The Gatecrasher by Sophie Kinsella Read Free Book Online Page B

control of himself and looked back towards her, the lacy stockings had disappeared under a sea of decorous black wool. He looked silently at her.
    “I must be a great disappointment to you,” he said eventually. “I’d quite understand if you decided . . .” he shrugged.
    “Decided what?”
    “That you didn’t want to see me any more.”
    “Richard, don’t be so silly!” Fleur’s voice was soft, compassionate, and just a little playful. “You don’t imagine that I’m only after you for one thing?” She gave him a tiny smile, and after a few seconds Richard grinned back. “We’ve been having such wonderful times together,” continued Fleur. “I’d hate either of us to feel pressured . . .”
    As she was speaking, she caught a glimpse of the taxi driver’s face in the rearview mirror. He was staring at them both in transparent astonishment, and Fleur suddenly wanted to giggle. But instead she turned to Richard and in a quieter voice, said, “I’d love to come down and stay at Greyworth and I’d be very happy to have my own bedroom. And if things move on . . . they move on.”
    Richard looked at her for a few seconds, then suddenly grasped her hand.
    “You’re a wonderful woman,” he said huskily. “I feel . . .” He clasped her hand tighter. “I feel suddenly very close to you.” Fleur stared back at him silently for a moment, then modestly lowered her eyes.
    Bloody Emily, she thought. Always getting in the way. But she said nothing, and allowed Richard’s hand to remain clutching hers, all the way back to Regent’s Park.

Chapter 4
    Two weeks later, Antony Favour stood in the kitchen of The Maples, watching as his Aunt Gillian whipped cream. She was whipping it by hand, with a grim expression and a mouth which seemed to grow tighter at each stroke of the whisk. Antony knew for a fact that inside one of the kitchen cupboards lived an electric whisk; he’d used it himself to make pancakes. But Gillian always whipped cream by hand. She did most things by hand. Gillian had been living in the house since before Antony was born, and for as long as he could remember she’d been the one who did all the cooking, and told the cleaner what to do, and walked around after the cleaner had left, frowning, and polishing again over surfaces which looked perfectly clean. His mother had never really done any of that stuff. Some of the time she’d been too ill to cook, and the rest of the time she’d been too busy playing golf.
    A vision of his mother came into Antony’s mind. Small, and thin, with silvery blond hair and neat tartan trousers. He remembered her blue-grey eyes; her expensiverimless spectacles; her faint flowery scent. His mother had always looked neat and tidy; silver and blue. Antony looked surreptitiously at Gillian. Her dull grey hair had separated into two heavy clumps; her cheeks were bright red; her shoulders were hunched up in their mauve cardigan. Gillian had the same blue-grey eyes as his mother, but apart from that, Antony thought, it was difficult to believe that they’d been sisters.
    He looked again at Gillian’s tense expression. Ever since Dad had called to tell them he’d be bringing this woman to stay, Gillian had been walking around looking even more grim than usual. She hadn’t said anything—but then, Gillian didn’t often say very much. She never had an opinion; she never said when she was pissed off. It was up to you to guess. And now, Antony guessed, she was seriously pissed off.
    Antony himself wasn’t quite sure how he felt about this woman. He’d lain in bed the night before, thinking about his mother and his father and this new woman, waiting for a sudden gut reaction; a stab of emotion to point him in the right direction. But nothing. He’d had no particularly negative emotions, nor any positive ones, just a kind of astonished acknowledgement that this thing was happening; that his father was seeing another woman. Occasionally the thought would hit him as he