WHEN SHE WAS absolutely positive that Dan and John had left for their late afternoon meeting in town, Chloe entered the offices of O’Leary & Hunt, Chartered Accountants.
“Hello,” she said to the young receptionist at the front desk, who had absolutely no idea that the blonde woman standing before her was her boss’s fiancée. “I’m looking for . . .” she made a great show of studying the folder she carried, “for a Mr Hunt, please.”
“I’m sorry, Mr Hunt is out of the office for the afternoon.” The girl spoke as though she had rattled off that line many times before.
“Would Mr O’Leary be available, then?” Chloe asked, knowing full well what the answer would be.
“I’m afraid Mr O’Leary is meeting with clients at the moment. He’s also out for the afternoon.”
“Oh, dear.” Chloe feigned an unimpressed frown.
“Did you have an appointment?”
“No, it’s is a spur-of-the-moment visit, actually. I’m here on behalf of a previous client of Mr Hunt’s. I’m her legal representative, and I was really hoping to speak to one of the partners about my client’s affairs.” She flashed a business card.
“Oh. Well, if you’d like to leave your name and number, I can get Mr Hunt to phone you,” the receptionist offered.
“No, I’m on my way down the country this afternoon, and just popped in on the off-chance. I was really hoping to speak to someone, though.” Chloe sighed dramatically, but then her eyes widened, as if she had just thought of something. “Tell you what, maybe you could help me. You’re Mr Hunt’s personal secretary, yes?”
The girl blushed, flattered. “No, I’m only a student on work-experience here for the summer. Mr Hunt’s PA is upstairs. Would you like to speak to her?”
Chloe pretended to study her folder again. That was exactly what she’d like. Chloe had spoken to his PA on the phone a few times but luckily they had never met. The woman wouldn’t know Chloe from Adam, so hopefully by using the solicitor’s ruse she would be able to glean some information from her on events from a few years ago ie, Dan’s marriage break-up.
She looked up and smiled beatifically at the young receptionist. “If you wouldn’t mind checking that she’s free. It’s Miss Fogarty, isn’t it?”
The receptionist nodded, and dialled the extension. She spoke pleasantly into the mouthpiece. “Are you free for a moment, Shannon?” she asked. “There’s someone at reception hoping to speak with you.”
* * *
“So, you knew Nicola well then?” Chloe asked, offering a cigarette.
The other woman shrugged. “Not that well, but you could say that I knew a lot about her. Dan and I were close and he confided in me, particularly when things weren’t going well.”
“I see.”
“Nicola wasn’t right for him. I could see that from the very beginning. When they got married John and I gave it three years max.” She gave a short laugh. “Still, I didn’t think we’d be that close to the mark!”
“So what went wrong for them?” There was no point in beating about the bush, and Chloe sensed that the other woman seemed only too happy to dish the dirt.
“A number of things,” she said, echoing exactly what John O’Leary had told Chloe. “His parents hated her. She wasn’t good enough for him in their eyes, quite rightly too I think.”
“Not good enough? How?”
She exhaled a cloud of cigarette smoke. “Come on! She had nothing going for her. Dan has his own business, he comes from a very well-off family and his father was a self-made man for Chrissake! But her parents – well, let’s just say they weren’t exactly the Rockefellers.”
Chloe looked at her. “That sounds a bit harsh,” she said and, despite herself, felt a bit sorry for Nicola. Would Dan really let that kind of snobbery affect him? And who the hell these days worried about backgrounds when choosing a partner?
“You asked, I’m just telling you how it happened.”
“So was that it then? Did Dan’s parents succeed in breaking them up?”
A derisive snort. “You could say that. But there were other things too.”
“Like what?”
“Well, Nicola was mad for a baby from the very beginning. Dan wasn’t so sure though. I think – no – I know that he wanted to wait for a few years, didn’t want the pressure of a young family along with the pressure of running a new business. But he said that Nicola kept pushing him and pushing him and eventually she got her wish.”
“Her wish? You don’t mean that she got pregnant?”
“Yep – eventually.”
“What?” Chloe nearly fell off her chair. Her heart pounded with panic. Dan had never told her. He had a child with Nicola and he never told her. But why not? And where was the child now? Was that why he had been so anxious about her coming back to Ireland? Was it because he was hiding a secret child? “You can’t be serious!” she exclaimed. “Dan and Nicola had a child together?”
“I never said that they had a child – I said that she got pregnant. She lost it.”
“Oh.” Chloe felt something akin to relief. That explained a lot, a hell of a lot, actually. She breathed deeply. Things were finally beginning to make sense now. Dan doesn’t want a child, Nicola does, she gets pregnant, loses the baby and blames Dan for not wanting it in the first place.
End of story and – more importantly – end of marriage.
She didn’t have to try too hard to imagine how it all went after that. Nicola devastated by her loss and Dan’s rejection of their baby initiates the divorce, Dan sick to the teeth of it all agrees, they separate, Nicola moves away and all concerned (including Dan’s parents) are happy.
“But of course the affair didn’t help either.”
“What?” Chloe couldn’t hide her surprise. An affair? This was incredible! Dan had an affair! She didn’t think he had it in him.
“Yep. Not long after the miscarriage.”
Wow! Now Chloe was really shocked. Dan just didn’t seem the cheating type. He just wasn’t that interested in other women. OK, he had a few female friends but that was it. He never noticed things other men noticed, like long legs and big boobs – the normal things! Whenever they were out together she might point out a good-looking woman across the room, just to see if she had caught his eye, but nine times out of ten he wouldn’t even have seen her. Chloe supposed she should be flattered, but then again Dan was so used to women making eyes and practically throwing themselves at him, that he didn’t really give a shit. And although she hated admitting it, even to herself, it had taken Chloe weeks to get him to notice her.
The very first time she saw Dan, he had been a guest at one of her friend Alison’s Sunday barbecues. He and John had been invited by Alison’s fiancé, who used Dan and John’s accountancy firm. Chloe remembered thinking he looked exactly like Mel Gibson did in that film Forever Young, all sweet-faced and blue-eyed. For most of that day she had followed his every move out of the corner of her eye, laughing and joking loudly, trying to get him to notice her. It had been impossible, and he seemed the only man in the room that wasn’t drooling over her in that short red Ben de Lisi she had been wearing.
Eventually, she had no choice but to walk right up to him and introduce herself.
“Haven’t we met before somewhere?” Chloe cringed when she thought about it now, but at the time it was as good a line as any.
“I don’t think so,” he said, a slight smile playing about his lips, leaving Chloe in no doubt that he was used to this kind of thing.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I thought you might be a client of my father’s.”
“And your father is . . . ?”
“Jeff Fallon. As in Fallon & Co? Solicitors?”
Dan shook his head.
“Are you sure? I’m almost positive I saw you in the office last week, with one of the partners?” She was getting desperate now and she was sure he could see it in her eyes.
“Afraid not.”
“Oh – OK.” Chloe feigned nonchalance. She might as well give up. “Well, nice meeting you then – Dan, isn’t it?”
He nodded. “See you later.”
“Yes, enjoy the party.”
Chloe remembered walking off in a right mood. Who the hell did he think he was? Then a thought struck her. Maybe he was gay! Of course – that had to be it. Why else would Dan have kept his gaze on her face throughout the entire conversation, when the neckline on her dress plunged deeper than Angel Falls? He was almost definitely gay.
“Isn’t he gorgeous?” she heard Alison say beside her. “Only for I’m an engaged woman,” she flashed her white gold solitaire, never missing an opportunity to show it off, “I’d probably be running after him too!”
Running after him? Chloe didn’t need to run after anyone!
“I think you’d be wasting your time.” Chloe growled sulkily. “I don’t think he’s that way inclined.”
“What? Don’t be silly. According to Scott, he’s not long separated from his wife. Upped and left to England apparently.” She leaned forward conspiratorially. “I mean, who in their right mind would leave someone like that? He’s an absolute angel!”
Chloe stopped her mind wandering and brought her attention back to the present. Well, apparently Nicola had left someone like that.
Because her beloved husband hadn’t turned out to be such an angel, after all.