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Take Mum Out
Fiona Gibson
Three blind datesTwo teenage boys messing up her plansAnd one man who'll melt Alice's heart.'You need to get back in the saddle…' Alice despises that phrase. She's fine being single – with two slothful teenage boys and a meringue business to run, she has enough on her plate without negotiating the troublesome world of modern dating.However, Alice's three best friends have other ideas. Each one will present her with an utterly delicious, eligible man – all Alice has to do is pick her favourite.
FIONA GIBSON
Take Mum Out
Copyright (#ulink_0533a90c-8792-5c5a-8fb9-1fbb6ed031fc)
Avon
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins 2014
Copyright © Fiona Gibson 2014
Cover Illustration: Lucy Truman
Cover design: debbieclementdesign.com (http://www.debbieclementdesign.com)
Fiona Gibson asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication.
Source ISBN: 9781847563651
Ebook Edition © March 2014 ISBN: 9780007469383
Version: 2015-04-09
For Gavin, for setting me up on a very significant blind date
(‘I don’t think he’ll fancy you though’)
Table of Contents
Cover (#ua182fde8-c665-5515-9c36-4c5148e7bcfc)
Title Page (#u7555c8f4-69ac-5a6a-b3b5-c9f81fccb4b2)
Copyright (#u97763bd8-4206-5638-a506-72d191c72edd)
Dedication (#uadbf9529-e0bb-59c2-b527-8a86830fcb53)
Chapter One: Inspection day (#u814ea56f-f8d1-52bb-9986-8a94458c4840)
Chapter Two: Four months later (#u0138f4c8-29be-5eb5-8d2a-75da3b6241a7)
Chapter Three (#ud1422270-2766-5e4b-a3ef-1cd25f8430fd)
Chapter Four (#ucc4c6b12-8f30-57be-b96a-6b887ace601d)
Chapter Five (#u30237a9c-9b1d-503f-925e-31999ce7b4f5)
Chapter Six (#u9d9d4c96-b684-5c32-807b-f461fbed701f)
Chapter Seven (#u9d8673e9-cb62-5fc1-8ee1-25d506dde14b)
Chapter Eight (#ub4f6b30b-9e74-55a2-bec6-5692ea91d0ea)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Five (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twenty-Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-One (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirty-Five: Seven months later: Inspection day (#litres_trial_promo)
A Grown-up’s guide to dating (#litres_trial_promo)
Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)
By the Same Author (#litres_trial_promo)
About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter One (#ulink_9a8b2ec7-1862-55a1-a658-216927ad8d9e)
Inspection day (#ulink_9a8b2ec7-1862-55a1-a658-216927ad8d9e)
‘So you’re setting up a meringue business,’ Erica says as I show her into my kitchen.
‘That’s right,’ I reply. ‘I’ve been testing different recipes and I’m all ready to go – as soon as I have official permission, of course.’ I’m aware of this thing I do – of putting on an oddly posh, grown-up voice when I’m in the company of an Official Person. In her navy blue trouser suit, with her shiny auburn hair swinging around her pointy chin, Erica falls into this category. She is an inspector from the council’s environmental health department. Her job is to ensure that I don’t poison the public – i.e. that my fridge isn’t seething with listeria or my cooking quarters populated by mangy cats. They aren’t, of course, but still, Erica’s very presence is making me nervous. It’s like when you’re being followed by a police car while driving. Is something broken on my car? you start wondering. Could the wine I guzzled two nights ago still be swilling around in my bloodstream?
‘I love meringues,’ Erica enthuses, peering into my fridge which I’ve scrubbed so thoroughly even its light seems to shine more brightly. ‘It’s the texture, isn’t it? The crunchiness on the outside, the gooey bit in the middle …’
‘That’s right,’ I agree. ‘I imagine it’s impossible to feel depressed when you’re biting into a meringue.’
She laughs politely and marks a few boxes on the form attached to her clipboard. I try to sneak a look, but can’t read it. Anyway, I must stop feeling so paranoid. I spent the whole of yesterday preparing for her visit, and so far it seems to be going well. Erica caresses my cooker hob and ticks another box on her form. ‘D’you have a name for your business?’ she asks.
‘Yes, I’m calling it Sugar Mummy.’
‘Oh, that’s cute. That definitely has a ring to it. I assume you have children then?’
‘Yes, two sons.’
‘Sons,’ Erica repeats with a slight shudder. ‘Oh, I take my hat off to you. I don’t know how people cope with boys.’
‘Really?’ I say, acting surprised. In fact, I have encountered this anti-boy attitude on numerous occasions since Logan and Fergus were tiny; a fierce aversion to young males, as if they are not miniature humans but incontinent pitbulls, prone to violence and likely to pee wherever the mood takes them (as opposed to little girls who’ll quietly colour in and groom their teddies for weeks on end).
‘Well, I couldn’t,’ Erica asserts. ‘My sister has three and her place is a wreck. She used to collect Danish glassware and of course that’s all been trashed.’
‘Oh dear,’ I say, wanting to add, Why didn’t she put it away in a cupboard? However, it’s crucial to keep Erica on my side. I’m itching to get my business started, and need to convince her that Logan and Fergus won’t be constantly charging into my ‘professional’ kitchen, bringing in live bugs to show me or using my mixer to blend potions of rotting leaves and soil.
‘Well, they’re thirteen and sixteen,’ I tell her, ‘so we’re past that crazy stage now.’
‘Oh, teenage boys,’ she goes on with a dry laugh, ‘and their terrible bedrooms. Eugh. That horrible dank duvet smell …’
‘They’re actually incredibly helpful around the flat,’ I fib, trying to quash the defensive edge to my voice.
‘Really?’ Erica widens her eyes. ‘Handy with the Mr Sheen, then?’
‘Yes, very.’ Actually, they back away from it as if it’s pepper spray, and neither seem capable of operating the Hoover without choking it. Plus there is an underlying smell around here, which I’ve tried to obliterate by burning the sandalwood and ginger oil my friend Ingrid gave me, with the promise that it would ‘uplift the senses’. On this rain-lashed November afternoon, both boys are off school with streaming colds, and the flat is tainted with the whiff of the unwell.
‘D’you have any children yourself?’ I ask pleasantly as she peers into the oven.
‘Just the one, a little girl.’
Ah, that figures.
‘I was terrified she was going to be a boy,’ Erica adds, straightening up. ‘In fact, I paid to have an extra scan to determine the sex as early as possible.’
‘Really?’ I have no idea how to respond to this.
‘If it was a boy,’ she goes on, ‘I wanted to be prepared.’ What could she possibly mean? Line up an adoptive mother for him? Just as I’m about to say they’re not that bad really – I mean, look at me, I’m healthy and happy and alive (well, alive) – Fergus, my youngest, yells, ‘Mum!’ and stomps along the hallway towards us.
‘I’m still with the lady,’ I call back. ‘Won’t be long now.’
‘Mum. Can’t get this stupid thing to work at all.’ He marches into the kitchen, wavy caramel hair askew, clad in just a pair of baggy grey boxers. He is clutching a small silver gadget which he thrusts into my face.
‘Fergus,’ I say, ‘you might want to go and put your dressing gown on, love.’
‘Nah, I was really boiling up, like my whole body was soaking. And the tubes at the back of my nose are totally bunged up with phlegm …’
Erica pretends to study our spice rack. ‘I’m a bit busy right now,’ I say briskly, trying to transmit the message: Please leave this kitchen immediately. Curiously, Ingrid’s sandalwood oil appears to be failing on the mood-lifting front. Fergus sneezes without covering his mouth, and something actually shoots out, causing Erica to shrink back in alarm. Christ, he’s probably infected her now. ‘It’s stopped working,’ he says, stabbing at the gadget’s buttons. ‘It’s gone weird.’
‘What did you expect for two pound fifty?’ Logan asks, wandering into the kitchen bare-chested in a pair of particularly unfetching tracksuit bottoms, bringing with him the powerful meaty pong of unwashed underarms. Neither of my boys have acknowledged our visitor.
