Czytaj książkę: «A Will, a Wish...a Proposal»

CHAPTER ONE

‘WHAT ON EARTH were you thinking?’ Max Loveday burst into the office and shook the printed out press release in his father’s direction. True to form his father’s chair was turned away from the desk, allowing the occupant to face the window. Apparently the view over the city ‘inspired’ him.

‘What on earth is DL Media going to do with a dating app?’

More pertinently, where exactly were the millions of dollars his father had apparently paid out for the app going to come from? In the last year every budget had been squeezed and slashed to accommodate his father’s spending spree; there was no more give in the entire company.

Steven Loveday swivelled the black leather chair around and looked at his son, his expression as guileless as that of a three-month-old baby. It was, Max reflected, the expression he always wore when he was up to something.

And he usually was.

‘Max? What a lovely surprise.’

Steven’s voice was as rich as molasses and just as smooth. The kind of voice that oozed authority and paternal benevolence, as did the warm brown eyes and wide smile. It was a shame he didn’t have the business acumen to match the veneer.

‘When did you get back from Sydney?’

As if Max hadn’t dropped him an email the second he had landed. He tightened his grip on the press release.

‘Two hours ago.’

‘I’m touched that you rushed over to see me but there was no need, dear boy. Take the rest of the day off.’

His father beamed at him as if he was giving Max a great treat.

‘Why don’t you go and visit your mother? Have you heard from her at all?’

‘I can’t take the day off.’ Max refused to be diverted. He held up the piece of paper his PA had pressed into his hand the second he had walked into DL Media’s headquarters. ‘What on earth is this? Why didn’t you consult me?’

His father leaned back and stared at him, his chin propped on his steepled hands. It was a look he had probably seen in a film: the wise patriarch.

‘Max.’ There was steel in his voice. ‘I know your grandfather gave you a lot of leeway, but can I remind you this is my company now?’

Just.

Max held a third outright, his father another third. But, crucially, the final third, the controlling share, was held in trust by his father until he retired. Then it would go to Max. If there was a company left by then. Or if Max didn’t ask the board for a vote of no confidence first...

‘Grandfather did not give me a lot of leeway.’ He could feel the paper crumple, his grip tightening even more as he fought to control his temper. It was so typical of his father to reduce all his years of hard work and training to some sort of glorified work experience. ‘He trusted me and trusted my judgement.’

As he never trusted you... The words were unsaid but hung in the air.

‘Look, Dad, we have a five-year plan.’ A plan his father seemed determine to ignore. ‘A plan that kept us profitable through the financial crisis. We need to focus on the core business strengths, not get distracted by...by...’ Max sought the right diplomatic words. Shiny new toys might be accurate, but they were unlikely to help the situation. ‘By intriguing investments.’

Steven Loveday sighed, the deep breath resonating with regret. ‘The problem with your grandfather was that he had no real vision. Oh, he was a media man through and through, and he knew publishing. But books are dead, Max. It’s time for us to expand, to embrace the digital world.’

Max knew his mouth was hanging open, that he was gaping at his father with an incredulous look on his face, but his poker face was eluding him. His grandfather had had no vision? Was that truly what his father thought?

‘He took DL global,’ he managed after a long pause. ‘Made us a household name.’

A name his father seemed determined to squander. What was it they said? One generation to found, another to expand and the third to squander? It looked as if Steven Loveday was going to prove the old adage right in record time.

Max’s hands curled into fists. Not if I have anything to do with it.

‘Everyone wanted this, Max. Have you seen the concept? It’s brilliant! Bored and want to go out? Just log on and see who’s free—make contact, get a reservation at a mutually convenient restaurant, book your taxi home. And if the evening goes well you can even sort out a hotel room. It’s going to revolutionise online dating.’

Possibly. But what did online dating have to do with publishing?

Max began to walk up and down the thickly carpeted office floor, unable to stay standing meekly in front of his father’s desk like a schoolboy any longer.

‘But we can’t afford it. And, more crucially, it’s not core business, Dad. It doesn’t fit with the plan.’

‘That was your grandfather’s plan, not mine. We have to move with the times, Max.’

Max bit back a sigh. ‘I know. Which is why we were the first to bring eBooks to the mainstream. Our interactive travel guides and language books are market leaders, and thanks to our subscription service our newspapers are actually in profit.’

He shouldn’t need to be explaining this to his father. Max had always known that his father would inherit the controlling share of the company, even though Steven Loveday had only played at working over the last thirty years. He also knew how hard his grandfather had struggled with that decision, how close he had come to bypassing his son altogether for his grandson. But in the end even his hard-nosed grandfather hadn’t been able to bring himself to humiliate his only child with a very public disinheriting.

And now the family business was paying the price.

The increasingly awkward silence was just beginning to stretch to excruciating when a loud and fast hip-hop tune blared out of the phone on his father’s desk. It was the kind of ringtone Max would expect from a streetwise fifteen-year-old, not a fifty-eight-year-old man in a hand-made suit and silk tie, but his father’s eyes lit up as he grabbed the telephone, his body swaying a little to the furious beat.

‘Sweetie?’

Max could just make out a giggle from the caller. Not that he needed to hear the voice to know who it was. The inappropriate ringtone, the soppy expression on his father’s face, the nauseating tone of his voice...

It had been six months. If his father was playing true to form he should be getting bored with his latest crush by now. But then none of this latest infatuation was running true to form. Not bringing it out in the open, not leaving Max’s mother and setting up a love-nest in a Hartford penthouse... No, Steven Loveday’s little affairs of the heart were usually as brief as they were intense, but they were always, always clandestine.

This...? This almost felt...well, serious.

His father looked over at Max. ‘Mandy sends her love.’

Max muttered something inaudible even to himself. What was the etiquette here? Just what did you say to your father’s mistress? Especially a mistress several years younger than yourself—and your own ex-PA. She’d giggled a lot less then.

To occupy himself while his father continued to croon sweet nothings down the phone, he pulled out his own phone and began to scroll through the long list of emails. As usual they were multiplying like the Hydra’s head: ten springing forth for each one he deleted. His father’s name might top the letterhead, but Max’s workload seemed to have tripled in the last year no matter how many sixteen-hour days and seven-day weeks he pulled.

Delete, forward, mark for attention, delete, definitely delete... He paused. Another missive from Ellie Scott. What did Miss Prim and Proper want now?

Max had developed a picture of Ellie Scott over the last two months of mostly one-sided emails. She had to be of a similar age to his recently deceased great-aunt, probably wore tweed and had those horned reading glasses. In tortoiseshell. He bet that she played bridge, golfed in sturdy brogues and breakfasted on kippers and anaemic toast.

Okay, he had based her on all those old classic series featuring British spinsters of a certain age. But the bossy, imperative, clipped tone of her emails made him pretty certain he couldn’t be that far off in his estimate.

And she lived to plague him. Her requests for information, agreement, input and, worst of all, his actual presence had upped from one a week to almost daily. Sure, the money his great-aunt had left to start a literary festival in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere might seem important to Miss Scott, but he had actual real work to do. At some point he was going to have to see if he could delegate or refuse the trustee post he had been bequeathed. And get somebody to sort out the house that was part of the same unwanted legacy.

There was just no time for anything that didn’t involve clearing up after his father.

Max’s finger didn’t even pause as he pressed ‘delete’. He moved on, reading another and another, and—hang on a minute. His eyes flicked back up the screen as he reread one, barely able to believe the words dancing in front of his eyes.

Irregularity...

Share of the company...

Your great-aunt...

Twenty-five per cent.

Max blinked, casting a quick glance over at his father. Did he know? Could it possibly be true that his recently deceased great-aunt had kept hold of her twenty-five per cent of DL Media even after she had walked away from her work and her family? The same great-aunt who had left her house and belongings to him? This could change everything.

Maybe Miss Scott’s luck was in. A trip to Cornwall might be exactly what the lawyer ordered.

‘Sorry about that.’ His father’s expression was a discomfiting mixture of slightly sheepish and sappy. ‘Max, I would really appreciate it if you had a word with your mother.’

Here they went again. How many times had Max been asked to broker a rapprochement in the constant battlefield that was his parents’ marriage? Every time he swore never to do it again. But someone had to be the responsible one in the family, and somehow, even when he could still measure his age in single digits, that person had had to be him.

But not this time.

‘I’m sure she would rather hear from you.’

The sappy look on his dad’s face faded. He was completely sheepish now, avoiding Max’s eye and fiddling with the paperclips on his desk. ‘My attorney has told me not to speak to her directly.’

Time stopped for one long second, the office freezing like a paused scene in a movie.

‘Attorney? Dad, what on earth do you need an attorney for?’

‘You’re going to be a big brother.’

Max stopped in the middle of a breath. He was what?

‘Mandy’s pregnant and we’re engaged. The second your mother stops being unreasonable about terms and we can get a divorce I’ll be getting married. I’d like you to be my best man.’

His father beamed, as if he were conferring a huge honour on Max.

‘Divorce?’ Max shook his head as if he could magically un-hear the words, pushing the whole ‘big brother’ situation far away into a place where he didn’t have to think about it or deal with it. ‘Come on, Dad. How many times have you fallen in love, only to realise it’s Mum you need?’

Max could think of at least eight occasions without trying—but his dad had never mentioned attorneys before.

‘Max, she’s demanding fifty per cent of my share of the company. And she wants it in cash if possible. DL can’t afford that kind of settlement and I sure as hell can’t. You have to talk her down. She’ll listen to you.’

She wanted what? This was exactly what DL Media didn’t need. An expensive and very public divorce. Max had two choices: help his dad, or involve the board and wrestle control of that crucial third of the company from his dad.

Either option meant public scrutiny, gossip, tearing the family apart. Everything his grandfather had trusted Max to prevent.

A pulse was throbbing in his temple, the blood thrumming in his veins. Talk to his mother, to the board, to his dad, go over the books yet again and try and work out how to put the company back on an even keel. There were no easy answers. Hell, right now he’d settle for difficult answers.

Steven Loveday was still looking at him, appeal in his eyes, but Max couldn’t, wouldn’t meet his gaze. Instead he found himself fixated on the large watercolour on the opposite wall: the only one of his grandfather’s possessions to survive the recent office refurbishment. Blue skies smiled down on white-crested seas as green cliffs soared high above the curve of the harbour. Trengarth. The village his great-grandfather had left behind all those years ago. Max could almost smell the salt in the air, hear the waves crashing on the shore.

‘I’m away for the next two weeks. The London office is shouting out for some guidance, and I need to sort out Great-Aunt Demelza’s inheritance. You’re on your own with this one, Dad. And for goodness’ sake, don’t throw everything away for an infatuation.’

He swivelled on his heel and walked towards the door, not flinching as his father called desperately after him. ‘It’s different this time, Max. I love her. I really do.’

How many times had he heard that one? His father’s need to live up to their surname had caused more than enough problems in the Loveday family.

Love? No, thank you. Max had stopped believing in that long before his voice had broken, along with Father Christmas and life being fair. It was time his father grew up and accepted that family, position and the business came first. It was a lesson Max had learned years ago.

* * *

‘Ellie, dear, I’ve been thinking about the literary festival.’

Ellie Scott turned around from the shelf she was rearranging, managing—just—not to roll her eyes.

It wasn’t that she wanted to stifle independent thought in Trengarth. She didn’t even want to stifle it in her shop—after all, part of the joy of running a bookshop was seeing people’s worlds opening out, watching their horizons expanding. But every time her assistant—her hard-working, good-hearted and extremely able assistant, she reminded herself for the three billionth time—uttered those words she wanted to jump in a boat and sail as far out to sea as possible. Or possibly send Mrs Trelawney out in it, all the way across the ocean.

‘That’s great, Mrs Trelawney. Make sure you hold on to those thoughts. I’ll need to start planning it very soon.’

Her assistant put down her duster and sniffed. ‘So you say, Ellie...so you say. Oh, I’ve been defending you. “Yes, she’s an incomer,” I’ve said. “Yes, it’s odd that old Miss Loveday left her money to Ellie and not to somebody born and bred here. But,” I said, “she has the interests of Trengarth at heart.”’

Ellie couldn’t hold in her sigh any longer. ‘Mrs Trelawney, you know as well as I do that I can’t do anything. There are two trustees and we have to act together. My hands are tied until Miss Loveday’s nephew deigns to honour us with his presence. And, yes,’ she added as Mrs Trelawney’s mouth opened. ‘I have emailed, written and begged the solicitors to contact him. I am as keen to get started as you are.’

‘Keen to give up a small fortune?’ The older woman lifted her eyes up to the heavens, eloquently expressing just how implausible she thought that was.

Was there any point in explaining yet again that Miss Loveday hadn’t actually left her fortune to Ellie personally, and that Ellie wasn’t sitting on a big pile of cash, cackling from her high tower at the poverty stricken villagers below? The bequest’s wording was very clear: the money had been left in trust to Ellie and the absent second trustee for the purposes of establishing an annual literary festival in the Cornish village.

Of course not every inhabitant of the small fishing village felt that a festival was the best thing to benefit the community, and most of them seemed to hold Ellie solely responsible for Demelza Loveday’s edict. In vain had Ellie argued that she was powerless to spend the money elsewhere, sympathetic as she was to the competing claims of needing a new playground and refurbishing the village hall—but her hands were tied.

‘Look, Mrs Trelawney. I know how keen you are to get started, and how many excellent ideas you have. I promise you that if Miss Loveday’s nephew does not contact me in the next month then I will go to America myself and force him to co-operate.’

‘Hmm.’ The sound spoke volumes, as did the accompanying and very thorough dusting of already spotless shelves.

Ellie didn’t blame Mrs Trelawney for being unconvinced. Truthfully, she had no idea how to get the elusive Max Loveday to co-operate. Tempting as it was to imagine herself striding into his New York penthouse and marching him over to an aeroplane, she knew full well that sending yet another strongly worded email was about as forceful as she was likely to get.

Not to mention that she didn’t actually know where he lived. But if she was going to daydream she might as well make it as glamorous as possible.

Ellie stepped back and stared critically at the display shelf, temptingly filled with the perfect books to read on the wide, sandy Trengarth beach—or to curl up with if the weather was uncooperative. Just one week until the schools broke up and the season started in full. It was such a short season. Trengarth certainly needed something to keep the village on the tourism radar throughout the rest of the year. Maybe this festival was part of the answer.

If they could just get started.

Ellie stole a glance over at her assistant. Her heart was in the right place. Mrs Trelawney had lived in the village all her life. It must be heartbreaking for her to see it so empty in the winter months, with so many houses now second homes and closed from October through to Easter.

‘If I can’t get an answer in the next two weeks then I will look into getting him replaced. There must be something the solicitors can do if he simply won’t take on his responsibilities. But the last thing I want to do is spend some of the bequest on legal fees. It’s only been a few months. I think we just need to be a little patient a little longer.’

Besides, the elusive Max Loveday worked for DL Media, one of the big six publishing giants. Ellie had no idea if he was an editor, an accountant or the mail boy, but whatever he did he was bound to have some contacts. More than the sole proprietor of a small independent bookshop at the end of the earth.

The bell over the door jangled and Ellie turned around, grateful for the opportunity to break off the awkward conversation.

Not that the newcomer looked as if he was going to make her day any easier, judging by the firm line of his mouth and the expression of distaste as he looked around the book-lined room from his vantage position by the door.

It was a shame, because under the scowl he was really rather nice to look at. Ellie’s usual clientele were families and the older villagers. It wasn’t often that handsome, youngish men came her way, and he was both. Definitely under thirty, she decided, and tall, with close-cut dark hair, a roughly stubbled chin and eyes so lightly brown they were almost caramel.

But the expression in the eyes was hard and it was focussed right onto Mrs Trelawney.

What on earth had her assistant been up to now? Ellie knew there was some kind of leadership battle on the Village in Bloom committee, but she wouldn’t have expected the man at the door to be involved.

Although several young and trendy gardeners had recently set up in the vicinity. Maybe he was very passionate about native species and tasteful colour combinations?

‘Miss Scott?’

Unease curdled Ellie’s stomach at the curt tone, and she had to force herself not to take a step back. This is your shop, she told herself, folding her hands into tight fists. Nobody can tell you what to do. Not any more.

‘I’m Ellie Scott.’ She had to release her assistant from that gimlet glare. Not that Mrs Trelawney looked in need of help. Her own gaze was just as hard and cold. ‘Can I help?’

‘You?’

The faint tone of incredulity didn’t endear him any further to Ellie, and nor did the quick glance that raked her up and down in one fast, judgemental dismissal.

‘You can’t be. You’re just a girl.’

‘Thank you, but at twenty-five I’m quite grown up.’

His voice was unmistakably American which meant, surely, that here at last was the other trustee. Tired and jetlagged, probably, which explained the attitude. Coffee and a slice of cake would soon set him to rights.

Ellie held out her hand. ‘Please, call me Ellie. You must be Max. It’s lovely to meet you.’

‘You’re the woman my great-aunt left half her fortune to?’

His face had whitened, all except his eyes, which were a dark, scorching gold.

‘Tell me, Miss Scott...’ He made no move to take her hand, just stood looking at her as if she had turned into a toad, ice frosting every syllable. ‘Which do you think is worse? Seducing an older married man for his money or befriending an elderly lady for hers?’

He folded his arms and stared at her.

‘Any thoughts?’