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‘…Three, two, one, go!’ Edward shouted.
Henry and Daisy immediately grabbed two panels, one back panel and one of the sides, positioning them so they were at a right angle to each other. They were a perfect team, each knowing what the other was going to do before they did it. Pe
She quickly started spooning the icing mixture into the piping bag as Henry got the two panels perfectly lined up.
Pe
‘It’s setting really quickly, what is this stuff?’ Henry said, tentatively letting go of the panel.
‘I don’t know, it’s not like any icing I’ve ever seen before. If I were you, I wouldn’t eat it,’ Pe
Suddenly Pe
Henry had told Clara that he had a girlfriend. That surely should be the end of it. So what would cause Henry to be so worried?
Henry focussed on securing the front panel to the side they had already used, ignoring the questioning gaze from Pe
This was not going to end well for him. Clara was an incredibly proud and arrogant person. The rejection and then the embarrassment in front of her assistant was going to be the final nail in his coffin.
But surely Clara wouldn’t make a scene here today, not in front of Daisy and Pe
He glanced over again. Clara was deliberately stopping to talk to each of the teams. On the surface, the audience watching would think that one of the managing directors of the company was just being sociable, cheering the teams on, but the look of surprise from the employees she was interacting with and even from Edward showed she had never done anything like that before. Henry knew why too, it was completely tactical. If she was seen talking to every team then when she came over to talk to him, which she undoubtedly would, no one would be suspicious.
He looked over at Pe
‘Grab the other bit, Daisy,’ Henry said and Daisy ran off to grab the panel.
Henry moved to the back on the pretence of checking the join and Pe
‘She’s blackmailing me to sleep with her,’ he whispered then continued, ‘if I don’t, I lose my job. If I do I’ll probably lose my job, so it’s a win-win situation all round.’
She stared at him in shock.
‘Daisy, can you hold that side panel against the front?’ Henry called over, directing her to the furthest corner away from them.
‘Have you told Edward?’ Pe
He shook his head.
‘If you don’t tell him then I will. I’m not letting her get away with that.’
‘Shit, Pe
‘Then how did you plan to resolve it?’
‘I told her I’d slap a sexual harassment suit on her if she tries to blackmail me again.’
‘And will you?’
‘Well, I’m not going to sleep with her if that’s what you’re thinking,’ he hissed. ‘She can’t possibly sack me, Edward would want to know why. I’m sure if I keep rejecting her she’ll just go away.’
‘That’s why you’re as skittish as a kitten about her coming over here then. Because you’re confident that she’s just going to go away?’
He moved away, angry that everything was crashing down around him and there didn’t seem to be any way to stop it. Pe
‘You need to fight for this. If you want this job, if you want anything badly enough, then you fight for it. Don’t just roll over and play dead.’
Henry nodded, though he wasn’t sure what he could do to fight Clara. He glanced over at her again and he caught her eye. She smirked to herself as she moved to the team in the next bay. Henry saying no had provided her with a challenge which she wasn’t going to back down from.
Clara stepped up to their bay, the only thing separating them was the low rope barrier.
‘This is looking good,’ Clara remarked cheerfully, though her eyes were firmly on him and not the house.
He returned his attention to the house as Pe
‘Henry, might I have a word?’ Clara called over.
‘I’m busy,’ Henry snapped and watched Daisy’s mouth fall open at his rudeness to his boss.
He glanced over at Pe
He had to resolve this once and for all.
Leaving the girls to work on their own for a moment, he stepped over the little rope fence towards Clara and moved a few steps away so no one in the audience could hear them either.
‘I told you to leave me alone.’
‘I’m not used to people saying no to me,’ Clara smiled, flicking her hair over her shoulder.
‘And are you used to getting sued for sexual harassment, because I told you if you bothered me again about this, that’s the direction I would take it.’
‘Oh please, Henry. If you were going to do that you would have done it already, you’d have marched straight from my office to Edward’s or human resources and complained to somebody but you haven’t. And that’s because you secretly want this.’
‘I’d rather gouge out my own eyeballs with a fork than sleep with you or have anything to do with you.’
‘Yet one word from me and you’re over here talking to me instead of working alongside your pretty girlfriend.’
Henry glanced over at Pe
‘You’re right, Henry, I can have any man I choose and I choose you. Let’s cut the crap, you and I both know you’re going to sleep with me so stop trying to put me off. I’ll be in my office at six o’clock tonight. The factory will be empty but I’ll leave the side door open.’
‘I’m not—’
‘You will be there or I will make your life a living hell. I’m sure your little girlfriend will be delighted to hear of how you fucked me over the desk the other day, I could give her a very detailed account of that, if you don’t show later. Or perhaps I could tell her that that was how you got the job in the first place.’
Henry wanted to tell her to go ahead, but was his and Pe
He knew what he had to do and he felt sick at the thought of it. He nodded. ‘OK, six o’clock. Wear something sexy and not a lot else.’
Her eyes lit up that he had been bought so easily and she licked her lips and nodded before she walked out.
Chapter Twenty