“Mrs. Cooper will be in tomorrow. She can clear up,” grinned Simon. “It’ll give her a chance to have a good moan. No doubt she’ll threaten to complain to my step-father so I’ll have to give her a bob or two to keep her mouth shut.”
He cleared a space in the kitchen and within minutes had prepared an enormous cheese omelette, which he cut into two and garnished with piles of salad and slices of buttered seeded bread. They ate the meal in silence, just smiling at each other, Margaret still dizzy with desire and Simon immensely pleased that he had achieved exactly what he wanted. She was crazy for him and he didn’t think it would be long before she had him set up somewhere.
Having satisfied their hunger for food, their interest in sexual gratification was overwhelming and Simon swept Margaret into his arms and took her back to bed. They made love. They slept. They made love and slept again. The cycle continued until the following morning.
Just before the much-needed Mrs. Cooper was due to arrive, Margaret left the flat in a taxi. She departed with a smile on her face and promise from Simon that he would visit Canleigh House that evening. Margaret envisaged the scene. That gorgeous male, stretched out on the rug in the lounge or cavorting in her bed. She shivered with anticipation. Never had her body or her soul felt so relaxed. She closed her eyes, re-living the night with vivid pictures in her mind of his gorgeous muscular body, his mouth and his hands caressing her, sending her to the brink and beyond many times. She was desperate for more and sighed with deep pleasure, opening her eyes reluctantly when the taxi stopped at traffic lights.
Glancing round to see where they were, a nearby newsstand caught her eye. The headlines were bold. ‘DUCHESS OF CANLEIGH FROLICKING NAKED IN PARK WITH TOY BOY’. With sickening clarity, she recalled the malevolent grin on Michael Green’s face.
Her mind was in a whirl as the taxi slowed near to Canleigh House and she was horrified to see there were already reporters hanging about, smoking cigarettes, chatting excitedly and playing with their cameras.
“Don’t stop,” she screamed at the taxi driver. “Keep going. Go around the corner.”
She threw herself onto the back seat so no-one could see her and began to shake uncontrollably. What on earth was she going to do? She couldn’t go back to Simon’s. They were probably already there too. Think, think, Margaret, she told herself. Rifling in her bag she found her keys. With huge relief, she saw the one to Amelia’s flat. Hoping upon hope there wouldn’t be anyone there, she redirected the taxi driver to a street nearby to her former bolthole. He was trying unsuccessfully to hide the smirk on his fat, florid face. He too had seen the headlines, recognised her and was enjoying the situation hugely.
Fifteen minutes later she alighted the taxi, almost threw a five-pound note at him and watched him drive away, still smirking. As soon as he was out of sight she hurried down the road, turned a corner and nearly cried with relief when she saw the street she wanted was empty of reporters and she could sidle into the block of flats undetected, praying there would be no-one in at Amelia’s so she wouldn’t have to give explanations of her sudden presence. She really wasn’t up to it.
Amelia and all her chums were abroad at the moment so Margaret was lucky. The flat was empty, although the phone was ringing. She lit a cigarette. That bloody phone. It was driving her mad and now she was headline news it was going to get worse, far worse. It might even be Charles. He might have been in touch with Amelia and she might have given him the number. Oh God, whatever was he going to say? She was in shock. She had to think but the noise kept on and on. Unable to stand it any longer she marched into the hall and picked up the receiver, bracing herself in case it was Charles.
It wasn’t. It was some female wanting to talk to a Charlene. The tension drained from her body for a second as she said firmly she didn’t know who Charlene was and replaced the receiver.
Helping herself to a shot of brandy from Amelia’s decanter, she smoked two cigarettes down to the butt, frequently checking the windows for signs of journalists gathering outside. She felt utterly trapped. She couldn’t go back to Canleigh House, she daren’t go on the train back to Canleigh Hall, and she certainly couldn’t go to Simon’s. She could stay here. Amelia wouldn’t mind and probably would find it highly amusing in the circumstances. But what would Charles do? Oh, God, she really had made a mess of it this time. She had to talk to someone and there was only one person.
Simon answered the phone almost as soon as it had started to ring. “Have you seen the papers?” she asked quickly.
“Yes, Mrs. Cooper had a copy and gave it to me with a distinct look of disapproval on her face … and I now have bloody photographers outside. Mother is going to be furious and as for my damned step-father, he will see red. Blast that bloody journalist … he should be strung up. I am so very sorry, Margaret. What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know. Charles is going to be furious too. He’ll insist I go back I expect and I’ll be placed in never-ending seclusion in that damned awful old house in darkest, deepest Yorkshire for the rest of my life. God knows if I will ever be allowed back into civilisation again.”
“Christ,
