Always and Forever. Cathy Kelly

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СКАЧАТЬ inner fire roared a bit more. He was doing what they all did: deliberately avoiding any mention of the hotel’s shortcomings. Like ostriches with their heads in the sand.

      Cleo steeled herself. ‘I wish I could agree with you about the hotel, Dad,’ she said, ‘but I can’t. I love this place but we’re on the slippery slope. We need to do something.’

      ‘I think your father knows what he’s doing,’ Sondra shot in. ‘He’s been running this hotel for thirty years.’

      Cleo’s plans to be diplomatic took a dive. ‘So a hotel management degree is a waste of time and money, is it, Sondra, and I know nothing about hotels?’

      ‘You said it, not me,’ smirked Sondra.

      ‘Please don’t argue,’ said Sheila.

      ‘All I’m saying is that the hotel is in trouble and nobody’s even talking about it,’ Cleo argued hotly. ‘We might have managed in the past because people love the Willow but it’s getting older; the whole hotel needs refurbishing. If you could see the money they spend in some of the hotels I’ve worked in…Customers expect that now…’

      ‘The Willow doesn’t stand up to the other places you’ve been then?’ her father said evenly.

      ‘No, Dad, that’s not what I mean at all.’ Cleo’s eyes pleaded with him not to take offence. ‘They were different sorts of hotels. We run a small, intimate house hotel where people feel welcomed into our world and that’s what I love. That’s what you created, Dad.’ Her eyes were still pleading. ‘But we need to improve the place somehow. Carrickwell’s changing all the time and we’ve got to change with it, be ready for the future or else…’

      ‘Or else what?’ asked Harry.

      Cleo couldn’t say it. She couldn’t say they’d close down.

      ‘Or else we’ll see the profits dive,’ she added lamely.

      ‘Cleo, we’ve got twenty covers for dinner tonight,’ Sheila Malin added. ‘That’s hardly bad for a week night.’

      Everyone but Cleo smiled at this clear proof of the hotel’s success.

      ‘Make that twenty-two covers. Or even twenty-three.’ Sondra patted her belly happily.

      ‘You don’t have any steak, Jacqui?’ called Barney. ‘I’m ravenous.’

      ‘Chef does not have time to whip up private meals for you, Barney,’ Cleo snapped at her brother. ‘You’ve been up here four times in the past week for dinner. Can neither of you cook?’

      ‘I’m pregnant,’ Sondra said, looking daggers at her sister-in-law. ‘Cooking makes me sick. I don’t know why they call it morning sickness, when it’s all-day sickness.’

      ‘Lots of women have to work when they’re pregnant and they can’t afford to give up their jobs at the drop of a hat because their husband’s family business will keep doling out money to support them,’ Cleo said, taking the gloves off. She knew that her parents supplemented Barney’s income with handouts. Handouts that Barney felt were entirely his due.

      ‘It’s a loan,’ snarled Sondra.

      ‘Four loans in the past two years?’

      ‘It’s none of your business.’

      ‘It’s my business when the hotel profits are being siphoned off into your pockets.’

      ‘Cleo.’ There was a warning in her father’s tone but neither Cleo nor Sondra took heed.

      ‘You could be contributing something if you were still working on reception, Sondra,’ Cleo went on. ‘We all know that Tamara is hopeless. She spends the whole time doing her nails.’

      ‘How dare you talk about my sister like that?’ shrieked Sondra.

      ‘Don’t, please,’ Sheila begged her daughter.

      ‘Yeah, who do you think you are, Cleo?’ Barney said, remembering his husbandly duty. ‘Apologise.’

      Cleo was just about to say that she had no intention of apologising because every word she’d said was true, when Harry interrupted. ‘Yes, apologise, Cleo.’

      Stunned, she spun round to look at her father. ‘For telling the truth?’ she demanded.

      ‘We don’t have big rows in this family, Cleo,’ Harry went on. ‘That gets nobody anywhere. Please apologise to Sondra.’

      Cleo felt betrayed. Her father rarely interfered in squabbles and it was hardly a family secret that she and Sondra didn’t get on. They were grown-ups; they were entitled not to get on if they didn’t want to. She loved and respected her father but he wasn’t always right. All she’d done was tell the truth and she was being punished.

      Although she knew why: her father hated rows and tried to avoid conflict at all costs. His mother had been what he euphemistically called ‘fiery’ and Harry had grown up watching his parents face each other like bullfighters, circling in rage, screaming insults several times a week. A person could have too much plate-throwing in their life, he used to say. Cleo knew she’d inherited her grandmother’s passion – although not her harsh tongue. She would never hurt anyone with a rash word – she knew better than that, no matter how passionately she felt about something. Her grandmother’s way was not the right way to do things.

      ‘You’re right, Dad,’ she said calmly now. ‘I went about it the wrong way. I’m sorry for talking about Tamara like that,’ she said to Sondra. But not sorry for the other parts. ‘That wasn’t fair. I’m going out for a walk.’ And she got up to go.

      Her father muttered something about going into the office for a few moments, and he left too, by a different door.

      

      Cleo went and sat where she’d always gone when she was wildly annoyed but trying to hide it. Down at the bottom of the garden, behind the orchard wall, on the cracked stone seat under the apple tree. The bark of the tree was coated with silver and there were no acid-green buds appearing. The tree was dying from neglect. Nobody in the Willow knew the first thing about trees and the men who worked on the garden had their hands full sorting out the front in the limited time available.

      Some of the hotel’s brides had found this secluded spot over the years and had been photographed there, just the bride and the groom, smiling under the apple tree. For that reason alone, the tree should have been taken care of but nobody had listened to Cleo when she said it. They never did. And they probably never would, Cleo realised with a jolt.

      She knew she’d changed from a tomboyish kid, but to Mum, Dad, Jason and Barney, she was still the baby of the family.

      Idly, she picked a bit of bark off the tree. Several beetles fell out, shocked at losing their home. Feeling like a murderer, Cleo tried to replace the bark but it wouldn’t stick.

      ‘Sorry, boys,’ she said to the beetles who’d made a rapid exit on the stony ground at her feet.

      They’d lost their home and the Malins would lose their home too.

      She took the piece СКАЧАТЬ