CHAPTER NINE
‘FOR heaven’s sake, Emily, you look terrible,’ said Ginny, when they met as usual the next day. ‘Are you in mourning, or something?’
To match her mood, Emily was wearing unrelieved black, the only touch of colour her eyes and a lipstick so bright she rarely used it on the mouth she considered too full for bright shades. ‘I’m tired, that’s all.’
‘You’re sure you haven’t caught this man’s flu?’
‘Yes. It’s just lack of sleep.’
‘So what’s keeping you awake at night?’
Not even to Ginny could Emily confide the real reason for her insomnia. Instead, she told her friend about Nat and Thea and the phantom lover.
Ginny chuckled as she dished out coffee and buns and gave Emily the gooiest. ‘You look as though you could do with it. Are you eating properly?’
‘Yes, Mummy!’ Emily tucked into her cake, feeling better, as always, in Ginny’s company. ‘How’s Charlie?’
‘At a conference this weekend. At least, that’s what he tells me.’
‘Come off it,’ jeered Emily. ‘You know perfectly well Charlie’s never looked at another woman since the day he met you.’
‘Of course I do,’ said Ginny fondly. ‘This all came up unexpectedly. He had to take someone else’s place. So how about coming round to our place to keep me company tonight? We can get a bottle of wine and a video and be all girly.’
Emily gave a fleeting thought to the work she’d meant to do on her novel over the weekend, but the prospect of a day away from her lonely room—and her telephone—was too tempting to pass up. ‘I’d like that a lot.’
Emily slept better on Ginny’s sofabed than she had for some time, and returned to Spitalfields late the following afternoon, surprised to find no messages for once. Her immediate reaction was sharp disappointment because Lucas hadn’t rung, followed by relief because Miles hadn’t either. Emily put out a hand to ring Lucas, then changed her mind and opened the laptop instead. She would recycle her emotions by transferring them to the central female character in her novel.
Next morning, Emily was on her way out of the Donaldsons’ flat when the bell rang. When she opened the door as far as the safety-chain allowed, her heart skipped a beat at the sight of Lucas.
‘Let me in, Emily.’
She took the chain off and turned away to pick up her bag. ‘I’m just leaving.’
‘I was afraid I’d missed you.’ He stood just inside the door, looming large in the padded jacket. ‘How are you?’
‘Fine. How are you?’
‘Only a few more antibiotics to go. I’ll be back in work soon.’
‘That’s good.’
Silence fell, loud with things unsaid.
‘Look, it’s too soon for me to know yet, Lucas,’ said Emily, cutting straight to the chase. ‘I promised to let you know and I will.’ She gave him a wry little smile. ‘My father’s a clergyman, remember. He brought me up to keep my promises.’
‘Admirable habit,’ said Lucas, relieving her of the backpack. ‘I never knew my father.’
Emily’s eyes softened. ‘He died when you were little?’
‘No. When Ally and I were small he just left home one day and never came back.’
She gazed at him in horror. ‘Why?’
‘When my mother thought we were old enough to understand, she told us he was a free spirit who felt stifled by marriage and fatherhood.’ His jaw clenched. ‘She was wrong.’
‘About your father?’
‘About me. I’ll never understand how a man could do that. Just take off and slough off his responsibilities like so much unwanted baggage.’ Lucas paused. ‘Look, if you’ve finished here have some coffee at my place before you go back, Emily.’
‘All right.’ She made sure the door was locked behind them and followed Lucas into the lift.
‘I rang you over the weekend,’ he informed her.
‘You didn’t leave a message.’
‘The idea was to speak to you, not to a machine.’
‘I was with the friend I used to live with. Ginny and I still meet every Saturday morning, but this weekend her husband was away so I stayed the night with her. Though I don’t know why I’m telling you this,’ she added with sudden irritability. ‘I don’t have to report to you.’
Lucas smiled faintly as they reached the ground floor. ‘True. But I was worried when I couldn’t reach you.’
‘Why?’ she demanded, shivering in the wind which funnelled down the street as they crossed the cobbles to his building.
‘I was afraid you’d succumbed to my flu after all.’
‘In which case, I would have been in my room.’
‘You could have gone home to your mother for more cosseting.’
She shook her head. ‘I’m keeping well away from Chastlecombe for the time being.’
The lift in the converted warehouse was bigger than in the modern building next door, but even so Emily felt hot and bothered by the time they reached the top floor. In such close proximity to Lucas every hormone she possessed clamoured in response to the warmth from his body and the familiar tang of the soap he used mingled with the clean male scent of his skin. When they went into his flat he dumped her bag down, shed his jacket and took her raincoat, as though they’d done this a hundred times before, then followed her into the kitchen.
‘Shall I make the coffee?’ offered Emily.
‘If you like.’ He gave her a straight look. ‘I take it you’re here with me solely out of pity about my defecting father?’
‘Sympathy, not pity.’ Which wasn’t the exact truth. She’d come with him because she wanted—needed—to be with him, if only for a little while, before going back to her solitary room.
Lucas sat on a stool and leaned his elbows on the counter to watch her get to grips with the coffee-machine. ‘Normally, I never discuss my father. But I told you the story, Emily, to make a point. Well, two points, actually.’
Emily threw him a curious look as she took porcelain mugs from a cupboard. ‘Which are?’
‘First of all, it seemed a good idea to kill this bee in your bonnet about the social difference between us. I’m well-educated, I admit, but that’s because I’ve always worked hard and I’ve been lucky enough to win scholarships at the necessary stages. And these days I’m successful in my career. But you fell asleep on me the other night so I didn’t tell the whole story. Unlike you, Emily Warner, I’m the product of a single parent family. When my father abandoned us we moved in with my grandmother and Mother had to go back to work to feed and clothe us.’
Emily gazed at him in horrified sympathy as she passed him his coffee. ‘What did she do?’
‘She’d been a legal secretary before her marriage, but to earn money straight away she worked in a shop before she finally landed a job with the local solicitor.’ Lucas’s mouth twisted. ‘Ally and I used to cry for our father in the beginning, but in the way of the young we eventually forgot him. I was in my first year in grammar school before the lack of a dad was really brought home to me. Schoolboys can be cruel young savages.’
‘Did your father ever come back?’ said Emily.
‘No. In true beachcombing fashion his free spirit eventually took him to a Pacific island so small and remote it took months for news of his death to reach my mother.’
‘After all that time was she upset?’
‘Inconsolable for a while.’ His eyes hardened. ‘She’d never stopped loving him.’
Emily finished her coffee, at a loss for something to say. Even on acquaintance as short as theirs, she knew that baring his soul was hard for Lucas Tennent. He would probably curse himself for it afterwards. Maybe her, too.
‘I had another reason for telling you,’ he informed her, picking up on her reaction. ‘If you are expecting my baby, Emily, you can be sure I won’t evade my responsibilities. No child of mine will grow up without knowing his father.’
‘That’s very high-minded and noble,’ sh
e commented after a pause. ‘Doesn’t the mother—me, in this particular instance—have a say in this?’
Lucas’s eyes flickered in surprise. ‘Well, yes, of course. But surely you want my support if the worst happens?’
Emily’s unruly heart contracted painfully. She looked at her watch. ‘Time I was off. Let me know when you go back to work and I’ll come and sort this place out for you. Unless you’d rather find another cleaner—’
‘To hell with the cleaning! We need to talk about the necessary arrangements if you’re pregnant, woman,’ he growled, intercepting her as she passed him.
‘Let’s leave all that until I know whether the worst has actually happened,’ she flung at him. ‘Goodbye, Lucas.’
‘Emily,’ he said, striding after her as she made for the door. ‘I put it badly—’
‘But so accurately. My sentiments, exactly.’ Emily turned her back on him and got in the lift she was beginning to dislike, because lately she so often went down in it feeling utterly miserable.
When she got back, Emily was surprised to find Nat in the hall as she let herself in.
‘I’m on a flying visit. Louise Powell’s with Thea,’ he explained. ‘She’ll fetch the twins and stay with Thea until I get back. My presence is required at a meeting this afternoon, then I’ll come here afterwards for some clothes and go back to Chastlecombe for the rest of the week.’
‘How is Thea?’
‘Better, but still pretty fragile, poor darling.’ Nat’s grin took ten years off him. ‘But with my tender loving care she’ll soon be right as rain.’
‘I’d send her my love, but I’m not top of Thea’s list at the moment,’ said Emily glumly.
‘Actually, she’s come round on that subject now, even begged me not to tell you she’d been so silly.’
Emily brightened. ‘I’m off the hook, then?’
‘Not exactly. She’s still asking for details of this dream lover of yours.’ Nat grinned widely. ‘I was pretty unimaginative—tall, dark and handsome was all I could come up with. Must run—see you later.’
Emily trudged up the stairs to her room, cheering up a little when there were no messages waiting for her. Miles had obviously given up.
With no need to clean for Nat that day, Emily decided to skip lunch until she’d done Mark’s rooms, and put in a couple of hours before retreating upstairs for a shower. Afterwards, comfortable in pull-on pink jersey trousers and black cable sweater, Emily made a sandwich and drank some tea. While she’d been cleaning, thoughts of Lucas kept coming between her and the next instalment, but now, she ordered herself, opening the laptop, she would banish him by getting to grips with her story. She spent a long time editing what she’d written, then started on the next chapter. For a long time her absorption was fierce, but eventually it dawned on her that there was something going on downstairs. Emily opened her door to hear familiar voices raised in altercation in the hall far below, and flew, barefoot, down two flights of stairs, skidding to a halt in the hall when two male faces swivelled towards her; Nat’s deeply embarrassed, the other rigid with offence.
‘A slight misunderstanding, Em,’ explained Nat. ‘I’ve just tried to throw your visitor out. From your description I thought he was Miles Denny.’
‘I’d better introduce you,’ said Emily, her spirits rising so precipitously that she smiled brilliantly on both men. ‘Nat, this is Liz’s friend, Lucas Tennent, one of the people I clean for. As you’ve probably guessed, Lucas, this is Nat Sedley, my landlord.’
The two men eyed each other warily, then Nat’s face broke into an apologetic grin as he held out his hand to Lucas. ‘Humble apologies! A case of mistaken identity. Emily’s brother gave me strict instructions to throw the ex-boyfriend out if he showed his face here.’
To Emily’s relief, Lucas grinned back as he shifted a sheaf of flowers to the hand holding a carrier-bag so he could shake Nat’s. ‘No harm done. The flowers suffered the most.’
‘Are they for me?’ said Emily idiotically.
‘Who else?’ said Lucas, and thrust them at her. ‘Perhaps you can salvage some of them.’
Nat’s vivid blue eyes moved from one face to the other with interest. ‘Look, I’m just off to Gloucestershire, so I haven’t got time to give you a whisky by way of apology, but Emily can do that. She knows where I keep the drinks. Make yourself at home in my place, if you like—not, I assure you, that I object to gentleman callers in Emily’s room.’ He glanced at his watch and whistled. ‘I’m late. Promised to be home by bathtime. See you.’
He grabbed a suitcase and went out at a run, leaving a tense silence behind him after he closed his elegant front door.
‘Do you get many?’ asked Lucas eventually.
‘Flowers?’
‘Callers.’
Emily shook her head. ‘You’re the first.’
Another silence.
‘So what do we do now?’ he asked. ‘Do you want me to go?’
She looked down at the flowers. ‘I’d better put these in water. Would you like that whisky Nat mentioned?’
‘Damn right I would.’ He smiled crookedly. ‘It’s not every day of the week I get mugged.’
Emily chuckled. ‘I don’t see a black eye.’
‘No, fortunately. And it only got as far as it did because Sedley took me by surprise. I didn’t anticipate ejection into the street the minute I mentioned your name!’
She smiled ruefully. ‘Sorry about that. Nat’s never met Miles. I just gave him a description.’
‘Which obviously fitted me down to the ground.’
‘Not really. You’re both tall, dark and very—’ She halted.
‘Go on!’
‘In Miles’s case, very full of himself.’
Lucas looked offended. ‘And is that how you see me?’
‘No. Confident, maybe? Self-assured?’
‘Better,’ he conceded grudgingly. ‘And is Miles prettier than me?’
‘Heavens, no. You win by a length in the looks department.’ She showed him into Nat’s small, elegant drawing-room. ‘If you’ll wait here for a moment I’ll just put these in water.’
Emily hurried along the hall to Nat’s kitchen, thrust the sheaf of spring flowers into the kitchen sink, half-filled it with water, then rejoined Lucas, who was taking in his surroundings with interest.
‘Your landlord has great taste,’ he told her, then frowned as his eyes dropped to her feet. ‘Shouldn’t you be wearing shoes?’
‘When I heard the fracas I ran down as I was.’ Emily hesitated. ‘Look, it was very kind of Nat to offer the use of his place, but—’
‘You’d rather I left.’
‘No,’ she said impatiently. ‘I didn’t mean that at all. I don’t have any whisky, but I can offer you some reasonable wine. Though you’ll have to come up to my room to share it. Don’t worry,’ she added. ‘My mother provided me with a chair comfortable enough for you to sit in.’
‘I’m delighted.’ He grinned. ‘Are you all right without shoes, or shall I carry you up?’
‘In your state of health?’ she jeered. ‘Be warned. These are serious stairs—two flights of them, and murderously steep.’
‘Stairway to heaven,’ he said promptly. ‘If your room’s at the top.’
‘Corny!’ Emily wrinkled her nose at him, then started up the stairs with a practised speed which had Lucas coughing by the time they reached the landing outside her room.
‘Holy Moses!’ he gasped. ‘This place could do with a lift.’
‘Inharmonious with early Georgian architecture,’ she said loftily, and went through her open door, beckoning Lucas inside. ‘Welcome to my eyrie.’
Like the rest of the house, the room was high-ceilinged, with beautiful plasterwork picked out in white against walls painted pale, authentic green.
Looking at the room as though he meant to memorise it, Lucas stood in the doorway, carrier-bag in hand, while Emily closed down her laptop, burningly aware of his physical presence. In blac
k jeans and a brown leather windbreaker well-worn enough to match the bigger chair, he dominated her private space to such an extent she wished they’d stayed downstairs in Nat’s place.
‘Great room,’ he said at last. ‘Your taste in furnishing or Sedley’s?’
‘The paintwork had been done and the bed and wardrobe were already in situ. But Andy donated the chair and table I use as a work-station, the leather chair came from home, and I bought the other one in the antiques market near your place. It was a bit battered, but I found a biggish remnant of rose corded velvet to cover it—a bit faded, but I like that—and there was enough left over for the bed.’ Enough, she told herself sharply, and gave him a bright, social smile. ‘It’s a bit of a surprise to see you here, Lucas, but now you are, do you approve?’
‘Very much,’ he assured her, and handed her the bag. ‘I brought your coat back.’
‘Thank you. Come in and close the door. You can put your jacket on the bed.’
Lucas’s smile was wry as he removed the jacket to reveal a black roll-neck sweater. ‘You know, Emily, when Sedley wouldn’t let me in I thought he was acting on your instructions.’
She shook her head and hung the velvet coat in the wardrobe. ‘I never expected you to come here.’
‘I came to grovel, make my peace. Unfortunately, my olive branch got a bit mangled.’
‘A soak in some water and the flowers will soon revive,’ she said, suddenly feeling breathless. The room seemed to have shrunk in size now they were alone in it together. ‘I’ll open that wine.’
‘Let me do it for you.’
Emily went behind the screen to take a bottle from her tiny fridge and collected glasses and corkscrew from one of her shelves. ‘It’s not champagne, I’m afraid.’
Lucas removed the cork and poured the wine into the glasses she’d set down on the crowded table. He handed one over and raised his own. ‘To your beautiful eyes, Emily Warner,’ he said, and tasted the wine.
City Cinderella Page 11