Penny Jordan (16 page)

Not that they were likely to have
that
problem with either Joss or Jack.

Ben had never been close to either of his younger grandsons. Jenny suspected that the fierce intensity of the love he felt first for David and then for Max had exhausted and burned out his ability to love anyone else.

Jack had come to feel that his grandfather somehow blamed him for the disappearance of his father, whilst Joss, with his sunny nature, looked upon Ben with the kind of mature compassion that made Jenny reflect that in some way their roles had been reversed. In terms of human awareness and what made others tick, it was Joss who was the adult and Ben the child.

'What do you want to borrow the car for?' Jon now asked the boys promptly.

'We're going to a party,' Joss announced.

Jon's eyebrows rose.

'It's okay,' Joss was quick to reassure them.

'We'll drive safely.'

Jon and Jenny exchanged looks and Jenny gave her husband a brief nod of her head.

'Very well, then,' Jon consented, and Jenny had her reward when she saw the proud, pleased look in Jack's eyes as he thanked them.

'Whose party is it?' Jenny asked Jack curiously an hour later as he walked through the garden with her, helping to deadhead the last of the late-summer roses. In this sheltered part of the garden, they had managed to last until the autumn gales had battered them the night before.

'Patti's,' Jack responded promptly. 'Her family has only recently moved to Haslewich. Joss and I bumped into Mike Salter last night and he invited us over. He was on his way to her place to practise with the band. Mike plays keyboard for them.'

'Mike Salter,' Jenny repeated. 'That's Guy's sister Frances's son, isn't it?'

'Uh-huh,' Jack agreed without elaborating any further. He didn't think that Jenny would particularly care for Patti or her parents if the comments he had heard about them were anything to go by.

It wasn't that Jenny was a snob. Far from it. But Jack had gained the impression that there was something a little bit too materialistic about both Patti and her father. He especially hadn't liked the way she so openly, and in his mind, unfemininely displayed her sexuality.

That pale little blonde, Annalise, whose boyfriend Patti was so obviously and aggressively determined to hijack, didn't stand a chance of competing with her. Not if the sultry, assessing looks Pete Hunter had been giving Patti were any indication.

Jack knew which of the two
he
preferred.

Heavy make-up, too-short skirts and overt displays of sexuality didn't hold very much appeal to him.

Not that he really had time to be interested in

any
type of girl right now. He was determined to work hard at university and get a good degree. It was important to him not just to make Jon proud but to refute the look he had so often seen in his grandfather's eyes.

He might not, unlike Max, ever make Queen's Counsel and he certainly didn't share Joss's easy learning skill and flair, but as Jon had very warmly assured him, he did have the potential to become a very good lawyer.

'There's a lot more to the law than courtroom dramatics,' Jon had told Jack during one of their heart-to-hearts. 'An awful lot more.'

And Jack had taken comfort from Jon's gentle words after the unkind cruelty of his grandfather's dismissal of him as a son unworthy of a man like David.

It had been on the tip of Jack's tongue to retort that far from being the wonderful human being his grandfather believed, his father was actually a liar and a thief, but he had fortunately managed to restrain himself. His own memories of his father were vague and shadowy. David had never seemed to have much time for him although he had never been actively unkind to him. When Jack tried to talk to Olivia, his sister, concerning his curiosity about his father as a man—after all, she had had the opportunity to view their father through the eyes of an adult—she had told him curtly that she didn't want to discuss the subject.

It was no secret in the family how much Ben longed for David to return, but Jack wasn't sure how
he
would feel if he did.

It was Jon whom he turned to for advice and support...and for love.

'COME ON. WHO'S GOING
to know? Your dad and his kind are out. Wouldn't you like me to take you upstairs and undress you and—'

'No.' Annalise tried to sound firm, but she knew her voice was trembling. Her body was trembling, too, but not with excited desire. No.

What she actually felt was horribly afraid and nervous, all the more so because she could sense not just Pete's impatience with her refusal to have sex with him, but his boredom with her, as well.

She'd become all too aware of just how much time he was spending with Patti and how triumphant the other girl looked.

'You're not real, do you know that?' he derided her bitterly now. 'Why are you so keen to hang on to it anyway? No one wants a virgin—it isn't cool. You should be grateful to me. I'd be doing you a favour.'

Annalise felt acutely sick. She knew that what he was saying was true. The crowd the band went around with was openly mocking about girls who hadn't had sex.

'Imagine not knowing what it feels like when a boy really makes you come,' Patti had said to her only a few days ago, closing her eyes and smiling a secret and, to Annalise, very enviable smile. 'They just don't know what they're missing, do they? Has Pete ever gone down on you?'

she had asked casually. .

Annalise's heart had missed a beat as she floun-dered for the right degree of insouciance.

'All my boyfriends have done it for me,' Patti had boasted. 'That's a sure way of telling that they love you. What else have you done?' Patti had asked her, fortunately not waiting for a reply to her previous question. 'My last boyfriend gave me twenty out of ten for the way I gave him head,' she had bragged. 'You should have seen him. He was really big. I bet Pete is, too, isn't he?' she had demanded with a sideways smirking look at Annalise's pink, hot face.

'Have you ever done it with more than one boy—or another girl?' Patti had continued. 'I went to this party once. It was cool, everyone doing it with everyone else. They'd got this stuff.

You put it in your drink and it really turns you on... mind-blowing.'

'Drugs...?' Annalise had asked nervously.

'But—'

'Yeah,' Patti had agreed, changing the subject with lightning speed, demanding, 'Did you ever see your folks having sex?'

Numbly, Annalise had shaken her head.

'I've seen mine. I found this video. It was a scream. No wonder my dad is always telling my ma that she's got a fat bum. Not that he's got much room to talk.' She had pulled a face. 'Yuck.

I couldn't do it with a fat old man, could you?

No way. I like boys with fit, strong, horny bodies... just like your Pete's.'

'Okay, then, don't bother,' Pete announced, the wheedling tone of his voice giving way to angry dismissal.

'Where...where are you going?' Annalise asked unsteadily as he dropped her hand and turned away from her. They were now in the shopping precinct, their regular meeting place on a Saturday afternoon. Pete liked to go to the local music store and listen to all the latest releases.

'Why should you care?' he responded sulkily.

'You don't want to go to bed with me, so why should I stay here with you?'

Annalise sucked in her breath on a sharp sob of despair. It was happening already, just as everyone had predicted. He was going to leave her...dump her. She didn't think she could bear the humiliation of it. He would tell everyone that she was still a virgin and they would all make fun of her...especially Patti.

But there was no way Annalise could give in to his urging. No way she could allow herself to be branded like her mother, because no matter what Pete might say, in the real world, the adult world, things were different. She had only to listen to her father to know that, and besides... A tiny quiver of fear slicked through her. Despite all she had heard, all Patti's boasts and enthusing, she just didn't feel that she wanted...

Ducking her head so Pete wouldn't see the betraying tears sheening her eyes, she wondered de-spairingly what he would say if she were to tell him that she was frightened, that she was afraid that having 'it'...doing 'it' would hurt.

Perhaps there was something wrong with her.

Perhaps she wasn't quite like other girls...perhaps she was...horror of horrors...
abnormal
in some way.

Now, as she watched Pete being absorbed by the group, she hunched her shoulders and started to walk quietly away.

She was dreading tonight's party. For one thing, she didn't have anything to wear...at least not anything like Patti was going to be wearing.

And for another... Her mouth went a little dry at the thought of what the evening might hold.

There would be drink, lots of it, according to Patti, and probably drugs. But the band would be playing and that would give her an excuse to sit somewhere on the sidelines. As Pete's 'girl' she was naturally excused from getting involved in the horseplay indulged in by the others. Pete was the 'boss', the 'top guy', and as his girl she was considered untouchable by anyone else. Thankfully.

But was she still Pete's girl? What had happened to the boy who had kissed her so sweetly and lovingly at the school dance last term? Pete had seemed so tender then...so caring. But that was before he had become involved with the band. Now everything was different, she acknowledged sadly. Now
he
was different.

As
THEY WALKED
across the town square together, having come from Ruth Crighton's home, which was close to the church, Joss nudged his cousin and asked him, 'Isn't that the girl who was at the band practice the other night?'

Screwing up his eyes against the sharpness of the autumn sun, Jack followed the direction Joss was indicating.

Annalise was walking away from them, her body tight and hunched over. She looked lonely and pensive.

'I think so,' Jack agreed noncommittally.

'She's pretty,' Joss announced unexpectedly.

'Much prettier than that other one.'

'Pretty?' Jack questioned.

'Yes,' Joss confirmed, adding with insight,

'Other people might not see it yet, but that's just because she can't see it herself.'

'Uh-huh. You wouldn't be thinking of chancing your arm, not to mention other parts of your anat-omy, with the boss's girl, would you?' Jack teased.

'Nope. She's not my type,' Joss returned loftily, adding with a grin in his cousin's direction,

'but I reckon she's yours!'

A passer-by tut-tutted as the pair of them started scuffling together, much as they had done when they were younger.

On her way home, Annalise stopped off at the restaurant owned by Frances Salter and her husband. They had given her holiday jobs in the past and she was hoping that they might have some more work for her now.

'Well, we could do with an extra washer-up,'

Frances allowed cheerfully after Annalise had made her stammering request, ignoring the way her son was shaking his head at her behind Annalise's back. 'When do you want to start?' she asked the girl. 'Tonight?'

Blushing a little, Annalise shook her head.

'No...I...there's a party tonight. But I could do tomorrow lunch-time,' she offered eagerly.

'What do you mean we could do with an extra washer-up?' her son asked reproachfully once Annalise had gone. 'We've only just bought a brand-new, state-of-the-art dishwasher.'

'I know that,' Frances Salter agreed. 'But I just can't help feeling sorry for her. She doesn't have the easiest of lives. Her father...' She paused and smiled at her eldest son. Her own family life was so happy that she felt that somehow she had to acknowledge her own good fortune by helping others out whenever she could.

She was always being teased by her family for not being able to turn anyone away. Every down-and-out for miles around knew they could always get a hot meal at her restaurant.

'I'm just paying my dues' was all Frances would say when her family asked her why she did it.

'CASPAR, HOW LOVELY
to see you,' Maddy exclaimed as she opened her front door. 'Come in.'

'I'm not calling at a bad time, am I?' Caspar asked as she ushered him and his two small daughters inside, calling to her own children to come and see who had arrived.

'Not at all,' Maddy assured him. 'Max isn't here, I'm afraid. He's playing golf.' She wrinkled her nose. 'And I suspect there could be a slight delay at the nineteenth hole! How's Olivia? It seems ages since I last saw her,' Maddy continued as she led the way into her comfortable kitchen and the two girls were carried off by their cousins to inspect their toys.

'She's...she's very busy.'

Maddy, who was filling the kettle with water to make them both a drink, turned round to look at him, alerted to the fact that something was wrong by the cool tone of his voice.

'She
is
busy,' she agreed quietly. 'Jon and Jenny have both mentioned how hard she's working, and the fact that Katie has been taking some days off won't have helped, either.'

'Has she?' Caspar commented lightly. 'I'm afraid that Olivia and I don't have enough time together to discuss things such as other people's schedules. Hell,' he said in a much more forceful and explosive voice, 'we don't even have enough time together to discuss our own... I'm sorry,' he apologised as he looked across at Maddy. 'I didn't mean to let off steam like that, but—'

'It's all right,' Maddy reassured him. 'I can understand your concern. I've been rather worried about Livvy myself recently. But if you're planning a holiday for the two of you—'

'Not for the two of us,' Caspar interrupted grimly. 'Olivia refuses even to talk about it. She says she's got too much on... My half-brother, Bryant, is getting married,' Caspar started to explain. 'He's invited us to the wedding and I think we should go—as a family. Olivia seems to have other ideas. Of course, I appreciate that my people aren't Crightons,' he added sarcastically. 'And there's no way we could ever be described as close-knit, but this is the second time she's found a reason not to visit them and I'm beginning to run out of excuses for her. I'm even starting to wonder if it's having to spend time with my folks she's so against or having to spend time with me and the girls.