Marion Lennox - In Bed with Her Ex - Miss Prim and the Billionaire / Mardie and the City Surgeon / The Boy is Back in Town

‘How could you? I must admit that I did hope for a while, but in the end I realised you’d accepted our parting and that was the end. So I married him.’

‘You married him?’

‘Why not? I felt my life was over. I just went with the tide. When I found he’d been fooling around with other women it gave me the weapon I needed to divorce him. Suddenly I wasn’t afraid of him any more. I accepted some money from him because I had people who needed it, but I didn’t keep any for myself. I didn’t want anything from him, even his name. I used Henshaw because it was my mother’s maiden name.’

‘What’s happened to him since? Does he trouble you?’

‘He’s in jail at the moment, for several years, hopefully. I told you how I took business courses after that, and started on the life I live now.’ She raised her wine bottle to the moon. ‘Independence every time. Cheers!’

‘Independence or isolation?’ he asked.

She shrugged. ‘Does it matter? Either way, it’s better to rely on yourself.’

He sighed. ‘I guess so.’

He was glad she couldn’t see his face, lest his thoughts showed. He was remembering one night, a lifetime ago, when she’d endured a bad day at work and thrown herself into his arms.

‘What would I do without you?’ she’d sighed. ‘That rotten photographer—goodness, but he’s nasty! Never mind. I can put up with anything as long as I know I have you—’

‘And you’ll always have me,’ he’d assured her.

Three weeks later, the disaster had separated them.

‘Better rely on yourself,’ he repeated, ‘rather than on a fool who thought it was funny to conceal his real background, and plunged you both into tragedy.’

‘Hey, I wasn’t getting at you. Nobody knows what’s just around the corner.’ She laughed. ‘After all, we never saw this coming, did we?’

‘And you’d have run a mile if you’d known. I remember you saying so.’ He waited for her answer. It didn’t come. ‘How long ago since your divorce?’ he asked.

‘About five years. Since then I’ve been Mrs Henshaw, bestriding the financial world. It suits me. Remember you used to joke about my having a great brain?’

‘It wasn’t entirely a joke. I think I was a bit jealous of the way you could read something once and remember it like it was set in stone.’

‘There now, I told you I was made to be a businesswoman.’

‘But that’s not your only talent. Why didn’t you go back to modelling? You’re still beautiful.’

‘Not really.’

‘I say you are,’ he said fiercely.

‘I won’t argue about it. But it takes more than beauty and I’ve lost something special. I know that. I knew it then. I’d look in the mirror and see that a light had gone out inside me. Besides,’ she hurried on before he could protest, ‘I wanted to try something new. It was my choice. Life moves on, we don’t stay in the same place.

‘Cassie was one person. Mrs Henshaw is another. I became quite pleased with her. She takes people by surprise. Some of them are even scared of her.’

‘And you like people being scared of you?’

‘Not all the time, but it has its uses. She’s a bright lady is Mrs Henshaw. Lots of common sense.’

‘Now you’re scaring me.’

‘Good.’

‘So I’ve got to get used to Mrs Henshaw hanging around, when the one I want is Cassie?’

‘I’m not sure that’s a wise choice. Mrs Henshaw has to get that hotel set up. You need her expertise, her “great brain”. Cassie wouldn’t be up to the job.’

She managed to say it in a teasing tone, and he managed a smile in reply. But they both knew that she was conveying a subtle warning.

Go slowly. Don’t rush it. A false step could mean disaster.

‘I think we should go back now,’ she said.

She rose and offered him her hand. He hesitated only a moment before nodding and taking it. In this way, with him following her lead, they strolled back to the hotel.

SHE slept alone that night. Marcel kissed her at the door, touched her face with his fingertips and hurried away. She smiled at his retreating figure, glad that he had the sensitivity not to try to overwhelm her with passion at this moment.

After everything that had happened, all the unexpected revelations, the business of deciding her appearance next morning was a minefield. In the end she selected clothes that were respectable rather than forbidding, and wore her hair drawn back, but not scraped tightly, so that it framed her face softly before vanishing over her shoulders.

When she entered the office he was deep in a phone call, his manner agitated. He waved for her to come in, then turned away. He was talking French but she managed to make out that he was about to go away. The idea didn’t seem to please him, for he slammed down the phone and snapped, ‘Imbécile!

Idiot!’

‘Somebody let you down?’ she asked.

‘Yes, he’s made a mess of a deal I trusted to him, and now I have to go and rescue it. It’ll take a few days. Come here!’ He hugged her fiercely. ‘I don’t want to leave you. You should come with me and—’

‘No,’ she said firmly. ‘I’d be a distraction and you’ve got to keep your mind on business.’

‘I’d planned such a day for us. I was going to take you over Paris—’

‘Paris will still be here when you get back.’ She added significantly, ‘And so will I.’

His brow darkened. ‘Your word of honour?’

‘I told you, I have no reason to leave now.’

Reluctantly he departed, giving her one last anxious look from the door. She saw him go with regret, yet also with a faint twinge of relief. His possessiveness was like a reproach to her. She couldn’t blame him for it, but she sensed that it could be a problem, one to which he was blind.

Knowing herself better than Marcel could, she sensed that Mrs Henshaw was more than just an outward change. Her businesslike appearance really did represent a certain reality inside. For the moment Cassie and Mrs Henshaw must live side by side, each one taking the spotlight according to need. But which one of them would finally emerge as her true self? Even she could not be certain about that.

She’d hinted as much to Marcel the previous evening, but she knew he didn’t really understand. Or perhaps didn’t want to understand. That was the thought that made her a little uneasy.

For the next few days she was Mrs Henshaw, deep in business and thoroughly enjoying herself. Vera introduced her to the chief members of the staff, who had clearly been instructed to cooperate with her. She went through the books and knew she was impressing them with her knowledge of finance.

Then there were the builders who had renovated and extended La Couronne, and who spoke to her at Marcel’s command. The more she listened, the more she understood what he’d been trying to do, how well he’d succeeded, and what he wanted in London. Ideas began to flower inside her. She would have much to tell him when he returned on Thursday.

He called her several times a day on the hotel’s landline. Wryly she realised that in this way he could check that she was there. Just once he called her cellphone, and that was when she was out shopping. He managed to sound cheerful but she sensed the underlying tension, especially when he said, ‘Don’t be long getting back to the hotel. There’s a lot to do.’

‘I’m on my way back now,’ she assured him.

Vera greeted her in a flurry of nerves. ‘He was very upset when he called and found you not here,’ she said.

‘Don’t worry; he tried my cellphone and I answered at once.’ She added reassuringly, ‘So when he calls, you can tell him that I’m not slacking on the job.’