A Desirable Residence - By Madeleine Wickham Page 0,91

put their professional reputation on the line next time.

Leo, of course, had spoken smoothly and reassuringly, then, when he realized that Marcus was serious, switched to a patronizing scorn. But Marcus didn’t care. Neither did he care that he was saying goodbye to what was, in effect, easy money. It simply wasn’t worth the risk. Two hundred thousand pounds—but what, he thought yet again, was he going to do with it? Pay the school fees? But there was a family trust already set up for that purpose. And anyway, he thought, smiling as he remembered Daniel’s excited face last night, if the scholarship exams had gone as well as everybody seemed to think, perhaps he wouldn’t be paying any school fees for Daniel. So what else? A country cottage? A house in France? But the rest of the family would want to know where he’d got the money.

The trouble with family money, their family money in particular, he thought, was that it was all so transparent; so well documented. They all knew exactly the sums of capital each other possessed; they all knew exactly how much the others had paid for their houses; they knew how the family firm was doing. It would be less scandalous to confess to being broke than to having sudden large amounts of unexplained cash.

Marcus felt a cold feeling at the base of his spine, as he imagined admitting everything to Miles; watching his honest face creasing into a horrified frown. Dear Miles, who valued family loyalty above almost anything else, who quite clearly wanted to believe the best of Marcus, whatever his suspicions were. Since that phone call on the day of the ECO parade, Miles had said nothing to Marcus about Leo Francis. And yet he must have been wondering, and worrying . . . Marcus shivered. At least some of this money, he suddenly thought fiercely, would go on a long boozy lunch at Le Manoir for himself and Miles. A good bottle of claret, brandy, the works. An all-afternoon job. Just like in the old days . . . the days before Leo. And before Liz . . .

‘Well, goodbye, Marcus,’ said Leo smoothly, as they were handed their coats. ‘Good to do business with you.’ Marcus nodded curtly, pulled on his herringbone coat, and hurried down the thickly carpeted stairs towards the exit of the restaurant. He suddenly wanted to get out of the place; to leave all of them behind. Leo, Liz, the lot of them. He could barely believe that he’d bumped into Liz like that. Christ knew what might have happened, what might inadvertently have come out. The thought made him shiver, and curse himself unreasonably. He shouldn’t have agreed to going to the restaurant in the first place. They should have met at Leo’s place instead. Really, he might have known he would bump into someone he knew, he told himself angrily. And he might have known it would be Liz.

He recalled Leo’s teasing comment, and felt a tingle in the base of his spine. Did Leo really suspect something? Had he guessed at the truth? And would he, out of some sort of malice, make his suspicions known to Anthea? Marcus suddenly, irrationally, pictured Leo picking up the phone; speaking to Anthea; smoothly insinuating and hinting, while Anthea’s bewildered frown got deeper and deeper. The bastard. He would fucking kill him if he said anything.

Then common sense took over. Leo hadn’t meant anything. He wouldn’t say anything. He had no reason to make an enemy of Marcus. As his steps took him further away from the restaurant; further away from the danger, Marcus was able to reassure himself that it had just been bad luck.

But the encounter had left him feeling wary and on guard. What if he bumped into her again? What if Anthea had been with him? She would have been bound to notice something, with Liz getting so flushed and animated. He recalled Liz’s pink cheeks and sparkling eyes, and shuddered. Once upon a time the sight of those would have made him excited, made him look forward even more to their next encounter. Now it just made his heart sink slightly. Obviously she thought everything was still the same between them. Didn’t she realize why he kept cancelling their meetings? Had she unwittingly misunderstood the message he was trying to give? Or even deliberately?

It came to Marcus that he had to make things plain to her soon, very soon. He couldn’t