Alex just let his eyebrows mirror hers, a slight crooked smile curling his lips.
‘Yes, it was awful,’ Jennie said, words coming out so fast they were almost tripping over each other. ‘But, you know, we phoned every day…texted…emailed…’ She trailed off and looked at the floor.
Marion watched him carefully as Jennie babbled on, and when her stepdaughter fell silent she nodded gently. ‘You must be the stomach bug I’ve heard so much about.’
Jennie was still holding Alex’s hand and now she gripped it with a strength he hadn’t realised she’d had.
‘Apparently so,’ he replied, catching on. One of the things he’d liked about Jennie was her creativity. He hadn’t realised it extended to fibs, too.
Marion turned to Jennie. ‘Well, it seems as if Mr Dangerfield here is right. You have some talking to do, I imagine, so I’ll say my goodbyes and leave you to it.’
‘Don’t go!’ Jennie said, a little too quickly, then recovered herself, lowering her tone and smoothing her dress down with her free hand. And then he felt her relax, breathe out. She continued slowly, the hint of a relieved smile in her voice. ‘After all, it’s too noisy here, and it isn’t as if I’ve got a room to go to—Auntie Barb’s in mine, snoring away loudly, I expect. And it’s late.’ She turned to face him. ‘We’ll just have to catch up in the morning after all,’ she added, not even pretending to look crushed by the fact.
Marion shook her head. ‘That’s what I was coming to tell you. We’ve got you a room.’
Jennie’s mouth sagged. ‘That’s impossible! They were all full up only an hour ago.’
‘But there’s one room we booked that isn’t being used tonight, remember?’ Marion said, looking very pleased with herself. ‘Of course, you’ll have to move the clothing rails and hair and make-up stuff into a corner, but it’s a large suite—I’m sure you’ll manage.’
Alex had been standing still, vaguely amused at the exchange between daughter and stepmother. It was quite refreshing to find things going his way, with very little toil on his part. He had the feeling that if he just stood here and let events unfold around him, fate would be kind. He would get his answers, and he’d get them tonight.
Jennie began to shake, right down to her fingertips. He could feel her hand trembling in his.
‘You don’t mean.?’
Marion winked at Alex, clearly having
decided he was a stomach bug that Jennie needed a second dose of, and he was unexpectedly glad to have found an ally, someone who realised Jennie shouldn’t always be able to shimmy her way out of difficult situations, that she had to learn to face the consequences of her actions.
‘Should have thought of it sooner,’ she said mildly. ‘I’m sure Alice wouldn’t mind, and it seems a shame to let the room go to waste.’ And then she pressed a key with a large plastic tag on it into Jennie’s hand.
Jennie clamped her fingers around it as if it were a hand grenade with the pin out. And then the tension bled out of her and Alex knew he’d won. Funnily enough, he was disappointed by her reaction. He’d never known her admit defeat so easily. Her bullheaded determination was one of the things he loved about her.
Maybe he’d been wrong about her from the start. They’d rushed headlong into things, too caught up in the whirlwind that seemed to storm and crash around them when they were together. Unfortunately, he’d forgotten that, while whirlwinds were awesome displays of natural power, they were ultimately destructive. What a pity he hadn’t realised that until he’d been picking through the wreckage of his marriage, wondering what had gone wrong and whether it was even worth collecting the debris to see if it could be put back together.
In the end, he’d decided that all he really knew about Jennie Hunter was that she was the one woman who’d fascinated him, captivated him. Ensnared him. And that she’d run away the first time the going had got tough.
‘You know where it is, don’t you, Jennie?’ Marion said. ‘After all, you got ready there this morning.’
Jennie nodded dully and started leading the way. Marion grabbed his arm as he passed her and leaned forward to whisper in his ear. ‘Good luck,’ she said, squeezing gently. ‘She’s hard work—but she’s worth it.’ And then she walked smoothly across the foyer and disappeared into the banqueting hall.
Alex followed Jennie up the large wooden staircase. Not as closely as he had before, but close enough to watch those memorable curves move under the satin of that dress.
She had to be wearing that dress, didn’t she?
Finally, they reached the top of the staircase and she led him down a corridor to a vast pair of double doors. Instead of opening the door, she just stood there, the key clutched in her closed left hand.
She wore no ring, he realised.
Slowly, he peeled her fingers away from the key’s plastic tab, and when he’d reached the last one he stopped. He realised the reason for her hesitation now, shared a little of it himself, if he were honest.
In gold italic writing, on the moulded smooth plastic of the old-fashioned room key were two words: Bridal Suite.
CHAPTER THREE
ALEX was glad the sun was finally lowering itself behind the trees and rhododendrons, changing the neat lawn’s wide stripes a dirty gold colour. Garden parties were, by definition, a daytime pursuit, and he’d soon be able to legitimately say his goodbyes. Inside his jacket pocket, his fingers traced the flat buttons of his mobile phone. He imagined sliding it open and dialling the number of the local cab company he’d programmed in earlier.
When his senior partner, Edward, had suggested this event to thank the staff and schmooze their most important contacts, Alex hadn’t been slow in voicing his objections. The beginning of September wasn’t really the perfect time for an outdoor event, was it? But Edward wasn’t cutting his annual sailing trip in Barbados short for anyone, so September it had been.
Luckily, the fickle English summer had only got into her stride around mid-August and had decided to linger awhile yet. The day had dawned bright and sunny and all afternoon a warm breeze had rippled the petals of the late roses in Edward’s borders. But then Edward was an annoyingly lucky man.
Alex sighed and sipped his cold beer. He supposed it had been a good party. To be honest, he’d coasted through it, moving his mouth when he’d had to, smiling if he really must, but he hadn’t retained a single fact about anyone he’d talked to. He couldn’t even remember what he’d filled his plate with at the buffet table. Unless it was connected with work, it seemed details were beyond him these days.
He found a lone wicker chair in the corner of the lawn and waited for the crowds milling in and out of the vast conservatory, or under the rose-twined pergola, to thin. It would look bad if he was the first to disappear, but once others had started to drift off he could follow their lead. The last thing he wanted to do was stand out in this crowd. That would mean they would expect him to be brilliant and eloquent, dazzle them with stories of trials lost and won. And, while he had stories aplenty, he knew that the greyness inside him would invade the telling. So, while he kept his distance, he let them whisper
