Lies and Weddings(6)
Thomas was actually glad to be making a fresh start away from Hong Kong and Houston, and truth be told he felt more comfortable in England, having more or less spent the majority of his formative years there since being sent away to boarding school at the age of thirteen. But what compelled him most to set up home in Greshamsbury were the three ready-made playmates for Eden. She and Rufus were the same age, while Augie was two years older and Bea had just been born.
“She’ll grow up with my kids, and our nannies will take care of her while you’re at the clinic. Rufus will be like a brother to her, and Augusta and Bea will be like sisters,” Francis declared. The earl’s prediction had exceeded his own expectations, and in the ensuing years Eden and the Gresham children became so inseparable that after finishing her medical foundation-year program in London, Eden decided to return home to Greshamsbury. Though she was doing her core medical training at a hospital in Plymouth, she was happy to commute every day and live at the cottage so that she could be with her adored father and next door to her dear friends.
As Thomas and Eden walked past the impeccably pruned lime trees that lined the gravel driveway to Greshamsbury Hall, the side door was quietly opened by a strapping sandy-haired butler dressed in the bespoke uniform of squid-ink-dyed Japanese denim shirt and jeans that Lady Arabella had designed for her staff.
“Morning, Hemsworth,” Thomas and Eden greeted him in unison.
“Good morning, Doctors,” the butler said warmly. Hemsworth (Ringwood/Heathmont/Screenwise/International Butler Academy) gestured to the back stairs but did not bother to escort Thomas and Eden up, being accustomed to the doctor’s frequent morning visits. The two of them bounded up the stairs quickly, and at the second-floor landing where three delicate Ruth Asawa woven mesh sculptures hung, Eden split off and wandered down the Long Gallery toward Bea’s rooms while Thomas approached the hallway leading to Arabella’s suite. Gracie, the countess’s lady’s maid, who was hovering outside the suite, greeted Thomas with a look of relief and immediately turned to knock on the door.
“Dr. Tong, ma’am,” Gracie announced as she pushed the door open without waiting for acknowledgment. Thomas entered the countess’s morning room, where he found her arranged dramatically on her Carlo Bugatti chaise longue, swathed in an apricot silk robe, propped up by a dozen velvet pillows in assorted crimson hues with a cashmere eye pillow over her face and the blood pressure monitor conveniently tied around her left arm. Even in her discomfort, not a single strand of her signature chin-length bob appeared out of place, and the countess in her sixth decade retained the strikingly photogenic features that had once upon a time made her a sought-after fashion model.
“Lady Greshamsbury,” Thomas greeted her formally, observing the protocol he knew she expected even though he was her husband’s closest friend and had been her neighbor and family doctor for decades.
The countess removed her eye pillow almost in slow motion but kept her eyes closed. “Hiyah, what took you so long?” Arabella (Maryknoll Convent School/City University of Hong Kong/King’s College) said in the tone she reserved for Thomas Tong and other Asians she deemed inferior to her.[*4] “I can’t open my eyes. The room keeps spinning. Gracie just checked my blood pressure two minutes ago. One ninety over one forty.”
“Not likely. You’d be quite dead if that were the case,” Thomas said,[*5] looking down at the machine. “You know your arm needs to be level with your heart when you take a reading.”
“Did I have a transient ischemic stroke? I’m absolutely convinced I did. You have no idea what happened in the middle of the night!”
“Tell me,” Thomas said calmly, taking out his own blood pressure monitor and strapping it on her upper arm.
“Where’s my phone?” Arabella felt around the cushions weakly with her right hand.
“Your diction is impeccable as ever; you’re certainly not slurring. Any numbness or loss of vision?”
“I’m numb everywhere. My fingers and toes feel like they are on fire.”
“That’s not numbness,” Thomas said patiently.
Arabella waved a hand in the air helplessly. “Gracie, where the hell is my phone?”
“It’s in your other hand, ma’am.”
Arabella held it up to Thomas. “Look! Look!”
“Now, you need to be completely still while I take the reading. No talking. That’s a very nice picture of you on the cover of ?Hola!”
“Hiyah, not that one. Gracie, show him the video!”
Gracie swiped past the screensaver and held up the video that had been sent to Arabella in the middle of the night.
“Spectacular,” Thomas said, marveling at the high-res video of lava shooting out of the cliffside like a geyser.
Arabella bolted up from the chaise, her cashmere eye pillow falling to the floor. “Spectacular? Seeing that almost killed me! That lava you see is a volcanic fissure that opened up earlier today—right in the middle of the garden where Augusta’s wedding ceremony is supposed to be!”
“Looks like it will be a spectacular ceremony…”
“You don’t get it. A volcano basically erupted at the wedding site! The Balinese pavilion, the replica of the bar at Loulou’s, the ballroom mimicking the checkerboard floors at Chateau d’Anet, it’s all ruined! Everything has been ruined!”