FROZEN ENCHANTMENT
Jessica Steele
It was the chance of a lifetime
Any ambitious secretary like Jolene would seize the opportunity to accompany the big boss on a wide-ranging business trip to the Soviet Union.
However, impressing Cheyne Templeton with her sterling qualities was another matter. He'd already made up his mind what kind of girl he thought she was. And it was far from the truth.
Jolene could find no way to convince him that he was wrong. Nor could she convince herself that his opinion didn't matter .. . .
CHAPTER ONE
MONDAYS, since she had been secretary to Tony Welsh, were not the joy they had been when she had been secretary to his predecessor, Mr Neale, Jolene fretted as she drove herself to work that morning.
When she had started work at Templeton's she had felt that she really did have her feet on the ladder-rungs of a first-class career. But things had changed. She still enjoyed the work she did, but it was not the same She knew why it was not the same, too. Mr Neale had been a gentleman; Tony Welsh most definitely was not. Of course, Tony was much younger, but that was no excuse...
Jolene parked her car in the firm's car park and wished that Mr Neale had not had that slightly adverse medical report which had made him decide to retire early. She had only been working for him for three months when he had left.
She entered the plush Templeton building, reflecting that she had only worked for Tony Welsh for three months too, though it had not taken her longer than a week to know that Tony was the worst sort of office wolf—the insidious kind.
Never did he say a word out of place or a word which could be construed by anyone else as any more than a mere compliment to herself. Yet never did he miss an opportunity to ogle her, to brush closely by her or to touch her in some 'accidental' way.
In the interests of office harmony she had often bitten back some sharp remark along the lines of his keeping his hands to himself, although on Friday she had come close to letting go.
Jolene approached her office door recalling clearly how he had bent over her to explain some point about the work in front of her. There had been no need at all for him to place a seemingly casual arm about her shoulders while he explained, but he had. If he could not tell from the cold way she had shrugged his arm from her that she did not want him to paw her about, Jolene thought as she opened her office door that Monday, the day was drawing near when she would let him know so—verbally, and bluntly. Married men—huh!
'Ah, Jolene!' Tony beamed at her when she went in. 'I trust you haven't done anything this weekend that I wouldn't do.'
Her insides screwed up on the instant. But again she bit back some acid comment. 'Good morning,' she managed civilly and, making some cool comment about how she'd spent the weekend trying to do something in the garden now that winter seemed to be over, she went to her desk, complimenting herself on her control.
She was not complimenting herself on her control half an hour later, however, for within the next thirty minutes a couple of things happened which were to leave her feeling disbelieving—and angry—and vocal.
To start with, Tony Welsh had chosen to give her a hand-written piece of work which she simply could not decipher. She stopped typing and looked up, to find that he was watching her from his desk in his own office.
'Having trouble with my writing?' he enquired smilingly, and, before she could leave her seat to take the work to him, he had left his desk and was over at her desk, all ready to translate it for her.
I'm getting paranoid, she calmed herself when, since she had had no trouble in reading his handwriting before, the idea came to her that he had made his writing indecipherable on purpose.
'It's quite simple, Jolene,' he began, but as he bent over her—her cold treatment of him on Friday apparently being water off a duck's back—his arm once more came about her shoulders.
Nauseated when she could have sworn that his hand actually squeezed her shoulder, she knew then, office harmony or no, that she was going to have to say something or explode.
'Will you kindly...' she began through gritted teeth, when suddenly the door opened and a pretty young woman came in.
Immediately Tony took his arm from about her shoulders, though not before the woman visitor had spotted what Jolene realised must have seemed, if not exactly an embrace, then a welcome familiarity. The moment had evaporated when Jolene could have given voice to her feelings, though. But on noticing that the woman wore a top coat as protection from the crisp March weather, she realised that she could not, therefore, work in the building. It was then that—since Tony was apparently struck dumb—her loyalty to the company's image forced her to be the one to deal pleasantly with this member of the public who appeared to have wandered up to the second floor by mistake.
'Can I help you?' she enquired, and was ready to redirect her—only to be utterly astonished when the woman shrilled at her,
'You can help me by leaving my husband alone!'
Jolene was still looking at her in amazement when Tony suddenly ceased to be dumbstruck, and exclaimed sharply, 'Roz! For heaven's sake!'
'For heaven's sake nothing!' the pretty brunette shrieked hysterically. 'You've done nothing but sing "Jolene's" praises since you were promoted to this job, and I know damn well you're having an affair with her...'
'An affair?' Jolene suddenly came to, unable to credit that it was her the woman was talking about. 'I assure you...'
'I don't want your assurances! I've had enough of those from him!' the woman snapped. '"I'm working late again tonight, darling!'" she mimicked.
'We do work late sometimes!' Tony told her. 'Now this has gone far enough, Rosalind,' he blusteringly tried to take charge.
'It's gone too far!' his wife cut him off, and went into an exaggerated tirade of how she had caught them about to cling to each other passionately when she had come in.
'If you'll leave us, Jolene, I'll sort this out,' Tony again tried to take charge. But his wife appeared to have simmered silently for too long, and she was too overwrought to let him get another word in. And, while Jolene was more inclined to stay to convince her how totally mistaken she was, rather than to leave, Rosalind Welsh went ranting on.
Finding that she was unable to get a word in either, however, Jolene was forced to hear the woman out, while at the same time she could not but wonder what kind of loathsome husband Tony was, that he should provoke his wife into this state.
'If you'll only listen...' she tried to get in again, only to realise that there was no reasoning with the woman when, looking near to nervous exhaustion, Rosalind Welsh cut her off.
'I've listened enough!' she cried. 'Morning and night, and the weekends too, I've listened to him singing your praises, while by comparison I'm told that I'm a useless wife and mother. Well, I've had it with him,' she said, 'I'm divorcing him—and—I'm naming you! I'm...'
'Naming me?' Jolene echoed incredulously.
'I know you fancy him!' the demented woman cried. At that point Jolene knew that, aside from there being no reasoning with her, Rosalind Welsh was never going to know peace of mind about her husband. Not while she was his secretary, at any rate.
Feeling angry with Tony, and deeply sorry for his wife, Jolene decided that this whole sordid scene had gone on far too long.
'Believe me, Mrs Welsh,' she said, surprising the woman into silence by going to collect her jacket and shoulder-bag, 'I wouldn't fancy your husband if he was first boiled and then disinfected.' With that, while they both gaped at her, she walked out of her office, and out of her job.
By the time she had reached the car park, Jolene had gone from being angry, through being furious with Tony, to being outraged by all that had taken place, and
then just plain sickened by the whole nauseating scene.
Seating herself behind the steering wheel, she inserted her key in the ignition, then paused. Would she have felt so furious or so sickened had she not had that terrifying experience with a married man all those years ago? She had thought she was long since over it, but...
Her hand fell back into her lap, and suddenly her thoughts had gone to six years ago when she was sixteen and keen to have a Saturday job.
She was an only child, so that probably accounted for the way she had always been a little over-protected by her parents. At any rate, it had taken a great deal of discussion and a great deal of persuasion on her part before her parents had finally agreed that she could take the shop job she had found for herself.
The job had not lasted long, though. For she had quickly learned that not all men were as nice as her father.
She had felt disgusted, degraded and frightened when the married owner of the small shop had cornered her in the back room just after they had closed for the day. Never would she forget the dreadful lusting look that had come over his face when the man who outwardly appeared an impeccable pillar of society had told her in vulgar, explicit terms that he had always had a fancy for a virgin.
With her face draining of colour, Jolene had stared at him, not quite believing what she was hearing from this man whom her father himself had personally vetted before allowing her to work there.
'You've grown into a raving beauty,' the licentious shop owner had gone on, and while, frozen and as though turned to stone, Jolene had stared at him, he stated, 'You must be dying to know what it's like.' As he started to come nearer, he ended greedily, 'I'm just the man to help you find out.'
He had reached her and was standing in front of her blocking her way when Jolene, transfixed with fright and only half comprehending, suddenly snapped out of her trance.
This was here and now and, for the first time in her life, her parents weren't there to help her. But she was past thinking rationally what she should do, and she reacted on instinct alone. The nearest thing to hand happened to be a small wooden-backed brush that more usually partnered the dustpan..
Reacting blindly, she grabbed up the brush and hit him and hit him and hit him with it. She saw his hands go up to his head when she caught him a heavy blow near his ear, and heard him roar. Though whether he roared from anger or pain, she did not stop to find out. For, still acting on instinct, she pushed violently past him and ran out of the shop, and did not stop running until she reached the gate of her home.
She had never gone back. Nor had she told her parents why she had finished her Saturday job. They had just accepted that she had got the urge to try a Saturday job out of her system, and never knew the trauma that had struck that Saturday in particular, and which had darkened her Saturdays, and other days, for a long time to follow.
Shortly afterwards she left school and started secretarial college. By the time she had completed her studies, she had recovered and was no longer afraid or anxious when left alone in the same room with any man.
By that time, though, when one or two of her friends were already thinking of getting married and settling down, she was thinking of making a career for herself in big business. As top student in her class, she had a feeling for office procedures, and thought she had quite a lot to offer an employer.
Initially, though, she had problems on two counts. One: that there were no 'big business' type of firms in her part of Somerset. The other: that no prospective employer seemed to take her stated desire for a career seriously.
'Are you sure it's a career in an office you want?' one of them had asked. 'With that face and figure, you could take the lot on as a model.'
'Good afternoon,' Jolene had told him politely, and had left the man staring after her dumbfounded—she had not the smallest wish to work for any man who didn't put her excellent qualifications before her shape, her blonde hair and green eyes.
Eventually, however, she did find one such. But after working for kindly Mr Gabriel for two years, Jolene, with her capabilities in no way stretched, knew that if she was going to realise her full potential then she was going to have to move on.
That chance came unexpectedly and out of the blue when a short time later her grandmother died and left her her small bungalow in the village of Priors Aston, in Essex.
Jolene, on her tri-monthly visits to her grandmother's home, had always liked Priors'Aston. Indeed, she felt at home there herself. But it was only after her grandmother had died, and after she had come to terms with the sadness of that fact, that on the last of the subsequent 'attending to matters' trips to Priors Aston Jolene started to think she might quite like to live there permanently.
'The bungalow will be no trouble to sell.' Her father was addressing her mother as the two of them decided what was best to be done with their daughter's inheritance. 'We can put the money in the building society for Jo-Jo, and when…'
'Actually, Dad,' Jolene found her voice—and nerve, since she had an idea that she was about to hurt her doting parents—'I was—er—well, actually, I shouldn't mind at all living here.'
It was done, said. Startled at this never-thought-of notion, both her parents had stared at her, open-mouthed. Her mother was the first to recover.
'You want to leave home?' she asked, looking totally scandalised.
There followed a month where the subject of Jolene's leaving home was put under the microscope. 'You'll have to give up working for Mr Gabriel,' was one point raised by her father.
'I know,' Jolene had replied quietly.
'It's not cheap, running a home,' was a point her mother mentioned.
'I know,' Jolene had agreed.
Though it was when her father smiled and told her mother that he thought they should make her an allowance to help pay for such things as the rates and the maintenance of her bungalow that Jolene knew, with some relief, that they were getting used to, and accepting, the idea that she would soon be leaving them.
'I don't want you to give me an allowance, Dad,' she had told him then, and, addressing both her parents, 'I'd—er—like to stand on my own two feet if I can.'
Fourteen months after she had said these words, Jolene faced the fact that she was having a struggle making ends meet. She had left her home in Somerset a year ago, and had found herself a more exacting job than the one she'd had with Mr Gabriel. She was doing very well in her job, too, but, having recently had to find an unprepared-for amount for some extensive rewiring to her property, she sat back to review the situation. Without question, she had only to ask and her parents would help her out like a shot. But, having gained her independence, she did not want that. And so, since it appeared that nothing was certain where property was concerned, and that for all she knew the central heating, or the plumbing, or anything else, might be the next unprepared-for catastrophe for her earnings, it seemed to her that she had better do something about finding a job that paid more.
She found that job—with its much higher salary—in Chelmsford, in the head offices of Templeton's, manufacturers of heavy machinery-for the home and export market. Templeton's had large works and some offices in Hampshire and they paid well. Having started work in the Chelmsford offices, Jolene worked hard and reckoned that she earned every penny she received. But she had no complaints, because for the first time she felt stimulated, using all her office skills and learning fresh ones. She began to enjoy every moment of it—and then Mr Neale had retired.
Jolene came out of her reverie with a start to realise that she was still sitting in her car in Templeton's car park. Rushing back into her mind came the ugly scene which she had just been embroiled in. She felt less furious than she had, but the scene had left an unpleasant taste in her mouth.
Again she reached forward to turn the ignition key, and then suddenly she began to get cross. Why should she leave a firm that paid so well? She needed that salary, and she was fully prepared to work hard for her rewards. It was not as if she had done
anything wrong, for goodness' sake! It was not her fault that Templeton's had engaged a man on their management side who was such a creep.
For five minutes more Jolene sat in her car, torn between the pride that would have seen her thumbing her nose at Templeton's and driving home to Priors Aston— and reason, that said that if some other calamity happened to her property then she would probably have to sell her home to pay for it.
Pride might well have won the day, however, had she not, when reaching for the ignition key a third time, recalled how one of the other secretaries who had had a personality clash with her particular boss had asked for and got a transfer to another section without any trouble.
When Jolene thought of how she had worked at Templeton's for six months and yet still did not know half the people who worked at that vast establishment, she got out of her car, and headed for the personnel department. If luck was with her, she could stay on at Templeton's, and might not ever see Tony Welsh again.
'But why do you want to move from your present section?' Miss Caldicott asked, glancing down at Jolene's file which she had extracted from a cabinet drawer. 'I thought you were getting on so well there.'
'I—was,' Jolene replied, and realised, without knowing why, that she seemed to feel more loyalty to Rosalind Welsh than her creep of a husband in that she could not divulge any of what had taken place that' morning. Though the way the poor woman was shrieking her head off, it would be a miracle if someone had not overheard what was going on. 'Our personalities clash,' she drew out of the hat, though since she did not like Tony Welsh as a person she supposed that wasn't too far from the truth.
But Miss Caldicott was shaking her head. 'I haven't a secretarial vacancy anywhere I can place you at the moment,' she said apologetically. 'I'm sorry,' she added as she leafed again through her file. 'Your references from previous employers are excellent, and aside from speaking highly of you, Mr Neale put in a special recommendation about you before he left, but...' She broke off. 'Couldn't you go back and try again? I'm sure Mr Welsh…'
Frozen Enchantment Page 1
