The Feisty Fiancée

by Jessica Steele

  She was on the point of leaving, however, and was in fact making her goodbyes, when Mrs Fisher suddenly asked if she was going anywhere close to the nearby supermarket.

  'I'm sure I must be,' Yancie obliged.

  She shouldn't, Yancie knew as she sped down the motorway to Staffordshire, have wandered around the supermarket with Mrs Fisher. But, for goodness' sake, surely she wasn't expected to leave the old dear to carry all that shopping back on her own!

  The only trouble now, of course, was that there was no way that she was going to be able to pick up sir at six. He'd have her hide, she knew it. He'd be kept waiting-and she'd like to bet that no one ever kept him waiting.

  It was ten past six now, and there were miles to go yet. She glanced at the petrol gauge, and found fresh cause to worry. Oh, grief, she was driving again on empty! She normally spent her waiting time filling up and checking her vehicle was ready for the return journey. Only she hadn't this time-and she dared not stop now. She remembered the last time a petrol gauge had registered empty, and how that time she'd come close to disaster. She'd been visiting Mrs Fisher that time too. Perhaps the Fisher family were a jinx on her.

  She made a vow there and then to let Wilf Fisher deliver his own parcels in future. Though in fairness it wasn't anybody's fault but her own. She was late because she'd stayed for tea and cake-so all right, Thomson Wakefield had ordered her to take refreshment-he just hadn't expected she'd trip into the next county to carry out his instructions, that was all.

  Thomson had been around the last time she'd been rushing back from Derbyshirehe'd been angry then; he'd be furious now. Oh, help, half past six-he'd skin her!

  It was ten to seven when Yancie pulled up to collect her employer. She could see at once that he was not a happy man. She opted to stay in the driver's seat-the sooner she got started, the sooner she'd get him back to London.

  Though first, as if to deliberately keep her waiting this time, Thomson Wakefield took a slow, methodical walk all around the car, every bit as though checking to see how many dents she had put in it. Sauce! Anyone would think she went around having accidents-there wasn't so much as a scratch on the Jaguar.

  Eventually he opened a rear door and got in. Yancie saw it as her cue to prostrate herself at his feet. Fat chance! But, `I'm sorry,' she began-she owed him that much. Only he didn't want to hear the rest of it.

  'Save it!' he snarled.

  Yancie was happy to. She had just discovered she had more of an aversion to lying to him than she'd realised. Although, in reality, she hadn't any idea what she could have added to her apology that wouldn't implicate Wilf Fisher. But in any event Wilf hadn't exactly held a gun to her head. She could have, and should have-of course-told him to post his mother the wool parcel, though it had been more of a sackful than some small, neat parcel.

  Suddenly Yancie became aware that she must have missed a turn somewhere. Where had the town gone? By now she should be in a lit-up area heading towards the motorway. Instead she was in a dark, tree-lined area with no sign of a motorway. In fact, the road she was travelling on seemed to be getting narrower and narrower. And where was all the traffic? There was none. She was in the middle of nowhere with not so much as a streetlamp about, leave alone another vehicle. Oh, grief!

  'You do know where you're going?' enquired a nasty, disgruntled voice from the back.

  And Yancie found she could still conjure up the occasional lie-when desperate. `I know a short cut,' she answered, hoping he would think she was taking the short cut. Icy silence was her answer.

  Shame about him. He who liked to work the whole of the time. It was much too dark to see to read paperwork, much less make a few pencilled notes. Though it wouldn't surprise her if any minute now he didn't get out his tape machine and start dictating letters for Veronica Taylor to type back in the morning.

  Then it happened. The engine cut out. Oh, no! How could she have forgotten? The Jaguar slowed to a stop. The silence behind her was deafening. `I…' she found her voice, slightly strangulated though it sounded '…because of my rush-er-my fault,' she added hurriedly,"my fault entirely. I-um-didn't fill up with petrol.'

  Silence again; she imagined her disgruntled employer was counting up to ten. She was not flavour of the month, she knew that much anyway when, his voice holding several degrees of frost, he ordered, `Then perhaps you wouldn't mind filing up with petrol now.'

  Yancie was getting seriously fed up with him. `Where from?' she asked, a touch snappily, she had to own.

  'You tell me-I thought you knew this ` `short cut".'

  Swine, pig, toad! He knew full well she had been lying. `There's a petrol can in the boot,' she hinted. Bubbles to it, if anybody was going for petrol, it was going to be him, not her.

  'I'll see you when you get back,' he stated charmingly.

  'Me? '

  'It was your lot who wanted equality of the sexes,' he pointed out, quite fairly, she knewbut it didn't endear him to her any. `On your way.'

  Silently calling him all the foul names she could think of, Yancie got out of the car and opened up the boot. Everything neat and tidy-car rug, first-aid kit. Ah, there it was. She took the can for petrol from the boot and, on a spirit of the moment, took the car rug as well.

  She closed the boot, and went and opened the rear passenger door and tossed the car rug inside. `I may be some time,' she said in the manner of Captain Oates-who had gone and had never come back. She thought she heard a sound that might have been a smothered laugh-but she didn't believe it.

  She closed the door and looked aboutthere was nothing to see! Which way? Well, she wasn't going back the way they had come. If there had been a petrol station in the last five miles she'd have noticed it, remembered it, she felt sure of it.

  She liked walking, Yancie told herself as she headed in the direction the car had been facing. So, okay, she was wearing two-and-ahalf-inch heels and the road was getting more rutty than tarmacked by the minute. Where the dickens was she? Not on any main road, that was for sure. Oh, help, she'd nearly fallen over then.

  Yancie concentrated on walking in a straight line-only the road wasn't straight; she went round a bend, knowing she was out of sight of the car, not that Wakefield could see her in the dark-not that he'd be watching. He'd be too busy dictating something or other into that infernal machine.

  What was that? She heard a sound, and then another in the trees to her right, and swallowed down fear. Don't be a sissy; country dwellers hear those sorts of noises the whole time.

  The sound came again, to her left this time. It was so dark, and she was scared, and as the sound came again she knew she definitely hadn't imagined it. There it was again, behind her this time-she hurried up her pace, her mouth drying.

  Footsteps! She could have sworn she heard footsteps behind her. Fear gripped her. Here she was, half petrified, while that smug swine Wakefield was comfortably ensconced under a car rug to keep out the chill. Here was she, ploughing through… Her palms went moist… Those were definitely footfalls she'd heard. Somebody was creeping up behind her.

  She hurried up her step. Keep calm, keep calm. She heard a twig snap not too far away-and then the sound of rapidly approaching feet! Yancie tossed away the petrol container she was carrying and took off.

  She did not get very far. Because suddenly, close by, a voice called, 'Yancie, you idiot, it's me!' and she halted in flight. Halted, turned, took a pace, and cannoned straight into Thomson Wakefield-and hit him.

  'You pig!' she yelled, her control shot, feeling a mixture of relief and anger that he could so frighten the daylights out of her. Anger with herself that she could be so weak, so pathetic as to be scared-and to indeed feel every bit the idiot he had called her.

  'Shh-it's all right,' Thomson attempted to calm her.

  She was not to be calmed. `How dare you sneak up on me?' she yelled, and punched him again, hitting his shoulder. She might have hit him a third time, but he had taken hold of her arms and anchored them to her sides-about the only
way to stop her practising on him for a world-title fight.

  'Shh…' he said softly again. `I didn't mean to scare you. I…'

  'Well, you did!' she raged, but owned shee was feeling much, much better.

  'I'm so, so sorry,' he apologised handsomely, and, now that she had stopped hitting him, had one arm around her. Instinctively Yancie leant her head against his chest, feeling better still and comforted, when, as if to hold her there, Thomson placed a hand to the back of her head. And Yancie felt all at once strangely at peace-as if this was where she should be.

  But somewhere in her mind she knew that she should break away before Thomson pushed her away. Yet she didn't seem able to move, and he didn't seem in any hurry to let her go.

  'You're very kind,' she said against his chest.

  'You really were scared, weren't you?' he teased.

  'You mean to say nobody ever accused you of being kind before,' she actually heard herself laugh-and once more began to feel back in charge, and the Yancie Dawkins she had always known herself to be. She took a step back, and he let go of her. `I threw the petrol can away,' she said, somehow knowing that she would never forget those wonderful soothing moments when Thomson Wakefield had held her against him to comfort her. 'We'll never find it; it's much too dark.'

  'Suddenly you're "we",' he answered, telling her if she didn't know it that he had no intention of scrabbling around looking for it.

  'So,' she said, `since you're the brains of this outfit, what do you suggest I do?'

  'Go to the farm, and see if they can help out.'

  'What farm?"

  'Didn't you see the lights?'

  'You're taller than me.'

  'I'll come with you,' he said. She wasn't arguing-she'd had enough of wandering around pitch-black, deserted country roads on her own.

  It was quite a way to the farm and she instinctively took hold of Thomson's arm when they left the road, crossed a field and trod ankle-deep in mud. She didn't quite fancy going splat on her face. He didn't seem to objecthe didn't shrug her hand off anyhow. In fact, he really was as kind as she'd said, talking to her quietly as they went, seeming more considerate of the fright he'd given her than bothered that his day's work was ending up with him up to his trousers in quagmire.

  Yancie was growing to like him more and more as they trudged on to the ever nearing lights shining from the farmhouse. By the time they were knocking on the farmhouse door, she had decided that she was definitely never, ever, going to lie to him again.

  'I'm sorry to trouble you…' Thomson began when someone came to the door, and Yancie's heart was warmed when the farmer not only supplied them with some petrol, but insisted on driving them back to their car.

  Yancie gave her own thanks to the farmer and left Thomson talking to himm as they emptied the fuel into the petrol tank.

  She was in the driving seat when the farmer drove off. She started the engine and it purred into life. Then, while she waited for Thomson to get into the back seat of the car, to her surprise, he came and opened the driver's door.

  'I'm driving,' he said.

  'No, you're not!' she argued-she was the driver. `And it's cold with the door open.'

  The interior light stayed on. Thomson studied her. `I could pull rank, or I could physically move you.'

  Yancie considered her options. `You're saying you're fed up and you want to go home and you don't want me to take you on any more short cuts?'

  He just looked at her. In any other circumstances she had an idea he might have laughed. But suddenly she was contrite. He'd had a long day, she'd had a long day-and they were both tired. Without saying another word she got out and went round to the other side, opening the front passenger door, absently tossing her shoulder bag from the front passenger seat to the rear.

  They were driving along before it suddenly occurred to her to ask, `Was I supposed to sit in the back?' Thomson didn't answer, but half turned, a trace of amusement on his mouth before he gave his attention back to the road.

  Shortly afterwards they stopped to fill up with petrol and Yancie stayed with the front seat. She felt right there. And if Thomson didn't want her sitting next to him, then she full well knew he wouldn't mince words to tell her so.

  'Where did you get to this afternoon?' he asked conversationally when they were on their way again.

  'Where?' she questioned in return, playing for time, her decision to always tell him the truth soon under attack.

  'There were an additional sixty miles on the milometer.'

  'Trust you to take a note,' Yancie accused stiffly, knowing she still hadn't got the hang of this being employed lark, though having an idea she shouldn't be answering back. But really!

  'I didn't intentionally,' Thomson answered, quite civilly, she felt, considering she was all snappy and snarly.

  'You have a brain that automatically registers numbers?"

  'Quite often without me being aware of it,' he agreed. `So, left with time on your hands, you decided to go and take tea with one of your friends from nursery school who happens to live barely thirty miles distant?'

  Yancie by then was forming the opinion that he didn't really want to know, and started to like him afresh that he seemed, by chatting to her in this conversational way, to want to make amends for previously scaring the living daylights out of her.

  But, although she hadn't been having tea with one of her old friends, she had been having tea with someone. And, very conscious of his clever brain, Yancie didn't want him prying further when who knew?-she might in advertently let the name `Fisher' slip-and from there she might get Wilf into trouble. So, `No,' she said briefly, `I didn't.'

  'Then you must have been visiting your sister.'

  She laughed. `I don't have a sis…' She stopped laughing.

  'You don't?' he questioned evenly. `You mean there's no little Miranda-Cassandra?'

  Oh, help! Yancie took a glance at him. She thought she might see him looking angry. But no, if anything he looked amused that she had been so neatly tripped up. And it was then that she knew that he had known all along that she didn't have a sister. All the time she'd been trotting out that tale about her niece leaving her inseparable toy behind, he had known she had neither sister nor niece. That she had been lying her head off.

  'I confess,' she owned up-what choice did she have? `I'm an only child. But,' she hurried on, still desperate to keep her job, `I will never, ever, lie to you again.'

  She held her breath-was it goodbye time? Thomson glanced at her. `Promises, promises,' he said. Yancie breathed again.

  Some while later she recognised they were nearing the smart area where Astra's father's flat was… `I should be driving you home,' she said hurriedly.

  'You've had a long and-trying-day,' he answered kindly.

  And Yancie was quite taken suddenly by the fact that this man she was sitting beside had not barked at her once in the last couple of hours. She was still feeling a little bemused by his kindness when, Thomson having read her address once, apparently, and with his photographic memory filed it away, he pulled the car up outside her home.

  She vaguely recalled she had a shoulder bag in the back somewhere, and stretched an arm back, connected with it, but in pulling it over she accidentally clipped Thomson on the ear with it.

  Oh, my word, he was not amused. But unfortunately, at the what-the-hell-are-you going-to-do-next kind of look he threw at her, Yancie very nearly collapsed.

  Oh, help, she could feel a fit of the giggles coming on. It was his pained expression that triggered it. She laughed; he didn't. She strove hard for control-it was a wasted effort. Thomson got out of the car. Think of something awful. She couldn't.

  He came round to the passenger door and Yancie got out of the car, her eyes brimming with merriment. She coughed down another giggle as she struggled for control.

  Oh, my giddy aunt, she would have sworn she hadn't had a fit of the giggles since she and her cousins had been at boarding-school. But, as she stood on the pavemen
t with him, so Yancie knew she was fighting a losing battle with her giggle-muscles.

  She was still swallowing down laughter, or trying to, when Thomson, standing there silently studying her, found the cure. `You're stupid!' he gritted exasperatedly. And when that only seemed to make her explode into more giggles he did no more than catch hold of her and, his head starting to come nearer, he kissed her.

  There was not a glimmer of laughter about Yancie when he pulled back to look down at her. Satisfied, as she just stood there and stared at him, Thomson, without so much as a goodnight, turned and walked away.

  Walked away and left her with a wild mixture of emotions raging in her. He started up the Jaguar and drove off, but Yancie didn't move. She had known Thomson had a wonderful mouth, but had never thought to experience it against her own.

  Yet, while it had not been a lover's kiss, or even a friend's kiss, it was a kiss that seemed to shatter all she knew. Her heart, her mind seemed to be in uproar. She felt breathless, dizzy-and had the craziest notion that-if she didn't know better-she'd have said she had fallen in love with him!

  CHAPTER FIVE

  SHE WAS not, not, not in love with Thomson, Yancie told herself repeatedly as the weekend came and went. She was still telling herself the same thing when Thursday rolled around again-a week, a whole week since she had last seen him-and thoughts of the head man at Addison Kirk seemed to be still totally dominating her mind.

  She supposed, on balance, seeing what a hash she'd made of it the last time she'd been called upon to chauffeur him-when he had ended up chauffeuring her-that she couldn't blame him for not requesting her to drive him since. And yet-even though she wasn't in love with him-she missed him. Indeed, sometimes she felt so heartsore, she ached just to see him. But she wasn't in love with him!