Henry watched Penny across the table, tucking into her food with much more enthusiasm than she had been a few minutes before. He was an ass and he shouldn’t have overreacted about her comments that afternoon. It was a perfectly reasonable misunderstanding and he should have just laughed it off.
He really liked having her here. He and Daisy so rarely had company; any women that he dated he normally did so away from his home, wanting to keep that part of his social life separate from his daughter. But this little family dinner with the three of them seemed so right. Penny fitted in with them perfectly. There was something about her that he found he was attracted to that went way beyond her looks. She was fascinating and he could have watched her all night and never got tired of it.
‘So Daisy, you’ll be going to White Cliff Senior School?’ Penny asked.
‘After Christmas,’ Daisy said, over a mouthful of garlic bread.
‘Don’t talk with your mouth full,’ Henry said.
Daisy swallowed. ‘I’m going in for a day to meet people and some of the teachers but I won’t start properly till after Christmas because they won’t have the room for me. One of the kids is leaving so it works out well for me, otherwise I’d have to go to the school in the next town and the bus ride is over an hour. And the art teacher here is fantastic, he’s had work in galleries in London.’
‘Mr Cartwright?’
Daisy’s face lit up. ‘Yes, you know him?’
‘He used to be my teacher too. So you like art?’
‘I love it, just to be able to watch something brought to life with your hands is just wonderful.’
Henry smiled as he watched his daughter come alive as she talked about her passion.
‘Dad said you were an ice carver?’
‘I am.’
Daisy started bombarding Penny with a hundred questions about the process and Henry watched as Penny explained in detail about how she did it. It was clearly a great passion for Penny too. He liked that Penny was talking to Daisy like she was an adult, she wasn’t dumbing down any of the explanations. Most of the women he had been with still spoke to Daisy like a child and she hated that. Lots of people didn’t know how to behave around a teenager, but for Penny, it was the most natural thing in the world. She had behaved the same with Bea in town; there was no singsong voice or cutesy face like Jade.
He finished his dinner and was standing up to take his plate to the sink when there was a knock at the door. He looked up to see Jade outside. He sighed – speak of the devil. She clearly hadn’t gotten the message earlier in the café. She looked like she was about to go on a glamour shoot dressed in a red clingy dress and high heels.
He opened the door and Jade immediately leaned into him, engulfing him in a sickly cloud of perfume. He took a step back and she pouted slightly.
‘Henry, I brought you some dinner. I figured you’d be tired from all the unpacking and I went to The Olive Branch and got you some Italian. I figured we could share it together.’
‘That’s very thoughtful of you, thank you, but I’ve just eaten, though me and Daisy can reheat it tomorrow. We still have a ton of unpacking to do so this will be a huge help.’
He heard Daisy snigger at his polite rebuttal and he tried to suppress a smile.
‘Daisy?’ Jade asked in confusion.
‘My daughter.’ He gestured to the dining table. Jade hadn’t even registered there was anyone else in the room with them. He didn’t know whether to be flattered by that or annoyed that she hadn’t even acknowledged Penny and Daisy.
Jade looked over and Daisy smiled with pasta hanging out of her mouth. Henry scowled at Daisy’s rudeness but had to keep the laughter that bubbled in his throat under control.
‘Oh, she’s so cute.’
She still hadn’t acknowledged Penny, which annoyed him and he didn’t know why.
‘Penny, do you like Italian?’ Henry called over to her. ‘Looks like Jade has brought a ton of food here, you can come and share it with me and Daisy tomorrow.’
Penny nodded in confusion. She’d gone very quiet again, scuttling back inside her shell just as she was starting to come out of it.
Jade laughed nervously at the new cosy arrangement that Henry had created with Penny.
‘I hope you are settling in OK, is there anything I can do to help?’ Jade said, curling her hair around her finger, leaving him with no doubt as to how Jade would like to help him settle in.
‘Well, actually there is. Me and Penny are going out on a date on Tuesday, would you be able to babysit Daisy for me?’
Daisy choked on her pasta. It had been a long time since he’d needed a babysitter for her. He glanced over at Penny who was looking like a rabbit in the headlights.
‘I’d normally ask my sister but she’s busy with the new baby so could you do it, Jade? I know how much you love children.’
Jade’s sultry smile slipped from her face. ‘You’re going out with Penny?’
She said it with such disgust that he felt anger slam through him at her reaction. He bit back the retort he wanted to make. It had been kind of Jade to bring him dinner even if she had an ulterior motive.
‘Yes, we just hit it off the moment we met. It would be so kind if you could babysit?’
‘I, erm… I’m busy that day.’
‘Ah, that’s too bad, I’m sure we can find someone. Thanks for this, did you want to come in and share dessert with us all? We have Funny Feet ice lollies or I think we might have a Magnum or two at the bottom of the freezer.’ Henry moved to the fridge, knowing Jade would be the last person in the world to sit down at the table with Daisy and Penny and suck on a Magnum.
Jade shook her head, still clearly in shock over the Penny revelation. ‘No, I better go, I, erm… have somewhere I need to be.’
‘Oh, that’s a shame. Thanks for popping by though.’
Jade stumbled out and disappeared round the back of the house. Henry closed the door softly after her.
He went and sat down at the table again.
‘Dad, you’re so rude,’ Daisy giggled.
‘She’s rude, I don’t like her much.’ He turned to Penny. ‘Another classmate of yours?’
Penny nodded.
‘How many times has she been up here over the years?’
‘Tonight was the first, I’m surprised she even knew the way. She, erm…’ she looked at Daisy as she tried to find the right words ‘…went out with Chris for a while.’
‘Who’s Chris?’ Daisy asked.
‘My ex.’
‘Let me guess, she went out with him whilst he was seeing you,’ Henry said.
Penny nodded.
Bitch.
He took a sip of water and stared at Penny across the table. Jade’s attitude to Penny disgusted him. And Beth’s too. He suddenly had a sudden desire to stick two fingers up at all the arseholes in the town who didn’t think Penny was worthy of paying attention to. ‘You know what this means? You and I have a date on Tuesday.’
Penny’s eyebrows shot up and Daisy grinned at him.
Chapter Five
Penny woke in the night to mumbles and cries of panic coming from the lounge. She quickly got up and ran downstairs.
She was surprised to see Daisy lying on her sofa with Bernard by her side. She was clearly having a nightmare. She didn’t know whether to wake her or not and she certainly didn’t want to scare her by doing so. She didn’t know why Daisy was in her lounge either.
‘Daisy,’ she said softly but there was no response. What should she do? What kind of mum would she have made when she didn’t even know how to deal with a child who was having a nightmare? Her first reaction was to stroke Daisy’s head and hug her, but Daisy wasn’t her daughter, she couldn’t do that.