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CHAPTER FOUR
SOMEONEFILLEDKAT’S glass with the wine from the party-sized box that she was pretty sure Zach Gavros would have turned his autocratic nose up at. It was still in her hand as she slipped out of the room, where the mood was definitely party, and into the relative quiet of the office. Though no longer her office.
She had said goodbye to everyone earlier, fighting the emotional lump in her throat, reminding herself that she was the only one, barring Sue, who knew that this was a permanent parting. The goodbye was of the ‘for ever’ variety.
Maybe she would come back after two months, but it didn’t seem fair for her to ask Sue to step down when or if she returned, so she was making a clean break. Which had left her with no real option but to tell Sue, considering she was relying on her deputy to step into her shoes, the task that wasn’t as easy as she had hoped. While she had been convincing a sceptical Sue how perfect she was for the job and how smooth the transition would be, Kat realised just how true it was. She supposed everyone liked to think they were indispensable, that they would leave a hole, be missed, but it was depressing to realise that she was so easy to replace.
‘You should go back to the party,’ she said to Sue, who she had seen slip away a few minutes earlier. The older woman, who was bent over a carboard box of files, straightened up and nodded.
‘I will, but I couldn’t let you go without a last hug.’
Feeling the tears press against her eyelids, Kat blinked and turned her head, putting her half-full glass down next to a pile of books on a cabinet. ‘Nice photos,’ she said, her glance taking in the framed photos of her children that Sue had already arranged on what was now her desk.
Sue looked anxious. ‘I hope you don’t mind?’
‘Of course not,’ Kat responded, feeling guilty because she had minded—just a bit.
‘So, when do you want me to tell the others that you’re not coming back from the management course?’ Sue asked, framing the words with inverted commas. She had made no secret that she was mystified by Kat’s determination to keep the truth under wraps, and Kat hadn’t really known how to explain it herself. It was hard to tell other people about something that still seemed unreal to her. Besides, they might look at her the way Sue had initially, as though she’d changed or she were a different person.
Well, she wasn’t, and she didn’t intend to be. Kat was determined that, whatever happened, she would hang on to her own identity. If her grandfather or Zach Gavros thought they could mould her into something she wasn’t, they would soon learn otherwise.
Of course, she had searched for his name. There was plenty of information there to give her an insight into the man her grandfather had chosen to tutor her in how the super-rich behaved, and also a few significant gaps.
His past seemed something of a mystery, which had sparked a thousand conspiracy theories. A favourite being that he had underworld connections. Another that he was Alekis’s bastard son, which would make him her... No, that couldn’t be right, she decided, sure that there could be no blood connection between them.
There were almost as many stories of his financial genius and ruthless dedication to amassing wealth as there were to the sleek cars he drove, and the even sleeker women who lined up to have their hearts broken by him.
And to be fair, in a number of cases their public profiles and careers had been enhanced by their association with the man. Kat didn’t feel it was fair, though, as an image floated into her head of her mother’s grave as it had been when she’d finally found it. Overgrown, untended...lonely. Her mother’s heart had not been as resilient as the women whose names had been associated with Zach Gavros, but she liked to think that her mother had finally found a man worthy of her love. The beautiful gravestone in the cemetery gave her hope.
Kat pushed away the intruding thoughts with a firm little shake of her head. She smiled at Sue.
‘That’s up to you. You’re the boss.’ A sudden whoop from the other room, where the party was still in full swing, made her turn her head. When she looked back, Sue was looking at her suitcase.
‘That is one very small case for a new life.’
‘Just what I was thinking.’
Both women turned to the owner of the pleasant voice—pleasant was a good description of the man who was standing in the doorway. A little above average height, he was fairish and good-looking. Mike’s newly acquired and carefully tended beard made him look less boyish and gave him, according to him, the maturity his clients expected of a solicitor earmarked for partner in a successful practice.
‘I did knock but nobody heard. Am I too early?’
‘Perfect timing, and I always travel light,’ Kat told them both truthfully, seeing no need to explain that it was a hangover from her childhood, when for years she had been utterly certain that the mother who had left her sitting on the car-park wall of a health centre would come back to her. Her faith had been absolute; she had kept her small suitcase stowed neatly under her bed, packed, ready for the day her mum would come to claim her. Which was probably why none of the early foster placements had ever stuck, and the couple who had been interested in adopting her had backed out. Polite, she’d heard them tell her case worker, but unable to respond to love. They hadn’t understood that Kat didn’t need a family, she already had one, though seeing as they had said she was a polite child she hadn’t wanted to upset them by explaining this.
In the end she’d found her way into a long-term foster home. A mad, hectic household with a rare and marvellous couple who didn’t expect love, they just gave it, and they never mentioned her case under the bed.
Kat still had a packed case under her bed that she didn’t have to explain, because Kat didn’t share her bed or her history with anyone.
‘You know everyone is going to be gutted they didn’t get to say goodbye properly.’
Kat smiled. For a day or two, a week maybe, they might miss her. Might even say some affectionate remember when things about her in the future, but people forgot and that, she reminded herself before she slipped into a self-pitying spiral, was the way it should be. She would be in a position now to help them more from a distance than she ever could have here.
‘What shall I tell them when you don’t come back?’
‘That’s up to you. Like I keep saying, you’ll be the boss, you’ll do things your way. Oh, sorry!’ She straightened the photo her elbow had nudged. ‘This one of Sara is so cute. She looks just like you.’
‘So everyone keeps telling me.’
Kat placed it carefully back down. The photo was the reason why Sue would always be missed, never forgotten. She had family. Shrugging off the wave of sadness tinged with envy that threatened to envelop her, Kat picked up her case and reminded herself that she travelled light, something that Sue, with all her responsibilities, couldn’t do. She was lucky.
