He also suspected her motives. ‘Why so concerned about Simpson? If he goes, it might do your own career some good.’
‘I doubt it.’ Tory wondered who he was trying to fool. ‘Simon is more experienced than me.’
He frowned, making the connection only when she glanced towards the second desk in the room. ‘More willing to promote his cause, too, as I recall. Is he the reason you’re loyal to Simpson?’
‘Sorry?’
‘You don’t want to work for this Simon guy?’
No, Tory certainly didn’t, but she didn’t want to do Simon down either.
‘You’re not homophobic, are you?’ he surmised at her uneasy silence.
‘What?’ Tory was startled by his directness.
‘Homophobic,’ he repeated, ‘Anti-gay, against homo—’
‘I know what it means!’ Tory cut in angrily, and, forgetting—or, at least, no longer caring—who he was, informed him, ‘It might be hard for an American to understand, but reticence isn’t always an indication of stupidity.’
‘Being brash, loud-mouth colonials, you mean.’ He had no problem deciphering the insult. He just wasn’t bothered by it.
Tory wondered what you had to do to dent this man’s confidence. Use a sledgehammer, perhaps.
‘Simon’s sexual preference is a matter of complete disinterest to me,’ she declared in heavy tones.
‘If you say so,’ he responded, as if he didn’t quite believe her.
‘I am not homophobic!’ she insisted angrily. ‘Whether I’d want to work for Simon doesn’t hinge on that.’
‘Okay.’ He conceded the point, then immediately lost interest in it as he looked at his watch, saying, ‘I have to go. I have a meeting in London. I’ll give you my number.’
He picked up her Biro and, tearing out a slip of paper from her notepad, leaned on her desk to write his name and two telephone numbers.
‘The top one is my mobile,’ he informed her. ‘The other’s Abbey Lodge. I’m staying there in the short term.’
Abbey Lodge was the most exclusive hotel locally, favoured by high-powered businessmen and visiting celebrities.
He held out the piece of paper and for a moment Tory just stared at it as if it were contaminated. Why was he giving her his telephone number? Did he imagine she’d want to call him?
‘In case you have a problem tracking down Alex Simpson,’ he explained, patently amused at her wary expression.
‘Of course.’ Now she almost snatched the paper from him.
‘Still, if you want to call me, regardless—’ his mouth slanted ‘—feel free. I’m sure we can find something to talk about…’
‘I…’ On the contrary Tory couldn’t think of a sensible thing to say. She’d been so presumptuous it was embarrassing.
‘Meanwhile—’ his smile became less mocking ‘—it’s a beautiful day. Why not play hooky for once?’
The suggestion sounded genuine but Tory felt even more uncomfortable, recalling the fact she’d played hooky yesterday.
‘I have some stuff to finish,’ she claimed, sober-faced.
‘Well, you know what they say: all work and no play,’ he misquoted dryly, ‘makes for a dull television producer.’
Tory realised he was joking but wondered, nonetheless, if that was how she seemed to him. Dull. What an indictment.
It put her on the defensive. ‘I’m not the one travelling down to London for a business meeting on a Saturday.’
‘Did I say business?’ He raised a dark brow.
Tory frowned up at him. He had, hadn’t he?
He shook his head, adding, ‘No, this one’s strictly personal.’
‘I’m sorry.’ Tory denied any intention to pry.
But he continued, ‘In a way, it involves you. I’m having dinner with the woman I was dating until recently…a farewell dinner,’ he stressed.
Tory met his eyes briefly, then looked away once more. There was nothing subtle about his interest in her.
‘This really is none of my business, Mr Ryecart,’ she replied on an officious note.
‘Not now, maybe—’ he got to his feet ‘—but who knows what the future might hold?’
He afforded her another smile. Perfect white teeth in a tanned face. Too handsome for anyone else’s good.
Tory tried again. ‘I shouldn’t think we’ll meet very often, Mr Ryecart,’ she said repressively, ‘in view of your considerably senior position, but I’m sure I’ll endeavour to be polite when we do.’
This time her message couldn’t be missed. ‘In short, you’d like me to take a hike.’
Tory’s nails curled into her palms. The man had no idea of the conventions that governed normal conversation.
‘I didn’t say that,’ she replied, through gritted teeth. ‘I was just pointing out—’
‘That you’d touch your forelock but nothing else,’ he summed up with breath-taking accuracy.
Tory felt a curious desire to hit him. It took a huge effort to stop herself, to remind herself he was her boss.
He held up a pacifying hand, having clearly read her thoughts. He might be brash, but he wasn’t stupid.
‘Tell you what, let’s agree to dispense with the forelock-tugging, too,’ he suggested and finally walked towards the door.
Tory’s heart sank. What did that mean?
‘Mr Ryecart—’ she called after him.
He turned, his expression now remote. Had he already dispensed with her, altogether?
She didn’t intend waiting to find out. She asked point-blank, ‘Should I be looking for another job?’
‘What?’ Such an idea had obviously been far from his mind. He considered it briefly before answering, ‘If you’re asking me will Eastwich survive, then I don’t know that yet. It’s no secret that it’s operating at a loss, but I wouldn’t have bought it if I didn’t feel turn-around was viable.’
It was a straight, businesslike response that left Tory feeling decidedly silly. She had imagined rejecting Lucas Ryecart might be a sackable offence but obviously he didn’t work that way.
‘That isn’t what you meant, is it?’ He read her changing expression.
‘No,’ Tory admitted reluctantly. ‘I thought…’
‘That I’d fire you for not responding to my advances,’ he concluded for himself, and now displeasure thinned his sensual mouth. ‘God, you have a low opinion of me…or is it all men?’
Tory bit on her lip before muttering, ‘I—I…if I misjudged you—’
‘In spades,’ he confirmed. ‘I may be the loud, overbearing American you’ve already written me off as—’
‘That’s not—’ Tory tried to deny it.
He overrode her. ‘And I may let what’s in my pants overrule good sense occasionally,’ he continued crudely, ‘but desperate I’m not, or vindictive. If you leave Eastwich, it won’t be on my account.’
Tory wanted the ground to swallow her up. She started to say, ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—’ and was left talking to thin air.
Lucas Ryecart might not be vindictive but he had a temper. She experienced its full force as the door slammed hard behind him.
And that’s me told, she thought, feeling wrung out and foolish, and wishing she’d kept her mouth shut.
He’d been flirting with her. Nothing more. Perhaps he flirted with all personable women under the assumption that most would enjoy it. He’d be right, too. Most would.
They’d know how to take Lucas Ryecart, realise that anyone that handsome, and rich, and successful, would scarcely be interested in ordinary mortals. They’d be slightly flattered by his appreciative gaze, a little charmed by his slow, easy smile, but they certainly wouldn’t be crazy enough to take him seriously.
She glanced out of the window in time to see him striding across the car park. She didn’t worry that he’d look up. She was already forgotten.
She watched him get into a dark green four-by-four. It was a surprisingly unflash vehicle. She’d have expected him to drive
something fast and conspicuous—a low-slung sports car, perhaps. But what did she really know about Lucas Ryecart? Next to nothing.
She tried to remember what Charlie, her ex-fiancé, had said. He hadn’t talked much of his dead sister but he’d mentioned her husband a few times. He’d obviously admired the older man who’d spent his early career reporting from the trouble spots of the world. Charlie’s mother had also alluded to her American son-in-law with some fondness and Tory had formed various images: faithful husband, dedicated journalist, fine human being.
None fitted the Lucas Ryecart she’d met, but then it had been years since Jessica Wainwright’s death and time changed everybody. It had certainly changed his circumstances if Eastwich was only one of the television companies he owned. He was also no longer the marrying kind, a fact he’d made clear. Arguably, his directness was a virtue, but if he had any other noble character traits Tory had missed them.
Time had changed Tory, too. Or was it her current lifestyle? All work and no play, as he’d said. Making her dull, stupid even, unable to laugh off a man’s interest without sounding like prude of the year.
Tory felt like kicking herself. And Alex. And Lucas Ryecart. She settled for kicking her waste bin and didn’t hang around to tidy up the mess she made.
She took the American’s advice and spent the afternoon at the Anglian Country Club, a favourite haunt for young professionals. For two hours she windsurfed across the man-made lake, a skill she’d acquired on her first foreign holiday. It was her main form of relaxation, strenuous though it could be, and she was now more than competent.
Sometimes she took a lesson with Steve, the resident coach. About her age, he had a law degree but had never practised, preferring to spend his life windsurfing. They had chatted occasionally and once gone for a drink in the club but nothing more. Today he helped her put away her equipment and asked casually if she had plans for the evening. She shook her head and he proposed going for something to eat in town.
Normally Tory would have politely turned him down, but Lucas Ryecart’s image loomed, and she said, ‘Why not?’
Tory drove them in her car and they went to an Italian restaurant. They talked about windsurfing, then music and the colleges they’d attended. Steve was easy enough company.
They went on to a pub and met some of his friends, a mixed crowd of men and women. Tory stuck to orange juice, and, although declining a party invitation, agreed to drive them there.
When the rest had piled out of her car, Steve surprised her with a kiss on the lips. It was quite pleasurable, but hardly earth-moving and another man’s image intruded when she closed her eyes. She broke off the kiss before it turned intimate.
Steve got the message. ‘I don’t suppose you’d like to go home to my place?’ he asked, more in hope than expectation.
‘No, thanks all the same.’ She gave him an amiable smile and her refusal was accepted in the same spirit.
Steve bowed out with a casual, ‘Perhaps we can go out again some time,’ and followed his friends into the house where the party was.
Tory drove home without regrets. She’d enjoyed the evening up to a point, but she had no desire to have competent, athletic sex with a man whose raison d’être was windsurfing. She’d sooner go to bed with a mug of Horlicks and a Jane Austen.
She returned to find her flat empty and felt a measure of relief, assuming Alex had chosen somewhere else to doss down.
No such luck, however, as she was rudely awakened at two in the morning by a constant ringing on her doorbell. Pulling on a dressing gown, she went to the bay window first and wasn’t entirely surprised to see Alex leaning against the wall.
‘Lost my key, sorry,’ he slurred as she opened the outer door and took in his swaying figure.
‘Oh, Alex, you promised.’ She sighed wearily and for a moment contemplated shutting the door on him.
‘Couldn’t help it,’ he mumbled pathetically. ‘Love her, really love her… Know that, Tory?’
‘Yes, Alex. Now, shh!’ Tory hastily propelled him through the hallway before he woke her neighbours.
‘I’m not drunk.’ He breathed whisky fumes on her as he lurched inside her flat. ‘Just had a drink or two. Her fault. The bitch. Phoned her up but she wouldn’t talk to me.’
Tory sighed again as he sprawled his length on her sofa. There would be no moving him now. She should have turned him away.
‘Why won’t she talk to me?’ he appealed with an injured air. ‘She knows she’s the only one I’ve ever loved.’
‘Her husband was probably there,’ Tory pointed out in cynical tones.
‘Husband?’ He turned bleary eyes towards her, then rallied to claim belligerently, ‘I’m her husband. Eyes of God and all that. Better or worse. Richer or poorer. Till death or the mortgage company do us part,’ he finished on a self-pitying sob.
‘Who are we talking about, Alex?’ Tory finally asked.
‘Rita, of course.’ A frown questioned her intelligence, then he began to sing, ‘Lovely Rita, no one can beat her—’
‘Shh!’ Tory hushed him once more. ‘You’re going to wake the woman upstairs.’
‘Don’t care,’ Alex announced, this time like a sulky boy. ‘All women are vile… ’Cept you, darling Tory.’ He smiled winningly at her.
Tory rolled her eyes heavenward. She might have taken Lucas Ryecart too seriously that morning, but she was in no danger of it with Alex. Drunk, Alex would flirt with a lamp-post.
‘I thought you were talking about Sue,’ she stated in repressive tones.
‘Sue?’ He looked blank for a moment.
‘Sue Baxter,’ she reminded him heavily. ‘Works at Eastwich. Husband in Navy. Woman you’ve been living with for the last month or two.’
Drunk though he was, Alex understood the implication. ‘You think I don’t love Rita because I’ve been shacking up with Sue? But I do. Sue’s just…’
‘A fill-in?’ Tory suggested dryly.
‘Yes. No. You don’t understand,’ he answered in quick succession. ‘Men aren’t the same as women, Tory, you have to realise that.’
‘Oh, I do,’ Tory assured him, and before he could justify his infidelity on biological grounds she stood and picked up the blanket and pillow she’d dug out earlier. ‘You’re an education in yourself, Alex,’ she added, draping the blanket over him without ceremony. ‘Lift.’
He raised his head and she thrust the pillow under him. ‘You’re not a woman, Tory,’ he told her solemnly, ‘you’re a friend.’
‘Thanks,’ she muttered at this backhanded compliment. Not that she minded much. She didn’t want Alex’s roving eye fixing on her. ‘Goodnight, Alex.’
‘’Night, Tory,’ he echoed, already settling down for the night. Soon he would be out for the count.
It was Tory who was left sleepless.
After an afternoon spent windsurfing and an evening in company, she should be tired enough to sleep through a hurricane, yet she couldn’t sleep through Lucas Ryecart.
Alex had provided a temporary distraction but now he was just another concern. How could she keep Alex sober tomorrow so he would be presentable on Monday for his meeting with Ryecart?
She tried telling herself it wasn’t her problem. And it wasn’t, really. After all, what did she owe Alex? He had given her a chance, taking her on as a production assistant when she’d had little experience, but she’d surely repaid him, covering up for him as she had over that last three months. It would be much the wisest thing to let Alex fend for himself.
Perhaps Alex might even hold his own with the American. After all, he was an intelligent, articulate man with a first-class degree from Cambridge and twenty years’ experience in the television industry.
Whereas Lucas Ryecart, who was he?
The man who was going to wipe the floor with Alex, that was who, she answered the question for herself, and for the second night in a row fell asleep with Lucas Ryecart’s image running round her brain.
CHAPTER THRE
E
TORY woke in an extremely bad mood, and felt not much better after taking a shower. Dressed in jeans and T-shirt, she went through to the living room to tackle Alex. She had decided: she wanted him gone, a.s.a.p.
Only he wasn’t awake yet. With his arms tight round a cushion and his legs bent up on the sofa, he lay there muttering in his sleep. He looked a wreck and he smelled awful, of too much booze and nicotine. She’d never found Alex attractive; this morning he was positively repellent. No way was he going to get his act together by Monday.
But she realised that she wouldn’t need to give him a hard time. When Alex woke up, he would feel sorry enough for himself.
She was right. When she woke him with strong black coffee, he was full of remorse.
He’d forgotten his promise not to return to her flat drunk. Apparently he’d had a whisky for Dutch courage before phoning his wife in Edinburgh. When she’d slammed the phone down on him, he’d had several more.
‘So, basically it was all Rita’s fault,’ Tory concluded on a sceptical note, deciding a sympathetic approach wasn’t going to help him.
He looked a little sheepish. ‘I didn’t say that, exactly.’
‘Just as well,’ Tory muttered back, ‘because I haven’t met many candidates for living sainthood, but your wife has to be one.’
He looked taken aback by her frankness, but didn’t argue. ‘You’re right. I didn’t treat her very well, did I?’
Tory’s brows went heavenward.
‘Okay, I admit it,’ he groaned back. ‘I was unfaithful to her a couple of times, but it didn’t mean anything. It’s Rita I love. After twenty years together she should know that.’
‘Twenty years?’ Tory hadn’t viewed Alex as long-term married.
‘We met at college,’ Alex went on. ‘She was so bright and funny and together. She still is… If only I’d realised. I can’t function without Rita,’ he claimed in despair.
‘Then you’d better try and get her back,’ Tory advised quite severely. ‘Either that, or get your own act together, Alex, before you lose it all.’
‘I already have,’ he said miserably.
Tory resisted the urge to shake him. ‘Hardly. You have an exceedingly well-paid job doing something you used to love. Give it another week or so, however, and you’ll probably be kissing goodbye to that, too.’
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