Jill Mansell - Sheer Mischief

‘It isn’t over yet.’ Flustered, she resorted to feeble humour. ‘I’ve still got Maxine’s present to look forward to, haven’t I? If Josh’s brain says "Ouch", she’ll probably find one for me that yells "Dimwit".’

Guy, who was still wearing his dinner jacket, reached into the inner pocket and withdrew a small, green leather box.

‘Well, I can’t compete with a bouncing brain.’ As he took Janey’s hand and placed the box in her palm, his eyes silently dared her to object. ‘But at least this won’t hurl insults at you.’

Inside lay a slender rose-gold bangle engraved around the outer edge with delicately entwined leaves and flowers. It was old, simple and breathtakingly beautiful. Janey, who had never been more embarrassed in her entire life, said, ‘Oh for heaven’s sake, you don’t want to give me something like this.’

‘Don’t be silly. Call it making amends for giving you such a hard time tonight.’ Since she evidently had no intention of taking the bracelet out of the box, Guy did it himself and pushed it over her trembling hand.

‘But where ... who ... ?’

‘I spotted it in an antique shop in St Austell a few months ago,’ he lied. ‘I was going to give it to Serena, then I decided it wasn’t her style. You may as well have it,’ he added casually. ‘It’s no use to me.’

Janey flushed with pleasure. It was still embarrassing to be on the receiving end of such generosity but Guy clearly wouldn’t take it back. The engraved flowers were forget-me-nots, she realized, studying the bangle in more detail and loving the way it gleamed rather than glittered in the light, showing its age and quality.

‘Definitely not Serena’s style.’ She gave him a mischievous smile. ‘I’m glad you didn’t give it to her. I love it, Guy. Thank you.’

This time she reached up and kissed him, her warm lips brushing his cheek a decorous inch from his mouth just as he had done earlier. The same tingle of longing zipped through her. Janey, fantasizing wildly, wondered what Guy would do if she moved towards him ... moved her mouth to his.

The image flashed into her brain. ready-made, as if in answer. Pushy, eager Charlotte, throwing herself at Guy. Guy, good-humoured but resigned, wondering how the hell to fend her off without hurting her feelings. And Janey herself, hearing all about it, wondering how Charlotte could bear to make such an idiot of herself when he was so plainly uninterested.

No upturned bucket of ice-cold water could have shocked her to her senses more abruptly.

So much for wild fantasies, Janey decided, and prayed that Guy hadn’t been able to read her mind.

‘Thanks again for the bracelet.’ She took a hasty step backwards, pulling the scarf up over her chin once more and making a clumsy grab for the front door. ‘Gosh, it’s freezing outside!

Look at all those stars ... there’s even ice on your bird table ... poor old birds ...’

One stupid kiss on the cheek, Guy realized, shaking his head in disbelief, and she’d managed to give him a severe erection. Never mind the poor birds, he thought, watching Janey as she jumped into the van, anxious to get home to her undeserving pig of a husband. To hell with the wildlife. What about me?

Chapter 52

‘Janey, it’s me. Can you come over here right away?’

At the sound of her mother’s voice, Janey felt the muscles of her jaw automatically tighten.

Confiding her marital problems to Guy had been one thing, but she still considered Thea’s outburst in front of Alan to have been totally out of order. Even if she had been right, it was an unforgivable action.

They hadn’t spoken to each other since. And now here was Thea on the other end of the phone, expecting her to drop everything and rush over to see her. To add insult to injury, it was pouring with rain.

Squish, went the mister spray in Janey’s hand as she aimed it at a three-foot yucca plant.

‘I’m busy,’ she said, stretching past the yucca and giving the azaleas a shower. Squish, squish.

‘What do you want?’

‘I need to see you.’ Thea sounded quite unlike her usual self. ‘Please, Janey.’

Suspecting some kind of ulterior motive, Janey kept her own response guarded. ‘Why?’

‘Because Oliver is dead,’ said Thea quietly, and replaced the receiver.

* * *

He had died the previous evening, without warning, in her bed. Thea, having slipped out of the house at eight o’clock, had gone to the studio and worked for three hours on a new sculpture.

Returning finally with arms aching from the strenuous business of moulding the clay over the chicken-wire framework of the figure, and a glowing sense of achievement because it had all gone so well, she had climbed the stairs to her bedroom and found him. His reading glasses were beside him, resting on her empty pillow. The book he had been reading lay neatly closed on the floor next to the bed. It appeared, said the doctor who had come to the house, that Oliver had dozed off and suffered the stroke in his sleep. He wouldn’t have known a thing about it. All in all, the doctor explained in an attempt to comfort Thea, it was a marvellous way to go.

Thea, wrapped up in a cashmere sweater that still bore the scent of Oliver’s cologne, was huddled in the corner of the tatty, cushion-strewn sofa drinking a vast vodka-martini. There were still traces of dried clay in her hair and beneath her fingernails; her eyes, darker than ever with grief, were red-rimmed from crying.

Having left Paula in charge of the shop, and feeling horribly helpless, Janey helped herself to a vodka to keep her mother company. Their differences forgotten, because her own unhappiness paled into insignificance compared with Thea’s, Janey sat down and put her arms around her.

‘Bloody Oliver.’ Thea sniffed, continuing to gaze at the letter in her lap. ‘I keep thinking I could kill him for doing this to me. How could he keep this kind of thing to himself and not even warn me? Typical of the bloody man...’

She had found it in his wallet, neatly slotted in behind the credit cards. The plain white envelope bore her name. The contents of the letter inside had come as almost more of a shock than his death.

‘Are you sure you want me to read it?’ Janey frowned as her mother handed it to her. ‘Isn’t it private?’

‘Selfish bastard,’ Thea murmured, fishing up her sleeve for a crumpled handkerchief as the tears began to drop once more down her long nose. ‘Of course I want you to read it. How can any man be so selfish?’

Janey recognized the careful, elegant writing she’d noted on Oliver’s visit to her shop as she now read his farewell.

My darling Thea,

Well, if you’re reading this you’ve either been snooping shamelessly or I’m dead. But since I have faith in you, I shall assume the latter.

Now I suppose you’re as mad as hell with me for doing it this way because, yes, I knew it was going to happen in the not-too-distant future. My doctor warned me I was a walking time-bomb. And no, there was nothing that could be done either medically or surgically to prevent it happening. This time even money couldn’t help.

But think about it, sweetheart. Would you really have been happier, knowing the truth? I’m afraid I developed an all-consuming fear that you might try and persuade me to take things easy, maybe even not allowing me to make love to you as often as I liked for fear of overexerting myself What a deeply depressing prospect that would have been. Now perhaps you can begin to understand why I didn’t tell you!

Right, now for something you do already know. I love you, Thea. We may not have had a vast amount of time together but these last months have been the very happiest of my life. When I came to Cornwall, it was to see my grandchildren. How could I ever have guessed I would meet and fall so totally in love with a beautiful, bossy, wonderful woman who loved me in return? And for myself rather than for my money.