*~*
TBC…
This is one I wrote a year ago. It wasn't really intended as a Buffy story, but life's funny that way, and now I've turned it into a Spuffy. I hope you all enjoy it as it's pretty different to my other stories. Though saying that, I think a lot of you will see a similarity between the 'William' of this story and the 'Spike' in 'Winters Storm'...only not quite 'that' dark, and not 'that' in-depth, as it's supposed to mirror a faster paced Mills & Boon type story. And I hope you like how I've placed and rewritten other characters from the show *grin*, you'll see what I mean as you read.
And a huge thank to u2fan for the lovely banner. Thanks hun, *hugs*
NC 17 for the sex scenes, but nothing too heavy as this is essentially a relationship novel.