Page 15 of CEO April: Zed Barker
Chapter Six
I don’t think I was surprised when I headed down for lunch and discovered that Laura had left. According to Anna, who took the time to make sure I knew, she often left early, normally after she’d gotten exactly what she came for. Perhaps we’d see her at the next party, maybe not, she’d told me.
From then the party lacked its attraction, although I was determined to see it through to the end. We had shooting and one more evening before leaving the following day.
I tried to join in the conversation over lunch. I listened without really hearing the words and smiled, probably in the wrong places. Eventually, it was over and we headed out to the front car park where we were met by two guys with identical green Land Rovers.
Joe and Perry introduced themselves and it was obvious that Joe, the one wearing the puffer jacket with the Union Jack and Olympic rings, took control of the ladies. He was smarmy and I shook my head, knowing he had no idea what he had just let himself in for. Not even Miriam licking her lips as she surveyed her prey gave him a hint of what was to come.
“Climb in, ladies and gentlemen,” Joe said although it was clear he meant just the ladies for his vehicle.
Duke, Darius, Harry, and I headed to the second one, all the while doing that laugh that meant we knew what was funny but no one else did.
As expected, by the time we arrived at our destination in the middle of a woods, Joe was looking a little dishevelled and most certainly flustered. His hair had been ruffled more than once by the looks of it, and his cheeks were flushed. I doubted he’d ever heard some of the comments those ‘ladies’ were able to let loose and there were only three of them.
“Ah, poor Joe,” Duke said, straightening his long socks that met the end of his shooting trousers at the knee. Joe scuttled off to a log cabin and left Perry to deal with administration.
Once we had promised not to shoot ourselves, we were issued shotguns, taught how to hold and load them, and then taken to a range.
Duke, the master of shoots on his estate, so he told us, missed most of the static targets, complained that he only shot moving ones. Anna screamed with every boom until she declared that it wasn’t for her and she’d meet us all back at the clearing with coffee and bacon rolls.
Once we’d practiced, the rest of us accompanied by a subdued Joe and jubilant Perry, who I suspected was thrilled to take a lead role for once, headed into the woods. There were various areas set aside for us, clays were fired into the air or rolled across the ground, and I was actually surprised that I was quite good. Of course, Duke performed well and I suspected Miriam, who was clearly a good shot herself, deliberately missed a few so he could score more points. She’d wink to me every now and again, as if including me in her plan. I liked her; she was a forthright woman and full of fun. Perhaps my last night would be with her again, and I rather hoped we might keep in touch for the odd dinner or two. She was someone I thought could be a good friend, with a side benefit, of course.
However, it seemed that Anna had other plans for me.
We decided on a break for a coffee and to tally up the scores. Duke was a stickler for keeping score and we’d all but given up telling him it was just for fun. While he recited from his notebook for Perry to write up on a blackboard, Anna fetched coffee and bacon rolls for us all. She came to sit beside me.
“I was hoping that you and I might spend some time together later, or this evening, if you’d like to rest before dinner,” she said, not looking at me and sipping from her polystyrene cup.
“I’d like that. Maybe before and after dinner.”
She was an attractive woman and certainly caused a stirring in my shorts. Maybe she and Miriam might like a little threesome that evening.
“Good. It appears you have made your way through all the ladies but me. I was beginning to wonder why,” she said with a fake pout.
“Not all the—” I started to protest.
“Okay, not Angela, but your performance with Laura was something to behold.”
I turned sharply to her. My brow furrowed in question and she laughed. “It is a public beach. Darius and I got rather hot watching you.” She took a bite of her roll. “You don’t mind, do you?” she added as an afterthought and she blinked a few times. I wasn’t sure I was portraying the look she was expecting.
“No, that’s fine,” I replied, not for one minute thinking it was.
What happened on that beach was private and memorable for me. It wasn’t part of theparty, it wasn’t for titillation, but I didn’t want to confess what it meant. Anna relaxed when I smiled at her.
“Phew, I thought then we’d stumbled upon something that we shouldn’t have,” she said, although her cheeks had coloured and I was sure I hadn’t convinced her it was fine at all. She then, very quickly, changed the subject.
We laughed at Duke’s assessment of us all, and hislessonon how to shoot better, as if any of us were likely to do it again. Although, he did extend an invitation to his estate for a weekend, I wondered how many times those invitations were given but never followed up. A wave of sadness rolled over me. The weekend had certainly highlighted how much I worked and how few friends I had.
“Cheer up, old boy, we have a whole afternoon and evening of delights with the ladies,” I heard. I turned to see Duke by my side. We had finished our coffee and rolls and had opted to return to the house instead of repeating the circuit.
We climbed back into the Land Rovers and headed back to the house. As we stood on the drive with Angela, I looked up at the house.
“It is ugly, isn’t it,” she said with a laugh.
“Yes, I have to confess, it was the first thing that crossed my mind when I arrived.”
“Keeps the nosy people away,” she replied.
