But not today.

The reception was being held in the Orchid Room, with its walls of delicate blue and ornate painted scrollery. A string quartet had been arranged near a parquet dance floor, and guests circulated amidst waiters bearing trays of hors d’oeuvres and sparkling champagne.

Allegra surveyed the glittering crowd and lifted her chin. She wasn’t used to this. She didn’t go to parties.

The last party she’d attended—a party like this, with society in full swing—had been for her own engagement. She’d worn a poufy, pink dress and heels that had pinched her feet, and she’d been so happy. So excited.

She shook her head as if to banish the thought, the memory. Why was she thinking—remembering—those days now? Why was she letting the memories sift through her mind like ghosts from another life—a life that had never happened? A life she’d run away from.

It was the wedding tonight, she decided. It was the first one she’d attended since she’d abandoned her own.

Forget it, Allegra told herself as she plucked a flute of champagne from one of the circulating trays and made her way through the crowd. Her cousin’s wedding was bound to stir up some unpleasant memories, unpalatable feelings. That was all this mood was, and she could deal with it.

Allegra took a sip of champagne, let the bubbles fizz defiantly through her and surveyed the milling crowd.

‘Allegra…I’m so glad you could come.’

She turned to see her Aunt Barbara smiling uncertainly at her. Dowdy but cheerful, Barbara Mason wore a lime coloured evening gown that did nothing for her pasty complexion or grey-streaked hair.

Allegra smiled warmly back. ‘I’m glad to be here as well,’ she returned a little less than truthfully. ‘I’m so thrilled for Daphne.’

‘Yes…they’ll be very happy, don’t you think?’ Barbara’s anxious gaze flitted to her daughter, who was chatting and smiling, her husband’s arm around her shoulders.

‘I’m afraid I don’t know much about the groom,’ Allegra said, taking another sip of champagne. ‘His name is Charles?’

‘Charles Edmunds. They met at work. You know Daphne’s been a PA at Hobbs and Ford?’

Allegra nodded. Although her uncle disapproved of Allegra keeping in touch with his family, she still spoke to Barbara on the telephone every few months, and several times Daphne had defied her father to meet Allegra for lunch.

She’d learned at one of those outings that Daphne had secured a job as PA at an advertising firm, despite her obvious lack of qualifications. Her father’s, apparently, had been enough.

‘I’m happy for them,’ she said. She watched Charles Edmunds as he glanced down at his wife, smiling easily. Then he raised his eyes, surveying the ballroom with a gaze that was steely and grey. Looking for business contacts, associates? Allegra wondered cynically. Someone worth knowing, at any rate, she decided as his eyes passed over her and Barbara without a flicker.

So much for true love, she thought with a little grimace. Charles Edmunds was a man like most others—cold, ambitious, on the prowl.

‘Barbara!’ Her uncle’s sharp voice cut across the murmur of the crowd. Both Allegra and her aunt tensed as George Mason strode towards them, his narrow features sharpened by dislike as he glanced at his niece.

‘Barbara, you should see to your guests,’ he commanded tersely, and Barbara offered Allegra a quick, defeated smile of apology. Allegra smiled back.

‘It was good to see you, Allegra,’ Barbara murmured. ‘We don’t see enough of you,’ she added with a shred of defiance. George motioned her away with a shooing gesture, and Barbara went.

There was a moment of tense silence and Allegra swivelled the slick, moisture-beaded stem of her champagne flute between her fingers, wondering what to say to a man who had ordered her from his house seven years ago. The few times she’d seen him since, at increasingly infrequent family gatherings, they’d avoided each other.

Now they were face to face.

He looked the same as ever, she saw as she slid him a glance from beneath her lashes. Thin, grey-haired, well-dressed, precise. Cold eyes and a prim, pursed mouth. Absolutely no humour.

‘Thank you for inviting me, Uncle George,’ Allegra finally said. ‘It was good of you, considering.’

‘I had to invite you, Allegra,’ George replied. ‘You’re family, even though you’ve hardly acted like it in the last seven years.’

Allegra pressed her lips together to keep from uttering a sharp retort. She wasn’t the one who had ordered so-called family out of his house, and who had made it increasingly difficult for Allegra to stay in touch.

Running away had been her only crime, and her uncle never failed to remind her of it.

For in running away she’d shamed him. Allegra still remembered her uncle’s fury when she’d shown up, terrified and exhausted, on his doorstep.

‘You can stay the night,’ he’d said grimly, ‘and then you need to be gone.’

‘He does business with Stefano Capozzi,’ her aunt had explained, desperate for Allegra to understand and not to judge. ‘If he’s seen sheltering you, Capozzi could make life very unpleasant for him, Allegra. For all of us.’

It had been an unpleasant insight into her former fiancé’s character. She had wondered then if Stefano would come for her, find her. Make life unpleasant for her.

He hadn’t, and as far as she knew he’d never made life unpleasant for her uncle. She wondered sometimes whether that had been a convenient excuse for George Mason to wash his hands of her, especially when her own defection had been followed so quickly by her mother’s.

Her mother…another person, another life, Allegra chose not to remember.

Now she met her uncle’s cold gaze. ‘I needed help and you gave it to me,’ she said levelly. Her fingers tightened on the stem of her glass. ‘I’ll always be grateful for that.’

‘And you’ll show it by keeping out of my way,’ George finished coolly. ‘And Daphne’s. Her nerves are strung high enough as it is.’

Allegra felt a flush creeping up her throat, staining her face. She kept her chin high. ‘I certainly don’t want to cause any dismay to my cousin. I’ll pay my respects and leave as soon as possible.’

‘Good,’ he replied shortly before moving off.

Allegra straightened proudly. She felt as if every eye in the faceless crowd was focused on her, seeing, knowing, condemning, even though she knew no one cared.

Except her uncle and his family.

A waiter passed and Allegra placed her nearly untouched champagne on his tray.

Murmuring her excuses as she moved through the crowd, she found a secluded corner of the ballroom and took her position there, half hidden behind a potted palm.

She took a deep breath and surveyed the circulating crowd. No one was paying any attention to her, she knew, because she wasn’t important. Her flight from Italy seven years ago was little cause of concern or even gossip these days.

She’d kept her head down and well out of society’s glare these last years, working two jobs to pay for her schooling. She was far, far from this glamorous crowd, the glittering lifestyle. Yet the people who knew her, who were supposed to love her…what had happened seven years ago still mattered to them. And it always would.

It didn’t bother her on a day-to-day basis. She didn’t need these people. She had a new life now, a good one. When she’d left that night, she’d gained her freedom, but the price for that freedom had been, quite literally, everything.

It had been a price worth paying.

The music died down and Allegra saw everyone heading to the tables. Dinner was about to be served.

Taking another deep breath, she moved through the crowds again and found her place card. She was at a table tucked in the back with a motley handful of guests who looked to be nearly as out of place as she was. Distant, vaguely embarrassing relatives, colleagues and friends who necessitated an invitation yet were not an asset to the sparkling and successful party George Mason intended for his daughter.