Читать книгу Her Hand in Marriage - Jessica Steele - Страница 4

ROMILLIE opened her eyes to a bright sunshiny morning and knew it was going to be a good day. Wrong! Well, perhaps not totally. Her mother, a poor sleeper, was already up and about when Romillie went down the stairs.

‘Any plans for today?’ Romillie asked gently. Eleanor Fairfax had suffered for some years with general low spirits and feelings of inadequacy, but of late there were more good days than bad.

‘If this weather holds I thought I might do a spot of weeding or…’ she hesitated ‘…I might take a sketchpad outside.’

Romillie’s spirits soared. Her mother was a professional artist—portraits mainly. She was truly gifted but had not so much as picked up a sketching pencil in an absolute age.

‘The forecast is good,’ Romillie answered lightly, taking a quick glance at her watch and getting up and taking her cereal bowl over to the kitchen sink. ‘Better be off. Don’t want to be late.’

It was not far to the dental practice where she worked. But because she liked to return home in her lunch hour, and since her mother had given up driving, Romillie made the journey in her mother’s car.

They lived in the village of Tarnleigh on the Oxfordshire and Berkshire borders. Her receptionist-telephonist job with Yardley, East, and—now—Davidson, was well within her capabilities. It was not a job she would have chosen to do, but it was convenient.

Five years ago she had intended to go to university. But everything had suddenly gone catastrophic at home. She had been coming up to eighteen, her place at university assured, when her grandfather Mannion, her mother’s father and a man who had never had a day’s illness in his life, had suddenly died.

She had been upset, her mother distraught. It had not ended there. They had always lived with Grandfather Mannion. Romillie’s father, despite his frequent absences, had lived with them, too.

Her mother had adored Archer Fairfax and had put up with his womanising, his idleness, his spendthrift ways, making excuses for him whenever Grandfather Mannion would frown in his direction.

Romillie had known her father had other women. She had seen him driving along one time with a pretty blonde by his side. And another time, when he was supposed to be in Northampton for a job interview, and she had been in the school coach some miles from home after playing in an away game hockey match, she had seen him arm in arm, with a brunette this time.

He had returned home the next day, having not got the job but related that, after a very detailed and extensive interview, it had been felt that he was too well qualified for the job. Her mother had swallowed it all and Romillie just hadn’t had the heart to tell her that he had been nowhere near a job interview.

But it became plain that Grandfather Mannion had been wise to his son-in-law in that when Archer Fairfax was of the opinion that he would now rule the roost, he discovered that his well-to-do father-in-law had left him not one penny. The bulk of his estate had gone to his daughter, Eleanor, with money left in trust for his granddaughter until she attained the age of twenty-five. The house, the large rambling house, had been left to Eleanor during her lifetime, or until she no longer required it, when it was then to be handed down to her daughter.

There had been shouting matches before, mainly Romillie’s father roaring away when Grandfather Mannion was not around. But then, with no one there to keep him in check, Archer Fairfax had given his temper free rein. The consequence being that Eleanor, highly sensitive to begin with, shrank deeper and deeper into her shell. She lost heart, and gave up painting altogether.

Romillie had tried to intervene, only to discover that instead of helping she had made things worse. As a child she had suffered bouts of sleepwalking—but that had not happened in a long, long while. The last time had been on the night before she had been due to leave for university. There had been another tremendous row that night, her father yelling, drowning out her mother’s cries of protest. Stressed and worried about leaving her mother with her bullying father, Romillie had gone to bed, only to awake the next morning to find that in her sleep she had got up and taken everything out from her suitcase. She knew then what she supposed she had known for some while—university, for the moment, was out.

One year passed, and then two, and things in the Fairfax household did not get any better. Her mother became more and more reclusive and leant more and more on Romillie. University seemed as far away as ever. Romillie thought about getting a job but did not know how she could leave her.

Grandfather Mannion’s money kept them afloat for three years, but, what with Eleanor giving in to her husband’s constant demands for money, at the end of those three years the money had gone.

When the money went, so too did Archer Fairfax. Guiltily, Romillie had been glad to see him go, but it was he who had brought her mother to the state she was in. For the next year they struggled on, Archer Fairfax appearing frequently, to make sure he was not missing out on anything.

And then out of the blue, one morning when Romillie and her mother were doing nothing in particular, Romillie had felt her mother’s eyes on her and had the feeling that something momentous was taking place.

‘What is it?’ she remembered asking, certain as she was that she was picking up some pretty gigantic vibes.

Eleanor Fairfax had continued to look at her for some seconds more, and had then calmly enquired, ‘I wondered, Rom, would you mind very much if I divorced your father?’

Wow! That was momentous! ‘I’ll get the car out and drive you to the lawyers, shall I?’ she’d volunteered.

Oddly, once that decision had been made, Eleanor had seemed to gain some confidence. Archer Fairfax hadn’t liked it, did not like losing control, but Eleanor had remained firm. She’d still had her ‘off’ days, but she was no longer at rock bottom.

She had not been able to resume her painting, though, and by then the need of an income had become a pressing need. Romillie knew then that university was definitely out. Instead she found herself a job.

She could probably have found a more interesting job, one that paid better, but that would have meant working further afield. And the chief bonus of working so close to home was that because of her mother’s occasional ‘off’ days, she could return home at lunchtime.

There was another bonus, too. Jeffrey Davidson—her boyfriend. He was the new junior partner at the dental practice, a replacement for the soon to be retired senior partner. Jeff had been with the firm only three months, and she had been going out with him for two of them, which was a long time for her. She liked him, and believed she might even be a little in love with him. He was a good dentist, considerate to his patients and staff, and understanding when, because of her dislike of leaving her mother on her own for too long, Romillie seldom stayed out late. Her mother, Romillie realised, seemed relieved and happy that she was ‘seeing someone’.

So it was on that bright sunny April morning that Romillie parked her car and went swinging into the large old Victorian house that had been converted into a dental practice.

She stowed her bag behind the receptionist’s desk and was taking her first call before she’d had chance to turn on her computer.

It was eleven o’clock before she knew it. Cindy Wilson, one of the dental nurses, came and took over while she went and made herself a cup of coffee. It was there that Jeff Davidson sought her out.

‘I thought I might find you here round about now,’ he said, his eyes admiring on her shining raven hair, now drawn back neatly, and looking deeply into her wide brown eyes.

‘Sorry I couldn’t make it last night,’ she apologised, having cancelled their arrangement, though without explaining that her mother had seemed a bit down when she had gone home at lunchtime.

‘No problem,’ he replied good-humouredly. ‘How are you fixed for tonight? We could go and see that new film.’

Romillie, recalling that her mother was so sensationally ‘up’ that morning as to actually consider picking up her sketching pad, smiled a warm smile. ‘I’d love to,’ she accepted.

Carrying her coffee back to her desk, she thanked Cindy for covering for her. But when Cindy did not go but fidgeted, moving things around on the desk, Romillie realised she had something on her mind. When she heard what it was, however, something in Romillie iced over.

‘Are you and Jeff Davidson an item?’ Cindy blurted out suddenly.

The dental nurse seemed wound up. Romillie, from experience, tried to help. ‘Is it important?’ she asked quietly.

‘I went out with him last night,’ Cindy said in another rush, and, while a sick feeling invaded Romillie’s insides, ‘I—um—wouldn’t want to—um—you know, if…’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Romillie answered, somehow managing to maintain her quiet air. ‘I have been out with him. But that’s finished now.’

Cindy beamed at her. ‘You didn’t mind me asking?’

‘Not at all,’ Romillie replied, and even found a smile.

She carried on with her work, but all the while thoughts of the fickleness of men bombarded her. Her father was a prime example, and now the man she had been out with enough times to have begun to think of him as her boyfriend was another.

But, as she had told Cindy Wilson, that was now finished. If he thought she was going to the cinema with him that night did he have another think coming! All that remained was for her to tell him that.

Romillie went home at lunchtime, hid from her mother that she had received a pretty nasty jolt that morning, and ate the sandwiches her mother had prepared. She returned to work with a certainty that nothing would alter, that while she and Jeff Davidson might have been an item yesterday, they most assuredly were not an item today. Nor would they ever be.

She did not get the chance to tell him so until she went to make a cup of tea and he came to find her. ‘What time tonight?’ he began.

While the fear silently haunted her that she might have inherited some of her father’s weaknesses, Romillie, with her years of experience of his dishonesty in his relationship with her mother, just knew without having to think about it that there would be no such dishonesty or underhandedness in any relationship she had.

‘You went out with Cindy Wilson last night,’ she said bluntly.

That caught him off-guard, but after a second or two he recovered. ‘I didn’t know I was yours exclusively,’ he replied.

Romillie stared at him, her brown eyes wide and serious. Then suddenly she smiled. It was a phoney smile. She might be hurting but he would never know it. ‘You’re not,’ she said. And, in case he had not yet got the message, ‘Enjoy the film,’ she bade him, picked up her tea, and walked away.

Romillie was still feeling churned up inside about Jeff Davidson when she drove home that night, and she blamed herself—when her father was a fine example of a two-timing man; in her father’s case more than two timing—that she had believed that she and Jeff Davidson were exclusive to each other.

It made her angry that she had been such a fool. Once bitten twice shy, she vowed. And with her knowledge of her father’s faithlessness, and now her supposed boyfriend proving to be little better, Romillie knew it would be a very long time before she trusted any man again.

She hid her hurt and disenchantment when she arrived home, and went in search of her mother. She found her in the kitchen.

‘I saw you coming. I’ve got the kettle on,’ Eleanor Fairfax announced, and seemed equally bright as she had at the start of the day, so that Romillie felt able to bring up the subject of her taking her sketchpad outside.

‘Did you manage…?’ It was as far as she got. For, guessing the question, her mother picked up the sketchpad from behind her.

‘What do you think?’ she asked, showing a small sketch of a corner of the garden.

‘Mum, it’s wonderful!’ Romillie enthused, meaning it on both fronts. It was wonderful that her parent was showing an interest again, and her talent as an artist was truly wonderful too. Her attention to detail never ceased to amaze Romillie.

‘Oh, I wouldn’t go that far,’ Eleanor protested. ‘I might try painting it later, but I’m so rusty. I…’ She left the rest unsaid, but was smiling happily as she revealed, ‘I had a blast from the past this afternoon.’ And when Romillie looked at her quickly, fearing the worst, ‘No, not your father. Though no doubt Archer Fairfax will show his face again as soon as he wants something. No, I was absorbed in what I was doing when I suddenly felt someone’s eyes on me. I looked up, and there in next-door’s garden was Lewis Selby.’

‘Lewis Selby?’

‘You won’t know him. I wouldn’t have known him myself—I hadn’t seen him in over forty years. He’s a cousin of Sarah Daniels.’ Sarah Daniels lived next door, but had closed the house up some months previously to go on an extended stay in Australia. ‘Lewis and his family used to visit quite often when he was a boy—he’d have been about twelve the last time I saw him. I must have been five or six,’ Eleanor broke off to explain, ‘and I heard them having such fun in the garden next door that it seems I toddled off round there to join in. Lewis was delegated to take hold of my hand and bring me back.’

‘You remember the incident?’

‘Oh, I do. He was such a kind boy. Apparently I would look out of the window every day for him, but I didn’t see him again.’

‘Until today?’

‘Until today,’ her mother agreed with a smile. ‘He knew from Sarah that I’d become an artist—was an artist,’ she corrected. ‘He didn’t recognise me either, but came to the hedge when he saw me to make himself known.’

Romillie laughed. It was a joy to see her mother so ‘up’. ‘What a pity he didn’t know that Mrs Daniels was away. Had he come far?’

‘He lives in London and he knew Sarah was out of the country. She has been in touch, it seems, and guess what?’ Romillie had no idea. ‘Apparently Sarah, horse-mad Sarah, has met a man in the Outback—and won’t be coming home.’

Romillie’s eyes went wide in surprise. ‘She’s getting married?’ she asked. Sarah Daniels, closer to sixty than fifty had, when widowed young, moved back to her family home.

Eleanor nodded. ‘Isn’t it lovely?’ she exclaimed, seeming oblivious to the fact that marriage, as in her own case, was very often a disaster.

‘Er—yes,’ Romillie agreed, holding back from saying that now, and probably even before Jeff Davidson’s careless treatment of what she had started to think was a little more than a casual association between them, she viewed the prospect of men and marriage through much less rose-tinted glasses. ‘Um—so why did this—er—Lewis Selby visit if he knew she wouldn’t be here?’

‘Apparently Lewis is thinking of semi-retirement and Sarah contacted him with the idea of putting his semi-retirement to good use.’

‘She’s selling the house?’ Romillie guessed.

‘Not straight away,’ her mother corrected. ‘It seems that she and her Australian are mutually besotted and he’s afraid that if she comes home she won’t go back again. So to prove her love she has said that she will stay.’

‘This Lewis Selby told you all about it over the hedge?’ Romillie enquired.

‘He started to,’ Eleanor replied. ‘But then I realised that all the services in Sarah’s house must be disconnected. So, as I already knew him, albeit from around forty-four or so years ago, I asked him if he’d like to come round for a cup of tea.’

Romillie was little short of amazed—yet at the same time delighted. Her mother had not shown an interest in anything remotely social for at least five years! However, since the last thing she wanted was for her to retreat back into her shell, she hid her amazement and asked instead, ‘So, the house isn’t being sold just yet?’

‘Sarah has a few very special pieces. Some she wants sold, others she wants shipped out. Lewis has a list, and was here today checking through and sorting out prior to contacting the valuers. Now, how about you? Are you going out with Jeff tonight and do you need an early dinner?’

It was good to hear her mother think about cooking a meal when for so long she had not been remotely interested in food. ‘We can eat late if you like,’ Romillie answered, pondering whether to say more but, with her mother so ‘up’, risking it. ‘Other than work, I won’t be seeing Jeff again.’

‘You’ve split up!’ Eleanor exclaimed, searching her daughter’s face for signs of hurt, her own expression troubled.

‘It was a mutual kind of thing,’ Romillie answered lightly. ‘I don’t—um—fancy him any more,’ she added, and knew as she said it that it was true.

She knew as lay in bed that night that it was probably because of her father chasing anything the slightest feminine that she had grown up being a little cautious where men were concerned. She had certainly been very circumspect with whom she went out with—which made Jeff Davidson so special that she’d gone out with him more than a few times. But, having dated him often enough to believe that they were sole boyfriend and girlfriend to each other, today’s revelations had struck at the heart of her—and had killed stone-dead any feeling she might have thought she had for him.

Which, from his point of view the next morning, was rather unfortunate. Because no sooner had she arrived at her place of work than he was there, meeting her in the firm’s parking area.

‘Romillie.’ He waylaid her. ‘I was a fool. I’m sorry.’

She stared at him. Then she smiled—her phoney smile. ‘Why, what have you done?’

‘You’ve forgiven me?’

‘Of course,’ she said, still smiling, and would have walked on. But he caught hold of her arm, halting her.

‘Prove it. Come out with me tonight. Let me show…’

Romillie looked pointedly down at his hand on her arm, and pulled out of his grasp. ‘I think you must be confusing me with someone else,’ she informed him coolly—and left him standing there.

The trouble was, she discovered over the next few days, that men were all casual and careless of your feelings when they thought you were interested, but once you had shown them that you were not remotely interested they just wouldn’t leave you alone. Tough! She was not there to be picked up and put down again at the whim of Jeff Davidson, or anyone else for that matter.

He continued to frequently ask her out. She as frequently told him no. Her mind was on very different matters. Her mother was continuing to make progress. Slow progress, it was true, but after so many years in her private dark place, it was a joy to Romillie to see her picking up the threads of living again.

‘I was wondering,’ Eleanor mused as they sat drinking coffee after dinner one night, ‘how you’d feel about sitting for me?’

Romillie could not believe it, but was more than ready to give her every encouragement. ‘No problem,’ she answered cheerfully.

As soon as his gifted daughter’s artistic talent had shown through, Grandfather Mannion had had a studio made for her. And so it was that after her stint at the dental practice, where it seemed Jeff Davidson still had not taken on board that no thanks meant exactly that, Romillie would spend some part of every evening in her mother’s studio while her mother re-acquainted herself with that which had once been her life.

It was during these sittings that Romillie learnt that Lewis Selby had been down, and had again been invited in for a cup of tea.

Indeed, as the weeks went by, it appeared that he came down once or twice every week and, out of courtesy, always knocked on the door to let her mother know that he was about. Out of that same courtesy, her mother would always invite him in for a cup of tea.

He was divorced, Romillie learned at one of their sittings. ‘A rather acrimonious divorce too, I think,’ her mother revealed. ‘Though, because he’s such a nice person, he never says a word against his ex-wife.’ And, going on to another topic, ‘How do you feel about doing a nude sitting? You needn’t if you don’t want to, but I’d like to try…’

‘Happy to oblige,’ Romillie answered. If her mother went on making progress like this she might soon be saying a permanent goodbye to her ‘down’ days.

At a further sitting Romillie learned that Lewis Selby had paid another visit, and had again been invited in. But when she privately wondered if he was perhaps interested in her mother, she discovered that he was seemingly still too bruised from his divorce to consider leaving himself open to anything like that again.

‘It’s nice that he can pop in from time to time,’ Romillie commented lightly. ‘Er—when does he retire?’

‘Not yet. Not officially for another three years. He works for the telecommunications company Tritel Incorporated. But with him being chairman of such a vast company, it’s not a job he can leave in an instant.’ Eleanor broke off to concentrate on what she was doing for a while, and then resumed. ‘Though from what Lewis was saying he has a very able deputy in Naylor Cardell, a man who, it seems, while dealing with his own work, is already taking on some of Lewis’s duties. Keep your head still for a moment, there’s a love.’

Romillie was in the kitchenette of the dental surgery a few days later when Jeff Davidson came in and tried a new tack. ‘If I promise to keep solely to you while we’re going out, would you bend just a little and come out with me again?’ he asked. And as she just stared at him, because he still hadn’t got the message, ‘Did I hurt you so much, Romillie?’ he went on. ‘Did I? That you no longer trust me?’

Trust, in her book, was one very big word—and he had proved himself undeserving. She looked at him, tall, good-looking and with everything going for him—and yet he suddenly seemed totally without substance.

But her pride reared up at his question of whether his fickleness had hurt her, and there was no way she was going to let him know that hurt she had been, nor how betrayed she had felt. And she who abhorred lies found in that proud instance that it was no effort to have a lie tripping off her tongue.

‘I’ve moved on, Jeff,’ she replied.

He cocked his head to one side. ‘How?’

‘Pastures new,’ she told him without blinking.

‘You’re dating someone else?’ he asked, seeming astounded.

‘You seem surprised?’

‘No, no.’ He back-pedalled. ‘You’re very attractive…You know that you are. It’s—um—just…’

It annoyed her that he should so conceitedly think she stayed home nights, hurting because of him. ‘You blew it, Jeff,’ she informed him coolly. ‘Get over it.’

Her pride was fully intact when she drove home that night. But, when she went in it was to discover that her mother, who had recently been so up, looked tense, and had taken a step backwards.

‘Had a good day?’ Romillie asked cheerfully, starting to become convinced that her father had called and been up to his old trick of shattering her mother’s confidence.

But it was not her father who was the culprit this time, but, surprisingly, Lewis Selby. And he was not so much shattering her confidence as wanting her to take a peep outside the safe little world she had made for herself.

‘Lewis—called,’ she answered jerkily as Romillie put the kettle on to make a pot of tea.

Lewis Selby had been there yesterday. Twice in two days! ‘He must be nearly finished with his business next door,’ Romillie remarked lightly.

‘He asked me to have dinner with him!’ Eleanor burst out in a sudden rush.

Oh, heavens! Romillie kept her expression impassive, but knew the answer even before she asked the question. ‘Are you going?’

‘No, of course not!’ Sharp, unequivocal. And she saw that her mother, like herself, was a long way from trusting again.

Romillie had never met Lewis Selby, but in her conversations with her parent had gleaned enough to know that the man seven years her mother’s senior sounded a very nice and kind man. He must be nice or her mother would never have allowed him over the doorstep.

‘What did you tell him?’ she asked, believing her mother needed to talk her present agitated feelings out of her system. She looked at her parent and thought, as she always had, how beautiful her mother was. She had raven hair, too, but the trauma of her life with Archer Fairfax had added a wing of pure white to one side.

Her mother was suddenly looking self-conscious, and all at once confessed, ‘I feel a bit of a fool now, but he caught me so unawares at the time that I told him that I never went anywhere without my daughter.’

‘You didn’t!’ Romillie gasped. And, when her mother nodded, ‘What did he say to that?’ she asked.

‘He didn’t bat an eye, but straight away suggested that he take the two of us to dinner.’

Heavens! He sounded keen! ‘So where are we going?’ Romillie teased gently, knowing in advance that her parent had put the kibosh on that notion.

‘We aren’t. I told Lewis I wouldn’t hear of it,’ Eleanor replied, as Romillie knew she would. ‘I feel dreadful now. I didn’t even make him a cup of tea. He just—sort of left.’

All went quiet on the Lewis Selby front after that. Her mother seemed to spend long moments staring into space—though pensively, and not as she had formerly, when her whole world seemed to have imploded.

But a week later Romillie arrived home from work to discover that Lewis had popped in again and had been given a cup of tea. In return he had left her mother with a couple of complimentary tickets he could not use himself and which he thought, since it was for an exhibition of paintings at the opening of an art gallery in London on Friday evening, she might be interested in.

‘Wasn’t that thoughtful?’ Eleanor said, more back to the way she had been prior to Lewis’s dinner invitation. ‘We won’t be able to use them, of course, but it was very kind of Lewis to think of us.’

‘Why won’t we be able to use them?’ Romillie asked, not missing that her mother had seemed a touch animated when speaking of the exhibition of paintings.

‘Do you think we could—should?’ Eleanor asked hesitantly.

‘I don’t see why not. It would be a shame to waste the tickets if Mr Selby can’t use then. And we can easily drive up there when I finish work.’

Eleanor was thoughtful for a minute or so. But suddenly agreed, ‘We’ll have a cooked meal at lunchtime,’ she said. ‘Then we’ll only need a sandwich before we go.’

Romillie hurried home after on Friday and noticed that her mother was dressed in a pale blue suit, making her look as smart as a new coat of paint. It pleased her—her mother was usually dressed in trousers and an overblouse.

‘I can’t remember the last time I was in London,’ she commented when Romillie, having quickly showered and changed into a smart two-piece, too, headed the car down the drive.

It was ages since her mother had been anywhere, for that matter, and Romillie could only hope she was not too churned up. She would keep an eye on her anyway, and if she looked to be feeling stressed in any way she would get her out of there.

Romillie found that she need not have worried. ‘Eleanor! Eleanor Mannion!’ someone greeted her the moment they walked into the gallery. She had always painted under her maiden name. And, for all she had not picked up a paintbrush or sold any of her work in years, as several other arty types came up and beamed at her, it was a name that had not been forgotten.

The next half-hour passed quickly as they paused to look, paused to study, prior to moving on. Romillie did not know when she had last seen her mother so animated.

There were a good many people there whom Eleanor did not know, but a good few whom she did. More people came over and expressed warmth and delight at seeing her there so unexpectedly, and Romillie stood back. This was her mother’s world, or used to be. And she looked so cheered Romillie could only be glad that they had come.

Then it was just the two of them again, but as her mother turned to point out the merits of one particular picture, Romillie saw her glance to someone else who was making his way over to them. He was a man of average height, smartly suited, and had white hair and looked to be approaching sixty.

‘Lewis!’ Eleanor exclaimed, a hint of pink creeping up under her skin—and Romillie knew then that there was something more serious going on here than her parent was willing to acknowledge.

‘Eleanor! I’m so glad you could make it!’

‘I’ve used your tickets!’ she exclaimed apologetically.

‘When I knew I would be able to make it after all, I was easily able to get another,’ he said with a smile. And, turning to Romillie, ‘You must be Eleanor’s daughter.’

Romillie studied him for a moment before deciding that she liked the look of him. She had a feeling he would not deliberately harm her mother—and held out her hand. ‘Glad to know you, Mr Selby,’ she said, for he could be none other.

‘Lewis, please,’ he suggested, and they shook hands.

And while he and her mother discussed the picture in front of them, and commented on other works to be seen, Romillie for the moment kept to the sidelines while she wondered—had Lewis Selby really been unable to use the tickets he had given her mother? Or, in the face of her refusing to go out with him, had he intended to be there all along, this merely a ploy to have some time with her away from her home? At any rate, he was not moving on, but appeared to have latched on to them.

She was still pondering that matter when she noticed a tall man who must have just come in, because she had not spotted him previously. What especially caught her notice was that the tall, good-looking man, somewhere in his mid-thirties, was standing stock still and just staring at her.

Romillie tilted her chin a trifle—and looked through him. She had seen tall, good-looking men before—tall, good-looking and untrustworthy. She turned back to tune in to what Lewis Selby and her mother were saying. But suddenly they were interrupted when the good-looking man she had been ready to ignore was there, proving that he was not so easy to ignore.

‘Naylor!’ Lewis exclaimed. ‘I thought you were still at the office!’

‘I’m taking time off for good behaviour,’ Naylor replied, his voice even and well modulated.

‘Let me introduce you,’ Lewis said pleasantly. ‘Naylor is my deputy and will take over when I retire. Naylor, Mrs Eleanor Fairfax.’ And, as they shook hands, ‘And this is Romillie, Eleanor’s daughter.’

‘Romillie,’ Naylor acknowledged, and shook her hand too, but did not, she thought, seem overly impressed, because he turned from her and straight away asked her mother if she was enjoying the exhibits, and if she had far to come or lived in London.

And while Eleanor explained briefly where they lived, and that they had journeyed up by car, Romillie realised she must have gained the wrong impression when she had thought Naylor Cardell had been standing stock still when he had seen her. If he had, he must have seen all he wanted to, because he was not looking at her now—and in fact had barely given her another glance.

She felt slightly miffed for no reason, because she was sure she did not want the next chairman of Tritel Incorporated to be interested in her—which clearly he was not. So, after first checking that her mother appeared to be all right and in no way anxious, Romillie moved a step or two away to look at a different painting.

From the corner of her eye she saw her mother and Lewis Selby move on. She had thought Naylor Cardell had moved on with them. But—wrong—he was all at once there in front of her.

Romillie looked up and observed that he had short dark blondish hair and quite striking blue eyes—eyes that were looking no more interested now than they had. And—more—were definitely unfriendly. Abruptly, she glanced from him to see that her mother, although now out of earshot, was otherwise chatting happily to Lewis.

Romillie flicked her glance back to Naylor Cardell. She had a feeling she did not like him. Had a feeling he did not like her. Fine. She did not have to like him—if he was standing there waiting for her to say something he’d have a long wait.

But he wasn’t waiting. His tone curt, ‘You know that Lewis has asked your mother out?’ he gritted.

Romillie was so taken aback she wasn’t sure that her jaw did not drop. She took another glance to where her mother and Lewis appeared to be getting on famously.

‘He told you?’ she questioned sharply, not at all sure how she felt about that, but her protective instincts on the upsurge.

‘We’re friends as well as colleagues,’ Naylor Cardell stated. ‘Lewis Selby is a fine man,’ he went curtly. ‘I admire him tremendously.’

Romillie did not care to be spoken to curtly. Who the blazes did he think he was? ‘You’re suggesting I should join his fan club?’ she asked acidly.

Naylor’s eyes narrowed at her impudence—Romillie had a feeling that he was more used to women falling at his feet than giving him a load of lip. He swallowed down his ire, however, to inform her, ‘Lewis is an honourable man. I can guarantee that should Eleanor take up his invitation she will come to no harm.’

Romillie had had enough of this before it started. He had known her mother for five minutes—she had spent this last five years trying to help her through what had been a very dreadful time for her.

‘I’ll bear that in mind!’ she retorted, and went to walk away—the nerve of the man!

‘Hear me out.’ Naylor insisted.

Romillie could think of not one single, solitary reason why she should. But, glancing at her mother again, she saw her laugh at something Lewis had just said. And just then she was struck by the change in her mother since that day she had first invited Lewis Selby in for a cup of tea. She seemed, in fact, from that day onwards, to have made great strides in surfacing from the despair that had held her in its grip for so long, and moving on towards regaining her full confidence. So maybe, just maybe, she owed this man—who clearly held Lewis Selby in high regard—some small hearing.

‘So?’ she invited.

‘So I’ll tell you,’ Naylor Cardell took up, without waiting for her to change her mind, ‘because it’s for certain that Lewis won’t. He went through one horrendous divorce a couple of years ago, where he was too much of a gentleman to fight back. She, the ex, did everything she could to destroy him. She almost succeeded.’

That had such a familiar ring to it—had not her own father tried to undermine her mother at every turn, done everything he could to make her crumple?

‘She hated it like hell when he proved too much of a man for her,’ Naylor went on. ‘But that doesn’t mean he didn’t suffer just the same.’

Romillie could feel herself warming to Lewis Selby. Oh, the poor man. If…She checked the thought. She mustn’t go soft here. Her mother was still her prime consideration.

‘So?’ she tossed at him, chin jutting.

Naylor Cardell’s eyes glinted steel. ‘So,’ he said heavily, ‘from the little Lewis has told me of your mother—and I swear to you he has not broken any confidences,’ he added, when she started to bridle, ‘I’d say that both your mother and Lewis could do with a break.’

‘A break for what?’ Romillie questioned hostilely, as ever her mother’s guardian.

‘A break to get to know each other, wouldn’t you say?’

Romillie was not sure that she would. She looked into those striking blue eyes and could feel herself giving in while not sure what she was giving in to. Time to toughen up! ‘Who elected you cupid?’ she challenged curtly—and discovered that he didn’t like being spoken to that way either.

‘Look here, Fairfax,’ he rapped. ‘It’s an initial dinner that’s in the offing, not a trip to see the vicar. And if you could forget to be thoroughly selfish for two minutes, and after all your mother does for you do something for her for a change, it might improve your disposition.’

Romillie’s jaw did drop. That was so unfair! How dared he? She felt like hitting him. But she was used to dampening down her feelings, and so swallowed down the urge to hit him or to tell him just how wrong he had got it. No way was she going to tell him anything of how downcast her mother had been.

So, she stared up at him. Then suddenly she smiled, the phoney smile she had up to then reserved for Jeff Davidson, and with no intention whatsoever of doing anything Naylor Cardell might suggest, ‘What would you like me to do?’ she invited sweetly.

Whether he saw straight through her or not, Romillie had no idea, but Naylor Cardell seemed to be giving the matter every consideration before, after several moments, he suggested, ‘Why not urge Eleanor to take up his dinner invitation? To accept—’

‘She won’t.’ Romillie cut him off. Oh, my, he wasn’t used to being interrupted. That was plain as she weathered the exasperated look he sent her.

‘Lewis tells me there’s a chance if you go too,’ he grated.

Oh, help us, this Naylor Cardell really did dislike her, didn’t he? She should worry! ‘My mother would never agree to that,’ Romillie told him forthrightly. But then, out of positively nowhere—though perhaps since he had been trying to back her into a corner where she, it seemed, was selfish and uncaring—Romillie thought it about time she challenged him for a change. ‘My mother wouldn’t agree to that,’ she reiterated, but added, bringing out her phoney smile again, and looking up at him all wide-eyed and innocent, ‘But she might agree if we went out in a foursome.’

Naylor Cardell stared at her as if he just could not believe his hearing. As if his normal powers of rapid comprehension had just deserted him.

‘Foursome?’ he queried slowly. ‘We?’ he questioned, scandalised.

Suddenly Romillie was having a lovely time. It was all right, wasn’t it, when he was doing the challenging, he urging she persuade her mother to accept Lewis’s invitation, but different again when that challenge was bounced back at him. ‘It’s time to put your money where your mouth is,’ she told him. And just had to release a light laugh that bubbled up and would not stay down when she added, ‘Be brave, Cardell—you’ve been elected.’

He stared down into her wide brown eyes, looked down at her laughing lovely mouth, and appeared to be very much taken aback—even a little stunned. She was still smiling, not a phoney smile this time, but a genuine smile that came from the fact that in putting him on the spot for a change her good humour was restored. It was not, however, to last.

Because suddenly her own previous phoney smile was being lobbed back at her, and she just did not believe it when, ‘Very well,’ Naylor Cardell conceded. And, while that wiped the smile from her face, ‘I’ll make up a foursome,’ he agreed, bestowing on her a superior kind of look that had soon put paid to her smile. And, in case she was in any doubt, ‘But if your mother still says no,’ he added, ‘it’s off.’

The nerve of the man! Open-mouthed, she stared at him. ‘Don’t flatter yourself!’ she retorted heatedly, having no need of the reminder that he had no personal interest in her but, when he would not normally dream of going out with her, would if it would help out a friend and colleague who had been through very bad times. ‘You’re not married?’ she thought to question, committed, by the look of it, but already searching for a way out.

The trouble was, he seemed to know exactly what she was thinking. It was all there in his silkily drawled, ‘You don’t get out of it that easily. I’m completely unattached—and like it that way.’

Romillie breathed out heavily. ‘Good for you!’ she erupted, niggled, and was more annoyed when he took out his business card and handed it to her.

‘Call me,’ he said.

She did not want his wretched card, but without another word took it from him. Fuming, she turned from him and went in search of her mother. ‘You don’t get out of it that easily’ he had said. She did not like the sound of that. Somehow, those words had sounded ominously like a threat!