‘If I stay with you, can I have cappuccino to finish with?’ Honor asked Silas.
‘Er…’ Silas was looking uncertainly from his daughter’s face to his girlfriend’s. In any other circumstances and with any other man, Verity knew she would have felt quite sympathetic towards him. As it was, tucking down the corners of her mouth so that no one could see the smile curling there, she caught Honor’s attention.
‘Remember the Bible story of Solomon?’ she asked the little girl sotto voce.
‘Solomon?’ Honor whispered back w
hilst Silas and Myra removed themselves slightly from the table to engage in what looked like a very heated conversation. ‘Oh, you mean the one where the two women both claimed the baby and Solomon threatened to cut it in two and let them have half each?’ Honor asked her.
‘That’s the one,’ Verity agreed dulcetly. Honor frowned and then suddenly burst out laughing as she saw Verity glance over towards Silas.
‘Oh, but Dad isn’t a baby,’ she protested.
‘No, but he is your father and sometimes loving someone means letting them make their own decisions,’ Verity told her gently.
‘But she’s not right for him,’ Honor protested, and then shrugged her shoulders. ‘Okay.’
‘Dad…’
‘Honor…’
Verity waited as they both started to speak and then both stopped.
‘If you’re sure you don’t mind giving Honor supper and keeping her with you until I can collect her,’ Silas told Verity distantly.
‘I don’t mind at all,’ Verity responded truthfully, adding as she smiled at Honor, ‘In fact, it will be a pleasure.’
‘Goodie…There goes Myra’s plan for showing my father the tempting prospect of getting married via her cousin’s wedding video,’ Honor exulted several minutes later as she and Verity exited the restaurant, Honor clutching a huge double portion of rich ice cream that the now-besotted maître d’ had insisted on giving her complete with a bowl of ice to keep it chilled until they got home.
‘I shouldn’t be too sure about that,’ Verity warned her. ‘Myra looks one very determined lady to me…’
‘Determined she might be, but Dad is catastrophically old-fashioned about me going to bed early on school nights. There’s no way he’s going to be able to go home with Myra tonight.’
Verity stopped walking and swung round to glance incredulously at Honor.
‘Did you deliberately plan all of this?’ she asked her bluntly.
Honor’s face assumed a hurt expression.
‘Me…I’m ten years old,’ she reminded Verity.
‘Yeah…but somehow you seem so much older,’ Verity responded feelingly.
As they walked in amicable female companionship towards Verity’s parked car, Honor allowed herself to relax.
Part one of her plan was working. What would Verity say, she wondered, if she told her that she had recognised her straight away on the day of the accident from a photograph of her she had found in her father’s desk? Her father needed rescuing from Myra and it was high time, Honor had already decided, that she had a mother—one of her own choosing!
She looked sideways at Verity—why had she fibbed about not knowing her father? She was tempted to ask but she decided it might be best not to rush things so much…not yet. Honestly, grown-ups, they were so slow…But it was just as she and her friend Catherine had said earlier this afternoon when she had jubilantly told her all about Verity. Sometimes grown-ups didn’t know where their own best interests lay, so it was just as well that she, Honor, was here to show them.
What she needed to do now was to keep her father and Myra apart, but if her plans worked out as she knew they would that shouldn’t prove too difficult—Catherine had her instructions!
Verity gave her a surprised look as Honor suddenly slipped a small, slightly grubby hand into her own and beamed a huge smile up at her.
‘It’s no good trying to get round me like that,’ Verity warned her severely, adding untruthfully, ‘and, besides, I can’t make cappuccino…’
‘No, but I bet Myra can,’ Honor told her. ‘She was really frothing at the mouth, wasn’t she?’ she observed dispassionately.
‘Honor…’ Verity warned, and then spoiled it by suddenly giving way to an uncontrollable fit of the giggles.