Can You Keep A Secret?

transfer something… and Plan B… and something being urgent…'

'Transfer what?' says Lissy suspiciously. 'Funds?'

'I du

Jemima looks beside herself.

'Emma, I do not believe this. You've had this information all this time? This has to be

something juicy. It has to be. If only we knew more.' She exhales in frustration. 'You didn't

have a Dictaphone or anything with you?'

'Of course I didn't!' I say with a little laugh. 'It was a date! Do you normally take a Dictaphone

on a…' I tail off incredulously at her expression. 'Jemima. You don't.'

'Not always,' she says, with a defensive shrug. 'Just if I think it might come in… Anyway.

That's irrelevant. The point is, you have information, Emma. You have power. You find out

what this is all about — and then you expose him. That'll show Jack Harper who's boss. That'll

get your revenge!'

I stare back at her determined face, and for a moment I feel a sheer, powerful exhilaration

bubbling through me. That would pay Jack back. That would show him. Then he'd be sorry!

Then he'd see I'm not just some nothing, nobody girl. Then he'd see. Then he'd see.

'So…' I lick my lips. 'So how would I do it?'

'First we try to work out as much as we can ourselves,' says Jemima. 'Then, I've got access to

various… people who can help get more information.' She gives me a tiny wink. 'Discreetly.'

'Private detectives?' says Lissy in disbelief. 'Are you for real?'

'And then we expose him! Mummy's got contacts at all the papers…'

My head is thumping. Am I really talking about doing this? Am I really talking about getting

revenge on Jack?

'A very good place to start is rubbish bins,' adds Jemima knowledgeably. 'You can find all

sorts of things just by looking through somebody's trash.'

And all of a sudden sanity comes flying in through the window.

'Rubbish bins?' I say in horror. 'I'm not looking in any rubbish bins! In fact, I'm not doing this,

full stop. It's a crazy idea.'

'You can't get all precious now, Emma!' says Jemima tartly, flicking back her hair. 'How else

are you going to find out what his secret is?'

'Maybe I don't want to find out what his secret is,' I retort, feeling a sting of pride. 'Maybe I'm

not interested.'

I wrap the chenille throw around me even more tightly, and stare at my toes miserably.

So Jack's got some huge secret he can't trust me with. Well, fine. Let him keep it. I'm not

going to demean myself by grubbing after it. I'm not going to start poking around rubbish bins.

I don't care what it is. I don't care about him.

'I want to forget about it,' I say, my face closing up. 'I want to move on.'

'No you don't!' retorts Jemima. 'Don't be stupid, Emma. This is your big chance for revenge.

We are so going to get him.' I have never seen Jemima look so animated in my life. She

reaches for her bag and gets out a tiny lilac Smythson notebook, together with a Tiffany pen.

'Right, so what do we know? Glasgow… Plan B… transfer…'

The Panther Corporation doesn't have offices in Scotland, does it?' says Lissy thoughtfully.

I turn my head, and stare at her in disbelief. She's scribbling on a pad of legal paper, with

exactly the same preoccupied look she gets when she's solving one of her geeky puzzles. I can

see the words 'Glasgow', 'transfer' and 'Plan B', and a place where she's jumbled up all the

letters in 'Scotland' and tried to make a new word out of them.

For God's sake.

'Lissy, what are you doing?'

'I'm just… fiddling around,' she says, and blushes. 'I might go and look some stuff up on the

Internet, just out of interest.'

'Look, just stop it, both of you!' I say. 'If Jack doesn't want to tell me what his secret is… then

I don't want to know.'

Suddenly I feel completely drained by the day. And kind of bruised. I'm not interested in

Jack's mysterious secret life. I don't want to think about it any more. I want to have a long hot

bath and go to bed and just forget I ever met him.

TWENTY-THREE

Except of course I can't.

I can't forget about Jack. I can't forget about our argument.

His face keeps appearing in my head when I don't want it to. The way he stared at me in the

sunlight, his face all crinkled up. The way he bought the lucky heather.

I lie in bed, my heart hammering, going over it again and again. Feeling the same smart of

hurt. The same disappointment.

I told him everything about myself. Everything. And he won't even tell me one-

Anyway. Anyway.

I don't care.

I'm not going to think about him any more. He can do what he likes. He can keep his stupid

secrets.

Good luck to him. That's it. He's out of my brain.

Gone for good.

I stare at the darkened ceiling for a few moments.

And what did he mean by that, anyway? Is it such a disaster for people to know the truth

about you?

He can talk. He can so talk. Mr Mystery. Mr Sensitive and Complicated.

I should have said that. I should have said-

No. Stop thinking about it. Stop thinking about him. It's over.

As I pad into the kitchen the next morning to make a cup of tea, I'm fully resolved. I'm not

even going to think about Jack from now on. Finito. Fin. The End.

'OK. I have three theories.' Lissy arrives breathlessly at the door of the kitchen in her pyjamas,

holding her legal pad.

'What?' I look up blearily.

'Jack's big secret. I have three theories.'

'Only three?' says Jemima, appearing behind her in her white robe, clutching her Smythson

notebook. 'I've got eight!'

'Eight?' Lissy stares at her, affronted.

'I don't want to hear any theories,' I say. 'Look, both of you, this has been really painful for me.

Can't you just respect my feelings and drop it?'

They both look at me blankly for a second, then turn back to each other.

'Eight?' says Lissy again. 'How did you get eight?'

'Easy-peasy. But I'm sure yours are very good too,' says Jemima kindly. 'Why don't you go

first?'

'OK,' says Lissy with a look of a

the whole of the Panther Corporation to Scotland. He was up there reco

want you spreading rumours. Number two: He's involved in some kind of white-collar fraud

…'

'What?' I stare at her. 'Why do you say that?'

'I looked up the accountants who audited the last Panther Corporation accounts, and they've

been involved in a few big scandals recently. Which doesn't prove anything, but if he's acting

shadily and talking about transfers…' She pulls a face and I stare back, disconcerted.

Jack a fraudster? No. He couldn't be. He couldn't.

Not that I care one way or the other.

'Can I say that both of those sound highly unlikely to me?' says Jemima with raised eyebrows.

'Well, what's your theory, then?' says Lissy crossly.

'Plastic surgery, of course!' she says triumphantly. 'He has a face-lift and he doesn't want

anyone to know, so he recuperates in Scotland. And I know what the B is in Plan B.'

'What?' I say suspiciously.

'Botox!' says Jemima with a flourish. 'That's why he rushed off from your date. To have his

fine lines smoothed. The doctor suddenly had a spare appointment, his friend came to tell

him-'

What planet does Jemima come from?

'Jack would never have Botox!' I say. 'Or a face-lift!'