Maximum Exposure: The Heartlands Series

by Harper, Jenny

  ‘And …’ she pulled his head down towards hers and cradled his face in her hands, ‘let someone prove to you that you are …’ she kissed him on the mouth, ‘… very …’ kiss, ‘… very …’ kiss, ‘… attractive.’

  There didn’t seem a lot to say. Ben lifted one finger and gently pushed aside the shirt. Underneath, she was naked. Abandoning all sense, he scooped her up in his arms and carried her in three easy strides across to the bed.

  Afterwards, he propped himself on one elbow and studied her as she lay beside him, naked in the sunshine that streamed in through her window. He trailed his hand along the length of her body, enjoying the curves, loving the way she wriggled and inhaled when his hand touched her most intimate parts.

  ‘You’re amazing.’

  ‘So I’m told.’

  Her hair had come loose from its anchor at some point in their embracing. It lay round her shoulders, spread out across the pillow like dark straw in autumn.

  She said, ‘Ben.’ One word that presaged a statement.

  ‘Lizzie.’

  ‘I don’t do relationships. Not just now, at least.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘I’m not into commitment. I like men. I like men who make love well and know when to be gentle, when to be rough. I like men who kiss nicely and don’t start obsessing about me.’

  ‘Is there a reason for that?’

  Her mouth twitched into a smile. ‘The usual. I was hurt. Jilted, actually. I had even made my wedding dress. Love’s young dream … I cried for a year and told myself all men were bastards and I would never lose control of my feelings in that way again. I would see men, but on my terms. I wanted to be in control.’

  ‘That’s very sad, Lizzie.’

  She shook her head. ‘No. For a long time I was angry. I screwed men like they had to pay for Ritchie’s faults. I like sex. I’ve always liked sex. I just don’t like having to give up my independence to get it.’

  ‘Surely no decent man would ask you to give up your independence? Even if you were in a relationship.’

  ‘You’d be astonished. Anyway, I’m not angry any more. And I guess maybe one day I will find a man I’d like to spend a long time with. But not yet.’ She laughed. Again, the rich, full laugh. ‘I just thought I should tell you now. I don’t want a partner. I don’t want a husband. I’m very happy to find a friend I can enjoy great sex with. Until we’re both ready to move on.’ She studied him. ‘Does that bother you?’

  Ben rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling. ‘Will I see you again?’

  ‘Do you want to?’

  ‘Does the Pope speak in Latin?’

  ‘No ties. No promises. No seeing other people while we see each other. And no tears when it’s time to move on.’

  ‘Suits me.’

  And then she was straddling him, her long, thick hair falling round her face. ‘Daisy’s loss, Ben,’ she whispered, ‘is most definitely my gain.’

  Chapter Nineteen

  ‘Hello Daisy. You’re late.’ Her father, opening the front door to her, was characteristically critical.

  Daisy took in his humour at a glance. She only needed the smallest signs to know if he was in one of his dark moods – the vein in his neck throbbing, his face a shade redder than usual. Whatever it was, she no longer let it get to her, consciously at least. After all, she had the option of walking out.

  The greeting was curt but she spied his golf shoes under the hall stand. There were small blades of fresh grass visible from under the soles. He’d been out this morning, which was a good sign. Golfing usually lightened his mood – unless he’d had a really poor round.

  ‘Good morning, Dad. Lovely to see you too.’ She pecked him on the cheek cheerfully, determined not to be crushed. ‘How was the golf?’

  Eric, turning into the corridor that led along to the living room, grunted. ‘Had a birdie at the third and the seventh, and three pars.’

  Daisy knew enough about golf after years of listening to her father to understand that this was good. ‘Great,’ she smiled, ‘Mum in the kitchen?’

  There was another grunt. The atmosphere of the house settled round her now, muffling, stifling. Did she come here because of a sense of duty? Or did she still long for love? To please her mother or to try, despite everything, to win her father’s approval for what she had achieved in life? Daisy stood at the threshold of the room, uncertain.

  ‘Hello, Mum. Can I help?’ Her voice wobbled a fraction.

  Her mother wiped her hands on her apron, her face cracking into a smile that put the light back into her eyes. ‘Daisy, love,’ she said.

  Daisy need not have worried about being able to refuse pudding. She’d forgotten how her appetite dropped when she crossed the threshold of number five Laurel Lane. She escaped as soon as she could, fighting the feeling of disappointment she always had that things hadn’t gone better with her father, and headed to the office. An hour’s work would get her well ahead for the morning.

  Christ. Ben. She’d been going to phone him. Something must have happened to him or why would he have left his car at the cottage? She pulled over and dialled his number. It rang out. She was just about to call off when a voice, light and melodious, said, ‘Hello? Ben’s phone?’

  There was laughter, a shriek and a yelp, then Ben said, ‘Hi. Who is this?’

  ‘Ben? Was that Lizzie?’ Daisy was puzzled.

  ‘Oh Daisy. Hi. Hi.’ Was he flustered? He sounded odd.

  ‘Are you OK? Where are you? Are you with Lizzie?’

  ‘Yeah. I’m at your cottage. I couldn’t get my car started last night, so I came back with some jump leads. Lizzie’s going to give me a hand in a minute. I should’ve called first, sorry, don’t know why I assumed you’d be here.’

  There was a whisper, a giggle, then another yelp. ‘What’s going on there?’ Daisy smiled. ‘You sound like you’re having fun.’

  ‘Fun? Yeah. I suppose. Lizzie’s just horsing around. Listen Dais, were you phoning about something in particular?’

  ‘What? Oh. No. I just wondered why your car was at the cottage. Now I know.’

  ‘Fine. So I’ll see you later then.’

  ‘Tomorrow morning probably, at work.’

  ‘Yeah. Great.’

  ‘Right. I’m headed there now, for an hour. Tell Lizzie I’ll be back by five.’

  ‘Will do. Cheers.’

  At the cottage, Lizzie and Ben stared at each other.

  ‘We’ll have to tell her. If we’re going to carry on seeing each other.’

  ‘No reason why not. She can hardly object.’

  ‘No. No reason.’ Ben, high on sex and laughter, didn’t regret making love to Lizzie. Christ, she was one sexy lay. He pulled her close to him, closed his eyes, and showered her face with tiny kisses. But it was Daisy’s eyes he was still seeing in his head. He hoped he hadn’t closed that door for ever.

  Daisy pulled up outside the offices of the Herald and turned off the engine. She felt oddly troubled. There was no reason Ben and Lizzie shouldn’t be enjoying time together. After all, soon she would have Jack back. The more she saw of him at the gym, the more sure she was of that. She felt so comfortable with him again. It was just like they’d been in those first few years, before somehow – how? – their relationship had changed and begun to drift.

  Even so…

  ‘Right,’ said Jay. ‘What have we got for the front page this week?’

  ‘Flooding in Yetholm,’ said Murdoch. ‘It’s quite bad down there. There’s a chance the old bridge might go.’

  ‘Possible. Especially if it does go and we can’t get Daisy down there in time.’

  ‘There’s the bullied soldier story,’ ventured Dave.

  ‘That’s more tricky. No one’s been able to produce any evidence yet.’

  ‘I’ve got a story,’ said Sharon.

  ‘You’ve found Provost Porter with his hand in the till?’

  ‘No, but he’s having an affair.’

  ‘You
’re kidding!’

  ‘No way!’

  ‘Who with, for heaven’s sake?’

  They all leaned forward, eager to hear the gossip.

  ‘How do you know?’

  The attention she was getting perked Sharon up. ‘I’ve got a friend who works in The Black Horse down at Mains village. Couple of times a week there’s a woman books in, name of Joyce Carlton. Comes around three o’clock, likes to work in her room, has dinner sent up. Quite often it’s dinner for two.’

  ‘Carlton?’ Murdoch was pensive. ‘Why do I know that name?’

  ‘She runs a small company called Carlton Catering.’ Sharon was well in her stride. She’d been doing her homework and had everyone’s attention. The drawn look she’d had for the past couple of weeks had gone and the old animated Sharon was back. ‘They have a unit down on the industrial estate?’

  ‘Got it now.’ Murdoch’s bald head gleamed in the harsh light of the fluorescent tubes from above. ‘Small place between the joinery works and the electrical supply shop.’

  ‘Could be getting a lot bigger if Joyce Carlton’s plan works,’ said Sharon, the smugness back in her voice. ‘There’s a big catering contract up for grabs with the Council. Includes the local schools and all the Council properties.’

  ‘Phew,’ Murdoch whistled. ‘And you reckon she’s trying to influence the Provost?’

  ‘She is influencing the Provost. Carlton Catering is on the short list for the final decision, which will be made later this week. And that’s odd because you’d think they’d be too small to be in the running.’

  ‘But surely that will go through procurement?’

  Sharon nodded. ‘Yes. But don’t forget, the Provost’s nephew is Head of Procurement.’

  ‘Bloody hell,’ Murdoch sat back, ‘I had forgotten that. That’s always been a tricky one, in my book. But Provost Porter has always insisted he’s very hands-off.’

  Sharon grinned broadly. ‘Well he’s having some very hands-on sessions with our Joyce. There’s a back door into The Black Horse from the car park. The Provost’s private car has been seen regularly in the car park, but no one’s ever seen him in the hotel. He must sneak in and go straight up to her room.’

  ‘Jeez.’

  ‘That’s a serious allegation to make, Sharon.’ Jay was concentrating hard. Ever since he’d apologised to the team and pulled everyone together to try to improve sales and circulation, he’d been working overtime to try to turn things round. ‘You’d have to have some hard evidence –’ Dave sniggered in the background and Jay glared at him, ‘– some hard evidence of what you are alleging before we could publish anything. We can’t land ourselves with a law suit.’

  Sharon frowned. ‘Yeah. I know. I’d like to get Daisy down there with me tomorrow. It’s one of the days they often meet. For starters, we could get pictures of the cars, but you never know, we might get lucky and get something else.’

  Daisy was dubious. ‘I’ve never been one to stake people out, Sharon. Lurking behind bushes for the sleazy snap, that kind of thing.’

  ‘Well maybe just this once that’s what we’ll have to do.’ Sharon was short. She clearly felt she was onto a good story and wasn’t about to let it go.

  ‘A good scandal would send sales rocketing,’ said Murdoch.

  ‘Scandal certainly sells,’ Jay said ruefully.

  ‘The affair would be a good enough story on its own,’ said Sharon determinedly. ‘We could get the furious wronged wife angle too. But if we’re careful, we can expose the affair and just mention that Carlton Catering is shortlisted for a contract without actually making any kind of allegation that there is a link.’

  ‘Daisy?’ Jay turned to her.

  She sighed. ‘OK. I’ll give it a go.’ It was a long way from an art-photograph exhibition, but it paid the bills.

  ‘We need to try to get this story nailed this week if we can, before the contract decision is made. We could still expose it later, but there would be more impact right now.’

  ‘Right. Thanks team.’ Jay stood, signalling the end of the meeting. ‘We’ll get the flooding story in the bag for sure and use it on the front if this one’s not a goer. OK?’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘Am I interrupting?’ came a diffident voice as Sir Cosmo Fleming poked his head round the door. ‘Ruby said to go on in.’

  ‘Not at all. You could be witnessing a great turning point. What do the stars say for us this week?’

  Jay stood up and went over to shake his hand. He’d decided not only that they should retain the horoscopes, but also that Sir Cosmo was an influential local contact. And charm was something Jay Bond did very well when he chose to. Daisy smiled inwardly. Cosmo was such a sweetie, she’d have hated to see him given the chop.

  Cosmo, who had been stealing covert glances in Sharon’s direction, focused on Jay.

  ‘You’re Aquarius, aren’t you? For you, the aspects are exceptionally good. You like to solve problems, rise to a challenge, bring fresh approaches but always have to seek balance.’

  ‘Hey Cosmo, tell me mine.’ Sharon, who was attending a business lunch later in the morning, was dressed to kill in a smart suit and high heels. Cosmo looked at her with such longing that Daisy almost laughed, but Sharon seemed blissfully unaware of his feelings.

  ‘With Mars high in the sky, you are in fighting mood,’ said Cosmo gravely, ‘but Venus is rising. You only have to look in the right place and you will find the love you seek.’

  ‘Oo-er,’ Dave whistled. ‘Hey Shar, go on, look at me!’

  ‘Piss off,’ said Sharon.

  Chapter Twenty

  The car park at the Black Horse was quite full, but Daisy and Sharon had two pieces of luck. First, having checked Joyce Carlton’s car registration with Sharon’s friend on Reception, they discovered that on this occasion it was parked adjacent to the Lexus they knew belonged to Provost Archie Porter. And second, they managed to park Daisy’s Suzuki, its bumper still dented from the nose dive into the ditch near Kelso, facing square on to the back façade of the building – and to the room that Joyce Carlton was in that night.

  It was the only luck they’d had, thought Daisy miserably as she huddled down into her fleece, her camera on her knees at the ready. They’d been here two hours already and to her mind, there didn’t seem any point in waiting any longer.

  ‘We’re never going to get anything,’ she said to Sharon for at least the fourth time. ‘I mean, Christ, the curtains are drawn. What could we possibly get, for heaven’s sake?’ Even if a miracle happened, she would have to shoot without a flash if she could, to avoid being caught.

  ‘Dunno,’ said Sharon curtly. ‘We just have to hope for something.’

  ‘Just seems a waste of time.’

  Sharon sighed. ‘Just shut it, Daisy, will you?’

  Daisy’s hand went to her pocket before she remembered that there was no Tiny Ted to stroke for comfort. It was so automatic a gesture that she still did it a dozen times a day and still had the same feeling of loss when she remembered he’d gone for ever.

  ‘Well I just …’

  ‘Shut … it.’

  She clamped her mouth shut resignedly. A stake-out. She was sitting here doing a stake-out when she could have been at the gym or making plans for how to get Jack back. Then there was Ben and Lizzie. Last night, when she’d got home from work, Lizzie had poured her a large glass of wine and sat her down in the kitchen to tell her what she had already guessed – that she had started seeing Ben Gillies.

  ‘You don’t mind, do you, Dais?’ Lizzie had the look of a woman who had recently enjoyed very exciting sex. A glow had settled around her. Her skin was looking peachy and her eyes sparked with life. ‘Do you mind?’ Lizzie asked again, ‘because if you do I’ll stop seeing him right now. But Ben said you’d made it clear you weren’t interested.’

  ‘’Course I’m not interested. It’s never occurred to me to date Ben. He’s just a friend.’ It was how she’d always thought of him – until s
he knew he’d fallen into bed with her best friend. Now she understood that it was possible to view Ben Gillies in a different light.

  Sharon sat up straight. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘What’s what?’

  ‘I thought I saw something at their window.’

  ‘How? Nothing to see, Shar. Curtains.’

  ‘They moved, I’m sure they did.’

  ‘Perhaps fat Archie farted and she tried to open the window.’

  Sharon laughed. ‘You can be quite funny, Daisy. Anyway, whatever it was, it seems to have stopped. I can’t see anything now.’

  She couldn’t see anything either. Curtains had closed in front of her and she couldn’t see past them. Of course she still wanted to win Jack back. Whatever it took.

  But she felt indefinably uneasy about Ben and Lizzie.

  Sod it. She was chilly. ‘Got any of that tea left?’

  ‘Yeah. A bit.’

  ‘Any chance of another cuppa?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘No? Why not? Don’t be mean.’

  ‘Sorry Daisy, it’s too early. We could be here for hours. I can’t have you running off for a pee at the crucial moment and missing the money shot.’

  Bugger. Daisy lapsed into a grumpy silence and moved her mind on to Jack – never a difficult thing to do. How was she going to move things on? He was really friendly now, but somehow she had to precipitate a crisis with Iris – surely that wouldn’t take much doing? Or at the very least, she had to find a way to have a real conversation with him, the kind you couldn’t have in the gym. A thought occurred to her. Thursday was the day of the cookery evening class. Jack had stopped going ages ago, he’d told her so, but Iris still went every week. Ideal. She’d buy a really good bottle of wine and go and knock on his door. Perfect.

  ‘There!’

  ‘Where? What?’