Free The Trouble With Emma by Katie Oliver Page B

didn’t mean anything.”
    “No. It was very –” Lizzy reddened. “Pleasant, and perhaps if I hadn’t lost my job, and we’d continued to work together…” She paused. “But it didn’t work out, Emma. There was never really anything between us.”
    “He seems too arrogant by half.”
    “Yes.” She smiled slightly. “He does come across that way, at first.”
    “But –?” Emma prodded.
    “But
what
? He’s a perfectly nice man, Em,” Lizzy said in exasperation. “He’s not all that different from you, now I think on it. Intelligent, well spoken, opinionated…” She cast a quick, considering glance at her sister. “And quite fanciable, too, don’t you think?”
    “I wouldn’t know.” Emma pushed her chair back and took several lemons out of the refrigerator bin. “I’ll make a pitcher of lemonade and we can take it outside. But first,” she added as she turned around to face her sister, “I want to hear all about your honeymoon. Every romantic, jealousy-inducing detail.”
    “All right,” Lizzy agreed. “Hand me some of those lemons and come and sit down.”
    Emma set a bowl of lemons on the table and joined her sister. They talked of the honeymoon in Cornwall and the pleasures of sailing on the
Rosings
, as well as Lizzy’s complete and utter adoration for Hugh, and Mark Knightley was not mentioned again.

Chapter 15
    Saturday morning found Emma in the kitchen, in desperate need of a cup of coffee.
    Such a flurry of pie baking, scone making, and flour flinging went on as her father and Martine – who’d come in to help on her day off – prepared for tomorrow’s party, that Emma felt guilty as she reached for the coffee pot.
    “Is there anything I can do?” she asked Mr Bennet.
    “Nothing,” he replied, cutting butter into his flour mixture with a grim expression, “unless you can bake a cake or make fondant.”
    “You know very well I can’t do either.”
    “Then you have your answer.” He glanced down at Elton, who
would
keep getting underfoot. “Charlotte’s not up yet; why don’t you take Elton for a walk? I’m sure he’d like that.”
    At the word ‘walk’, the pug began to yap and chase himself in excitement.
    “All right,” Emma agreed, and sighed. “Lord knows when Charli will decide to get up…just let me finish my coffee.”
    Twenty minutes later she and Elton made their way across the field to Cleremont – slowly, because the dog stopped to investigate and sniff every rock, tree, and pile of horse manure along the way. But Emma didn’t mind. It was a lovely sunny day, and she was anxious to see Lizzy again.
    Her thoughts wandered, as they sometimes did, to Jeremy North. She wondered what he was doing now. How strange it was, knowing they’d be married now if things had turned out differently. She’d be Mrs Emma North and they’d live in London.
    Would they have been happy? Was remaining single a mistake?
    No, she decided, and tugged on the lead to pull Elton away from the brambles. She was perfectly happy. It was true she missed her sisters…even Charli. The house was too quiet by half with only her and daddy remaining at home.
    But who’d look after him if she left?
    The thought troubled her. While Mr Bennet was in the pink of health in most regards, he was no longer a young man. His knees troubled him and he tired more easily; she often found him sleeping in his study, slumped back against the chair and snoring softly.
    Perhaps instead of fixing Litchfield Manor up, she should persuade him to sell it, and move into something smaller and easier to manage – a flat, for instance.
    Even as the thought occurred she dismissed it. He’d never give up his home, and he wouldn’t leave until, as he often declared, ‘I go out in a box.’
    Besides, it was too late to change her mind now – Simon Fox and Jacquetta Winspear of
Mind Your Manors
would arrive on Tuesday to have their first look round the house and property. The television wheels were in