Reluctant Date (23 page)

And that had been the end of the conversation.
 
Claire had thanked her and taken the painting
home, hung it on the wall, and derived a great deal of pleasure from looking at
it without giving any more thought to Beth’s situation.

Now, however, seeing the concern on Daniel’s face, she felt
a twinge of dismay.
 
Why did Carl have to
go away with Daniel?
 
Was he in trouble
again or was it just a business trip? Was his and Beth’s print business okay?

Unable to ask Daniel any of the numerous questions that
popped into her head, she started to think about something else that was
equally confusing. Was he worried about Beth being on her own for Carl’s sake,
or was it because he still loved her himself? She guessed she would never know.

“I’ll do my best,” she conceded. “Although I can’t promise
I’ll be successful because she’s the most independent person I know.”

He gave a relieved smile.
 
“Thank you. I’ll tell Carl. If we could avoid leaving her, believe me we
would.
 
And if there are any problems at
all, then please just call me, any time, day or night, because one thing is for
sure, Beth won’t! She’ll try to cope on her own.”

Something inside Claire wouldn’t let her return his
smile.
 
She didn’t know whether she was
jealous because he was so worried about Beth, or whether it was pique because
he hadn’t chosen to join her during the afternoon. Whatever it was, her lips
refused to curve upwards.
 
Instead, she
just nodded, and then turned away so that he wouldn’t see the frustration in
her eyes.
 

In a month or so she was going to have to decide whether she
was going to stay in Dolphin Key, or whether she was going to return to England
at the end of her six-month contract, because although she loved her job, and
thoroughly enjoyed her new life, she wasn’t sure she could continue working
with Daniel.
 
She had tried to accept
that he wasn’t interested in her. She had made other friends and developed a
social life, but none of it had made a jot of difference.
 
Her mouth still grew dry whenever she saw him
and her pulse became erratic as soon as she heard his voice.
 
It seemed as if her first thought about
moving to Florida to work with him had been the right one after all. Her heart
sank. Whether she liked it or not, soon it would be time to go home.

* * *

Daniel watched her walk away with a frown.
 
Had he been presumptuous in asking her to
keep an eye on Beth?
 
He knew they were
good friends, so he had been sure Claire would want to know Beth was on her own
so near to the end of her pregnancy.
 
Not
that he and Carl intended to be away for a moment longer than necessary, but
this trip was something they had to make together.

He sighed as he started to clean up the barbecue.
 
If only it didn’t have to be this way but
despite many warnings, his father had brought it on himself.
 
It was no longer possible to run the company
the way he wanted it.
 
Times had moved
on. Finances were difficult. Clients wanted different experiences. Yet whenever
Daniel or the other directors suggested changes, Gordon Marchant always managed
to thwart them, and because he was still Chairman of the company there was
little they could do about it unless they ousted him from the Board.

For months it had been clear that unless drastic action was
taken, and soon, the company would fold, and they would all go down with
it.
 
Not wanting to destroy what was left
of his father’s pride, Daniel had managed to avoid making a final decision
until the fire in Mexico.
 
That had been
the final straw, however, and, even worse, so had his father’s reaction.
 
Instead of recognising that in the wake of
such a disaster the company needed to rebuild its reputation with further
investment and with special promotional deals, he had spent all his time trying
to apportion blame.
 
This had resulted in
the very public resignation of one of the company’s best resort managers. A
particularly unpleasant meeting with him had left Daniel feeling emotionally
bruised and beyond weary, and ready, finally, to accept that the time had come
to do the one thing he had been trying to avoid. He had nowhere else to go. His
only solution was to call a special Board Meeting and ask for a vote of no
confidence in his own father, the person who had originally set up the company.
To do this he had to present the directors with a solution to their present
dilemma and this was where Carl came in. It was the reason why they needed to
attend the Board Meeting together.

He stopped scraping the barbecue and stared into space as he
thought about his brother. Carl had proved to be a source of unexpected wisdom
and support over the past couple of years. Back on track thanks to Beth, he had
found the strength to leave his past behind and make a new life. In the process
he had discovered that he not only had a good business brain, and a flair for
negotiation, but that he was a natural salesman too.
 
And if Beth was added to the mix, with her
eye for color and décor, and her enormous energy, then the new leaders of
Marchant Enterprises were standing in the wings ready to take over. All Daniel
had to do was persuade the Board that this was the way forward.

He looked over to where his father was sitting alone on the
deck waiting for his wife to come to his aid, and his heart shriveled inside
him.
 
He didn’t want to do this to him
and yet he knew he had to, for everyone’s sake.
 
If he didn’t, then his parents would have to sell the house they had
lived in and cherished for so long, and move to somewhere much smaller.
 
Taylor-Ann and Melanie would have to finish
college too, and find some sort of employment, and he would have to think long
and hard about whether he could afford to keep his own company going or whether
he should abandon it and look for another job. One that would bring in the sort
of rewards the family needed to survive. He tried not to think about what would
happen if he abandoned his own dreams because he knew it would break his heart.
He also knew it would mean saying goodbye to Claire as well.

He looked around the garden wondering if she was still
around or whether she had already left.
 
He wished he could take her into his confidence, but there was no way he
could possibly burden her with such a secret, especially as she visited his
parents so frequently. Eventually he spotted her.
 
She was standing on the far side of the lawn
talking to Melanie.
 
Scott was standing
beside her and the three of them seemed to be having a serious discussion about
something.
 
Then, as he watched, Claire
and Scott turned away with a brief smile and a wave. Within moments they had
gone, leaving him feeling more miserable than he had ever felt in his life.

Chapter Nineteen

Over the next few days Claire felt increasingly
despondent.
 
Gone was any hope Daniel
might suddenly see her in a new light and decide he really did want to have a
date with her after all.
 
Gone, too, was
the carefree friendship she had had with Scott.
 
He was far too busy spending time with Melanie, and worrying about what
would happen when she told her parents about her relationship with him, to give
any thought to Claire.
 
Nor was Beth her
usual cheerful self.
 
She seemed to have
something on her mind but whatever it was, she didn’t share it.
 
Instead she just kept her head down when she
was in the office, and left with little more than a brief farewell on the dot
of five o’clock.

To add to her misery, the weather was so hot and humid she
found it difficult to concentrate. Even the air conditioning in her apartment
was a mixed blessing because it kept her awake at night with its constant
humming and yet if she turned it off the growing heat was unbearable, so when
Daniel called her on his first day away, to check if Beth was okay, her reply
was brusque to the point of rudeness, something she regretted the moment she
cut the connection.

Angry with herself, as well as with everyone else, her state
of mind began to affect how she felt about her job as well, and she took to
leaving on time like Beth, instead of staying to chat about work with
Scott.
 
Consequently she had been home
for several hours on the day Beth telephoned her.

“Claire…would you like to come over for a couple of hours?”

When Claire heard the uncharacteristic quaver in her
friend’s voice she was instantly alert. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing…it’s just that Carl’s away…and I think there’s a
hurricane brewing.”

By now Claire had been well briefed about hurricanes, and
about their history in the Dolphin Key area. She knew it was very unlikely they
would have a direct hit but she also knew it
was
possible, so Beth’s words made her feel doubly nervous.

“Would you like me to stay over?” she asked, fighting to
make the question sound casual and to keep her voice calm.

“Um…yes, I…that would be great!
 
Better to be together than both on our own if
the weather does blow up.”

It was obvious Beth was trying to hide her relief, but she
didn’t fool Claire.
 
Something was wrong,
so the sooner she set off for the apartment over the print shop, the better.

“Give me twenty minutes and I’ll be with you,” she said.

In less than ten minutes she had thrown overnight
necessities and a change of clothes into a backpack, checked the contents of
her fridge, and added a handful of herbal teabags to her luggage. Her packing
complete, she brought the furniture in from the balcony, and locked and
shuttered all the doors and windows.
 
Then, with a final look around, she picked up the backpack, slung her
camera case across her shoulder, stuffed her cell phone into her pocket, and
made her way downstairs into the street.

The strength of the wind startled her, as did the size of
the waves curling up through the bay.
 
She had never seen the sea behave like that before.
 
Ever since she’d arrived in Dolphin Key the
water had been so calm the fisherman considered even a mild swell to be a bad
day. Pushing down a rising panic she battled her way across to Main Street and
then turned left and hurried towards the print shop as fast as she could.

Beth was waiting for her. She opened the door as soon as
Claire tugged on the rope of the ship’s bell that hung over the doorway, and
pulled her inside.
 

“According to the guys at the National Hurricane Centre it’s
going to give us a wide berth.
 
We’ll
just have high winds for a couple of days, and some rain.
 
It might disrupt travel though…” her voice
trailed off as she stared dejectedly at Claire.

“So you’re worried about Carl and Daniel,” Claire finished
the sentence for her.

“I’m not worried about
them.
 
I know they won’t travel if there’s any
danger…it’s more that I’m worried they won’t be able to get home in time.”

“In time for what?” Claire looked puzzled until the penny
dropped, and then she started to worry.
 
“You mean the baby.
 
Are you in
labour Beth?”

“I…I don’t know…that is, I’m not sure.
 
I’ve still got two weeks to go and because
I’ve never had a baby before I don’t really know what to expect.
 
It might just be normal, this slight
discomfort.”

Exhibiting a calm exterior when she was actually cold with
panic inside was something that came naturally to Claire.
 
It was a skill she had developed as a child
whenever she was faced with something new and scary, and now it kicked in
automatically. She smiled encouragingly at Beth as she directed her back up the
stairs to her homely and comfortable sitting room and settled her onto the
couch before she went into the kitchen to make herbal tea for both of them.
While she was waiting for the kettle to boil she checked all the windows,
securing the shutters, lowering the blinds and pulling the curtains until she
had turned the apartment into a cozy cocoon.

“Drink this,” she told Beth, handing her a mug of chamomile
tea. “My mother swears by it.
 
She says
there’s nothing better for soothing nerves and keeping panic at bay.”

“Well let’s hope your mother is right because panic is quite
close,” Beth gave her a watery smile as she raised the mug to her lips.
 
“My mother died when I was small so I don’t
have any maternal wisdom to fall back on. I never really bonded with my
stepmother either.
 
It’s my own
fault.
 
I never gave her a chance.
 
I left home when she moved in although not
for any particular reason.
 
It just
seemed the right thing to do at the time. And now my father is dead too,
so…well it’s just me…and Carl…and I really, really wish he was here.”

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize,” Claire sank down onto one
of the large cushions that furnished most of the room and put her mug on the
floor.
 

“Usually it’s OK,” Beth told her with a sigh.
 
“After all it happened a very long time ago
and my life has moved on. In fact I rarely think about my mother at all, or I
didn’t until I found out I was pregnant. Since then...well, it’s as if there’s
a hole in my life that can’t be filled. If there was a time when she needed to
stay around for me, then it’s right now…instead of which I’ve got to do this on
my own.
 
She’ll never see my baby either,
nor will its other grandparents, given how Carl’s parents feel about him…us.”