Flora's Lot by Katie Fforde (best books under 200 pages TXT) 📗

a television now. Charles had bought onefor her from the sale the previous day. He'd put it in theback of the Land-Rover for her and said, 'I suppose youmight as well have this. No one else seemed to want it.’

She hadthanked him in a manner appropriate to such a grudginggift but a tiny part of her wondered if he wasactually being quite kind, but didn't want her to know. Theporters all seemed to like him well enough, but then they would, wouldn't they? Hewas good-looking in a conventional sort of way and if they'd known and liked his father, they were bound tofeel motherly towards him. And, ofcourse, he wasn't trying to force any of them to leave.

After shehad got the TV to work, she settled down in frontof it. But instead of concentrating on six young women fromvery sheltered homes struggling through the desertcarrying Kalashnikovs and backpacks the size of smallcars, which appeared to be the latest in reality television,she found herself thinking about the business and Charles.

Yesterdayshe had noticed that he had been constantly followingon Annabelle's heels. Was he soothing ruffled feathers,or checking she'd done things right? If she'd beenAnnabelle and Charles had done that, she'd have killedhim. Annabelle seemed oblivious. Did she not know? Ornot care? It was hard to believe that Annabelle was reallyas bad at the job as she appeared to be, but going onwhat the porters said, she was worse, and bossy with it.

Florayawned, aware that if she didn't go to bed soon, she'd wakeup in the middle of the night on the sofa, cold andstiff. As she sleepily locked doors and windows, brought up more food and water forImelda, and unplugged the slightly dodgyelectric kettle, she decided thatCharles and Annabelle were nothing to do with her and went to bed. They had certainly gone way pastthe 'in love' stage of their relationship.

So wastheir relationship purely for practical reasons? It was none of Flora'sbusiness of course, she told herself firmly, but she was a compulsivepeople-watcher and couldn't help but be fascinated by this oddlydistant couple seton marrying. Why on earth were they together?If Annabelle wanted control of a business, why didn't she use her money to start one she liked, instead of muddling about with furniture andknickknacks that gave her no pleasure at all? Unless, of course, it wasn't that way round. Maybe she wanted to be financially involved in Stanzaand Stanza so that when she persuaded or bullied or convinced Charles to sell the buildings, shewould get her cut. Or even just bemarried to Charles to share his bit.

Charleswas possibly hoping that Annabelle would investsome of her money in the business so he could improvethings, do a little marketing, some proper advertising. Butthat seemed terribly cold. Maybe Flora was barking upthe wrong tree completely. The trouble was, theirprivate life could be a sea of endless passion but they wereboth so buttoned up and conventional the rest of theworld would never know. And if they'd known each otherfrom childhood, perhaps they'd never shared the white heat of a new relationship.

Thinking of new relationships remindedFlora of Henry. She liked Henry; he lookedas if he could be fun. The twinklein his eye was such a relief after Charles's disapproval,and in a town this small she was sure she'd run into himagain. She was rather looking forward to it.

*

'I mightjust have to get one of those stickers saying "I Love MyLandy",' declared Flora as she and Charles got out of their vehicles atroughly the same time. 'It's such fun being able to see into thegardens. And being so high up makes me feel empowered, sortof. Strong,' she added, in case the word 'empowered' was too frighteningly feminist for him.

Charlesraised an eyebrow, possibly a little surprised at beinggreeted in this light-hearted way. 'Well, there's no reasonwhy you shouldn't carry on driving it. It's a firm car -they're still waiting for that part for yours, by theway.' He frowned, and carried on. 'As long as you don'tmind us using it to collect odd bits of furniture from time to time.'

‘Iwould have thought a big old Volvo would be better for things like that?’

Charlesheld the door open for her. 'It would, actually, butAnnabelle had her heart set on a Land-Rover.’

Flora hadtold herself she was going to see the positive inAnnabelle at every opportunity. 'I expect she likes being able to see into the gardens,too.'

‘No. She said it made her feel safe.'

‘Ican understand that. The roads round here must get quite icy in winter.’

Charleslooked down his nose at her - probably by accident,he was so much taller. 'Not really. It's very mild here.’

Florareally wanted to go to the Ladies' but felt that thisconversation should be finished first so she followed him into theoffice. 'But I thought you said she found it difficult to drive. Where is she,by the way?’

°Going toyour house, later. She does find the Land-Rover awkward to park.'

‘Then why are you keeping it? It's quitenew.'

‘Ithink we need to have this conversation sometime, but not now,' said Charles. 'Can you pick up anotebook and a reliable pen andwe'll be off? I don't want to keep thesepeople waiting. They've travelled a long way to get their uncle's estatesettled.’

It wasvery frustrating. Flora couldn't exactly accuse him ofbeing secretive, but he simply wasn't telling her anything.

They wereboth silent as they set off in his old but roomy Citroen. Flora was wondering whythe firm bought a Land-Rover it didn't reallyneed when Charles was driving such anold car. Surely it couldn't just be Annabelle's whim? Eventually Charles said, 'We mostly use taperecorders to do valuations thesedays, but ours has broken and it'll be good training for you. In the old daysthey were always written out by handand typed up later. You had to have two of you doing it.'

‘Doesn'tAnnabelle like doing them?' Annabelle had said as much herself, but Florawanted to prod a little deeper.

‘Not really. Wedon't do all that much fine furniture these days and she's not reallyinto everyday household effects, which are the bread and butter of ourbusiness.' Flora filed away the snippet