Special Deliveries: Her Nine-Month Secret

CHAPTER FOUR

‘YOU’RE NOT FOOLING anyone, Hols. You smile a lot but, just between you and me, you’re letting yourself go…’ Andy, who still managed to look dapper in muddy, low-slung jeans and his close-fitted knitted jumper, was standing back and looking at her with a critical eye. ‘Frankly you’re putting on weight.’

‘I’ve been comfort eating… a little,’ Holly confessed defensively. ‘It’s getting colder, salads don’t work in October. Besides, what’s the point of growing all those vegetables if I don’t eat them? And I have to have something to eat with them.’ But it was a paltry excuse. She had put on weight in the nine weeks since Luiz had walked out of her house. She was shamelessly indulging her sweet tooth and finding it hard to care if she gained a pound or two.

It was just her luck that Andy was proudly gay and into anything and everything to do with fashion, despite the fact that he worked in a job that came with mud as part of the package. He never failed to let her know that his jaundiced eyes were noticing each creeping pound she put on.

Ever since Luiz had left, Andy had seen it as his mission to ‘get her out of herself.’ He delivered lectures on the importance of learning curves, arranged parties to which he invited single straight friends and watched beadily from the sidelines as she steadfastly failed to notice any of them.

‘You need to move on,’ he now said kindly. ‘That sexy hunk of yours won’t be back and it’s no good eating your way through the biscuit tin while you wait in vain.’

‘I’m not eating my way through the biscuit tin and I’m not waiting in vain, either…’ But she smiled reluctantly and nodded when he invited her yet again to another of his parties, this one a soiree where she would be able to meet a couple of really nice guys into music: very hip, very cool, although he could try for an accountant if asked nicely…

So far, he had introduced her to a doctor, a hairdresser, several artists and two farmers, both of whom she had gone to school with and neither of whom elicited anything other than polite enquiries about their parents. He was determined to stop her from brooding, and she was grateful, just as she was grateful to all her friends who had rallied round and were equally determined to make her forget the whole Luiz episode and treat it as though it had never happened.

Holly knew that they were right. She needed to move on. She hadn’t heard a word from Luiz since he had walked out of her life. Several times she had been tempted to call his mobile just to hear the sound of his rich drawl, and she had had to fight the urge with all her might.

Now, more than ever, she was alert to the reality that time was not standing still. While she succumbed to fudge cake and hearty pasta meals, Luiz had well and truly forgotten about her.

‘He’s found someone else,’ she blurted out as they closed the final gate on a donkey that had come to the sanctuary after the death of his owner, and began walking up to one of the outbuildings which had been converted into a comfortable changing room.

Her shoulders were hunched and she kept her eyes firmly on the ground. ‘I looked on the Internet… just a peep to see what was happening with him. I know I shouldn’t have. Curiosity killed the cat and all that.’

‘Well, I’m surprised it took him that long,’ Andy said acerbically. ‘The man has a reputation. I’ve done a bit of reading up on him myself. If you were over him, you wouldn’t be checking to see what he was up to,’ he belatedly admonished and Holly cast him a sheepish, sidelong glance.

‘You should see her.’ She hovered miserably by the door to the changing rooms, which was one of the upgrades covered by the so-called money that had been lying around in an account after the sale of the farm but which Holly now suspected had just been money donated by Luiz to cover the cost of sex with the woman he’d had no intention of settling down with. There were two shower cubicles, toilets and sinks on either side, one for the men and the other for the women; the black-and-white tiled floor, always scrupulously clean, was rescued from appearing too clinical by the addition of a couple of chairs and a small table. Leading off from the changing area, a comfortable room was big enough to cater for everyone at mealtimes when the weather was foul and they wanted to escape from the great outdoors.

‘Don’t think about that,’ Andy urged.

‘She’s beautiful. I mean really beautiful. Plus she’s Brazilian, from a very important, very rich family. And she’s skinny and tall. She’s the exact opposite of me. There’s loads of speculation that they’re going to be married.’

She could have elaborated on the slew of pictures she had pored over the evening before. Luiz and Cecelia Follone laughing as they stepped out of a limo for the premiere of a movie; snapped unawares leaving a restaurant; posing in front of the theatre. They had only been seeing each other for three weeks, yet he seemed as comfortable standing next to her as though they had been going out for centuries.

Holly had spent a sleepless night torturing herself with the thought that he was over the moon at having had a lucky escape from a country bumpkin living in the back of beyond, someone who had yet to discover the joys of shopping, who seldom wore make-up and who, as far as he was concerned, had been a potential gold-digger only saved from revealing her baser instincts because he had lied to her about the scale of his wealth.

Andy was right, she thought later. It was time to be proactive and to move on. She would try and show a healthy interest in the musicians. She would definitely go on a crash diet. In no time at all, she would be thin and her life would be back on track…

In his towering office in the city, Luiz had swivelled his chair away from his desk and was absently gazing out to a view of a city always on the move. In one hand he idly played with some of the bits of jewellery he had given to Holly over the time they had been lovers. She had returned the lot to him weeks ago and for some reason he had kept the stuff shoved at the back of his desk drawer.

It was grey and miserable outside, which meant that Cecelia would be complaining. She complained a lot, and she loathed the English weather, which she claimed to be depressing and responsible for her scrupulously maintained tan fading faster than normal. Right now, she would be complaining to Ana, her maid, who had travelled over with her.

Tonight he would be taking her to the opera. The thought of it induced a feeling of inertia which he knew was not in keeping with a man supposedly in the throes of a relationship. An extremely suitable relationship. He had met her through a friend of his mother’s and Cecelia’s aunt, who had looked him up on the spur of the moment with her niece in tow.

Privately Luiz thought that she had wanted to offload her high-maintenance niece and she had caught him just at the precise moment in time when he had been contemplating his recent loss of libido with vast annoyance, wondering whether he shouldn’t be thinking about settling down and forgoing a continuing lifestyle of interchangeable airheads.

As yet, Cecelia had still to fire his libido, but he was certain that the lack of sexual chemistry was a temporary drawback. He had been working ungodly hours since Holly had disappeared from his life and lack of sleep could do all sorts of things to a person’s body. The fact remained that Cecelia was perfect for him. Any union between them could only be to his advantage. Her family was on a par with his, from the point of view of wealth. Like most pampered women, she was far more interested in the business of building up and maintaining an enviable social circle than she was in spending quality time with him. She enjoyed being seen with the right people in the right places. She was not the type to start making demands about the amount of time he devoted to work. It was all to the good.

As he thought about her, he ran his fingers over the smooth stones on the bracelets and rings that had been returned to him without even the courtesy of a note.

Immediately, the image of a leggy, Brazilian brunette was overlaid by the image of a small, curvaceous blonde who probably didn’t know a manicure from a pedicure and had most likely never stepped foot in a spa to get any of the treatments that Cecelia did on a more or less daily basis.

Luiz’s lips thinned. He loathed it when he was distracted by the memory of Holly and it was a distraction that occurred far too frequently for his liking. Supposedly this was because, for the first time in his life, he had not been the one to terminate the relationship. Naturally the way it had ended would have left a sour taste in his mouth. Naturally, she would crop up in his thoughts more than he wanted. Obviously, this was an occurrence that would disappear soon enough, but in case it didn’t…

Luiz glanced down at his mobile phone and scrolled to the text message which he had received the evening before. It was brief: she wanted to meet him. He had no idea why and he had seriously been tempted to press the delete button without bothering to reply. But then he had been struck by the thought that seeing her might just put paid to her annoying and lingering presence at the back of his mind. He would be reminded that she had been little more than an unusual distraction. He would stop thinking about her and sex in the same breath and gain some much-needed perspective on a slice of his life that he was glad to be rid of.

He allowed himself the luxury of wondering what would be bringing her to London; naturally, he had informed her in a text as brief as hers had been that, whilst he would grant her an audience, he certainly wouldn’t be doing so up north. If she wanted to see him that badly, then she would have to do the unthinkable and travel south.

He couldn’t imagine what would possess her to get in touch with him after all this time. Had she begun to regret her hasty departure from his life? She had returned all the priceless jewellery. Maybe she had started thinking that that had been a wrong move, bearing in mind how much money she would have been able to get had she decided to sell them.

In the end, people were always motivated by money. It was a disappointing truth. He was in no doubt that, under the waffle she would have prepared, she would be on a begging mission. Maybe something had collapsed in the animal shelter, or the dodgy plumbing in the cottage needed replacing. Not to beat about the bush, one of a dozen things could have happened that required financial input and doubtless she had reached the conclusion that he was the best source of money she had.

It would definitely be satisfying to watch her squirm. Any lingering nostalgia he had would be wiped out the second she lowered her eyes, cleared her throat and asked if he could lend her just enough money to… do whatever she needed it to do. He would think with warmth and relief then of Cecelia and the fact that she would never need to ask him for money.

A cynical smile curved his sensuous mouth. He decided that this unexpected visit from Holly was just the thing. In fact, he couldn’t wait…

Dithering outside the most impressive office building she had ever seen, all smoked glass and metal, Holly chewed her lip and clutched her backpack in front of her like a talisman. People swerved around her, coming and going. They all wore dark business suits and carried briefcases or computer bags slung over their shoulders. These were people in a hurry and on a mission. When she had sent that text to Luiz, asking to meet up, she had expected him to suggest somewhere neutral, maybe a restaurant or a coffee bar. The fact that he couldn’t even be bothered to leave his office to see her was a stark reminder of how little she meant to him and how thoroughly she had been forgotten. He was quite literally prepared to ‘grant her an audience’ between emails.

She knew she should be neither hurt nor surprised by that. She had invested far more in their relationship than he had. He wasn’t going to be eager to see her and he wouldn’t be interested in catching up. In fact, she was slightly surprised that he had agreed to see her at all. She glumly thought that, by the time she was finished saying what she had to say, he would be heartily wishing that he had refused.

Taking a deep breath, she forged a way through the busy swarm of people, either leaving for or returning from lunch. In her shapeless, long-sleeved dress and her thin waterproof anorak, she felt as conspicuous as an elephant at a tea party. She knew, as she was propelled through the revolving doors and ejected like a sack of potatoes into the vast, opulent foyer of the building he had directed her to, that people were staring at her. Politely staring; wondering what on earth she was doing there. She knew that if she didn’t act purposefully right now that a security guard would materialise and offer to show her out of the building. There would be an implicit threat that the police would be involved if she didn’t go quietly.

How on earth had it come to this? It was the question she had been asking herself for the past week. She had made the appointment to see her doctor, as she had been feeling under the weather recently. A prescription and maybe a pep talk on the curative aspect of time had been the only things she’d expected…

Someone bumped into her from behind, a young girl in a snappy black suit carrying the obligatory briefcase and Holly mumbled an awkward apology and was rewarded with a gimlet stare and raised eyebrows.

Her frayed nerves were well and truly reduced to rubble at this timely reminder of how out of place she was here and how horrendous and awkward the next half an hour was going to be.

Indeed, her thoughts were in such a state of meltdown that she was barely aware of the next ten minutes or so, during which a friendly girl, one of four positioned behind a circular desk, pointed to where she should sit whilst one of Luiz’s secretaries came for her. Then, ten minutes later, she was herded off to a private lift and whooshed upwards so that her already sick and nervous stomach churned even more sickly and nervously.

She ceased noticing the curious stares as she was ushered into a huge space that smelled of money being made and deals being done. She paid absolutely no attention to the opulence of her surroundings. She no longer felt insignificant next to the thirty-something-year-old clones with their ears pressed to phones and their fingers tapping on computer keyboards, their body language proclaiming that they couldn’t stop because they were in the middle of making huge profits for their company.

She blindly followed the middle-aged woman in front of her while every fear and apprehension she had nurtured on the train down coalesced into a sickening knot in the pit of her stomach.

She desperately wanted to reach out, grab the woman by the hand and tell her that she had made a terrible mistake; could she please just leave now? But, before she could open her mouth to utter a word, they were at the end of the corridor where she was staring into a boardroom, then turning left through a suite, then an office, then facing a heavy door which was very firmly closed.

Holly felt as though she had had no time to register this side of a Luiz she’d never known existed, no chance to appreciate the world he worked in. She felt that she should have paid more attention to her surroundings. It would have given her the opportunity to stoke up the old anger and fan the flames of hurt and disillusionment which she would need to see her through the next half an hour.

She felt vulnerable, under-prepared and scared to death as the heavy door was pushed open. Her first glimpse of Luiz after all these weeks was of his back, turned away from her as he stared through an impressive bank of windows overlooking the city.

Luiz was aware of his secretary showing Holly in but he only turned around when he heard the soft click of the door being shut. Still playing with the bits of jewellery she had returned to him, he now dropped them into the depths of his trouser pocket and looked at his visitor with a cool, unreadable expression, his antennae on full alert as he studied her, taking in every detail of her appearance.

She had put on weight. Or had she? He couldn’t tell because for the past few weeks the women with whom he had come into contact had all been thin and lanky. Next to any of them someone with even the merest hint of a curve would appear overweight. Next to her, Cecelia was a stick insect.

Familiarity kicked in. The memory of her voluptuous, sexy body slammed into him with the unexpected force of a freight train. He was angrily aware of his dormant libido gathering force and breaking through the barrier of indifference he was keen to keep in place, even though she couldn’t have been dressed in a less flattering outfit. Having not seen him for over two months, she couldn’t even be bothered to dress for the occasion! He thought that she could have tried a bit harder to impress, for someone on a begging mission.

‘I can’t spare you a lot of time,’ he said, moving to sit and watching intently as she hesitantly remained where she was, as though ready to take flight at a moment’s notice. He was riveted by the untouched prettiness of her face. He had contrived to forget the appeal her lack of artifice had always held for him, but he was fast realising that the memory of that had been buried in a very shallow grave indeed. The hope that Cecelia might benefit from comparison wasn’t happening. In fact, it was a struggle to revive the image of the Brazilian beauty with her full, pouting mouth and model size-zero figure.

‘That’s okay.’ In her peripheral vision, Holly was conscious of a comfortable leather sofa against a stark white wall on which hung an imposing abstract painting in bold colours. On the opposite side, a slightly smaller desk was backed by bookshelves, all high-gloss white. But really her eyes were glued to Luiz, as imposing, impressive and sinfully good-looking as he had been in her head, where he had continued to plague her waking moments and invade her thoughts when she was asleep at night.

‘So… what can I do for you?’ He tapped his pen restively on the surface of his desk and lounged back in the chair. Keen eyes noted the slow crawl of colour into her cheeks, confirming his suspicion that her visit was financially motivated. Naturally, he wanted to wait until she was forced to confess the reason for her visit. There was already a cynical twist to his mouth in anticipation of the predictable denouement of her presence in his office but, when the silence stretched on and on, he finally clicked his tongue impatiently and leant forward.

‘You were never short of something to say, Holly, so why the dumbstruck silence?’

‘I… I’m not sure where to begin…’ Her voice sounded unnaturally high and tinged with guilt. She hadn’t expected to be thrown in at the deep end, made to feel unwelcome, granted none of the usual pleasantries that might have put her a little more at ease. He acted as though she had been the one to blame for the break-up of their relationship! As though he hadn’t been the guilty party… the man who had lied to her and led her up the garden path!

Hard on the heels of that thought came the realisation that he could behave however he chose because in his head he was probably guilty of nothing. So he had lied to her, but he certainly wouldn’t feel mortified at that because to feel mortified, he would also have had to care about her and he hadn’t. That was the bottom line. Her soft mouth firmed.

‘Shall I give you a helping hand?’ Luiz queried in a silky-smooth voice that somehow managed to get her back up and reduce her already scattered ability to think even more.

‘How could you do that? You don’t know what I’ve come here to say,’ Holly intoned in a nervous whisper.

‘I can take a guess…’

‘How?’ Confusion tore into her as she tried to fathom out how he could possibly suspect the reason for her visit. Was he a mind reader? He had always been spectacularly good at placing her moods and had always seemed to instinctively know what she was about to say. Plus, she had gained weight. All over there was just… more of her. She had gone up a bra size, and that was underestimating things. Self-consciously, she felt her breasts tighten and she shifted a little. For a man who could take in every detail of a woman’s body in seconds, he would have spotted that in a flash. She thought that it might make her job a little easier if she didn’t have to spell it all out in black and white. Caving in to his superior knowledge, and not doubting for a second that he had guessed why she was there, Holly sagged. ‘I suppose it’s pretty obvious.’

‘It is to me. For God’s sake, Holly, why don’t you take that ridiculous jacket off and sit?’

‘You don’t have much time. I wouldn’t want to impose… I just wanted to say what I have to say… leave you to mull it over…’ But she awkwardly removed the anorak and slunk into the chair opposite his desk.

Luiz gave a sharp intake of breath. He would have had to be blind not to see how those luscious curves were even more tempting now. Her generous breasts were more than evident underneath the baggy dress. His jaw hardened as he fought to contain a crazy urge to lock the office door and discover for himself just how voluptuous she was underneath the unappealing clothing.

‘What’s there to mull over?’ he demanded harshly. ‘Just tell me what you need the money for. What’s gone wrong at the sanctuary? High winds wrecked some of the enclosures? Or is it the cottage? That damn building’s so ancient that you might as well resign yourself to the uphill task of finding money to fix things forever more until you decide to sell it.’ He reached into the desk drawer and pulled out a cheque book. ‘For old times’ sake, I’ll give you however much you want, but after this the well is dry…’