‘Do something tomorrow,’ he said, watching her face.
Miles, Jemima decided, was one of life’s problem solvers. Of course, she ought to do something fun tomorrow. She bit her lip and considered her options. First choice would be to take Ben and Sam on that long promised trip to Legoland, but her car was unlikely to make it that far. So…
She smiled. ‘I could bring them here. Ben would love the transport museum and the street performers.’
‘Would the boys like to see where you work?’
‘I—I suppose they would—’
‘Why don’t you do that too? I’m going to be in work part of tomorrow. Bring them up and show them the office. Let them see where you go each day.’
Miles was a continual surprise to her. Jemima just looked across at him, a little stunned. Day after day she was falling just that little bit more under his spell. She’d never met anyone quite like him.
He was so supremely confident, fearsomely clever…handsome, naturally…and fun. Being with him was pure fun. Whenever she was with him she felt as though she were a different person. Much more like the woman she wanted to be.
‘Okay.’ She pulled at a strand of her hair. ‘What shall I do? Ring you when we’re here?’
‘It’s probably easiest.’
The waiter walked across with their drinks. Jemima had chosen a tall glass of freshly squeezed orange juice and she took a sip immediately. She would never, ever, have believed she’d be meeting Miles outside working hours, but then this wasn’t exactly a date…
Just like this wasn’t exactly a working lunch either.
‘Have you got my mobile number?’
Jemima shook her head. ‘Rachel gave me the Kingsley and Bressington one.’ She felt a small bubble of laughter in the pit of her stomach. ‘I felt daft pretending to write it down.’
He smiled, three tiny lines fanning out at the edges of his eyes.
She watched, fascinated, and then rushed in with, ‘Did you ring Amanda and tell her what happened on Saturday?’
The glint in his blue eyes intensified. ‘Oh, yes,’ he said, drawing the words out.
‘What did she say? Actually, what did you say? I don’t want to contradict you. I’m going to see her this evening.’
Miles picked up his iced water. ‘I told her about the dandelion. Since everyone appears to think it was a little naff, I thought Amanda might well agree.’
Jemima bit her lip, trying hard to stop the laughter which was threatening to engulf her. ‘Did she?’
‘Let’s just say I don’t think you’re going to find the conversation very difficult at all.’
‘Excellent.’ Jemima gave up and laughed. After a moment, she wiped her eyes. ‘Of course, tonight is the dandelion date.’
Actually that part of it wasn’t so funny. It reminded her that, in some respects, Miles was still the man she’d first thought him. He was still the man who played the dating game as though it was, indeed, a game. As though the women he sent flowers to wouldn’t care whether he sent flowers to a different woman the week after.
Perhaps they wouldn’t. Perhaps it was only her who took everything so seriously. Maybe she was fifty years out of date. Maybe even as boring as Russell had found her.
‘I hope you’re taking Keira somewhere expensive. I think she deserves that after receiving a dandelion.’ She kept her voice light. It was absolutely none of her business who Miles saw, but…
Jemima drew a deep breath and then smiled. ‘I suppose we’d better get on with the purpose of our lunch.’ She pulled the carrier bag on to her knee and lifted out the box file. ‘It’s a bit daunting,’ she said, flicking through the contents of the bag. ‘I think I’ll leave the magazines in there and go through them this evening by myself. There might be some useful telephone numbers and websites in them.’
Miles opened the box file. ‘What have we got here?’ he said, spreading out a picture of a pink lined marquee on the table.
Jemima put the carrier bag back down on the floor and looked over. ‘That’s what Rachel doesn’t want. It’s too girly. We’re looking for “medieval”, remember. Though, to be honest, I think we’d be better trying to get a basic marquee and adding our own twelfth century touches,’ she said seriously.
His eyes lit with laughter. ‘Such as?’
She was ready for that one. ‘I went to the library and got a book out on the period,’ she said, reaching down and pulling it out from between the February and March editions of Brides Today. ‘We probably could do something with heraldry.’
Miles turned it over and flicked the pages. ‘How efficient,’ he slid in lazily.
Jemima pulled out a notepad and headed it up with the words ‘To Do’. ‘That’s why I’m such an excellent secretary.’
Miles laughed as she intended he should, but then he sat back in his chair, watching her. It made her feel uncomfortable, so it was almost a relief when he spoke. ‘What are you going to do?’
She looked up, her pencil poised. ‘About what?’
‘Your career. You aren’t going to be satisfied working as a temporary secretary for long. What’s your long-term plan? I don’t believe you haven’t got one.’
Jemima smiled and returned to what she was doing. His words were a direct echo of her sisters’. Verity, because she didn’t have children, had no concept of mother love and couldn’t see there was any conflict of interest. Imogen, because she had a supportive husband who loved her and who had the kind of bank balance which made ‘having it all’ a distinct possibility.
Not her mum, though. Despite having had a highly successful career herself, her mum was a realist. She recognised that her situation had been very different from the one her middle daughter found herself in—and she was there for her, doing what she could to make things better. Jemima so loved her for it.
‘Whatever I do is going to be a compromise,’ she said, echoing something her mum had said to her when they’d been discussing the options.
‘Between?’
She looked up again to find him still watching her intently. ‘Ben and Sam come first. They have to.’ He said nothing and she felt obliged to continue. ‘That’s part of the deal when you have children. I suppose, in the end, I’ll settle for something near home.’
‘Doing?’
Jemima smiled a little stiffly. She wasn’t at all sure she wanted to be telling him all this. ‘It doesn’t really matter. I want to earn enough to finish the house and pay for some treats for the boys. I’m tired of telling them how sorry I am, but I don’t have the money. It’s not the earth I’m after.’
Miles looked thoughtful. He handed her back the book on medieval life as the waiter returned with their plates of pasta. ‘In a decade or so Ben will be at university. You can’t put everything on hold for ten years.’
‘I know.’ It was what she said to herself. It was why she’d gone to see Amanda. And why she’d taken a secretarial course.
It had seemed a reasonable compromise, but deep down she knew Miles was right. She did want more. Or, at least, the prospect of more. Being the least successful member of a high achieving family was difficult. But missing the boys’ school sports day and never being home in time for tea wasn’t an option either.
‘So?’ he prompted. ‘What’s your long-term plan?’
It was such a difficult question to answer. Jemima was acutely aware that in accepting the house in lieu of any claim on Russell’s pension she had left herself vulnerable for the future.
And while Russell was never awkward about paying his contribution, how long would his girlfriend be happy with him paying out so much to his ex-wife?
And if Stefanie insisted he referred his payments back to the CSA she might find it wasn’t worth her working at all, certainly not for the minimum wage. She could end up losing as much as she gained in a vicious catch-22.
Jemima picked up her fork. ‘I haven’t decided yet.’ She looked across at him and forced a smile. ‘I think I’ve become Amanda’s pr
oject. It bothers her intensely that I’ve left myself unable to support myself and my children entirely alone. It offends her principles as a card carrying feminist…’
She stopped, suddenly reminded that Amanda’s views were very likely to be shared by Miles’s mother. Hermione Kingsley was a fierce advocate of financial and emotional independence—whatever the latter actually meant when it was applied to the real world.
Did ‘emotional independence’ mean you couldn’t let yourself love anyone because it was weakness to need any one other person? She’d never be able to truly believe that. Jemima concentrated on eating her pasta.
‘Don’t let Amanda bully you.’
She looked up, surprised. ‘I won’t.’
‘There must be something out there that’ll be a good balance.’ He looked thoughtful, and then he smiled. ‘Why are you looking so surprised?’ he asked, his hand curving around his tall glass of iced water.
‘Well—’ Jemima searched for a way of expressing what she was feeling ‘—your mother…’
Miles shook his head. ‘Hermione is Hermione. Her views are extreme and I’ve experienced the consequences of them.’
He must have. Everything he said about his childhood made her feel intensely sorry for him. ‘Do you always call her Hermione?’ she asked curiously after a moment.
He nodded, eating another mouthful of his pasta. ‘Unless she irritates me especially. If she writes about me in her column and the ripples hit my life in any kind of negative way, then I find calling her Mum is very effective.
‘The ultimate punishment, of course, will be to make her a grandmother. Although I’m sure she’d turn it to her advantage as long as I’ve not married the mother.’ He smiled across at her. ‘Do you want parmesan?’
It seemed an abrupt change of conversation, but clearly Miles was so used to his background that he expected other people to find it as easy to come to terms with. She didn’t know quite what to say. His background was so different from hers.
Her mum delighted in her grandchildren, even more since her retirement. She was more of a hands-on grandmother than she’d ever had time to be as a mother.
‘You look shocked.’
Jemima shook her head. ‘Just can’t quite imagine calling my mum “Margaret”.’ But it was more than that. In all the world there was only Ben and Sam who could call her ‘Mum’. That made it special. Didn’t it?
‘Do you want parmesan?’ Miles asked again.
She looked at it a little longingly. ‘I mustn’t.’
‘Why ever not?’
Jemima looked at him as though he’d developed two heads. Every day of his working life he was surrounded by stick insects. He must have noticed the difference.
His eyes glinted and his voice was pure temptation. ‘Parmesan is an essential. A staple of life. And you’ve got to try the Apple and Vanilla Tart later.’ His mouth twisted into its almost habitual sexy smile. ‘It beats Alistair’s fig concoction hands down anyway.’
There was a brief moment during lunch where she regretted her lack of willpower, but it was shortlived when she tasted the tart. Jemima’s lips closed round the warm puff pastry base with its sweet apple topping and she sighed. ‘I’m never going to be thin. I may as well accept it.’
Miles laughed, sitting back in his chair.
‘Verity never eats desserts. I think they must be against her religion,’ she joked.
‘Then she misses out. Try the ice cream with the tart. The combination is terrific.’
Jemima didn’t disagree. The cold and the warm mingled in her mouth and she closed her eyes to allow her sense of taste to fully experience it.
‘Good?’
‘Incredible.’ She felt a little self-conscious as she opened her eyes to find Miles was smiling at her, almost laughing, but not unkindly.
‘Why is it everything that’s bad for you tastes so good?’ Jemima rushed on, unnerved by his expression. ‘Verity eats everything with chopsticks. She reckons she eats far less that way.’
‘It’s a cruel business she’s in. Most models are emaciated.’ Then he looked up with an intensely wicked gleam in his eyes and Jemima braced herself for something shocking. ‘Great with their clothes on, not so great without.’
Jemima sent him what her mum would describe as an ‘old-fashioned look’. ‘And you should know.’
His smile widened and it felt as if a million butterflies had been let loose in her stomach.
How did he do that? She’d forgotten what it was like to flirt and laugh for no reason. Truthfully, she’d forgotten what it was like to have fun. But sitting here in the summer sunshine, the noise and the bustle of Covent Garden going on all around…
She felt more like the woman she’d been when she’d first left university. Anything had seemed possible then.
Miles finished the last of his dessert and reached out for the notepad. ‘It’s very dull to go out with a woman who’s watching every mouthful.’
‘I watch every mouthful. The trouble is I’m eating it at the time.’
Miles laughed. ‘But you didn’t order salad with no dressing or some peculiar combination that’s the latest craze. I hate that.’
‘I must have tried every diet going.’
‘Why?’
Why? Jemima mentally ran through the possible whys. On the BMI index she was coming in at the perfectly respectable top end of normal, but she still felt this…pressure to be thinner.
It was as though she believed her life would be better, happier, more successful, if only she looked…well, thinner.
And that pressure hadn’t come from her family. Surprising, considering she had a super-model-sized sister. In the family they all thought Verity looked better a stone heavier.
It was Russell. It came as a shock to realise it was Russell’s voice she heard in her head. Still. He’d been so keen for her to lose the ‘baby weight’ she’d gained. Perhaps because he’d already started to be unhappy living with her.
Jemima shrugged the bad memories away. Though some time she ought to think about it more. It made her angry to think she’d allowed Russell to control how she felt about herself.
Miles was reading down the list she’d started. Three weeks ago, if anyone had told her she’d be sitting in Covent Garden’s beautiful glass-covered building with a man like Miles Kingsley she’d have laughed.
But here she was. And he didn’t look desperately bored. He wasn’t glancing down at his watch as Russell had used to do, or making her feel as though she had nothing to talk about but nappies and playschools.
Just possibly, Jemima thought with a new stirring of anger, the problem was with Russell and not with her.
Miles looked up and surprised her watching him. ‘Why don’t we divide and conquer with all of this?’ he said, gesturing down at the long ‘To Do’ list.
‘How would it be if I leave you with tracking down a marquee since, frankly, I don’t know where to start with it and searching out possible caterers? And I’ll sort out the medieval musicians and the…florist. I might have some contacts that’ll be useful,’ he said and his eyes were smiling.
Jemima kept a straight face. ‘I think ringing Becky is probably a great idea.’
‘It’ll give her heart failure if I tell her I’m choosing flowers for a wedding.’
‘Scare her, more like. You must be ten per cent of her business.’ Jemima started putting Rachel’s clippings and tear sheets back into the box file. ‘What are you going to do if your contacts aren’t useful? Realistically, Becky can’t do flowers for a wedding in Kent, can she?’
He smiled and she felt as though she’d swallowed something hard and spiky. ‘If it all goes pear-shaped I’ll call you to fix it.’
Chapter Eight
MILES flung his jacket across the sofa and sat, staring at the telephone as though it might speak and tell him what to do.
It had been a long and intensely dull evening. Keira Rye-Stanford was all glitz and no substance. She’d looked…amaz
ing. There was no other way to describe her. Tall, elegant, sexy—and delighted to be out with him. So far, so good one would think.
Miles rubbed his hand across his aching neck. Hell, he’d been bored. There’d been moments when he’d wondered whether he’d manage to keep his eyes open long enough to end the evening politely.
Lunch with Jemima had felt like a five minute highlight of the day, whereas dinner with Keira had felt like a five hour endurance course.
And, when he looked at it logically, he didn’t know why. Keira was a great idea, Jemima a dreadfully bad one.
Keira was an alluring, independently wealthy career woman who didn’t have a genuinely romantic bone in her body. Jemima was ‘walking wounded’ from her divorce, had two dependent children and an irrational belief in living happily ever after.
Miles smoothed his hand across the taupe-coloured suede of his sofa and debated whether eleven was really too late to ring Jemima. He wanted her to know…
What?
He frowned. What was it that he wanted her to know? That he was home by eleven? That he was home alone?
He stretched back on the sofa and debated the wisdom of ringing her. All he needed was an excuse, some…reason for calling. His eyes lighted on the scribbled note he’d left on the coffee table and he reached for his phone. If she’d gone to bed she’d have switched her mobile off and he could leave a message for the morning. Safe enough.
Miles tapped in her number, so convinced she wouldn’t answer, that he was surprised when she did. ‘Jemima!’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you awake?’ Miles closed his eyes. Daft, daft question! Of course, if she’d answered the phone she was awake. What kind of idiot was he?
‘Miles?’
And she didn’t even recognise his voice. It was getting better and better. ‘Miles Kingsley.’ He cleared his throat. Damn! He felt…like an adolescent schoolboy.
What was he trying to achieve here? Jemima didn’t need to know he’d found a group of musicians who were prepared to play at the wedding. Not tonight.
It was merely his need to hear her voice that meant he had to call her. ‘I’ve just got in and I thought I’d try and catch you before…’
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