Sitting Pretty

by April Hardy

  Had Alex got home yet and found I wasn’t there? Would he come looking for me and make a scene? I’d already rung reception and told them I wasn’t to be disturbed if anybody came asking for me, but to be honest I doubted if he’d bother. He’d probably just expect me to come running back to him again once I’d calmed down. Well he’d have a damned long wait.

  I must have dozed off eventually and it was quarter to eight in the morning when I was woken up by the sound of someone banging the door closed in the next room. Checking my phone I saw there was still no response from Henry so I got dressed and went down to breakfast. Last night’s moussaka seemed like a very long time ago, and I’d only had a small portion, so I found I was suddenly ravenous. I hit the breakfast buffet with a vengeance. A cocktail of exotic fruit juices, a mountain of fresh pineapple and assorted melon slices, smoked salmon and scrambled eggs and two pains au chocolat, all washed down with a pot of the most deliciously fragrant coffee.

  Back in my room I packed my things in case, when I did finally hear from Henry, I’d need to rush to the airport. I was surprised I hadn’t heard from him at all – he was normally never far from his phone. Still, it was only seven o’clock in UK. He might be having a lie-in, or be in the shower himself – a memory of lemon verbena wafted through my mind. Stop that, Beth, he’s only a friend, he doesn’t want anything else from you.

  Reception informed me that nobody had turned up asking for me, which was just as I’d expected, so I decided to take the bull by the horns and tell Alex what I was going to do. Although it would serve him right if I just left without telling him, I wanted closure, and this time I was going to get it.

  I got a taxi to where Steve had told me their offices were. It was a smart building and, after looking at the sign saying which offices were on which floor, I took the lift up to the eighteenth.

  ‘Good morning,’ the receptionist greeted me with a smile.

  ‘Alex Petropoulos, please.’ I smiled back before noticing that the girl looked nervous. ‘Is there a problem?’

  ‘It’s just that he’s got someone in with him at the moment.’

  The way she said it, it didn’t sound like it was anything to do with work. ‘I’m his wife. Please show me to his office. Don’t make me walk around looking for him and disturbing people. I can see you’re all busy.’

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN

  There were raised voices coming from Alex’s office and I didn’t know whether to go in and try to diffuse the situation a little, or leave Alex and whoever he was arguing with to it. The receptionist, having done what I’d asked, had left me to it. I didn’t blame her.

  Indecision kept me hovering next to the water cooler outside his door – should I stay or should I go away and come back later? I was about to walk away when I heard my name. I went closer to the door. That sounded like Henry’s voice. But it couldn’t be. I pressed my ear right against it.

  ‘She’s my wife.’

  ‘Not that anyone would know, for all the respect you show her. You desert her with no warning, then when she gets on with her life, you don’t like it.’

  ‘Working for you isn’t getting on with her life.’

  ‘She’s happy working with me. She has an interesting job, good friends, somewhere to live …’

  ‘What, on your couch?’

  ‘No, the job comes with a studio.’

  ‘Which I bet you have a key to.’

  ‘Alex!’ I shouted, bursting through the door.

  ‘Beth!’ they both said at once.

  ‘Henry, what are you doing here?’

  ‘I was worried after I got your text yesterday so I got on the first flight.’

  ‘How did you know where to come?’

  ‘The internet is a mine of information, Beth. And when my plane landed I called the office number, not expecting anybody to actually be working today …’

  ‘Whatever!’ Alex shouted. ‘Enough! Look, Henry, Beth’s back with me now, so you’ve wasted your journey.’

  ‘No, I’m not,’ I stopped him before he could say any more.

  ‘Yes, you are.’ Alex took a step towards me.

  ‘You know what, Alex? After you left for Dubai without me and phoned from the plane like a coward, I was convinced at first that you’d change your mind and I thought that was what I wanted. Then all I wanted to do was come over here and shove you off a tall building. I behaved like an idiot because I was angry and my head was all over the place. But then Henry gave me a job – a really good, interesting, exciting job – and I started to get my self-respect back. But I hadn’t got it back completely yet. Henry understood that. He knew I wasn’t ready to come here and see you, but I thought I was. It was my mistake. But d’you know what good has come out of it? I’ve seen that the marriage I thought might be worth fighting for isn’t. You’re not worth it. And that’s what I came here to say to you now. I’ve packed and as soon as I’ve got my ticket sorted I’m going home.’

  ‘With him?’ Alex glared at Henry.

  ‘If you mean will we be on the same plane, then hopefully yes.’

  ‘You know that’s not what I meant,’ he snarled.

  ‘Not that it’s any of your business, but no, not with him. Henry isn’t interested in me in that way. Now, I think it’s time Henry and I were making our arrangements. Goodbye, Alex. I don’t expect to hear from you again other than via a solicitor.’

  I took off my wedding ring and tossed it to him before walking out of the room with as much dignity as I could muster, relieved to hear Henry behind me.

  ‘I’m so proud of you,’ he touched my arm as we reached the lift. ‘I was worried he’d find a way to get round you, take advantage of your generous nature, get you to stay with him, and then hurt you again.’ The lift doors opened and we got in. ‘But what did you mean when you said I wasn’t interested in you in that way?’

  This was going to be awkward. ‘Well, it’s just that … well, you’re not, are you?’

  ‘What makes you think that?’

  I couldn’t think of any other way of saying it. ‘Because I’m a woman?’

  ‘You think I don’t like women? What? Hang on a minute, you think I’m gay?’ He looked so shocked it was almost comical.

  ‘Well, you asked me to keep the women at the ball away from you.’

  ‘Because those particular women could bore for England. What other reasons?’

  ‘You chose those ball gowns for me with matching accessories? What straight man does that?’

  ‘One who still has an account at all the fancy shops where his ex-wife used to spend most of his money, and can rely on the staff to think for themselves when given a few simple instructions!’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘You’re the cleanest, tidiest man I’ve ever met and you always smell lovely.’ Even I knew I was scraping the barrel now.

  ‘Er, thank you?’ Henry looked at me quizzically.

  ‘I’m sorry. I thought that was why you got divorced.’

  ‘I got divorced because my wife ran off with a timeshare salesman.’

  ‘Ouch.’ I grimaced at him. ‘You must have hated me when I compared your company to a posh timeshare …’ The lift doors opened on to the ground floor and we stepped out, moving aside to let other people get in and the doors close again before saying any more.

  ‘It wasn’t your most endearing moment,’ he raised an eyebrow at me. ‘Let’s get out of here and sort out our tickets.’

  ‘And pick up my luggage.’

  ‘Yes, and pick up your luggage. All of it. We don’t need any reason for you to have to come back here.’

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-EIGHT

  ‘Would you like the window seat or the aisle?’ Henry asked as we boarded the business class cabin. He had a lovely warm smile on his face.

  ‘I’d like the window seat if that’s all right.’ I couldn’t help smiling either.

  Henry put our c
abin bags in the overhead lockers and sat down next to me, his arm on the wide armrest just inches away from mine. ‘You keep smiling,’ he observed.

  ‘Do I?’ I edged my arm slightly closer. ‘So do you.’

  ‘Can I ask you something?’

  ‘You can ask me anything you want, Henry.’

  He leant a bit closer and asked quietly ‘Why do you think I dropped everything and flew over as soon as I got your text?’

  ‘Er … because you’re a very kind boss who’d do that for any of his employees?’

  ‘I’m not that kind and no, I wouldn’t.’

  ‘Then can I ask you something?’

  ‘You can ask me anything you want, Beth.’

  ‘Well,’ I leant a bit closer too, ‘does our conversation by the lift mean that you don’t not like me in that way?’

  ‘Possibly. Why? Is that something you might be interested in? Not being not liked by me in that way?’ His arm came a bit closer to mine.

  ‘It might be.’

  ‘Well, you’ve got about eight hours to make that decision. Do you think that’ll be long enough?

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE

  I took one last look in the little mirror. Henry would be picking me up in a few minutes for our romantic dinner for two at Hetherin Hall. I was wearing a new dress in the raspberry colour he liked me in so much and underneath that, a new set of hot-pink underwear I thought he’d like me in even more. I was also wearing the Ted Baker body spray he’d put in my Christmas pillowcase.

  It was all I’d been able to do to stop floating since we got back from Dubai. Even the news that Davina, Natalia, and Stinky Steve had been arrested and charged with distributing smuggled goods hadn’t been able to keep the smile off my face. Sitting Pretty was safe, along with Daisy’s and everyone else’s jobs because Henry had bought the company and Daisy and I were running it as a job-share so I could work around my mystery guest assignments. But tonight was my biggest reason for smiling. Tonight was mine and Henry’s first real date.

  He knocked on my door and I went to open it. There he was, looking handsome and elegant as ever. He had a hand-tied posy of flowers which he held out to me.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, smelling them. ‘They’re gorgeous.’

  ‘Not as gorgeous as you.’ He bent to kiss me, his lips just centimetres away from mine. He smelled so good.

  ‘What time’s our table booked for?’ I brushed his lips lightly with mine, wrapping my arms round his neck.

  ‘Eight.’ He pulled me even closer, his fingers in my hair.

  ‘Do you think they’d hold the table if we were late?’

  ‘I’m sure they would.’

  I pulled him gently towards the bed. ‘Then let’s see if we can make it in time for last orders.’

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  April Hardy grew up on the outskirts of the New Forest. After leaving drama school, her varied career has included touring pantomimes, children’s theatre and a summer season in Llandudno as a Butlins red coat. All interspersed with much waitressing and working in hotel kitchens!

  After moving to Greece, she spent many years as a dancer, then choreographer, and did a seven-month stint on a Greek cruise ship before working for a cake designer and then training as a pastry chef in a Swiss hotel school in Athens. Whilst living there, she also helped out at a local animal sanctuary.

  Relocating to the UAE with her husband and their deaf, arthritic cat, she has lived in both Abu Dhabi and Dubai, where she is delighted to have found herself so unemployable that she has had plenty of time to devote to writing!

  Sitting Pretty is the first of her New Forest-set novels.

  For more information about April Hardy

  and other Accent Press titles

  please visit

  www.accentpress.co.uk

  Copyright © April Hardy 2016

  eBook ISBN: 9781786150578

  Paperback ISBN 9781786153326

  The moral right of April Hardy to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

  All the characters in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  The opinions offered in this book are those solely of the author.