Starting Over

Starting Over by Penny Jordan Read Free Book Online Page A

Book: Starting Over by Penny Jordan Read Free Book Online
Authors: Penny Jordan
don't deserve to be considered fitting for that role—not really.'
    'Look, I know how you must feel,' Jon tried to comfort him. 'But why don't you wait until Jenny's been to see her?'
    'Has she brought the girls back with her, do you know?' David asked him.
    'Yes,' Jon confirmed.
    David let out his breath in a leaky sigh. He ached to get closer to his granddaughters, to be for them all that he had not been able to be for their mother. Just watching Jon with Max and Maddy's children brought out such a yearning in him to hold his own granddaughters in his arms that it was almost a physical pain. Right now he felt that same urge, that same need, to hold Olivia—adult though she was.
    'Oh, by the way, I ought to warn you that Dad isn't too pleased about the fact that you've invited Father Ignatius to live with you,' Jon told him ruefully.
    'I know, he told me,' David acknowledged without adding that Ben had actually hinted to David that if he and Honor were to move into Queensmead with him he would make the house over to him.
    'Queensmead! You've already promised Queens -
    mead to Max,' David had reminded his father grimly.
    'Maddy has spent a fortune of time and effort on the place and—'
    'More fool her. I never asked her to,' Ben had returned surlily.

    Honor had been both shocked and angry when David had told her what Ben had said.
    'When I think of the way Maddy has looked after him,' she had exclaimed. 'He really is the most thoughtless, chauvinistic man....'
    'All that and more,' David had agreed wryly. He was working himself up into a real royal fury. 'What's wrong?' he had questioned when Honor had started to frown.
    'Well, although for his age he's relatively healthy, he does have a heart condition. He told me and I checked with Maddy,' Honor informed him.
    'Just how serious is it?' David had asked her.
    'Well, it isn't going to do him any good if he overdoes things and that includes working himself up into a furious temper. He's well into his eighties, David,'
    she had added gently.
    'I understand what you're saying,' David had agreed, 'But just because he's got a heart condition that doesn't mean he can be allowed to get away with hurting other people, especially someone like Maddy.'
    'He can't hurt Maddy,' Honor had assured him gently. 'She's far too well protected by Max's love.'
    No, he couldn't hurt Maddy but he had hurt Olivia.
    Olivia who should have had his, her father's love, to protect her.
    'I won't come up to the house with you if you don't mind,' David told Jon abruptly.
    Jon shook his head guessing that David wanted to talk over what he had told him about Olivia with Honor.
    DAVID FOUND Honor in the kitchen with Father Ignatius who was peeling the potatoes for their meal.
    'I went to early communion this morning,' the priest told him. 'I like your church.'
    David waited for him to finish before turning to Honor to tell her, 'I've just seen Jon up at Fitzburgh Place. Olivia and Caspar have separated.'
    'Oh, David!' Honor exclaimed, coming over to him.
    'I want to go and see her, Honor...talk to her...help her...'
    'Oh, David,' Honor protested in a different tone. 'I don't think...'
    'She won't want me. Jon's already told me that,'
    David agreed flatly.
    'Perhaps I could go and see her,' the priest suggested gently.
    David laughed mirthlessly and shook his head.
    'She'd be as reluctant to see you as she would me.
    You're tainted by association,' he told him. 'Your association with me. I'm sorry,' he apologised to them both. 'I know I'm over-reacting.'
    'Give her time,' Honor had counselled him earlier, but suddenly as she listened to him Honor sensed intuitively that Olivia no longer had that time.
    Her heart ached for the woman who was now her stepdaughter and she longed to be able to help her for Olivia's own sake just as much as David's.

    Like the priest, she too had a need; a mission to heal and repair the damage that life could inflict on her fellow men and women, but she suspected that Olivia was

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