I was wrong and she was right, thought Janey wryly, sipping her drink. Ouch.

It would have been nice to have company, too. Doing herself up and telling herself that the party would be fun was all very well, but now she was actually here Janey was beginning to feel conspicuously single. Most of the guests were from out of town and she didn’t know as many people as she had imagined she would. Sometimes even being driven to distraction by Maxine’s over-the-top chat-up lines was preferable to standing alone and wondering who to talk to next.

Chapter 26

The next moment, just to prove she looked as solitary as she felt, a male voice behind her said, ‘Speak of the devil’s sister. Hello, Janey, all on your own tonight?’

Turning, she saw that it was Guy Cassidy, looking ridiculously handsome in a black dinner jacket and white shirt. Next to him stood a tall, titian-haired woman wearing a strapless topaz silk evening dress. Janey smiled as Guy, making no mention of Serena, introduced her as

‘Charlotte, a friend of mine’. From what Maxine had told her, he had almost as many female friends as Bruno.

‘I was just telling Charlotte about Maxine’s latest adventure,’ Guy went on, his tone dry.

‘She got on to Josh’s skate-board, shot down the lane at the end of our drive and landed up in the back of a milk float. The milkman almost had a heart attack.’

Janey winced. Was she hurt?’

‘No, but she spent the rest of the afternoon washing strawberry yoghurt out of her hair. And the milkman, in a state of shock, ran over the skate-board.’

‘Poor Josh.’

‘Poor Maxine! Very poor Maxine, in fact. As soon as her hair was dry, Josh dragged her down to the shops and made her buy him a new one.’ With a grin, he added, ‘It cost thirty-eight pounds. When I found out what he’d done I didn’t have the heart to tell her he’d bought the old one in Oxfam for a fiver.’

This time Janey laughed. Grateful that Guy hadn’t asked her where laughing-boy James was tonight and eager to keep him away from the subject, she said, ‘When she was seven, Maxine rode her bike into a fish pond and ended up covered in frogspawn. You’d think she would have learned her lesson by now.’

Guy stepped to one side as a man wearing a crash helmet, white silk boxer shorts, a tropical suntan and a pair of water skis made his way past. ‘This party would suit Maxine down to the ground,’ he observed. ‘She could have brought Josh’s new skate-board along and challenged that chap to a race.’

‘She’d certainly enjoy herself.’ Janey wondered where Serena was. ‘Is Maxine at home with the children?’

‘I thought it would be safer,’ Guy replied enigmatically. ‘Bruno invited her, of course, but I told her it was her turn to babysit and for once she didn’t kick up a fuss.’

Surprised and faintly put out because she hadn’t realized Maxine had been invited to the party by Bruno, Janey said, ‘Oh.’

Charlotte, who was gazing with fascination at the water-skiing racing driver, drawled, ‘Do you know, those boxer shorts are completely see-through.’

‘Enthralling.’ Guy returned his attention to Janey. ‘We hadn’t planned to come here ourselves; Charlotte pressganged me into partnering her at a charity dinnerat some castle in Bodmin but it was so Godawful we escaped at half-time.’

‘Between the main course and the sweet.’ Charlotte, gazing fondly up at Guy, slid her hand into his.

‘I didn’t particularly want to come here, either,’ said Guy. ‘Bruno Parry-Brent isn’t one of my favourite people but he knows how to throw a party. And at least the food’s edible.’

Janey raised her eyebrows. ‘Does this mean you’re gatecrashing?’

‘Oh, I was invited too.’ He looked amused. ‘Probably because I’m a good customer and Bruno felt I deserved to be thanked.’

Charlotte, who evidently felt that Guy was spending too much time talking to a rival female, gave his arm a possessive tug. ‘Come on, darling, we’re missing all the fun.’

‘Hooray,’ said Guy. On the dance floor the water-skier had now been joined by a fat man in a bikini with a surfboard under his arm. ‘Why don’t you go and dance with them?’

‘I’ve got a much better idea.’ Charlotte wasn’t about to give in. Her green eyes glittered.

‘Why don’t you come and dance with me?’

‘Oh look, there’s Suzannah.’ Embarrassed and terribly afraid that Guy was only staying because she was on her own and he felt sorry for her, Janey waved at a girl she barely knew.

With a brief smile she said, ‘Do excuse me, I must go and say hello.’

At least Suzannah didn’t mention Bruno. ‘My boyfriend’s buggered off to Ibiza,’ she pouted. ‘Men, honestly. He didn’t even have the nerve to tell me to my face! All ‘I got was a message left on my answering machine saying he’d be back in three weeks. How about you, Janey? Are you seeing anyone at the moment?’

Out of the corner of her eye Janey glimpsed Bruno, murmuring into the ear of yet another blonde.The next moment he was kissing her neck.

‘No,’ she replied firmly. ‘Nobody at all.’

Suzannah, who was also blonde, and whose parents owned the largest yacht in Cornwall, didn’t work. Getting her hair highlighted and zipping around in her open-top jeep evidently occupied all her time.

‘Ah, but it’s all right for you,’ she told Janey. ‘You’re running your own business. At least you’ve got something to take your mind off not having a man.’

‘Of course.’ Janey managed to hide her smile. ‘It’s a great help.’

‘You’re really lucky,’ sighed Suzannah. ‘I sometimes wonder if I should think about getting a little job.’

How about Governor of the Bank of England, thought Janey. But at least she was talking to someone, even if it was only Suzannah. At this moment she couldn’t afford to be choosy.

Feigning interest, she said, ‘What kind of work are you interested in?’

‘God, I don’t know.’ Suzannah flicked back her hair with a tanned arm and half a dozen solid gold bangles jangled in unison. ‘Something easy, I suppose. Like your job.’

Janey tried to envisage Suzannah getting up at five every morning, working flat out for twelve hours a day and settling down at night to do the books. Determinedto keep a straight face even if it killed her, she said, ‘I didn’t realize you were interested in floristry.’

‘Oh, I love flowers.’ To prove her point, Suzannah gestured vaguely in the direction of a frantically gyrating girl whose purple taffeta dress was patterned with enormous yellow daisies.

‘They’re so ... um ... pretty, aren’t they?’ Then, brightening, she added, ‘In fact my boyfriend bought me a big bouquet of flowers for my birthday. And he got them from your shop.’

‘Really?’ Every cloud, thought Janey. Men, incapable of coming up with anything more imaginative for the women in their lives, were what kept her in business. ‘What were they?’

‘Red ones,’ said Suzannah, pleased with herself for having remembered. ‘Roses, I think.

With bits of funny white stuff mixed in.’

‘Cocaine?’

‘What?’

‘Sorry.’ Biting her lip, Janey said, ‘It’s called gypsophila.’

‘Oh, right.’

‘Did the roses last a long time?’ Janey couldn’t help it. She always wanted people to get the very best out of their flowers. ‘If the heads start to droop after the first week you can re-cut the stems and plunge them into boiling water for a few seconds. It works wonders.’

‘Really?’ Suzannah looked blank. ‘I forgot to put them in water when he gave them to me.

When ‘I woke up the next day they were all dead.’

The dedicated revellers were moving up a gear. People were stripping off to reveal swim suits beneath their party clothes, ready for a moonlight dip at high tide. A state-of-the-art camcorder ended up in a bowl of punch and one of the male guests, suspected of working on behalf of one of the more down-market tabloids, was handcuffed to a tree in the restaurant garden, his hairy ankles tied together by the reel of exposed film from his camera.

For Janey, introduced by Nick and Tony to an hotelier who was interested in flowers, the evening was turning out to be not so bad after all. He needed regular arrangements for his foyer and sitting rooms and a deal was struck over two hefty measures of cognac, both of which were drunk by the hotelier.

‘Sign here,’ said Janey, having written out details of the agreement on one of Bruno’s linen napkins. ‘You may not remember this tomorrow. I want something I can jog your memory with.’

‘You sound like my wife,’ he grumbled good naturedly. ‘I still don’t remember asking her to marry me. She just woke me up the next day and told me I had.’

‘Don’t worry.’ Janey grinned as he scrawled a haphazard signature across the bottom of the napkin. ‘This isn’t going to tie you down nearly as much as a wife.’

Bruno caught up with her as she was on her way to the loo.

‘I saw you,’ he murmured, catching her around the waist and pulling her towards him.

‘You’ve been talking to Eddie Beresford for the last twenty minutes.’

‘I’m amazed you even noticed.’ Bruno reeked of Shalimar. Janey tried to pull away, but he was stronger than she was. Now he was drawing her back towards the dance floor.

‘I notice everything.’ With a derisory glance in Eddie Beresford’s direction, he drawled,

‘He could hardly take his eyes off your cleavage.’

‘Don’t worry,’ said Janey in pointed tones. ‘I’m sure he’s faithful to his wife.’

But Bruno didn’t make the connection. ‘He’s so ugly ‘I shouldn’t think he could find anyone to be unfaithful with. Anyway, it’s my turn now.’ His green eyes glittered as he studied Janey’s rigid face. ‘And don’t think I’ve forgotten about my birthday present either. How about a couple of dances to put us in the mood, then you head on up the stairs and make yourself ...