Daughters-in-Law by Joanna Trollope Read Free Book Online

shoulder.
    “Wife—”
    “Don’t change the subject.”
    “I’ll ring him later. When I don’t want to thump him for being so thoughtless.”
    “
Is
he thoughtless?”
    Luke took his chin away, and stared past Charlotte at the cemetery walls of San Michele as they slid by.
    “By normal standards, yes. But Ralph isn’t normal. He’s brilliant and he’s impossible. I missed him like anything when he was away, and it was so peaceful at the same time. You are so bloody gorgeous.”
    Later, while Charlotte was showering in the black-marble bathroom, with the window open to the warm, bell-haunted sounds of early-evening Venice, Luke rang Ralph. Charlotte knew he was ringing, so she had the shower turned on full, and she sang as well, for good measure, in order to indicate to Luke that she was in no way going to influence or preempt any reaction Luke might be having in response to whatever it was that Ralph had to say. When she had finished, she wrapped herself in a large white towel, ran her hands through her hair so that it stood up in the soft damp spikes Luke seemed to like so much, and went through to the bedroom. Luke was lying on the bed with his shoes off. His phone was some distance away, on Charlotte’s side of the bed, as if he had just chucked it there.
    Charlotte sat down on the edge of the bed beside him. She waited for him to ruffle her hair, or untuck her towel, or slide his hand underneath it. But he lay there frowning, looking ahead at the silvered wooden cabinet that housed the television.
    “Is he okay?”
    Luke went on staring ahead. He said shortly, “He’s losing his business.”
    “
What?
”
    “The bank won’t either extend his credit or lend him any more, despite him offering their home as collateral, so he’ll lose the business.”
    “Oh my God,” Charlotte said.
    Luke took her nearest hand.
    “He said he suspected it would be that bad, at our wedding. He said he was sorry he was a bit weird, but he couldn’t help thinking about it.”
    “Was he weird?”
    Luke sighed.
    “He got plastered. He was smoking. Mum and Dad were furious with him.”
    “Do—do they know?”
    Luke raised Charlotte’s hand to his mouth and looked at her over it.
    “No. They don’t. Nobody does, except Ed, and now me. He hasn’t told anyone. He hasn’t told Petra.”
    Charlotte felt a clutch of panic. She wanted to say, “You’d tell
me
, wouldn’t you? You’d always tell me everything. Wouldn’t you?” but sensed that if she did she might not get any answer that reassured her. So instead she said, “So, even if he’d offered their house to the bank and they’d, say, accepted, Petra wouldn’t have known anything about it?”
    Luke regarded her solemnly.
    “Yes.”
    “But that’s awful—”
    “It’s to protect her.”
    “What?”
    “Not telling Petra is protecting her. So’s not to worry her.”
    Charlotte took her hand out of Luke’s.
    “That’s not right—”
    “Petra’s got no family,” Luke said. “We’ve all sort of become her family, so there’s this unspoken thing about looking after her. She’s only twenty-four, or something.”
    “Two years younger than me.”
    “Not a real comparison, angel.”
    “But,” Charlotte said, “she’s his
wife
. They’ve got
children
. It’s a thing you do
together
, bad times.”
    Luke sighed. He twisted himself round, and lay so that his head was in Charlotte’s lap. Then he reached up to untuck the towel across her breasts. Charlotte put her hand on his.
    “Don’t—”
    “Why not?”
    “The mood’s not right—”
    “Bloody Ralph.”
    “It’s not Ralph,” Charlotte said, “not really. It’s Petra. It’s this Brinkley thing of treating Petra like a child.”
    “Well, she is in a way—”
    “Only if you all make her like that. She was managing okay on her own, I gather, before she met Ralph—”
    “Just.”
    Charlotte looked away. She said, “It’s like Ralph found her under a hedge or something, like an