‘Yes,’ she acknowledged tiredly.
‘And...’ Hugo prodded. ‘Or can I guess?’
‘He wasn’t very happy,’ Dee admitted.
‘So, tell me something I don’t already know,’ Hugo drawled. ‘I suppose he claimed that you would be wasting your degree and the government’s money, that you’d be exposing yourself to almost certain death, that I was being a selfish so-and-so and that I should stay at home and get myself a proper job...’
His comments were so acutely right that Dee felt her eyes prick with vulnerable tears.
‘Hugo, he’s my father; he loves me. He’s just trying—’
‘To come between us?’ Hugo suggested bitterly.
‘He just wants to protect me,’ Dee protested. ‘When you...we...have children, you’ll feel the same.’
‘Maybe I shall, but I certainly won’t put emotional pressure on them or try to control their lives for them,’ Hugo told her tersely.
‘Julian Cox arrived whilst I was there. It sounds as though he’s trying to persuade Dad to put him on the Foundation committee.’
‘So?’ Hugo questioned.
‘I don’t trust him, Hugo. There’s something about him.’
‘He’s not my type, I agree,’ Hugo replied, ‘but then I’ve never been into making money, so...’
‘Maybe not, but that’s because you’ve never needed to be,’ Dee responded, with an unusual touch of asperity. ‘You get an allowance, Hugo, as well as your grant. One day you’ll inherit family money—even though you claim your parents aren’t wealthy. My father has had to make his own way in life. He’s proud of what he’s achieved and so am I, and I hate it when you go all aristocratic and contemptuous about him. There’s nothing wrong about being good at making money.’
‘Isn’t there?’ Hugo asked her quietly. ‘ My great-great-grandfather made his from coal, from sending people deep down into the earth to dig for black gold for him. There’s a plaque outside the colliery that he owned. It commemorates the deaths of twenty-nine men who were killed making my great-great-grandfather a millionaire. He gave their widows a guinea each. It’s all there in his accounts. Like your father, he had a good head for money. I used to dream about them sometimes, those men, and how it must have felt to die like that.’
‘Hugo, don’t,’ Dee pleaded, white-faced. Hugo rarely talked about his family history, but Dee knew how he felt about it.
As she turned towards him Hugo cupped her face in his hand as he begged her hoarsely, ‘Don’t ever leave me, Dee. Don’t let your father come between us. I love you more than you know. You’ve enriched my life, made my life better in so many ways. Without you...’
‘Without me you’d still go to Ethiopia,’ she told him quietly.
His eyes darkened.
‘Yes,’ he agreed simply, before adding harshly, ‘I have to, Dee. I can’t... I have to. But I shan’t be going without you,’ he added softly. ‘Shall I?’
He was kissing her by then, and so there was no vocal reply that Dee could give other than a soft, blissful sigh as she moved closer to his body.
r /> Later, their bodies closely entwined, Hugo leaned over her propping his head up on his elbow as he told her quietly, ‘Dee, there’s something I have to say to you.’
‘Mmm...?’ she encouraged him languorously.
It wasn’t unusual for him to tease her with this kind of pronouncement, which was usually followed by a declaration of his love or an announcement that some part of her body was filling him with unquenchable desire, and so, smiling back at him, she waited happily.
‘This aid work—it isn’t just something I want to just do to fill in a year,’ Hugo told her abruptly.
Dee sat up in bed. She knew already how strongly Hugo felt about what he wanted to do, but this was the first time he had mentioned it being more than a short-term vocation.
‘I was talking to someone the other day, and they were saying how desperately they need people to take on not just work in the field but fundraising as well.’
‘But you can’t do both,’ Dee objected practically.
‘Not at the same time,’ Hugo agreed. ‘But there’s a desperate need for people to increase everyone’s awareness of how vitally important good aid programmes are, to act as ambassadors for them. Charlotte was saying that I’d be ideal for that kind of role, especially once I’d got some practical hands-on experience in the field.’
‘Charlotte?’ Dee queried uncertainly.