“I’m guessing we’ll be eating outside as Daddy is laying the table out there.” Lizzie picked up the plates and salad before heading back outside.
Tasha had rearranged her sarong so that it was tied around her neck and hung in a dress like arrangement to cover her up and avoid any embarrassment for Dylan who looked like he was quaking in his seat under Jim’s glare and questioning.
“So, Dylan, how do you and Elizabeth know each other?” Jim shocked Tasha and apparently Lizzie too by his use of her full name.
“We go to school together,” stammered Dylan nervously.
“Ah. What do your parents do?” Jim asked between mouthfuls of food.
“My dad is a doctor, like Lizzie’s dad, I mean step-dad,” he quickly corrected. “And my mom is a teacher.”
“And what do you hope to do in the future?” Jim relentlessly questioned the boy as he tried to eat.
“I kind of fancy the idea of racing cars...” Dylan began.
“Racing cars? That seems a little unlikely—” began Jim before Tasha interrupted.
“But no more unlikely than a girl like me becoming an actress, so good luck.” Tasha smiled.
“But I’m sure you’d agree, Natasha, that without luck it would be wise to have an alternative career in mind.” Jim spoke with a seriousness as he addressed her.
“Maybe. I didn’t have a plan at all, but everyone should have a dream shouldn’t they, James?” she replied equally as seriously.
“If you say so.” He frowned.
“Oh, I do. Like Lizzie’s dream of being a model,” she said and immediately regretted her inclusion of Lizzie when his expression changed and darkened considerably.
“Eat your lunch, Tasha. It would be such a waste for you to leave two lunches in one day.”
She said nothing and continued to eat as the others chatted in a more relaxed manner with the pressure off Dylan now.
****
It was the following morning before Jim made a verbal reference to what he saw as her defence of Dylan. He emerged from the bathroom, freshly showered and wearing his favoured small, white towel around his waist.
“Good morning.” He grinned as he bent down and kissed her gently on the nose.
“Morning.” She stretched out in the now empty bed.
“Why did you compare Lizzie’s modelling ambition to that horny boy’s ridiculous dream of being a racing driver?” he asked as he entered the wardrobe.
She laughed making him stick his head back around the door. “I am not laughing, Natasha,” he said rather unnecessarily.
“I can see that, but that horny boy has a name and I am sure you wouldn’t want to think of his parents referring to Lizzie asthat slutty girlwould you?”
She thought she’d made a good point clearly. She was wrong. Very wrong.
“Really? That slutty girl? My daughter is many things, but slutty is not one of them and you suggesting that she is makes me even more pissed off with you at the start of today than I was by the end of yesterday. Fucking hell, Tasha! I was hoping we were working to resolve your misdemeanours of yesterday, not for you to add to them and certainly not by badmouthing Lizzie.” He was obviously exasperated by her now.
He shook his head like a disapproving parent or teacher which made her think of his role as principal to her naughty schoolgirl and instantly she had an overwhelming urge to entice him back to bed, but to what end?
“That is not what I meant and I think you know it,” she said as she watched him fastening the buttons on his crisp, pale blue shirt with contrasting white collar and cuffs. “I like that shirt,” she admitted to herself as much as him.
“I know,” he said wryly.
“I also think that the last thing on your mind was resolving or absolving my misdemeanours anytime soon. You like the power that me being needy and horny brings you,” she told him as she sat up and propped herself forward on his pillows.
“You are far too clever for your own good, Miss Winters, and the sooner you are Mrs Maybury the better for all of us.”
