The Australian Affairs Collection. Margaret Way

I thought this was your first visit to Australia.’

      ‘Not at all,’ he said. ‘I’ve spent a lot of time here. Well, in New South Wales, at least. My parents are divorced, you see. You already know my father’s American, but my mother’s Australian. She owns the apartment in Blue Bay. I actually went to boarding school in Sydney. That’s where I met Andy—he’s the one who’s getting married.’

      ‘Goodness!’ she exclaimed. ‘I had no idea.’

      ‘Well, why would you?’ he said, sounding puzzled.

      Jess suppressed a groan. As the saying went, oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practise to deceive.

      It actually went against Jess’s grain to be less than honest with people. But her intentions had been good. Hopefully, Ben wouldn’t be too annoyed with her if she told him the truth. She really didn’t want to drive all the way to Mudgee watching what she said and didn’t say. And, yes, she supposed she did still hope to discuss the future of Fab Fashions with him. He seemed very approachable and a lot smarter than she’d given him credit for. But that didn’t make the act of confessing any easier.

      ‘Oh gosh, this is just so awkward. I suppose I simply have to tell you now. I…I just hope you won’t be too annoyed.’

       CHAPTER FOUR

      BEN HAD NO IDEA what she was talking about. ‘Tell me what?’ he asked.

      ‘The thing is, Ben…’ she started, obviously with great reluctance.

      ‘Yes?’ he prompted when she didn’t go on.

      She pulled a face. ‘I just hope you understand.’

      ‘Understand what?’ he demanded to know.

      ‘Just wait, will you, till we’re safely on the motorway?’

      Jess turned right onto the ramp which took them down to the highway, heading north.

      ‘I have a confession to make,’ she said at last, then hesitated again.

      ‘Go on,’ Ben said with more patience than he was feeling.

      ‘The thing is… I knew who you were yesterday on the phone once you said you were Benjamin De Silva.’

      Ben tried to assimilate what Jess was actually saying, but failed.

      ‘What exactly do you mean by who I was?’

      ‘I mean, I knew you worked for De Silva & Associates and that you were Morgan De Silva’s son.’

      Ben could not have been more taken aback.

      ‘And how come you knew that?’ he said, sounding more confused than angry. ‘I wouldn’t have thought my father was all that well known in Australia. He keeps a low public profile. Same with myself.’

      Her sigh was heavy. ‘You might understand better if I tell you I used to have a part-time job at a Fab Fashions boutique in Westfield’s till last weekend, when the manager had to let me go.’

      ‘Ah,’ Ben said, light dawning. Though what she was doing working part-time in a fashion boutique at all was a mystery. She’d said she was a mechanic, hadn’t she? And an advanced driving instructor.

      There was no doubt that Jess was a surprising girl in more ways than one. You could have knocked him over with a feather when she’d turned up, looking nothing like the middle-aged battle-axe he’d been envisaging. Not only was she young—surely no more than mid-to late-twenties—she was also hot looking. Normally he went for blondes, not brunettes. But he found Jess quite delicious with her full lips, flashing dark eyes and seriously great legs. She also had an engaging and rather amusing personality. That boyfriend had been a fool, letting her go.

      ‘Yes, ah…’ Jess said somewhat sheepishly. ‘I asked Helen…she’s the manager…what the problem was and she told me about this American company taking over Fab Fashions and threatening them with closure if they didn’t make a profit before the end of the year. I was so mad I found out what your name was and looked you up on the Internet. Not that I found out much about you,’ she added hastily. ‘Mostly it was about your father and the company he founded. Anyway, when an American chap rang yesterday and told me his name was Benjamin De Silva, I nearly fell off my chair.’

      Ben didn’t doubt it.

      ‘So why on earth did you agree to drive me anywhere?’ he asked her. ‘I would have thought you would have told me to drop dead.’

      ‘Good heavens, no. What would have been the point of that? Look, the truth is that I had this crazy idea that during our long drive out to Mudgee I could somehow bring Fab Fashions into the conversation. I imagined you’d be surprised at the coincidence that I’d once worked for them but that you wouldn’t be suspicious. I’d then tell you what I thought could be done to make Fab Fashions more profitable. I know that sounds terribly arrogant of me but I do know fashion. It’s a lifelong passion with me. My grandmother was a professional seamstress and she taught me everything she knew. I’ve also done a design course online and I make a lot of my own clothes.’

      ‘I see,’ Ben said slowly. She was serious, he realised, but truly there was probably no saving Fab Fashions. Retail was in a terrible shape worldwide. He’d only given them till the end of the year because he hadn’t wanted to play Scrooge. His father had wanted him to shut them down straight away, having bought them only because it came as a package deal along with other companies which had much better prospects and assets.

      But Ben wasn’t about to tell Jess that. Not yet, anyway.

      ‘So why did you look so surprised when we first met today?’ he asked, trying to get the full picture.

      Jess frowned.

      ‘You did stare at me, Jess,’ he went on when she didn’t say anything.

      ‘Yes… Yes, I did, didn’t I?’ she said, seeming a little flustered. ‘The thing is…there was a photo of your father on the Internet and…well…you don’t look much like him, do you?’

      Ben had to smile. She really didn’t have a tactful bone in her body. Or maybe he meant artful. Yes, that was it. Jess was not, by nature, a deceiver. She was open and honest. He suddenly wished that something could be done with Fab Fashions, just to please her.

      ‘No,’ he agreed. ‘I take after my mother.’

      ‘She must be very beautiful.’

      Ben suppressed another smile with difficulty. Lord, but she was quite enchanting. And totally ingenuous in her honesty. She wasn’t trying to flatter him, or flirt with him. Which was a change. It was years since Ben had encountered a girl who did neither in his company.

      ‘Mum was very beautiful when my father married her,’ he said. ‘She still is, despite being over sixty. She was quite a famous model in her time. But that came to an end when she married Dad. After their divorce, she came back to Sydney and started up a modelling agency. Did very well too. Sold it for heaps a couple of years back. But perhaps you already knew all that, did you? From the Internet?’

      ‘Heavens, no. The only personal information was that your father was divorced with one son, Benjamin. The article was all about business. It didn’t say a word about your mother.’

      Ben imagined that was his father’s doing. He was a powerful man and still very bitter about the divorce. He rarely spoke of his ex-wife, which made his parting words on the phone last night extremely surprising.

       Give my regards to your mother…

      Odd, that.

      ‘Ben, I’m really very sorry for prying into your life like that,’ Jess suddenly blurted out, perhaps interpreting his thoughtful silence for annoyance. ‘I realised as soon as I met you that I shouldn’t