by Penny Jordan
Ben smiled slightly, remembering that comment. Sarah lived in New York now. She had moved there after her husband died to live with David and his family. David was a doctor and Ben still kept in touch with the family.
Henri had sold the Paris restaurant after a spectacular—and very costly—quarrel with his cousin and partner Fabian, and had now opened a new restaurant in Provence. In the catering business, it was not the chefs who earned a good living but the restaurant owners. Ben had seen that when he’d worked in Paris and it was a fact which had been reinforced while he was working in London.
Owning his own restaurant had been his dream ever since he had left Paris, but, if he was honest, it was a dream he had never dared to envisage coming true, and now that it was on the point of doing so—more than doing so, in fact—his delight was tinged with apprehension and fear—a fear that sprang not from any lack of belief in his own talents, nor in Zoe’s, but from a lack of trust in fate to be so beneficent to him; fear of allowing himself to believe that his dream was attainable only to have it snatched back from him at the last minute.
Zoe might tease him for his caution, but Zoe had never known what it was to be denied anything. He did not resent her for that. In fact it was the confidence, the sheer bubbling confidence in herself and in life which she possessed in such abundance that had drawn him to her in the first place. But he could not change the watchful caution of a lifetime’s awareness of life’s cruelty and unfairness no matter how much he wished he was able to do so.
‘I’ve explained to Clive that we’d prefer to travel down there on our own so that we can spend a couple of days looking around and sussing out the competition. He was all for it. And I’ve booked us into a hotel.’ Her nose wrinkled. ‘It’s closer to Salisbury than Bath and advertises itself as “An exclusive country house hotel designed to provide the discerning guest with every comfort and luxury.” It’s got its own indoor pool and gym and apparently a well-recommended restaurant.’
‘It sounds gross,’ Ben told her frankly. ‘That official recommendation could be a problem, though.’
Zoe gave a small shrug. ‘Well, hopefully it will be far enough away not to be any real competition, and if Clive gets the go-ahead to buy the extra land and build a golf course…’
‘If… it’s a big if, and anyway I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to start expanding into that kind of market too soon. We don’t want to overstretch ourselves. Let’s get the restaurant established first.’
‘And the hotel,’ Zoe interrupted him.
‘The house is too small to accommodate more than three or four couples at most as it stands at present, and even then it’s going to need a lot of work on it. We shan’t be able to call it a hotel until the extension has been built and we don’t even know if we’ll be able to get planning permission for that yet.’
‘Clive has been in touch with a local architect and he hasn’t said that we won’t,’ Zoe objected.
‘No, but he hasn’t said that we will either, has he? Don’t get too excited yet, Zoe. We’ve still got a very long way to go.’
Zoe pulled a face at him.
‘Why do you always have to be such a pessimist?’
‘Because life’s safer that way. Have you told your parents yet?’
Zoe shook her head. ‘I was going to tell Ma when you were in Manchester, but by the time we’d had lunch and been shopping… She rang me this morning. She sounded a bit down; I…’
‘She probably hasn’t had her hair done this week,’ Ben interrupted her.
Zoe glared at him. ‘Ben, that isn’t fair. I was going to suggest we drive out to see her. Dad’s away on business again, but if you feel like that, I’ll go on my own.’
A little to her surprise, Ben shook his head.
‘No, I’ll come with you—or would you prefer I didn’t bother? After all, we don’t want to embarrass Mummy with my uncivilised behaviour, do we?’
When he saw her face, he made a small grimace and apologised.
‘OK, OK. I’m sorry but I can’t help it. Your parents’ life, their relationship, even that damned house—they’re all so perfect, so—so politically correct. I sometimes wonder how they managed to produce you.’
‘Oh, I think they did it just like everyone else; they did it with a good fuck,’ Zoe told him, baring her teeth.
She knew he hated her saying anything like that, and while normally she was gently careful not to tread on the tenets of his upbringing which still subconsciously led him to think that ‘nice girls’ did not use that kind of language, his criticism of her parents had annoyed her so much that she wanted to hit back at him, and she saw from his face that she had done and that he was aware of what she was doing.
Her temper, quick to flare, was always equally quick to subside, remorse darkening her eyes as she hugged him and said ruefully, ‘I’m sorry… I expect, or at least I hope, I was conceived with the same love and enjoyment that we share when we make love. Is that better?’
‘Mmm… but somehow I can’t see your mother… She always looks so perfect, so almost antiseptic that it’s hard to imagine…’ He shook his head. ‘Come on, then, if we’re going to Hampstead, we might as well start now before the rush-hour.’
* * *
‘Just think… I can hardly believe it! In two days’ time we’ll be there, seeing it properly…’
‘Where?’ Ben teased her, pretending not to understand and then yelping in protest as she took her attention off the road to aim a playful fist at him and in doing so nearly hit a car emerging from a side-street.
‘Idiot,’ Zoe muttered under her breath, causing Ben to stare at her when he realised it was the innocent and affronted driver of the other car she was castigating and not herself.
If Zoe’s mother was surprised to see both of them standing outside when she opened the front door, she did not show it.
‘You didn’t need to knock, darling,’ she told Zoe gently as she kissed her. ‘You’ve still got your key, haven’t you?’
‘Yes, but I don’t like using it,’ Zoe told her as she stepped past her into the house, adding with a grin, ‘After all, for all I know you could be upstairs, enjoying a very private interlude with your lover!’
‘Zoe!’ her mother protested.
‘All right, Ma,’ Zoe laughed. ‘We all know that you and Dad are boringly faithful to one another.’
Because he was still standing in front of her and because the light from the still open doorway was streaming fully into her face, it was Ben and not Zoe who saw the way her expression changed, shadowing so that for a handful of seconds she was suddenly stripped of the cool veneer which Ben always found so irritating, and for once he could see behind it to a woman who was suddenly far more like Zoe than he had realised.
Automatically he stepped forward, and then checked as her general veneer slid back into place. Silently he watched her retreat from him and turn towards Zoe.
‘Ma, before we do anything else, Ben and I have something to tell you…’
Quickly and excitedly, before her mother could say a word, Zoe rattled on at high speed, delivering a complicated and muddled account of what was happening, leaving Ben to unravel the tangled threads of her conversation and to explain their plans.
When Heather interrupted quietly, ‘Wiltshire?’ it was Ben who picked up on the suppressed note of despair that contradicted the smile she was giving them, and cut through Zoe’s excitement to say calmly,
‘It sounds further than it is. Just a couple of hours’ drive, really.’
He watched as the hazel eyes briefly met his, revealing conflicting emotions of pride and gratitude, and wondered why it was that he had felt impelled to reassure her.
He was not antagonistic towards Zoe’s parents; at least, not as far as his relationship with Zoe went—there had never been any need. But if he was honest there was a small thread of atavistic, instinctive rejection of them within him that was more cultural than logical, something he normally tried to igno
re but which surfaced occasionally, normally in the form of some acid comment about their cushioned, protected, cosseted lifestyle.
Zoe’s mother in particular irritated and baffled him. She was so different from his own mother, different too from the women who came into the restaurant, career women in the main, efficiently businesslike and in control, without those odd flashes of vulnerability which Heather possessed and which disconcerted him so much, causing a shift in his perception of her, which made him feel unwantedly protective towards her, protective and irritated at the same time.
It was happening now, while Zoe chattered on excitedly about their plans and the future, apparently oblivious to the anxiety and panic her mother was suppressing. Those emotions were so clear to Ben that he felt angry with them both, Heather for imposing them on him and burdening him with them and Zoe for not recognising what her mother was feeling and thereby making him feel responsible for her emotions.
And yet as he looked away from her and glanced round the pristinely immaculate sitting-room with its fresh flowers and pastel colours, a prettiness and warmth which somehow only seemed to emphasise the loneliness of the small, slim, elegant woman who was its creator, he wondered as he had wondered so many times before how such a woman could ever have produced a child as vibrant and ebullient as Zoe, and, as he had been forced to do in the past, he had to admit that there must be something within Heather that he was missing, that he was simply not perceptive enough to see.
Now, as he saw the distress she quickly concealed from Zoe, he wondered if he was finally seeing it.
‘Well, that’s wonderful, darling,’ he heard her saying warmly to Zoe. ‘I only wish that Daddy were here to share your exciting news. Actually, though, I have something to tell you myself.’
Quickly Ben looked across at her, hearing the strain in her voice, but Zoe seemed oblivious to it.
‘What is it, Ma?’ Zoe teased. ‘Are you planning to change your hairstyle?’
‘I’ve been asked to consider working full-time for the housing charity. They’re running a training programme and there’s a place on it for me…’ She paused uncertainly. ‘I’m not sure what I should do. If I take the place and then it turns out that I’m not really suitable for the work, I’ll have prevented someone else from training.’
‘What does Dad think?’ Zoe asked her.
There was a small pause and Ben watched as the small frown between Zoe’s mother’s neatly defined eyebrows increased. ‘Well, I have discussed it with him, of course, but you know how busy he is. He’s in Zurich at the moment—something to do with the IMF, some kind of conference.
‘Of course, it is a big commitment to take on, but I will be doing something useful, something that’s of benefit to others…’
‘The Sixties teenager comes of age with a Nineties conscience,’ Zoe teased, and Ben, who had been thinking much along the same lines, saw the brief flicker of pain in the older woman’s eyes and said nothing.
Instead, as much to his own surprise as to hers, he went over to Heather and hugged her, telling her gruffly, ‘You go for it, Heather. You’ve got one hell of a lot to offer.’
He saw the surprise in her eyes, the quick sheen of tears which she covered, the gratitude mingling with pain. He also felt the small slight tremble of her body; a totally non-personal reflex action of female to male which told him that her body was unfamiliar with that kind of spontaneous show of affection.
And yet Zoe had often commented how as a teenager she would regularly inadvertently interrupt her parents sharing a kiss, and that it was partially this awareness of their sexuality and their enjoyment of it which had given rise to her own belief that physical intimacy was a natural expression of emotion.
As Heather stepped back from him, Ben glanced across at Zoe. She seemed oblivious to her mother’s tension, insisting instead on outlining to Heather all their plans for the future of the hotel.
‘Well, I’m thrilled for both of you,’ Heather announced when Zoe had finally run out of breath.
‘It’s all really thanks to you,’ Ben told her quietly. ‘After all, you were the one who recommended me to Clive Hargreaves in the first place, and if I hadn’t been invited to cater for his daughter’s wedding…’
‘Clive is a businessman, not a philanthropist. If he didn’t have faith in you, he would never have even contemplated backing you. So when are you going to see the house?’ Heather asked them.
‘This week,’ Zoe told her excitedly. ‘We’re meeting Clive down there. Ben and I are having a couple of days off so that we can scout around and test out the competition.
‘We’re staying at this hotel near Salisbury. It seems to be the only close competition we’re going to have, and of course the chef won’t be anywhere as good as Ben.’
‘Don’t be too sure,’ Ben advised her. ‘The restaurant does have a good star rating, remember.’
‘Oh, you. Why are you always such a pessimist?’ Zoe objected, laughing at him.
* * *
It was gone midnight when they finally left. Heather had insisted on opening a bottle of champagne to toast their success. The phone had rung while they were drinking it and she had hurried to answer it, her face flushing with colour, the anticipation draining from her voice, leaving it flat and tired when she responded to the caller.
‘I was hoping it might be your father,’ she told Zoe as she replaced the receiver. ‘He promised he’d try to call this evening, but obviously he’s got tied up with something.’
Later on while they were driving home, Zoe commented happily to Ben, ‘Ma seemed really pleased for us, didn’t she? Not that I thought she wouldn’t be. I was surprised about this extra work she’s talking about taking on, though.’
‘Perhaps she feels she needs something to fill her time with your father being away such a lot,’ Ben responded cautiously.
Zoe seemed to have no perception of the undercurrents he had sensed in her parents’ home, nor of the tension he had felt emanating from her mother, and he had no wish to distress her by outlining his own suspicions.
Was it because he didn’t want to upset her, or was it because, selfishly, he didn’t want her attention deflected from their own lives to her parents’?
What was the point in stirring up trouble? he asked himself, shifting a little uncomfortably in his seat as he suppressed the sharpness of his silent self-questioning.
After all he could be wrong. Heather Clinton could genuinely simply wish to find something to fill in her spare time. He could quite easily be wrong in suspecting that Zoe’s parents’ marriage was not after all as idyllically happy and secure as Zoe had always seemed to think.
Or was he just being over-cynical in suspecting that a husband who spent so much time away from home, plus a wife who was plainly unhappy and feeling rejected, was a recipe for marital problems?
And had it already gone further than merely being a slight problem; was Zoe’s father… ?
‘Ben, come back,’ Zoe called out, demanding his attention. ‘You were miles away. Who were you thinking about? Sharon?’
‘No,’ he told her honestly as he smiled at her.
‘Well, you were worrying about something… someone…’ Zoe retorted.
Ben said nothing. Worrying? About her parents, her mother… ? Why should he? He had problems enough worrying about his own family without taking on the additional burden of Zoe’s parents as well.
And yet later, holding Zoe tight in the warm relaxation of post-coital intimacy, her head resting heavily on his arm, her body curled sensuously around his, her breathing slowing and evening out into sleep, he remembered how tense and oddly fragile Heather had felt when he hugged her; how struck he had been by his sharp awareness of her unhappiness and aloneness.
They were not his problem, he reminded himself as he closed his eyes. She was not his problem.
CHAPTER TEN
‘WELL, what do you think?’ Zoe demanded excitedly.
Clive had just driven off to go a
nd see the architect and they were alone in Broughton House’s grounds. From where they were standing it was possible to see the house through the tangled undergrowth that choked the small copse, and from this distance it looked solid and permanent, the signs of age and decay hidden.
‘It’s smaller than I’d imagined,’ Ben commented, ‘and one hell of a lot of work will have to be done before we can even think of using those kitchens.’
‘Well, we knew that,’ Zoe dismissed impatiently. ‘And anyway, you’ve said all along that you’d prefer to have a say in the design of the kitchen.’
‘Those don’t just need redesigning,’ Ben told her drily.
‘But Ben, you’ve got to admit that it’s got masses of potential. These grounds… the area… I hadn’t realised the town was going to be so pretty. It will be a tremendous hit with American and Australian tourists.’
‘American and Australian tourists? What American and Australian tourists? We don’t get any any more!’
‘We will,’ Zoe told him firmly. ‘You’ve got to admit that all this…’ she waved an arm to embrace their surroundings ‘… is wonderful…’
‘Is it?’ Ben asked her wryly, but he was laughing, Zoe recognised, and behind his dour refusal to share her enthusiasm she could sense that secretly he was excited.
‘I can see what Clive means about the stable block being extended to make perfect extra accommodation.’
‘Yes, if we can get planning permission,’ Ben reminded her.
Zoe refused to be deterred. She laughed, turning to him, flinging her arms round him and hugging him fiercely.
‘Oh, Ben,’ she teased him. ‘How you do love to worry! Just look at all this.’ She gestured to the grounds around them. ‘And once people taste your food…’
‘All right,’ Ben admitted, hugging her back, his face breaking into a grin. ‘All right… I love it. Now are you happy?’
‘Yes, yes, yes!’ Zoe laughed back.
‘It’s going to take a hell of a lot of time and money before we even get close to serving food, though, Zoe,’ Ben warned her. ‘And as to what it will cost to convert it to the type of place Clive has in mind…’