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‘Nah, doll. Don’t wanna be a third wheel.’ She went to the door. ‘If you ever need anything, just come through to the main house, okay? James will give you my number.’ She turned to him. ‘Won’t you, babe?’
He didn’t reply. The dam holding his personal life back from the rest of the world had been breached, and the hole was only getting bigger.
‘And he bought a pull-up bar,’ his mum said to Estelle. ‘That’s what’s in the box.’ She winked. ‘So, if you want a front seat at the gun show, get him to whip it out and show you what he’s got.’
Estelle snorted, then covered it up with another cough.
‘Okay, kiddies. See you later!’
Beverley waved at them both, then left the room.
James shut the door behind her and went back to his desk. He opened up recruitment websites to start the new search for festival staff and waited to see if Estelle would reply to his last email.
She didn’t.
17
‘So, I’ll see you tomorrow?’ James asked Estelle.
He was standing by the office door, a messenger bag over his shoulder containing the apology letters to the councillors and save-the-date invitations.
‘Yeah, sure,’ she replied, her eyes on her two dogs. They were at his heels, tails wagging in hopeful excitement that he might take them with him.
James crouched. ‘You two are staying right here.’
Joy, who got the gist of what he was saying, whined. Chester, who didn’t, barked.
Estelle watched James as he stroked her dogs, soothing Joy and allowing Chester to lick and headbutt his other hand. It was very difficult to hate anyone who’d been ninety-eight per cent polite all day and was kind to animals.
‘Good boy, good girl,’ James continued. He straightened. ‘Stay.’
‘Chester! Joy! Come!’ Estelle called to them.
They didn’t move.
Fuck’s sake.
She risked a glance at James.
He was grinning.
Pressing her lips tightly together, she went back to looking at her laptop, ignoring them all.
‘You sure you don’t want to come with me?’ James asked.
‘The dogs and me in your compensation car, or the dogs and you in the Defender?’ she replied, pretending to type again. ‘Your choice.’
‘I’m going to go with option C.’ He paused. ‘See you tomorrow?’
She waved her hand as if to waft him away. ‘Yeah, yeah. I’m contractually obliged to show up after I signed away my soul to the devil. Remember?’
He huffed out a short laugh, then left.
As the door closed behind him, Estelle leaned back in her chair and exhaled a long, slow breath. After the most stressful and strange dinner party, she’d spent the day reorganising her thoughts and feelings towards James and now found she had no proper place to put them.
On the one hand, he’d confounded her beliefs, then on the other he’d confirmed them. No matter how many nice things James did, he was still the man who’d bullied Henry at school and stolen his client at Conqueror.
She glanced over at the water bowls he’d painted for Chester and Joy. She would never have had the time, nor patience, to ensure every letter was the same size and perfection as the last. James had even decorated the insides. It must have taken him hours.
