Page 54 of A Colourful Country Escape
‘Telling women your mum chose your colour scheme is no more impressive. And you’ll have to ask her to stop ordering funeral flowers for the place too, if you’re hoping to move a wife in. And maybe start buying your own underpants.’
‘She does not buy my underwear! Anyway, I’m more concerned about her choice of wife. She’s on my back again about going out with Cynthia since I shunned Amanda and turned my nose up at her other finalists.’
‘Oh, the Fortescue woman? So what’s wrong with … ?’
‘No bloody way. Too much history.’ He shuddered. ‘As for Mother selecting the colour scheme, I’m just a bloke. If she elects to kit the place out in shades of bland, I let her get on with it. Anyway, it’s still her property, so if she wants to paint it black and turn it into a hovel for devil worship there’s not much I can do.’
‘Or, you know, you could just move out, like normal people.’
He took a gulp of his Singapore sling. ‘That wood-panelled office is where the magic happens. If I’m not sure of the way forward, it’s like Dad is in there, channelling the answers through the woodwork.’
‘And your ancestors in the creepy horsey paintings.’
Ben scoffed.
‘Maybe your new wife will inspire you and you won’t need your dad’s guidance any more.’
He looked like he was mulling it over. ‘Tom and Mrs M would be redundant without me and Cory. Mum would turf them out on their ears and trade them in for fancy new ones, given half the chance. Or just sell the place.’
‘You really are a home bird, aren’t you?’
He shrugged. ‘That house and the business are under my skin, or maybe even part of it. They’re surely all I need.’
‘And a loaded wife to secure it with.’
Ben pulled a face. ‘I’ll have to stick her in a granny annex like Mrs Moon if she ends up annoying me as much as Mum annoyed Dad. To death.’ The last two words were more of a whisper.
Would there ever be a good time to ask what all that was about? No. There were more pressing issues.
‘Ben, you can’t live like that for ever. No love, just money, work and a wife you’ve confined to an outhouse. You’d end up old and bored.’
‘Yep. I’m just boring Ben.’
She could tell he was trying to be nonchalant, but it wasn’t quite working. Did thisboringthing go deeper than her jokes about the beige?
‘Anyway, maybe I’ll speak to her about those ghostly white flowers.’ His voice was more upbeat again, thank God. ‘I think they remind her of Dad. I’m working on her, but I haven’t got the heart to tear out her roots entirely. She does have a soul in there somewhere, beneath the rhino skin and layers of woolly Chanel.’
Lexie giggled. In fact, these cocktails were making her feel far too giggly. She hoped she wouldn’t be staggering all over the place when they came to leave.
‘What about you, anyway? You’re always wittering on about the importance of this so-calledlove, but I don’t see you out there looking for your own perfect match.’
She waved a hand. ‘I’m off men. They’re a bloody nightmare. The guys I choose always seem to be selfish dicks who are motivated by pound signs.’ She thought of Drew tossing her aside for thoroughbred Tabby, and Inkie being so keen to make a fast buck he could have landed her in a prison jumpsuit. Maybe there was something to be said for Sky’s money-free world. God, she really must be tipsy.
‘And if you were on them?’
She rewound their conversation, everything starting to feel hazy. On what? Pound signs? Dicks? She tittered into her cocktail. No. Sensible Ben did not mean dicks.
‘Men,’ he clarified, as though noticing her thoughts were in a tangle. He waved at the barman for a jug of water. ‘If you wereon men, in a purely hypothetical and non-physical way, who would you see as your perfect match?’
She pointed a wavering finger at him. He raised his eyebrows further.
‘Yoooooou, Mr Carrington … ’
‘Me?’ He looked surprised.
‘No, notyou, you. I mean yoooou must learn to behave yourself. I’m the social butterfly around here. Don’t you go worrying your pretty face about me.’ Did she just call him pretty? Hell, but he was though. Well, manly pretty.Hot.
He leaned over the bar and grabbed a pencil, ready to write on his serviette. ‘Maybe I’ll have to find you someone. Now, tell me about yourself. Favourite fruit? And don’t you dare say apples.’
