A Pretend Engagement

‘So when this Mrs Lloyd told Metcalfe she couldn’t come, he rang and asked you to come and help out?’ he asked, looking not taken in for a second.

‘That’s about it,’ Varnie answered. What on earth was she doing? While she wanted to stay on at Aldwyn House, no way did she want to stay here with him! And no way did she want to stay and, worse, work for the wretched man.

‘Thanks, but no thanks.’ He declined an offer that she was not altogether sure she had made anyway.

‘Why not?’ Why was she arguing? Johnny—must keep Johnny to the forefront of her mind. Part of being a sister meant looking out for one’s sibling—no matter how infuriating that sibling could be at times.

For a moment it did not look as though Leon Beaumont would deign to answer. Then, abruptly, ‘I don’t take favours,’ he said curtly.

Good! Johnny! Damn. ‘It’s you who’ll be doing me a favour,’ she said in a rush—Johnny Metcalfe, you owe me, big-time. ‘I’m out of a job and I’ve nowhere to live until I hear from my live-in job applications,’ she lied sorrowfully.

Leon Beaumont looked as if to say, Tough. Oh, how she’d delight in kicking him out. Did Johnny really, really want to keep his job? ‘You intend to “live-in”?’ Beaumont asked harshly. ‘You want to be a…’ he paused ‘…a “live-in” skivvy?’ he enquired deliberately.

Oh, to thump his head! ‘The nearest town is miles away,’ she controlled herself to explain.

‘You didn’t come here on your bike—there’s a car parked out there.’

Clearly this man did not miss much. She’d had it with him. I tried, Johnny, I tried. ‘So I’ll leave!’ she answered snappily—and with no little amazement. She had been going to throw this man out, for goodness’ sake, and here she was, saying that she was going to leave! Johnny, of course. A part of his job appeared to be to find this womanising swine a bolthole when his womanising backfired on him. Well, Johnny had been efficient—he had found him that bolthole—nobody was likely to find Beaumont here.

She sighed heavily, and was about to get out of there when she found that Leon Beaumont had misinterpreted the reason for her sigh. He thought she was sighing because she was homeless and had nowhere to go. She guessed it was that, but didn’t thank him for it when suddenly he seemed to relent in his tough stance.

But his tone was curt, nevertheless, when he stated abruptly, ‘You can stay and earn your keep—with certain conditions.’

Huh! Big of you! I own this place! Johnny? Always Johnny. She lowered her glance so Beaumont should not see the enmity in her eyes. ‘Anything you say,’ she answered meekly.

There was a moment of silence, as if he either didn’t care for her meekness or did not believe in it. But he was soon sharply itemising. ‘One, you tell anyone I’m here—just so much as a whispered hint—and you’re out. Got that?’

She knew he meant the press, if they came sniffing around. They must have been ‘doorstepping’ him to have got that picture of him decking Neville King. ‘You don’t want anyone to know you’re here?’ she asked innocently. ‘I saw a picture of you in the paper yesterday. Are you afraid of that woman’s husband…?’ She didn’t finish, and he didn’t bother to dignify her absurd question with an answer.

‘I want no company but my own,’ he told her forthrightly.

‘You’re off women too?’

‘In spades!’ he retorted, and she could see that he meant it. ‘Which leads me to the second condition. You stay out of my bedroom!’

Oh, the arrogance of it! How she managed to hold down some snappy comment she had no idea. But she did, to ask nicely, ‘You’ll manage to make your own bed?’

He gave her a speaking look. She waited to be hired or fired. ‘Get my breakfast!’ he ordered.

Get it yourself, sprang to mind. But by the look of it, whether she wanted it or not—and she did not—she had been hired. ‘Three bags full, sir,’ she retorted, her phoney meekness short-lived as, his instructions given, he strode out.

Varnie went to her grandfather’s pantry to see what, if anything, there might be there that would in any way do for his lordship’s breakfast.

As she had anticipated, unless he fancied canned mandarins followed by canned corned beef, there was nothing. She went to the drawing room, where she found her new and unwanted employer standing looking out of the window.

He was so not interested in her he did not even turn around. ‘I shall have to go to the shops,’ she announced bluntly.

He did turn then, favouring her with a brooding kind of look. ‘Get me a newspaper,’ he commanded, and, to her huge embarrassment, he took out his wallet, extracted some notes and, without a word, held them out to her.

She flushed scarlet. ‘I don’t want your money!’ she erupted indignantly.

He stared at her in some surprise—surprise not only at her high colour but at her genuine indignation too. He seemed about to make some comment about both, but changed his mind to tell her bluntly, ‘I don’t want you paying for my breakfast.’ And, ramming the money into her hand, ‘Bring receipts,’ he snarled, and, plainly fed up with her, left her standing there.

Varnie wondered if she would last the day without thumping him. Never had she met such a man. He could starve as far as she was concerned. But again her mutiny was squashed by thoughts of her dear—though not so dear at the moment—brother.

She knew then that she would do all she could not to, as it were, rock the boat for Johnny. She would, because he loved his job so well, and for once seemed settled in a career, try to put in a good word for him whenever she could. She would do a good job on his behalf too, as long as it lasted. She hoped it would not be for long. She looked at the money in her hands. Oh, grief, there was enough there to keep them in supplies for a month.

She felt better when common sense stirred to make her feel sure he had no intention of being away from his business for that long. She determined, however, that she would ask Beaumont just how long he was staying at her first opportunity.

Hoping that it would not be longer than for just a few days, she went upstairs to take a shower—it wouldn’t hurt him to wait a little longer for his breakfast.

She heard him on the phone in her grandfather’s study as she went by on her way out to her car. Darned cheek! Though, in fairness, she supposed that since he was probably expecting to pay rent for this hideaway accommodation that his assistant had ‘found’ for him, Beaumont assumed he was renting the whole house—and that included the study.

Varnie bought sufficient supplies to last a week, and took her purchases back to her car. She was loading up the boot while musing that her grandfather’s fridge-freezer would come in handy, when someone called her name.

She straightened up. ‘Varnie Sutton!’ exclaimed the wiry, fair-haired man standing there, a broad smile on his face.

‘Russell Adams!’ She smiled in return.

He caught a hold of her arms and bent and kissed her cheek. She had always liked Russell. He and his parents lived about a mile from Aldwyn House. He was the same age as Johnny, and they had spent some splendid childhood times together. Then he and Johnny had gone to university—Johnny had dropped out after a year—and they had seen less of Russell. She guessed it must be five years since she had last seen him.

‘I heard about your grandfather,’ Russell remarked. ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t come to his funeral to pay my respects. Working away,’ he explained, but added quickly, ‘Have you time for a coffee? We could catch up. Is Johnny with you?’

‘I really should…’ Get back, she would have said, only she suddenly felt quite happy to think of Beaumont back at Aldwyn House, waiting for his breakfast. ‘Of course I’ve time,’ she said brightly.

And over coffee she learned that Russell was now a qualified civil engineer whose work took him all over the place. He now lived in Caernarvon, but was here visiting his parents for a day or two. In the space of fifteen minutes Varnie learned that Russell was unmarried, but had once ‘come close,’ and that there was no one else he was interested in. Russell liked his job well enough, but sometimes fancied working at something different.

‘How’s Johnny doing? I expect he’s married and settled down?’

‘He’s still single,’ Varnie replied, hoping that he was settled, and realising that perhaps she should make more of an effort on his behalf. Perhaps try to get Leon Beaumont to see what a good assistant he had in her brother. Which reminded her—she’d better head back. This was no way to make sure Johnny kept his job. She had to be the best ‘skivvy’ going—this skivvy that Johnny had organised.

‘And how about you?’ Russell asked. ‘Still breaking hearts, Varnie? Or do you have someone special in your life?’

Still breaking hearts? She was sure she never had. Though as she thought about someone special in her life it was Leon Beaumont and his need for sustenance that occupied her. And it was with quite a start that she all at once realised that thoughts of the person who yesterday had been the someone special in her life had been astonishingly absent!

‘No one,’ she answered, hiding her astonished feelings. ‘But I think I’d better be going. It was lovely bumping into you ag—’

‘How long are you here for?’ Russell cut in.

‘I’m not really sure,’ she hedged, and stood up. She really should be getting back.

Russell walked to her car with her, suggesting that perhaps he might call and see her the next day. Varnie liked him very much, but was unsure of how she was going to cope being head cook and bottle-washer for Johnny’s employer. And in any event Beaumont, who didn’t want anyone to know where he was, would probably be furious should she have ‘gentleman callers’ turning up at his hideaway. Though hadn’t Russell said he was only here for a day or so?

‘I shall be pretty busy sorting out my grandfather’s affairs,’ Varnie invented, and kissed cheeks with Russell on parting. But she drove back to Aldwyn House still feeling very much shaken that, when she had believed she thought enough of Martin Walker to go on holiday with him he should, in less than twenty-four hours, barely figure in her thoughts!

Though when she considered the depths of his deception—he was a married man, for goodness’ sake, deceiving his wife, the mother of his children—Varnie began to feel less astonished that he had killed stone-dead her feeling for him. No wonder he did not figure largely in her thoughts. She knew then that she had not loved him as much as she had thought. She had been stunned, and that was natural enough. Had felt sick and half a dozen other emotions. But any feelings she had thought she’d for him had died the moment he had acknowledged that he was married, yet had still thought she might go away with him when he lyingly told her he was getting a divorce.

She had thought she would find living with the knowledge of his deceit exceedingly painful, but in actual fact the only thing that was smarting was her pride that she had been so gullible. How could she have been so unworldly as not to smell something fishy when the only times she’d seen him had been when he was Cheltenham way on business? And that had always been in the week. True, she had worked peculiar hours too. But really—and dim wasn’t the word for it—only now did the fact that in all the months she had known him never once had they both had a weekend free at the same time. Even one time when he was supposed to be free, and she’d managed to swap duties and arranged to see him, he had rung at the last minute to say that something had cropped up. Of course it had—his wife and children!

Varnie put him from her mind, realising that perhaps she had Leon Beaumont to thank that Martin Walker hadn’t spent the whole of that morning occupying her head. For goodness’ sake, it wasn’t every day that she strolled naked into some man’s bedroom! That was certainly enough to block off all thoughts of some other man. And that was without his overbearing attitude and all that followed. The arrogant…

Varnie calmed down. Johnny. She must keep that clever brother, but—as his father said—often without a grain of sense, to the forefront of her mind. He did not deserve her consideration after what he had done; how dared he hand over his key to her property and invite his boss to use the place as his own? But Johnny did so love his job, and wanted desperately to keep it, and he was her brother and, as her brother, the rights and wrongs of it just didn’t come into it.

That being so, Varnie decided she must make the best of a bad job. She did not want Beaumont in her house, but since, she reluctantly faced, she could not throw him out if Johnny was to keep his job, she would allow him to stay—and only hope it wouldn’t be for more than a day or so.

She pulled up her car to the side of the house and started to extract the groceries while at the same time deciding that, since it looked as though she was going to have to put up with him, she might as well be nice to Beaumont. No, not Beaumont—Leon.

He came into the kitchen just as she placed her first three carriers down on the kitchen table. ‘You took your time!’ he opened curtly.

She felt her hackles go on the incline. Be nice. Be nice. She smiled. ‘I met a friend. We had coffee,’ she replied pleasantly, and was about to add that she’d have brunch ready in next to no time when he butted in—a habit of his she had noticed and didn’t very much care for.

‘You know someone here?’ he questioned sharply.

She very nearly slipped up and said of course she did, that she had spent all her childhood holidays here. In time, she remembered. ‘I did tell you I’d been here before,’ she stated quietly.

‘With Metcalfe?’

‘Naturally. He—um—rented this place before.’

‘How well do you know him?’ Leon Beaumont was interested in knowing.

Oh, you’d be surprised. She toyed briefly with the idea of confessing that Johnny was her brother, her stepbrother, but only briefly. Her being here, skivvying, was her attempt to prove to Leon just how very efficient his assistant was. How, when Mrs Lloyd could not make it, his resourceful and worthwhile assistant had speedily found a replacement to cook and clean for him. Besides, this man didn’t take favours. No, she definitely could not tell him that his assistant was her brother. So, in answer to his question of how well she knew him, she had to settle for, ‘Very well.’

‘You and he are an item?’

‘No!’ she answered, more sharply than she’d meant.

‘You’ve slept with him?’ he questioned shortly.

‘Do I ask you whom you’ve slept with?’ she retaliated. The sauce of it!

‘So you have?’

A childhood memory—a sweet childhood memory—of her being very upset one time. A stray cat had been run over just outside. She had been horrified and dreadfully tearful. She had been awake in the night, sobbing, and Johnny had come from his room—he’d have been about eight at the time. ‘Don’t cry, Varnie,’ he’d begged, and had climbed into her bed and cuddled her better. They had both dropped off to sleep. Who could help but love him? She smiled at the fond memory. ‘Yes,’ she agreed, ‘I’ve slept with him.’

‘Obviously not a lasting experience,’ Leon Beaumont answered with a dismissive kind of a grunt—inferring, she felt, that his assistant had dumped her when he had grown tired of her.

‘Perhaps you’ll feel sweeter when you’ve got something in your stomach,’ she said nicely—lead shot came to mind.

He gave her a nasty look and wandered away, and in between stowing the shopping Varnie cooked him bacon, eggs and beans. In the hope that his arteries were clogging up, she added a piece of fried bread.

The meal was almost ready when she went to lay a place in the dining room. Beaumont came out of the study and saw her with the tray in her hands. ‘I’ll eat in the kitchen,’ he decided, and she was sure he only said it to be difficult. Still, if he wanted to eat with what he thought was the hired help, who was she to say he couldn’t?

She had thought the meal would be eaten with not a word being exchanged. But, sitting at one end of the scrubbed-top kitchen table, a cloth hastily thrown over it, he at the other end, she had barely cut into her bacon when to her surprise he enquired, ‘Where do you come from?’

Varnie popped a morsel of bacon in her mouth, and under cover of chewing it, and emptying her mouth before speaking, cogitated on her answer. Had Johnny, during the miles he had driven him around the country, told him anything at all about his family? Or had Beaumont been occupied with work the whole of the time?

‘Gloucestershire.’ She decided to risk it. Her brother had lived in London for some years now.

‘Where did you meet Metcalfe?’ he wanted to know.

‘He stayed at a hotel I worked at one time.’ And she’d thought she hated liars!

Though of course Johnny had stayed at the hotel. But why wouldn’t he? Their parents had owned it. Leon Beaumont opened his mouth to ask another question she was sure she wouldn’t want to answer either, but she butted in first. It made a change.

‘Talking of staying, how long were you thinking of staying on here?’ she asked, and felt herself go a touch pink. She saw his glance on her delicate colouring, saw his glance go to what had once been described as a very kissable mouth, and she hated him when he ignored her question and made an observation instead.

‘You’re looking guilty about something?’ he questioned grimly. ‘What have you done?’

‘Nothing!’ she denied hotly. ‘Honestly, you’re the most, most…’ she got stuck for a word ‘…most I’ve ever met!’ Oddly then, his lips twitched, as though she amused him. Though his smile never made it. Abruptly she dragged her eyes from his well-shaped mouth. ‘It was a quite innocent question,’ she defended. ‘I like to know where I am. If I have some idea of how long you intend to be here, then I’ll have some idea of what to do with regard to the catering arrangements.’ She was starting to feel a fool. ‘Just how long are you staying?’ she demanded. As if she expected an answer! She didn’t get one.

‘I’m on holiday,’ was as much as he revealed. And that annoyed her.

‘It’s November! Why can’t you holiday abroad like everybody else?’ she snapped, exasperated.

‘I’ve done the “abroad” bit,’ he answered, and while she was wondering what the penalty was for fratricide—she felt like murdering her brother—Beaumont went silkily on, ‘You’ve got something against my holidaying here?’

Who am I to complain? I’m only the skivvy! This was helping Johnny keep his job? ‘No, of course not,’ she swallowed her ire. ‘I feel very lucky that Johnny…’ Bother, she should have said John. Too late now. ‘Er—Johnny Metcalfe thought of me when he wanted emergency cover. It’s just that I should hate to let him down should a job offer come before your—um—holiday is over. Naturally I’d honour my contract with John Metcalfe first. He was insistent that I didn’t let you down…’ Oh, grief, was she laying on John Metcalfe’s efficient reliability too thickly? ‘There’s more bacon there if you’d like…’

‘You sound as if you’re fond of him, as if you’d do anything for him?’

Varnie had had quite enough of Beaumont’s observations. ‘Well, I’ve always found him to be a man of the highest integrity.’ She found she was spreading more on—grief, she was sounding like a talking reference.

‘You’re in love with him?’ Blunt, to the point.

‘No, I’m not!’ she denied, realising that perhaps she had been singing Johnny’s praises a little too highly. She tried for the middle ground. ‘He’s a very nice person, that’s all, and I’m very fond of him.’

‘But not in love with him?’

Varnie gave him an exasperated look. ‘I said not!’ she exploded. And, before she could stop herself, ‘And, contrary to your opinion that I might fancy you—I’m off men, quite severely, right now.’ And, with barely veiled innuendo, ‘In particular men to whom the state of marriage means nothing!’ There, pick the bones out of that!

He did. But to her further annoyance chose not to see her remarks as a dig at him for his disgraceful goings-on—that woman—what was her name?—Antonia King—was still living with her husband, for goodness’ sake. ‘Some man refused to marry you?’ Beaumont leaned back in his chair to enquire coolly.

Varnie sent him a filthy look for his trouble. She didn’t mean her! She meant him! ‘It didn’t get that far,’ she erupted. ‘I found out he was married!’ She looked away in disgust. Had she really openly just told Leon Beaumont that? For goodness’ sake! Okay, she accepted that to be a successful businessman probably meant having an investigative mind, an enquiring mind, a mind that determined to find out that which he did not know. But…

He proved it. ‘You dumped him?’

Honestly, this man! ‘Quicker than that!’ she snapped. And, having had quite sufficient of his company, thank you, she abruptly got to her feet. ‘If you’ve had enough to eat, I’ll wash these dishes,’ she said shortly.

He carried his own used dishes over to the sink, but wasn’t yet done with his questions, apparently. ‘This man, the one you had coffee with—is he the married one who…?’

‘I never said my friend was a man.’

Leon Beaumont looked loftily down at her. ‘You’re saying your friend was female?’

She felt a fool again. She did not like the feeling. ‘Do you give all your—your staff this—um—third degree?’ she questioned hostilely.

He smiled. He actually smiled. It did wonders for the mostly severe expression she was more used to. She wasn’t sure that her heartbeats did not give a little flip—utter nonsense, of course—but it did make her see, as Johnny had told her, why women fell for him like ninepins. Not her, of course. Heaven forbid.

‘Not all of them,’ he drawled. ‘But you’re so delightful to wind up.’

The pig! He was baiting her for his own amusement! While she admitted that there was not very much going on around here in the way of entertainment, she did not take kindly to the fact that he was amusing himself by getting her to rise—that she was the star turn! How she hid the fact that she would like to crack the plate in her hands over his head, she did not know.

‘Thanks a bunch!’ she told him huffily. ‘I’ll let you know when dinner’s ready.’

‘Your friend knows you’re here at Aldwyn House?’ he stayed to enquire, ignoring her hint that she hoped not to see him again before dinner.

‘I expect so,’ she answered carefully.

‘You didn’t say what you were doing here?’ Leon Beaumont’s tone had hardened, as he reminded her how much he wanted his whereabouts kept secret.

For about two seconds she played with the idea of saying that she had. Then thoughts of Johnny were there again. Perishing brothers! ‘No,’ she replied. ‘I didn’t think you’d like me to tell him.’

‘Are you having coffee with him again?’ he wanted to know, taking in his stride the information that her friend had been male, as he had thought.

She shook her head. ‘Russell is returning to his home in Caernarvon soon,’ she replied.

‘Good!’ Leon Beaumont grunted, and, taking up the newspaper from the top of one of the units, where she had put it, he went casually out from the kitchen.

Varnie did not mistake that that ‘Good!’ was anything other than good because it meant there was someone less for her to blab to about his whereabouts. The man did not care a jot how many men she had coffee with, that much was certain. His privacy was all that concerned him. She wouldn’t have it any other way.

CHAPTER THREE

SOMEHOW the weekend passed without Varnie putting rat poison in Leon Beaumont’s food. They were sparky with each other—she couldn’t always remember to be nice.

Well, who would? she thought mutinously on more than one occasion. He still did not seem totally convinced that she wasn’t there trying to make capital of the situation of them being under the same roof alone together. Huh!

She sat in front of her dressing table mirror on Monday morning and brushed her long blonde hair, then flipped it up into an elegant bun. She allowed her large sea-green eyes to study her dainty features and clear complexion, then took her eyes from the mirror to stare down at her well-kept hands and long fingers with their neat and equally well-kept nails. Then had to suppose that in all honesty she was not your general picture of an everyday ‘skivvy’.