Heller's Regret (20 page)

He blinked at me, his gaze unmoving, and that
was enough to express his opinion of that spurious activity.

“And now I’m tidying the queue restraints,” I
tried again.

“Sounds like busy work to me.” He looked
around the store floor. “I’d kill for a coffee right now.”

“I’ll play fetch. It’s ages until we open. I
don’t know why you made us come here so early.”

“It’s always better to be prepared.”

“Not this prepared. What do you want?”

“Double shot, flat white, no sugar, skim,
jumbo size,” he shot out, not hesitating to think. A man who knew
what he liked.

“I’m surprised you allow yourself the luxury
of milk. I thought you’d order a triple shot espresso, being such a
tough man and all.”

“Just go get the coffee. I can do without the
side order of smartarse comments.”

There were only a few customers at this time
of the day at the nearest coffee stand. I waited for one person to
be served before my order was taken. I also bought two bottles of
water for us as it didn’t appear the department store was willing
to cough up some for our benefit. I returned to my post, my hands
full of coffee, a water bottle carried under each armpit.

Mrs Burwood rushed forward when she saw me
with the beverages. “You can’t drink those in the room. Or in the
store, for that matter.”

“Can’t we keep the waters in the room at
least? They’re in bottles and we were parched yesterday, not having
any breaks.”

“I suppose that would be all right, as long
as they’re hidden off to the side. But you have to drink the
coffees out here, even though that’s against store rules,” she
decided reluctantly, glaring at me as if I planned to run amok in
the store, impishly splashing my cappuccino on her silk scarves and
watches.

“Okay.” I called into the room, “Hugh, get
out here.”

Before taking his coffee, he pulled the water
bottles from my armpits. They’d left condensation on my clothes
that made it look like I was sweating heavily.

He noticed my dismay when I touched the
dampness. I spent a lot of good money on a deodorant that promised
eternal dryness of the underarm area, so didn’t want a few drops of
unexpected water to ruin my look of complete calmness and
control.

“Don’t pretend you’ve worked that hard,”
Farrell said blandly. I pulled a face at him that decisively
destroyed any calmly controlled look surviving from my deodorant
disaster.

We sipped our coffees quietly. I savoured
mine, licking the creamy froth from my lips with relish. But
thinking of it reminded me of tea, which in turn reminded me of
Miss Grimsley’s tea. I wondered if this was how it would always be
for me – disparate things freshly triggering an endless loop of
that terrible experience in my mind.

“What’s the matter?” asked Farrell, as sharp
as ever.

“Bad memories resurfacing.”

Though his face didn’t change, I picked up
(or imagined I did) a faint hint of sympathy. I didn’t want
sympathy from him or any of my fellow workmates. What happened in
the past was often best left there.

As if reading my mind, Farrell said, “That
was then, this is now.” And I didn’t know whether to be grateful or
angry with him.

With ten minutes to go before opening time,
Francine joined me as I gazed at the necklace again. I was a bit
embarrassed, starting to feel like a jewellery stalker.

“You seem very taken with this piece.”

I reddened. “Oh, well, you know. It’s very
pretty. I’ve never seen anything like it.” To take her mind of my
weird behaviour, I asked, “Who’s the guy who worked on the queue
yesterday?”

“Oh, him,” she said scornfully. “He works
with me. He’s a complete moron. Thinks he knows everything about
jewellery, but he doesn’t. We don’t get on too well.”

“Doesn’t sound like it. What’s his name?”

“Jaegar.”

“That’s unusual.”

“There’s nothing more he loves than telling
everyone it means ‘hunter’. A human has never before been so
misnamed in the history of the world. He’s too stupid to hunt
anything.”

“You really don’t like him.”

“You wouldn’t either if you had to work with
him, trust me. And it’s not as if I can get away from him. Apart
from Mrs Burwood, the jerk and I are the only permanent staff. All
the others we have are casuals. So we’re expected to be a
team.”

“I thought he was pretty good-looking.”

She indicated the door with a flourish. “Go
for it. He’s all yours. Nobody else wants him.”

“Er, no thanks. I already have a boyfriend
and he’s enough for me.”

“He brags about his fantastic ‘social life’
all the time. I’ve wasted more breath than I care to remember
trying to get it through his thick skull that screwing a different
drunken scrag each week doesn’t constitute a social life.” She
shook her head. “Like I said, utter moron.”

“It must make Mrs Burwood’s life difficult if
you two are at each other’s necks all day.”

She shrugged. “He starts most of the trouble.
He sucks up to her all the time. It makes me sick. And he thinks he
knows everything about jewellery. I have much better qualifications
than him, but he argues with me about everything. It drives me
crazy.”

“Opening time,” interrupted Mrs Burwood,
popping her head through the doorway.

“Oops, I better scuttle,” said Francine and
left.

I moved over to the other side of the room
from Farrell. Through the doorway I saw Francine walk past Jaegar.
They conspicuously ignored each other, turning their heads away. It
must really affect team dynamics to have such animosity between two
staff members. I wondered why Mrs Burwood hadn’t stamped down on it
from the beginning. She certainly didn’t look the type to be too
timid to confront her staff about their behaviour.

I didn’t have time to ponder this any further
because the room filled to maximum capacity with those first in
line. As Farrell had predicted, even this early on in the day it
was clear that the crowd would reach bumper numbers. After an hour,
Farrell indicated I should go outside to take over crowd control
from Jaegar. Though the queue was mostly well behaved, there were
the usual problems of impatience, irritability and sheer
hot-headedness with which to deal.

Jaegar didn’t immediately disappear on my
arrival. He remained behind, fiddling around with the queue props
while I patrolled the perimeter of the queue, glaring at anyone who
even looked as though they were going to step out of line. After a
couple of circuits, I joined Jaegar.

“Sounds like you and Francine don’t get along
very well,” I commented casually.

He sighed. “She’s been bitching about me
again? Bad form to air our dirty laundry. Not that it’s ever
stopped her before.” I couldn’t help agreeing with him. It wasn’t a
good look for the department store or her.

“She told me a little,” I said tactfully.

“She’s a repressed singleton who probably
hasn’t had a date for years, if ever. She’s worked here forever and
has long thought of herself as Mrs Burwood’s favourite.” He rolled
his eyes. “As if anyone would be excited by that prospect. She’s
resented me from the day I started working here, imagining I’m
trying to outshine her or steal her sales. God! She needs to get a
life. I’ve never met anyone with a bigger stick up their butt
before.”

“You don’t like her much either.”

“I’m a friendly person. When I first started
I tried to engage with her, like any normal person would do in a
new workplace, but she brushed me off every time. She disagrees
with everything I say, and even denigrates me for having inferior
qualifications to her, though I don’t. Now I’ve completely given up
on having any kind of cordial relationship with her. It’s much
better if we ignore each other.”

“Must be hard for Mrs Burwood.”

“She’s torn strips off us heaps of times for
bickering, but it doesn’t seem to make much difference. Francine
picks at me again the second Mrs Burwood turns her back. So her new
suggestion for us is that we ignore each other. We’ve been doing it
for a week and it seems to be working for now.” He looked over
towards his section. “I better get back to the counter. We’re
really busy at the moment because we’re selling replica pieces of
the collection jewellery. They’re flying off the shelves,
especially the necklace replica. People are going nuts over it.
Yes, technically it’s almost perfect, but I think it’s too showy.
Not my kind of piece at all. I prefer jewellery that’s more
subtle.”

I guess now wasn’t the time to mention my own
obsession with the necklace to him. “Have fun,” I said.

“You too,” he replied with a cute ironic
quirk of his lips that had me watching him as he walked off. He was
one good-looking guy.

The day was hectic and tiring. Once again, we
didn’t find any chance for a break, and I was elated when closing
time finally rolled around.
One more day
, I told myself.
Surely I could last that long?

On our way out, I loitered at the jewellery
counter eyeballing the replica necklace. I
could
afford one
of those, though it was a fairly expensive piece. But I’d always
know it was only a replica. It just didn’t have the same beauty or
attraction for me as the real one.

I let Farrell drag me away.

Chapter 15

Back home I checked in with the guys, but
they were busy, Daniel pulling some overtime to meet a deadline and
Niq desperately trying to finish an assignment due tomorrow which
he was yet to start. With nobody else to talk to, I changed and
went to the rooftop. I sat in the hot tub by myself, singing a song
that had been stuck in my head for days and allowing myself a glass
of chilled wine.

I’d almost dangerously drifted off to sleep
in the hot tub when someone said my name. I jolted awake and
upright. It was Clive of all people. Geez, what had I done wrong
now? I hadn’t even been in the office for two days and I’d been
doing my job conscientiously, as far as I knew.

“Clive?” I asked warily.

He grabbed a chair from the dining area and
plonked it down next to the hot tub, sitting heavily in it. His
craggy features revealed his conflicting emotions, as if he
simultaneously did and didn’t want to be here. I couldn’t imagine
what he was planning to say to me.

I waited for him to speak.

“Tilly,” he started, pausing for so long I
thought that was the extent of our conversation. How was I supposed
to respond to that? Say “Clive” back to him, pleased we’d
remembered each other’s names?

The silence stretched awkwardly between us.
When he spoke again he couldn’t quite meet my eyes. “I shouldn’t
have sent you to that boot camp without researching it further. It
was wrong of me and I’m sorry they treated you so badly. I should
have dealt with the whole matter in a better way, keeping you at
home. Heller was angry with me.” The pain of that rebuke clouded
his face still. I couldn’t mock him for that. I’d experienced the
lasting sting of a rebuke (or a right old bollocking) from Heller
far too often. “I resented that for a long while. But after that .
. . other job, I realised how much you’d been through. And apart
from that first day when you came back from the boot camp, you’ve
never reproached me or blamed me for what happened.” He stood up,
carefully tucking the chair back under the table. “I’m very sorry
and it won’t happen again, I promise. Heller trusted me to ensure
your safety in his absence. I failed him and I failed you. I can’t
forgive myself for that.”

His words robbed me of speech. If I’d thought
about how the situation between Clive and me would resolve itself –
and I had – I would never have considered him apologising to me in
such a simple, genuine way.

“It’s okay, Clive. It’s done with now. I’m
happy to just move on and put all that behind me.”

“Thank you, Tilly. That’s very generous of
you.” He met left quietly.

I sat in the hot tub thinking over what he’d
said. It was such an unexpected gesture that I wasn’t sure how to
file it away in my memory.

The interruption broke my dozy mood. I
shivered, not having realised before how cold I’d grown. Showered,
dressed in pyjamas, and with a glass of milk next to me, I surfed
the internet and answered emails. Opening one from Dixie, my heart
sank to find another uncomfortable, gushing email and happy pic.
She’d admitted this guy was a bad boy and a player. What was she
thinking to become so involved with him? She should have just
shared a wild night with him, taken a pic of him naked and asleep,
and kicked him out in the morning. Like she usually did. It made me
queasy to look at a snap of her draping herself over him in a
restaurant, beaming into her phone camera. I wanted to be happy for
her and sincerely hoped I was completely wrong about this guy, left
feeling foolish and judgmental afterwards.

Pushing her potential problems to the back of
my mind, I flicked through a few websites without much interest,
eventually caught up reading a bitter forum fight on a well-known
food blog about pasta sauce of all things.
Pasta sauce?
I
laughed to myself. Guess some people were really passionate about
their pasta meals. My front door opened, but I didn’t bother
turning around – it was probably Heller. There weren’t too many
surprises about my visitors, especially after that traumatic
experience with his bunny-boiler ex-girlfriend.

“What is so amusing, my sweet?”

“People are fighting over pasta sauce
recipes,” I laughed. He smiled and pulled up a chair next to me.
“You should see what they’re saying to each other. They’re starting
to insult each other’s nonnas. I think that’s going too far, don’t
you?”

“Yes,” he agreed, his voice suspiciously
serious. “That’s most definitely going too far.”