by Liz Fielding
‘Someone has to be there to hold the fort while the future is decided, to reassure the staff—and the bank—and to deal with people like those two men yesterday, or there won’t be a company for anyone to run. As of now, that’s me.’ She lifted her head a little. ‘I didn’t thank you for rescuing me. Yesterday.’
‘I didn’t think you’d noticed.’
Her tense mouth softened as she glanced at him and fell into a natural smile. If she was trying to distract him, she was doing a good job. He’d lived with this woman in his head, in his heart, for three years. He needed to remind himself that that was all a fantasy. That he’d been in the grip of an obsession. That he didn’t actually know her.
Well, all that was going to change. There was definitely something not quite right about her relationship with Steve and he was going to find out what it was.
‘What, exactly, does the company do?’ he asked.
‘Imports the kind of stuff that no one actually needs but most of us love to buy. After his last trip he was really excited about something. He said it was just ticking over for the moment, but that once he was better he’d really show everyone.’
‘Everyone’ being Guy.
‘Maybe he left some notes,’ Guy said quickly, intent on a little distraction of his own. ‘Have you been through his desk? Checked his laptop?’ She looked at him blankly. What was he saying? She’d been nursing the man she loved through a terminal illness. Going through his desk for business notes would have been the last thing on her mind. ‘Has anyone else?’ he said.
She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I suppose I should have brought his laptop with me today. Some businesswoman I’m going to make…’
‘Give yourself a chance. That you’re even going into the office today shows enormous strength.’ Then, ‘We could look at it together if that would help?’
‘We? Why would you bother yourself?’
When he couldn’t be bothered to visit while his brother was alive? The unspoken question hung in the air.
‘I’m Steve’s executor,’ he reminded her leadenly, suddenly back to square one. ‘I’m going to have to take a good look at the business. Sort out the best way to go forward. I’ll need your input on that. If you’re going to take an interest in running it.’
‘It’s all I have,’ she reminded him. ‘If I’m going to provide a home for Toby, I don’t have any choice.’
‘Matty doesn’t pay rent for the flat?’
‘Just a nominal amount,’ she said. ‘To cover her share of the outgoings.’ Then, with just a touch of challenge in her voice, ‘I suppose sub-letting of any kind is forbidden under the lease too?’
‘Don’t worry about it.’
‘I don’t think the landlord is going to be that relaxed about it, do you?’ Then, ‘We’ll need some time to find somewhere else. It’s not such a problem for me, but it will be more difficult for Matty. I realise she’s not your concern, of course.’
‘Unlike you.’
‘I am not your concern, Guy.’
He glanced at her. ‘Shall we discuss that once you’ve told me what you weren’t prepared to say in front of Tom Palmer?’
Francesca had hoped that Guy might have forgotten their precipitate departure from Tom Palmer’s office. Which was pretty stupid of her.
As stupid as allowing herself to lose her temper with him. She’d come so close to blurting everything out, just to shut him up. Everyone in that room knew Steven had lied to her. Well, that was what he’d been like. He had been weak. Charming, but weak. But even when you’d known him you’d still believed him. Even Guy had been fooled…
Guiltily, she slammed mental doors on the disloyal thoughts. She had lived a charmed life. She’d been pampered, cared for, envied by friends who constantly worried about their partners straying at the first temptation.
She had never doubted that she and Toby came first in his life and now he was dead she wasn’t going to keep quiet while anyone, let alone Guy Dymoke—especially Guy Dymoke—criticised him, judged him, blamed him.
She had been a fool to allow Guy to take charge and practically frogmarch her to his car. Except, of course, if she’d resisted, walked away, he’d have kept pace with her and all she would have been able to do would be hope for a knight errant—in the shape of a black cab—to swoop to the kerb and carry her away. As if that would have shaken him off. All he needed to do was go to Elton Street and wait for her to return.
She glanced at him. Having reminded her of the real purpose of this journey, he was concentrating on getting them through the traffic, taking shortcuts through the narrow little streets that connected the great arteries of London. His face was set, expressionless, all angles and planes that caught the light as they zipped in and out of the traffic. A long, thin nose that was a shade too large. The kind of cheekbones that she’d once seen on a Roman frieze. A mouth, full and sensuous and—
Guy brought the car to a halt, then reversed into a parking space.
‘Oh. You’ve brought me home.’ Then she realised why. ‘You want Steven’s laptop.’
‘That, and it occurred to me that you’d never have managed a hundred yards in those shoes.’
‘No, I suppose not.’ She looked down. ‘My feet are a bit small to fill Steven’s shoes.’
He said nothing, did not move, did not even look at her. She swallowed, suddenly afraid. She knew that if he came inside she would have to tell him everything. That he would be angry with her. Would utterly despise her for the fool she was.
Well, that was fair. She despised herself.
‘Guy?’ she prompted.
He continued to grip the steering wheel. ‘I want you to know that I loved Steve. He probably told you that I was an overbearing big brother, that I tried to run his life, that I had everything and he had nothing…’
A small, telltale sound escaped her throat.
‘I was probably all those things, and yes, I did have an inheritance from my mother that left him feeling less loved, less important, less of everything. The unhappy truth is that he was less loved by his mother. That she didn’t even turn up for his funeral tells you exactly what kind of mother she was. Non-existent. That woman doesn’t have a maternal bone in her body, not an ounce of kindness, and I loathed her for what she did to him. I tried to make it up to him, but nothing I could do ever filled the void, the lack of self-worth, she left in his life. I hoped with you, with Toby, he might begin to find it.’
‘So why did you stay away?’
‘I was the one person who knew every idiotic thing he’d ever done. I’d been getting him out of scrapes since he was big enough to get into them. Always at his shoulder urging him to make something of his life like some nagging conscience.’
He finally looked at her and she felt the need to swallow again.
‘And I was angry with him for not marrying you and he knew it. He said it was your choice, but I knew him…’ Then, ‘It’s complicated.’
‘Life starts out complicated and goes downhill from there,’ she agreed.
‘He was telling the truth for once, wasn’t he?’
She didn’t answer. Instead she opened the car door and swung her legs to the pavement and said, ‘We’d better go in.’
She slid her key into the lock. Matty was downstairs, catching up with her work. Toby wouldn’t be home from nursery school for another half an hour. She glanced at her watch and went through to the comfort zone of the kitchen, where Connie was getting ready to go and pick Toby up.
‘Oh, Fran. You come home.’ Then, catching sight of Guy, ‘You want me to make lunch?’
‘No,’ she said quickly.
‘I just going to fetch Toby. I take him to the park. Feed the ducks, eat ice cream.’ Then, ‘We could come straight home if you like?’
‘No, you go right ahead, Connie. Have you got enough money?’ Not waiting for an answer, she opened her bag, found a banknote and gave it to her. ‘Just for emergencies,’ she said. ‘No need to rush back. To
by deserves a treat.’ Then, feeling as if she had to explain why she was inviting a strange man into her home the day after Steven’s funeral, ‘This is Steven’s brother, Guy, Connie. We’re just going to look through some papers.’ She turned to where Guy was standing in the kitchen doorway. ‘Connie is our nanny, housekeeper, surrogate mother. I don’t know how we’d manage without her.’
As she watched them shake hands she remembered what Matty had said. How worried she was about the future.
‘Does she live in?’ Guy asked when the front door had banged shut behind her.
‘Yes. It’s just as well the house is so big.’
She swallowed. Now they were on their own the kitchen seemed a lot less like a comfort zone.
‘Would you like some coffee?’ she asked to fill the lengthening silence. ‘Before we start.’
‘Why don’t I make it while you go and fetch Steve’s laptop?’
‘You?’ she asked, startled. Then, realising that she was as good as admitting that Steven had never crossed the kitchen threshold, she quickly went on, ‘You mean you want to work in here?’
‘I thought we could use the kitchen table. There’s plenty of room to spread ourselves out. The study is a bit small for two people to work in comfort, I thought.’
‘How do you…?’ Then, ‘Oh, right.’ She kept forgetting that he knew the house intimately. But he was right. The tiny study tucked away on a half-landing was not big enough for two, not unless they were prepared to work very close. ‘I’ll go and fetch it,’ she said quickly. ‘The coffee is—’
‘I’ll find it.’
‘Right,’ she said again. ‘I, um, won’t be a minute. I’ll just—’ She managed to stop herself from saying, slip into something more comfortable. ‘I’ll just change out of this suit.’
‘No rush. I’m not going anywhere.’
If he’d meant to reassure her, she thought, as she kicked off her high heels before picking them up and running upstairs, he’d failed.
Guy filled the kettle, found the coffee, and by the time Francesca had returned was pouring hot water into the cafetière. He looked up and saw that she’d exchanged her suit for a pair of softly tailored grey trousers.
Okay, she was in mourning. And she was three years older than that vibrant girl who’d grabbed his heart, but it was as if her entire personality had been toned down. Her hair, her clothes, her figure. She was just too damned restrained. Not a hair out of place, her make-up perfect. She looked nearer thirty-five than twenty-five.
Not that it was any of his business.
She busied herself with the laptop, all the time avoiding looking at him. ‘The battery’s flat.’
He searched the case, extracted the cable and plugged it into the nearest wall socket and switched it on.
‘What’s the password?’ he asked, as the prompt appeared.
‘Oh, good grief. I’ve no idea.’
He wondered if that was usual. Maybe. He’d had a couple of long-term relationships, but not the live-in kind. Not the kind where you’d exchange computer passwords. But living together for three years…
None of his business, he reminded himself again as he tried the ‘forgotten your password’ prompt, hoping that Steve hadn’t actually taken any notice of advice to use something trickier than his son’s first name. If it was numbers and symbols they’d have to hope that someone in his office knew it.
The hint offered was ‘First Love’. He glanced at Francesca before he could stop himself.
She coloured slightly, but said, ‘I doubt that I can claim that honour, and besides, I think my name would be a bit obvious, don’t you? The first word that anyone would try.’
‘Possibly. Could it be ironic? Some kind of food? There was a time when he would only eat Marmite on toast.’
‘How old was he? Six?’
‘Nineteen.’
Their eyes met and it was as if they’d both had the same thought. Steve, as an unshaven, scruffy student with no money.
She blinked. ‘What about “Toby”?’
He shook his head. First love… And suddenly it came to him. He typed in a name…was offered the hint again. He tried it again without the capital and he was in.
‘What was it?’ she asked.
‘It’s “harry”. All lower case.’
‘Harry? Who’s Harry?’
‘He was a puppy Dad bought him for his fifth birthday. A liver and white springer spaniel. Completely brainless, but it was love at first sight.’
‘He didn’t… He never mentioned him.’ Then her eyes dropped to the screen, as if suddenly aware that there were bigger omissions than that, and he wanted to reassure her about this one, at least.
‘Steve never talked about Harry to anyone after he was killed. He just seemed to blot it out.’
‘Oh,’ she said, the sound small, little more than an expelled breath. ‘How did it happen?’
It occurred to him that he knew things about Steve that she would like to hear. His childhood. Not just the scrapes he had got into, but the fun he’d been, too. He’d had charm, by the bucketful, even then. Talking, remembering with someone else, had to be better than bottling everything up.
‘It was the summer holidays and we were at the cottage in Cornwall,’ he said. Then, realising that she might think he still had it, ‘Dad had to sell it, along with this house, when he had some problems a few years ago.’ She nodded, obviously well briefed on how their father had almost been wiped out financially by the collapse of a bank back in the nineties. The strain had finally killed him… ‘We were going down to the beach and Steve had Harry on one of those long leads that allow a dog to run without letting him go.’ She nodded. ‘You’re supposed to lock them when you’re walking on the road to keep the dog at your heels and, believe me, Harry wasn’t the most disciplined dog in the world.’
‘A bit like his owner, then.’
‘A lot like his owner.’
And they both smiled at their memories of him.
‘They were inseparable.’ He paused for a moment as the sunny image of boy and dog filled his mind. Then, ‘Harry made a lunge at a cat and it took off across the road in panic. He followed and went straight under the wheels of a car. The poor man driving it was devastated, but it wasn’t his fault. He didn’t have a chance.’
‘Oh, poor Steven,’ she murmured, and the hand that went to her mouth was shaking. ‘Poor, poor love.’ Until that moment, apart from the outburst in Tom’s office, she’d had her emotions totally under control. She’d looked drawn and pale, but there had been no hint of tears. Now, as he looked sideways at her, he saw them well up, spill over and, without him knowing exactly how it happened—whether she turned to him, or he reached for her—she was in his arms, sobbing her heart out.
It was one of those bittersweet moments. To hold her against him with only the silk of her shirt between her back and his hands, to take the intoxicating hit of her scent, not in his imagination, but in reality…
Sweet, so sweet.
But to know that she was in his arms only for comfort because the man she loved was dead, that the tears soaking through his shirt and on to his skin had been provoked not so much by what had happened to Steve’s puppy as knowing how much he must have suffered because it had been his own mistake.
He just held her, let her weep. He didn’t say anything. What could he say? The empty comfort words… There, there, it’ll be all right… The words people had said to him when his mother died and he hadn’t understood where she’d gone, only that she wasn’t coming back.
Nothing would ever be all right for her again. Or for Toby.
And he would have to live with the fact that it was his selfishness that had kept him and Steve apart for the last three years.
He’d told Francesca the truth. He had believed that Steve would do better without him around as a constant challenge, but that hadn’t been all of it. His reasons had been darker. Less altruistic. He just couldn’t bear to see them together. Had known tha
t, but for the fact she’d been pregnant, he’d have done everything he could to steal her away…
‘Sorry,’ she mumbled into his shoulder. ‘That caught me by surprise.’
‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘Crying is okay.’
‘It’s embarrassing when you do it in public,’ she said as she finally pulled back, not quite looking at him. ‘I’m really sorry.’ Whether she was referring to the tears or their unexpected closeness he couldn’t say.
‘I’m not “public”,’ he said, as she rubbed the palm of her hand across her cheek, sniffed, then looked around, as if hoping a box of tissues might magically appear. ‘Steve was my brother.’
He wanted to tell her how he’d wept too, when he’d realised what he’d done. That there would never be a chance to put his arms around Steve and just hug him. He wanted to cling to her, never let her go, but he didn’t resist as she pulled away, instantly releasing her and taking a clean handkerchief from his pocket. She took it, pulled a face that might have been a grin, or maybe just a grimace.
‘You and Steven must be the only men in the world who still use linen handkerchiefs,’ she said ruefully as she carefully wiped her eyes, blew her nose. Giving herself time to recover.
Unfortunately there was no such relief for him. He was beyond help.
‘It was instilled in the nursery. Nanny was the old-fashioned variety. Starched aprons, two slices of bread and butter and all the crusts, if you wanted cake for tea. And bed by six,’ he said, trying to make light of the misery of it. ‘And reinforced at school. Boys always had to carry a clean handkerchief, a coin for the telephone and a safety pin.’
‘Now all the kids carry mobile phones instead. What was the safety pin for?’
‘I have absolutely no idea. Perhaps it was simply training for later life, although I somehow doubt any woman would welcome the offer of a two inch safety pin to rescue a snapped bra strap.’
She laughed. ‘Oh, I don’t know. In an emergency…’ It was as if the sun had come out and cracked the ice. ‘This would be boarding school, I take it?’
‘It would. From eight years old until eighteen, and then it was off to university. My father came from the class of parents who knew how to keep children out of their hair.’