‘Why don’t you ask him what he intends to study?’ Anthony prompted silkily, and Jessica could feel the tension begin to slip back in between them.
‘Art.’
‘That’s great,’ she said.
‘Why is it great?’ Anthony turned to look at her. ‘How many jobs can you name offhand that are available for graduates in art?’
This appeared to be a tried and tested point of friction between them. Every family had its own, and right now Jessica did not feel inclined to become embroiled in this one, but she couldn’t quite see a way of escape.
‘What sort of art?’ she asked, and Mark looked at her gratefully.
‘Eventually, I’d like to specialise in commercial art. Possibly something to do with computers.’
‘Yes, that’s all the rage now, isn’t it?’ she contributed vaguely. ‘Computers.’
‘That’s not what you said when I told you about Kath leaving to do a computer course after exams,’ Lucy pointed out with the shrewdness of a barrister in full flow, and Jessica glared at her turncoat daughter.
‘I have no objections to computer courses, Luce. I just think that university will suit you better in the long run.’
‘Who cares about the long run?’ she muttered into her coffee. ‘Most prospective employers,’ Anthony pointed out. ‘Having a degree is a distinct advantage. Especially,’ he added coldly, eyeing his son, ‘when it’s a degree in a sensible subject. What do you intend to study, should you decide to go’?’
‘Economics.’
‘Excellent option.’ Anthony shot his son a look that seemed to say, Hear that?
‘It’s the easiest thing I can think of. I’m good at maths and sciences but hopeless at all that arty stuff.’ Jessica was beginning to see Mark’s appeal to her daughter. He was creative, artistic—he operated with confidence in a field in which she would always be little more than an onlooker. He was also, Jessica thought with relief, down to earth—not the hell-raiser she had originally imagined.
From that point of view, if nothing else, the arranged dinner had been a success, because it had set her mind at rest. Lucy’s behaviour might have changed dramatically over the past few months, but there was no point in trying to pin the blame on any one person. She had changed because she was in the difficult process of growing up, and there was nothing that could be done to ease the transition.
She was vaguely aware of conversation going on around her, then Lucy’s voice asking Mark whether he was interested in going to a party. At which, Jessica’s head shot up and she said quickly, ‘Out of the question.’
‘It’s not really a party,’ Lucy said, mouth downturned. ‘Kath and a few of the others are going to a club to hear her brother’s band.’
‘I’m not interested in where Kath and her friends are going,’ Jessica said sharply. ‘You’re heading home with me. Tomorrow’s school, and...’
‘And I have to get an early night. Mum! That’s what you used to tell me when I was eight years old! Besides—’ she looked at her watch ‘—it’s only just gone nine-thirty.’ Nine-thirty! For Jessica the night was hardly young at nine-thirty. She was usually in bed by ten o’clock, exhausted after a day at work, grateful for sleep.
‘That’s not the point,’ Jessica said, shying away from informing her daughter in company that nine-thirty was hardly the start of the evening. She could feel Anthony following this little exchange with interest, and she instinctively knew that he certainly would not be a person who found himself tucked into bed by ten most nights. She had a feeling that he would be highly amused by any such admission on her part, and there was no way that she was going to provide a cheap source of amusement for him.
‘Well, what is?’ Lucy insisted, not backing down. She folded her arms and challenged her mother to prolong the argument. ‘The point is...’ Jessica began.
‘Why don’t you let her go?’ Anthony said smoothly, to Jessica’s fury. ‘As a one-off. After all, it’s been something of an evening...’
Jessica turned to face him angrily. ‘I really don’t think that it’s any concern of yours, Mr Newman.’
‘Oh, come on, Mum. Don’t be such a stickin-the-mud! Anyone would think that you were never young!’ I never was, Jessica felt like crying out. I was saddled with responsibility before I even knew what youth felt like. I don’t regret any of it, but that’s just a fact! ‘I’ll make sure that she’s back home by eleven,’ Mark said helpfully.
‘This club’s only about five minutes from here, and I’ll drop her back afterwards.’
‘Fine,’ Jessica agreed through gritted teeth. Outnumbered, outvoted and outraged. That was precisely how she felt. Lucy was beaming now that she had got her own way, irrespective of the fact that it had hardly been a fair fight. She couldn’t wait to be on her way. She began chatting to Mark and there was real animation on her face, none of the stilted politeness that had been there earlier on.
‘Why don’t you two go?’ Anthony suggested. He looked at Lucy. ‘I’ll drop your mother back home.’
Which silenced Lucy. She eyed them quickly, then shrugged and stood up.
As soon as they were on their way out, Jessica turned to Anthony furiously.
‘How dare you? How dare you butt in and encourage her to go nightclubbing at this hour? You agreed to all this because I needed your help!’
‘Has it occurred to you that that was exactly what I thought I was giving?’
‘No.’
‘What was there to gain by putting your foot down? You would probably both have got back home and argued the point until midnight anyway.’
He was so damned calm about the whole thing that Jessica wanted to scream. He linked his fingers together and regarded her unsmilingly.
‘My daughter is not your responsibility, Mr Newman. If I decide that we go home and argue until midnight, then that’s entirely my decision. It has nothing to do with you!’
‘Fair enough.’ He shrugged. ‘In that case, please accept my apologies.’
Except he wasn’t sorry. Not at all. He was merely being diplomatic because that seemed the most trouble-free option. In a very short while he would be in his taxi, or his car, or whatever else he had come in, zooming out of her life and away from her headaches.
‘And, if you don’t mind, I’ll settle my half of the bill,’ she informed him coldly. Which she duly did, trying not to gulp at the amount. As a single parent without much money to spare, she had developed over the years the unnerving habit of translating in her mind every little luxury into necessities that could be bought for the same amount.
And paying didn’t make her feel much better either. She just felt petulant, like a child trying to make a stand.
‘I’ve got my car,’ he said, standing up, and allowing her to precede him to the door.
‘I’ll give you a lift to your house.’
‘I’m fine. I can get a taxi.’
‘Oh, for God’s sake, don’t be so bloody stubborn.’ Which made her glower at him. ‘Besides, I want to talk to you about this evening.’
Jessica looked at him narrowly, wondering whether she should be suspicious or not. He had risen to the occasion, done his part, engineered the meeting, however useless it might turn out to be—what was there to discuss? ‘Where do you live?’ he asked, strolling towards his car and opening the passenger door for her.
He got in, started the engine, and turned in his seat to look at her.
How, she wondered, could such an enormous car suddenly seem so tiny?
She could feel his presence pressing down on her, suffocating. When she looked at him, her heart seemed to do a series of uncomfortable little leaps inside her chest, before settling back down. A nerve-racking sensation. Anyone would think that he was the first man she had come into contact with for decades! She forced a nonchalant smile to her face at that inner joke, told him where she lived, and then allowed him the privilege of trying to work out how to get there.
‘I usually take the underground,�
� she said politely, deciding that the safest thing to do as far as her pulse rate went was to avoid looking directly at him.
‘I really have no idea of the layout of the roads in London. I mean, I can get to a few tried and tested places, but that’s about it, I’m afraid.’
‘Very complicated network,’ he agreed, pulling away from the kerb with every appearance of knowing where he was going, after briefly consulting an A-Z.
‘You don’t seem to find it too overwhelming,’ Jessica pointed out after a while.
‘I used to work as a taxi driver.’
‘Not really?’
‘You’re right. Not really.’ He glanced quickly at her and grinned, and she found herself, somehow, smiling back in return. ‘So your mood does occasionally lighten!’
‘Occasionally,’ Jessica admitted.
‘Although I give my mind strict instructions not to let that happen too often.’ He laughed at that, and reluctantly she gazed across at him, using the darkness in the car as a shield, to linger on his face, the curve of his mouth, still smiling slightly, the strength of his features.
Physically, she thought, he really was remarkable. Or at any rate mesmerising, though she couldn’t put her finger on why.
‘Why not?’ He shot her a quick glance, then looked back at the road. ‘Doesn’t your boyfriend approve of a sense of humour?’
‘I haven’t got a boyfriend,’ Jessica told him abruptly. ‘Lucy takes up all my time.’
‘I see.’
No, you don’t, she wanted to inform him. You don’t see at all. How could you? You know absolutely nothing about me, nothing about my past.
So why did he make her think of it? Remember things she’d rather let cobwebs grow over? No boyfriends because her one experience of the opposite sex had left her jaundiced enough never to test the water again.
Eric Dean, who had lied about his age, lied about his marital status, lied about his job, lied about everything it was possible to lie about. And she hadn’t seen behind the lies until it had been too late and she’d been foolishly pregnant. ‘I find that rather sad,’ he commented.
‘My house is just at the end of this road. On the right, just beyond the letter box.’ She absolutely refused to have him fish information out of her as a way of passing the time and making small talk. She had always been deeply guarded of her private life, and she wasn’t about to let that guard drop now, even though for a second there she had felt a strange pull to confide. Peculiar. But then they said that it was often easier to confide in complete strangers than in the people who knew you intimately.
‘Well,’ she said, when they had pulled up outside the house, ‘thank you for putting yourself out and arranging this dinner.’ Should she shake his hand, or was that a bit too businesslike? Since she didn’t want to feel the coolness of his skin against hers anyway, she kept her hands firmly clasped together on her lap. ‘You had no need to, and I appreciate that.’
‘What about a nightcap?’
‘A what...?’
He didn’t answer. Instead, he opened his door, swung his long body out, and Jessica very hurriedly followed suit. ‘I’m afraid I don’t keep a great deal of alcohol in the house,’ she stammered, thinking that his overall impression of her, based on one night in the company of two teenagers, was probably of a dull ‘stay at home’ woman with nothing else to fill her life apart from her daughter. Then she immediately decided that she didn’t care what he thought anyway, which made her feel much better. ‘A cup of coffee would be fine.’
‘A cup of coffee.’ Jessica fumbled with the door key then finally got the damned thing to work. ‘Sure,’ she said, pushing the door open and switching on the hall lights.
She walked through to the sitting room, assuming that he was following her, but when she did finally look at him, he was gazing around him with appreciation.
‘Charming,’ he said eventually, his eyes meeting hers.
‘That’s the sort of word that estate agents use when they want to describe somewhere incredibly small which has been brightened up by a spot of floral wallpaper.’
‘Do you ever accept a compliment at face value? Or do you argue about everything?’ He shoved his hands in his pockets and stood there, inspecting her thoroughly.
Jessica didn’t know what to say. He had tried to be pleasant and polite, and had been met with a cold rebuff. Though not deliberately. I’m not used to this, she thought with surprise. I’m not used to a man being inside this house, I’m not used to being complimented, I’m not used to feeling awkward and defensive in front of someone else.
‘I’m sorry I snapped. I must be a little tired.’ She could tell that he didn’t believe her because he raised his eyebrows and continued to stare at her in silence. Okay, she thought irritably, so I overreacted. So sue me! ‘How do you take your coffee?’
‘Black, two sugars.’
To her consternation, he followed her into the kitchen and promptly sat down at the table, watching as she made them both a mug of coffee.
‘Feel free to describe my kitchen as charming,’ she said, trying to make up for her response to his compliment earlier on. ‘I promise I won’t bite your head off.’ She handed him the mug and primly sat opposite him.
It felt odd, this. Sitting here at this hour of the night, at the kitchen table, talking to this man. Every so often, she had friends from work over. It was always very casual pasta at the kitchen table, a bottle or two of wine, some music. It never felt like this.
‘How long have you lived here?’
‘Years. I like it. It’s convenient for where I work, and I’ve spent time on it.’ That was almost approaching a confidence, and out of habit she pulled back and took a sip of coffee. ‘You mentioned that you wanted to chat about this evening.’
‘Was it what you had hoped for?’ He looked at her carefully over the rim of his cup.
Jessica gave that some thought, and then said, with a shrug, ‘I’m not sure what I’d hoped for. I guess that my mind’s been set at rest insofar as Mark seems a pleasant enough boy...’
‘You’d expected long hair? An earring? A cigarette permanently glued to his lower lip?’
‘I couldn’t imagine what he’d be like,’ Jessica said warily. She fidgeted in the chair and concentrated on the mug of coffee. Over the sound of the ticking of the wall clock she could hear the fast, furious beating of her heart. Whatever lectures she gave herself, something inside her responded to this man and it was sufficient to send her into a state of panic. ‘Still think that it might be a good idea for me to warn him away from your daughter?’
‘I suppose not.’ If anything, Mark had seemed a stabilising influence, and it disturbed her to realise that she had misread a situation so comprehensively.
‘You’ll probably jump onto the defensive if I tell you this, but if you’re looking for answers to Lucy’s behaviour then I suggest you get them from her. She’s responsible for her own actions, for her own behaviour.’
‘She’s only a child! How can you say that?’ Her cheeks felt inflamed with colour.
‘She’s no longer quite the child she once was, I imagine. She’s growing, up. It was bound to happen, you know.’
‘Are you giving me a lecture on my own daughter?’ Jessica stared at the loathsome man, aghast.
‘I’m telling you what I think, from a completely detached point of view.’
‘Good of you!’ she retorted sarcastically. ‘Any more sweeping generalisations, while you’re about it?’
His lips tightened and he drained the remainder of his coffee in one gulp.
‘You’re not going to let anyone give you advice, are you?’ he asked coolly.
‘You can be on the verge of stepping over the edge, but, if someone points that out, you’ll go right ahead and do it anyway, because you don’t need help or suggestions from anyone.’
‘That’s not true! How dare you come here and then...’ She had to take a deep breath because she could feel herself losing control of h
er voice. ‘And then proceed to psychoanalyse me?’
‘I’m doing no such thing, although, admittedly, you’d make a great case study.’
‘And what exactly is that supposed to mean?’ She stared defiantly at him. Her hands were shaking, her voice was shaking, her face was red. Where had all her self-control gone? She had a child of sixteen! She should be able to act in a more reasoned and mature manner than this. ‘What happened to Lucy’s father?’
The directness of the question caught her unawares, and she looked at him as though he had dared to ask her the most personal and insulting of questions, such as the colour of her underwear or what size bra she wore.
‘At a guess,’ he continued, in the face of her silence, ‘I’d say that for whatever reason he flew the coop probably before Lucy was even born. At a guess, I’d say that you’ve spent the past sixteen years making sure that no one breaks through that veneer of yours.’
‘Oh, is that a fact?’ She frankly couldn’t think of anything else to say. Words, arguments, any kind of coherent vocabulary, had deserted her in the face of such an overwhelming intrusion of her privacy. Overwhelming and uninvited. ‘Are you going to deny it?’
‘I don’t have to deny anything! And while we’re on the subject of perfect parenting...’ Sheer, hysterical emotion was about to take over. Jessica could feel it in every pore of her body, but she was powerless to resist the urge to fly off the handle. ‘It doesn’t seem to me that you’re exactly the ideal father figure yourself! It’s fine for you to waltz in here and then proceed to tell me what I’m doing wrong...’ Just the thought of it was enough to make her face burn. She didn’t care whether he had a point or not. She quite simply felt as though her lifetime’s work had been derided in the space of five minutes. ‘But you and Mark aren’t exactly a shining example of the great bond between father and son!’
The Unmarried Husband Page 5
