‘Heavens, no. Keith’s not that far up the corporate tree that his chairman would know of his existence!’
That was some small relief to Alethea. She felt she would never have survived the embarrassment had Trent known all the time he had sat opposite her this evening that her brother-in-law, his employee, was a crook who had robbed him. ‘Mother knew all about Trent being the man who pays Keith’s salary, though, didn’t she?’
‘She saw Keith’s letter today from SEC. It had the name of the chairman and directors on it. You know Mother’s sharp brain. She’ll have filed away all that information without even realising she was doing it.’
‘Oh, grief!’ Alethea exclaimed, and remembered how both her mother and sister had looked when she had come into the sitting room at a minute before seven that evening. ‘Mother seems to be permanently bitter about men. But is that why you looked a degree or two more sour when Trent was here? Because...’
‘How else could I look?’ Maxine asked tearfully. ‘Here am I stuck in this house which, since Mother insisted I bring everything that wasn’t nailed down so that some other woman couldn’t have it, is so crammed full you can’t move without tripping over, and there were you, all dressed up to go out for a fun evening with a man who I’d just realised could be ultimately responsible for bringing a court action against my children’s father!’
‘Oh, Maxine!’ Alethea exclaimed as her sister started to cry. Men, men, rotten men, she fumed as she hurried over to her.
Alethea wasn’t sure that she meant all men as she tried to comfort her sister. When Maxine was a little calmer, she made her the drink which Maxine had offered to make her. And when, half an hour later, she and her sister were upstairs and in their rooms, one thing was set like concrete in Alethea’s mind. Maxine’s disclosures about who was in charge of SEC made it well and truly settled. Even if Trent de Havilland did make contact to ask her for a second date, now that she knew that, ultimately, he was the man her brother-in-law had stolen from, there was no way she could ever go out with him again!
CHAPTER THREE
WEDNESDAY and Thursday passed uneventfully, although Alethea found that thoughts of Trent de Havilland were slipping into her head far more frequently than she would have expected—given that she was never going to go out with him again, even if he did ask...which he wouldn’t.
Evidence that Trent de Havilland was not thinking of her so frequently—if at all—was plain from the fact that her phone at home stayed silent. Not that she was at all bothered, of course. It saved her from looking for some excuse to give him. How could she go out with him when her sister’s husband had cheated his firm out of money?
Life at home, however, seemed to be growing incneasingly difficult. Her mother was forever badgering her on the subject of Trent de Havilland, even though Alethea had stated that she had no intention of going out with him again. No need to tell her mother that chance would be a fine thing—a girl had her pride.
‘The children have been up in your room,’ her mother greeted her when she arrived home from work on Friday.
‘All of them?’ Alethea asked faintly.
‘Just Sadie and Georgia. I looked after them after school while Maxine took Polly to the doctor. I don’t think they did any harm.’
‘How is Polly?’
‘It’s just a bit of a cold. The doctor said there’s nothing to worry about.’
Bracing herself, Alethea went upstairs to her room. ‘Oh, grief!’ she muttered as she went in. Someone had added an extra table to the room, which was already filled to capacity, and her wardrobe door was ajar. Her clothes had been gone through, garments tried on and then crumpled by the inexpert attempts of shorter persons to hang them back on the rail. Her dressing table was a disaster area. The idea of having an apartment of her own had more and more appeal. Her mother would have a fit if she suggested leaving home, she knew that in advance, but...
Sadie and Georgia, of course, had no school the following day and were allowed to stay up a little later—if they were quiet. But they seemed to be noisier than ever that evening. Alethea joined in the general sigh of relief when at last all three girls were in bed and silence reigned.
Then the telephone rang. Most peculiarly, for there was not the smallest reason why, Alethea felt her heartbeat quicken. She looked across at Maxine. ‘It’s for you, I expect,’ she commented, but Maxine was already halfway out of her chair.
‘She’s far too soft with him!’ Eleanor Pemberton stated abruptly as Maxine disappeared into the hall to take the call in the alcove under the stairs. ‘What she wants to do is—’ She broke off as Maxine came back into the room.
‘It’s for you, Alethea,’ Maxine informed her.
‘Who is it?’ their mother wanted to know.
‘Trent de Havilland,’ Maxine answered, and Alethea felt her face go a warm pink.
‘I thought you weren’t going to go out with him again!’ Eleanor Pemberton snapped.
‘I’m not,’ Alethea answered, and went out into the hall. Why on earth she felt the need to swallow before she could pick up the phone and say, ‘Hello,’ she had no idea.
‘Lucky I caught you in!’ Trent responded. Was he being funny?
‘You’re on your way out yourself, I expect,’ she commented lightly, hoping he’d think that was the way it was with her, too, and that the sun never set for her on a Friday night.
‘I’m just back after a few days in Italy,’ he drawled easily, and, getting down to the point of his call, he continued, ‘I’m having some people round tomorrow evening—any time from eight to midnight. Can you make it?’
He did want to see her again! She wasn’t going, of course, but, she realised, she felt much better for being asked. ‘I’m sorry,’ she began, useless when it came to telling lies, but striving hard to think up some excuse.
‘It was a long shot,’ he cut in pleasantly. ‘I hardly expected you’d be free.’
‘You know how it is,’ she murmured, wondering why she didn’t tell him outright that she was not going to see him again—probably because she was certain to receive a very short and sharp answer for her trouble. Or perhaps it was solely good manners that held her back.
‘Of course,’ he answered blandly, but straight away he went on to astonish her by adding, ‘Perhaps you’ll make a note of my address. If you and your date are in the area, both of you might like to drop in.’
She hadn’t found his address on file at the office. So, like the efficient assistant PA that she was, Alethea automatically had a notepad before her, a pencil in her hand, as Trent dictated his address. Don’t hold your breath, she thought sourly—clearly Trent de Havilland didn’t give a button that she had a date with someone else tomorrow—and he wasn’t to know that she hadn’t, was he! Not that she wanted him to give a button anyway! ‘I’ll see what I can do—thank you for asking,’ she said prettily, and knew, as she was sure Trent knew, that his small ‘get together’ tomorrow evening would take place without her.
She said goodbye nicely and, tearing the slip of paper from the notepad, she put it in her pocket and went back to the sitting room.
‘You were a long time,’ her mother accused her.
‘Was I?’ Alethea thought she hadn’t been speaking with Trent for more than a few minutes.
‘What did he want?’ Eleanor Pemberton demanded.
Alethea didn’t want to tell her. Somehow, she just knew it: the fact that Trent de Havilland had invited her out for a second time would be all her fault.
‘He’s having a small—or—party tomorrow night.