Читать книгу Playing by the Rules: The feel-good heart-warming and uplifting romance perfect for Valentine’s Day - Rosa Temple - Страница 12

Chapter 6

Cassandra had been good enough to hand over a spare set of keys for the office before I left on Monday afternoon – reluctantly, I should say, but she handed them over all the same. So the next morning I arrived bright and early carrying two bunches of flowers and a couple of vases from home. I decorated both mine and Anthony’s office with the flowers and went out to buy some biscuits for Anthony’s twelve o’clock. One of the few things I’d learned as a PA was that whenever there was a meeting, there should be tea and there should be biscuits.

At a couple of the previous offices I’d had a subordinate who could rustle up a tea tray for me. But as I was not sure Cassandra would take it too well if I asked her to make the tea, I decided I’d do it myself. I’d bought bad biscuits because Arthur Shearman didn’t like Niles Benson and rule number one in meetings etiquette was to give your worst clients bad biscuits because it was a sure way to keep them at arm’s length. Garibaldi biscuits it was and I hoped the raisins would stick in Niles Benson’s teeth.

Anthony surprised me with his arrival before I’d finished tidying his desk. He wasn’t wearing his glasses and he squinted in my direction.

‘Those look nice,’ said Anthony loosening his tie and coming quite close to where I was standing. He looked nice and relaxed but had a faint hint of a frown line on his forehead. He smelled of freshly showered body and expensive cologne. I wondered how he stayed so fresh after braving the London tube network. Maybe he lived nearby. I assumed he lived with Inez. All those things I had yet to discover.

‘I thought I’d brighten the place up for your meeting,’ I said backing away from Anthony so that my nose didn’t end up on his neck. His cologne was tantalisingly strong and his neck … I swallowed hard. Did she, Inez, buy the cologne for him? Focus, Magenta.

‘My meeting?’ Anthony looked confused and the frown line in his brow deepened a millimetre or two.

‘Yes, Anthony,’ I said, picking up the new desk diary I’d bought in Tiger and thought would make me look efficient if I walked around with it. I’d also bought a matching notebook and had made a note to find out how to claim the expense back from petty cash. ‘It’s with Niles Benson.’

‘Oh him,’ said Anthony. ‘I think my father arranged it.’

Strange. Didn’t Arthur Shearman tell me yesterday that Niles Benson was trouble? Something wasn’t adding up.

‘I did a bit of background on Mr Benson,’ I said. ‘For my own benefit,’ I added, quickly. ‘I see he has a rival company in Bristol and they’re doing pretty well. Factories in China and outlets in Italy, Japan and Sweden.’

‘You have been busy.’ Anthony smiled widely but followed the smile with a frown. ‘I don’t suppose you did a background on why we’re having a meeting did you?’ He leaned back in his chair.

‘Not really,’ I said. ‘I thought you would know. I thought you … Actually, Anthony, would you like me to cancel this appointment?’

‘You can’t do that.’ Cassandra’s voice from the doorway startled us both. ‘I mean, Bristol is quite a few miles away. He must already be on the train, or driving.’

I looked at Anthony who was frowning again.

‘Cassandra’s right, Magenta,’ he said. ‘I should hear him out. I mean he’s on his way and everything.’

Cassandra looked at me, smugly, but I was becoming worried about this meeting. Anthony hadn’t arranged it and I was positive Arthur Shearman hadn’t either.

‘Fine,’ I said. ‘I suppose once you’ve heard what he’s here for things will start to fall into place.’ I looked at Cassandra and the open door to Anthony’s office with one eyebrow raised. ‘Was there anything else?’

‘Um, I just came up to ask Anthony if he wanted his coffee now,’ she mumbled.

‘Yes, he would,’ I said before Anthony could catch his breath. ‘And I have mine black with no sugar.’

Cassandra’s eyes bulged to just enough for me to see how pissed off she was but her voice was sweet when she replied.

‘Coming right up,’ she said, fake smiling her way out of the room.

‘I don’t know what I would have done without Cassandra these past couple of weeks,’ Anthony said. He huffed on the lenses of his glasses, rubbed them with his tie and slid them on. ‘She’s a godsend. If I didn’t need a secretary come receptionist I would have asked her to be my PA.’

‘But you’ve got me now,’ I added, quickly.

‘Of course I have.’ Anthony pulled at his tie and tugged at his shirt collar. As gorgeous and as debonair as he looked in that Hugo Boss suit, formalwear was obviously not his favourite attire. And not surprisingly, if his real talent lay in painting pictures.

Again I wondered why he’d agreed to take over for his father. Perhaps, like me, he didn’t really have a choice. Perhaps his father, who had sounded like an absolute sweetheart on the phone, was really a tyrant who forced Anthony here, threatening to write him out of his will if he didn’t come. Maybe he’d been struggling as an artist and needed to pay some bills. Maybe he was still paying off that expensive engagement ring I’d seen Inez wearing.

Anthony sat staring at the neat piles of letters and other papers I’d straightened out on his desk. Then he scratched his head and looked at me and smiled. He tapped the metal tray on his desk and looked at the letters again. Then he picked up a pen and stared at the phone. Was he expecting a call? When he scratched his head a second time, blew a puff of air up his face and frowned, I knew exactly what was wrong.

Anthony didn’t have a clue where to start. Apart from wrestling with chocolate chip muffins, interviewing me and looking gorgeous, as CEO of the family business this man had no idea which end was up.

‘Should we begin by looking at the letters?’ I asked.

Anthony raised a finger. ‘That’s a good idea.’ He picked up a few of them. ‘Only thing is, I did read through them last week but I’m not sure how to deal with them.’

I sat on the corner of his desk and crossed my legs. He leaned back and appeared to be looking at my legs when Cassandra came in with the coffee. Her face turned bright red and she put a cup of coffee down in front of Anthony.

‘Are you having yours in your office?’ she asked, looking at my legs and the great wax job I’d had.

‘No, I’ll be in here with Anthony for most of the morning, Cassandra, so you can direct any calls for Anthony to his line until I say otherwise.’

‘Fine,’ she said and let my coffee land on the table with a thump. I watched her until she left the room and then took the letters out of Anthony’s hand. Our skin touched for a brief moment and sent a telltale signal to my lower tummy. I squirmed. I’d need cold showers every morning for the next 363 days; I knew that.

‘I hope you don’t mind, Anthony, but I looked at these yesterday. Most of them can be delegated. You know? To your staff along the corridor? They need to see these. All you need to do with post in the future is make sure someone else is doing something about it.’

‘Really? That’s it?’

‘That’s it.’ I smiled, jumping off the desk and shaking out the letters. ‘In fact, why don’t I have Cassandra direct all the post to me from now on? I’ve already made acquaintance with the other staff and they all seem to know their stuff. I’ll redirect everything for you, if you like.’

‘That would be great, Magenta. And what should I do?’

I stood and looked at this little boy lost and all of a sudden his Hugo Boss suit swamped the body of a ten-year-old Anthony with mud on his face and a plaster on his forehead.

‘We’ll figure that out as we go, Anthony. In the meantime you do whatever you need to do to prepare for the meeting. I’ll let you know when Niles Benson arrives.’

I scooped up my coffee cup and went to plonk the post on my desk. Why Cassandra hadn’t already redirected the post instead of dumping it on Anthony, I had no idea. I didn’t trust that woman as far as I could throw her. I went down to reception to have words and found her several centimetres too close to a tall, strikingly smart-looking man in a dark suit. He looked to be in his late thirties. He smiled at me when he noticed me walk in and angled his large frame away from Cassandra and towards me.

‘Oh, Magenta,’ she said. ‘I was just about to buzz you. This is Niles Benson.’

So that’s what a Niles Benson looked like.

‘Thanks, Cassandra, I’ll take it from here.’ I walked over, confidently, and outstretched my hand. One thing Nana Clementine had taught me was always to look confident even when you’re falling to pieces on the inside. I knew Anthony was most likely going to look like a complete amateur compared to Niles Benson so someone here had to look as if they knew what they were doing.

‘I’m Magenta Bright, Anthony Shearman’s PA.’ It rolled nicely off the tongue and I straightened my shoulders with pride.

Niles Benson’s long-fingered hands wrapped around mine. I was surprised by the familiar way he pulled me towards him, still holding my hand and breathing aftershave over me as he said, ‘Pleasure.’ His eyes swept up and down my body. They were piercingly dark and his lashes deliciously long. I wasn’t about to fall for his flirtatious moves as Cassandra may have done.

‘This way,’ I said, trying to unravel my fingers. He followed me up the stairs and I could feel those eyes piercing their way to my underwear as he watched my buttocks progressing up the stairs. Being of mixed parentage, I had managed to acquire a black girl’s bum that a guy I met in New York once told me would never disappear. I had given up asking if my bum looked big in anything I tried on a long time ago. I stopped suddenly on the stairs and Niles Benson’s face nearly made contact with my bottom.

‘I’ll tell Anthony you’re here,’ I said. ‘Please just take a seat in my office.’ On the landing I gestured to my open door. Once Niles was inside I jumped as if I’d just got an electric shock and ran to Anthony’s office. I burst in and found Anthony, jacket off, feet on the windowsill behind his desk and sketching the view from his window.

‘Cool,’ I said looking over his shoulder at the pencilled replica of the hotel and sky outside. ‘You’re really talented at this.’

‘Thanks,’ he said with pink cheeks, spinning back round to face me. ‘It relaxes me. I thought it would help me prepare for the meeting I know nothing about with a man I’ve never heard of.’

‘Well I hope it’s worked, because he’s here. In my office. If you’re ready I’ll send him in.’

‘He’s early,’ said Anthony, putting his jacket back on. I rushed over and helped fix his tie. He sighed and I felt a lovely wave of coffee breath float by me.

‘Don’t worry, Anthony. You’ve got this. Would you like me to sit in?’ Not that I’d know what to say.

‘Er, perhaps I should learn how to handle a meeting on my own. I’m sure that’s what my dad would do.’ Anthony looked at me questioningly and I was sure that if I’d told him not to worry, carry on sketching, I’ll take the meeting, he would have let me deal with Niles.

‘I’ll show him in,’ I said.

When Niles entered Anthony’s office and they shook hands, I saw the ten-year-old Anthony again. His jacket sleeves were so long he had to roll them up to shake hands and he tripped on the extra long trousers of his suit as he tried to climb back into his high leather chair. I offered Niles a coffee, which he declined. Closing the door behind me I shook my head, knowing that Anthony was probably about to make a complete idiot of himself.

I had my office door open and heard Niles about to leave half an hour after he’d arrived. I popped out into the hallway to offer to see Niles to the door and saw that the colour had drained out of Anthony’s face while Niles was strutting like a peacock. Niles almost bowed to me as he left the building and gave me a look I couldn’t fathom – a certain smugness wrapped in fake charm, perhaps. I legged it back upstairs to find out what he’d come for and ignored Cassandra calling after me.

Anthony was at the window when I arrived, opening it wide and loosening his tie.

‘Everything all right, Anthony?’ I asked.

He turned slowly to me, still looking pale.

‘Magenta, I need you to arrange a meeting with the finance department with me for tomorrow morning. I need to look at our sales figures and … well I need to know what’s going on with this company.’ He crashed down onto his chair.

‘Is … is something wrong?’ I said, walking up to his desk.

‘Well if what Benson has just told me is true, this company is on the verge of going bankrupt and he’s just offered to buy us out.’

I leaned my knuckles onto the desk and mouthed: Oh my God! in slow motion.

‘I know,’ said Anthony. ‘Dad said we had hit a bump but he never told me it was an iceberg and that we were sinking.’

‘It can’t be true. I spoke to your dad for ages, yesterday. He didn’t say a word.’

‘You did? Did he call to check up on me?’

‘No, nothing like that. I just needed to fill some time so I thought I’d pick his brain a bit.’

Anthony pursed his lips and then exhaled with a sigh. ‘I think he’s testing me, Magenta. He wants to see if I can get us back in shape. That man has spent his life trying to make me as business-minded as he was and his father before him, especially since my older brother, Michael, went into medicine. He should have taken over the company but he was adamant he didn’t want to follow in Dad’s footsteps. So that just left me – the pushover. Dad knows I won’t want to let the family business down and now he’s landed me right in it.’

‘Perhaps this Benson guy is bluffing,’ I reasoned with him. ‘Maybe he sees you’re new at this and he’s chancing his luck.’

‘I hope you’re right. Look, Magenta, organise that meeting for nine tomorrow morning. I need to get my father on the phone.’

I backed out of the room slowly, taking in Anthony’s drooping shoulders and the solemn way he tapped in his father’s number on his mobile phone.

I closed the door behind me and went about organising the meeting. When I spoke to the finance section they sounded rather as if they were expecting this day to come. It wasn’t looking good for the company and it wasn’t looking good for me. I’d managed two days. Two. And already it looked as if I’d be out of another job before a month was up. But I refused to let my ideal job be taken away from me. I wasn’t sure what I would do to avoid the inevitable but I would try. In many ways, it wasn’t just about me. Anthony also had something to prove and I wanted to be the one to help him prove it.