Yes, Fenton had always wanted for nothing; he was the quintessential poor little rich boy – the kid who had everything apart from the one thing he truly needed – his parents’ affection. He smirked humourlessly at the self-pitying turn his thoughts were taking.
“Is something funny, Fenton?”
“No, Mother, I was just thinking.”
She gazed at him coolly – heaven forbid, he thought, that she might actually give a shit what, exactly, he had been thinking.
“Please don’t be long. We’ll be in the main drawing room.”
With those words she left his bedroom without a backward glance, leaving him standing there feeling like the lost little boy he always secretly felt like inside. Sure, he had that casual arrogance of the super-rich, that air of breezy, over-entitlement that would undoubtedly open many doors to him in life, but all he really wanted was a show of kindness from his mother, no matter how small. Just one kind word. A hug, maybe. Even a genuine smile would do. Was that really so much to ask?
Sighing deeply, he pushed aside the sudden bout of melancholy – it really wasn’t like him to dwell, to let his thoughts amble down the badly-done-to-child road. He knew perfectly well that he was lucky, that he had been born with the proverbial silver spoon in his mouth, that he had a glittering career ahead of him in law, and, in the unlikely chance that he should screw that up given his enviable social connections, there was always Daddy Dearest’s money to fall back on.
But still. Sometimes, like right now, such melancholy gripped him. He wished he hadn’t bothered coming back, but his mother had been quite forceful on the matter. Something about a big party that she insisted he attend. Something, she said, that would be very important for his future.
Thank God I’m only here for another week.
A sense of cold detachment seeped through him as he looked around himself. The room looked like every other room in the nine bedroomed mansion – all gleaming, dark-oak floorboards, high ceilings, chandeliers and painstakingly-restored, antique furniture.
There was no sense of him in this room. His childhood toys had long been ‘lost’, and all that remained was an antique, painted, wooden rocking-horse that his mother had never let him ride as a boy because it was too valuable.
He thought of Tabitha, quite probably sleeping in her cot down the hallway. He pitied her. At least he was now a young adult. He was out of it, unlike Tab, who had their entirety of her childhood spread out before her.
Fenton found his attention drawn to the window once more, but the girl, along with his father, was gone.
CHAPTER THREE
“Let me take that for you,” Wilbur Hiddleston said, reaching for the suitcase which was propped up next to her on the gravel forecourt.
Mr Hiddleston took the suitcase from her – she still couldn’t quite bring herself to think of him as Wilbur – and gestured over towards the porch with the faintest flick of his head.
“Shall we?”
“Sure.”
On trembling legs, she followed him inside.
*
Mrs Hiddleston greeted her in the large hallway, which did nothing to help with her feelings of inadequacy. She was beautiful. At first glance, she looked around her own age of twenty-five, partly perhaps because she was so short, and partly because she was so smooth-skinned and perky, but Lauren very much doubted that she was so young. It was hardly impossible – plenty of handsome, successful men paired up with much younger women, but Mrs Hiddleston carried herself with the self-assured grace of someone much older.
She wore a plain, knee-length navy dress that showcased her tight curves – the type of body that left Lauren sick with envy.
“Thanks,” she said, accepting the woman’s offered hand. “I’m so happy to have been offered the job.”
Mrs Hiddleston, or Anoushka – she really had to get used to the idea of calling these people by their first names – swept an appraising eye over her body. The faintest sneer curled her upper lip, but just as quick it disappeared again…
END OF SAMPLE