Jessica Steele
Bachelor's Family
From the back cover :
He was two different men!
"You must be the most impudent female I've ever employed!"
Vere Tolladine had a nerve--how dare he imply that she was the one with the attitude problem? The man was infuriating, objectionable! So why did he arouse such wild, bewildering emotions in Fabienne?
What did she care if he had fascinating gray eyes--or that he was a kind, gentle uncle to his vulnerable seven-year-old-twin niece and nephew? Perhaps she didn't hate him so much after all? But Vere seemed more interested in his beautiful, delicate stepsister-in-law.
So where did that leave Fabienne?
ISBN: 0373033567
© 1995 Jessica Steele
Harlequin Romance
CHAPTER ONE
FABIENNE had said cheerio to her parents and Oliver, their mischievous Jack Russell terrier, and was in the hall on her way to spend Saturday evening with some of her friends when the phone rang. 'I'll get it!' she called, and went over to the instrument, picked it up, and said, 'Hello.'
'Miss Preston?' queried an all-masculine, all-authoritative voice. A voice she immediately recognised, for all she had only heard it once before.
'Y-yes,' she stammered, and could barely believe that, when she was normally so confident, she should sound so nervous!
Were Tolladine.' He announced that which she already knew.
'Oh, yes,' she replied guardedly.
'Can you start Monday?'
'I've got the job?'
'Don't you want it?' There it was again, that brusque, no-nonsense tone she had brought on herself at the job interview.
'Of course I do!' she asserted, rattled, when in truth she had been unsure.
But, not one to be oppressed by anyone, she metaphorically pulled up her socks and, before he could bark out his orders on what time she should start on Monday, she took the battle straight into his camp. 'If I'm to get the twins to school for nine, I'd better move in tomorrow,' she declared. 'Do that,' he returned coolly, and spent the next few minutes giving her directions on how to get to Brackendale, his home in the village of Sutton Ash, Berkshire, from her home in the small town of Lintham, Oxfordshire.
'Until Sunday,' he ended-and put down his phone.
Slowly, Fabienne did the same. But, even as she pondered why she should have considered her dealings with Vere Tolladine as a battle, she knew that she was committed. Too late now to consider if she really and positively wanted the job of 'temporary nanny and mother's help' she had seen advertised. In all honesty, though, she hadn't thought, when she'd journeyed to London for an ,expenses-paid' interview, that she had stood a chance of getting it. For she had not the smallest nanny-mother's help credential. Her only experience of the workplace was as first assistant in her mother's gown shop.
'Who was it?' Her mother and Oliver, coming out into the hall from the drawing-room, caused Fabienne to concentrate her thoughts on how in
creation she was to soften the blow that, albeit temporarily, she was leaving home.
There was, she swiftly realised as she bent to pat Oliver absently, no way to soften it. 'You know that interview I went for last Tuesday? Well,' she went on quickly, not wanting to draw out the agony, 'I got the job.'
'Oh, love!' Clare Preston cried, but proved again what Fabienne already knew-that her mother was a special kind of person-for she suddenly found a smile and asked, 'Have you time to come and chat it over with your father and me before you go out?'
When, fifteen minutes later, Fabienne drove off to keep her arrangement with her friends, she took with her, her parents' blessing about her leaving home to take up her new job.
It had helped, of course, that the job was temporary. And the fact that she was able to tell them that she would have every weekend off to come home went a long way to weaken their resistance. And, although she was twenty-two and of an age where she did not need her parents' consent to leave home, what finally convinced her father that she would come to no harm living in a household which was not his was that Vere Tolladine was known to him. Not that the two had ever met, but apparently the man who headed Tolladine Finance Incorporated was well known for his integrity in the business world-word of that integrity filtering down to her father who, with her brother Alex, ran the family engineering firm that touched the fringes of 'big' business. It was her father's view that Vere Tolladine's business integrity was so much part and parcel of the man that it must spill over into his private and, therefore, home life.
Fabienne halted her car in the car park of the George Hotel where she was meeting her friends. She did not immediately get out, however, but sat and reflected about how, save for her good friend Hannah, everyone in their group had left home ages ago and was now living on their own. 'Your parents make life too comfortable for you,' Tom Walton-another of her very good friends-had teased one time and, she realised, she could not argue with that.
She came from a very comfortable home and, from day one, had been loved, cared for and protected. Even her brother Alex, her senior by ten years, had taken to watching over her and was ever-ready to take up cudgels on her behalf.
It was Alex to whom she had turned when her studies at school were almost completed. She knew that her father was keen for her to go to the same university as Alex and obtain an engineering degree with a view to entering the family firm. And Alex was, too. But, while she had no idea what sort of career she wanted, or if she wanted a career at all, what she did know was that she did not want to be an engineer. The problem was that as she was loved by her family, so she loved them as much in return, and she just could not bear the thought of hurting her father by telling him of her feelings. Alex was married by that time and, after weeks of fretting about how to tell her father, it had all come blurting out one early evening when her brother came to collect her to babysit while he and his wife, Victoria, went for a rare evening out.
'Would Daddy be very upset if I didn't come into the firm, do you think?'
she had said in a rush, before Alex had barely driven out of the avenue where she lived.
By the time they had reached the crescent where Alex lived, he had taken a tremendous load of worry from her by assuring her that their father would be twice as hurt if she went into training for something she had no appetite for, just to please him.
'Don't worry about it anymore, Fenne,' Alex had said and, like the marvellous big brother he was, 'I'll tell Dad tomorrow, if you like.'
And she had been so relieved she had almost let him. But she was growing up and she just knew that this was something she must do for herself. 'No, I'll do it,' she'd replied.
Though she afterwards wondered if perhaps Alex had laid some sort of foundation for her, because when the very next evening she took her courage in both hands and tentatively began to tell her father how she felt, instead of being shocked, hurt and disappointed as she'd imagined he would be, for some serious moments he had looked solemnly into her worried brown eyes. Then, stretching out an arm to give her a hug, 'Is this your way of telling me you want to work in your mother's frock shop?' he'd teased. 'She'd scalp you if she heard you call Clare's a frock shop!'
Fabienne had laughed in her relief-and, when she left school, somehow found that she was working, quite happily, in the gown shop which her mother had opened ten years previously.
Everything had gone along swimmingly, and was still going along swimmingly until some months ago when something had happened which had caused Fabienne to do some very in-depth thinking. Although,
in fact, what she had had to do did not require very much thinking about at all. Out of the blue her mother suddenly began to have dizzy spells. It was when she fainted outrigh
t, however, that her husband put his foot down. The end result was that a medical consultant was called in, who said that there was nothing wrong that tablets and complete and utter rest would not cure. His stipulation that she must slow down and rest more in future, too, gave them all food for thought.
'I'm not very happy about your mother starting work again,' Edward Preston took his daughter aside one day to state.
Fabienne wasn't happy about it either, yet they were a work-orientated family and, despite this being Nature's way of telling her mother to slow down, her mother was already making noises to the effect that she'd had enough rest. 'How do you think she'd feel about closing the shop?' she asked him. 'Close the shop!'
'Mum will never rest while it's still open.'
'That's true,' her father conceded. 'What about you, though? Don't you want to keep it on?'
'It wouldn't work.'
'I can set you up in something of your own, if you like,' he offered.
'Can you see Mum resting while I'm rushing around in the throes of getting everything ready to open?' Fabienne vetoed that idea and, because her mother was going to be upset at the idea of closing down Clare's while there was any chance of keeping it open, 'Actually, I wouldn't mind having a go at something a bit different.'
What that something different was, however, she had little idea. She knew that she did not want to work in an office environment, nor a factory environment, either. Their own shop was closed down by then, but to work in someone else's gown shop, when she was used to virtually being her own boss, was something she felt would not work out very well either.
'What you need,' her friend Hannah stated after some thought, 'is a job that's a total contrast.'
'So tell me about it?' Fabienne encouraged. 'Something-something you wouldn't think of doing in a million years.'
'I'm not going deep-sea fishing for you or anybody,' Fabienne laughed.
Though it was Hannah who, a day or so later, produced the 'temporary nanny' advertisement. 'Have you seen this?' she asked, and didn't seem to think the notion was at all as preposterous as Fabienne did as she read the advertisement for a live-in, weekends-off, temporary nanny-cum-help to mother and seven-year-old twins during the school summer holidays.
Interviewing expenses paid.
'Go back to sleep, Hannah,' was her initial reaction.
But she went home with the piece of paper bearing the advertisement which Hannah had insisted she not dismiss out of hand, but think about. It was certainly a job that was a total contrast, she'd give Hannah that!
She was amused by Hannah's idea that she could do a nanny's job, or that anyone might want to employ her as such, and at dinner told her parents of her friend's latest wacky notion.
'What does she use for a brain?' was her father's good-humoured reaction.
'Actually, Hannah's got quite a good brain,' Fabienne defended. 'It's just that... '
'In this instance she left it in neutral.'
'Oh, I don't know, Edward,' her mother chipped in. 'Fabienne's very good with children. Her patience with Philip was endless when his "terrible twos" seemed to go on until he was five. Victoria couldn't do...' Her voice petered out, and they each became engrossed in their own thoughts for the moment. Her parents adored Philip, their grandson; they all did. But, after Alex and Victoria had divorced last year, they saw less and less of him. The breakup of her brother's marriage had been bitter and acrimonious and the divorce messy, with Alex losing the fight for custody of his son and with Victoria, regardless of his 'rights of access', being obstructive when he went to collect Philip on his allotted weekend.
It was sad because they were all fond of Victoria, and they'd had no idea that there was anything wrong. It hadn't been until Victoria had started to complain about her husband working too many hours and the lack of a social life that they'd realised his marriage was hitting troubled waters.
Just the same, it had been something of a very great shock when her mother had hinted to Alex 'That's true,' her father conceded. 'What about you, though? Don't you want to keep it on?'
'It wouldn't work.'
'I can set you up in something of your own, if you like,' he offered. 'Can you see Mum resting while I'm rushing around in the throes of getting everything ready to open?' Fabienne vetoed that idea and, because her mother was going to be upset at the idea of closing down Clare's while there was any chance of keeping it open, 'Actually, I wouldn't mind having a go at something a bit different.'
What that something different was, however, she had little idea. She knew that she did not want to work in an office environment, nor a factory environment, either. Their own shop was closed down by then, but to work in someone else's gown shop, when she was used to virtually being her own boss, was something she felt would not work out very well either.
'What you need,' her friend Hannah stated after some thought, 'is a job that's a total contrast.'
'So tell me about it?' Fabienne encouraged. 'Something-something you wouldn't think of doing in a million years.'
'I'm not going deep-sea fishing for you or anybody,' Fabienne laughed.
Though it was Hannah who, a day or so later, produced the 'temporary nanny' advertisement. 'Have you seen this?' she asked, and didn't seem to think the notion was at all as preposterous as Fabienne did as she read the advertisement for a live-in, weekends-off, temporary nanny-cum-help to mother and seven-year-old twins during the school summer holidays.
Interviewing expenses paid.
'Go back to sleep, Hannah,' was her initial reaction.
But she went home with the piece of paper bearing the advertisement which Hannah had insisted she not dismiss out of hand, but think about. It was certainly a job that was a total contrast, she'd give Hannah that!
She was amused by Hannah's idea that she could do a nanny's job, or that anyone might want to employ her as such, and at dinner told her parents of her friend's latest wacky notion.
'What does she use for a brain?' was her father's good-humoured reaction.
'Actually, Hannah's got quite a good brain,' Fabienne defended. 'It's just that... '
'In this instance she left it in neutral.'
'Oh, I don't know, Edward,' her mother chipped in. 'Fabienne's very good with children. Her patience with Philip was endless when his "terrible twos" seemed to go on until he was five. Victoria couldn't do...' Her voice petered out, and they each became engrossed in their own thoughts for the moment.
Her parents adored Philip, their grandson; they all did. But, after Alex and Victoria had divorced last year, they saw less and less of him. The breakup of her brother's marriage had been bitter and acrimonious and the divorce messy, with Alex losing the fight for custody of his son and with Victoria, regardless of his 'rights of access', be-ing obstructive when he went to collect Philip on his allotted weekend.
It was sad because they were all fond of Victoria, and they'd had no idea that there was anything wrong. It hadn't been until Victoria had started to complain about her husband working too many hours and the lack of a social life that they'd realised his marriage was hitting troubled waters.
Just the same, it had been something of a very great shock when her mother had hinted to Alex applied for, and had probably got, the temporary nanny's job. It did not surprise her at all when the page stopped outside the door that the woman had just come from. 'Thank you.' She smiled to him, knocked, and waited.
The door was soon opened and a last-word-in-smartness woman stood there. 'Miss Preston?' she smiled. 'Come in.'
She led the way into the ante-room of a hotel suite-and that was when Fabienne realised that whoever got the job would not be working for any harassed mother on a budget. Not that she had thought about it much before; she had just sort of assumed that the interview would take place in the hotel lounge, perhaps over a cup of coffee. But Mrs Morris had clearly rented a suite and, in this hotel, that wouldn't come cheap. 'I think I'd better tell you, Mrs Morris, that-'
'Miss Morris,'
the other replied and, while Fabienne was taking that on board, Sonia Morris smiled and at once disabused her of any idea that she was either a single lady or used the 'Miss' title for career purposes, by adding, 'I don't think we should keep him waiting.'
Waiting! She was bang on time, not so much as half a minute late. What sort of impatient person was she to see? And-him!
'You can tell Mr Tolladine what you have to during your interview,' Sonia Morris added serenely as she went over and opened a door that led into a
room that was the main sitting-room of the suite. 'Miss Fabienne Preston, Mr Tolladine,' she announced and, ushering her in, she promptly went from the room, closing the door after her.
In those initial moments of looking across at the dark-haired man, probably about thirty-five, who stood well above average height, and who looked back at her with the most direct look from cool grey eyes, Fabienne went through the whole gamut of thoughts and emotions. Where was Mrs Tolladine? She'd have thought, since it was her she or the successful applicant would be working with, that the twins' mother would want to interview her in person. Though on looking at the cool, grey-eyed man, Fabienne had a notion that one would have to be up very early in the morning to put one over on him!
Whether he was used to interviewing nannies on his wife's behalf, she had no idea, but she quickly formed the notion that he was more than up to the job. There was a tough look about that strong, firm chin that said he did not suffer fools gladly and, as she saw the immaculately suited man take in her smooth, olive-tinted complexion, brown eyes, loose-flowing hair and dress to match-his one glance taking in her classic but none the less casual sandals and bare toes-so she began to feel at a disadvantage and, more than ever then, wished she had dressed differently.
'I shouldn't have come!' she stated, her voice strangely husky, as she half turned to the door.
'Why?' Just the one word. Curt. Crisp. No-nonsense. It stopped her.
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