Page 34 of The Importance of Being Emma
He gave an unpleasant laugh. ‘Harriet? You’re mad, what would someone like me see in Harriet? Oh, I’m sure she’d be good for a quick shag, but why would I bother with her when you’re giving me all the encouragement I need?’
‘Encouragement?’ I said, hotly. ‘You’re the one that’s mad, I’ve never given youanyencouragement, except where Harriet’s concerned.’
‘You mean pretending those flowers I gave you were for her? I thought that was all part of your little game.’ His lip curled. ‘Most of the time you understood me perfectly, I bloody well know you did.’
‘Oh yes? Like when?’
‘The Board meeting, when I said that you had beauty, class and brains and that you were my real-life inspiration for Victoria’s Secret Recipes.’
‘But you never actually said who you were talking about, so I—’
He interrupted me, grim-faced. ‘And when we were looking at those photos of your sister’s family, and you said there were no couples involved in the photo shoot, and I said not yet — you behaved as if you knew I meant you and me. Andthen, when I told you that my idea for the strapline had the name of my ideal woman in it, you said it was glaringly obvious to you!’
‘It was,’ I said, coldly. ‘Harriet’s Secret Recipes.’
‘For fuck’s sake, only Harriet would think it was somethingthatobvious. I meant “Emma-ncipated” — the way I said it was a big enough clue, surely!’
I sat in silence, twisting my hands in my lap. What a fool I’d been, what a blind, self-opinionated fool. And now here I was, alone in a deserted place with a man I knew very little about —and even less than I thought I did — whose advances I’d just rejected. What if things got — out of control?
I took a deep breath. ‘Look, Philip, I’m not interested in you and I’m really sorry if you got the impression I was. Please take me home — now, before the others find out I’m not back.’
There was a nerve-racking pause. Then he yanked his seat belt on, bullied the engine into life and reversed the car, at speed, all the way back to the turning he’d supposedly missed. Once again, he drove fast and in silence; but this time he kept his eyes on the road and I made no attempt at conversation. I was trembling, both with relief that he was taking me home and with fear that we wouldn’t get there in one piece. Only when he stopped the car outside Hartfield, in a squeal of brakes, did I relax.
I forced myself to look at him. ‘Let’s be sensible about this, Philip. We’ve both made a mistake, but I hope we can still work together in a professional way. I won’t breathe a word about this to anyone and I’ll make sure Harriet sees you as nothing more than a work colleague from now on.’
‘Great,’ he said, glowering at the windscreen.
Getting out of the car in my long tight skirt was tricky. Needless to say, the attentive Philip who’d helped me into it was nowhere to be seen; I’d barely shut the passenger door when he drove off, tyres screeching. I stayed outside for a few minutes, taking big gulps of the fresh night air, fighting back tears, cursing my stupidity.
I’d completely misjudged Philip Elton. When it came to women, he wanted the ‘safe and lucrative’ option — exactly as Know-it-all Knightley had predicted.
Chapter Five
~~MARK~~
Since Sunday morning was dry and sunny, and the autumn colours at their best, I decided I’d walk to Randalls to have a look at the car.
Tamara opted for a lie-in, especially when she heard where I was going. She’d been less than impressed by the Westons’ dinner party, dismissing Mary, Mrs Bates and Henry as ‘a bunch of old women, especially Henry’, Tom, Kate, John and Izzy as ‘too boring for words’, Philip as ‘a waste of space’ and Emma as ‘quite the surprise package’. When I probed a little further into this last comment, she said she’d imagined Emma to be more like her nickname and refused to say more.
As I strode along the bridleway, I realised how good it felt to be on my own. With Tamara’s frequent demands, the last few days had been a bit of a strain . . .
Ahead of me, a twig snapped. A small boy came hurtling along the path and skidded into my legs. My nephew, Mark.
‘Up!’ he said, with the supreme confidence of a three-year-old.
I grinned down at him. ‘Hello to you, too. Who are you out with on such a beautiful morning?’
He pointed to a woman in red trousers some distance behind him; as she approached, I saw that it was Emma, with Emily in the backpack. Her trousers were tight-fitting, leaving little to the imagination. A bit like that skirt she’d worn to the Westons’ . . .
‘Up!’ Mark said again. ‘Please.’
I switched my thoughts firmly away from last night. ‘OK then, one — two — three.’ I swung him onto my shoulders and he clapped his hands in delight.
‘Aunty Emma, look, I’m the king of the castle!’
‘And who’s the dirty rascal?’ she said, as she reached us.
‘Uncle Mark.’
