Behind The Billionaire's Guarded Heart

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Belatedly Hugh registered what the conference call voices were saying.

He’d tuned out at some point. In fact, he could barely remember what the meeting was about. He glanced at his laptop screen.

Ah. App bug fixes. And something about the latest iOS upgrade.

Not critically important to his business, but important enough that he should be paying attention.

He always paid attention.

The meeting ended with his presumed disappearance, and his flat was silent.

He pushed back his chair and headed for the kitchen, leaning against the counter as his kettle boiled busily.

He’d left his tea mug in the sink, as he always did. He reused it throughout the day, and chucked it in the dishwasher each night.

Why had he cared about April’s mug?

He was neat. He knew that. Extremely neat. The perfect contrast to his mother and her overwhelming messiness.

Although, to be fair, his mother hadn’t always been like that.

At first it had just been clutter. It had only been later that the dishes had begun to pile in the sink and mounds of clothes had remained unwashed. And by then he’d been old enough to help. So he’d taken over—diligently cleaning around all his mum’s things: her ‘treasures’ and her ‘we might need it one days’, her flotsam and jetsam and her ‘there’s a useful article/recipe/tip in that’ magazines, newspapers and books.

But he wasn’t obsessive—at least not to the level of compulsively cleaning an employee’s coffee mug.

It had been odd. For him and for April.

He didn’t feel good about that.

He didn’t know this woman at all.

That had been deliberate. He hadn’t wanted to use the Precise HR Department, or reach out to his team for recommendations of casual workers, university students or backpackers—he hadn’t wanted anyone he knew or worked with to know about what was he was doing.

But the fact was someone needed to know what he was doing in order to actually do it—and that person was April Spencer.

And so she knew about his mother’s hoard and would know it better than anyone ever had. Even him.

That sat uncomfortably. Hugh had spent much of his life hiding his mother’s hoard. It didn’t feel right to invite somebody in. Literally to lay it all out to be seen—to be judged.

His mum had loved him, had worked so hard, and had provided him with all she could and more on a minimal wage and without any support from his father. She didn’t deserve to be judged as anything less than she had been: a great mum. A great woman.

Her hoard had not defined her, but if people had known of it...

The kettle had boiled and Hugh made his tea, leaving the teabag hanging over the edge of his cup.

April had offered to leave yesterday.

But he’d rejected her offer without consideration, and now, even with time, he knew it had been the right decision.

If it wasn’t April it would be someone else. At least April wasn’t connected to his work or anyone he knew. Anyone who’d known his mother.

She was a temporary worker—travelling, probably. She’d soon be back in Australia, or off to her next working holiday somewhere sunnier than London, and she’d take her knowledge of his mother’s secret hoard with her.

His phone buzzed—a text message.

Drinks after work at The Saint?

It was a group message to the cyclists he often rode with a few mornings a week. He liked them. They were dedicated, quick, and they pushed him to get stronger, and faster.

He replied.

Sorry, can’t make it.

He always declined the group’s social invitations. He liked riding with them, but he didn’t do pubs and clubs. Or any place there was likely to be an unpredictable crowd—he never had, and in fact he’d never been able to—not even as a child. He avoided any crowd, but enclosed crowds—exactly as one might find in a pub—made him feel about as comfortable as a room full of his mother’s boxes.

He actually wasn’t sure which had come first: Had he inherited his crowd-related anxiety from his compulsive hoarder mother, or had his hatred of bustling crowds stemmed from the nightmares he’d once had of being suffocated beneath an avalanche of boxes?

It didn’t really matter—the outcome was the same: Hugh Bennell wasn’t exactly a party animal.

Fortunately Hugh’s repeated refusals to socialise didn’t seem to bother his cycling group. He was aware, however, that they all thought he was a bit weird.

But that wasn’t an unfamiliar sensation for him—he’d been the weird kid at school too. After all, it hadn’t been as if he could ever invite anybody over to his place to play.

Want to come over and see my mum’s hoard?

Yeah. That had never happened. He’d never allowed it to happen.

His doorbell rang.

Hugh glanced at his watch. It was early afternoon—not even close to the time when packages were usually delivered. And he certainly wasn’t expecting anybody.

Tea still in hand, he headed for the door. It could only be a charity collector, or somebody distributing religious pamphlets.

Instead it was April.

She stood in her coat and scarf, carrying a box.

A box labelled ‘Hugh’.

* * *

Hugh’s eyes narrowed when he saw her.

April knew she wasn’t supposed to be down here, but she just hadn’t been able to simply send an email.

He wore a T-shirt, black jeans and an unzipped hoodie, and he held a cup of tea in one hand. He was barefoot and his hair, as she’d come to expect, was scruffy—as if he’d woken up and simply run a hand through it. Yesterday he’d been smooth-shaven, but today the stubble was back—and, as she’d also come to expect, she really rather liked it.

Hugh Bennell seemed to be in a permanent state of sexy dishevelment, and she’d put money on it—if she had any—that he had no idea.

But now was not the time to be pondering any of this.