mean he’s sacked you just for being late?’
Kate permitted herself a thin and slightly bitter smile. ‘No, he hasn’t sacked me, but let’s just say I’m leaving ahead of having him do so.’
‘Oh, Kate, no!’ Laura protested, obviously upset. ‘I can see that things have got off to bad start for you—!’ She stopped, biting her lip and looking uncomfortable.
Laura would never make a politician, Kate reflected wryly, witnessing her colleague’s discomfort.
‘Laura?’ she prodded firmly.
‘Well, I’m sure he didn’t mean anything—to be critical…or unkind. But I did hear Sean asking John where you were,’ Laura admitted reluctantly, adding quickly, ‘I’m sure he’ll be understanding, Kate. He seems such a sweetie, and so gorgeous.’
A sweetie! Sean! Kate suppressed a bitter laugh.
Sean might be many things, but he had never been a sweetie—not even when she had first known him.
A tough, streetwise, untamed rogue male, who could make a girl go weak at the knees and hot in places she hadn’t previously known existed with just one taunting look, that was what he had been. And she…
Her face started to burn as she recognised where her unwanted thoughts were leading. She switched on her computer and started to type.
‘Oh, thank goodness you’ve changed your mind,’ Laura began, with relief, but Kate shook her head.
‘No, I haven’t. I’m just typing out my notice,’ Kate informed her crisply.
‘Your notice! Oh, Kate.’ Laura looked aghast, and immediately tried to dissuade her, but Kate refused to let herself be swayed.
Finishing her typing, she checked and then printed off her letter, placing it neatly in an envelope, which she put in the internal post tray.
Her task completed, she headed for the door.
‘Where are you going?’ Laura demanded anxiously.
‘I’m leaving,’ Kate answered patiently. ‘I’ve written my resignation letter. As of now, I no longer work here!’
‘But, Kate, you can’t leave just like that—without telling anyone!’ Laura protested.
‘Watch me!’ Kate answered succinctly, walking calmly towards the door.
But inwardly she was feeling far from calm. Frantically she clamped down on her treacherous thoughts.
Kathy was working here! Sean paced the floor of his office, having terminated the call from the wife of his financial adviser. She had called to invite him to a dinner party she was planning, but Sean did not do dinner parties. His mouth twisted bitterly. Until he had met Kathy he hadn’t even known the correct cutlery to use. She had been the one who had gently taught him. Gently rubbed off his rough edges. And he…
He strode angrily over to the office window and stared out of it. He had deliberately not kept track of Kathy after their divorce. There hadn’t been any point. The marriage had been over and he had made her a generous financial settlement, even if she had returned it to his solicitor intact. Who had she married? When had she married him?
He went back to the desk and picked up the personnel files he had not yet read.
CHAPTER TWO
AS SHE climbed out of her car Kate acknowledged that really there was no way she should have been driving. She was shaking from head to foot, and she had no real idea of how she had driven home. The entire journey had been a pain-fuelled blur of fighting back unwanted memories whilst surge after surge of panic and anger had washed through her.
‘Kate!’
Kate tried to looked relaxed and smile as Carol, her friend and neighbour, came hurrying towards her.
‘What are you doing back so early?’ Carol asked, adding teasingly, ‘Did the interview go so well that the new boss gave you the rest of the day off?’
Kate opened her mouth to make a suitably lighthearted response, but to her chagrin she could feel her lips starting to tremble as emotions overwhelmed her.
‘I’ve handed in my notice,’ she told Carol shakily. ‘I…I had to…My…the new boss is my ex-husband!’ Tears filled her eyes. She was shaking so violently she could have been in shock, Kate recognised distantly.
‘Come on, let’s get you inside,’ she heard Carol announcing in a motherly voice. ‘And then you can tell me all about it.’
Ten minutes later, after she had made them both a cup of coffee and chatted calmly about their sons, Carol turned to Kate and said gently, ‘I’m not going to pry, Kate, but if you want to get it off your chest I’m a good listener, and I promise it won’t go any further.’ When Kate made no response, but simply continued to sit huddled in her chair, her hands gripping her coffee mug, Carol added quietly, ‘Not even to Tom, if that’s what you want.’
Kate turned her head to look at her, her gaze blank and withdrawn, then forced herself to focus on her friend.
Taking a deep breath, she began to speak, slowly and painfully. ‘I met Sean when I was eighteen. He was building an extension for my aunt and uncle’s neighbours. We’d had a very hot summer, and he worked bare-chested in a pair of old tight-fitting jeans—’
‘Mmm, sexy. I can picture the scene.’ Carol smiled encouragingly, relieved to see just the merest twitch of humour lifting Kate’s mouth.
‘I used to walk the long way round just so that I could see him,’ Kate admitted. ‘I hadn’t thought he’d notice me, but then one night at a local club he was there and he asked me to dance. Fantasising over him when I walked past the building site was one thing. Being confronted with him there in front of me in the flesh was another! I felt intimidated by him.’ Kate gave small shrug and looked at Carol.
‘I was a naïve eighteen-year-old virgin, and all that fierce, potent hot male sexuality was a bit overwhelming. Unfortunately he thought I was rejecting him, and…’ She shook her head. ‘I didn’t know it then, but like me he’d had a very unhappy and lonely childhood, which had left him with a bit of a chip on his shoulder and a determination to succeed. I can see now that I was a bit of a challenge to him, because I was a girl from a different background. A trophy girlfriend, I suppose the press would call it nowadays, and for a while I was good enough for him as just that. Good enough to marry, in fact. But once he’d become very successful I think he began to realise that I wasn’t much of a trophy after all, and that with his money he could afford a much, much better one than me.’
Carol could hear the pain in Kate’s voice. ‘You obviously loved him,’ she said softly.
‘Loved him?’ Kate looked at her starkly, her emotions darkening her eyes. ‘Yes, I loved him—totally and completely, blindly and foolishly I realise now. Because I believed then that he felt the same way about me!’
‘Oh, Kate!’ Carol
