The Reluctant Tycoon. Emma Richmond

a face at him, she slung her muddy coat round her shoulders. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’

      Not if I see you first, hung in the air between them, and she gave a rueful smile. After opening the door, she returned for the tray. ‘I’ll take it back to the kitchen, shall I?’

      ‘It won’t do you any good.’

      ‘That wasn’t why I…Sorry, I tend to get a bit—’

      ‘Carried away?’ He was staring at her with an expression of such interested attentiveness that she laughed.

      ‘All right, I’m going.’ Don’t push your luck, Sorrel, she warned herself. Hastily escaping, she awkwardly closed the door behind her. She knew she did tend to get a bit carried away in other people’s houses, but then that was probably because she usually worked in other people’s houses. And he hadn’t forced her to take back the portfolio, so there was still hope, wasn’t there? Ever the optimist, smile still in place, she headed down the hall.

      Assuming that kitchens were normally at the rear of a property, she pushed open the door beneath the staircase, and came to an abrupt halt. The room looked like something from the Middle Ages, and the contrast with the hall was—well, astonishing.

      Mrs Davies was sitting at the long scrubbed table in the centre of the room. She looked as though she’d been crying. Putting down the tray, Sorrel asked gently, ‘Are you all right?’

      ‘Yes. No. I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing!’ the housekeeper exclaimed. ‘He doesn’t say! Mr Craddock, the last owner, was so—easy.’ Staring at Sorrel, she burst out, ‘I need this job. Clive’s out of work at present—my husband,’ she explained, ‘and although Mr Chevenay said I could stay on, I don’t know what he expects of me.’

      ‘Because he doesn’t say,’ Sorrel agreed sympathetically. ‘I’m sorry I got you into trouble.’

      ‘It wasn’t your fault, not really. Could you ask him?’ she pleaded. ‘What my duties are?’

      ‘Me?’ Sorrel exclaimed in astonishment. ‘But I don’t know him! I’m not really a friend…’

      ‘Please? If I Hoover, he asks me to stop; if I cook him meals, he doesn’t eat them. I don’t even know if I’m supposed to answer his phone! And now he wants me to redesign his kitchen! I know it’s a bit old-fashioned, but redesign it how?’

      ‘Get some magazines,’ Sorrel advised. ‘That’s what people normally do, isn’t it? Show him some pictures. And surely it will be better for you to work somewhere, well, modern?’

      ‘I suppose,’ Mrs Davies agreed gloomily. ‘If I’m here that long. I don’t think he even likes me. I’ve asked him and asked him to call me Davey, like Mr Craddock used to, but he won’t. Mrs Davies, he says. So—so polite!’

      With a little grin, and because Sorrel knew exactly what she meant and what it was like to have no job, no money, Sorrel agreed. ‘All right, I’ll ask him.’

      ‘Thank you,’ Mrs Davies said gratefully. ‘You must think me an absolute moron, but…I’m not usually like this,’ she confessed. ‘Or, I wasn’t. Perhaps it’s the menopause.’

      ‘Oh, dear,’ Sorrel murmured.

      ‘Yes. I keep getting hot.’ Mrs Davies sighed. ‘And he makes me so flustered. He’s so—well, angry-looking, isn’t he?’

      Was he? Yes, Sorrel supposed he was.

      ‘And his voice is so…’

      ‘Derogatory?’ Sorrel offered, tongue in cheek.

      ‘Yes, as though he doesn’t have a very high opinion of anyone.’

      ‘Perhaps he doesn’t,’ Sorrel murmured. It was something she could well believe.

      ‘He makes me feel stupid,’ Mrs Davies continued, ‘and although I’m not very clever I can cook and clean and everything. I worked for Mr Craddock without any trouble. I wish he hadn’t left.’

      ‘Well, look on it as a challenge,’ Sorrel said bracingly. ‘You’ll soon get used to him, I’m su—’

      ‘And now, with the reporters and everything,’ Mrs Davies continued, as though she hadn’t heard, ‘I just don’t know what to do.’

      ‘The reporters?’

      ‘Yes. They all seem to hate him.’

      Astonished, Sorrel just stared at her. ‘Why on earth would they hate him?’

      ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Mrs Davies said wearily. Getting to her feet, she carried the tray over to the sink.

      Staring at the housekeeper’s bent back, Sorrel asked hesitantly, ‘Is he famous?’

      ‘Famous? I don’t know. All I do know is that every time I go out I fall over the reporters clustering at the gate. I’m not allowed to talk to them,’ she added crossly, as though that were yet another bone of contention between them.

      About to ask for clarification, Sorrel suddenly caught sight of herself in the mirror above the sink. Diverted, she stared at her image in astonishment. ‘Good grief,’ she whispered. ‘I didn’t know I looked that bad.’ Her face was filthy! And her hair, still tucked into the neck of her sweater, was liberally decorated with mud and grass. Untucking her hair and brushing off the worst of the debris, she scrabbled in her pocket for a tissue. Peering into the mirror, she began to clean herself up. ‘Not perfect,’ she sighed, ‘but better than it was. Oh, well.’ With a crooked smile at Mrs Davies and a little shake of her head, she walked across to the door. ‘I’d better be off.’

      ‘You won’t forget to ask—’ Mrs Davies began urgently.

      ‘No, no, don’t worry.’

      ‘Now?’ she asked hopefully.

      ‘Now?’ Sorrel queried in alarm. She didn’t think now was a very good idea.

      ‘Please?’

      Too soft-hearted by far, Sorrel reluctantly agreed. ‘Oh, OK, but I can’t promise anything.’

      Walking back to the study, she gave a brave little tap on the door, and quickly put her head inside. ‘Sorry to interrupt,’ she began.

      He looked up from her open portfolio, which he’d obviously been perusing, and asked derisively, ‘Back again so soon, Miss James?’

      ‘Mmm,’ she agreed ruefully. ‘There was just one thing…’

      ‘I thought there might be.’

      She widened her eyes at him. ‘You’re barking up the wrong tree,’ she told him softly. ‘It’s about Mrs Davies. You seem to have frightened the poor woman to death. Not intentionally, I’m sure,’ she added quickly. ‘But if you could just tell her what her duties are, when she’s to Hoover, cook, etc…’

      ‘Thank you,’ he said without inflexion. ‘I’ll be sure to do so.’

      ‘Good.’ With a little grin, she added reprovingly, ‘And you might have told me I had a muddy face.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Why?’ she exclaimed. ‘Because…’

      ‘Go away,’ he ordered softly.

      Grin widening, she put her coat more securely round her shoulders and walked out. She closed the door very softly behind her. And then she laughed. ‘Yes!’ she whispered with a little clenched fist. If he’d been looking at her work then he wasn’t totally disinterested, was he? And if she didn’t get the job, well, she was still rather glad she’d come. She’d really rather liked him. And it would be someone to dream about, wouldn’t it?

      Staring at the closed door, Garde gave a brief grunt of laughter. This procession of ‘wannabes’