Chapter 12
Zoe hovered at the door of Alex’s office, waiting for him to notice her. But he was engrossed in a spreadsheet open on his laptop, and so she cleared her throat loudly to get his attention. After a second, he looked up, his face transforming into a broad smile.
‘I didn’t hear you come in,’ he said.
‘I’m not surprised.’ Zoe went to stand at his shoulder and looked at the screen. ‘I’d like to pretend I know what this is all about, but there’d be no point. It looks complicated.’
‘Oh, I think it’s just the way I input things that makes it look complicated to everyone else… How was your day?’
‘Interesting.’
‘Oh?’ Alex reached across the desk for a pack of chewing gum and folded a strip into his mouth. ‘Just in case you want to kiss me,’ he added with a grin. ‘So I’m all minty fresh.’
‘Don’t expect me to do the thing teenagers used to do when they were French kissing,’ she said with a grin to match his. He frowned. ‘You’ve never heard of it?’
‘What?’
‘It’s probably best that way – I’ll tell you another time. I’m sorry, but I have a favour to ask you.’
‘Ask – you know I can’t say no to you.’
‘You might wish you could… my dad and Chantal are coming to Thimblebury to talk to the vicar at St Cuthbert’s. They’ve asked to meet us for lunch while they’re here.’
‘OK…’ he began slowly. ‘I mean, that’s fine with me, but I get the sense it’s not so fine with you.’
Zoe grimaced. ‘Of course it’s about time you met my dad, but I’m worried you might feel awkward… that I might have told you too much and not all of it good. And then there’s the whole business of him and my mum.’
‘Zo, it doesn’t worry me. I think it will be more of an ordeal for you than it will for me.’
‘I wouldn’t go so far as to call it an ordeal. I think it will be fine. Maybe even nice as long as my poor mum doesn’t get to hear about it.’
‘Well, I certainly won’t tell her.’
‘No, I know. I don’t know why I’m worrying. Nobody is going to tell her, so why do I still feel guilty?’
‘I suppose it’s how she feels about him and Chantal being together and you knowing how much of a problem that is for her.’
‘The worst thing is, I don’t even dislike Chantal that much.
Granted, she got with Dad very quickly after he left Mum, and I can see why Mum thinks they were having an affair, but Chantal and Dad both deny it no matter how many times it comes up, and at this point I don’t see why they’d feel the need to unless it wasn’t true. ’
‘Perhaps they feel guilty about it. I mean, if they were.’
Zoe shook her head. ‘Dad wouldn’t – he doesn’t operate like that.
I mean, he would for a while, but he’d move on.
The past is the past – that’s his philosophy.
That was always the biggest difference between him and my mum.
She clings to the past, and she doesn’t let go of grudges, but Dad is totally the opposite.
He’s all about what’s happening tomorrow, and he barely gives a thought to things that happened yesterday.
I suppose that’s part of the reason they couldn’t get along.
He could never understand why things bothered her so much when, to him, it was water under the bridge. ’
‘I can understand where you’re coming from, but surely your mum isn’t expecting you to have no contact with them. Especially given they’re getting married here in the village.’
‘I’m sure. I don’t know whether that makes it worse or better. Like if she finds out we met Dad and Chantal, it will just be a sad but inevitable disappointment to her. I suppose I had to say yes, but I just wanted to check you’re happy to come.’
He held out his arms and gestured for her to sit on his lap, where he folded his arms around her and pulled her close.
‘As if I would say no. If you want me there, of course I will be there. Like you said, I need to meet your dad sooner or later, and at least this way we won’t be strangers at the wedding.
And I know you’d always do the same for me. ’
‘I would,’ Zoe said.
‘When are they thinking?’
‘This weekend. How would Sunday be for you?’
‘Aside from anything urgent cropping up here, it should be fine.’
‘I’ll let them know then.’ Zoe kissed him lightly, recognising that she’d interrupted his work but wishing the kiss could be more as her lips melted onto his. She shook the thought and got up from his lap. ‘I’ll see you downstairs shortly.’
Zoe could see her dad’s car parked outside the restaurant as she and Alex pulled into a space.
They’d chosen somewhere just outside the village, a place Ottilie had recommended where Heath had taken her many times.
It was a stone building, like many in the area, sheltered beneath a sheer, overhanging rock face, with heavy wooden window frames that made it look like something out of a fantasy novel.
Her dad was sitting in the driver’s seat, Chantal next to him, both of them in animated conversation.
Chantal was laughing. Zoe couldn’t help but smile, despite a pang of guilt.
She wanted the best for both of her parents, but it was a shame that what was good for one was bound to hurt the other one, and there was no way around that.
As she got out of the car, she saw that her dad had noticed their arrival.
He held up his hand to wave and then opened his door too.
Zoe watched as Chantal got out the other side, and then sucked in a breath.
She was a lot more pregnant than Zoe had been led to believe.
Either she was growing at a phenomenal rate, or she and Nigel had been keeping the news from everyone else for some time.
One thing Zoe now understood was the rush to get married.
It was nothing as old-fashioned as making an honest woman out of Chantal, but when Nigel had told Zoe his fiancée had worried about getting into the wedding dress she’d set her heart on, Zoe could see why.
‘Wow…’ She gave a pointed look to Chantal’s bump. ‘I wasn’t expecting you to be quite so pregnant. How far along are you?’
‘Not even four months!’ Chantal laughed lightly. ‘I think I’m just showing so much because I’m skinny everywhere else.’
‘I have to say you look further along. You’ve had your twelve-week scan then?’
‘Oh yes, everything is fine.’
‘Right.’ Zoe tried not to frown, even though she was confused. ‘Because Dad said…’ She turned to her dad. ‘I thought you said you’d only just found out.’
‘I had,’ he said.
Zoe found it difficult to believe he wouldn’t have noticed Chantal’s bump far earlier than when he’d called to tell her the news, but the way he glanced at his young fiancée, it seemed to be true.
So if he hadn’t noticed for himself, why had Chantal kept it from him?
She must have known for some time if she’d had her twelve-week scan.
Had she been afraid to tell him for some reason?
‘I’m a bit cold,’ Chantal said. ‘Should we go in?’
Alex put his arm around Zoe, and it was then she realised she’d been so distracted by Chantal’s bump she hadn’t even introduced him.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she said as they all walked to the entrance together. ‘Dad, Chantal… this is Alex.’
‘We guessed as much,’ Nigel said wryly. ‘Good to finally meet you, Alex.’
‘You too,’ Alex said.
The inside of the restaurant was just as the outside suggested it would be: furnished in warm woods and softly lit. The air smelled of hops and herbs.
‘This is cosy,’ Zoe said.
‘It looks lovely.’ Chantal turned to her. ‘Did you say you’d been here before?’
‘No, my friend, Ottilie, recommended it. She’s been here a few times.’
‘Ottilie…’ Nigel’s forehead creased slightly. ‘Your nursing friend. She lives here?’
‘I thought you knew that.’
‘I suppose you might have mentioned it and I forgot. If the food is as good as the décor, I’ll be happy,’ Nigel said.
‘Funny how you and Ottilie both ended up moving to the same village,’ Nigel continued as Alex took his seat.
‘She’s the reason I’m here. She practically got me the job. I have a lot to thank her for…’ Zoe angled a fond glance at Alex, who returned it.
‘Not as much as I do,’ he said.
‘Aww…’ Chantal beamed at them both. ‘I’m so glad you’re happy, Zoe. I always felt a bit guilty that you’d had such bad luck with Ritchie and I got lucky with your wonderful dad.’
Zoe tried to ignore the mention of her ex. It seemed it wasn’t Cherie who’d needed warning to stay away from the subject. She glanced to her side, but if Alex was bothered, he didn’t show it.
She turned back to Chantal. ‘I don’t know why you’d feel guilty. It’s not your fault Ritchie and I split up.’
‘I know, but I did.’
It was Nigel’s turn to look fondly at his partner. ‘That’s because you’re such an empath. You feel everyone else’s troubles like they’re your own.’
Zoe could have pointed out that Chantal’s empathy had never extended to his ex-wife – her mother – but she held it in.
It was just like her dad to conveniently forget all the heartache he’d caused, and Chantal hadn’t exactly been blameless.
Zoe didn’t know much about how they’d got together – the details had been kept deliberately vague as far as she could tell – but Chantal had been his assistant at the investments company where he’d worked, and they’d started to see one another very quickly after he’d split from Cherie, who’d always been convinced there had been an affair before the marriage had ended.
Zoe wasn’t so sure, but she could see why it would look that way.
If there hadn’t been one, there had obviously been an attraction and perhaps some flirting prior to Nigel calling time on his life with Cherie, because there was no other way he could have got so serious with Chantal so quickly.
‘Heath says the portions here are huge,’ Alex said, perhaps sensing a change of subject was needed.
Zoe was grateful, and her smile told him so.
‘I really can’t eat all that much at the moment.’ Chantal unfurled one of the napkins from the table, only to roll it up again and put it back. ‘I don’t know why.’