Jill Mansell Boxed Set

by Jill Mansell

  ‘We didn’t even shake hands. Just said goodbye and that was it.’ Millie pulled a face; to be honest, she hadn’t been quite sure how to go about leaving Hugh Emerson. After getting on so completely brilliantly together, the end bit of the evening had been a bit awkward. She’d wondered if he was already regretting telling her so much about himself.

  ‘So when are you seeing him again?’

  ‘It wasn’t a date, dipstick! We didn’t arrange to meet again. He just drove off.’

  Hester, who was draped across the sofa wearing her Ricky Martin T-shirt-cum-nightie, rolled on to her front and began flicking through the TV channels in search of hunky men.

  Or even… bleeugh… dishy ones.

  In the end, she was forced to settle for Gary Rhodes.

  ‘Sounds like you had a fun evening. You must have been bored out of your mind.’

  ‘It wasn’t boring.’ Instinctively, Millie leapt to Hugh Emerson’s defense.

  ‘Get your hair cut,’ Hester shouted at Gary Rhodes on the TV, ‘and stop poncing around making out you’re so great.’ Over her shoulder to Millie she added, ‘Actually, that’s a thought.’

  Millie was busy levering the lid off the biscuit tin.

  ‘What is?’

  ‘How do we really know his wife’s dead?’

  ‘She is, I know she is,’ Millie sighed.

  ‘Yes, but you’re ultragullible. You always give everyone the benefit of the doubt. ‘You,’ Hester pointed out, ‘think Gary Rhodes can’t help looking like an overgrown back garden because his hair just naturally grows like that.’

  ‘She was killed in a horse-riding accident,’ Millie said defensively.

  Hester waggled her eyebrows in a meaningful manner.

  ‘Really? Or did he murder her?’

  ‘Okay, maybe he murdered her. And this is a mad conversation,’ Millie pointed out, ‘because I shouldn’t think I’ll ever see him again anyway.’

  ‘If he’s an ice-cool con man who murdered his wife, he’ll be in touch.’ Hester nodded knowledgeably. ‘He’ll come up with some feeble excuse to see you again. You’re probably already earmarked as target number two.’

  ‘If he’s an intelligent, ice-cool con man,’ said Millie, ‘he’ll find himself a target really worth murdering. Someone with a lot more money than me.’

  Chapter 14

  ‘Bit big,’ said Millie the next morning, ‘but quite comfy.’

  Having braced herself for the worst, she was glad it didn’t itch.

  Lucas was busy on the phone. Sasha, who had Olympic-sized breasts and platinum-blonde hair, was measuring how much the gorilla suit needed to be taken in. As well as being Lucas’s strippogram, Millie gathered she was also his kind-of-girlfriend. Evidently she did a great Marilyn Monroe.

  ‘Rather you than me,’ Sasha said cheerily when the last pin was in place. ‘Stuck inside that great furry thing… I’d get claustrophobic in no time flat!’

  You don’t say.

  ‘Actually, it’s not too bad.’ Millie did a little dance to demonstrate. ‘At least there’s room to move inside.’ Pulling a face she added, ‘I’d feel a lot more claustrophobic trapped inside Lucas’s leather trousers.’

  ‘What’s all this about you being trapped inside my trousers?’ Lucas had finished his phone call. His wink encompassed both Sasha and Millie. ‘I know how I’d feel and we’re not talking claustrophobic. So, how’s the suit?’

  ‘Great. Never felt more glamorous.’

  There were four types of kissogram and Millie suspected she’d be the one getting the most wear out of the gorilla suit. Sasha was the sex-bomb who was happy to strip down to a couple of tassels and a sequinned G-string. Eric, a mild-mannered history teacher by day, was transformed at the flick of a leopard-skin jockstrap into a lovable, roly-poly, wise-cracking Full Monty-type at night.

  The fourth kind was the hen-night special when the handsome dark stranger swept the lucky participant off her feet, flexed his muscles, flattered her outrageously, and prayed the effort of having to lift fifteen stone of shrieking, flailing female wouldn’t cause his leather trousers to split.

  ‘What gave you the idea of starting up a kissogram agency?’ Millie asked as Sasha began to peel her out of the gorilla suit.

  ‘Spot of girlfriend trouble.’ Lucas grinned and flicked the ring-pull off his can of Coke. ‘One of them was refusing to leave my flat, another was turning into pretty much a full-time stalker. I couldn’t be doing with the hassle anymore. And I’d had enough of the radio station, getting up at four-thirty every morning to do the breakfast show.’ Generously, he offered Millie a swig of Coke. ‘Anyway, a friend of mine had a load of costumes he wanted to sell. I bought them and decided to move back down here to Cornwall. For the summer, at least. We’ll see how things go.’

  The different costumes were hanging up on a rail behind him. Everything from the Officer and a Gentleman outfit and the policeman’s uniform to Sasha’s fabulously over-the-top Cleopatra get-up. Stacked on the floor next to them was a pile of cellophane-wrapped T-shirts with ‘I’ve Been Kemped’ printed across them and a crate of cheap sparkling wine.

  And tomorrow I’ve got to do my bit, thought Millie, experiencing a sudden attack of stage fright. Sing, dance, make people laugh, and not fall off my roller skates.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Lucas cheerfully, ‘you’ll be fine. The first time’s always the worst. Just close your eyes and think of the cash.’

  ‘lf I close my eyes,’ said Millie, ‘I’ll definitely fall off my skates.’

  ***

  The phone was ringing when she arrived home. Grabbing it, Millie said, ‘Yes?’

  ‘Three letters. Simply something.’

  Her heart soared; she couldn’t help it. She didn’t even want it to soar, but when these things happen, they happen. It wasn’t something you could physically control.

  ‘Red,’ said Millie. Gosh, there was a coincidence, that was currently the exact same color as her face. It had been so long since she’d fancied someone she’d completely forgotten about all this blushing palaver—in fact, she hadn’t even realized you could blush in a room on your own.

  ‘Excellent. Now how about: Item of female apparel of a conical nature?’

  ‘Um… ooh, witch’s hat!’

  ‘Not quite, try again. Underwear, three letters.’

  ‘Bra! Oh my hero, you found my red bra!’ Millie let out a squeal of delight.

  ‘In my car.’

  ‘That is so great, it’s my absolute favorite bra! When I got home and realized it was gone I thought it must have fallen out of my bag on the beach. I had visions of it being swept away, bobbing along merrily for weeks on end before ending up in America.’

  She was gabbling. Okay, stop it.

  ‘I found it this morning.’ Hugh paused. ‘Under the passenger seat.’

  It was the pause that did it. Until that moment Millie had simply been delighted to hear from him again so soon and thrilled to discover she hadn’t lost her very best bra.

  But in that brief, all-too-significant fraction of a second between sentences, the horrid truth came crashing down like a slab of concrete. Millie went cold all over.

  He thinks I did it on purpose. He thinks I deliberately hid my bra in his car, so I’d have an excuse to see him again!

  God, it was exactly the kind of thing Hester would do. Millie wondered how on earth she could convince him that she absolutely genuinely hadn’t had any idea she’d left her bra in his car and what’s more she’d never dream of playing a dirty trick like that, never ever ever.

  But of course, Hugh didn’t know she wasn’t that kind of girl. The sneaky Hester kind. He thought she had done it deliberately. And if she tried to tell him she wasn’t like Hester and it had been a complete accident, honestly, Millie realized she’d only be making things worse.

  Because, let’s face it, her heart had definitely soared earlier. She’d been ecstatic when she’d heard his voice on the phone.

 
Oh dear, it was a horrible thought, but what if, subconsciously, she had left her bra under the passenger seat on purpose?

  ‘Look, I’ve got an appointment in Newquay tomorrow afternoon.’ Hugh’s voice cut through her inner turmoil. ‘If you’re home around fiveish, I’ll call by and drop it in.’

  Millie squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them again.

  ‘That would be great.’ She forced herself to sound cheerful and enthusiastic and as if she hadn’t noticed anything amiss. ‘My little bra, back again! Hester and I might even have to throw a welcome home party for it. Oh,’ she added as a seemingly careless afterthought, ‘we’ll both be out tomorrow afternoon, so don’t bother trying the doorbell. Just shove it through the letterbox, okay?’

  We love you James, we really do,

  We love your ability

  To perform anything from a brain transplant

  To an appendectomy.

  When it comes to surgeons you’re number one,

  We’re especially keen on your gorgeous bum,

  Far better than Alan’s or Sunil’s or Doreen’s

  And so tempting to touch in your surgical greens.

  You’re forty today and we all think

  You definitely improve with age

  Meet us tonight in the Crown for a drink

  And let’s get as pissed as… parrots.

  Millie ran through the poem one last time. Honestly, what a heap of drivel.

  Still, at least it wasn’t her heap of drivel. The theater staff who had booked the gorillagram had faxed it through to Lucas’s office yesterday and were no doubt delighted by their wit. All she had to do was recite it.

  ‘Okay, he’s out of theater,’ hissed one of the scrub nurses. Grabbing Millie by the arm, she propelled her along the corridor and swung her to the right. ‘Remember, he’s the blond one with the droopy moustache.’

  ‘Fine.’ Millie lowered her gorilla’s head into place.

  ‘Ready?’

  ‘Ready.’

  ‘Can you breathe in there?’

  ‘Not really, no.’

  ‘Oh well, never mind,’ giggled the scrub nurse. ‘Come on, let’s go!’

  The job went off like a dream. James, the surgical registrar whose birthday it was, was a terrific sport. The forty or so hospital staff who had managed to cram themselves into the coffee room whooped and whistled and applauded on cue. Millie, feeling as if she was on stage, roller-skated her way around James as she recited the hysterically funny poem. Thankfully, the in-jokes meant a lot more to his co-workers than they did to Millie and everyone laughed themselves sick. Then a dozen or so cameras were produced and flashbulbs popped like fireworks as Millie presented James with his ‘I’ve Been Kemped’ T-shirt and bottle of cheap sparkling wine. She took off her gorilla’s head and gave James a kiss on the cheek. He picked her up and twirled her around and told her he’d never seen a gorilla with blonde ringlets before. Then, back on terra firma, Millie led them all in a rousing chorus of ‘Happy Birthday.’

  More photos. More people told her she was great. They gave her a round of applause. She was no longer on any old stage, she was Shirley Bassey taking her curtain calls after a sell-out show at the London Palladium.

  ‘It was my first time,’ Millie happily confided in James as she was leaving.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ James told her, ‘we never tell our patients either.’ He grinned. ‘For some reason they prefer not to know.’

  Back at home by four o’clock, still sky-high on adrenalin, Millie was oh-so-tempted to wash her hair (the gorilla head had flattened it completely), re-do her makeup, greet Hugh at the door with the news that she was back after all, and regale him with the story of her magnificent triumph.

  But that was the kind of behavior he would expect of a girl who was so lacking in the art of subtlety that she deliberately left her best lace bra on the floor of his car.

  It was the kind of thing Hester would do.

  I must not open the front door when he gets here, Millie vowed.

  Or the front window.

  ***

  Hugh was late. He wasn’t coming. He’d realized he couldn’t bear to be parted from her irresistible, underwired, dramatically padded red bra, Millie fantasized. Maybe he wanted to wear it himself.

  At five-thirty, peering out from behind Hester’s bedroom curtains, Millie spotted his car slowing to a halt outside the house. She instantly threw herself, sniper-style, down on the floor.

  He rang the doorbell and waited. Checking first that she wasn’t in. Just being polite, thought Millie. Mustn’t, mustn’t answer the door.

  Scuttling crab-like across Hester’s bedroom carpet, she crawled out on to the landing and watched, nose to the ground, as the metal flap was pushed open and a scarlet satin strap appeared through the letterbox. For a moment she imagined grabbing it and giving Hugh a fright. Heavens, having a tussle over her bra, how immature, the very thought of it.

  The next moment, a flash of fuchsia pink appeared next to Hugh’s dark outline through the frosted glass of the front door. Millie froze in alarm as she heard Hester say perkily, ‘Well, hi! I know who you are!’

  Bugger, bugger. It was half past five and Hester—with her customary hideous timing—had picked this moment to arrive home from work. Worse still—oh God—she was being perky.

  ‘I know who you are too,’ said Hugh.

  The letterbox rattled, the bra strap twitched.

  ‘And are you here stealing underwear,’ Hester brightly inquired, ‘or delivering it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t steal this bra,’ Millie heard Hugh say gravely. ‘It’s not my size.’

  ‘Oh, ha ha ha ha ha,’ trilled Hester, overdoing it as usual.

  ‘Millie left it in my car. It fell out of her bag,’ Hugh explained.

  ‘But isn’t she in? It’s half past five, she should be in!’

  ‘I tried the bell. No answer.’

  ‘Well you can’t just post a bra through our letterbox and rush off!’ exclaimed Hester. ‘Millie was worried she’d never see you again!’

  Up on the landing Millie let out a low moan and banged her forehead despairingly—but quietly—against the carpet.

  ‘Anyway,’ Hester rattled on, ‘she’ll be home any minute now, so why don’t you come in and wait? Have a drink and a bit of a chat?’

  No, no, noooo, Millie silently howled, even as she began to shuffle backwards along the landing. But the silent pleading didn’t work. She might have known it wouldn’t. Hester was too pushy and Hugh too polite. He simply couldn’t bring himself to say no.

  Back in Hester’s bedroom, squashing herself out of sight in the gap between the bed and the window, Millie heard the familiar click of Hester’s key turning in the lock. God, it was dusty down here, she hoped she wouldn’t sneeze.

  And she certainly hoped that Hester wasn’t planning to take advantage of Hugh’s inability to say no by dragging him up to her bedroom and reminding him what he’d been missing out on all these months.

  Although should that happen, Millie thought, it would be great to suddenly pop up from nowhere, tap Hester on the shoulder and announce, ‘I think you owe me two hundred pounds.’

  Chapter 15

  It was the longest twenty-five minutes of Millie’s life. Terrified to move in case the floorboards creaked, she held her breath and listened to Hester merrily burbling away downstairs, so eager to keep Hugh there that she was barely letting him get a word in edgewise. It was probably better that she couldn’t make out what Hester was actually saying to him—it didn’t bear thinking about.

  ‘Top of the stairs and to the right,’ she heard Hester call out, and Millie’s heart began to leap around her rib cage like a terrified gazelle. This was what Hester always told guests when they asked for directions to the bathroom, and of the two doors on offer to them, they invariably picked the wrong one.

  Boing, Boing, BOINGGG went Millie’s heart as the bedroom door was pushed open. For a second she knew Hugh was standing there in
the doorway surveying Hester’s bed. Millie squeezed her eyes shut and stopped breathing altogether. There was something tickling her nose but she didn’t dare move…

  Phew. Safe. The door closed again. She heard Hugh find the bathroom. Two minutes later he made his way back downstairs.

  Shortly after that, he left.

  Just as Millie was clambering out of her hiding place—yeugh, cobwebs—she heard Hester racing up the stairs. Quick as a flash she threw herself on to Hester’s bed and closed her eyes.

  ‘Bloodyhell!’

  Feigning surprise, Millie blinked and rubbed her eyes and mumbled, ‘What?’

  ‘We thought you were out! Why are you asleep on my bed?’

  ‘Huh? Oh, I was shattered. There was a fly buzzing around in my room so I came in here.’ Looking bemused, Millie added, ‘Who’s we?’

  ‘Your chap! Hugh Emerson! He’s been downstairs, waiting to see you!’

  ‘Really? Oh well, never mind.’ Millie yawned and stretched, rather convincingly if she did say so herself. ‘I’ve had a lovely sleep.’

  ‘I came home and he was on the doorstep, feeding your bra through the letterbox. Your best bra,’ Hester added, doing that Roger Moore thing with her eyebrows. ‘Go on, admit it, you left it in his car on purpose.’

  ‘You would think that.’ Millie wished there was an on-off switch in Hester’s back. Sometimes, like a Furby, she was just too much.

  ‘Anyone with half a brain would think that. It’s totally obvious. Especially when he’s so dishy.’

  Eeyurggh, that word again.

  ‘And off-limits.’

  ‘That only makes him dishier. We always want what we can’t have.’

  And you especially can’t have him, thought Millie with a surge of extremely muddled emotions. If anyone around here’s going to want him and not have him, it’s jolly well going to be me!

  Good grief, where had that come from?

  Aloud she said, ‘What about Lucas?’

  ‘Ah,’ Hester swooned with joy against the windowsill, ‘he’s still my number-one man.’

  Poor Nat.

  ‘What about Nat?’

  ‘Oh stop giving me that shriveled-spinster look—I’m allowed to fantasize, aren’t I? Nat would be my number one, if he was here. But that’s the trouble,’ Hester declared fretfully, ‘he isn’t here, is he? He’s too busy searing scallops in sodding Glasgow.’