Chapter 8

“You’re away for the whole week?” Candace asked, scribbling in her notepad.”

“The whole week,” Tobias confirmed as he rolled down his sleeves. “Come in,” he shouted, when he heard the knock at the door.

But when the door opened, Savannah Page wasn’t the person he expected to see even though he’d been wondering how she might have taken the news about the job offer. He had pushed his attraction to her out of the way and tried to find a way of making it up to her without it looking as if he had masterminded the whole thing. Even for someone as sharp-minded as her. Looking at the way her lips were now pursed together tightly, he wasn’t sure he had succeeded.

“That will be all, Candace,” he said, dismissing his PA with a nod. She got up haughtily, muttered something about his pre-dinner drinks with a client but he ignored her and pinned his gaze on Savannah as she hovered around the doorway.

“I can come back another time.” She looked as though she was ready to bolt.

“Don’t forget 6 o’clock at The Oasis with—”

“I heard you the first time,” he replied brusquely, throwing Candace a withering look. “Close the door on your way out.”

But Candace paused as she headed towards the door. “Is this about more Word templates?” she asked him, turning around.

“Leave, now.” He growled, his anger rising. Savannah stepped to the side, leaving barely enough room for Candace to glide past her. He felt sure there was no love lost between the women. Unfortunately his PA seemed to have the kind of territorially hostile reaction to most women he came into contact with. Her reaction to Savannah didn’t surprise him.

Savannah walked in and let the door slam shut behind her. “I need to know.” She said, not moving from the doorway. “Need to know what?” he asked, slowly standing up and unrolling his shirt sleeves all the way down, just to have something to take his mind off the way she stared at him. It must have been difficult, he imagined, to have heard the news today. Losing that other job.

She walked towards the center of his office. “This new position—working for you two days a week—”

“You’re not working for me.” He thought he’d made that clear to Briony. “You’ll have nothing to do with me. It’s for work I need done but everything will go through Briony.”

She fixed her stare on him, her face solemn, and all hard edges and brittleness.

This is your doing, asshole, he told himself.

“Did you create that role for me?” Her voice wavered as she asked, and he couldn’t help but cast his eyes over her. Damn it, she was a fine looking woman, all the way from the loose fitting pale gray top she wore, with the same black skirt she seemed to have on most of the time, right down to her sling-back heels. And here she was trying to unravel him. Why had he assumed she would have bought it, no questions asked? She was nothing like the vacuous women he usually met, the outwardly pretty empty heads over whose eyes the wool could so easily be pulled. “Create a position just for you?” he asked easily, his voice smooth like molasses as he secured his bullet back cufflinks in place. “You’re being slightly presumptuous again, aren’t you?”

“I wouldn’t put it past you.” Her voice was cold and flat, as if she didn’t believe anything he said.

“If you must know, it was a project that Briony and I had talked about a while back. I brought it forward. You probably want to know why?” He slipped on his suit jacket, conscious that he had gone through the motions of getting partly dressed in front of her.

“I’m listening.” She folded her arms, resting them under her breasts, the loose top now snugly in place, drawing his attention to her in ways which didn’t help him. All too aware of the effect she had on him, , he slid his hands into his pockets. It always seemed a safer option—it meant he couldn’t be tempted to reach out and touch her. Everything about the last week, the highs and lows and things best forgotten, now stared back at him, reminding him of what he had lost.

“It’s down to market changes and needing to look ahead. The work you’ve been given is something I need done. But you’re leaving anyway, aren’t you?” He asked, casually. “We can fill that position internally, if you aren’t interested. Don’t worry,” he whispered, leaning towards her slightly. “I didn’t divulge to Briony what you shared with me last night.”

She gulped but said nothing.

“When do you leave?” He asked, sounding more casual than he felt.

“I don’t. I didn’t get it.”

“You didn’t? I’m sorry to hear that.” He grabbed his cell phone. “Briony wants to offer this position to you first, and you are more than welcome to turn it down. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of other opportunities coming your way.”

“I’m not sure.”

“About this job?” He narrowed his eyes. “If you’re worried about working with me, don’t be. The work will come through Briony. There’s no need for any interaction between us.”

Her lips moved but she didn’t say a word. “One more thing,” he said, as she turned to leave. “If you still need that advance, assuming you take the offer, it’s still available but you’ll need to speak to someone in HR.”

She seemed to consider his advice. “Thank you.” Then, without looking at him, she slipped out of his office and left him standing there, all dressed up for drinks at The Oasis.

~~

“What was that letter about, Mommy?” Jacob asked, stretching his mouth into a yawn that showed her all of his teeth and the back of his throat. She’d been reading it again while they ate dinner.

“I’ve got a new job,” she announced, smoothing the duvet over him. She’d read through the contract twice, not so much to check the fine print, but because she had never had a job which paid this much, or which had offered the kind of perks that would make a difference in her life, and she wanted to double check it all. “I was going to tell you, once I accepted the offer.” It was a marvelous opportunity and of course she was going to accept. Not only that, but when she went into work tomorrow, she was going to take Tobias up on his offer and see someone in HR. Any help with that hospital bill was a godsend—if only because it meant she could sleep peacefully at night not fretting about where to get the money. With a permanent job, she knew she would be able to pay it all back and she couldn’t help but feel happier. Depending on what HR offered, she might not even need to borrow any money from Kay.

“A new job?” Jacob asked, sounding disappointed.

“It’s a good thing! For us, it’s a great thing. Why do you look so sad?”

“You’re leaving Mr. Stone?” His reply threw her for a moment.

“No. It’s a permanent job.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that before this, I was a temp. I was there for a short time, like they were trying me out, and I was trying them out.”

“And now?”

“Now they like me and I like them and they want to keep me there all the time.” She thought for a moment how it would have turned out had that other job not simply vanished. Jacob was looking at her curiously. “I said Yes. Or rather, I will say yes, when I hand that letter back tomorrow.”

“You’re staying with Mr. Stone’s company?” His expression brightened up again. “Yes I am and it means…” How was she to explain to a six year old that it meant peace of mind for her? “It means we can go ice-skating more, and we can go to the cinema, and…” And pay her debts off and buy him things when he needed them instead of waiting for them to be discounted, and go on a mini vacation somewhere, for a few days.

“Cool!”

“Though maybe not ice-skating just yet.” She didn’t want to run the risk of him having another asthma attack.

“Why not?”

“It’s bitterly cold outside at the moment, Honey. I don’t want to risk triggering your asthma.” Which reminded her of something she’d been meaning to find out. “The doctor at the hospital told me you weren’t taking your inhaler when you should have been. I found that hard to believe. Is it true?”

Jacob slipped under the covers. “Jacob Samuel Stone,” she said, her voice taking on a teacher’s solemnity. But he giggled in response. “Mommy, you said Jacob Samuel Stone!”

“Page, I meant Page.” Of course she meant Page.

“Jacob Samuel Stone,” repeated Jacob, giggling even more until she pulled the duvet down. His floppy hair was all mussed up. “Your inhaler,” she said, forcing a stern look and addressing him in the strictest voice she could muster. How had she made that enormous error? Choosing not to fix on it a moment longer, she tried to focus on what she needed to uncover. “I want to know why you’re not taking your inhaler.”

His lower lip trembled.

“Jacob.”

“He said I was a wuss and that I couldn’t breathe properly by myself ‘cos I was weak.”

“Who?” Even as the question left her lips, she already had a good idea who.

“Henry Carson.”

Goddamnit that devil child seemed hell bent on making her son’s life hell and she was powerless to do much about it. Savannah’s mind spun with images of the brat whose cruel words had hurt her boy before. She wanted to shake Henry Carson by his shoulders and tell him to leave her son alone.

“Oh, Honey,” she said, trying to think of the best way of dealing with this. Being a single mother was hard. What she wouldn’t give to discuss such things with a partner, to have someone else to share her worries with. But that was a fantasy she could never have and there was no use dreaming about it, just the way that there was no point in looking through holiday brochures or beautiful homes she saw on TV and in magazines. She gritted her teeth together “Henry Carson sounds to me as though he’s out to make trouble. Why are you paying any attention to what he says?”

“Because everyone else does. Everyone likes him and…” Jacob’s eyes crinkled up. “Nobody likes me, Mommy.” Her insides sliced into slivers to hear him say it. Instantly her hand slid over his baby soft skin, trying to soothe his hurt by the power of touch. “That’s not true, Honey. You told me you play with Lenny mostly. He’s your friend isn’t he?”

He nodded.

“See! I bet he doesn’t like Henry Carson much.” She’d met Lenny once at a party and had been secretly pleased that Jacob counted him as a friend. He wasn’t riotous and seemed to have a similar temperament as her son.

“He can’t stand him. He thinks he’s a show-off.”

“There you go, then. How about I set up a play date for you both?” Already her mind was thinking ahead as to how she could solidify their bond, how she could fix it so that her son would feel more secure and happy, even if Devil Child Carson felt the need to pick on Jacob in order to make himself feel better. If this didn’t stop soon, she’d have to go and see his teacher but she was trying to help Jacob to stand up on his own two little feet, to not always rely on her to fix everything. “We could get him to come over one weekend.”

“Can we, Mommy?”

“Of course we can.” He seemed appeased, calmer and she tucked the duvet under his chin, running her fingers gently around the shape of his eyebrows. “You mustn’t let any child stop you from taking your inhaler, Jacob. You could have been really ill.” It could have been fatal. She’d heard and read of too many cases where someone didn’t have their inhaler to hand when their airways had constricted. The consequences had been fatal. “Not taking your inhaler was wrong. I know it matters to you, at this age, what people think.” Heck, it mattered, to an extent at any age. “But you can’t let Henry Carson bully you into doing the wrong thing. I want you to try to stand up for yourself, especially when it comes to important things. I thought you were Iron Man?”

He gave her a searching stare. “I’m trying, Mommy.”

“And I love that you are. Goodnight, Honey.”

“’Nite.”

Once the financial pressure was off, to some extent, she could stop worrying about their future and concentrate more on Jacob and his friends and what was going on at school.

Compared to worries about debt, Henry Carson was a pushover.