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‘Yes, Dan.’
‘Then will you organise some flowers and fruit for Brian’s wife—’
‘I’ve already taken care of it. And Ned Gresham’s agreed to come in and cover for him.’ Karen might not have the glamour of a Garland Girl, but she was their equal in every other way. Dan recalled Mandy’s smile, slightly parted lips, the way her fingers had felt as they had rested briefly on his and the way his skin had tightened at the contact. Not quite every way, which was probably just as well. A sexy secretary combined with a garage full of impressionable drivers and mechanics was nothing short of a recipe for disaster. ‘Do you want me to write him in for the five o’clock pick-up from The Beeches?’ She didn’t say, Now that Sadie’s arrived. She didn’t need to.
With just a touch of regret, he surrendered the memory, the anticipated pleasure … But not to Ned Gresham. With his public school accent and chiselled good looks, the man thought he was God’s gift to women. A lot of women thought that too. The idea of him flirting with Mandy Fleming … ‘No. Ask Bob to do it.’ He kept his finger on the button for a moment. ‘Tell him he can take Miss Fleming home rather than back to the Garland offices if she prefers.’
Karen laughed. ‘Pretty, was she?’
‘Simple public relations, Karen. Please the secretary and you’ve got the boss.’
‘And if Miss Fleming lives on the other side of London?’
‘She’ll be even more impressed and Bob will enjoy the overtime.’
‘She was that pretty?’
‘I didn’t notice.’ His lie was rewarded with the disbelieving snort it merited before he flicked the switch. Dan straightened and looked at his daughter, remembering the pretty child she had been, seeing the lovely woman she would become once she stopped trying to hurt him, hurt herself—but only because her mother wasn’t around to take the abuse in person. ‘Come on,’ he said.
‘I’m not going back,’ she repeated stubbornly.
‘I heard you, Sadie. I’m not taking you back to school, but I’m not leaving you to run around London on your own. If you’re not going back to school you’re going to have to work for a living.’
‘Work?’ Sadie’s careless certainty, the belief that she was the one calling the shots, wavered. That gave Dan hope.
‘You leave school; you have three choices. If you’ve decided not to do re-sits, college is a non-starter. The alternative is work, and since you’re hardly likely to have employers lining up for the privilege of signing you up, you’ll have to work for me.’ He waited for her reaction. When none was forthcoming he added, ‘Of course you’re welcome to try the Job Centre if you think you can do better?’
‘You said three choices.’
‘You could telephone your mother and see if she’ll offer you a home.’ He had his fingers mentally crossed. The last thing he wanted for Sadie was a lotus-eating existence with her mother. ‘I don’t suppose she would expect you to work for your living.’
Her response left no room for doubt about Sadie’s feelings on the subject. Daniel hadn’t anticipated ever feeling sorry for his ex-wife, yet for a woman to have earned so much scorn from her own daughter would wring sympathy from a stone. ‘No? Well, it’s not too late to change your mind.’ His gaze rested momentarily on her hair. ‘Assuming the suspension is not as permanent as your hair colour.’
‘Read my lips, Dad.’ She pointed a black-painted fingernail at her mouth and said, very slowly and very carefully, ‘I am not going back to school.’
‘Are you going to tell me why? Or are you going to wait for Mrs Warburton’s letter to arrive? I imagine she will write to me.’
‘Yeah.’ Her voice was all careless indifference, but her gaze slid away from him as she stuffed a hand into the pocket of her black leather bomber jacket and tossed a crumpled envlope onto the desk. Not so tough as she would have him believe, his little girl, and his insides turned over; it was all he could do to stop himself from grabbing her and hugging her and telling her that it didn’t matter, that whatever she’d done it didn’t matter because he loved her.
By the time she had gathered herself sufficiently to fix him with a belligerent glare, he was looking out of the window, contemplating the yard as if he had nothing more on his mind than the price of engine oil. He ignored the letter. ‘I’d rather hear it from you.’ His tone was mild, but his heart was beating like a steam pump. ‘Was it drink?’ he prompted. ‘Boys?’ He turned to look at her, his mouth suddenly bonedry. ‘Drugs?’
‘What do you take me for?’
An average teenage girl with more money than was good for her and a desperate need to lash out, to hurt the people who loved her.
‘I’ve been suspended for a week, that’s all.’ Under the white make-up he could have sworn she blushed. ‘For dying my hair, if you must know.’
It had to be relief that made him want to laugh. ‘Just for dying your hair? Mrs Warburton isn’t usually that harsh.’ Surely living with the colour while it grew out would be punishment enough. ‘Is she?’ he demanded sharply, suddenly very sure that she wasn’t telling the whole truth.
Sadie lifted her shoulders in a couldn’t-care-less shrug. ‘Yes, well, when the Warthog had me in her office to haul me over the coals for ‘‘letting down the high standards of Dower House School’’…’ she affected a nasal twang that was a cruel caricature of Mrs Warburton’s aristocratic accent ‘… I suggested it was time she touched up her own roots because the grey was showing.’
He put down his cup, turned away, his lips curled hard against his teeth. ‘I can see how that might not have helped matters,’ he said, when he was sure he wouldn’t betray himself.
‘Hypocritical old cow.’
He was forced to cover his mouth, pretend to cough. ‘Maybe so, but that really wasn’t very kind.’
‘She shouldn’t have made such a big deal about it. Anyone would think I’d had my nose pierced, or something.’
‘That’s banned too, is it?’
‘Everything’s banned. Of course if I’m not going back, I suppose I could—’
‘Your mother had her nose pierced the last time I saw her,’ he said. ‘She was wearing a diamond stud.’
Sadie said nothing; she didn’t have to. Dan knew she wasn’t about to do anything that would make her look more like her mother than she already did. Or had done, until she’d dyed her hair. That was something to be grateful for.
‘So, when do I start this wonderful job, then?’
Her tone was as belligerent as her expression, but adolescent rebellion was something he knew all about; this wasn’t the moment to demand she apologise. Despite the ‘hard girl’ act, he was sure she didn’t need to be told what was required, whether she returned to school or not. He was also sure that she was more likely to get on with it if she wasn’t nagged.
‘No time like the present. Come on, I’ll get you an overall and then we’ll go and find Bob.’
‘I can’t wait.’ The heavy sarcasm suggested that this was going to be a long week. He just hoped, for both their sakes, that at the end of it Sadie would realise that school was a soft option compared with working for a living. And that Mrs Warburton was in a forgiving mood.
Should he have tried harder to persuade her to go back? What would her mother have done? Not much. Vickie was in the Bahamas with her latest lover and a new baby to drool over. He doubted if she would welcome a phone call reminding her that she had a daughter approaching an age at which she would become competition. Instinct suggested that his best bet was to set Sadie to work and hope that a week of mind-numbing drudgery would do the job for him.
‘What am I going to have to do?’
‘The options are limited since you can’t drive—’
‘I can drive,’ she declared fiercely. ‘Better than most people.’
That was true. He’d taught her to drive in the field behind the cottage he had bought a couple of years back, and she could handle a motorbike or a car with all the panache of a professional. ‘You can’t drive a car on the road until you’re seventeen, Sadie. You can’t even move one across the yard until you have your licence because you wouldn’t be insured.’ She didn’t answer, but it was obvious that calling her bluff was not going to have any immediate effect. ‘Perhaps you should try a bit of everything. Make yourself useful about the place.’
‘Be a dogsbody, you mean?’ She was not impressed. ‘Great.’
‘If you plan on running this outfit one day you might as well find out how everything works.’
‘Who said I was?’ she demanded.
‘If you don’t go to college you won’t have much choice. You can start in the garage with Bob. He’ll show you the ropes.’
‘Cleaning cars.’ Only an adolescent could endow two such inoffensive words with quite that level of scorn. ‘You didn’t start this business by cleaning cars.’
‘I started with one car, Sadie, and I promise you, it didn’t clean itself.’
‘Very funny.’
‘You think you’re such a catch? Come back when you’ve seen what the Job Centre has to offer and we’ll talk again.’
‘But you’re my father; you can’t expect me to skivvy for you …’ Something in his expression must have warned her that she was doing herself no favours, because she stopped. ‘Okay, okay, whatever you say.’
If only. ‘And one other thing, Sadie. During working hours you’re no different from anyone else around here, you’re an employee with the same privileges and the same responsibilities. That means you arrive on time—’
‘That won’t be difficult. Just give me a call five minutes before you leave.’
‘I don’t provide a wake-up service for my staff, Sadie. And I don’t give them a lift to work, either. The only place I’m prepared to drive you to is Dower House, next Monday morning.’
‘Don’t bother. I’m sure there’s a bus.’
‘There is.’ He was looking out of the window, contemplating the business that he had built from scratch. It had been hard. Twenty-four hours a day work, and worry that had left him with too little time to invest in his marriage, too distracted by his own big ideas to notice when his wife had gone looking for company elsewhere. Or perhaps he’d needed the big ideas and the twenty-four-hour work schedule to distract him from his marriage. He turned to his errant daughter. ‘And while you’re here,’ he instructed, ‘you’ll do anything Bob asks of you. In return you get as much tea and coffee as you can drink, a cooked lunch in the café next door and clean overalls every morning. I’m afraid you have to be eighteen before you can join the pension scheme.’
‘My dad, the comedian.’
‘Your boss, the comedian. At least while you’re at the garage.’
‘You’re kidding, right?’ He didn’t bother to reply. ‘Okay … boss. How much do I get paid for doing the dirty work around here?’
‘The going rate for the job. After deductions for tax and national insurance you might earn almost as much as your allowance.’
‘Do I still get the allowance?’
‘What do you think?’
Amanda couldn’t wait for five o’clock. She had been looking forward to attending this seminar, but it had proved mind-numbingly dull. Or maybe it was just that her mind had other things to occupy it. A pair of capable hands. A quiff of sun-bleached hair with a will of its own. A dangerously attractive smile that still made her feel warm inside. Ridiculous.
Well, she was being ridiculous all round today. Common sense suggested it would have been wiser to call Capitol and cancel that five o’clock car. Her mother lived only a few miles away; she could have got a taxi there, stayed the night. Stayed the weekend, even. Except that she wasn’t quite ready to share her plans.
And now she’d left it too late.
She emerged from the hotel and glanced around, looking for Daniel, expecting to see him leaning against the bulk of his car. He wasn’t. Maybe he’d expected her to be late again, because the big dark blue Mercedes was on the far side of the car park and he was sitting inside it. Oh, well. She pinned a bright, careless smile in place and crossed the gravel. In the event, it was unnecessary, because the man who looked up from the driver’s seat was not Daniel Redford.
The plunging sense of disappointment certainly put that careless smile in its place. She definitely cared. Which was pretty stupid since she had only met the man once. Apparently that didn’t matter as much as she’d thought it did.
‘Yes, miss?’ The man had made no move to get out and open the car door for her, and for a moment she floundered before finding her voice.
‘You are from Capitol Cars, aren’t you? I didn’t realise I’d have a different driver.’
‘You haven’t got a different driver.’ She swung around at the sound of Daniel’s voice. ‘You have a different car, which is probably why you didn’t see me.’
How could she have missed him? He must have seen her confusion because he was smiling as he took her arm. ‘I’m parked over there.’ Her eyes widened as she took in the opulent lines of a classic wine-red Jaguar parked on the far side of the hotel entrance. She’d been so intent on looking for a Mercedes, for Daniel, that she hadn’t even noticed it. Amanda smiled apologetically at the driver of the Mercedes and walked with Daniel across to his car. ‘Well, this is different,’ she said.
‘Someone rear-ended the Mercedes this afternoon.’
Concern brought her to a halt and she looked up at him anxiously. ‘Were you hurt?’
‘Hurt?’ Then he shook his head. ‘Oh, no. I wasn’t driving it when it happened.’ They reached the car. ‘I hope you don’t mind this old jalopy.’
‘Mind?’ She glanced at him. ‘Why should I mind? She’s absolutely beautiful. A real classic.’ Whether the Jaguar merited quite that amount of breathy admiration was a moot point. But Amanda needed some excuse for her breathlessness.
‘Well, I’m glad you like her because there is a bit of a problem.’ Then he did that thing with the smile that made simple breathlessness seem like a piece of cake. ‘Because she’s rather mature, there are no seat belts in the rear, so you’ll have to sit up front with me.’
‘That’s not a problem. That’s a pleasure.’ She surrendered her laptop and document case to Daniel, and as he opened the door for her she stepped into the leather-scented interior. ‘My father had a car like this,’ she said, when he joined her. ‘It was dark green.’
‘The height of luxury in its time.’
‘It’s still luxury. A real treat after a dull day.’
‘I wish I’d had a dull day.’ There was a world of feeling in his voice as he started the car.
‘A baby and a rear-ending. Yes, I can see how that might complicate your life.’
‘They were the easy problems. After all, the baby isn’t mine and someone else’s insurance company will be paying for the damage to the car.’
‘There’s more?’
‘They say things happen in threes. My daughter chose today to drop out of school.’
His daughter. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. And she meant it. In more ways than one. The happy haze evaporated as quickly as it had formed at the sound of his voice. He had a daughter. Well, what was the big surprise in that? She’d asked about his wife and he’d been evasive. She should have remembered that before she’d made an utter fool of herself with her stupid That’s a pleasure …
Well, that would teach her to let her mind go awandering. He had a wife, and a wife almost inevitably meant children. But the inevitability of it didn’t stop her heart from sinking like a soggy sponge.
‘Was there any special reason?’ she asked. Well, she had to say something. ‘For the dropping out?’
‘She flunked her GCSEs last summer. I’m hoping she’s just a bit fed up because all her friends have moved on to the sixth form while she’s stuck with re-sits.’ Daniel pulled out of the parking bay and headed for the gates.
‘Hoping?’
‘I suspect it may be a symptom of something worse.’ There was what seemed like an endless pause as he reached the gates, waited for the traffic, then pulled out into the lane.
She couldn’t ask. Could she? ‘A symptom?’ Amanda prompted, once they were cruising.
Daniel Redford glanced at her briefly. Then, as if coming to a decision, he said, ‘Her mother abandoned her when she was eight years old. The divorce was a long time ago, but I have the feeling that it’s finally caught up with her.’
‘Oh, I am sorry.’ And she was. She might be glad that Daniel was unattached. The soggy sponge might be making a miraculous recovery. But she couldn’t be happy that a little girl had been abandoned by her mother. ‘That’s a terrible thing to happen to any child. What’ll you do?’
‘With Sadie?’ He glanced across at her and quite unexpectedly grinned. Sadie might have taken her mother’s abandonment hard, but she didn’t get the feeling that Daniel Redford was too bothered. ‘I’ve put her to work cleaning cars at the garage. I’m hoping a week of that might help to change her mind.’
‘It would certainly send me scurrying back to my books. But shouldn’t you be at home with her now, helping her sort out her life, instead of chauffeuring me about the place?’
‘I should. In fact you were rescheduled for another driver, but what with the shunt and a baggage handlers’ strike delaying a couple of airport jobs, it all got a bit complicated. Don’t worry about it. I’ve no doubt she’s very grateful for the opportunity to avoid me for another hour or two.’
Amanda was grateful too. So grateful that she sent a silent thank you to the striking airport baggage handlers, wherever they were.
‘Well, you’ve got all weekend to talk. Maybe it’ll seem clearer after a good night’s sleep.’
‘Maybe. And, since the urge to dropout was precipitated by a week’s suspension from school, there’s no rush.’
