Good Girl or Gold-Digger? by Kate Hardy Read Free Book Online Page A

my sisters did it for me.’
    ‘What’s so bad about being a stockbroker?’
    That made him lift his head and look her straight in the eye. ‘You really have to ask that?’
    ‘I’d say you didn’t want to do it because it’s not your dream.’
    ‘Absolutely. I like fixing things. Like you, I suppose,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Except I fix businesses.’
    Daisy raised an eyebrow. ‘So you admit that you’re an asset stripper?’
    ‘No, and if you bother to look me up on the Internet you’ll see exactly what I do.’
    She spread her hands. ‘OK, so that was unfair of me. And I haven’t done my homework on you. I meant to.’
    ‘But you got caught up in the engine you were working on this morning?’
    She smiled wryly. ‘Yes. I’ve been working on it for a while, and today was my first day back on it. That’s why I lost track of time and was late for the meeting.’
    He coughed. ‘Late?’
    ‘All right, you had to come and find me. And I’ve already apologised for that.’ What else did he want her to do?
    An unbidden image floated into her head of apologising to him in a much more personal way. With a kiss.
    Oh, no. What on earth was wrong with her? This was meant to be a business conversation. She needed to get things back on track, right now. ‘You were going to tell me what’s wrong with the way we do things.’
    ‘For a start, you’ve got all that land and you’re not using it.’
    ‘Of course we’re using it. It’s a play area for children, and pretty gardens for people to stroll in. Everyone loves our gardens.’
    ‘But the land isn’t earning you any extra money.’
    ‘So what are you suggesting—that we should sell it to a property developer?’
    He frowned. ‘Why do you keep thinking the worst of me, Boots?’
    She felt her face heat. ‘Sorry. It’s…’
    ‘A defence mechanism?’ he suggested.
    ‘No, I…’ Her voice faded. Maybe he was right. Usually she always looked for the good, but she was deliberately trying to see Felix’s dark side. It was a defence mechanism, because she found the combination of the way he looked and his quick mind seriously attractive, tempting her to ignore her common sense and break her personal rules. ‘Tell me what you were going to say.’
    ‘For a start, the fairground would be a really unusual venue for a wedding.’
    Daisy shook her head. ‘I did think about that, actually, but when I looked into how much it costs to get a licence for weddings I realised that it wouldn’t pay for itself. Besides, we don’t have a hall big enough to cater for a reception.’
    ‘You could use a marquee, in summer.’
    ‘Even when it’s wet?’ She pulled a face. ‘Yes, the gondolas would be fabulous for bride-and-groom photographs. But summer weekends are our biggest earners. Holding a wedding reception would mean having to close to the public and lose a day’s takings.’
    ‘Not necessarily. You could close in the evenings—that’s when the fairground could be exclusive to the wedding party.’
    An unobtrusive waiter cleared their empty plates away and brought their main courses through.
    ‘You also need to look at your prices and the number of visitors,’ Felix said. ‘I assume you do know that?’
    She frowned. ‘Didn’t Bill talk you through that? Yes, of course we do. We have a proper computerised system for tickets, otherwise we’d run into trouble with the tax people. We know exactly how much we take each day. We also know who visits, and whether they’re buying individual tickets, or a family ticket, or using a season ticket.’
    ‘Then you need to analyse the stats properly and see if you have the right pricing structure.’
    She sighed. ‘How do I get it through to you, Felix? We’re about heritage, not making huge profits. That’s why I want a sponsor, not someone who’s going to invest and have a stake in the fairground. I don’t want to hike up the admission price and make it too expensive for families to visit. I want