Miranda's Big Mistake - Jill Mansell [3]
The sudden hammering on the door almost catapulted her off the loo seat.
`Chloe? That you in there?'
Well, who else was it likely to be? thought Chloe resignedly.
`Um… yes.'
At least she hadn't been in the middle of some tricky form of gymnastics involving pipettes and mid-stream flow. `Okay.' Bruce, her boss, sounded impatient. He had never understood why any woman needed to spend longer than thirty seconds in the loo. `Keep an eye on the shop, would you? I need to make a phone call.'
`Two minutes,' Chloe called out in desperation. `What?'
She couldn't not find out now, the suspense was killing her almost as much as the need to pee.
`Just give me two minutes, okay?'
Outside the door, Bruce shook his head in bewilderment. Women and their inner workings, it was all a mystery to him.
`Okay.'
Out in the shop, the bell above the door went ding, heralding the arrival of a customer. Relieved, Chloe heard the sound of her boss's retreating footsteps. She couldn't possibly pee on to a stick with Bruce lurking just inches away on the other side of the toilet door.
The crucial stream of urine was duly passed. Chloe closed her eyes and began to count.
When she opened her eyes again, the end of the stick was blue.
`Oh, good grief,' Chloe whispered, the words almost drowned out by the thundering of her heart. Pulling open the neck of her angora sweater and peering down at her stomach, she said in an unsteady voice, `Hello.'
Out in the shop, Bruce was wrapping up his customer's purchase, a wildly expensive yellow and white Italian vase. When Chloe eventually reappeared, looking pale, he said, `Chloe, before I forget. Bit of a do on at the golf club this evening. Verity and I were hoping to get along for an hour or two, but the blasted babysitter's let us down. Any chance of you riding to the rescue?'
Having ridden to the rescue before, Chloe wasn't fooled for an instant by his jovial tone. Like cat years, Bruce's idea of an hour or two generally meant seven or eight.
`Bruce, I'm sorry. I can't.'
Taken aback wasn't the word for it.
`But you said you didn't have anything on tonight.' His tone was accusing.
Be brave, stand your ground, don't let him bully you into it.
`That was this morning.' Chloe spoke as firmly as she dared. `I do now.'
Chapter 2
Florence Curtis had led an action-packed life; she had always lived for the day and crammed as much as was humanly possible into each and every one of them. Married at twenty, a mother at twenty-five, divorced by twenty-seven, married again, widowed, married for the third time at thirty-three… good Lord, it made her dizzy nowadays just to remember those hectic years when, juggling homes, staff and the needs of her much-loved but incredibly demanding son, she had followed her various husbands all over the world.
Then her beloved Ray, number three, had died of a heart attack on the steps of the casino at Monte Carlo and Florence had decided to call it a day on the husband front. Twice widowed was enough; the pain was almost too much to bear. From now on she would stick to lovers. Apart from anything else, she glibly informed her friends - because sympathy was anathema to Florence - she was tired of endlessly changing her surname on chequebooks.
The next twenty years had been spent in the relentless pursuit of fun, with Florence adoring every last minute. Her motto had always been `You're a long time dead', and until the first signs of stiffness had begun to seep into her joints, it had never occurred to her that perhapsit should have been `You're a long time crippled with arthritis'.
It was hard, adapting to life in a wheelchair when your brain sometimes fooled you into thinking you were still as active as you'd always been. Every now and again Florence dreamt that she had been dancing all night at the Cafй Royal. When she woke up, exhilarated and in the mood to carry on, she would think, That's what I'll do today, go somewhere a bit swish and dance…
Until she tried to turn over in bed, only to groan aloud with the pain. These days she was lucky if she