A Nine-to-five Affair

‘You’ve nothing to worry about. I promise you, Neville has no idea what you’re up to,’ Barden soothed. ‘Now stop worrying. I’ll see you tomorrow. Everything will be fine.’

She’d bet it would, Emmie fumed. Quite plainly Roberta Short was getting the wind up that her poor husband might find out what was going on. And Barden Cunningham, who was no doubt no stranger to this sort of situation, was almost casual as he attempted to soothe Roberta’s anxieties.

‘Now what did I do?’

The tone was sharp. Emmie looked up—he had ended his phone call, though she would have known that from his tone of voice, which was oh, so very different from how it had been now that he was no longer speaking to his lady-love.

Emmie strove hard to keep a lid on her anger. ‘Do?’ she countered.

‘I’ve just about had it with you and your arrogance!’ Barden Cunningham snarled curtly. Arrogance? Her? Emmie could feel herself fighting a losing battle with her anger, even if she was desperate to keep her job. She sensed from his statement, ‘I’ve just about had it with you’, that she was on her way out, anyway. ‘So tell me what I did this time.’ He gave her a direct look from those no-nonsense cool grey eyes, and Emmie just knew that he was going to pursue this until he had an answer.

‘It’s none of my business.’ She felt forced, if she hoped to hang on to this job, to give him some sort of a reply.

‘What isn’t?’

As she’d thought. He wanted more than that. ‘When Mrs Short rang earlier she was very anxious that her husband didn’t know about it.’

‘So!’

Oh, abomination, he was immovable. ‘Add that to the conversation—well, your side anyway, which I’ve just overheard—and it’s obvious!’

‘What is?’

She wanted to hit him. He wanted her to come right out with it. Well, she’d be damned if she would. ‘If you don’t know, it’s not up to me to tell you!’ She could feel her temper getting away from her. Cool it, cool it, you can’t afford a temper.

‘You think—’ He broke off, and, putting her remark about Mrs Short being anxious about her husband knowing, together with the exchange he’d just had with her, he suddenly had it all added up. ‘How d—?’ He was angry; she could tell. That made two of them. ‘Why, you prissy little Miss Prim and Proper. You think I’m having an affair with—’

‘It’s nothing to do with me!’ Emmie flared. Her on-the-loose temper had no chance while that ‘prissy little Miss Prim and Proper’ still floated in the air.

‘You’re damned right it isn’t!’ he barked. He was on his feet—so was she. ‘What I do with my life, how I conduct my life, is absolutely, categorically, nothing whatsoever to do with you!’ he snarled. ’Got that?’

Who did he think he was? Who did he think he was talking to? Some mealy-mouthed, wouldn’t-say-boo typist? ‘It was you who insisted on knowing!’ she erupted, her brown eyes sparking flashes of fire.

She refused to back down, even though she knew he was going to well and truly attempt to sort her out now. Strangely, though, as she waited for him to rain coals of wrath down about her head, all at once, as he looked into her storming brown eyes, it seemed he checked himself—and decided to sort her out using another tack. For suddenly his tone became more mocking than angry.

‘Are you being fair, do you think, little Emily?’ he enquired charmingly.

She blinked. ‘Fair?’ She owned she wasn’t quite with him.

‘I don’t—scold—you over your affairs,’ he drawled, and she looked at him, momentarily made speechless. ‘But then,’ he went on coolly, ‘you’ve never had an affair, have you?’

She hadn’t. But pride, some kind of inverted honour, was at stake here. ‘I’ve…’ she began, ready to lie and tell him she’d had dozens of affairs—only she faltered. Given that it seemed it was she who had instigated this conversation, was she really discussing her love-life—or his view that she didn’t have a love life—with her employer? ‘How many affairs I’ve had, or not had, is entirely nothing to do with you,’ she jumped back up on her high horse, and told him loftily.

‘Typical!’ he rapped, soon back to snarling, she noted. ‘You think you can pass judgement on my out-of-work activities, but the moment I enquire into yours, it’s none of my business!’

‘Out-of-work activities’. That was a new name for it! But she’d had enough, and grabbed up her notepad. ‘Do you want this work back today or don’t you?’ she challenged hotly—and too late saw the glint in his eyes that clearly said he didn’t take very kindly to attitude.

Oddly again, though—when some part of her already wanted to apologise, while another part wouldn’t let her—instead of laying into her, as she’d fully expected, Barden Cunningham took a moment out to look down at her. She knew from her burning skin that she must have flares of pink in her cheeks. She was, however, already regretting her spurt of temper, and on the way to vowing never to get angry again, when still looking down at her, that glint of anger in those no-nonsense grey eyes suddenly became a mocking glint as he derided, ‘And there was I, putting you down as a mouse.’

That did it! Mouse! Apologise? She’d see him hang first! Mouse! What self-respecting twenty-two-year-old would put up with that? ‘Better a mouse than a rat!’ she hissed—and was on her way.

She went storming through the connecting door, not bothering to close it—she wasn’t stopping—and straight to her coat peg on the far wall. Even as she reached for her coat, though, and started shrugging into it, she was regretting having lost her temper. What the dickens was the matter with her? She couldn’t afford a temper!

Emmie dipped in the bottom drawer of her desk to retrieve her bag, knowing full well that even if she didn’t want to go there was no way now, after calling Barden Cunningham a rat, that he was going to let her stay.

Or so she’d thought. She had just straightened, her shoulder bag in hand, when his voice enquired coolly, ‘Where do you think you’re going?’

She looked over to the doorway and saw he had come to lean nonchalantly against the doorframe. She hesitated, common practical sense intruding on what pride decreed. Oh, she did so like the work, and didn’t want to leave. Her breath caught. Was he saying that, despite her poking her nose into his private life and making judgements on his morals, he wasn’t telling her to go?

‘Aren’t I—dismissed?’ she managed to query.

For answer Barden Cunningham stood away from the door. ‘I’ll let you know when,’ he drawled—and added, with insincere charm, ‘You’ll be working late tonight.’

With that he went into his office, and, obviously utterly confident that she would do exactly as he said, and not bothering to wait to see if she took her coat off, closed the connecting door.

Emmie slowly put down her bag, relief rushing in because she still had this well-paid and, it had to be said, enjoyable job—while another part of her, the proud part, she rather suspected, made her wish she was in a position to walk and keep on walking.

A cold war ensued for the remainder of the day.

Working late was of no concern to Emmie, and she arrived at her flat around eight that evening, starting to feel quite astonished that, though her security was so vital to her, she had today, because she had been unable to control a suddenly erratic temper, put both her security and Aunt Hannah’s future tranquillity at risk!

Emmie got up the following morning, still wondering what in creation had got into her. She was aware that she had been tremendously shaken when her stepfather Alec had died. Her emotions had received a terrible blow. Her redundancy from Usher Trading around about the same time hadn’t helped. The worrying time she’d had of it when each of her successive jobs had folded had been a strain too. Had she perhaps grown too used to heading for the door when something went wrong, and had it become a habit with her?

But, not without cause, she mused as she drove to the offices of Progress Engineering. She remembered Clive Norris’s attempt to kiss her. The way he’d hemmed her in between the filing cabinet and the wall—was she supposed to put up with that sort of nonsense? No, certainly not!

So what had Cunningham done that had made her so angry? So angry that for emotional seconds at a time she had been ready to forget her oh, so important security and walk out of there. Made him so angry she had thought herself about to be dismissed at any second—thought she had really blown it when she’d more or less called him a rat.

So he was, too. But was it any of her business? She hadn’t liked it when he’d said he thought of her as a mouse. Nor had she liked it when he’d referred to her non-existent love-life. But, and Emmie had to face it, she was employed by Barden Cunningham to work, and only work. She had been the one to bring the personal element into it. True, the whole sorry business could have been avoided if he hadn’t enquired so sharply—in such a direct contrast to his tone when talking to his lady-love, Roberta Short—’ Now what did I do?’

Or could it have been avoided? He’d caught her on the raw with his tone, and negated any chance of her making use of the skills of diplomacy she’d assured him at her interview she possessed, without those sharp words telling her he’d just about had it with her and her arrogance. And, if that hadn’t been enough, he’d insisted on knowing why she was being ‘arrogant’ this time.

Emmie went to her desk, aware by then that she was at fault. Anything that happened in the office that wasn’t business was nothing to do with her. Unless the womanising hound made a pass at her—and she could be part of the furniture for all the notice he took of her; not that she wanted him taking notice of her, thank you very much—perish the thought. But she had no call to be remotely interested in anything else that went on which was unconnected with business.

‘Everything all right?’ she asked Dawn after their initial greeting.

‘As it should be.’ Dawn smiled.

‘How are you feeling today?’

‘Touch wood, so far, and in comparison to Tuesday, quite good.’

Emmie got on with some work, but the row she’d had with Barden Cunningham the previous afternoon came back again and again to haunt her. Somehow, when at around eleven he called her into his office, she knew that she was not going to forget it, or indeed feel any better about it, until she’d apologised.

But he was cool, aloof, as he stated, ‘I have to go to Stratford—be ready at twelve.’

She felt niggled; no please, no thank you, no Could you be ready at twelve; I’d like you to accompany me? The cold war was still on, then? He was charm personified with everyone else.

‘Will you require any file in particular?’ she enquired politely, knowing by then that they had a product and design offshoot in Stratford-upon-Avon, about a hundred and ten miles away.

‘Just a fresh notebook,’ he replied. ‘You’re taking the minutes of what could be a lengthy, involved and very important meeting.’

Emmie returned to her desk, glad she was wearing the same smart charcoal suit she had worn for her interview. She knew she was looking good, and felt it was quite a feather in her cap that she had been appointed to go with the head of the group to take notes for this very important meeting. Although, on thinking about it, she had known from the first that Dawn wasn’t able to go. Barden could easily have found someone else, though. Emmie cheered herself up. Make no mistake, please or offend, he would have found someone else if he thought for a moment that she wasn’t up to it.

They made it to Stratford-upon-Avon in good time, and were greeted by the general manager, Jack Bryant, a pleasant man in his early thirties who, while totally businesslike with her employer, frequently rested his eyes on Emmie.

‘I refuse to believe you’re called Emily,’ he commented, while Barden was having a word with the products manager.

‘Would you believe Emmie?’

He smiled, and when Emmie was starting to wonder if she was going to last the whole afternoon, lunchless, he informed her, ‘A meal’s been laid on for you in the executive dining room.’ He was just adding, ‘I hope you won’t mind if I have lunch with you too, Emmie,’ when she became aware that Barden Cunningham had turned back to them.

He tossed her a sour look, which she took as an indication that he felt she hadn’t wasted any time in giving the general manager leave to call her by the name all but he used. Then he looked from her to remark, a touch sarcastically, she felt, ‘Good of you to wait lunch.’

They did not linger over the meal, and, having been given all of five minutes to wash her hands afterwards, they adjourned to the boardroom and the afternoon flew as fast as her fingers. Emmie had known she was good at her job, but at that meeting her skills were tested to the full. When it came to an end she felt as if she had done a full week’s work in one afternoon.

Jack Bryant came over to her while Barden was shaking hands with a couple of the board members. ‘I’m in London quite often, or could be.’ Jack smiled. ‘You wouldn’t care to let me have your phone number, I suppose?’

‘Your divorce through yet, Jack?’ Barden appeared from nowhere to ask conversationally.

‘Any time now,’ he replied.

Barden smiled. ‘Talk to my PA when it’s absolute—she doesn’t encourage married men.’

Why did she want to hit him? On the one hand she was thrilled to bits that he’d actually called her his PA, but on the other she wanted to land him one. For all it was true, and she didn’t encourage married men, he somehow made it sound as if she really was the ‘prissy little Miss Prim and Proper’ he had called her yesterday. That still stung!

It was around seven-thirty when they arrived back at the Progress Engineering building, and by then the mixed feelings about her employer Emmie had been experiencing had calmed down, to the extent that she was again thinking of the apology she owed him.

Intending to lock her notes away in her desk overnight, Emmie went up to her office in the lift with Barden, and he took a short cut through her office to his own. Placing her bag and pad down on her desk, she heard him at his desk, and, acting on the impulse of the moment—and in a now-or-never attempt to get her apology over and done with—she went and paused in the doorway.

Barden Cunningham looked over to where she stood—and her words wouldn’t come. He waited, his glance taking in her straight and shiny black hair, flicking over her suit, which concealed her slender figure. Unspeaking, his glance came back to her face, to her eyes, down to her mouth, where the words trembled, and then back up to her eyes.

Emmie knew then that if she didn’t push those words out soon she was going to lose all dignity and feel a fool. ‘I—I want to apologise for my—er—behaviour yesterday,’ she forced out jerkily—and wished she hadn’t bothered when, instantly aware of what she was referring to, but not looking at all friendly, he looked coolly back at her.

‘You’re still of the same view today as yesterday?’ he enquired crisply.

The view that he was a rat for playing away with Neville Short’s wife while pretending to be his good friend? Yes, she did still hold the same view. Why couldn’t Cunningham just accept her apology and forget it? But—he was waiting, and Emmie just then discovered that, even though a lie, a simple no would have ended the matter, suddenly, lying was beyond her.

‘Yes,’ she said quietly, weathering the direct look from those no-nonsense steady grey eyes. ‘My views haven’t changed.’

The no-nonsense look went from cool to icy. ‘Then your apology is worthless,’ he stated curtly.

Emmie abruptly turned her back on him and marched stormily into her own office. She didn’t know about losing dignity, but she did feel a fool—and humiliated into the bargain. Heartily did she wish she had never bothered, had ignored the plague of her conscience. Her apology was rejected. Huh! The way he talked, he would only accept her apology if it was sincere. He was so sincere! Stabbing his friend Neville in the back—it looked like it!

Fuming, Emmie tossed her notepad in her drawer and locked it away—only to feel like storming in and punching Barden Cunningham’s head when his voice floated coolly from his office. ‘Leave typing back your notes until the morning, Emily.’

Was he serious? He actually thought she had it in mind to type up those minutes tonight? There was a full day’s work there! Resisting the temptation to go to his doorway and poke her tongue out at him, Emmie instead picked up her bag and went swiftly to her outer office door.

Afraid that if she opened her mouth something not very polite would come out, she decided against wishing him goodnight, but, by switching out the light and plunging her office in darkness, she let that be her farewell to him. The swine. He had an assignation with Roberta Short at the theatre that night. He must already be late—she hoped that he wouldn’t be let in.

Emmie had difficulty in getting to sleep that night. It seemed to her that she only had to close her eyes to start wondering if Cunningham had managed to snatch some private time with his married lover. Perhaps even now, at this very moment, they were alone together. The thought made her feel quite wretched. She moved and thumped her pillow—wishing that it was his head.

She surfaced on Friday, after a very fractured night, and showered and donned a white silk shirt and her second-best suit of dark navy wool. Satisfied with her appearance, and aware that, since her notes from yesterday needed to be typed up she was in for a hard day, she was about to don her three-quarter-length car coat when her phone rang.

Aunt Hannah? She didn’t normally ring in the morning on a weekday. Though since she did sometimes get her days mixed up, which was perfectly understandable, Emmie defended, perhaps Aunt Hannah thought today was Saturday.

Emmie went over to the phone, checking her watch and mentally noting she had five minutes to spare if it was Aunt Hannah.

The call was from Keswick House, she soon discovered. However, it was not her step-grandmother—but Lisa Browne. Mrs Whitford was not to be found, and enquiries had revealed that one of the other residents had seen her letting herself out an hour ago. She hadn’t told anyone where she was going.

An hour ago! Aunt Hannah didn’t usually get up this early! Emmie took a quick glance to the window, trying not to panic. It was a grey day; snow was threatening. ‘Was she wearing a coat?’ she asked quickly.

‘Apparently, yes.’

‘She’s probably gone back to our old apartment.’ Emmie spoke her thoughts out loud, panic mixing with concern that Aunt Hannah might be getting confused again. ‘I’ll go there straight away,’ she told Lisa Browne—and wasted no more time.

Only when the cold air hit her did it vaguely dawn on her that she had rushed out without actually putting her own coat on. But she had more important matters to worry about than that—she’d soon get warm in the car. She must get the car heated up for Aunt Hannah. Must collect her. Must return her to Keswick House. Must get to work. Oh, heck, all that work she had to do today! Barden Cunningham was just going to love her. She tried not to think about him. This was the last day of her fifth week at Progress—and the first time she’d been late.

Hoping that her five-week record for being on time, not to mention that she had uncomplainingly worked late when required, would see her employer—womanising toad—forgiving her this one lapse—she couldn’t bear to think that there might be another—Emmie concentrated on her most immediate problem. Her present accommodation was just five miles away from Keswick House; the apartment where they’d used to live was seven miles distant from Aunt Hannah’s new home. For someone so confused that she had in the past believed that she still lived in their old apartment, it was a source of surprise to Emmie that, even in the depths of confusion, Aunt Hannah remembered their previous address and how to get there.

Thinking she would soon have her step-relative safe in her car, Emmie was delayed by twenty minutes in traffic. When eventually she did make it to the area where she had lived happily with Alec and his mother, Emmie looked about for signs of the dear love.

With not a glimpse of her, she parked outside her old address and rang the doorbells of their former neighbours. No one answered. For the next hour Emmie scoured the streets, looking for Aunt Hannah. Starting to feel quite desperate, she went back to her present flat, hoping that Aunt Hannah had thought to go there.

She hadn’t. Emmie rang Lisa Browne, crossing her fingers that her step-relative had made it back to Keswick House. ‘I’m afraid not,’ Lisa Browne answered.

By then Emmie was getting seriously worried. She thought of ringing the police, then decided she would give it one more try. Aunt Hannah had grown aggressive the last time she’d been in police ‘custody’.

Emmie did also consider ringing Dawn at Progress Engineering, but, as distracted as Emmie felt, she remembered just in time how Barden Cunningham had specifically asked her at her interview if she had any commitments. She had an idea she was going to be in enough trouble when she did eventually reach her office without now confessing that she had lied at her interview.

Emmie was back on the road to her old home once more when it came to her that because of her lie about no commitments she would be unable to tell the truth. She suddenly realised she had no excuse to offer for her absence!

All that, however, went from her mind when, just as she reached their former apartment, she saw Aunt Hannah getting out of a delivery van. The van drove off. Emmie made it to the pavement just as Mrs Whitford was about to climb the steps to the front door.

‘Aunt Hannah!’ she called, loud enough for her to hear, but not enough to startle the old lady.

Aunt Hannah turned and, seeing Emmie, smiled. ‘Hello, dear. Not at work today? I waited ages for a bus, but that driver stopped and—’ She broke off, something of much greater importance occurring to her. ‘Do you know, he used to have a Norton 16H too?’

Emmie smiled; her relief at having found Hannah was enormous! The dear love was motorbike crazy, and, in her unconventional younger years, had owned several machines. ‘How are you?’ Emmie enquired, as a precursor to getting her in the car and driving her back to Keswick House.

‘Oh, very well. Mr Norton,’ she went on, making Emmie smile—the van driver and ex-motorbike owner was obviously Mr Norton!—‘was telling me about the National Motorcycle Museum in Birmingham. It’s open seven days a week,’ she hinted.

How could you not love her? Emmie smiled fondly. ‘We’ll go,’ she promised. ‘Not today,’ she added quickly, ‘but soon. It must be getting near to your lunchtime. Shall we go back to Keswick House?’

It was closer to twelve than eleven by the time Emmie had got Aunt Hannah cheerfully settled back at Keswick House, and nearer one than twelve when she made it to her office. She noted that Dawn wasn’t around when she went in, and stowed her bag, glad that the door between her office and the next one was closed.

It did not stay closed for long. Trust him to have heard her. Barden Cunningham pulled back the door and took a pace into the room, his glance becoming more and more hostile the longer he looked at her. She swallowed. Oh, crumbs, it looked like fire and brimstone time!

It was. He took a long breath, as if needing control, ‘Since you obviously haven’t been rushed to hospital to have your appendix removed,’ he began, silkily enough—it didn’t last. ‘Would you mind telling me,’ he went on toughly, ‘just where the hell you’ve been?’

‘I—er—had a domestic problem.’ Emmie found her voice, hoping he would think her central heating system had malfunctioned.

‘Don’t tell me you’ve broken the habit of a lifetime and let some man into your bed!’ he snarled, his idea of domesticity clearly on a very different plane from hers.

The cheek of it! ‘According to you, I don’t have an overnight life!’ Emmie flared, not at all enamoured by his snarling sarcastic tone, but striving hard not to let it get to her.