Emma Richmond - The Boss's Bride

‘Yes. How well do you know him?’ she demanded bluntly.

‘Well enough.’

‘Is he permanently fixed down here?’

‘Why don’t you ask him?’

‘I did. He said to ask you.’

Claris merely looked at her.

‘Hmph. What’s this I hear about a baby?’

‘I don’t know,’ she denied. ‘What is it that you hear?’

A look of aggravation crossed her face. ‘You were seen arriving with one.’

‘Was I?’

‘Yes. Is it his? Are you sleeping with him?’

‘Are you always this rude?’ Claris countered.

‘In love with him?’

‘None of your business,’ she reproved, without inflexion.

Turning, Mrs Turmaine stared across the room at her nephew. ‘Time he was married and settled down. Good-looking men who play the field are usually bad news.’

Were they? To whom? Claris wondered. After sipping her drink, which was awful, she wedged it onto the crowded table beside her. Moving her eyes back to Adam, she considered his aunt’s statement. Yes, he was good-looking—no, she mentally denied, the man was devastating, but not necessarily bad news. He could sometimes be very rude. Must run in the family. His aunt was even ruder. He could also be aggravating, kind, and thoughtful. He also had a great deal of charm. When he cared to use it. His dark hair was thick, with a slight curl, his brown eyes direct. He was clever and challenging, and generous when he wanted to be. And, no, she wasn’t in love with him. She was attracted to him, she admitted, and it was an attraction she fought every minute of every day, but she was not in love. Any more than he was in love with her. The thought that it might even be conceivable brought a warped smile to her face. She wasn’t even sure that he was capable of loving. He was fond of his godson, which was the only reason he had moved to the house outside Rye—so that he could care for him whilst his parents were in hospital recovering from a horrendous car crash. His London apartment was totally unsuitable for a baby; the baby’s home was in Norfolk, and too far for easy access to the hospital, so they had come to the house he owned in the village of Wentsham. Little Nathan was probably the nearest he’d ever come to loving another human being. By his own admission he had no desire to marry, have children of his own…

‘What does he do?’

Wrenching her attention back to his aunt, Claris asked with deliberate vagueness, ‘Do?’

‘Yes, do. It surely can’t be a secret!’

‘No-o,’ she denied, ‘but I would prefer that you ask him yourself.’

‘I know he owns property,’ Harriet said crossly, as though it was some sort of sin.

‘Yes.’

‘And an electronics firm.’

‘Yes.’

‘And land. He’s extremely wealthy.’

‘Is he?’ asked Claris, who knew almost down to the last penny how much he was worth.

With eyes as direct as her nephew’s, Harriet Turmaine stared at Claris for some moments in silence. ‘It’s none of my business what he does, but I’ll give you a word of warning. This is a small community—old-fashioned, some might say—but if the baby’s yours, and he’s the father, and if he’s intending to stay here, he’d do better to marry you. I shan’t live in his pocket,’ she promised bluntly. ‘It’s not my way. No need to worry that I’ll interfere. Couldn’t if I wanted to. Don’t like people much.’ With an abrupt nod, she walked away.

Interesting, Claris thought. Related to Adam by marriage, not blood, astonishingly, she seemed very much like him. With a small smile, Claris made her way towards her employer, who was looking bored. She raised her eyebrows at him and amusement leached into his eyes.

‘Bored, Claris?’ he asked naughtily.

She gave him a look of mild derision and removed the glass from his hand. ‘Say goodbye to your hostess,’ she instructed him.

His amusement deeper, he went to do so.

‘Always does as he’s told, does he?’ a soft voice asked from beside her, and she turned to look at the young woman who had been talking to him.

‘Not always, no,’ she denied pleasantly. ‘It was nice to have met you,’ she added, by way of dismissal.

‘But you haven’t.’

‘No,’ Claris agreed.

‘I’m Bernice Long. Harriet’s niece. Her sister’s daughter. I expect we’ll meet again.’

It sounded like a warning. ‘Yes. Goodnight.’ A small smile on her mouth, she made her way towards their hostess, who had one hand resting rather intimately on Adam’s sleeve.

‘Thank you for a pleasant evening,’ Claris murmured, and Mrs Staple Smythe turned with a look of irritation.

‘I’m sure I don’t know why you have to leave so soon. You’ve only just arrived.’

‘Yes, but we don’t like to leave the baby too long.’ As an exit line, it was as good as any. With a last smile, she walked out. She wanted very badly to laugh.

‘A ghastly evening,’ Adam commented as they stepped outside.

‘Yes. I don’t think we endeared ourselves.’

‘Were we meant to?’ he drawled.

She laughed. ‘And if that is a sample of Rye hospitality…’

‘It isn’t, and this isn’t Rye. It’s a small village. Probably inbred,’ he commented indifferently as he headed towards the gate.

‘Well, you would know. You were born here.’

‘But I haven’t lived here since the age of eight. And eight-year-olds, my dear Miss Newman, aren’t known for their perspicacity.’

‘No,’ she agreed as she walked with him along the narrow lane. The well-manicured, immaculately hedged lane. Twenty or so detached houses and a small general store seemed the sum total of the community. Adam’s house was the last one on the right-hand side. Not that it could be seen behind its high brick wall, but that was where it was, and where she would be living for the next few months.

They walked in silence for a few moments, and then she asked curiously, ‘What was she like?’

‘Who?’

‘Bernice Long. The young woman you were talking to.’

‘I wasn’t aware I was talking to anyone.’

In other words, Claris thought wryly, mind your own business. ‘What did you think of your aunt?’

‘I don’t think I thought anything,’ he denied. ‘Why the remark about the baby?’ he asked, in the sort of voice that had often reduced past secretaries to tears. He’d had a great many secretaries, or so she’d been told. None of them had lasted very long.

‘I was being naughty,’ she said simply.

‘Then I would appreciate it if you would learn to contain it, and not make injudicious remarks.’

‘It wasn’t injudicious,’ she denied, without offence. ‘Your aunt had already asked me about it.’

‘And you told her?’

She slanted him a glance of derision.

‘Sorry,’ he apologised.

‘Accepted. She said she didn’t intend to live in your pocket.’

‘I’m very glad to hear it.’

‘But I suspect the same couldn’t be said of Mrs Staple Smythe.’

‘Then you had best make sure my pockets are always unavailable, hadn’t you? And don’t sigh.’ With one of his quicksilver changes of moods, he promised humorously, ‘I’ll let you look after the baby tomorrow.’

‘How kind. Sadly, I will be unable to take you up on your generous offer. If you want your printer replaced, I shall have to go to London and bully someone.’

‘Bully them over the phone.’

‘But it works so much better face-to-face,’ she informed him softly as she pushed open the narrow side gate that led into the extensive grounds. ‘Anyway, I have to see the letting agent about my flat.’ She thought it might also be wise to try and change the sub-lease from long-term to short. In case she needed a bolt-hole. Having met the residents, she wasn’t entirely sure she was going to like living in Wentsham.

THE Secret Garden, Claris thought humorously as she all but circumnavigated the red-brick wall before finding the rear entrance. Pushing open the gate, she stepped quietly inside. Enchanted, she halted to stare about her. Trees, shrubs, ancient statuary, and a flowering vine that scrambled unchecked over an old pergola. Closing her eyes, she breathed in the heady scent of honeysuckle. The sun was warm on her face, and for the first time in days she felt at peace. She hadn’t even known this part of the garden existed, but then, she thought wryly, the last few hectic days hadn’t given her much time for investigation.

Looking after Adam’s business interests was a difficult enough job. Adding a fourteen-month-old baby to the equation made it almost impossible. Before moving to Wentsham, she had wondered how hard would it be. Hard, was the answer. She had sort of assumed that a one-year-old would sit quietly and play with his toys—when he wasn’t asleep, that was. Not true. Nathan was active. So was Adam. Apart from helping out with the baby, he had expected her to set up his office in the house so that everything ran smoothly to beg, plead, sob, in order to get another phone line put in immediately, and then, hastily and exhaustingly, remove everything from the baby’s path. A one-baby demolition derby, that was what Nathan was. She must have run miles just chasing after him to prevent an accident. Not that she’d had to do it all herself. Adam was trying to be practical. He was also desperately worried about his friends, Nathan’s parents. Paul was still in a coma, Jenny in and out of consciousness but seemingly unaware of what had happened. Jenny’s parents, who had been in the car with them, weren’t on the critical list, but it would be weeks before they could be discharged. Which left only Adam, and herself, and his housekeeper to look after the baby.

Reluctant to move on, Claris spent another few moments just listening to the gentle buzzing of the bees in the honeysuckle, the call of a lone blackbird, and then began following the narrow, meandering path towards the small gate she could see ahead of her. Opening it, she stepped through into the garden proper. The manicured lawn, courtesy of an excellent gardener, looked almost emerald after the morning’s rain. A riotous profusion of flowers bordered each side, spilling lazily across the paths, and led the eye towards the old red-brick house before her. Grays Manor. Envy was as foreign to her nature as greed, but this house generated it in her. The first time she had seen it she had wanted it to be hers. Dream on.

With a wry smile she began walking along the path, past the French doors that stood slightly open, until she came to another wrought-iron gate. Pushing it open, she entered the paved courtyard. A vintage car stood before the old stable block. A pair of long legs protruded horizontally from the left-hand side—and the baby was crawling determinedly towards a cat that was lazily sunning itself beside a tub of geraniums.

‘Hello, pumpkin,’ she greeted softly, and the baby, presumably knowing he was about to be thwarted, increased his pace towards his goal. With a laugh in her eyes, she walked across to the car and gently touched her foot to one protruding leg. And no one would ever know, she thought pensively, how such a small action could set her heart beating into overdrive. With no hint of how she was feeling in her voice, she asked quietly, ‘Should that baby be crawling out here unattended?’

There was the thump of a head hitting the bottom of the car, a curse, and then the rapid emergence of the mechanic. Dark tousled hair, a filthy face, hands covered in black grease, one of which held a spanner. Dark eyes surveyed her with languid interest before he turned his head to watch the baby.