Jill Mansell Boxed Set

by Jill Mansell

  Nor did she have any intention of mentioning any of last night’s shenanigans with Hugh, not least because she wouldn’t put it past Orla to decide that here was a situation ripe for a spot of meddling and to promptly start meddling for all she was worth.

  Or more likely, giving her the mother of all lectures and shrieking, ‘For heaven’s sake, only a complete twerp would fall for a line like that… how could you be so stupid?’

  Either prospect sent shivers of mortification down her spine.

  Five thousand pounds, thought Millie, painfully aware that Orla wasn’t getting her money’s worth. Once again she was editing her own life. Actually, there was an idea. Wouldn’t it be great if you could go back and edit to your heart’s content, gaily snipping out and discarding any bits that made you shudder and cringe…? Somebody should definitely invent that.

  ***

  ‘Con’s brilliant company. We get on really well together. We had breakfast at the Ocean View Hotel, then spent a few hours mucking about on the beach.’

  This much had been true. Millie, swinging her legs against the side of Orla’s desk, glanced out of the upstairs window at the lovingly tended rose garden. ‘Oh, and Richard-the-gardener kissed me last night. He kisses like an Aquavac!’

  Excitedly, Orla scribbled on one of the charts pinned up to the left of the filing cabinet, then searched for a different colored felt-tipped pen and dashed to another chart above the desk.

  ‘Fabulous! Did Con see him kissing you? Was he madly jealous?’

  ‘It wasn’t the kind of kiss anyone would be jealous of.’ Millie pulled a face, just recalling it was enough to make her feel queasy. ‘Richard was very drunk.’

  ‘He really likes you, it’s sooo obvious. Oh, I knew this party would get things moving.’ Orla sounded triumphant. Here, clearly, were the beginnings of an entertaining little subplot. ‘So how did you feel when he kissed you?’

  Honestly, she sounded like a psychiatrist.

  ‘Wet.’ Millie watched the felt-tipped pen flying over the chart; Orla’s handwriting really was beyond belief.

  ‘And what about Hester?’

  ‘I’ve never tried kissing Hester. She’d probably bite me.’

  ‘I meant did she get anywhere with Lucas last night? You could tell she was pretty smitten.’ Orla paused, her greeny gold eyes dancing at the possibility of intrigue. ‘But this falling-asleep-by-the-pool business sounds pretty suspicious to me.’

  ‘And her boyfriend drove down from Glasgow to see her,’ said Millie.

  ‘No! When?’

  ‘Last night. He slept in his car outside our house.’

  ‘Oh good grief! And Hester didn’t come home! But that’s… dreadful.’’ Orla, who had been about to say it was fantastic, stopped herself in the nick of time. ‘Nat, isn’t it? So what did he say when Hester finally turned up?’

  ‘Nothing. He’d gone by then. Driven back to Scotland. Not thrilled.’ Millie pulled a face. ‘Still, look on the bright side. At least he wasn’t still there when Hester rolled up in your Mercedes with Con.’

  Chapter 30

  Hester was on the sofa shivering like a beaten whippet when Millie arrived home at seven-thirty. Orla, who had given her a lift back, had been clamoring to come in for an update. Glad she’d managed to fend her off, Millie said gently, ‘Spoken to him yet?’

  Hester nodded, her lower lip beginning to wobble. Her duvet was wrapped around her, a sure sign of emotional upset. The phone squatted on the carpet amid a scattering of Cadbury Twiglets. A party-sized Twiglet drum poked out from beneath the sofa. Picking it up, Millie saw that the drum was empty. Plus, the Twiglets had been a month past their sell-by date. They must have tasted awful but Hester had plowed her way through them anyway, because this was what she did in times of stress. Demolished whole treeloads of Twiglets.

  ‘I’ve been phoning and phoning all day. Leaving messages for Nat to ring me. He called ten minutes ago. Oh Millie, it was awful.’ Hester gasped and shuddered, clawing pitifully at the duvet in search of leftover bits of Twiglet. ‘He sounded like… like an android. All calm and polite, as if he didn’t even know me. And I told him the truth—that I went to the party with you and fell asleep in the garden—but I just know he didn’t believe me! Oh God, oh God,’ she wailed, rocking backwards and forwards, ‘what am I going to do?’

  Compared with Hester, Millie felt she was coping with her own emotional catastrophe remarkably well. Actually, the Nat thing had done a good job of taking her mind off… what was his name? Oh yes, Hugh.

  ‘Right.’ Striding up and down the living room, she forced Hester’s head to swivel from side to side like a spectator at Wimbledon. Then, slipping into scary-businesswoman mode, she began ticking points off on her fingers. ‘Number one, okay, he’s not very happy right now, but that’s because he’s just driven a thousand miles and didn’t get to see you. Number two, he might think you’ve spent the night having riotous sex with some other bloke, but he’s wrong. You didn’t. Number three, so all we have to do is convince him. Proof, that’s what Nat needs. So what I’ll do is get Orla to ring him up and tell him the truth, that nothing went on, you just fell asleep in her garden.’

  Hester was looking torn, as if half of her wanted to leap at this idea—which was, frankly, brilliant—while the other half was digging its heels in and whining, Yes, but what if he doesn’t believe Orla?

  ‘Yes, but—’ began Hester.

  ‘No, no buts about it.’ Millie was brisk. ‘You’re acting like the guilty party here, but you aren’t guilty, are you? Don’t you see, you didn’t do anything wrong!’

  Silence.

  ‘Oh God.’ Millie stared at her as if she’d just sprouted two horns and a pointy tail. Orla had been right after all. ‘You did. You spent the night having riotous sex with somebody else. Holy mackerel— not Lucas!’

  Hester shook her head and looked utterly miserable.

  ‘No.’

  ‘WHO WITH, THEN?’ bellowed Millie.

  ‘Nobody. I mean, it was Lucas, but we didn’t have sex.’ Her shoulders slumped in defeat. ‘I tried my best, but he refused. He just wasn’t interested.’

  ‘Good grief.’ Forgetting all about being brisk and businesslike, Millie plonked herself down on the sofa next to Hester. ‘You mean you actually offered yourself to him?’

  ‘Ripped off all my clothes, jumped into the pool, and launched myself at him,’ Hester groaned. ‘And he still turned me down. I mean, there I was, naked, and Lucas Kemp didn’t want to have sex with me! Can you think of anything more humiliating? Because I can’t.’

  Millie was stunned. It certainly didn’t sound like Lucas.

  ‘Did he, um, say why?’

  ‘Some utter crap about me having a boyfriend already and him actually possessing some scruples.’

  Oh dear. More and more unlikely.

  Scruples? Lucas? Surely not.

  Millie pulled a sympathetic face, because if ever there was a ridiculous excuse, this had to be it. Clearly, as far as Lucas was concerned, the prospect of intimate physical contact with Hester was too horrible for words.

  ‘Still, look on the bright side.’ Millie’s tone was soothing. ‘Nothing happened.’

  ‘I wanted it to happen.’

  Patience, patience.

  ‘Yes, I know that, but it still didn’t. So you don’t have to give me two hundred pounds!’

  ‘It would have been worth it.’ Hester bunked and looked desolate.

  Déjà vu. For a second, Millie was tempted to confess about Hugh. But only for a very brief second, because a) she didn’t want Hester to know about it, and b) what good would it do?

  Instead she said, ‘But at least you can forget about Lucas now, put it down to experience, and stop fantasizing about him.’

  ‘Right.’ Unearthing a lone Twiglet from a folded-over bit of duvet, Hester ate it and looked more wretched than ever.

  ‘And you can concentrate on getting Nat back! Not that he’s gone anywhere,’ Millie
added. Then, because of course Nat had gone somewhere—left the country, in fact—she went on, ‘I mean, it’s not as if he’s dumped you.’

  ‘He might, though.’ Wearily, Hester rubbed her face. ‘He could be building up to it.’

  ‘Well then, we have to make sure that doesn’t happen! Convince him that you’re innocent. I still think Orla’s our best bet,’ Millie declared. ‘She’ll vouch for you, no problem, and you know how persuasive Orla can be, she’ll just keep going on and on until Nat sees sense, she’s brilliant at that kind of thing… gosh, by the time she’s finished, you’ll have Nat on his knees groveling and apologizing and begging you to forgive him—’

  Millie stopped abruptly. Hester was crying.

  ‘Why are you crying?’

  ‘Because I hate myself. Because I would have been unfaithful to Nat if only bloody Lucas had let me, and Nat doesn’t deserve to be treated like that. I love him so much. How could I even try to do what I did? I’m disgusting,’ sobbed Hester, ‘just a complete trollop.’

  ‘So you want Nat to finish with you?’

  ‘I deserve to be finished with.’

  ‘And would that make you happy?’

  ‘Noooo!’

  Hester was in the grip of a major guilt trip, Millie realized. Time to be brisk and businesslike again.

  ‘You’re going to pull yourself together,’ she announced very firmly indeed, ‘and salvage the only thing that matters, which is your relationship with Nat. Because if you let him go, I’m telling you, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.’

  ‘I’m such an idiot,’ Hester moaned softly.

  ‘No you aren’t, you just made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes.’ Millie forced herself not to think about Hugh. ‘But it doesn’t have to be the end of the world, okay?’

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Millie slithered off the sofa and reached for the phone.

  ‘Ringing Orla.’

  ***

  Hugh looked at the Yellow Pages, lying open at F for florists. He couldn’t decide whether sending Millie flowers would be a good thing to do or a bad thing.

  Would it make matters better? Or worse?

  The next morning as Millie emerged from the shower her dearest fantasy came true. Hearing activity outside, she wrapped an orange towel around herself and peered out of the bedroom window. A florist’s van was double-parked in the street below.

  As she watched, Millie saw a young skinny lad leap out of the driver’s seat, lope round to the back of the van, pull open the doors, and lift out the most stunning basket of flowers she’d ever seen in her life. As her heart began to race, the young lad double-checked the address on the delivery slip and made straight for her front door.

  Oh yes, yes, yes, thank you God, thank you, thought Millie, galloping joyfully downstairs. It was actually happening, which in her experience was an unusual thing for fantasies to do. But never mind, who cared, because Hugh had come to his senses and realized he hadn’t meant all those awful hurtful things he’d said, hooray, hooray, oh what a beautiful morning, oh what a beautiful dayyy—

  Urrgh.

  Unless the flowers were for Hester.

  In which case, it would go back to being a decidedly un-beautiful day.

  Orange towel firmly in place and heart equally firmly in mouth, Millie opened the front door.

  The young boy peered at her through the jungle of blooms.

  ‘Millie Brady?’

  YES, YES, YES!!!

  ‘That’s me,’ said Millie, only just managing to stop herself leaping three feet off the ground and punching the air with glee.

  ‘Delivery for you.’

  ‘Really?’ Millie limited herself to a modest smile. ‘For me? Gosh, I wonder who they could be from?’

  Oh well, it never did any harm to give the impression you were awash with fervent admirers.

  ‘Dunno. Card’s in the basket.’ Bored, the boy shoved the massive arrangement into Millie’s arms. ‘Try opening it and you might find out.’

  He was probably jealous because nobody ever sent him flowers, Millie decided. Endlessly having to deliver them to other people and never getting any himself had caused him to become bitter and twisted.

  Still, he wasn’t going to spoil her day. Nothing could do that, not now. Because Hugh had decided he loved her after all and he was begging her forgiveness, tra-la. Everything was going to be all right, diddly-dee, in fact from now on the entire rest of her life was going to be perfect.

  Millie lowered the basket carefully on to the kitchen table— crikey, it was almost as big as the table—and rooted around until she found, in its midst, the all-important white envelope attached to a plastic prong.

  Emerging from the undergrowth with her prize—and pollen all over her nose—Millie tore open the envelope and pulled out the card:

  Dear Millie,

  I’m so sorry, my behavior on Saturday night was appalling. I do hope you can forgive me.

  Richard.

  Millie frowned. She turned the card over, found nothing on the other side, then turned it back again.

  It still said Richard.

  Right message, wrong name. Surely there was some mistake here? The flowers had to be from Hugh, they had to be. After all, he was the one she’d slept with on Saturday night, not Richard-the-gardener. Richard-the-gardener didn’t even know where she lived, for pity’s sake.

  Unless of course…

  Chapter 31

  ‘Darling, hi, how are you? More thrilling news to report? Hang on, let me just grab a pen… okay, got one… right, fire away!’

  ‘Orla.’ Gripping the phone, Millie kept her voice even. ‘Has anyone asked you for my address?’

  ‘Hmm, darling?’

  ‘I’ve been sent some flowers.’

  ‘Really? Oh, that’s fantastic! Gosh, that was quick.’ Orla laughed. ‘Poor boy, he turned up here this morning absolutely mortified… I’ve never seen anyone look so sheepish. He even groveled and apologized to me!’

  ‘Richard-the-gardener?’ Millie couldn’t help it, she had to be six hundred percent sure.

  ‘Well of course Richard-the-gardener, silly! Bless his cotton socks, he’s the clean-living type, not used to drinking at all. After a few glasses of wine, he was up, up, and away, and from then on there was just no stopping him. All his inhibitions went for a burton—I told him that was what parties were all about!’ Orla laughed and paused in mid-flow to light a cigarette. ‘But of course when the poor lamb woke up yesterday morning and realized what he’d done he was absolutely mortified.’

  Join the club, thought Millie. In fact, the club membership was expanding by the minute.

  ‘He can’t believe he behaved so dreadfully,’ Orla gabbled on merrily, ‘although I promised him he hadn’t done anything dreadful as far as we were concerned. But he said he’d grabbed you and mauled you like an animal and he’d never been so ashamed in his life, he couldn’t imagine what you must think of him now.’

  ‘Did you tell him I thought he kissed like an Aquavac?’

  ‘Of course not! Heavens, the poor boy might have committed hara-kiri in my kitchen with his pruning shears. Anyway, the point is, he doesn’t really kiss like an Aquavac, it was only like that on Saturday night because he was so incredibly drunk. I bet he kisses perfectly normally when he’s sober.’

  ‘In that case,’ said Millie, ‘why don’t you give him a try?’

  ‘Heavens, I’m miles too old for him—he doesn’t want a wrinkled old geriatric like me! Anyway, you’re the one he’s mad about.’ Orla was sounding pleased with herself. ‘He told me so this morning— although of course I already knew that.’

  Millie blinked.

  ‘How?’

  ‘Darling, it’s my job to know these things! And guess what?’

  ‘What?’ Millie was beginning to feel like a parrot.

  ‘He’s going to phone you up and ask you out to dinner!’

  Never mind pleased with herself, thought Millie. O
rla was, by this time, sounding positively gleeful.

  In fact, she was fizzing with glee. Like Alka Seltzers dropped into a glass of water.

  Millie said faintly, ‘He doesn’t have to do that. Really, one slobbery kiss, that’s all it was. I forgive him, I promise.’

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Orla chided, ‘that’s not why he’s doing it. He’s wooing you, sweetie. Wooing you!’

  Deeply suspicious, Millie said, ‘Was this your idea?’

  ‘No it was not.’ Orla sounded shocked. ‘That would be cheating. Inviting certain people to my party is one thing, but ordering them about and telling them what to do next… absolutely not. I’m not Machiavelli, darling!’

  Except she was, in a way, Millie thought later as she made her way across town to Lucas’s house. Because thanks to the five thousand pounds Orla had paid her, she hadn’t felt able to tell Orla that she had absolutely no intention of going out on a date with Richard-the-gardener.

  ‘There’s no point,’ she’d protested feebly, ‘it won’t come to anything.’

  But Orla had said, ‘Oh come on, darling, you don’t know that for sure. You hardly know him for a start! At least give the poor fellow the benefit of the doubt.’ Her eyes sparkling with mischief, she had added, ‘If nothing else, it’ll keep Con on his toes. Might even make him the teensiest bit jealous.’

  So, reluctantly, Millie had found herself going along with it. When Richard phoned her she would be perfectly lovely and charming and when he invited her out to dinner she would agree to go.

  Because, for five thousand pounds, basically, it was the least she could do.

  Anyway, one date, that was all they were talking about here. It wasn’t as if Orla was expecting her to bear his children.

  Crikey, thought Millie, at least I hope not.

  ‘Hang on a second,’ Lucas complained when Millie had finished bringing him up to date on the Hester-front. ‘I don’t seem to be able to do anything right, here. There I was, thinking I was being Mr. Totally Heroic, doing the decent thing for once in my life, and now here you are, getting all het up and giving me grief about it!’