A Summer to Remember (13 page)

‘It’s been a long time,’ he said, in the kind of tone that made Nina think he was about to reach across the table to hold her hand.

‘Yes,’ she said simply. ‘Alex – do you know what happened to Teri?’

He almost choked on his drink. ‘Teri? Why? What have you heard?’

‘Nothing, really. Your mother mentioned she was Dudley’s last assistant and I wondered why she left.’ Was it her imagination, she wondered, or had Alex’s cheeks developed a rosy hue?

‘Well, it was …’ he paused, ‘it got a bit much for her, working with Dad. He can be difficult at times. Not that you’ll have any problems with him, I’m sure,’ he quickly added.

‘Is that the
only
reason she left?’ Nina held his gaze, and she could almost see Alex buckling underneath her – just like when he’d been a young boy trying to convince her that he’d finished all his homework and should be allowed to watch TV for the rest of the evening. Then he cleared his throat nervously and gave a grin.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘we might have had the
tiniest
misunderstanding.’

‘Oh, really?’

He shrugged and took another sip of his drink.

‘Alex?’ she probed.

‘Hey,’ he said, ‘you’re not my babysitter any more. I don’t have to answer to you.’ There was a twinkle in his eye as he said this. ‘But, if you must know, I was sort of seeing her for a little while.’

‘
Sort of
seeing her? What does that mean?’

‘It means that we weren’t – you know – mutually exclusive.’

‘Oh, right,’ Nina said, clarity dawning.

‘Well, Teri got really narked when she saw me with Katy. I’d invited her home for dinner and Teri had stayed late to finish something for Dad. I had no idea she’d be there but – like I said – we had an understanding.’

Nina frowned. ‘It seems to me that this understanding was all on your side, Alex.’

He grinned again. ‘Yeah. You might be right about that.’

Nina shook her head in despair – but she couldn’t help smiling, too, because he’d grown into just the sort of cheeky, flippant young man that she’d guessed he’d become.

‘I believe Mum’s roped you into helping with this crazy party idea,’ he said, changing the subject.

‘Yes, and typing your father’s novel, too,’ Nina said.

Alex laughed. ‘If Dad’s a novelist, then I’m a monk!’

Nina looked up, surprised at his disbelief. ‘Looks like you’ve got a change of vocation then, because I’ve read the first few chapters.’

Alex almost did a double take. ‘
Really
?’

‘Yes. And it’s very good,’ Nina said with a hint of pride at her new employer’s talent.

‘What’s it about?’ Alex was suddenly very earnest.

‘Well, I think that’s a secret for the time being.’

He eyed her for a moment. ‘I admire your loyalty,’ he said, ‘but you can tell me, can’t you?’

Nina smiled and shook her head. She hadn’t been at the mill long, but she already felt enormously loyal towards her new boss.

‘Oh – go on!’ Alex said, leaning across the table. ‘Nina!’

‘No!’ she said.

‘Please!’ his voice was getting louder. ‘I won’t let on,’ he said, standing up and moving to sit next to Nina on her side of the picnic bench.

‘Alex – the bench will tip over!’

‘Go on!’ He pushed his head closer to her.

‘I’ve said no!’ She felt as if she were turning into the old babysitter once more.

‘Tell me – tell me!’ he chanted and began tickling her.

‘Alex – get off!’ she cried, aware that several pairs of curious eyes were looking in their direction. ‘STOP IT!’

Alex sat up and stared at her, startled at her command, his face very close to hers. Nina looked at him, aware that her heart was beating ten to the dozen. For a moment, neither of them spoke.

‘Cottage pie twice?’ a shrill voice came from behind them, breaking the spell. Alex leapt up to move back to his side of the bench, knocking over his drink in the process, and spilling the contents onto the grass. The waitress looked on, unamused. She’d seen it all before.

‘Er – better make that another cola, please,’ he said. The waitress nodded and left them to their meal. ‘Ooops!’ Alex grinned and started to chuckle.

‘You idiot!’ Nina whispered, but she was giggling, too.

‘Sorry about that,’ he said, catching her gaze and holding it.

‘We’d better eat this whilst it’s hot,’ Nina said.

On the drive back, Nina glanced at Alex, wondering if she dared to pry a little into family affairs.

‘Alex?’ she asked hesitantly.

‘Yeah?’

‘What exactly happened between Faye and Dominic?’

Alex’s eyes narrowed but his gaze remained fixed on the road ahead. ‘Why do you want to know?’

‘Oh – no reason. It’s just that it seems rather odd, don’t you think?’

‘Odd? How?’

‘That she spends so much time at the mill in the hope of patching things up with Dominic when he obviously isn’t interested in her anymore.’

Alex was silent. ‘Faye’s a lovely person,’ he said as the countryside flashed behind them.

‘That’s why I can’t understand why Dominic broke up with her,’ Nina said. ‘I bet they were absolutely brilliant together. They’re both such lovely people, and I can’t bear to see Faye so sad about it all. Do you have any ideas what might have happened? She talks to you, doesn’t she?’

Alex shook his head. ‘Not about Dominic.’

‘Oh,’ Nina said.

‘I’ve told her that she really needs to move on, but I guess she’s one of life’s great romantics and just won’t give up,’ he said.

Nina smiled. That was sweet, she thought. Behind the facade of a typical lad, Alex really was very caring.

Suddenly, a memory from the past flashed before her that reminded her that Alex had a darker side. It had been an evening just before Christmas when she’d been babysitting. She’d been making hot chocolate in the kitchen and had heard the young Alex and Dominic squabbling in the front room under the Christmas tree. She’d tiptoed towards the door, wondering if she could overhear what it was they were fighting about, and had heard their voices clearly from the hallway.

‘You don’t even like Anna,’ Dominic was saying. ‘She was my friend first.’

‘But she’s my friend
now
,’ Alex was saying. ‘She thinks you’re boring and she doesn’t want to be friends with you anymore.’

Dominic had got up from where he’d been sitting under the Christmas tree and had stormed out of the room, almost crashing into Nina, while Alex had sat there with a smug expression on his face.

Nina looked at him now, hoping that the past wasn’t repeating itself again and that Alex wasn’t somehow involved in the break-up between Dominic and Faye. She wouldn’t be surprised if he was.

Chapter Thirteen

‘You’ll never
believe
what I’ve managed to pull off!’ Olivia beamed from the threshold of the study the next morning.

‘What?’ Nina asked, looking up from the computer screen where she’d been typing Dudley’s novel and trying to take her mind off the night before.

‘Well,’ Olivia began, making sure her husband wasn’t about before entering the room, ‘I’ve been thinking about dear Dominic and his determination to be an artist, and I’ve persuaded the ladies at the Country Circle to sit for their portraits!’

‘Portraits?’ Nina said in surprise.

‘Yes! Isn’t it marvellous! They’re all terribly keen and terribly well-off – Dominic could more or less charge whatever he wants.’ Olivia clapped her hands together like an excited schoolgirl.

Nina had a sudden image of a line of little old ladies with perms, hitting each other with their handbags in order to be the first to sit for the handsome young artist.

‘I didn’t know Dominic did portraits,’ Nina said.

‘Well of course he does – he’s an artist, isn’t he?’

Nina thought of his huge abstract landscapes. She’d not seen any evidence to suggest that Dominic’s burning ambition was to paint Norfolk’s population of retired ladies.

‘He’ll make a fortune! I must grab him and tell him whilst he’s here! But this will involve you, too, Nina. You’ll be able to help Dominic, won’t you? There are over twenty women in the circle, and they’ll need to be given appointments and such like. Could you diarise for Dominic? Now that you’ve got the study in some sort of order?’

‘Well there’s the anniversary party to arrange yet, and Dudley’s asked me to make a start on some research for his novel,’ Nina indicated the computer screen in front of her.

‘Yes, I know,’ Olivia’s green eyes widened, ‘but you can do it. I have every faith in you.’

Nina smiled hesitantly. Did she have a choice? ‘Well, I suppose I can squeeze it in,’ she said, wondering if Olivia Milton was just a nicer version of Hilary Jackson and that she’d still be expected to break her back at work in exchange for a sweet smile and gentle pleading.

‘You’re wonderful! Whatever did we do before you came?’ Olivia teased, leaving the room as quickly as she’d entered it.

Nina turned her attention back to the novel and became instantly engrossed in the story of Lord Ellis Glavin and the beautiful young Caroline. Dudley had asked her to start typing up the novel as it stood, whilst he’d disappeared with his notepad to a corner of the house where he wouldn’t be disturbed.

The pages of typing she’d found on clearing the study on her first day were now barely visible after Dudley’s pen had scribbled his alterations in his own peculiar shorthand. Nina wished that there were prescription glasses she could get in order to decipher it all, but made do with twisting her neck and the paper at odd angles. She shook her head, forecasting eye strain and neck pain for herself in the near future. Still, she became so wrapped up in her task that she hardly heard the knocking on the French doors a few minutes later. It was Faye.

Nina sprang out of her chair and went to open the door.

‘Hi!’ Faye said, pushing her dark hair out of her face and smearing something green across her forehead in the process. ‘I’m just taking a break after digging up a rather unruly bramble bush and wondered how you were settling in.’

‘Oh, good, thanks. Just trying to work out Dudley’s handwriting.’

‘Rather you than me,’ Faye said and then she cocked her head to one side. ‘Nina?’

‘Yes?’

‘I heard you went out with Alex. Is that right?’

Nina looked surprised. ‘How did you hear about that?’

‘The mill is a very small world. Everyone knows exactly what everybody else is up to,’ Faye said with a grin. ‘So, how did it go?’

‘We were just catching up on old times, really,’ Nina said.

Faye nodded. ‘Don’t forget your vow.’

Nina frowned. ‘My vow?’

‘To avoid men,’ Faye reminded her.

‘But I’m not seeing Alex,’ Nina said quickly.

‘Well,
you
might think that but Alex probably thinks you’re an item now.’

‘Oh, that’s ridiculous.’

Faye’s eyebrows rose a fraction. ‘I’d just recommend caution when it comes to Alex,’ she said.

Nina chewed her lip. ‘Faye?’

‘Yes?’

‘Has he ever made a play for you?’

‘Alex?’

Nina nodded.

‘Of course he has!’ Faye said. ‘He’s Alex. He makes a play for every girl!’

Nina grinned and was just about to ask more when she heard somebody knocking on the study door. She wondered who it could be this time and realised she’d never get any work done if the daily intrusion rate was so high.

‘Come in!’ Nina sang. The door creaked open slowly and Dominic appeared.

‘Hello,’ Nina said.

He entered the room and then clocked Faye. ‘Oh,’ he said.

‘Hello, Dom,’ Faye said, her face flushing at coming face-to-face with her ex.

Nina stood between them avidly watching, the air positively crackling with awkwardness. But there was definitely something else there besides the awkwardness, she thought. If she wasn’t mistaken, the blushes that coloured the cheeks of the distraught couple told of an affection that hadn’t been completely forgotten. Maybe it was still there, Nina mused, bubbling away under the surface and just needing a little bit of help – a gentle push in the right direction from a well-meaning intermediary – in order for it to make a resurgence.

‘Hi,’ Dominic said, his voice sounding small and odd. ‘You okay?’

Faye nodded. ‘You?’

‘Good.’

‘Good,’ Faye echoed.

Nina blinked at the stunted monosyllables that passed between them and wondered if she should intervene, but Faye got there first.

‘I should get back,’ she said. ‘There’s a rambling rector that desperately needs my attention.’

‘A what?’

‘It’s a rose,’ she said with a little smile, before leaving.

Nina turned back to Dominic. He was watching Faye as she crossed the lawn, a pained look on his face. She watched him for a moment and wondered what thoughts were cascading around his brain.

‘Are you all right? You look a bit shell-shocked.’ Nina said at last, looking at his face – as pale as a Romantic poet’s – and saw the uneasy look in his dark eyes.

‘I am,’ he said, walking into the room properly now that Faye had gone, a scowl darkening his face. ‘Mum’s just told me the news about the portrait painting.’ He sighed and sat down in his father’s chair on the other side of the room.

‘Oh – I see.’

‘You know about it?’ he asked, not sounding surprised.

‘Yes,’ Nina confessed, ‘she did mention it.’

Dominic threw his head back to the ceiling and closed his eyes. Nina looked across at him, noticing the stubble on his face and under his chin. His shirt was open at the collar and she could see where he’d caught the sun.

She blinked and looked away. ‘Aren’t you pleased about it?’

He stretched his arms and sat up in the chair, looking across at Nina. ‘It’s good of Mum, I know, and I should be grateful,’ he started. ‘She’s always doing her best to help – she really is.’

‘But?’

‘But – it isn’t really what I want to be doing. For one thing, there’s this exhibition I’m meant to be preparing for.’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘And I know it sounds ungrateful but the idea of painting a succession of elderly ladies in twinsets and pearls doesn’t really appeal to me.’