Christmas at Claridge's Page 12

  Her words stopped him, but he didn’t turn back. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, Clem.’

  He closed the door softly and Clem ebbed against the doorframe, feeling relief, humiliation and shame flood through her. A party girl. An easy lay. A sure thing – predictable and disposable. Why wouldn’t he think that?

  She sank into a ball on the floor and began to cry.

  Chapter Twelve

  Clem blinked sleepily as she stepped out of the front door and into the first March day where the sun actually had any heat in it. She tipped the brim of her fedora down a bit to hide her red, swollen eyes, and undid the single button of her leopard-print pony-skin blazer. It was only nine o’clock, but the road was already in full swing with stallholders setting up.

  ‘Hey, Clem, looking foxy today!’ Jimmy the fishmonger called out to her as he hoisted up a crate of crayfish sitting on crushed ice.

  ‘Back at you,’ she drawled, even though he was wearing white overalls, a hair net, blue plastic bootees and smelled of kippers.

  Striding off the pavement, she walked down the centre of the road at a fast march. Their father had asked to meet her for breakfast and she was already late.

  ‘Morning!’ Katy called out as she approached the stall.

  ‘Hi! Can’t stop, I’m late!’ Clem waved as she stalked past.

  ‘Drinks later? We’re meeting up at the Duke.’

  ‘Sounds good,’ Clem replied. ‘You haven’t seen my dad have you?’

  ‘Yeah, ‘bout five minutes ago. He went that way,’ she said, pointing with a sheepskin-muffled hand that looked rosy with warmth.

  ‘Thanks,’ Clem replied, walking a bit faster.

  She strode down the road with the practised eye of a local, knowing exactly where the potholes were and dodging the bikes that came round corners too fast. Ahead on the right, she could already see the distinctive dark pink and brown awnings of the Hummingbird Bakery, rolled out to save the rainbow-iced confections in the windows from the glare of the early spring sun. But it wasn’t there that she was headed for today – she had to embargo herself from ever going there before 11 a.m., else she’d have Red Velvet cake for breakfast – instead, she was stopping just shy on the opposite side of the road at Gail’s, the large, bright delicafé where all the yummy mummies congregated after the school run, sitting out at the tables in the sun.

  Her father, she could see, had bagged a small, round table on the pavement, and she smiled to see him sitting there, looking so incongruous in his mustard cords and loden cashmere sweater, staring into space, a copy of National Geographic magazine unopened before him.

  ‘Hey, Daddyo!’ She called her usual greeting as she approached the table.

  He looked up at her distractedly, and the expression in his eyes stunned her to a complete stop. It was gone in the blink of an eye, his familiar twinkle coming back at the sight of her, but Clem felt like she’d been tasered.

  ‘Daddy, what is it?’ she asked, dismayed, sinking into the chair he’d left ready for her, her hands immediately clasping his.

  ‘What?’

  ‘You looked so . . . so sad.’

  ‘Me?’ He made the suggestion sound ridiculous. He was, after all, the man who ate Icelandic goose eggs for breakfast and had just holidayed in the Caribbean. ‘I was just daydreaming. Can’t an old man stare wistfully into space any more?’

  Clem shrugged. Was it wistfulness she’d seen?

  ‘Tea?’

  ‘I’ll get it,’ she said.

  ‘I insist,’ he said, rising from the table. ‘Will you have anything with it? See if we can’t feed you up a bit.’

  She shrugged again. ‘I’m not that hungry. But I’ll share something of yours if you like.’

  He shook his head, tutting. ‘Just like your mother,’ he mumbled, disappearing into the bakery. He came back out several minutes later with a pot of Earl Grey and a flapjack. Clem broke a third off the end of the flapjack and nibbled on it, watching her father pour the milk.

  ‘So, what’s up?’ she asked, although she already had an inkling why he’d asked to see her. ‘Is it Tom?’

  Edmund Alderton replaced the teapot with care and inhaled deeply. His usually jocular features – so full of colour and animation – seemed bloodless and limp today and he seemed older than she thought him.

  ‘Tom, yes. How is he? I was hoping he’d be here, too, today.’

  Clem shrugged. ‘Frantic at work.’ Clem was amazed how busy he could be doing nothing.

  Edmund tutted. ‘Always working, that boy. He never calls any more, and he’s cancelled our weekly lunch for the last four weeks on the trot. Whenever we call him, he always seems to be either working late or rushing out of the office. He says he’ll call back but he never does.’

  Clem bit her lip. So it wasn’t just her feeling abandoned then? Clover was tightening her grip, pulling Tom away from all of them, not just her.

  ‘Well, I’ve not seen much of him myself, if that’s any consolation. He stays at Clover’s practically every night now, and if he’s in the office he’s always on the phone, or else he’s off-site at the factory or trying to schmooze potential clients.’

  ‘Hmm, has any new business come in?’

  Clem shook her head. ‘No. It’s really quiet. We’ve had a few speculative calls and some follow-up meetings, but nothing seems to be coming of them. I’ve tried telling him I think we should diversify into other business models but . . . well, he doesn’t really take me seriously.’

  Edmund patted her hand. ‘Don’t take it to heart. It’s his baby. He’s always been dogged like that. He’ll listen only to the voice in his head when all’s said and done.’

  Clem sighed, pleased at least that her father’s words confirmed her own instincts to keep her plans a closely guarded secret. She couldn’t risk widening the circle of confidence any further.

  ‘It’s a shame he’s away so much,’ Clem said, stirring a sugar into her tea. ‘I’ve got a new cleaner coming in twice a week. She’s lovely, and the flat’s never looked so good, but Tom’s hardly around to notice.’

  Edmund gave a rumbling sound of disapproval. She knew her father had never taken to Clover either. ‘Is he getting ready to propose, do you think?’

  Clem sighed heavily. ‘Who knows? It’s hardly the time if the business is really on the skids.’ She didn’t dare mention that it was a lot more likely if Tom went ahead with the idea of selling the flat and moving in with Clover anyway – and she didn’t see how he wouldn’t, with things so bad at work. He’d done as he promised and given her some time; everything had gone quiet on that front since Clem had thrown out Clover and the estate agent in front of Mercy, but it wouldn’t last for ever. Spring was here and the road was beginning to burst into colour once more. If he was going to sell, it would be soon.

  She bit her lip anxiously at the thought of moving and resolved to get Stella round tonight, no matter what; they had to get the collection finished. Simon’s gift, last night, of the rose-pink suede and shagreens was a blessing from heaven, but it was going to mean a lot more work, and it was already getting harder to separate Stella from Oscar in the evenings. If that flash sale didn’t happen in the next few weeks it was going to be too late.

  ‘It’s not just Tom we’re worried about,’ Edmund said, staring at her with concerned eyes. Her face was puffy from another night spent in tears. ‘You seem to have become even more distant recently.’

  ‘Me?’ Clem asked innocently.

  ‘We live two streets away and yet it may as well be the other end of the country for the amount of times we see you.’

  ‘We’re doing this, aren’t we?’ She gestured around them.

  ‘You never pop in. And you seem to be going out of your way to avoid your mother. She’s very deeply hurt by it, Clemmie.’

  ‘We clash, that’s all. It’s just easier . . . not to.’ Clem looked away, watching as two skinny teenagers, who probably should have been at school, lit up behind a bin. ‘Besides, it’
s not me she’s interested in. Tom’s always been her favourite.’

  ‘That is categorically not true,’ Edmund said sternly. ‘She loves you very much. You must know that?’

  Clem looked at him side on, before looking away again. She didn’t reply. Last night’s tears weren’t quite spent and she felt dangerously emotional.

  ‘I know you’re very different creatures and that your mother can be . . . particular, at times, but I wish you’d try to get on a bit better,’ her father said, gently stroking her fingers whilst she watched the truanting teenagers. ‘Bear in mind that we’re none of us getting any younger, Clemmie. Your mother and I aren’t going to be around for ever. We want to see you both happy and settled.’ His voice had a tremor to it that made her look back at him.

  ‘I am happy and settled.’

  ‘You know what we mean.’

  Yes, she did know what they meant: married with kids. Clem stared into her tea just as a solitary tear dropped into it with a splash. She categorically did not want to have this conversation.

  ‘I like my life the way it is, Dad,’ she mumbled. Is this what today was about? Not Tom at all? She had been ambushed into a discussion about the ruins that passed as her life? Why did everyone think you had to be married with kids to be happy?

  ‘I wish I could believe that, darling. But if I’m honest, when I look at you, I see a lost little girl who somewhere along the line took a wrong turn. You put on a very good show, but you don’t fool me, Clemmie. I’m your father.’

  Clem drew her hands in sharply. ‘You’re wrong. There’s nothing I would change about my life. Nothing,’ she said with a defiance that was the only barrier keeping all the other tears in check.

  Her father stared at her for a long moment, before bowing his head and nodding. ‘Well, your mother and I miss you, that’s all, and we’d both dearly like to be more a part of your lives.’

  It was all Clem could do not to laugh at the statement. Her mother, wanting to be more involved with her life? As if.

  She rose to go. ‘I have to get to the office, Dad.’

  He looked hurt. ‘Because it’s so busy there?’

  ‘Because I’m paid to be there, whether it’s busy or not. Tom needs me.’

  Edmund nodded reluctantly. ‘Just think about what I’ve said. Your mother’s the only one you’ve got, and you’re losing time with each other by pursuing this silent war. She loves you very much.’

  Clem kissed him quickly on the cheek and left without saying another word. She couldn’t. Her poor father didn’t know that his words were false, that they’d already been found to be untrue. He was merely doing his wife’s bidding, saying the words that would choke her if she tried. But it was too late for olive branches now. Clem wouldn’t tolerate it. What her mother had done, Clem could neither forgive, nor forget.

  Everyone was busy trying to look busy when she walked into the office six minutes later. Pixie was collapsing cardboard boxes in the store cupboard, Simon was feeding paper documents into the shredder and Tom was on the phone.

  Clem dumped her battered vintage satchel disconsolately on the desk and slumped in her chair. Her father’s words – kind, loving, concerned – had rung in her ears like insults all the way back up the road, and she felt nervy and unsure of herself.

  She noticed a Post-it on her desk, written in Simon’s distinctive too-neat hand: ‘Delivery 5 p.m. today.’ She looked up at him – well, at his back. He was standing with his back to her, manually forcing sheets of paper through the cutting teeth every five seconds. He had to have seen her, he’d been standing side on to her when she’d walked in.

  ‘Thanks for this, Si,’ she said quietly. He was only 10 feet away from her, but he acted as though he hadn’t heard, widening his stance and pushing fatter wodges of paper through the machine, the revs filling up his silence.

  It was his version of a slap back, and she swallowed at the rebuke. Not friends after all, then. A great day this was turning out to be. Just great: a guilt trip from her father, and now a guilt trip from him.

  Pulling her phone from her bag, she texted Stella: ‘Surprise bounty of complete hides. Will explain later but must meet. Mine, 6 p.m. tonight? It’s urgent. Don’t blow me out for luvaboy.’

  Tom came off the phone, replacing the handset with something approaching a flourish, and both Simon and Clem looked back at him quizzically as he stared at it intently, lost in thought.

  ‘What?’ Clem asked, able to discern that he was trying his best to suppress the kind of warrior yell that had been the hallmark of their childhood. ‘Who was that?’

  He looked up, as though startled to find them all watching him, and an enigmatic smile flitted across his face like a phantom. ‘Possibly . . . only possibly, a new client.’

  Clem gasped in excitement.

  ‘Hold it! Don’t celebrate! It’s just a meeting,’ Tom warned her, worried by her instant happiness. ‘It’ll probably come to nothing.’

  ‘I bet it won’t!’ Clem gushed excitedly. ‘You’re Mr Charisma, you are. The bummer’s been the phone not ringing. As soon as you get someone face-to-face and start on your spiel, they’re goners every time. They love you, big brother.’

  ‘Actually, this might come down to whether or not they love you,’ Tom said steadily.

  ‘Me?’ Clem was stunned. She was never allowed near the clients. Hadn’t she proved time and again that she couldn’t be trusted to play with the grown-ups?

  ‘They’ve asked that you come to the meeting, too.’

  ‘Why me?’

  Tom shrugged. ‘Hopefully because they heard there’s a good-looking chick on my staff and they want something pretty to look at whilst they spend vast sums of money.’

  Clem tutted and threw a biro lid across the room at him.

  ‘Care to share?’ Simon asked, abandoning his position at the shredder and walking past Clem’s desk without acknowledging her. ‘What’s the project?’

  ‘A private house in Italy. Ligurian coastline.’

  ‘Nice!’ Simon nodded. ‘Big house?’

  ‘Big enough that it’s got a boathouse with . . . a boat,’ Tom said casually, his lips curling into a smile. ‘A sad and bedraggled boat that needs to be completely redesigned and reupholstered.’

  ‘A boat!’ Simon shouted. ‘Say you’re not messing with me.’

  ‘I’m not messing with you,’ Tom replied, thoroughly amused by Simon’s reaction – he knew full well this was Simon’s dream commission. Tom’s, too, albeit for different reasons: a marine project was up there in the prestige stakes with the supercar market, and would not only save the business, but propel it into the next level, just as they craved. Bugatti might have been lost to them, but they weren’t dead in the water yet.

  ‘Obviously, the boat’s going to require all manner of technical compliances, so I’d like you to get on it, Si. Research everything. I want to go to them with something innovative. We’ll give them navy and white over my dead body.’

  ‘Unless they want navy and white,’ Simon said sternly, arching an eyebrow.

  ‘Exactly.’ Tom laughed.

  Clem smiled to hear the sound – so rare in recent weeks – she could almost see the stress lifting off him like a heat cloud. Would Clover be so happy, she wondered, to learn that the business might be viable after all?

  And what about her collection? Was it even going to be needed now? She wondered as she watched Tom and Simon talk earnestly and eagerly, heads bowed together as Tom directed orders and Simon took frantic notes.

  Her phone buzzed with a new text and she looked down to see Stella’s reply: ‘Sure. Intrigued, haters.’

  Timing!

  Clem watched as the boys high-fived each other. So much for not getting carried away!

  She felt a kernel of nervousness harden in the pit of her stomach, anxious to see her brother so clearly investing all his hope into this one meeting in spite of himself, even though, as he’d said himself, it could all come to nothing.

>   She bit her lip thoughtfully. Well, she wouldn’t take the risk. For once, she’d be the one playing it safe. The hides were being delivered later and Stella was free to come over – things were already in motion anyway. The best thing she could do was to carry on as though their world was falling apart and she alone could save it.

  Chapter Thirteen

  ‘You’re under my feet, girl,’ Mercy said, flinging the Hoover alarmingly towards Clem’s bare feet as she painted her nails a deep, glittery shade of plum.

  Clem lifted her legs in the air, letting Mercy pass by, the Hoover in one hand, a glass of red wine in the other. Mercy had had to switch her hours because of another, awkward employer who refused to negotiate on either times or wages, and she was now often here in the evenings when Clem got back from the office. It suited them both. With Tom so rarely around, Clem enjoyed the company, and the confrontation with Clover had been a powerful bonding exercise. They chatted easily about anything and everything, and Mercy not only didn’t bat an eyelid at Clem wandering around half-clothed, which was the true litmus test of whether they could be friends, half the time she joined her.

  Clem admired her glossy, dark-disco toes. ‘Like?’ she asked.

  ‘They look bruised if you want my honest opinion,’ Mercy said, planting a hand on her hip and fixing Clem with a sceptical stare. ‘Like a truck ran over them.’

  ‘Good, that was just the look I was after.’ Clem giggled, delighted to be so contrary, pushing the rolled-up tissue paper further between her toes.

  The slam of the street door told them both Stella had arrived, and Clem got up to open the door for her, walking in a peculiar fashion on her heels to keep her nail polish from smudging.

  ‘Good look!’ Stella grinned up at her from the stairs as Clem stood by the door in a vest and knickers.

  ‘It’s boiling in here, I’m warning you,’ Clem said, kissing her friend on the cheeks as Stella unwound her signature metre-long Aran-knitted scarf. ‘Fuck knows where the thermostat is. I think Tom’s taken it with him. Or Clover’s hidden it.’