Read Online Forget Me Knot by Sue Margolis - Free Book Online Page B

multistory parking lot in Chinatown, where Toby had left his car. Neither of them spoke, but their mutual anger was almost palpable. Abby was the first to break the silence.
    “I cannot believe you agreed to me taking a fertility test just to please your mother. How could you do that without even asking me? The two of you sat there discussing me as if I weren’t even there.”
    “And how could you take on my mother like that? I told you not to and you disobeyed me.”
    “I disobeyed you? When did I start having to obey you?”
    “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. It’s just that you took one hell of a risk, that’s all. You could have wrecked everything. As it happens, I think she rather liked you.” He paused.“Look, I only agreed to you taking the fertility test to shut her up. Of course we won’t do it. We’ll lie, say you’ve taken it and that the results came back fine.”
    She bridled. “You can tell your mother what you like, but if she asks me straight out if I’ve taken the test, I will tell her the truth. You might be prepared to let her walk all over you, but I’m not.”
    “Clearly,” he said with a bitter laugh.
    “What’s that supposed to mean?”
    “OK, you really want to know?”
    “Of course.”
    “It means,” he said, “that I’m jealous. I’m jealous that you were able to stand up to her and I can’t.”
    “But why can’t you? She’d have far more respect for you if you did. From what I can see, she seems to thrive on conflict. So what if she shouts? Shout back.”
    “I’ve tried; I can’t. I know this sounds pretty pathetic, but I’m still desperate for her approval. I’ve spent my life trying to please her, hoping that one day she’ll tell me she’s proud of me. The fact is that whatever I achieve, whatever I do, it’s never enough.”
    “I can understand that,” she said, allowing her voice to soften.
    “And there’s something else.”
    “What?”
    “She holds the trump card.”
    “Meaning?”
    “Meaning that the one time I tried to stand up to her, she threatened to cut me out of her will.”
    “So what? Bloody hell, Toby, you earn a fortune as it is. Surely your self-respect is more important than any amount of money.”
    They were a few paces from the car. He took out his keys and hit the remote. The lock clicked open. “Abby, let me explain something to you. We’re not talking a piddling few hundred grand here. The manor house alone is worth ten million. Then there is the rest of the Kenwood estate, with its farms and houses. There’s also a vatload of cash. By rights it should have come directly to me when my father died, but he left it all to my mother so that she would be provided for in her lifetime. I don’t blame him for that, but after the way she’s treated me, I am not about to let her come between me and my inheritance. And don’t tell me you wouldn’t get a kick out of being lady of the manor.”
    His final remark quite literally stopped Abby in her tracks. “I can’t believe you just said that. If you imagine for one minute that I’ll be prancing round the estate in my green wellies and a Barbour jacket, hosting gymkhanas and dispensing patronage and largesse to the lower orders, then you clearly don’t know me.”
    “That’s what you say now,” he said.
    “Toby, please don’t patronize me.”
    “I’m not patronizing you. I just think you’ll change, that’s all. Money has that effect on people.”
    “Believe me. I will not change. Nor will I sit back and watch you let your mother behave toward you the way she does.”
    He shrugged. “Suit yourself, but I really don’t give a damn how she treats me. Not if I’m going to benefit in the end.”
    “I don’t believe you. If you don’t give a damn about your relationship with your mother, why are you still looking for her approval?”
    Toby didn’t reply. Her remark had clearly floored him.There was silence while they got in the car and he started the engine. He