‘Zander...’ Rod’s assistant caught his ear as he breezed past
into her boss’s office. He paused, turned. ‘He has Nigel in there.’
Nigel Westerly. Network owner. That wasn’t a good sign.
‘Thanks, Claire.’
Suddenly even his salvage plan looked shaky. Nigel Westerly
hadn’t amassed one of the country’s biggest fortunes by being easily led. He was
tough. And ruthless.
Zander straightened his back.
Oh, well, if he had to be fired, he’d rather it be by one of
the men he admired most in England. He certainly wasn’t going to quail and
wonder when the axe was going to fall. He pushed open the double doors to his
director’s office with flair and announced himself.
‘Gentlemen...’
TWO
Thank goodness for seeds. And quiet lab rooms. And
high-security access passes.
Georgia’s whole National Trust building was so light and bright
and...optimistic. None of which she could stomach right now. Her little X-ray
lab had adjustable lighting so it was dim and gloomy and could look as if she
were out even when she wasn’t.
Perfect.
She’d called in sick the day after Valentine’s—unable to crawl
out of bed was a kind of sick, right?—but she’d gone tiptoeing back to work, her
Thursday and Friday an awful trial in carefully neutral smiles and colleagues
avoiding eye contact and a very necessary and very belated inter-departmental
email to Kew’s carnivorous-plant department.
It was also very short.
I’m so very sorry, Daniel. I’ll miss you.
She knew they were done. Even if Dan hadn’t concurred—which he
had, once he’d cooled down enough to speak to her—she couldn’t spend another
moment in a relationship that just drifted in small, endless circles. Not after
what she’d done. Conveniently, it also meant she didn’t have to explain herself,
explain something she barely understood—at least not for a while. And she was
nothing if not a master procrastinator. She’d see Dan eventually, apologise in
person, pick up her few things from his place. But this way they were both out
of their misery.
Relationship euthanasia.
You know, except for the whole intensive public interest
thing...
And now it was Saturday afternoon. And work was as good a place
as any to hide out from all those messages and emails from astounded friends and
family. Better, probably, because there were so few staff here with her and
because she worked alone in her little X-ray lab behind two levels of carded
access restrictions. The world wasn’t exactly interested enough in her botched
proposal to have teams of paparazzi on her trail but it was certainly interested
enough to still be talking about it—everywhere—a few days later. She didn’t dare
check her social media accounts or listen to the radio or pick up a paper in
case The Valentine’s Girl was still the topic de jour.
London was divided. Grand Final kind of division. Half the city
had taken up arms in her defence and the other half were backing poor,
beleaguered Dan. Hard to know which was worse: the flak he was copping for being
the reject
or
or the abject pity she was fielding for
being the reject
ee
.
Didn’t she know what a stupid thing it was
to have done?
some said.
Yes, thanks. She had a pretty good idea. But it wasn’t as if
she just woke up one morning and wanted her face all over the papers. She’d
thought he’d say yes, or she wouldn’t have asked. It just turned out her inside
information was about as reliable as a racing tip from some random bag lady in
an alleyway.
Why do it live on air?
her
detractors cried.
Because she woke up the morning after Kelly’s stunning
pronouncement that her brother was ready for more and the ‘Give him a Nudge’
leap year promotion was all over the radio station she brushed her teeth to. And
rode to work to. And did her work to. All day. The universe was practically
screaming at her to throw her name into the hat.
She rubbed her throbbing temples.
Their names.
Dan was in it up to his neck, too, but because she wasn’t about
to out her best friend—for Dan’s sake and for his sister’s—she was still
struggling with exactly what her answer would be when he eventually turned those
all-seeing eyes to her and asked,
‘Why, George?’
She loaded another dish of carefully laid-out seeds into the
holder and slid it into the irradiator, then secured it and moved to her
computer monitor to start the X-ray. It took just moments to get a clear image.
Not a bad batch; a few incompetents, like all batches, but otherwise a pretty
good sample.
She typed a quick summary report of her findings, noted the low
unviable percentage, and attached it to the computerised sample scan to go back
to the seed checkers.
Incompetents
. It was hard not to
empathise with them, the pods that had rotten-out interiors or the husks that
formed absent of the seeds they were supposed to protect. Incompetent seeds
disappeared amongst the thousands of others on the plant and just never came to
fruition. Their very specific genetic line simply...vanished when they failed to
reproduce.
In nature, that was the end of it for them.
Incompetent seeds didn’t have to justify themselves and their
failure to thrive constantly to their competent mothers. Didn’t have to watch
their competent friends’ competent families take shape and help them move out to
their competent outer-city suburbs.
‘Ugh...’ Georgia retrieved the small sample from the
irradiator, repackaged it to quarantine standards and placed it back in its
storage unit. Then she reached for the next one.
Twenty-five-thousand seed species in the bank and someone had
to test samples of each for viability. Lucky for the National Trust she had
weeks and even months of hiding out ahead of her. Looked as if they were going
to be the immediate beneficiaries of her weekends and evenings in exile.
Across the desk, her phone rang.
‘Georgia Stone,’ she answered, before remembering what day it
was. Why was someone calling her on a weekend?
‘Ms Stone, it’s Tyrone at Security. I have a visitor here for
you.’
No. He really didn’t.
‘I’m not
expecting anyone. I would have left a name.’
‘That’s what I told him, but he insisted.’
Him.
Was it Daniel? Immediately,
new guilt piled on top of the old that she’d not been brave enough to face him
personally yet. ‘Wh...who is it?’ she risked.
Pause.
‘Alekzander Rush. With a
K
and a
Z
, he says.’
As if that helped her in the slightest; although some neuron
deep in her mind started firing.
‘Now he says he’s not a journalist.’ Tyrone sounded annoyed at
being forced into the role of interpreter. His job was just to check the ID of
visitors passing through his station, not deal with presumptuous callers.
‘OK, send him through. I’ll meet him in the visitor centre.
Thank you, Tyrone,’ she added before he disconnected.
It took her about seven minutes to finish what she was doing,
sanitise, and work her way through three buildings to the public visitor centre.
It was teeming with weekend visitors to Wakehurst all checking out the work of
her department while they were here seeing the main house and gardens.
She glanced around and saw him. Tall, dark, and casually but
warmly dressed, with something draped over his arm. The guy from the elevator at
the radio station. Possibly the last person in the world she expected to see.
Relief that he wasn’t some crazy out to find The Valentine’s Girl crashed into
curiosity about why he would be here. She ignored two speculative glances sent
her way by total strangers. Probably trying to work out why she looked familiar.
Hopefully, she’d be back in her office by the time the light bulb blinked on
over their heads and they remembered whatever social media site they’d seen her
on.
She walked up next to him as he stared into one of the public
displays reading the labels and spoke quietly. ‘Alekzander with a
K
and a
Z
, I assume?’
He turned. His eyes widened as he took in her labcoat and
jeans. That was OK; he looked pretty different without his pinstripe on,
too.
‘Zander,’ he said, thrusting his free hand forward. She took it
on instinct; it was warm and strong and certain. Everything hers wasn’t. ‘Zander
Rush. Station Manager for Radio EROS.’
Oh. That wasn’t good.
He lifted his arm with something familiar and beige draped
across it. ‘You left your coat in the studio.’
The manager of one of London’s top radio stations drove fifty
kilometres to bring her a coat? No way.
‘I considered that a small price to pay for getting the heck
out of there,’ she hedged. She hadn’t really let herself think about the signed
document on radio network letterhead sitting on her desk at home, but she was
thinking about it now. And, she guessed, so was he.
The couple standing nearby suddenly twigged as to who she was.
Their eyes lit up with recognition and the girl turned to the man and
whispered.
Zander didn’t miss it. ‘Is there somewhere more private we can
speak?’
‘You have more to say?’ It was worth a try.
His eyes shot around the room. ‘I do. It won’t take long.’
‘This is a secure building. I can’t take you inside. Let’s
walk.’
Conveniently, she had a coat. She shrugged into it and caught
him as he was about to head back out through the giant open doors of the visitor
centre.
‘Back door,’ she simply said.
Her ID opened the secure rear entrance and deposited them just
a brisk walk from Bethlehem Wood. About as private as they were going to get out
here on a Saturday. It got weekend traffic, too, but nothing like the rest of
Wakehurst. Anyone else might have worried about setting off into a secluded wood
with a stranger, but all Georgia could see was the strong, steady shape of his
back as he’d sheltered her from prying eyes back in the elevator as her world
imploded.
He wasn’t here to hurt her.
‘How did you find me?’ she asked.
‘Your work number was amongst the other contacts on our files.
I called yesterday and realised where it was.’
‘You were taking a chance, coming here on a Saturday.’
‘I went to your apartment, first. You weren’t there.’
So he drove all this way on a chance? He was certainly going to
a lot of trouble to find her. ‘A phone call wouldn’t suffice?’
‘I’ve left three messages.’
Oh.
‘Yes, I...’ What could she say that wouldn’t sound pathetic?
Nothing. ‘I’m working my way up to my phone messages.’
He grunted. ‘I figured the personal approach would serve me
better.’
Maybe so; she was here, wasn’t she? But her patience wasn’t
good at the best of times. ‘What can I do for you, Mr Rush?’
‘Zander.’ He glanced at her sideways. Then, ‘How are you doing,
anyway?’
What a question. Rejected. Humiliated. Talked about by eight
million strangers. ‘I’m great. Never been better.’
His neat five o’clock shadow twisted with his lips. ‘That’s the
spirit.’
Well, wasn’t this nice? A walk in the forest with a total
stranger, making small talk. Her feet pressed to a halt. ‘I’m so sorry to be
blunt, Mr Rush, but what do you want?’
He stopped and stared down at her, his eyes creasing. ‘That’s
you being blunt?’
She shifted uncomfortably. But stayed silent. Silence was her
friend.
‘OK, let me get to the point...’ He started off again. ‘I’m
here in an official capacity. There is a contract issue to discuss.’
She knew it.
‘He said
no
, Mr Rush. That makes
the contract rather hard to fulfil, don’t you think? For both of us.’ She hated
how raw her voice sounded.
‘I understand—’
‘Do you? How many different ways do you hear your personal
business being discussed each day? On social media, on the radio, on the bus, at
the sandwich shop? I can’t get away from it.’
‘Have you thought about using it, rather than avoiding it?’
Was he serious? ‘I don’t want to use it.’
‘You were happy enough to use it for an all-expenses-paid
wedding.’
Of course that was what he thought. In some ways she’d prefer
people thought she was doing it for the money. That was at least less pathetic
than the truth. ‘You’re here for your pound of flesh—I get that. Why not just
tell me what you want me to do?’
Not that she would automatically be saying yes. But it bought
her time to think.
Grey eyes slid sideways as his gloveless hands slid into his
pockets. ‘I have a proposition for you. A way of addressing the contract. One
that will be...mutually beneficial.’
‘Does it involve a time machine so that I can go back a month
and never sign the stupid thing?’
Never give in to her mother’s pressure. Or her own desperate
need for security.
His head dropped. ‘No. It doesn’t change the past. But it could
change your future.’
She lifted her curiosity to him. ‘What?’
He paused at an ornate timber bench and waited for her to sit.
Old-school gallantry
. Even Dan didn’t do old
school.
She sat. Curious.
‘The media is hot for your story, Georgia. Your...situation has
sparked something in them.’
‘My rejection, you mean?’
He tilted his head. ‘They’ll be interested in everything you
do. And if they’re interested, then London will be interested. And if London is
interested, then my network will want to exploit the existing contract however
they can.’
Exploit? He was happy to use that word aloud? She tried not to
let her surprise show.
‘Georgia, under its terms they could still require you to come
back for follow-up interviews.’
Her stomach crimped. ‘To talk about how very much I’m not
getting married? How I suddenly find myself alone with half my friends siding
with my ex?’ And the other half so determinedly
not
talking about it. ‘Not exactly perky radio content.’
He shook his head. ‘It’s what they could ask. But I have a
better idea. So that the benefit is not all one-way.’
She waited silently for his explanation. Mostly because she had
no idea what to say.
‘If you agree to seeing the year out, EROS is willing to
redirect the funds from the engagement, wedding, and honeymoon to a different
project. One that you might even enjoy.’
She frowned. ‘What kind of project?’