The Bedroom Assignment. Sophie Weston

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СКАЧАТЬ away. ‘Is he very upset?’ she said with compunction.

      Suze pursed her lips. ‘Confused is probably a better word,’ she pronounced.

      ‘I’m sorry about that.’

      ‘It’s understandable. He’s a scarce commodity and he knows it. Single, straight, solvent. And a business that’s going to make him a millionaire in the next five years. From his point of view, it’s a seller’s market.’

      Zoe felt slightly better. ‘You mean he isn’t breaking his heart?’

      In contrast to Zoe, who was barefoot in dusty cut-offs and a torn tee shirt, Suze was dressed in a business suit. But she kicked her legs against the settle like the five-year-old she had been when they’d first met at kindergarten.

      ‘No, but he’s scratching his head. He muttered something about sex…’ Again Suze left an inviting pause.

      ‘Did he?’ Zoe’s tone was discouraging.

      ‘Aw, come on, Zo. Give.’

      ‘Have a coffee,’ said Zoe firmly.

      She made instant coffee in two thick china mugs and padded across the kitchen with them. Suze took hers, but she frowned with irritation.

      ‘I mean, you can’t keep going through men like they grow on trees.’ Her voice was full of righteous indignation. ‘Quite apart from anything else, it’s not fair to the rest of us.’

      Zoe gave a hollow laugh. ‘Is that right?’

      Suze did not notice it was hollow. ‘And it’s beastly inconvenient. I never know who you’re going to bring to a party.’

      Zoe pushed back her untidy brown curls and hitched herself up onto the corner of the cluttered table. ‘Well, if that’s all you’re worried about—’

      ‘Or if you’re going to bring anyone at all. And what he will be like if you do.’

      ‘I’ll make sure to send you the next one’s resumé,’ Zoe said dryly.

      Suze Manoir grinned. ‘Or you could just stick to the same man for more than a couple of dates,’ she suggested. ‘That would be a first.’

      Oh, Lord, thought Zoe. Aloud she said, ‘Yes, ma’am.’

      ‘Oh, you,’ said Suze, exasperated. ‘Okay. I’ll mind my own business. What do we need to do to get this house sorted?’

      ‘Just about everything,’ said Zoe wryly. ‘Starting with rewiring and moving on up.’

      The kitchen of the Brown family house was big and untidy. Just at the moment about a third of it looked beautiful. A wild green arrangement of leafy summer branches and ferns hid the peeling paintwork round the fireplace and the stains on the old pine table. Zoe had set out dishes of roast beef, and the Thai chicken and vegetable salads that she had prepared yesterday, all covered in plastic wrap. She had even set little groups of solid candles, ready for lighting, on the fireplace and one corner of the table.

      But that was the far end of the kitchen. The other two thirds, where they were sitting, looked like a shipwreck. A pretty shabby shipwreck at that, thought Zoe ruefully.

      She and her sister had slapped a coat of paint on the walls at Christmas, just to make it look more cheerful. But the whole house had a patched and mended air. Whereas Suze had shown an interior decorator round her central London pad for a television lifestyle programme, and the Manoir house was immaculately presented.

      Suze followed her eyes. ‘Hey,’ she said gently, showing that in this area, at least, she was right that they had no secrets. ‘So it’s a bit battered. Don’t worry about it. That’s why we’re having the party here, after all.’

      ‘Good point,’ agreed Zoe. ‘Okay, let’s kick back and party.’

      From the moment that they’d taken charge of their own birthday celebrations, Suze and Zoe had given a joint party at Zoe’s house. They chose a day in the summer, when hopefully people would be able to go out into the garden, and called it their Official Birthday. Suze said that the arrangement gave her more freedom than her parents’ house and more room than her own flat. But Zoe knew it was more than that.

      Suze knew that, ever since Zoe’s father had left home, money had been dreadfully tight—and, even worse, that Zoe’s mother had withdrawn into the cocoon of her own world. The Official Birthday Party was Suze’s way of helping out without admitting it.

      ‘You’re a good friend,’ Zoe said with affection.

      She went over to the big wipe-down board where the family left messages for each other. Today it had been wiped clear—no phone messages for Artemis, her twenty-year-old younger sister, currently out with boyfriend Ed, or notes about washing seventeen-year-old Harry’s rugby kit. Today it was covered by one orderly list in Zoe’s neat writing. More than half the items had already been ticked off.

      ‘You’re so efficient,’ said Suze with a sigh. She came up and stood at Zoe’s shoulder. ‘You’re really wasted here. You ought to be running a government, not this mad house.’

      Zoe flung up a hand.

      ‘Oh, all right,’ said Suze, as she always did. ‘You know your own business best. Got a job for next week?’

      Zoe pulled a face. ‘Just a couple of guided walks along the Thames. I’ll probably call the library department on Monday morning, see if they’ve got anyone sick.’

      ‘I wish you’d sign on with me again,’ Suze said wistfully. She ran her own very successful staff agency. ‘People are always asking for you.’

      ‘Maybe after the summer,’ said Zoe vaguely. She narrowed her eyes at the list. ‘Put up fairy lights in the apple tree. Glitter balls in the sitting room. Which do you want to do?’

      ‘Sounds like manual labour.’ Suze looked at her elegantly painted fingernails and shuddered. ‘We’ll do them together,’ she decreed.

      They went out into the garden first. Zoe brought the ladder out of the shed and slung it over her shoulder to carry it up to the orchard.

      ‘High-ho, high-ho,’ sang Suze, following behind with a coil of outdoor fairy lights.

      Zoe grinned over her shoulder. ‘I’m no dwarf.’

      It was true. She was nearly as tall as her six-foot father, and certainly as striking, with her candid, wide-open brown eyes and mop of unruly chestnut curls.

      ‘No, but you’re certainly one of the workers of the world,’ said Suze, watching as Zoe lodged the ladder against the tree trunk in a workmanlike manner. ‘Now, if Simon were here he could do it. That’s what men are for.’

      Zoe pushed a dusty brown curl behind her ear and measured the angle of the ladder. She adjusted it.

      ‘Well, Simon’s not coming,’ she said bracingly. ‘Get used to it. And hang onto the ladder. You don’t have to chip your nails. Just lean against it.’

      She climbed nimbly up the ladder into the СКАЧАТЬ