A Rich Man's Whim(4)

‘I doubt it. I’m also in debt to my eyeballs,’ Kat confessed reluctantly.

Her sister studied her in astonishment. ‘Since when?’

‘For ages now. I mean, you must’ve noticed before you went away that business wasn’t exactly brisk,’ Kat responded.

‘Of course, you borrowed a lot of money to do up the house when we first came here,’ Emmie recalled abstractedly.

Kat wished she could have told her sister the whole truth but she didn’t want the younger woman to feel guilty. Clearly, Emmie had quite enough to be worrying about in the aftermath of a broken relationship that had left her pregnant. Kat did wonder if some people were born under an unlucky star, for Emmie had suffered a lot of hard knocks in her life, not least the challenge of living in the shadow of the glowing success and fame of her identical twin, who had become an internationally renowned supermodel. Saffy had naturally suffered setbacks too, but not to the extent Emmie had. Moreover, Saffy, the twin two minutes older, had a tough independent streak and a level of cool that the more vulnerable Emmie lacked. Already damaged by her mother’s indifferent approach to raising her daughters, Emmie had been hurt in a joy-riding incident when she was twelve and her legs had been badly damaged. Getting her sister upright and out of a wheelchair had been the first step in her recovery but, sadly, a complete recovery had proved impossible. The accident had left Emmie with one leg shorter than the other, an obvious limp and significant scarring, a reality that made it all the harder for Emmie to live side by side with her still physically perfect twin sister. Emmie’s misery and the unfortunate comparisons made by insensitive people had caused friction between the two girls and even now, years later, the twins still barely spoke to each other.

Yet, happily, Emmie no longer limped. In a desperate attempt to help her depressed younger sister recover her self-esteem and interest in life, Kat had taken out a large personal loan to pay for a decidedly experimental leg-lengthening operation only available abroad. The surgery had proved to be an amazing success, but it was that particular debt that had mushroomed when Kat found herself unable to keep up the regular repayments, but she would never lay that guilt trip on Emmie’s slim shoulders. Even knowing the financial strain it would place on her family, Kat knew she’d do it all over again in a heartbeat. Emmie had needed help and Kat had been willing to move mountains to come to her aid.

‘I’ve got it,’ Emmie said suddenly. ‘You can sell the land to settle any outstanding bills. I’m surprised you haven’t thought of doing that for yourself.’

But Kat had sold the land within a couple of years of settling in the area, reasoning that a decent sum of cash would be of more use to her at the time than the small income that she earned from renting out the land that she had inherited with the house. Raising three girls had unfortunately proved much more expensive than Kat had initially foreseen and there had been all sorts of unanticipated expenses over the years while Odette, who was supposed to pay maintenance towards her daughters’ upkeep, had quickly begun skipping payments and had soon ended them altogether. To add to Kat’s problems during those years, her youngest sister, Topsy, who was extremely clever, had been badly bullied at school and Kat had only finally managed to solve the problem by sending Topsy away to boarding school. Mercifully, Topsy, now in sixth form, had won a full scholarship and although Kat had then been saved from worrying about how she would keep up the private school fees she had still had to pay for that first year and it had been a tidy sum.

‘The land was sold a long time ago,’ Kat admitted reluctantly, wanting to be as honest about the facts as she could be. ‘And I may well lose the house—’

‘My goodness, what have you been spending your money on?’ Emmie demanded with a startled look of reproof.

Kat said nothing. There had never been much money to start with and when there had been, there had always been some pressing need to pay it out again. The front door bell chimed and Kat rose eagerly from her seat, keen to escape the interrogation without telling any lies. Naturally Emmie wanted the whole story before she committed herself to moving back in with her sister. But it was early days for such a decision, Kat reminded herself bracingly. Emmie was newly pregnant and a hundred and one things might happen to change the future, not least the reappearance of the father of her child.

Roger Packham, Kat’s nearest neighbour and a widower in his forties, greeted Kat with a characteristic nod. ‘I’ll be bringing you some firewood tomorrow … Will I put it in the usual place?’