The Virgin's Wedding Night. Sara Craven
would never work. I’d be so bored. And you know what they say about idle hands,’ she added unthinkingly, and saw his face harden into real anger.
‘Is that a reference to your mother?’
She bit her lip. ‘No, I promise it’s not.’ Although maybe things might have turned out differently for her if she’d been allowed to have a real job—a career from the outset—instead of being expected to stay at home, the dutiful daughter. Perhaps that original love affair was her first chance to be herself. To make a choice, even if it was the wrong one…
She thought it, but did not say it. Instead, she went on coaxingly, ‘All the same, I’d like to pass on the social graces, and start earning my living like everyone else I know.’
There was a silence, then he said, ‘Well, there’s no need to be in too much of a hurry to decide about the future. Why not take one of those gap years, and spend some time at home, while you make up your mind? If you need an occupation, there’s always plenty of voluntary work about.’
‘Gramps, my mind is made up.’ She took a deep breath. ‘And Larry Brotherton is interviewing me for a job as an assistant in the rents review department on Monday.’
‘No one,’ her grandfather said ominously, ‘has seen fit to mention this to me. And I am still nominally supposed to be the chairman of the board.’
‘With your mind, presumably, on higher things than the recruitment of very junior staff.’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, Mr Brotherton may turn me down.’
‘I doubt that very much.’ He was silent for a moment, then grunted. ‘I suppose if you’re determined I can’t stop you. And Flint Audley will do as well as anywhere—until, of course, you’re ready to settle down.’
And I laughed, and said, ‘Of course,’ thought Harriet.
She’d been too pleased with her victory to consider the clear implication in his words. That working at Flint Audley would be merely a stop-gap arrangement until she fulfilled her female destiny by making a sensible marriage.
And when, to her delight, she’d been offered the job, she’d thrown herself into it, working so conspicuously hard that promotion had soon followed. Now, six years later, driven by ambition and hard graft, she was at management level, with a salary to match, a generous bonus, and a possible brief to expand the commercial management branch of the company outside London.
That was if the afternoon’s meeting went her way, as she was determined that it should.
Her colleagues might not like her particularly—she knew that behind her back she was called ‘Harriet the Harridan’—but they couldn’t knock her achievements, and that was what she cared about.
If only Gramps could have been equally satisfied, she thought bitterly. But there’d never been any chance of that. His opinion of her career had remained totally unchanged—that it was simply a way of keeping busy until real life intervened, and she found herself a suitable man.
But over the past year his attitude had hardened to the point of disaster.
‘Gracemead is a house for a family, not a single woman,’ he’d growled. ‘You’ve wasted enough time, my girl. Find yourself a decent man and bring him home as your husband, or I’ll change my will. Arrange for the place to be sold after I’m gone.’
She’d stared at him open-mouthed. ‘Gramps—you’re not serious. You can’t be.’
‘I mean every word,’ he’d returned ominously. ‘I’m going to set you a deadline, Harriet. If you’re not engaged, or better still married, by your next birthday, I shall contact my lawyers. As my heiress, you’d be vulnerable—prey to any smooth-talking crook who came along. I intend to see you with a strong man at your side.’
‘I don’t believe this.’ She’d been breathless with shock and anger. ‘That kind of thinking belongs in the Ark.’
He’d nodded grimly. ‘And everything in the Ark went in two by two—exactly as nature intended. And if you want this house, you’ll do the same.’
Remembering, Harriet caught a glimpse of herself in a shop window, scowling ferociously, and hastily rearranged her expression into more agreeable lines. She made it a strict rule never to take any personal problems into the office, so no one knew about the rock and the hard place currently confronting her in her private life.
‘And they’re not going to know, either,’ she muttered under her breath. This afternoon she had to make a conscious effort to win hearts and minds for her expansion programme, and she already knew that her plans would be under attack by Jonathan Audley, just for the sake of it.
He’d been furious when she’d first overtaken him in the promotion stakes, and she knew she had him to thank for her less than flattering nickname.
But then he’s never heard what I call him under my breath, she thought.
All the same, there were times when she wanted to take hold of him by his pure silk designer tie, and say, Look, we’re on the same side, you pathetic idiot. Stop being a total obstruction.
But it wasn’t just office politics. Harriet knew that she’d offended Jonathan’s male ego long ago, by signally failing to appreciate the charms that had set the young secretaries in a dither since he’d joined the company.
Too pleased with himself by half had been her original thinking, and she’d seen no reason to alter her opinion since. Except, maybe, to add ‘bloody nuisance’ to his list of failings.
And today, unfortunately, she would need every scrap of patience she possessed in order to deal with him.
As she rounded the corner into the square where Flint Audley’s offices were located, she saw that a group of people had gathered outside the small railed garden opposite the building, and were watching something intently.
Curious, Harriet slowed a little, wondering what had attracted their attention. If there’d been some kind of accident, which might require emergency action.
Then, as realisation dawned, her brows snapped together. Good God, she thought. It’s the guy from the restaurant—the alley-cat artist.
Sitting sideways on the low wall, one long leg tucked under him and a board balanced on his lap, he was sketching rapidly.
As Harriet watched, he tore off the sheet of paper he’d been working on, and handed it with a bow to the girl directly in front of him, amid laughter and applause from the others standing around.
Not just vaguely sinister Mediterranean scenes, this time around, but instant portraits, it seemed. Was this the other—different—work that Luigi had mentioned? She was aware of an odd disappointment as the subject of the sketch blushed, giggled, then bent, a little awkwardly, to put some money in the box at his feet.
Well, that certainly confirmed what Luigi had also said about him being hard up, she thought.
Not that she could allow it to make a difference.
The square was a pretty exclusive location, and besides, he probably needed a licence for what he was doing, and she’d bet good money he didn’t have one.
And then, just as if he’d picked up her thought-waves across the width of the road, he looked at her, the dark brows lifting in recognition. Only this time he didn’t look away, subjecting her to a long, searching look that rested on her face, then travelled with lingering arrogance the entire length of her body, as if he was asking some silent question.
There was something in his gaze that caught Harriet completely on the raw, prompting—and deepening—the feelings of self-consciousness she’d experienced at their earlier encounter. Something which she could not understand, and certainly didn’t appreciate.
You’re one step away from down-and-out, my friend, she addressed him silently. So, talented or not, you’re in no real position to issue any kind of challenge, as you’re about to find out.