right about you,” he said with a smile.
“You haven’t answered the question, Spencer. I mean, do you get to chat much?”
“It’s difficult to share things,” he said.
He was still on the ropes. She wasn’t sure enough of him to take things much further. He surprised her with a counterattack.
“Who do you talk to? You said you had nobody?”
“No one like I think you mean. I’ve got my best mate, Mel. You—you have Jasmine....”
He leaned back and sighed.
“Yes, she’s been a brick. Since the accident, you know, Saskia’s death, Jasmine has kept us going I suppose.”
Shannon felt a surge of angry spite rumbling somewhere unpleasant in her bowels.
“She must be a great comfort,” she said.
“Comfort? Ah, look it seems disloyal to talk about her, you know?”
“Yes, I’m sorry. I was wrong to mention her. Now I’m being too personal.”
A silence fell between them. She let it work for her. He had the ball.
“She—Jasmine, has tried to be something of a mother to Ben. She thinks I must send him back to boarding school for his own good.”
“Bloody places seem like open prisons to me,” said Shannon, “but without parole.”
Spencer stared at her wide-eyed and open-mouthed as if he had never heard such a thing.
“The prime minister and everyone at the top—even your boss, Boris Johnson—they all went to boarding school.”
“No child of mine’s ever going to one. I’d be his or her mother even if it meant missing out on the wonderful world of politics,” she said.
She could tell he was appraising her.
“Am I being selfish keeping him here though? He hasn’t got a mother and it has been hard for him to fit in at school.”
She wanted to speak openly but she bit her tongue. If the nearest thing he had to a mother was Jasmine he would probably be better off away at school. It was obvious Ben hated her. It looked as if Spencer hadn’t picked up the vibes.
“He loves you, Spencer. That’s the whole deal apart from the fact that you love him and he knows that too. But look, I don’t know you guys. I’m sure Jasmine is on top of the job,” she said, keeping her eyes deliberately cold and dispassionate.
“Shannon, I can’t. I simply can’t. We shouldn’t be talking like this.”
She looked down, denying him her contact which she knew he wanted. Again a silence worked its corrosive magic.
“When will Jasmine be home? I must be keeping you,” she said.
“Home? No, Jasmine doesn’t live here. This is where she keeps some of her horses.”
“How many horses does a gal need?” asked Shannon, knowing she sounded edgy and insolent.
“Most of them are here. Maybe a dozen. She keeps a couple of mounts in London. She rides daily on Rotten Row in Hyde Park.”
“Not the Lady of the Manor then. I can imagine her on Rotten Row,” said Shannon.
“Oh no. She is a very top lawyer. She has a city penthouse.”
“You know she complained about me?” she said.
“Yes. I was extremely angry,” he replied. “I didn’t know if you knew. You weren’t supposed to find out apparently.”
“Spencer, it’s cool. I’ve got to work around you guys. I was a bit rude to her and I expect she’s a sweet girl if I got to know her and empathize with her,” she said.
“You don’t think that, do you? You’re just being professional and I respect that,” he said.
“Stuff ‘being professional,’ Spencer. I just wanted to trot out some half-baked crap to make me sound nice.”
For the second time his jaw dropped.
“You just say things, don’t you?”
She smiled at him. She’d roughed him up a bit. His experience was so different from hers. Life had knocked off her edges but had left a curved sharp blade underneath.
“I’m a bit direct I guess. I’m either an alien, a Yorkshire man or an American,” she said.
“You’re truly astonishing,” he said.
“So are you, Spencer. That boy loves and admires you.”
“You know all that in just a few minutes, just