Under New Management (8 page)

Chapter 8 

Mollie can’t believe it. Jack Murphy, last seen waving her a cheery goodbye at Heathrow Airport nearly eight years ago. He was off travelling for a year without so much as a tear for her and she was left standing there breaking her heart. He hasn’t changed that much; his hair is still a sun kissed wavy blonde, slightly shorter now, although it still reaches his shoulders. His eyes are sky blue; he still looks like a surfer dude and would look much more comfortable in shorts with a surf board under his arm. He is deeply tanned. Clearly he’s been on holiday recently, as that’s no fake tan. He has grown into his looks and is no longer the pretty boy he once was; he now has a rugged edge to him. Jack has filled out. He is wearing a clearly expensive suit with. a sixties retro edge to it and pointed black leather shoes. It suits him as he manages to pull off a slightly scruffy persona without looking dirty.
He just looks as hot as he did all those years ago. No not as hot, actually hotter!
Mollie takes in a breath.

Jack was a hippy at heart. Unfortunately that included the dope and the free love. For three years she had followed him around like a faithful puppy. He’d convinced her of the virtues of both the dope and the free love and she had actually believed he loved her really, above all others. This meant that she had bitten her tongue each time he spread the love, as long as he came back to her. She knew that the only way to keep a free spirit like Jack was to allow him to feel as if he was exactly that, free. Mollie shakes her head sadly at her naivety but he had been oh so charming, like a beautiful golden god. She often wondered how she had ever managed to get her degree given the distraction.

Now, as she stares at him standing next to Kieran she sees a resemblance even though they are polar opposites. One dark, brooding and broad, the other blonde, sunny and athletic. Christ, what’s a girl to do?

Lou is squirming next to her as if she’s having kittens. She drags Mollie from her thoughts and hisses urgently at her, “Oh my God! Oh my God! Introduce me, immediately.”

“Lou, this is Jack, the ex I’ve told you about, the one who broke my heart.” Mollie turns to Jack, “This is Lou, my best friend, Jack. I told you about her often enough but I don’t believe you were paying attention. And she picked up the pieces by the way.” Mollie watches for reactions in both men to this statement.

As Kieran raises an eyebrow but reveals no other emotion, Jack is traumatised. His gorgeous face falls dramatically; he looks so sorry for himself she wants to throw her arms around him and say sorry.

“Ahhh Molls, don’t be like that,” he says sadly. “I know I was a bastard to you, but I did adore you, you know that and I had that trip arranged for years. You know, you helped me plan most of it, didn’t you?”

She feels her heart jump slightly at the knowledge that he remembered that, especially considering he was stoned during most of the planning.

Pulling herself together and giving herself a mental slap (she is so not going down that road again) she changes the subject.

“So, cousins eh? You never let on you had a rich, good looking cousin Jack.”

Kieran smiles slightly at the compliment. “Don’t worry Mollie, Jack never mentioned he had a beautiful girlfriend for three years either.”

Mollie laughs, “Well Jack, seems like you have been holding out on everyone. That’s not like you at all is it? I’m glad to see you haven’t changed.”

Jack looks hurt again. “Blimey what’s this, pick on Jack night? Give me a break you two.”

Kieran laughs now and grabs Jack in a head lock, rubbing his hair, which causes the golden locks to stick up with static.

Pulling away Jack quickly tries to smooth his halo, “Mate, not the hair.”

Lou is still squirming by Mollie’s side. She is beginning to wonder if Dan has spiked her cocktails with an hallucinogenic drug:
two drop dead gorgeous guys here in Sedgwick, amazing.

Jumping in front of Mollie she shoves her hand out at Jack.

As Jack takes it she says, “So anyway, nice to meet you Jack. I have heard an awful lot about you over the years and peered at many a photo of you, too.” Lou swings her long hair and waggles her eyebrows at him.

Jack, never one to pass up an opportunity, steps up. Tightening his grip on her hand he turns on his charm offensive, “Lou! Yea of course, ditto. You are still looking ravishing, it has to be said.” He eyes her seductively up and down and lifts her hand to his smiling mouth, kissing her knuckles before he lets it go gently.

Lou colours up instantly and Mollie sighs - he is pretty hard to resist.

As Jack and Lou strike up a conversation Mollie moves around them to speak to Kieran. “So Kieran, where’s the connection then? Your dad, his mum, brother and sister, or the other way round?”

“Right first time,” he tells her with a little more restraint, which she picks up on instantly. He picks up his drink from the bar and takes a long swig as he plays for time.

Kieran is pissed off to say the least. He remains cool and confident on the outside, but what a bummer. He would love to break the rules and wake up next to that blonde hair on his pillow in the morning. Mollie really is very attractive, what red-blooded male wouldn’t? But he didn’t do Jack’s leftovers. He had done on a number of occasions a few years back, normally unwittingly. It was difficult not to back then as they moved in the same circles; hard not to step on toes if you wanted any sort of sex life.

All things considered though, he had found that where Jack had been he tended to leave an unexploded minefield of hurt, confused women in his wake.

Mollie had stated, like all the others, that Jack had broken her heart and what with her ex-husband and his recent actions, well she couldn’t be in a good place emotionally. She would take a long time to get over that level of hurt.

Kieran had to admit to fancying a casual fling with her. However, messing with the already raw emotions of a local woman in a small town, a town in which he was starting what should be a lucrative business, was not good for PR.

He could just imagine the headlines in the local paper, ‘new owner of Sedgwick Hall takes advantage of heartbroken local girl’. That would really help get the hotel off the ground. Nope, he needed to stay away from Mollie; let her rekindle things with Jack. Jack wasn’t the face of the McLaren Group. Jack was the artistic one; Jack could, as usual get away with murder with very little consequence.
Bloody Jack!

Jack and Lou are chatting animatedly now and Mollie is watching Kieran strangely. He puts his pint on the bar decisively. Realising he is being rude, he regains eye contact with Mollie.

Mollie feels her heart sink. He has clearly had second thoughts about her. Still, no big deal and the last thing she is prepared to do is let him know that he has got to her in any way.

Taking an inward breath of calm she decides to tackle it head on and get in there first. He isn’t having the satisfaction of walking away from her. Oh no, if there is any walking away to be done she would be the one doing it.

“You OK?” she asks him. “You look fed up. Do you still want that drink, or are you having second thoughts about the blonde who was ruined by the dastardly cousin and whose husband has just left her for another bloke?” Kieran’s head snaps up and he stares at her. Mollie sighs sadly.

“Ah you are, what a shame. We could have had fun. Just so you know, I was over Jack many years ago. Just a slight embarrassment remains at my foolishness, but that’s youth for you. As for the husband, well what can I say? In one way the gay thing makes it better. At least I know it wasn’t really my fault. I am sad at the waste of time and angry about his behaviour, but I’ll survive. People do, don’t they? I may even take a leaf out of Jack’s book and bugger off abroad for a while. After all, I am now officially unemployed into the bargain. Bloody hell, they’ll be sending the men in white coats for me soon. How will I cope?” She says with a sarcastic edge to her voice and smiles knowingly at Kieran. Reaching past him she picks up her cocktail from the bar and serenely turns on her heel, walking away from them all.

Kieran feels a whoosh of something in his stomach.
Wow, that was weird.
She knew exactly what he was thinking and he now feels embarrassed and ashamed, and that doesn’t often happen. She didn’t even give him time to answer, but then again what would he have said? He could hardly deny it. Not to mention the job thing; Lord John had gone on and on about Mollie and how amazing she was. He hadn’t made the connection until she told him her name earlier and at that point he had been too wrapped up in thoughts of getting into her knickers to give it much attention.

He knew that the dramatic change to the Hall since last week had been down to her considerable organisation skills. He had been impressed, so impressed in fact with tales of the unidentified Mollie that he had sneaked a look at her personnel file. All relevant paperwork regarding the Hall had been left in files in the study and Lord John had taken him through it all earlier that afternoon. The meticulous filing and the precise accounting system were, it appeared, also down to Mollie. He had been equally impressed by her qualifications. At no point would he have ever connected the sparky wronged wife he had watched a week ago, or the sexy Jessica Rabbit of this evening, with the methodical, intelligent, co-ordinating mastermind who clearly ran the entire estate.

Bollocks. And now he had just fucked it up spectacularly. After her little speech, he didn’t have her down as someone who would be knocking at the door begging for her job back. Kieran wasn’t stupid; he was going to need her advice. Based on her file, the evidence and the very strong recommendation from Lord John, Kieran had planned to re-employ the mysterious Mollie. Another very good reason why a casual shag would not be a good idea.

Kieran takes a large swig at his lager and grimaces at its warmth. Turning to the bar to order another he is confronted with the now smug looking barman who obviously thought his luck was back in with Mollie. Kieran asks for his drink, keeping his face deliberately blank.

Andy nods and as he turns to get a fresh glass he says sneakily, “Bad luck mate.”

Kieran takes a controlled breath and other than clenching his fists, which the barman can’t see, he shows no emotion. He turns away from the bar and takes a look around the room. He spots Mollie on the crowded dance floor. Lou and Jack, who had obviously left him at the bar without so much as a backward glance, are now sitting at a table over in the corner with their heads together.

Mollie is dancing erotically, to his mind, as if she doesn’t have a care in the world. No, she wouldn’t be asking for a job. Not now, anyway.

He could kick himself. He wasn’t usually so sloppy, but there was something about her. He had become distracted.

Picking up the fresh pint delivered rather too smugly by Andy, he takes a long swig and carries on people watching.

His mother has arrived. The local Mayor, who Kieran had been introduced to earlier, appears to be stuck to her side and Marylyn is enjoying the attention.

His sister, Megan, is also here with her professional footballer boyfriend Johnny Morgan. Johnny plays for a Premier Division club and he is causing quite a stir. Johnny broke his wrist on the pitch last weekend. A particularly vicious tackle had resulted in his injury and a red card and sending off for the other player.

Johnny wasn’t happy but there is nothing to be done for a couple of weeks while the bone heels. He now has his arm in plaster and some unexpected time off. Soon he will be stuck in daily physio to get him back in the game but Megan is enjoying having him around for a little while.

Johnny is quickly being surrounded by guests as the whispers of his presence spread around the room.

Kieran smiles to himself. He is used to seeing it; Johnny surrounded by random people, giving out his autograph and having pictures taken.

Johnny is a good looking lad, with his short brown hair and hazel green eyes. At twenty-three he is five years younger than Megan. He chased her relentlessly after meeting her at a charity event.

Megan had proved difficult to capture. She hadn’t wanted to go out with a footballer and she certainly hadn’t been comfortable with having a toy boy on her arm, but Johnny hadn’t given up and in the end he’d worn Megan down until she had agreed to a date with him.

They have now been together for eighteen months, are living together and perfectly happy.

Megan isn’t your stereotypical WAG. She has very little to do with Johnny’s career; after all she has her own to worry about. She watches the odd match but she doesn’t get too involved with the other WAGs.

At first they caused a great stir in the press, mostly to do with the age gap. Articles popped up everywhere on the rights and wrongs of women having relationships with younger men and vice versa. They both turned down numerous interview requests. Megan didn’t do media, she just about coped with having cameras randomly shoved in her face in the supermarket.

She drew the line at sitting on the couch dissecting her life with Philip and Holly, or anyone else for that matter. Megan’s private life was just that, private.

Unlike a lot of other footballers, Johnny totally agreed with her, which helped. They normally managed to keep themselves to themselves, and because they didn’t court publicity it helped them to stay under the radar most of the time.

Of course Johnny’s injury hadn’t helped. The tackle was fairly controversial and the press were demonising the guilty player. They wanted pictures of ‘poor Johnny’ in his plaster cast to help the cause. This is one of the reasons why Johnny is here and not at home in London. The paps have been camped outside their house. It is quieter here for now and hopefully they won’t find him.

Kieran’s eyes slide back to Mollie. She is now dancing with a tall broad man, who looks to be in his mid forties. Kieran feels a stab of jealousy, an emotion that he hasn’t felt in years.