A Deal To Mend Their Marriage

They sipped tea and ate cake in silence for a while. Paul had been in her father’s employ for as long as Caro could remember. He was more like an honorary uncle than a member of staff, and she found herself taking comfort in his quiet presence.

‘Are you all right, Miss Caroline?’

‘You can call me Caro you know.’ It was an old argument.

‘You’ll always be Miss Caroline to me.’ He grinned. ‘Even though you’re all grown up—married, no less, and holding a director’s position at that auction house of yours.’

In the next instance his expression turned stricken. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to mention that bit about you being married. It was foolish of me.’

She shrugged and tried to pretend that the word married didn’t burn through her with a pain that could still cripple her at unsuspecting moments. As she and Jack had been separated for the last five years, ‘married’ hardly seemed the right word to describe them. Even if, technically, it was true.

She forced herself to focus on something else instead. ‘It’s not my auction house, Paul. I just work there.’

She pulled in a breath and left off swirling her fork though the crumbs remaining on her plate.

‘My father has left me everything, Paul. Everything.’

Paul’s jaw dropped. He stared at her and then sagged back in his chair. ‘Well, I’ll be...’

His astonishment gratified her. At least she wasn’t the only one shocked to the core at this turnaround. To describe her relationship with her father as ‘strained’ would be putting it mildly. And kindly.

He straightened. ‘Oh, that is good news Miss Caroline. In more than one way.’ He beamed at her, patting his chest just above his heart, as if urging it to slow its pace. ‘I’m afraid I’ve a bit of confession to make. I’ve been squirrelling away odd bits and pieces here and there. Things of value, but nothing your father would miss, you understand. I just thought... Well, I thought you might need them down the track.’

Good grief! Paul was her father’s thief?

Dear Lord, if he knew her father had written Barbara out of his will, thinking her the guilty party... Oh! And if Barbara knew what Paul had done...

Caro closed her eyes and tried to contain a shudder.

‘Paul, you could’ve gone to jail if my father had ever found out what you were doing!’

‘But there’s no harm done now, is there? I mean, now that you’ve inherited the estate I don’t need to find a way to...to get those things to you. They’re legally yours.’ His smile faded. ‘Are you upset with me?’

How could she be? Nobody had ever gone out on a limb like that for her before. ‘No, just...frightened at what might’ve happened,’ she lied.

‘You don’t have to worry about those sorts of what-ifs any more.’

Maybe not, but she still had to find a way to make this right. ‘It’s only fair that I split the estate with Barbara.’

A breath shuddered out of him. He glanced around the kitchen pensively. ‘Does that mean selling the old place?’

What on earth did she need with a mansion in Mayfair? She didn’t say that out loud. This had been Paul’s home for over thirty years. It hit her then that her father had made no provision in his will for Paul either. She’d remedy that as soon as she could.

‘I don’t know, Paul, but we’ll work something out. I’m not going to leave you high and dry, I promise. Trust me. You, Barbara and I—we’re family.’

He snorted. ‘Funny kind of family.’

She opened her mouth and then closed it, nodding. Never had truer words been spoken.

‘Will you be staying the night, Miss Caro?’

Heavens, where Paul was concerned, Miss Caro was positively gushing—a sign of high sentiment and emotion.

From somewhere she found a smile. ‘Yes, I think I’d better.’ She had her own room in the Mayfair mansion, even though she rented a tiny one-bedroom flat in Southwark. ‘Hopefully Barbara will... Well, hopefully I’ll get a chance to talk to her.’

Hopefully she’d get a chance to put the other woman’s mind at rest—at least about her financial future.

* * *

‘Mrs Fielding refuses to join you for breakfast,’ Paul intoned ominously the next morning as Caro helped herself to coffee.

Caro heaved back a sigh. Barbara had refused to speak to her at all last night. She’d tried calling out assurances to her stepmother through her closed bedroom door, but had given up when Barbara had started blasting show tunes—her father’s favourites—from her music system.

‘You will, however, be pleased to know that she did get up at some stage during the night to make herself something to eat.’

That was something at least.

‘Oh, Miss Caroline! You need to eat something before you head off to work,’ he said when she pushed to her feet.

‘I’m fine, Paul, I promise.’ Her appetite would eventually return. Although if he’d offered her cake for breakfast...

Stop thinking about cake.

‘I’m giving Freddie Soames a viewing of a rather special snuffbox this morning.’ She’d placed it in her father’s safe—her safe—prior to the reading of the will yesterday. ‘After that I’ll take the rest of the day off and see if I can’t get Barbara to talk to me then.’

As a director of Vertu, the silver and decorative arts division at Richardson’s, one of London’s leading auction houses, she had some flexibility in the hours she worked.

She glanced over her shoulder at Paul, who followed on her heels as she entered her father’s study—her study. ‘You will keep an eye on Barbara this morning, won’t you?’

‘If you wish it.’

She bit back a grin, punching in the combination to the safe. Ever since Paul had caught Barbara tossing the first Mrs Fielding’s portrait into a closet, he’d labelled her as trouble. ‘I do wish it.’

The door to the safe swung open and—Caro blinked, squinted and then swiped her hand through the empty space.

Her heart started to pound. ‘Paul, please tell me I’m hallucinating.’ Her voice rose. ‘Please tell me the safe isn’t empty.’

He moved past her to peer inside. ‘Dear God in heaven!’ He gripped the safe’s door. ‘Do you think we’ve been burgled?’

Something glittered on the floor at her feet. She picked it up. The diamond earing dangled from her fingers and comprehension shot through her at the same moment it spread across Paul’s face.

‘Barbara,’ she said.

And at the same time he said, ‘Mrs Fielding.’

She patted her racing heart. ‘That’s okay, then.’

‘She’ll have been after those jewels.’