Sara Craven - Escape Me Never

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Former journalist SARA CRAVENpublished her first novel ‘Garden of Dreams’ for Mills & Boon in 1975. Apart from her writing (naturally!) her passions include reading, bridge, Italian cities, Greek islands, the French language and countryside, and her rescue Jack Russell/cross Button. She has appeared on several TV quiz shows and in 1997 became UK TV Mastermind champion. She lives near her family in Warwickshire – Shakespeare country.

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TITLE PAGE Escape Me Never Sara Craven www.millsandboon.co.uk

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Former journalist SARA CRAVEN published her first novel ‘Garden of Dreams’ for Mills & Boon in 1975. Apart from her writing (naturally!) her passions include reading, bridge, Italian cities, Greek islands, the French language and countryside, and her rescue Jack Russell/cross Button. She has appeared on several TV quiz shows and in 1997 became UK TV Mastermind champion. She lives near her family in Warwickshire – Shakespeare country.

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

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COPYRIGHT

IT had begun to rain. Cassie felt the first icy drops, as she waited on the edge of the pavement, and grimaced inwardly with irritation. She’d left the flat so hurriedly that morning that she’d failed to bring either an umbrella or even a scarf, and a heavy shower on her newly washed, carefully blow-dried and disciplined hair was likely to restore it to its usual riot of tumbling waves.

Clearly, it was going to be one of those days. Her radio alarm had gone off early, tempting her to the luxury of ‘just a few more minutes’, with the result that she’d fallen deeply asleep again.

And Jodie, usually the most amenable of children, had suddenly exhibited disturbing signs of a reversion to the panicky, hysterical tempers of a few years previously.

‘You haven’t forgotten it’s open afternoon at school, Mummy,’ she said, as Cassie dashed between toaster and kettle. ‘Miss Willard asked specially if you were going to be there.’

Cassie concealed her dismay at the reminder. Yes, it had slipped her mind, like so many other things did these days, she thought glumly, resentment rising within her at Jodie’s reference to her headmistress. Her school was well-run, and briskly geared to learning, but Miss Willard whose old-fashioned values oiled the wheels, had what amounted to an obsession with working mothers, holding them, Cassie often thought, responsible for most of the ills plaguing modern society.

And the fact that Cassie was a widow and needed to support herself and her child apparently made no difference to her views. She had never made the slightest allowance for women who worked, scheduling most school functions during normal job hours, and taking careful note, Cassie thought ruefully, of those who coped with awkwardness and inconvenience to be there. It was moral blackmail, and although Cassie, and others in the same boat as herself might grumble at it, none of them would have dreamed of removing their children from the school itself.

Now, with Jodie, Cassie sought to temporise. ‘I’ll try, darling,’ she promised. ‘But it’s a very big day at the office. But Mrs Barrett will be there,’ she added reassuringly.

Besides the stability of school, Mrs Barrett was the other blessing in their lives. A comfortable, motherly soul whose family had grown up, and who was happy to fill in the years before one of her own brood made her a grandmother by looking after Jodie on a more or less full-time basis.

It couldn’t have been more convenient. She lived in the flat below, and took Jodie to school each morning, as well as bringing her home in the afternoons, giving her tea, and playing with her until Cassie arrived home. She was well-paid, of course, but she never treated Jodie as if she was a source of income.

Now, to Cassie’s horror, she saw her daughter’s lip bulge ominously. ‘I don’t want Mrs Barrett,’ she said tremulously. ‘I want you to be there like the other mummies. You didn’t come to the carol concert, and I was the only one in our class,’ she added, her voice rising perilously.

She was beginning to stiffen. Cassie, biting her lip, knelt beside her, putting her arms round the rigid little body. ‘Sweetheart,’ she said gently. ‘It isn’t that easy. We’ve discussed all this before. I have to work to earn money for us to live on, you know that.’

‘We could have a Daddy to do that,’ Jodie said sullenly. ‘Proper families have daddies.’ And her eyes met Cassie’s, suddenly, shockingly Brett’s eyes.

Cassie bit her lip hard. Thank you, Miss Willard, she thought grimly. The school had a lot to its credit, but on the debit side was this constant reinforcement of the traditional stereotyped roles for the sexes, the insistence of the nuclear family as the norm, isolating those children whose lives did not conform to the cosy pattern. Making them aware that they were somehow different.

She had never felt less humorous in her life, but she tried to make a joke of it. ‘Well, daddies don’t grow on trees, I’m afraid, and neither does money.’ She got up. ‘I’ll do my very best to be there this afternoon. What time does it start—three o’clock, as usual?’

Jodie nodded slowly, her eyes wide and anxious fixed on her mother’s face, but that alarming stiffness was beginning to subside. And in a way, Cass thought, it might even be a hopeful sign, after all that had happened, that she could talk about fathers, although in general terms. It was one of those moments she ought to pursue, to build on, and she knew it both for Jodie’s sake and her own, and for a moment she was tempted to ’phone in to the office and tell them she wouldn’t be in.

But she couldn’t do it, she told herself reluctantly. Today was too important for the agency. They hadn’t exactly been in the doldrums recently, but the Eve cosmetics account would be a magnificent boost—a real feather in their caps if its board liked the advertising campaign they had designed, and which would get its initial presentation that morning.

There shouldn’t be any snags. The ideas were there, and they were good. Even Barney, their boss, thought so. Now, all they had to do was sell it to the clients. That, thankfully, wasn’t her job. Roger was always the front man on these occasions, enthusiastic, persuasive, a born salesman. They made a good team.

And if they secured the Eve cosmetics account, there’d been broad hints that other goodies from Grant International might be coming their way. The sky, in fact, was the limit.

If things went well, it could all be over by lunchtime, she told herself optimistically. And Roger would let her leave early. In the general euphoria, Barney might not even notice her absence. In his way, he was a male Miss Willard, also prepared to make no concessions, as he’d warned Cass when he hired her.

‘Women with small children are generally bad news,’ he’d told her brusquely. ‘Here,—er Ms Linton—the job comes first.’ He gave her a faint glare. ‘Not measles, or half term, or whatever. I don’t want there to be any misunderstanding. There’ll be no special favours.’

Well, there hadn’t been, nor had she ever asked for any. But in spite of Mrs Barrett’s unfailing willingness to be her substitute, Cass had not always found it easy.