Page 123 of Cooking Up a Christmas Storm
Tears were glistening in Fiona MacCellan’s eyes.
‘Fiona, what’s wrong?’
‘He thinks I’m stupid,’ she whispered.
‘You’re not stupid.’ Fiona wasn’t stupid. Jodie wasn’t useless. They’d both been sold the same lie by people who were supposed to make them feel safe. What did she wish somebody had said to her back when she was trying so hard to please the real Gemma Bryant? ‘But maybe you shouldn’t be with someone who makes you feel like you are?’
‘No.’ Fiona shook her head. ‘I need to do better. It’s my fault. I let him down and so of course he’s angry. I push him into things, you know. It’s not his fault.’
Jodie felt a wave of nausea crash through her body. She put her hand on Pavel’s arm for comfort. He stepped away.
‘What things do you push him into, Fi?’ Pavel asked quietly. ‘Does he hurt you?’
‘No. No. Of course not. He’s not like that. He helps with things I can’t manage on my own. I’d forget my own head. So it’s easier if he looks after… where we go and how I present myself and…’
Jodie was aware that time was not on their side. The kind way to do this would be with weeks of therapy. But the unkindest thing would be to let it stand. She stepped towards Fiona. ‘I’m really sorry, Fi, but John McKenzie is not a nice man. He’s a bully. He bullies you.’
‘He’s not.’
‘He is and he does.’
‘He just…’
‘What?’
The tears that had been threatening started to fall. Fiona didn’t wipe them away. ‘He doesn’t make me feel good,’ she admitted. ‘But if I just try a bit harder and…’
‘No.’ Jodie knew what she needed to say. It might not help Fiona, but it was what she, herself, wished she’d known. ‘Someone who loved you would build you up. They’d make you feel like you were enough. Like you were better than you ever imagined yourself to be just the way you are. They wouldn’t make you feel like you constantly had to be trying to be different.’
‘They’d make you feel braver.’ That was Pavel. Jodie couldn’t look at him. It was too much. ‘They’d make you feel more than, not less than. Always.’
Fiona gave the tiniest little nod.
Jodie hated pushing this, but they were running out of time. ‘So you can stay here and make a call and let people know what we’re up to. It’s fine. You caught us. And then McKenzie wins. Or…’
‘Or what?’ The fact that she’d even asked felt like a small victory.
‘Or you can pretend you never saw us here and come back over to Lowbridge for a proper party.’
Fiona shook her head. ‘No. Mr McKenzie wouldn’t…’ She stopped. ‘It was very good of him to take me on.’
‘You run this place, Fiona,’ Jodie pointed out. ‘You’re not his right-hand woman. You’re the one making everything work.’
‘None of this is his achievement.’ Pavel’s voice was soft. ‘It’s all you.’
‘I just wanted to do a good job.’ Jodie could hear the crack in Fiona’s voice now. ‘It was for my dad to start with. Selling the estate broke his heart.’
‘I’m sure he’s proud of you,’ Jodie suggested.
‘Maybe. I haven’t seen him so much lately.’
‘Not for Christmas?’
Fiona’s expression changed. ‘I was going to, but then John wanted to spend it together, just the two of us.’
That ought to have sounded romantic. Fiona’s tone was anything but.
‘And then he didn’t show up.’ Fiona’s fingers were wrapped tightly around the handle of Pavel’s hammer. ‘I waited all day. I shaved my fucking legs and I put on fake tan because I can be a bit pale, you know. It doesn’t look healthy, he says. So I did all that. And he didn’t even turn up.’ She was waving the hammer as she spat out the words.
