The Best of Fiona Harper

Swept Off Her Stilettos

Housekeeper’s Happy-Ever-After

Her Parenthood Assignment

Three Weddings and a Baby

The Ballerina Bride

Invitation to the Boss’s Ball

Break Up to Make Up

Always the Best Man

Blind-Date Marriage

Saying Yes to the Millionaire

Fiona Harper

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Swept Off Her Stilettos

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

CHAPTER ONE

The Girl Can’t Help It…

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 1—In my opinion, a pinkie finger isn’t properly dressed unless it’s got a man comfortably wrapped around it—and I always make sure I’m impeccably dressed.

I GLARED at the man who’d rushed through the coffee shop door. Not only had he almost spilled my caramel mochaccino down my best polka-dot dress as he’d barged past, but he hadn’t even bothered to hold the door open for me.

Not that I was about to admit I was losing my mojo. He probably just hadn’t seen me in his rush to escape from the unseasonable weather.

Left with no alternative, I balanced the two steaming paper cups of coffee I was holding and tried to open the door with my elbow. No good. There was only one thing for it. I sighed, turned one-eighty degrees, and shoved it open with my rear end.

I glanced upwards as I stepped outside onto Greenwich High Street. The sky wasn’t just promising rain but threatening with menaces. What should have been a balmy summer evening was as heavy and gloomy as a December afternoon. Thankfully, I only had a two-minute walk ahead of me, and would be safe and dry inside before the heavens opened.

Rude Man had something else to answer for too. No one would be standing with his hand on the open door, transfixed, as a steady stream of customers flowed past him. No one would be admiring my rear view as I walked away, my head high and my hips swaying like Marilyn’s in Some Like It Hot. I’d watched that movie at least fifty times before I’d got the walk down pat, and the least I deserved was a little appreciation for my efforts.

I squared my shoulders and lifted my chin. Well, I was going to make the journey back to the shop count—rude man or no rude man. There was plenty of traffic passing by to serve as an audience. I placed one red patent stiletto in front of the other and began to walk.

I nipped round the corner into Church Street and then across the busy junction into Nelson Street. However, not even the sight its neat row of cream Georgian buildings lifted my mood this evening. Normally when I passed each shop or boutique I’d smile and wave at the owner as I counted down the door numbers with growing excitement.

On the corner was the all-organic coffee shop—closed now, but mid-morning packed with Yummy Mummies who cluttered the floor space with their high-tech pushchairs and the air with discussions on the merits of the local private nurseries. Next was the second-hand bookshop that did a roaring trade in textbooks for the students at the nearby university campus. After that was Susie’s—a bakery that specialised entirely in cupcakes. The window was full of frosted and glittering towers of different flavoured cakes, delicious-looking enough to cause even the most dedicated dieter to stop and lick her lips. Then there was a Thai restaurant, a newsagent’s, and a shop called Petal that sold just about anything as long as it was pink.

Finally, next door to that, two doors down from the end of the eclectic row, was my shop—Coreen’s Closet—a vintage clothing emporium to rival the best in London.

I was in an even worse mood by the time I pushed the shop door open and flipped the sign to ‘Closed’.

Not a single honk or whistle as I’d made my journey! Another first. I didn’t want to give my recent doubts credit, but this didn’t bode well.

‘What’s got you in a snit?’ Alice said as I plonked her decaff latte on the counter. My business partner was one of those ethereal-looking types—flame-red hair, pale skin, willowy figure. Well, not so willowy at present. She was seven months pregnant, and being such a slip of a thing there was only one way that baby bump could go—outwards. She looked as if, python-like, she’d swallowed my classic VW Beetle for breakfast.

I prised the plastic lid off my mochaccino and blew on it. ‘There’s something wrong with the male population of London today.’

Alice chuckled. She knew me too well.

Despite my best attempts to pout, the corner of my mouth curled up. I took a sip of my coffee, then smiled back at her. She was leaning on the counter for support, circling her swollen ankles.

‘Crikey, Alice! You look dead on your feet.’

She gave me a hooded look. ‘Gee, thanks.’

I put my cup on the counter and trotted off into the back room. When I returned I presented Alice with her umbrella and handbag. ‘You need to get home. Call Cameron. I can manage the stock-take on my own.’

She started to protest, but I wouldn’t allow it. I fished her mobile out of her bag, pressed the button for her husband’s speed-dial and then handed her the phone when I heard it ringing at the other end. Within fifteen minutes her adorably protective husband had picked her up and taken her home to run her a bath, fuss over her, and generally indulge her every hormone-induced whim.

That’s what men are for, really, aren’t they?

Oh, I didn’t mean hormones and morning sickness! I’m not ready for that yet. Not by a long shot. The whim-catering bit? That I’m all for.

Once the door was locked behind Alice, I marched into the office at the back, grabbed my purple glittery clipboard and set to work. It wasn’t usually a chore. I loved my little treasure trove of vintage clothes and accessories. Some days I thought it was a tragedy to unlock the shop door and let other people leave with the fabulousness that I amass in my limited square footage. But a girl’s gotta keep herself in lipstick and stockings somehow.

I worked my way through the clothing racks as the weather-induced twilight deepened outside. Every now and then a group of students trailed past the shop window, off into the town centre in search of cheap food and even cheaper beer, but other than that the street was deserted. The fashionable bistros and wine bars would start to hum in an hour or so, but until then there was no one walking by to marvel at how the beaded handbags and evening gowns in my window display gathered the light from the rear of the shop and threw it back into the street in multi-coloured droplets.

I sat down on the varnished floorboards between the heaving clothing rails, the skirt of my red-and-white polka-dot dress spreading around me in a perfect circle, and pushed away a stray dark hair that had worked its way out of my neat quiff. Shoes were next, and I started checking the pairs on a low rack off my list.

I grabbed a pair of silver platform boots and checked the size and condition. I might have been tempted to adopt them, but although I do dress that way for fun sometimes, really I’m a Fifties girl at heart.

By today’s size-zero culture my figure’s considered too full…too lacking in visibly defined muscle…too pale with not even a hint of spray-on tan. My curves belong to another time—a time when red-lipped sirens winked saucily from the side of aeroplanes, when the perfect shape for a woman was considered to be an hourglass, not an emery board, for goodness’ sake.

Unwisely, I’d tucked one leg underneath myself, and it didn’t take long before it went to sleep. I unhooked it and shook it around. In the quiet shop my net petticoat rustled, drowning out the sound of the rain that had just begun peppering the large plate-glass window.

I put the boots back on the rack, leaving the sparkly purple clipboard and pen on the floor beside me untouched, and picked up a darling evening shoe with a starched bow on the toe. For some reason I just stared at it. Not that it wasn’t stare-worthy, but I was staring without really seeing. And then I realised I hadn’t ticked the silver boots off my list, so I dropped the shoe into my lap and picked up my pen.

I sighed. I wasn’t getting the usual joy this evening from the velvet and satin, from the whisper-soft silk lingerie. What was wrong with me? I’d achieved everything I’d worked for in the last few years. No more standing around draughty market stalls, stamping my feet and cursing the English weather. Coreen’s Closet was bricks and mortar now and, thanks to a rather successful joint venture with Alice’s husband, we were the happening new vintage shop in south London.

As well as the faithful customers who’d followed me from the market stall, I’d managed to attract some of the hot young socialites who thought vintage was cooler than cool, and who’d pay vast amounts for anything by a classic designer. I’d got the best of both worlds, really. Everything I’d planned and scrimped and saved for. So why wasn’t I lindy-hopping round my clothes racks, whooping as I went, instead of sitting on the floor counting the same pair of boots over and over again?

Maybe it was because I usually did this job with Alice. It was kind of quiet in here without her. I missed the gossip and the shared thrill of finding some fabulous skirt or blouse we’d forgotten about, squished amongst the other clothes. But Alice’s absence tonight was just a symptom of another disturbing change in my life.

I once used to be the centre of a large gang of single gals, all footloose and fancy-free, but I was the odd one out now. They were all paired up, more interested in painting nurseries than painting the town red. It could make a girl feel, well…lonely. Left behind. And that was a state I was definitely not comfortable with. I’d seen what Left Behind did to a person.

I wasn’t jealous, though. Really I wasn’t.

I tested myself. I imagined owning a little redbrick house and coming home to the same face every evening, cooking the dinner, paying the bills… No. It didn’t appeal. It was too staid. Too ordinary. People stagnated like that, and there was only one of two ways it could end: either they both numbed themselves to the dreariness and put up with each other, or one morning one of them woke up to discover the other side of the bed permanently empty, a note of dubious apology on the mantel, and a piece of themselves missing, accidentally packed in haste by the departed one, along with the wrong toothbrush and a stray sock.

So, no. I wasn’t jealous. Not in the slightest.

That sounded really snobby, didn’t it? As if I was belittling what my friends had found. But it wasn’t like that. I just wanted…

I didn’t really know what I wanted. I couldn’t identify what the nagging little ache inside me was, but every time it made itself known it reminded me of going into my favourite coffee shop, ravenous and ready to devour something sweet, only to look in the display case stuffed full of pastries and cakes and realise that nothing would hit the spot. It was all very unsettling.

I looked down at my chest, impressively showcased in the sweetheart neckline of my dress. My curves had arrived early in my life, and it hadn’t taken long to cotton on to the fact that men were simple creatures: easily brought to a drooling standstill with the right kind of encouragement. An ample chest and a well-timed pout can get a girl just about anything she wants.

However, I was starting to think I was losing my touch, and the events of this evening had only served to deepen my fears on that front. Because the truth was…there was one man who seemed to be immune to me, even though I’d given him every bit of my best encouragement.

I sighed and stared at the silver boots. The box beside their description on my list remained empty. Tickless.

The stupid stray bit of hair was back again, tickling my cheek and generally mocking me. I shook it out of the way and somehow that small gesture brought me back to reality.

I was being daft. There was nothing wrong with me. Just this morning a man walking behind me had spilled hot coffee over himself as I’d bent down to open the shutter over the front door. That didn’t sound like I was losing my mojo, now, did it?

I grabbed my clipboard, marked the boots off my list and added a little comment about the heel height, and then I got that pesky hair and shoved it under one of my hairgrips, pinning it away and out of sight with the rest of my maudlin thoughts.

I was halfway through my inventory of hats and hair accessories when a tapping on the window magnified, becoming more insistent. At first I hardly registered it, thinking somewhere in the back of my head that it was just the rain, but eventually I realised that even London rain couldn’t be that persistent.

I ignored it anyway. Honestly! It was after seven. The ‘Closed’ sign on the door wasn’t just a hint, you know. But, knowing our internet, everything-at-a-click generation, even that wouldn’t be enough for some would-be customers.

I stood up, brushed my skirt down and prepared myself to make Clear off! and I have a life too! hand gestures. While I understood the obsessive nature of some of my customers—and, to be honest, I shared it a little—not having exactly the right pair of loafers for their Swing Dance class that evening could hardly be considered a 999 emergency.

I minimised my wiggle as I walked to the shop door, hands on hips. This was one time when encouragement would only make things worse.

Over the top of the large ‘Closed’ sign I could see a pair of eyes and a scruffy brown haircut, but it was hard to make out who it was, because he was shielding his eyes with his hand in an attempt to see further into the shop. Great. One of my love-lorn swains—as my friend Jennie calls them—might just have gone all stalkerish on me again.

But then he spotted me walking towards him and pulled his hand away from his eyes and stepped back. Even in the gloom of the false twilight I could make out his broad smile. I could even see the dimples half-hidden by his light stubble.

‘Adam!’ I yelled, and rushed to unbolt the door.

And Adam it was, standing there in the rain with his eyes aglow and a bulging white carrier bag hanging off one of his outstretched arms.

‘What are you doing here?’ I said as I flung myself at him and dragged him inside. ‘I thought you were in the depths of the jungle somewhere!’

‘I was,’ he said, disentangling himself from me, all the while guarding the plain white carrier bag carefully. ‘But now I’m back.’

The smile grew in devilish wattage, reaching its peak in his deep brown eyes. This was the smile that had half my single girlfriends begging me to set them up with him. The other half just fanned themselves down and muttered things like ‘molten chocolate’ and ‘come to Mama’ under their breaths.

Of course I never did get around to setting any of my friends up with Adam. Not that I’m not a good friend, but the situation had the potential to become far too complicated. More than one girl had accused me of being a tad territorial when it came to Adam, but really it was nothing more than good old-fashioned self-preservation—really it was.

I led Adam through to the small back office of Coreen’s Closet. Now he was inside, delicious wafts of warm spice accompanied him.

‘You’ve brought Chinese food!’

He nodded, and dumped the bag in the middle of the desk. ‘I phoned Alice when I couldn’t reach you at home and she told me you were here, stock-taking. I thought you’d probably be famished by now.’

Adam Conrad is one of my favourite people in the whole world. And not just because he has some weird kind of built-in radar which means he turns up with takeaway at the moment I need it the most. Even weirder—it’s always the right kind of takeaway too. He never brings Indian when I’m in the mood for a pizza, or kebabs when I’m craving Thai. I wonder how he does it? It’s a gift. Truly it is.

Adam’s eyes widened as I pulled a garish pink wicker basket down from a shelf.

‘Excess stock from the shop next door,’ I explained as I undid the leather buckles and opened the lid to reveal a perfectly pink picnic set. ‘Daisies or roses?’ I said, indicating the patterned plates. Adam wrinkled his nose. The smile hadn’t completely left his face ever since he’d spotted me marching towards him through the shop door, but now it creased into a grimace before popping back into place. Sometimes I swear his face must be made of elastic. It isn’t natural to smile that much.

‘Can’t I just eat out of the carton?’ he asked hopefully.

I shook my head, and he flopped down on the ancient chintz sofa on the other side of our staffroom-slash-office. He held a hand over his eyes in mock despair. ‘You choose. Whichever one you think will dilute my pure masculine appeal the least.’

I snorted. ‘I’m giving you daisies,’ I said, with a wicked glint in my eye.

He just raised his eyebrows a little and smiled even harder. That’s the thing with Adam—he’s impossible to annoy. No matter how OTT I get, he’s always his same laid-back, unruffled self. I used to find it annoying that I couldn’t light his fuse—and, believe me, I spent a few years trying very hard to do just that—but nowadays I’m just grateful for his happy-go-lucky nature. I suppose I’m what some people would call ‘high-maintenance’, and in my quieter moments I know that a friend who’ll put up with me twenty-four-seven is a gift from on high.

We dished out copious amounts of food with pink spoons and started to eat it with pink forks, filling each other in on news of the last month or two. We didn’t usually have such a long gap between seeing each other, but he’d been away on business. More like a boys’ adventure holiday paid for on the company credit card, I thought. I mean, who can claim climbing up trees and messing about with bits of rope and wood a legitimate business expense? Adam does it. And he even fills in his tax form with a straight face.

‘Are you all right?’

I looked up. My fork was lying on my plate, a king prawn still speared on it. I didn’t remember putting it down. ‘I’m fine.’

Adam frowned slightly. ‘It’s just…you’ve been unusually quiet. For you. I’ve been managing to speak in whole sentences without being interrupted. It’s very unnerving. And you keep sighing.’

‘Do I?’ Even to my own ears my voice sounded far-off and a little dazed. I decided to deflect him a little. I wasn’t ready to talk with Adam about what was bugging me.

‘Nan said something to me the other day…’ I picked up my pink fork and doused the prawn on the end in sauce. ‘She told me she thought my biological clock was ticking.’

Adam reacted just as I’d hoped he would. He erupted into fits of laughter.

I crossed my arms. ‘Well, it’s nonsense,’ I said, feigning irritation quite passably and hoping Adam would take my rather distracting bait. ‘Even if I had a clock—which I very much doubt—I can’t hear it, and surely I’m the one who counts in this scenario?’

Adam grabbed the paper bag of sweet-and-sour pork balls off the desk and delved inside. ‘That’ll be the ear muffs,’ he muttered, without looking up. I think he was counting the pork balls to see how many he could filch without me noticing.

I frowned and scanned the office. What on earth was he talking about? I should have been grateful, I supposed. At least it had got him off the subject of my sudden attack of glumness.

And then I spotted some—in a torn cardboard box under the desk, which was full of winter stock I hadn’t cleared away properly yet. I reached forward and hooked them with my finger. ‘What? These ear muffs?’ I asked, holding a fetching baby-blue pair aloft.

Adam looked up, his mouth halfway round a crisp golden ball of batter. He bit into it and chewed slowly, not in the least perturbed by the hurry-up-and-spit-it-out vibes I was sending him. He licked his lips. ‘Not exactly,’ he said, keeping eye contact with me, but dipping his hand into the paper bag again. ‘I was talking more about your metaphorical ear muffs—the ones you wear to stop you hearing anything you don’t want to.’

My fingers tightened around the plastic band joining the two balls of fur together.

Adam just gave me a lazy smile. ‘I believe there’s a matching pair of polka-dotted blinkers too. Silk-lined, of course…’

He had to break off to duck out of the way of a flying pair of ear muffs. I quickly leaned forward and swiped a pork ball out of the bag with my free hand before he could stop me.

After a few seconds he narrowed his eyes. I thought he was reacting to my food-stealing counter-attack, but it turned out it was much worse.

‘Just because you can’t hear it, it doesn’t mean the clock isn’t there…that it isn’t ticking…’ he said.

I’d talked myself into a corner, hadn’t I? Time to end this stupid discussion once and for all. ‘Nan was wrong. My biological clock is not ticking,’ I said emphatically.

‘So you say…’ Adam just smiled serenely at me, and then picked up the ear muffs, which had landed just beside the sofa, and jammed them on his head.

I tried to tell him just how wrong he was about this, about all the reasons why I was still the same never-be-boxed-in, never-get-boring-and-predictable Coreen he’d always known, but he just kept nodding and smiling and mouthing, ‘I can’t hear you!’ while pointing to the ear muffs. I was sorely tempted to rip them off his head and ram them down his throat, but there’s no excuse for ruining perfectly good stock, so I nicked his chow mein instead. That’d teach him.

Eventually he pulled the ear muffs off his head and threw them back to me. The impish grin flattened out slightly. ‘Nah. I’m not buying it,’ he said. ‘Something’s up with you, and it’s got nothing to do with ticking clocks.’

I kept my focus on my plate and said nothing.

There was a deceptive carelessness in Adams’s voice when he tried again. ‘If it was anyone else I’d think it was man trouble. But I have it on good authority that there are men all over London who love nothing better than to follow you ’round like adoring puppies and scramble over each other to do your bidding every time you snap your fingers.’

I gave Adam what I hoped was a withering look. ‘Good authority?’

I’d hate to think where he got his information about me. Probably some jealous girl running me down. I get that a lot. ‘You, actually. You very proudly announced that to me…oh…about two years ago. That night Dodgy Dave’s van broke down on the way back from one of those vintage fashion shows you do, and we had to wait hours for the tow truck to turn up.’ Okay, that did sound a bit like the sort of thing I’d say when in a particularly full-of-my-own-praises mood, which I might well have been after a successful fashion show. I just hadn’t expected Adam to recite it back to me verbatim a whole two years later.

It was true, though. All I had to do was click my crimson-tipped fingers and a whole herd of ‘puppies’ came running. It was most satisfying. Sometimes I did it just for the joy of seeing all those eager little faces, not because I actually needed anything.

Adam lounged back on the sofa, resting his head in his hands, his elbows out wide, and gave me a searching look, with a glimmer in his eye that was part amusement, part wariness.

‘What?’ I asked crossly.

I should have stopped there, not risen to the bait, but I’m far too nosy to do something so virtuous.

I folded my arms across my chest. ‘Don’t just sit there staring at me!’

‘It’s all become very clear to me…’ he said quietly.

I had the horrible feeling he’d found me out, that he knew exactly what the problem was, but instead of teasing me about it, as I’d have expected him to do, he turned horribly serious. For once, I actually wanted him to laugh at me. I wanted him to try to suppress that wicked smile and deliberately drag his answer out, making me tap the heel of my red stiletto impatiently on the floor. But he didn’t make me wait at all. Didn’t tease me one bit. He just let me have it.

‘Yes,’ he said, nodding in silent agreement with himself, his expression hardening further. ‘You’ve finally encountered a puppy who doesn’t want to clamber over the elaborate assault course you’ve laid out for him.’

CHAPTER TWO

Put Your Head On My Shoulder

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 2—You’d have thought I’d have got bored with the effect I have on men by now, but I have to say it’s still as fun as it ever it was. The day it gets old, I might as well put on a pair of velour jogging bottoms and let myself go.

ADAM stared at the ceiling, his expression still grim. ‘Now you know what it’s like for the rest of us mere mortals.’ And then he started to laugh, shaking his head.

Normally Adam’s laugh makes me feel warm inside, but this time it sounded dry and hollow and made me all jittery and bad-tempered. I decided he was just being superior and glared at him. ‘Look, I don’t need you to start being all…avuncular with me—’

He just started laughing again. Properly this time.

‘What?’ I said, and my voice went all high and scratchy. ‘It’s a real word!’

I stood up. There was I, practically rigid with tension, and Adam had the audacity to sink even further into the couch, not bothered in the slightest that he was winding me up as far as I would go. I really shouldn’t let him do it, but we often start what seems to be a normal conversation and before long one of us is seething and the other is chortling. And it doesn’t take a massive IQ to work out which one is which.

‘You’re totally wrong, anyway,’ I told him as I sat back down and picked up my fork. I was not going to give him the satisfaction of agreeing with him today.

Anyway, nobody could call Nicholas Chatterton-Jones a puppy. He was sleek and dignified, like one of those lean hunting dogs, the ones with silky grey coats and bloodlines going back generations.

I sighed. Just thinking his name made me melt a little bit. He was the sort of man every girl dreamed of—rich, handsome, debonair. And I was suffering from unrequited something for him. Not sure about the ‘L’ word. That seemed a bit dramatic. But if the symptoms were daydreaming incessantly about him and looking him up on Google on an hourly basis, I thought I was probably halfway there.

‘You’re doing it again.’

‘What?’ I hadn’t been doing anything!

But then I realised my ribcage was deflating with the memory of a sigh. I jabbed the captive prawn in Adam’s direction. ‘Just leave it, will you? It’s none of your business.’

I bit the prawn off the fork and glowered at him.

Adam wasn’t a puppy either; he was a mongrel. Fully grown. Shaggy and adorable, true, but he’d probably give you fleas if you got close enough.

And he’d hit a nerve with his stupid comment.

Nicholas’s sister, Isabella—or Izzi, as she insisted being called—was one of the bright young socialites who’d decided that Coreen’s Closet was the Next Big Thing, and she shopped here all the time. She’d left university a few years ago and was still trying to decide what she wanted to do next, which left her plenty of time to lunch and party and go to spas while she told her parents she was chewing over her options. Izzi Chatterton-Jones had a heaving social calendar, and she was always needing a new frock for something or other. And now she was sending her friends along to Coreen’s Closet too. It was fabulous for business, and Izzi and I had struck up a friendship. Of sorts. We were more than mere acquaintances, but weren’t quite at the full-fledged gal pal stage.

But it did mean that Izzi, after being blown away by a vintage cocktail dress I’d found for her in emerald and jet shot silk, had invited me to a couple of her legendary parties, and that was where I’d first clapped eyes on Nicholas.

Just thinking his name caused all the air to leave my body in a breathy rush.

He was tall—well over six foot—had raven-black hair, and cheekbones to make a girl weep. Like a tall Johnny Depp, minus the Cockney pirate accent. No, when Nicholas talked it was all crisp syllables and long words. I could listen to him all day. In the secrecy of my bedroom I’d tried to mimic that tone, that voice, but I’d been born and bred in south London and my vowels just wouldn’t do whatever his did to make them so smooth and perfect.

He lived in a different world. One I’d decided I belonged in. Right from an early age I’d always dressed as if I was born for a life of beauty and glamour, and it was high time I stopped merely dreaming about it and acquired the lifestyle to match.

And if I ever was going to contemplate a long-term relationship, it couldn’t be with just anyone. I needed a man who’d worship me, yes, but someone who was dashing and exciting too. Someone I could look up to. Someone I wouldn’t get bored with. He’d have to be the man of my dreams, in short, and I thought Nicholas was a pretty good candidate.

We’d met on three occasions now. The first couple of times I’d played it cool. I’d glided around the room, looking aloof and elegant, so he could admire me from afar and ask Izzi who that stunning brunette was. Then last weekend I’d decided it was time to make my move.

I heard a crinkling noise and realised Adam had procured the pork balls again without me noticing. I narrowed my eyes at him, but he just sat there, one hand behind his head, smirking at me as he stole the rest of my share.

Hmph. He seemed to have bounced back to his old self annoyingly quickly.

Okay, so maybe there were two men in the known universe who weren’t inclined to fall at my feet and worship.

But Adam didn’t count. I’d known him since I was eight and he was twelve, and his mother had played badminton with my nan. I leaned forward and snatched the paper bag of pork balls from him before he emptied it, ignoring his grunt of displeasure. Then I picked a warm juicy ball of batter out of the bag—the last one!—and dipped it in the accompanying pot of sauce, before sucking a little bit of the bright orange liquid off and biting into it. Adam, however, didn’t notice, because he had moved on to the sesame prawn toast.

See? Immune.

My lips are my second most frequently stared at body part. They have an almost mesmerising effect on most of the male species. Something I capitalise on, of course. I always paint them red, for maximum visibility and effect. Not that trashy orangey-red. Crimson. The colour of passion and blood. Like the movie queens of old. I’d even seen men dribble watching me eat, and it wasn’t the food they’d been gawping at.

But Adam was unimpressed.

Well, maybe not unimpressed. He was my best friend in the whole universe, so that sounded a little harsh. Maybe unaffected was a better word. Perhaps it was something to do with the fact that he’d known me before I’d discovered my inner vixen, when I’d been flat-chested, with no waist to speak of. I suppose I ought to have been annoyed about his lack of puppyish adoration, but I wasn’t. Although we didn’t manage to see each other nowadays as much as we used to he was still my Best Bud. And every girl needs a Best Bud.

He’d been the one to chase away the bullies who’d teased me because I’d lived with my nan growing up. He’d been the one I’d cried on when my favourite boy band had split up, and again when, aged fifteen, I’d cut my own fringe too short by accident. He was the first person I’d phoned the day Alice and I had got the keys to our new shop, and he’d rushed round with a bottle of champagne and all three of us had sat cross-legged on the floor of what would soon be Coreen’s Closet and toasted each other with paper cups. Adam was my cheerleader and my big brother and my minder all rolled into one, and I suppose I could forgive him his lack of puppyishness for that.

However, thinking about puppies had me dreaming about Nicholas again, and the warm glow I’d generated with my Best Bud thoughts frosted over.

Why didn’t he like me? Why?

Last Saturday night had been my latest attempt to catch his eye. I’d gone all out, wearing a strapless red dress that matched my lips and was usually every bit as effective at making men drool. Nicholas had looked straight through me. And when I’d casually joined the group of people he’d been talking to, and had given him my patented eyelash sweep, he hadn’t even stuttered. What was wrong with the man?

Normally, just five minutes of concentrated Coreen had a bloke eating out of the palm of my hand. I just didn’t get it. What was I doing wrong? It was driving me crazy.

I could probably have coped with the blow to my ego if he wasn’t so gorgeous and so blinking perfect. Adam would say it served me right, but that wasn’t fair. Nobody deserved to be this miserable. And I’d felt this way for three whole weeks now. If something didn’t happen to change Nicholas’s mind soon, I’d be ready for those velour jogging bottoms after all!

‘So…’

Adam leaned forward and offered me a conciliatory prawn toast from the foil container he’d had resting on his knee, catching my gaze with his. I ignored the prawn toast and concentrated on those warm brown eyes.

‘Who’s this paragon of manliness that’s got you all tied up in knots?

I recognised the way Adam was looking at me. He was trying to appear all relaxed and jokey, but there was a glint of seriousness at the back of his eyes. Probably worried about me. That was the minder-slash-big-brother side of him coming out. But maybe that was a good thing. Adam’s shoulders, while possibly not as broad and honed as Nicholas’s, were perfect for crying on.

The only problem was, at present Adam didn’t look much as if he wanted to mop up my tears with his shirt. His expression was guarded again, and his flinty eyes felt as if they were boring holes into my forehead. I didn’t have any sassy comebacks left; my store of outrageous comments was worryingly empty. So I just looked back at him with blinking eyes, as close to begging as I ever came.

Adam’s eyes didn’t exactly soften and melt, but he stood up and rubbed my arm. ‘He’s an idiot, whoever he is,’ he said gruffly.

Then he took my hand and led me to the sofa. He even let me sit on the side where the springs weren’t so dodgy. Once I had arranged my skirt and petticoat carefully, he dropped onto the other side and looked at me.

I sighed, and it was long and heartfelt. There was no point trying to hide it now. ‘The idiot in question is Nicholas Chatterton-Jones. He’s the brother of one of my best customers.’

Adam frowned. ‘Chatterton-Jones? Isn’t he…? Doesn’t he own that investment company? Eagle something or other?’

‘That’s him.’ I could feel myself sinking even deeper into the sofa, but it wasn’t a relaxing kind of feeling. It was as if all the energy was leaching right out of me.

He whistled. ‘He’s the one that almost played rugby for England, but an injury stopped him.’

I just wilted a little further, my head bobbing in agreement. I knew every date and event of Nicholas’s personal history, and quite a lot about the previous three generations of the Chatterton-Jones family. Sometimes an internet connection can be a girl’s worst enemy.

I looked at Adam and took a deep breath. We both knew the game we were about to play. We always did this for each other when one of us was down. Friend A would relay the issue of contention, while Friend B nodded in all the right places and supplied suitably supportive comments, even if those comments were either a) outrageously optimistic or b) patent falsehoods.

‘He’s just not attracted to me in the slightest,’ I said mournfully.

Adam shook his head. ‘What? The guy must be blind!’ He was grinning as he said this, and the cold feeling that had been churning my stomach began to disappear. The truth was that Adam was much better at being Friend B than I was. He always knew exactly the right thing to say to cheer me up, and he always said it with that slightly devilish look in his eye—a sure-fire way to get me to smile. But behind the cheeky look I knew he was also a little bit serious, that despite the jovial nature of our banter he believed in me.

Told you he was my Best Bud.

‘It gets worse,’ I added, almost starting to enjoy moaning about my spectacular flirting flop of the previous Saturday. ‘I made a complete fool of myself.’

‘Now, I find that very hard to believe.’ The sarcastic sparkle in Adam’s eyes made me want to hit him. It also made me want to laugh.

We carried on like that for quite some time. Me relaying a blow-by-blow account of the party and Adam commiserating and commenting with precision and great comic timing. Only the momentary lift from Adam’s sideswipes didn’t improve my mood this time. The more I talked, the more morose I felt. Even Adam seemed to wince slightly with each mortifying detail, and I could tell he was struggling to keep his Friend B smile in place. We both fell quiet, knowing that we were losing our game, not sure that carrying on would salvage anything.

He gave me a softer, less Adam-like smile, and I leaned across and rested my head on his shoulder. It really was a lovely shoulder. Warm. Comforting. Solid. I wanted to believe things were going to work out right, but in my heart of hearts I just wasn’t sure. It might sound big-headed, but being invisible to a man was a new experience for me. I didn’t like the way it brought back flickers of other memories of being passed over, being invisible. Old memories, ones I’d done everything in my power to erase.

‘What am I doing wrong?’ I whispered. Adam was a man. I know he wasn’t the same type of guy as Nicholas, but he had to have some kind of insight. They must have more in common than just shared biology.

That was it! That was the thing both Adam and Nicholas had in common.

I sat up and looked at Adam. ‘Why don’t you find me attractive?’

If I could work that one out, maybe I could find a way to reach Nicholas after all.

Adam looked stunned. I suppose it wasn’t that surprising. We didn’t ever really talk about the fact that he was a boy and I was a girl. I knew he’d rather veer away from this topic of conversation, but I batted my lashes and gave him a look that said Please…

He chewed the inside of his mouth for a few moments. ‘I’ve never said I don’t find you attractive, Coreen. A guy would have to be unconscious not to find you attractive.’

Well, now it was my turn to be stunned.

Adam gave a one-shouldered shrug. His lazy demeanour had returned and he didn’t look at all bothered by what he’d just said.

‘Then why haven’t you…? Why have we never…?’

‘Hooked up?’ he suggested.

I pulled a face. That sounded kind of tacky. Adam wasn’t the sort of guy you ‘hooked up’ with. He was keeper material. And I didn’t like the thought of anyone treating him in such a…disposable manner.

‘See? That face you just made is one of many reasons why.’

I shook my head. He was taking it all the wrong way. The face I’d pulled didn’t mean—

‘And I’ve seen the way you treat men, remember? I’ve never jumped through hoops for you and I never will.’

I gasped. There had never been any hoops! Well…not for Adam.

He read my mind and fixed me with a knowing stare. ‘How did it go? Oh, yes. I remember…’ He did a rather good impression of my eyelash sweep and added an earthy, softer tone to his voice. If I hadn’t been so horrified I might have admitted it sounded quite a lot like me. “Adam, sweetie, would you mind coming along with me to a party this evening? I know it’s short notice, but I could really do with some moral support.”’

And then he flicked some pretend hair away from his shoulder, and I forgot to be horrified and descended into giggles. Adam, strangely enough, wasn’t laughing so hard.

‘When we got to said party I realised my role was more stooge than moral support.’

I stopped laughing. ‘That’s not true!’

He raised his eyebrows at me.

I opened my mouth to protest, but thought better of it. I’d buried that memory—along with a whole host of others from those days—quite effectively until that moment. It all came back to me with searing clarity: Adam’s face, his jaw set. The way he’d stormed from the party. They weren’t moments in my life I wanted to be reminded of.

I bit my lip. Something I hoped would show my contrition. Although—and I honestly did out of sheer habit this time—I knew it made me look very appealing too.

‘That was a long time ago. Back when we were teenagers. Teenagers do lots of stupid things.’

‘Like kissing their best friend in front of the whole room when the current Romeo is being a slightly harder nut to crack?’

Oh, hell. I’d actually done that too, hadn’t I? Not that I’d planned it, though. I’d just got carried away in the heat of the moment.

Adam hadn’t spoken to me for a month after Sharon’s party, even though I’d wheedled and whined and pulled every trick in the book to get him to forgive me. In the end I’d just turned up on his doorstep one day—no tricks up my sleeve, not even any make-up on—and begged him to give me another chance, to say we could be friends again. There’d been a huge Adam-shaped hole in my life. One I hadn’t cared for very much. One I hadn’t thought I could go on living with. Its presence had nibbled away at my very soul.

Adam had forgiven me. Eventually. But since then we’d both tacitly agreed to ignore the boy-girl element to our relationship, and I must have done a pretty good job of it if I’d managed to forget how atrociously I’d behaved.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said quietly. ‘I’m such a horrible person. No wonder Nicholas Chatterton-Jones wants nothing to do with me.’ And this time I wasn’t even angling for a compliment. I really meant it.

Adam pulled me close again and let out a long breath. ‘Don’t be silly. You’re fabulous. You know you are. It’s just that I realised that you won’t let the men in your life be anything but “puppies”, and I’m the sort that refuses to wear a collar and lead for anyone—not even you. So for that reason, and probably a few more, I decided we work better as friends.’ And then he kissed the top of my head.

One corner of my mouth tried to smile.

Adam carried on talking, and I could feel his warm breath in my hair. ‘I have to warn you…well…I’m sorry to say I don’t think you stand a chance with this one. You’d better find yourself a different puppy to train.’

Sorry? He didn’t sound sorry in the slightest.

I sat up and looked at him sharply. ‘What do you mean?’

He hesitated, and I half hoped he would drop it. Adam and I didn’t have conversations like this. But then, instead of looking down at his battered old trainers, he looked me straight in the eye. I held my breath. Just a little.

‘Guys like Chatterton-Whatsit… Well, sometime less is more. That’s all I’m saying.’

‘You think I’m too…?’ I trailed off, not quite sure how to label myself.

‘Maybe.’

I frowned. ‘But that’s who I am! Nicholas Chatterton-Jones might be a god, but I’m not changing myself for anybody.’

Adam looked rather weary. He shook his head. ‘That’s not what I’m saying. It’s just that there’s a girl underneath all of—’ he waved his hand to encompass the hairspray, the lipstick, the polka dots ‘—this. Just don’t forget that.’

I didn’t know what to say to that. Of course I brushed the hairspray out and took the lipstick off at night. I knew what I looked like without all of it. It was just that all of this, as Adam had so articulately put it, was how I felt on the inside. I only dressed the outside up to match.

I scowled at him. It felt as if he was criticising me, and I didn’t care for it much.

‘What makes you such an expert at relationships?’ I said sulkily, folding my arms and shifting back to rest against the opposite end of the sofa. ‘You haven’t had a serious girlfriend since Hannah, and that was a good couple of years ago.’

Adam matched my position, folding his arms across his shirt. ‘I’ve been working hard on building the business up. I haven’t had time for relationships. Unlike some people I know, I don’t think it’s fair to toy with people and then drop them when it suits me.’

See? This was why we should have never veered into to this territory. It was all getting horribly messy, and the lovely, smiling, joking Adam I knew had totally disappeared. I suspected that I too was being less than my normal charming self, but I wasn’t about to back down, and I wasn’t about to let my Best Bud analyse me further.

‘You never did tell me why it all fizzled out with Hannah. Did she get fed up with you spending all your time mucking about in garden sheds?’

That was below the belt, I knew. But Adam’s role was to make me feel better, not kick me when I was down, so he’d kind of brought it on himself.

He looked away. ‘My heart just wasn’t in it. I wanted it to be, but it wasn’t. And it wasn’t fair to Hannah to keep pretending.’

Blast, Adam! Just when I was all revved up for a cat fight, he had to go and get all honest on me and deflate my nice little bubble of adrenaline.

He looked back at me, an expression in his eyes I hadn’t seen many times before. ‘I hate it when you get like this about my job. I’m proud of what I’ve achieved, and I’ve been nothing but supportive of you.’

Urgh. I felt like an utter heel. He was right. I was taking cheap shots at my best friend just because some guy had had the nerve not to fall instantly at my feet. I was behaving despicably.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. I would have gone on, but there was a lump as big as one of my paste brooches in my throat.

Adam put his hand on top of mine and squeezed. ‘Apology accepted. You’ve really got it bad for this Nicholas guy, haven’t you?’

He looked slightly pained, as if he was sharing my misery. I nodded, and my whole insides started to ache. I don’t normally do the crying thing. Who has the time when liquid liner and three coats of mascara are involved? But I’d got this stinging sensation right up at the top of my nose and I knew I was perilously close.

I didn’t know why I liked Nicholas so much. Apart from the obvious looks-like-a-Greek-god, has-piles-of-cash thing. It was more than that. I never usually let guys get to me this way. Adam was right. Normally I was the one pulling all the strings. But there was something about Nicholas that had called out to me right from the start. I had a feeling he might be the elusive cupcake that would assuage my nagging hunger and satisfy all my sweet-toothed desires.

The stinging got worse. I looked at my shoes. Beautiful red peep-toe creations. But even they made me sad, and I didn’t even really know why.

Maybe Nan was right. Maybe something was ticking inside me. I was almost thirty, after all. But, seeing as I was…well, me, I was obviously going for the full-fledged meltdown rather than the polite tick-tock in the background of my life. Nan always says I can’t do anything unless I make a production out of it.

Adam shuffled closer on the sofa, so his arm was touching mine. He leaned down to try and see into my eyes, and nudged me. ‘Coreen…?’

My bottom lip slid forward. ‘Maybe you’re right. Maybe I am too much for Nicholas Chatterton-Jones.’ I shrugged and tipped my head slightly to look at him. ‘It’s a moot point now, anyway. I found out a couple of days ago that Nicholas might be off the market soon. There are rumours about a possible new girlfriend.’

Adam gave me a lopsided smile. ‘That’s never stopped you before.’

I punched him on the arm. ‘That makes me sound awful! I’ve never actually stolen a man away from anyone. I can’t help it if they take one look at me and realise I’m the one they can’t live without.’

Adam pressed his lips together and nodded sagely. ‘That’s what I love about you—your matchless modesty.’

I punched him again. And then I smiled. How did he do that?

He put up his fists and nudged me on the shoulder with one of them. ‘So? Who’s this girlfriend? Do you think you can take her?’

I swatted his hand away, but he kept jabbing me gently on the upper arm, the way boxers did when they warmed up with one of those swinging punch bags.

‘I’m going to take you down in a minute, if you don’t cut that out!’ I said, laughing.

The devilish twinkle was back. ‘Promises, promises,’ he said.

‘It’s that awful Louisa Fanshawe,’ I said, not rising to the bait. And if we were talking fisticuffs, I probably could take her. She was another one of those willowy sorts who’d blow away in a stiff breeze. I wouldn’t risk breaking a nail on her, though, so she was safe on that count.

‘Oh, yes. I’ve heard how awful she is,’ Adam replied. ‘All that charity work…visiting sick children in hospital and campaigning for the homeless. It’s positively disgusting.’

I jabbed him in the ribs with my elbow. He was supposed to be on my side, so why was he practically bouncing up and down? What had he to be so happy about? I decided to direct my ire at the absent Louisa.

‘When she’s not swanning up and down a catwalk for some pretentious designer,’ I pointed out.

I thought about Louisa Fanshawe and her stick-like limbs and big doleful eyes. She wasn’t exactly pretty, but I’d allow for the fact she was striking—in that understated, slightly duck-faced way some high fashion models were. The women on Nicholas’s arm always looked frighteningly similar. Duck-faced and stick-thin was obviously his type.

I sighed again. Louisa was the less Adam had been talking about. I looked down at my chest. Less wasn’t something I had a lot of. I was doomed.

I was about to point this out to Adam, but when I looked up at him he was paying an inordinate amount of attention to the last of the prawn toasts. I think he felt me looking at him, because he offered me the foil tray. I shook my head. ‘You have it.’

He demolished it in one bite, and then turned to look me straight in the eyes. ‘Like I said…’ The seriousness there made my pulse kick. ‘The guy’s an idiot.’

I felt a smile start somewhere deep in my chest and work its way up to my mouth. ‘I love you, Best Bud,’ I said, and wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled him close.

For a long time he was silent and he just held me, soothing me with the rhythmic warmth of his breath on my neck. Then the inhaling and exhaling stopped. Seconds and seconds seemed to drag past before it started again, and when the next breath came there were words floating on it.

‘It’s hard not to,’ he whispered into my neck.

And then I hit him again.

CHAPTER THREE

The Very Thought of You

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 3—You’d think that someone as vain as I am would enjoy looking in the mirror, but sometimes I just can’t face it.

I CONTINUED to mope around for the next few days, and the more I thought about it, the more I thought that maybe Nan was right about something ticking inside me.

Of course I didn’t tell Nan that I might be on the verge of getting serious with someone when I visited her the following Sunday. She’d have had me up at the church to book a date so fast my head would’ve spun. Baby steps. Just thinking about being with one man for a considerable chunk of time was about as far as I wanted to go at present.

No, when I visited Nan we did what we always did—ate roast dinner, drank tea, and planed to watch an old black-and-white movie on the telly. After lunch I observed a further ritual. I went into the spare bedroom, opened the rickety wardrobe, and looked at all the dresses hanging there in their clear plastic covers.

They had been my mother’s. She’d died about ten years earlier, in a shabby little bed and breakfast in Blackpool, killed silently, invisibly and senselessly by a faulty boiler spurting carbon monoxide. And when she hadn’t turned up to go on stage that night at the club they’d just slotted another singer into the bill and carried on. It shouldn’t be that easy to replace someone, should it? People ought be remembered for their unique qualities, even if the choices they made in life weren’t ones you respected, or even understood.

As I did most weeks, I pulled out just one of Mum’s stage dresses and studied it more closely. This one was all shoulder pads and sequins, probably from around the time she’d met my dad. I could imagine Mum, her big Joan Collins-style hair stiff with half a can of hairspray, singing a soft rock ballad into a microphone, her eyes closed and her heart on her sleeve. She’d had a lovely voice. I had a few cassette tapes at home, but I didn’t play them much—too scared they’d warp or wear out.

Her voice had been rich and husky, able to catch every nuance of emotion in a song, whether she was belting it out or making the audience hang on every note. By rights she should have had more success than she did. And maybe she would have done if she’d put all the energy she’d wasted trailing round the country after my father into her career instead.

Despite my love of vintage, I never tried on these clothes. The eighties weren’t my thing, for a start. I knew the dresses would probably fit, but I didn’t want to look in the mirror and see my mother staring back at me. I didn’t want to see that same broken hopelessness in my eyes.

‘Go on—take them down to that shop of yours and get a few quid for them,’ Nan said from behind me.

I hadn’t heard her come in the room. I shook my head, carefully put the dress in its place on the rail and shut the wardrobe door. Nan gave me a sympathetic smile.

‘Cuppa? And that Dirk Bogarde film starts in a few minutes.’

I shook off the sadness that had collected like dust on my mother’s abandoned clothes and smiled back. ‘That would be perfect.’

I loved my Nan. I’d never seen her feathers ruffled, and for someone who’d produced two generations of drama queens she was as sensible and grounded as they came. I hadn’t minded living with her when I was a kid. There had always been cake and cuddles at Nan’s little terraced house. And Nan made everything seem warm and cosy. She never got that far-off look in her eyes that made you feel as if she was thinking of someone else, wanting to be somewhere else, while you tried to tell her about the gold star you’d got for your school project.

It had been easy to fall into the trap of believing I lived with Nan because Mum was always up and down the country, singing in clubs and pubs, or off on cruise ships. While there was a certain amount of truth in that, after her death I’d started to see another reason for her not giving up the club circuit and settling down. Leaving that life behind would have meant giving up hope—hope that she’d bump into Dad, hope that he’d fall in love with her all over again and come home. While she sat in a never-ending succession of grubby backstage changing rooms, putting her false eyelashes and sequins on, she could still deny the truth, pretend that day still might come, when really the dream had expired many years before.

But I didn’t like to think of Mum like that, sad and alone, pining for a man who would never love her the way she had loved him. I liked to remember the happy times. Like when she came home and stayed in the spare room at Nan’s. When I was really small I used to come over all shy at first. I’d be awed by the glamorous lady sitting on Nan’s old-fashioned brown sofa. But it hadn’t taken me long to get all loud and demanding, to be clambering all over her and tugging her to my bedroom to see my toys. I even used to make her hold my hand while I went to sleep.

My favourite memories of her were the times she’d let me dress up in her clothes. She’d even backcomb my hair and put silvery eyeshadow on me. And then I’d clump around the spare bedroom in her shoes, singing one of her songs, doing all the actions, and she’d fall back on the bed and laugh until she cried. My mum had a lovely laugh.

‘Custard Cream?’

I looked up to see Nan offering me a battered tartan tin that, back in 1973, had once contained Christmas shortbread. I’d been so lost in my memories that I’d followed her into the living room and sat down in an armchair on automatic. The titles of the film were staring to roll, so I nabbed a couple of biscuits, balanced them on the arm of the chair, and prepared myself to slip into a world where men were noble, women had impossible eyebrows, and violins expressed every emotion while the actors stayed stiff-lipped, clenching their fists. I quite liked the idea of standing motionless at a moment of crisis, all elegant and dramatic, while an orchestra swelled around me.

I looked down at my floral Capri pants and red suede ballet pumps. Not sure I’d like to live in black and white, though. I’m a Technicolor kind of gal, I suppose.

We were ten minutes into the film when my mobile rang. Nan tutted, but didn’t swerve her gaze from Dirk, looking all square-jawed and beautiful on the screen, so I picked up my cup of tea and walked into the kitchen to answer it. ‘Oh, God, sweetie! I’m so relieved it didn’t go to voicemail!’

I’d recognise those upper-class tones anywhere. Unlike her brother, whose rich voice was even and restrained, Izzi Chatterton-Jones had a dramatic delivery that made booking a table at her favourite restaurant sound as if it was a life-and-death event. If Izzi had been a character in a novel, her dialogue would have been riddled with italics.

‘Hi, Izzi. What can—?’

‘I’ve had the most fabulous idea, darling, and you’ve simply got to help me with it.’

Knowing Izzi, whatever she was planning would be probably be last minute and extremely stressful to say yes to. On the other hand she was bags of fun, and I might even get to see Nicholas again.

‘I’m going to host a country house party!’ Izzi squealed. ‘Mummy and Daddy are going to the South of France for the whole of July, and they’ve said I can borrow the house for an entire weekend. Isn’t that the most super idea ever?’

She paused, probably waiting for me to recover from swooning with excitement. Only I wasn’t. I couldn’t think of anything worse—mud, rain, horsey laughs, everyone dressed in drab tweeds and shooting anything that twitched? Count me out. I was eternally grateful that Nicholas seemed to spend most of his time in London, in his tall white house with black railings in Belgravia. Now, I wouldn’t object to spending a weekend there, given half the chance.

‘Well, what do you think?’ Izzi asked, a hint of impatience in her tone.

‘Super,’ I said, borrowing her vocabulary. None of the words I had in mind would have gone down well. ‘But what’s this got to do with me?’

‘It’s a murder-mystery weekend!’

Okay. I know that compared to the Chatterton-Joneses I’m merely a commoner, but did I really look like the kind of girl who knew how to do someone in? It must be the accent. Although mine was a lot softer than true Cockney, Izzi and her sort probably thought I knew the East End like the back of my hand and was distantly related to the Krays or descended from Jack the Ripper.

‘I…er…don’t think I’ve ever been on one of those,’ I said. ‘What’s involved?’

‘I want to do the whole caboodle—costumes and everything—and that’s where you come in!’

Oh, goody.

‘I can’t abide those fancy dress shop monstrosities,’ she added airily.

I stifled a giggle. The thought of Izzi in a padded Superman outfit, complete with six-pack and biceps, had sprung to my mind, and it made it very hard to listen properly.

‘…so if you can sort all of that out it would be fabulous.’

Huh? Oh, dear. I’d wandered off again. Thankfully I have a full range of phrases tucked away at the back of my head for such eventualities. Sounding very serious, I said, ‘Could you be more specific?’

Izzi launched into a long spiel about wanting authentic thirties clothes for her Agatha Christie-type murder-mystery weekend, and I swear if I had been a cartoon my eyeballs would have been spinning round in my head and dinging like cash registers. Daywear, eveningwear and accessories for eight people! And Izzi only likes the very best stuff. I didn’t care that I was missing Dirk smouldering on Nan’s ancient telly for this. If things went well in the next year or two I was thinking of opening another branch of Coreen’s Closet, somewhere closer to the West End, and Izzi’s connections would really speed things along.

‘It’s going to be such a hoot!’ Izzi said. ‘We’ve all got characters to play. I’ll e-mail you details of every part so you can start hunting for suitable clothes.’

‘What’s your budget?’

Izzi made a dismissive noise, as I’d suspected she would. ‘I care more about it being right than I do about the cost,’ she said, and then she giggled. ‘I have the most fabulous part for you!’

I raised my eyebrows. I’d been hoping she’d say I was on the guest list, but hadn’t wanted to assume. This could have just been a business transaction, after all. I grinned to myself.

Izzi started telling me about the different characters the organisers she’d hired had outlined to her—lords, ladies, parlour maids and debutantes. And then she started reeling off the guest list. When she said Nicholas’s name my heart started to skip.

‘I can’t wait,’ I said softly. I wasn’t just being excited for Izzi’s benefit now. I really meant it. This was my opportunity! I’d be able to relax and mingle with Nicholas outside of a hot, crowded cocktail party. I’d be able to dial things down a bit—just as Adam had suggested—and Nicholas would be able to see my relaxed, fun side. I could see it all so clearly: languid cocktails in the drawing room before dinner, fresh, misty country mornings…

Izzi developed a stern edge to her voice. ‘And I need you to bring a man!’

I’d been deep in a fantasy where Nicholas and I had been strolling though a secluded bluebell wood. I had stepped in a rabbit hole and twisted my ankle, and he’d swept me into his arms and carried me back to the house as if I weighed nothing. (This was a fantasy, after all.) I could almost smell his woody aftershave as I laid my head against his chest…

‘What?’ I said, a little too sharply.

‘It’s a dealbreaker if you can’t,’ Izzi said. ‘I’m desperate! Jonti broke his leg bungee jumping, and is stuck in New Zealand, and Jonathan refuses to miss some horrible cricket match. You’ve got to bring someone!’

The bluebells, the rabbit hole, the lovely feeling of being safe in Nicholas’s arms? They all disappeared into that mist I’d been daydreaming about. I was glad Izzi couldn’t see me, because I felt my eyebrows clench together and my jaw tense.

The last thing I wanted to do was bring a date on Izzi’s weekend! It would spoil everything. While Adam had pointed out that I hadn’t been above being seen with another man to spark a potential conquest’s interest in the past, I’d learned my lesson on that front, and I’d never get any time alone with Nicholas if I had a lovelorn swain lolloping around after me all weekend. Also, I didn’t want to encourage any of them needlessly. The only man I was interested in at the moment was Nicholas, and it wasn’t fair to give any other impression.

What was it that Adam had said about toying with people the other night? Hmm. I decided I must be maturing.

‘It’s a bit short notice,’ I muttered to Izzi, but she just laughed.

‘I can’t believe you haven’t got a hundred men ready to fall over themselves for a weekend with you. You’ll manage it somehow.’

I pouted. Sometimes having a reputation like mine was not a good thing. Not that I’m a floozy. I might get a lot of male attention—I might even enjoy it—but I do try not to encourage it unless I’m interested. And I’m actually quite picky about who I go out with. There have been far fewer men in my life than most people think.

Flip. What was I going to do? I really needed this weekend to be a success for me—in more ways than one. I supposed I could fob Izzi off, hoping she was just blowing hot air about it being a deal breaker, but what if she stood her ground if I called her bluff? And she just might. One of the reasons I liked Izzi was that she was unpredictable and prone to sudden whims, just like me. If I caught her in the wrong mood when I let it slip I would be coming alone, she might just pull the plug on me. It’s the sort of thing I might have done in her place.

And then an idea struck me. Beautiful in its simplicity—except for the fact the man in question would never go for it. But Izzi was right: I’d manage it somehow.

‘Don’t worry,’ I said cheerily. ‘I have the perfect guy in mind.’

‘Why do I have the horrible feeling there’s a catch involved?’ Adam asked me from the other end of the rowing boat. I couldn’t see him properly. We were under tall sycamores on one corner of the boating pond and I couldn’t make out his features because the aggressive June sun was behind him, causing me to squint. However, even though he was just one big, soft blur, I knew there was a twinkle in his eyes.

Adam’s twinkle is a really good sign. It usually means he wants to say yes to whatever I’m trying to get him to agree to, but is just having fun with me in the meantime.

I adjusted my parasol. ‘Why would there have to be a catch?’ I said sweetly.

‘Oh, I dunno…’ The oars swept out of the water and propelled us forward in an exhilarating little jerk. ‘Maybe because you invited me out for an afternoon stroll in Greenwich Park—rest and relaxation, you said—and I end up doing all the work while you sit there licking an ice cream cone.’

‘I said I’d get you one when our time is up,’ I replied. I couldn’t see what he was fussing about. A little bit of delayed gratification is good for the soul.

The oars hit the water again, and I couldn’t help noticing the fine hairs on Adam’s forearms as we emerged into the sunshine again. Hairs that shifted and shimmered as the muscles underneath them bunched and relaxed. There’s something very captivating about watching a man row. I’d have to make sure that I ended up in a boat with Nicholas at some point during the country weekend. There must be a lake somewhere on the Chatterton-Joneses’ estate. It’s that kind of place.

I decided to get in some practice and attempted to drape myself fetchingly at my end of the boat, doing my best to look elegant and ethereal.

‘Now you’re just rubbing it in,’ Adam muttered.

I closed my eyes and smiled, my face turned up to the sun. The twinkle was still there. I could hear it.

‘All I’m asking for is one lick,’ he said softly, and I belatedly realised we were drifting rather than see-sawing through the water. I opened my eyes to find Adam much closer than I’d thought he’d be. The twinkle was there, all right, but there was something behind it, something hot and bright. That aggressive sun reflected in them, perhaps. I shifted my parasol. I must have let it slip back when I’d had my eyes closed, because I could feel my cheeks heating now.

For some reason I couldn’t find the words to refuse. He leaned closer and closer, a lazy smile spreading across his face. The chocolate in those eyes began to melt. I couldn’t help but watch it swirl and warm, filling my vision until it was almost the only thing I saw. It was odd, because we were hardly moving it all, yet it was at that moment I felt a quiver of seasickness in my tummy.

Just as he was close enough to lick my ice cream, as we were cocooned under my parasol and it seemed we were the only two beings in the whole of Greenwich Park, I felt a tug on my fingers and the cone was eased from my hand. There was a sudden lurch and a splash, and I found myself sitting alone in the rowing boat while Adam waded through the knee-deep water to the edge of the stone-lined pond, eating my ice cream in big gulps and laughing as he went.

I was so surprised I nearly dropped my parasol. And then Adam really would have been in big trouble. It was made of exquisite cream lace, and I hadn’t seen another one to rival it in years. I caught it just in time, and snapped it closed. Then, still listening to the sound of Adam chuckling from the safety of dry land, I swapped seats and picked up the oars.

I’ll bet you thought I couldn’t row. Well, I can. I’m rather good at it, actually. Boating ponds were cheap entertainment when I was a kid, and Nan and I used to come here all the time when it was sunny.

It was just as well I was facing away from Adam, because I was seething under my breath. The sight of me rowing expertly towards him just made him laugh harder, for some reason. I wanted to kill him.

Only I couldn’t. I needed him to do me a favour, didn’t I? A pretty big one. And if that meant sucking up my pride so I could further my business and snaffle the man of my dreams, so be it. I could be the bigger person while Adam continued to act like a kid. I could.

I reached the stone lip of the boating pond and marshalled my features to show none of my irritation. By the time I’d neatly nipped out of the boat—blowing a kiss at the scruffy teenager in charge of the pond so he’d come and fetch it instead of making me row it to the proper place—I was the pinnacle of elegant calm. I had a picture of Grace Kelly in my head, and I was determined not to lose it.

I caught up with Adam at the ice cream van, where he handed me a replacement cone, complete with chocolate flake and strawberry sauce. I snatched it from him and walked away.

‘Now you owe me,’ I said. To his credit, he didn’t disagree. Well, not straight away. We both walked, giving our attention to our ice creams until we were halfway up the hill.

‘I don’t think half an ice cream really equates to a whole weekend in the country dressed up like a wally.’

He might have a point there, but I was hardly going to acknowledge that, was I? ‘These are very good ice creams,’ I said, as I pushed the last of mine into my cone with my tongue. Adam went quiet. I looked up to find him swallowing. Hard. He had a strange look on his face, and I had a horrible feeling he was about to say something I wouldn’t like, so I started off up the hill again.

He caught up to me fairly quickly. ‘Come and see my latest project and we’ll call it quits,’ he said.

I sighed. ‘I’ve visited everything you’ve constructed for years.’

He shook his head. ‘Not for quite some time, actually. You’d be surprised at what I’m doing now.’

I wasn’t convinced. A summerhouse was a summerhouse, and a shed was a shed, after all. Not that I’m not proud of him for turning his hobby into a business that keeps him afloat, but it’s hardly glamorous. Wherever you find wood like that, there are inevitably spiders. And I’m not big on spiders.

‘And this thing you’ve being doing down in Kent is wildly different, is it?’

‘I finished that months ago. I was talking about the hotel project in Malaysia.’

I almost choked on the last of my cornet. ‘I can’t afford the airfare for somewhere like that! I need all my spare cash for Coreen’s Closet.’

There was a hard edge in Adam’s voice when he replied. ‘I wasn’t asking you to pay,’ he said. ‘I was asking you to come.’ He picked up speed, and I had to scurry after him in my crimson slingbacks. I tugged at his shirtsleeve.

‘Okay, I’ll come,’ I said, at once trying to work out how I could talk myself out of flying thousands of miles to look at a few treehouses in the jungle without actually breaking my word. I don’t like jungles. At least I don’t imagine I would. The nearest I’ve been to jungle is the palm house in Kew Gardens, but I got all hot and sticky and my hair started to frizz. Don’t care to repeat the experience unless I really have to.

Adam stopped walking and gave me a long, searching look. I tried not to squirm. He knew I would try and wriggle out of it, and I knew that he knew. And he knew that I knew that he knew. It was all very tiring. And embarrassing.

I don’t like letting Adam down, but seriously…a trip to a frizz-inducing jungle in exchange for a weekend at an idyllic country estate? Now who was being unfair?

Adam started walking again. This time his steps were slow and measured.

‘Even if I come, I’m not going to help you snag this Nicholas Chatterton-Jones. I’m not sure I like the sound of him.’

I huffed. There he was, going all big-brotherish on me again. But I supposed I could put up with a bit of sibling protectiveness if it meant I got what I wanted.

I lifted my chin. ‘I don’t need you to help me,’ I said airily. That part I could do all by myself. ‘I need you to help keep Izzi sweet. It’s a good business opportunity, and I need this to be a success. If Izzi decides I’m out of favour, I might as well kiss my expansion plans goodbye. She has a very wide circle of influence, and I want that influence working on my behalf, not against me.’

Adam nodded. ‘Why me? Why not one of the puppies?’

I rolled my eyes. ‘Because you have the uncanny knack of getting on with everyone and fitting in anywhere, and I need someone who knows, not just thinks, that I’m fabulous.’

And there it was again. The laugh. Why couldn’t this man ever take me seriously?

I cleared my throat and gave him a superior look. ‘Will you do it?’

He turned to look down the hill over the Thames to the odd mix of elegant Georgian buildings and silvery skyscrapers. ‘I’ll think about it,’ he said.

CHAPTER FOUR

These Foolish Things

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 4—I only ever wear red shoes. It started off as a coincidence, but then became a choice. Now it’s a divine ordinance.

A WEEK later I found myself standing in a leafy square in Belgravia, outside a tall white house. I took in a breath and held it. I’d e-mailed Adam six times, with gentle little messages asking if he’d meet me here, and whether he’d decided to come to the murder-mystery weekend in a fortnight’s time, but I hadn’t got a reply as yet.

He had sent me a link to an online video showing a yappy little dog worrying the life out of a bone, though. I didn’t get why. Sometimes Adam’s sense of humour can be a little…strange.

Anyway, if Adam wasn’t going to come, I was going to have to do this all by myself. No problem. Nan always says that a sense of style and good manners will help a girl fit in anywhere. Okay, Nan only really mentions the good manners, but the rest feels true. I turned my attention back to the house.

The Chatterton-Joneses had made their money in the early nineteenth century, bringing silks back from India, although none of them worked in the importing business these days. Nicholas could have decided to rest on the well-padded family laurels, but he was the successful and intuitive head of an investment group, wealthy in his own right.

I looked at the large sash windows, the freshly painted black wrought-iron railings, and swallowed. I’d spent most of my life living in Nan’s tiny terraced house in Catford, the whole floor space of which could probably fit into the entrance hall of this quietly elegant home. No time for nerves, though. I was here to perform a function, and it was time to show Nicholas just how slick and sophisticated I could be. ‘Darling, what are you doing standing in the street? I almost took you for a stalker.’

I turned to see Izzi coming to a halt beside me, looking effortlessly classy in a cream trouser suit and matching coat. Large sunglasses covered half her face, protecting it from the bright summer morning. Now that Izzi had arrived, the riot of petunias that I’d been admiring only moments before in the square seemed a little brash.

I’d aimed for ‘classy’ myself, but I was suddenly aware that my dark grey suit, made more than fifty years ago by a competent home seamstress copying a Lilli Ann design, wasn’t quite in the same league. And it wasn’t just clothing that separated us. She exuded the kind of casual elegance that only generations of confidence could breed, whereas I was more a combination of Nan’s Blitz Spirit, my mother’s need for drama, and something that a clipped-voiced character in a black-and-white film would call ‘pluck’.

But it was all I had to fall back on, so I was just going to have to make it work for me.

Izzi linked her arm through mine and swept me up the short flight of steps towards Nicholas’s glossy black door. ‘I’m sorry my brother is being pig-headed about getting himself measured for his outfits, and for dragging you all the way over here on your day off to give us all a fitting, but I want this weekend to be a success, and with only a fortnight left I don’t have time to deal with his tantrums.’

I smiled gently. No one in their right mind could ever imagine Nicholas Chatterton-Jones having a tantrum! He was far too inscrutable for that. Snarling like a panther, maybe…

‘I’ve texted him three times!’ Izzi was saying. ‘He just keeps saying he’s too busy to mess around with tape measures, so here you are! If the mountain won’t come to Mohammed… The rest of the gang should be here within the next half-hour, but I thought you’d like to get Nicky done first.’

I suddenly got a sinking feeling—as if I’d swallowed Nicholas’s big lion-head brass knocker and it was now settling in my stomach. Nicholas did know I was coming, didn’t he? But before I’d had a chance to check Izzi hadn’t sprung a trap on him she’d rapped the ring the lion held in its mouth against the door and turned to me.

‘You do have your tape measure, don’t you?’

I was far too nervous about what was happening behind that big black door to do anything but reach into my alligator handbag and produce it with a flourish.

Now, I knew some people didn’t like the idea of me carrying real reptile skin around with me, but be fair! I’d had nothing to do with the unfortunate beast’s demise, and the very least a kind soul could do after all it had been through was show it a little love and tenderness, and I certainly gave it plenty of that.

Besides, it matched my burgundy heels perfectly.

Just as the door creaked open I heard footsteps behind me, pounding down the pavement, and I turned to see a rather out-of-breath Adam darting up the steps to Nicholas’s front door. He gave me a quick grin and fell into step behind us as we entered the cool and silent hallway. Once inside, Izzi peeled off her glasses and turned to look at Adam.

‘So you’re the man Coreen found,’ she said loftily.

I started to glare at her. Just because Adam builds sheds and treehouses for a living, it doesn’t mean that he’s not in their league. Adam just plays by his own rules. I opened my mouth to say as much, but then Izzi’s lips twitched and her eyes roved all the way down to his toes and back up to his open, smiling face.

‘You’ll do,’ she added, with a hint of a purr in her tone.

I wasn’t sure I liked that reaction any better, to be frank, but it wasn’t the time to get into that.

Of course Adam just grinned all the more, so I aimed a well-timed jab with one of what he likes to call my ‘pointy little elbows’. He dodged it, and I gave him the please behave yourself stare he usually aims at me.

I didn’t have time to play games. In just a few moments I’d be seeing Nicholas. In his house. In the house I might one day want to become my house. My heart began to do the mambo. And not in the slow, sexy way they did it in Dirty Dancing. There were odd rhythms and missed beats all over the place. I captured some air, swallowed it down, and smoothed my skirt with my hands.

We were greeted by a well-groomed, discreet-looking man who conversed with Izzi in hushed tones. He nodded upstairs and I looked up the wide marble staircase to where Nicholas must be. When I looked back again the man was gone, and Izzi was answering a call on her phone.

‘You came,’ I said out of the side of my mouth to Adam.

He nodded and gazed nonchalantly around the room. ‘Looks like it.’

I resumed the behave frown. I hate it when Adam gets like this. He knows I’m buzzing with curiosity about something, yet he refuses to be anything more than vague. However, I wasn’t about to give up.

‘What made your mind up?’

He shrugged and looked up the marble staircase, which was lined with art I probably couldn’t afford and definitely didn’t understand. ‘I decided I’d better check out this Nicholas chap in person.’ He squinted at an abstract painting made up of squares in varying shades of beige. Without looking ’round he added, ‘To see if he’s good enough for you.’

My irritation melted like a chocolate bar left on a hot car dashboard. I was suddenly very glad Adam was here, and not just because it saved me from Izzi’s displeasure if I hadn’t come up with a willing victim. It was moments like these when I realised what a treasure Adam was. I hadn’t steered the conversation or fished for that compliment; he’d produced it all on his own. No string-pulling on my part whatsoever. And the warmth it gave me was twice as sweet as if I’d wrung it from one of my lovelorn swains. My heartbeat steadied into four-four time, and I was about to hug his arm when a horrible thought occurred to me. ‘You are coming on the weekend too? You’re not just here today to spy, are you?’

Adam reclaimed the please behave look and I instantly mumbled an apology. I should have known better. Adam is an in-it-for-the-long-haul kind of guy—probably why he puts up with me—and he wouldn’t have turned up today if he wasn’t going to go through with the whole thing. I was just nervous. What was taking all this time? Was Nicholas even at home?

The discreet man, who must have been a butler of some sort, reappeared and waited patiently while Izzi finished her call and slid her phone into her handbag. I’d half-heard the end of it and gathered she’d been chivvying her girlfriends along, telling them to prise their tiny backsides out of bed and get down here pronto.

‘Your brother is ready for you in the drawing room,’ Mr Discreet said in a silky voice, then disappeared again.

I was tempted to shudder. If I ever got to be a significant part of Nicholas’s life, I wasn’t sure how I’d cope with him. He seemed to vanish in and out of thin air, and, frankly, manners that good are just plain creepy.

Izzi started off up the marble staircase and nodded for us to follow. With each step my head grew lighter and lighter. By the time I reached the top I was verging on dizzy. It was all so elegant, so refined and understated. And in comparison I felt I had all the subtlety and grace of a kids’ cartoon. I suddenly wished I’d tried harder to eradicate the Cockney edge in my accent. I’d given up too quickly, frustrated that when I tried to emulate Izzi’s effortless drawl I always ended up sounding like a parody of Celia Johnson in Brief Encounter.

I decided then that being cool, aloof and businesslike—namely, keeping my mouth shut unless absolutely necessary—would probably be in my best interests. Men like a woman who’s mysterious, don’t they? And this approach would give me another fortnight to work on those vowels of mine before the murder-mystery weekend. I’d dazzle Nicholas with my witty banter then.

Izzi led us into a large drawing room with tall, almost floor-to-ceiling sash windows, and elegant yet somehow minimalist furnishings in neutral tones. I held my breath and hovered by the doorway, overcome by uncharacteristic shyness. Nicholas was there, gazing out of the window on the right and looking all lean, sexy and slightly irritated, in dark grey trousers and a shirt unbuttoned at the neck. Even in casual attire he oozed class.

I knew at that moment that if I had a future with Nicholas I would never again have to fear the spectre of the velour jogging bottoms. Not only would I not have to worry about being old and lonely and sad, but I’d become all I’d been training myself to be for all these years. I wouldn’t be dressing up any more. I’d rightfully inhabit a world of glamour and elegance, sliding into it with the ease of Cinderella trying on that glass slipper. I’d finally be able to look myself in the mirror without having to blink a few times to erase my mother’s eyes.

Nicholas turned to face his sister, the frown he was wearing only making him seem more broody and Mr Darcy-ish.

He spoke in a low voice, but unfortunately for him his gorgeous high ceilings carried his words over to where Adam and I were standing by the door. ‘I thought you were joking when you said you were bringing “the gang” over for a fitting for this weekend of yours.’ He hardly glanced in my direction long enough to register my presence, let alone see how cute I was looking in my pretend Lilli Ann suit with the flared jacket.

Izzi just kissed him on the cheek and waved his objections away with an airy hand. ‘Well, we’re here now. So you might as well get it over and done with. If you shoo us away, you grumpy old thing, we’ll just have to come back another time.’

To his credit, I saw a flicker of indulgent amusement in his eyes as he nodded grudgingly at Izzi, then strode across the room to greet us. He held out his hand for mine.

‘Nice to meet you again…’

That pause—the one meaning he couldn’t quite remember my name—almost finished me off. I felt like one of those buildings that you see getting demolished on the evening news. For a few slow-motion seconds it felt as if nothing was happening, and then everything inside me started to slide downwards. I grinned widely, hoping the shockwave wasn’t showing on the surface.

‘Coreen,’ I said, doing a pretty good job of sounding nonchalant, actually. ‘Coreen Fraser. We met at Izzi’s birthday bash.’

A pinprick of recognition registered in his eyes, and it was just enough to delay the almost inevitable collapse of my crumbling spirits.

‘Oh, yes,’ he said slowly. ‘You’re the girl who sells Izzi all those second-hand dresses she raves about.’

‘Vintage clothing, actually,’ a gruff voice beside me said. ‘Coreen is an innovative and successful businesswoman.’

Nicholas’s eyebrows raised and he turned his attention to Adam.

Seriously, what is it about men? Sometimes you get two of them into a room together and they have to turn everything into a competition for who’s got the most testosterone. Of course Adam’s surly interjection hadn’t helped things. I really was going to have to have a word with him about this big brother protectiveness thing. It was starting to make him behave most strangely at times.

‘Adam Conrad,’ he said, thrusting his hand forward.

Nicholas looked across at me, and then back to Adam. I knew that look. It was a jumping-to-conclusions kind of look, and it seemed as if I was going to have to intercept swiftly before he got the wrong idea.

‘My very good friend,’ I added sweetly, before Nicholas had a chance to put two and two together and come up with a million and six. He didn’t, however, look either pleased or relieved, as many men did when they found out Adam and I were nothing more than pals. His features hardly moved as he shook Adam’s hand. There might have been a slight squaring of his shoulders, but who wouldn’t when Adam was giving off such confrontational vibes? I was feeling a bit like standing taller on my heels and punching Adam on the nose myself.

Adam released Nicholas’s hand, a hint of a satisfied smirk sparkling in his eyes, and Nicholas flexed his fingers almost imperceptibly. If we weren’t in such elegant company I would have delivered that punch. Or at the very least put one of my pointy elbows to good use. I’d only chosen Adam for this weekend because I’d thought he’d be a help, rather than a hindrance, but I was starting to see the problem with not enlisting one of my ‘puppies’ instead. Mongrels have a nasty habit of having a mind of their own.

How strange. I realised as I saw the two men standing next to each other that I’d thought Nicholas was much taller than Adam, but they were practically eye to eye, and instead of seeming younger and scruffier and more laid-back in comparison to Nicholas, Adam looked rough around the edges, yes, but in a masculine, slightly dangerous way. I suddenly understood why my single girlfriends—and some of the not-so-single ones—had begged me to set them up with him.

Although Adam and Nicholas had stopped squashing each other’s hands in a show of masculine strength, there was still an atmosphere of tension in the room. Probably all those male pheromones floating in the air. Unfortunately, I’ve always been a little susceptible to the stuff, and I felt my neck grow warm and the little hairs at the back of my neck tickle. I blinked to snap myself out of it. Now was not the time to get all hot and bothered over Nicholas. I wanted to be cool and poised and professional, remember?

But even with my eyelids shut I could feel myself reacting to his nearness. My skin got too warm as the heat at my neck began to spread. My jacket suddenly felt a little too fitted. I decided that keeping my eyes closed, even for a second or so, was just magnifying the sensations, so I snapped them open again. Only, as everything swam back into focus, I discovered that it wasn’t Nicholas I was standing opposite but Adam.

How odd. Nicholas must have moved.

Izzi flitted round the three of us like a somewhat demented butterfly. ‘Oh, this is going to be so much fun,’ she gushed, dragging us all into the centre of the room. ‘You first, Nicky!’ she said, and shoved me at him. Thankfully I kept my balance.

Nicholas looked at me now, waiting, so I delved into my alligator bag, half expecting it to bite back, and produced my tape measure—not so much with a flourish this time as with a fumble.

Nicholas was looking down at me, a faint look of concern in his eyes. His gaze drifted to the tape measure and stayed there. ‘How are you going to…? I mean, where do you want to…?’

It was the first time I’d seen him anything but slightly bored-looking, and it was actually quite sweet. I got a little carried away with the idea he might be just as affected by the idea of me getting my hands on him as I was, and I totally blame the resulting adrenaline surge for what I said next.

I grinned back at him, forgetting the whole aloof plan entirely. ‘Don’t worry,’ I said, my voice coming out even huskier than usual. ‘No need to do a striptease. I’m very experienced in doing it both dressed and undressed.’

See? That came out totally wrong. And for some unfathomable reason every time I tell a joke or make a funny comment it always brings out the Londoner in me. In our supremely elegant surroundings my words clanged off the walls, sounding crass instead of playful. I blushed and busied myself getting my notepad and pen out of my bag.

Izzi just hooted with laughter, and said something about it being ‘classic Coreen’. I didn’t look at Adam. He ribs me mercilessly when I put my patent heels in my mouth, usually both at once, and I didn’t want to set him off and give Izzi even more encouragement. I concentrated on being belatedly poised and professional instead.

Finally I managed to get something right. I took all of Nicholas’s measurements swiftly and efficiently. Well, not all. I took his word for it on the inside leg. And my hands didn’t shake even once. I was very proud of myself. In fact I couldn’t have been more composed if I’d been measuring up Gladys and Glynnis, the two second-hand mannequins that live in Coreen’s Closet.

I moved onto Adam next, since I was in a man-measuring frame of mind, and that was when the delayed reaction hit. My ears began to tingle and I kept dropping my tape measure and forgetting the numbers so I had to start all over again. Thankfully Nicholas was deep in conversation with Izzi by then, and didn’t see a thing.

Hmm. I stared at my notepad and compared figures. It seemed Adam’s shoulders were as broad as Nicholas’s. Broader, in fact. Just goes to show how appearances can be deceptive.

Once I’d got started with the measuring, I didn’t stop. The rest of Izzi’s friends arrived while I was doing her bust measurement and she dashed off to greet them, almost taking me with her, connected by the tape measure, but I managed to wiggle free in time. There were a couple of floppy-haired ex-public schoolboys called Julian and Marcus, Izzi’s best friend Jos, and, to my horror, mouldy old duck-faced, stick-thin Louisa Fanshawe. Nicholas suddenly stopped looking as if he was a caged lion pacing backwards and forwards, smiled microscopically, and sent for coffee and croissants.

I noticed when they arrived that Louisa only nibbled hers.

I hate girls who nibble things. Don’t trust them. In my book, if you want to have a cake or some chocolate you should just have it. None of this gnawing at it like a hamster, pretending it wasn’t the sort of thing you’d wolf down in one go if you were on your own, and then leaving it half eaten because you’re supposedly too full up. My reasons for not having a croissant were purely professional, of course. It had nothing whatsoever to do with not wanting to look piggy. I mean, I could hardly leave greasy, flaky marks on everybody’s clothes as I measured, could I?

I could tell as I was doing the last of the measuring that Izzi was revving up to something. She kept giggling to herself and pressing her fingers over her mouth. She’d announced earlier that she’d tell us which parts she’d assigned us today, and I was dying to know who I’d be.

As I wound my tape measure I let myself dream about playing the part of the debutante. The whole murder-mystery thing was to be set around a family gathering on a country estate, as far as I could tell. I guessed that Nicholas would probably end up as the heir to the family fortune, and I was desperate to play his devoted fiancée. I even had a midnight-blue floaty chiffon dress picked out that would really set off my colouring.

Izzi made a big show of gathering us all on two vast sofas that faced each other near the fireplace, and produced a little notebook and silver pencil from her bag.

‘Boys first!’ she exclaimed, and fixed her eyes on Julian.

It turned out he was going to play the carousing younger brother. Marcus slapped him on the back and almost made Julian choke on his coffee. ‘That means you’re actually going to have to talk to a girl!’ he bellowed. Poor old Julian just blushed and stammered something about talking to girls on a fairly regular basis, actually.

Marcus was going to be the layabout best friend of the son and heir, to which he merely said, ‘Nothing new there, then!’ and slapped Julian twice as hard on the shoulder. He’d better be careful. From the looks Julian was giving him there might be a second murder at Izzi’s weekend. An unplanned one.

When Izzi said that Adam was going to play the cousin, who happened to be a vicar, I almost snorted my coffee out through my nose. Oh, I was going to have such fun with him! I wondered if he’d let me give him false teeth and a bald wig.

That meant, of course, that Nicholas was to be just who he should be—Prince Charming, for want of a better description—and I was more than willing to step into the shoes of his devoted princess. I sighed and reached for a pain au chocolat, completely forgetting myself.

If I’d thought Izzi was excited at dishing out the ‘boy’ parts, as she called them, she notched it up a gear when it came to us girls.

‘I’m going to be Lady Southerby,’ she said, clapping her hands loudly and waiting for us to all hoot and exclaim. ‘Isn’t it going to be wild! I’m going to be a crusty old matriarch and you’re all going to have to do as I say!’

‘Not much change there, then,’ Marcus said again, as he rammed half a croissant into his mouth and sprayed crumbs everywhere.

Izzi was far too pleased with herself even to give him one of her withering looks. And then she turned to me.

My heart began to pound. I clasped my hands together on my knees and looked at her with wide, unblinking eyes.

‘You’re going to love your part, Coreen,’ she said. ‘I guarantee it’s absolutely perfect for you.’

CHAPTER FIVE

Perhaps, Perhaps, Perhaps…

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 5—I’ve worn red lipstick every day of my life since I turned seventeen.

‘I STILL can’t believe Izzi did that to me!’ The corners of my mouth tugged downwards and made my bottom lip protrude slightly. ‘I thought we were friends!’

Adam glanced over at me, but kept his attention on the road. Just as well, really, since we were hurtling around the M25 in his Range Rover. ‘It’s been two weeks, Coreen. You need to let it go.’

Okay, I may have mentioned my displeasure regarding the matter to Adam a few times already.

‘It is what it is,’ he added, with an annoying air of superiority. ‘Sometimes life doesn’t hand us what we want, so we have to find a way to make what we have got work to our advantage.’

I folded my arms across my chest and stared at the number plate of the car in front. ‘Thank you for that bit of priceless wisdom, Socrates.’

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Adam had lifted one eyebrow. I decided his character for the murder-mystery weekend was going to his head. He was being annoyingly serene in the face of my abject distress.

‘I don’t need you to get all philosophical on me,’ I said sulkily. ‘I need you to be…to be my…’ What was the word I was looking for? It wouldn’t dislodge itself from my memory banks.

‘Your back-up?’ he suggested.

Exactly! I told him as much.

His mouth straightened out of its ever-present smile. ‘Always,’ he said quietly. ‘You know that.’

I sighed loudly and let my folded arms drop into my lap. Yes, I did know that.

Adam indicated and swiftly changed lanes to overtake a van. I held my breath, wishing I was behind the wheel instead. Adam might be steady and reliable in most aspects of his life, but none of that seemed to rub off on his driving. If my car had had a bigger boot we wouldn’t be having this problem, but unfortunately my treasured Beetle didn’t have the space for all this lovingly pressed vintage clothing.

He saw me tense up and chuckled under his breath. ‘Just because I’m here this weekend to be your “back-up”, it doesn’t mean I can’t have a little fun along the way too.’ And he pressed harder on the accelerator, reaching a speed my poor little Volkswagen could only dream about.

‘Mongrel,’ I muttered, as I dug my fingernails into the edge of my seat.

‘Drama queen,’ he shot back.

I didn’t have much of a defence to that, so I slumped back into the comfortable leather seat and tried to smooth down the little catches I’d made with my nails only seconds earlier before Adam noticed them.

‘When did you get rid of Dolly?’

Dolly had been Adam’s old Land Rover. Older even than my little car. He’d had her ever since I could remember. But when he’d come to pick me up that afternoon he’d arrived in a gleaming new Range Rover, with a glossy black exterior and parchment-coloured leather seats. It was almost sexy—at least as sexy as a giant hulk of a machine like that can be.

‘Oh, I haven’t got rid of the old girl,’ Adam said, smiling to himself. ‘But I need something a little more…confidence inspiring…when I go to meet clients. And a vehicle that doesn’t backfire rust and can get from A to B without the help of a recovery truck tends to help with that.’

I trailed a finger along the immaculately stitched seam on my seat. Dolly Mark Two was certainly very impressive. And rather expensive, I’d have guessed. How on earth had Adam managed to afford her? I hoped he hadn’t sold a kidney or something.

The clock on the dashboard said twenty to three. Only fifteen minutes more and we’d be at Inglewood Manor. Everyone else was due to arrive around four, to get ready, but Adam and I were getting there early so I could hang the outfits in each of the guest’s rooms and check that every last cufflink and clutch bag was present and correct.

Ugh. Thinking about what everyone was wearing just made me remember the fashion monstrosities that I was going to have to wear over the coming weekend, and that brought me both down to earth and back to square one.

I closed my eyes, shook my head and let out a loud huff. ‘I still can’t believe that Izzi—’

‘Get over it, already!’ Adam half-yelled, half-chuckled, cutting me off. I clamped my mouth shut and resumed my pout.

I suppose Izzi hadn’t sabotaged my plans on purpose. She was just dying to get out of her glamorous clothes and play against type. She must have thought I’d be game for a laugh, ready to do the same. I really shouldn’t be cross with her, but I had to be cross with someone, and she was the only one in the firing line at present.

Adam performed another bit of outrageous overtaking and then looked over at me. I grimaced back.

‘Okay…’ he said in conciliatory kind of voice. ‘Maybe you have got a little bit of a point.’ I didn’t like his tone, for all its sympathy and understanding. When Adam stopped bantering and talked to me that way it only meant one thing—trouble.

He let out a soft chuckle as he clocked a large blue road sign up ahead. ‘What was Izzi thinking when she cast a girl who changes her mind every ten seconds as Constance?’

I was too depressed to box his ears or give a witty comeback. I just sat in silence as Adam turned off the motorway and headed in the direction of Inglewood Manor.

Yep. That was my role for the whole weekend: Constance Michaels. The dowdy, frumpy sister of Adam’s country vicar. Not a hint of silk or chiffon in Constance’s wardrobe—oh, no. That was all going to rotten old Louisa. I was stuck with tweed and dreary floral prints. Sensible shoes and good, clean living. It was going to be dire. The only consolation was that as the Reverend Harry Michaels’s sister I’d be able to give Adam all the ear-flicks and Chinese burns I wanted, and he wouldn’t be able to complain.

As we turned off the main road and through an imposing set of gates I sat up straighter in my seat. We were finally there. But, rather than the sweeping drive through open parkland that I’d imagined, the road to the manor was lined with fir trees. I could half imagine that they’d picked up their skirts only moments before and run to stand on the edges of the drive, eager to see the approaching guests. Through their dark branches I glimpsed clipped lawns, rose gardens and finally a vast redbrick house.

It wasn’t until we were almost directly in front of Inglewood Manor that the drive widened and split to circle an oval-shaped lawn dotted with miniature firs in the most beautiful assortment of shapes and sizes.

I’d seen pictures of Inglewood Manor before, of course. Had known that it was grand and elegant. But now that I was actually there I realised that this vast multi-roomed house was also very pretty, even though it rose to three storeys. The windows were long and perfectly proportioned, and the unusual parapet of stepped battlements and cones, along with twisting redbrick chimneys, gave the house a fairytale air.

It struck me that Nicholas Chatterton-Jones was a man with a very attractive guarantee. Generations of tradition cemented his feet to the ground; he’d been bred to stay put, to build a family not to tear it apart. Chatterton-Jones men didn’t do runners. Never would. So why did that realisation make me feel more nervous, instead of more convinced I’d pinned my hopes on the right man?

Adam brought the car to a halt, switched it off, and turned his body to face me. ‘Raring to go…Constance?’

I jabbed him in the shoulder with a fingernail. ‘Just you remember that Socrates met a very nasty end. Poison, if I remember rightly. And this is a murder-mystery weekend.’

The corners of Adam’s eyes crinkled. ‘I hear the deadly draught was self-inflicted in that particular case.’

I ignored him. ‘Bring the clothes in, will you?’ I said, waving towards the boot, and then I opened the door, exited the car with an elegant sweep of my legs and walked off to the huge wooden front door, channelling every bit of Marilyn I could.

‘Starting to understand what drove the poor bloke to it,’ Adam muttered as he pulled his key out of the ignition and jumped out of the car.

The rest of the afternoon went in a bit of a blur. Before I’d even unpacked all the clothes the hordes descended, and rather than being able to concentrate on making what I’d got to wear work to my advantage suddenly it was, ‘Coreen, can you do this zip up?’ or ‘Coreen, how do I put spats on?’ Or a million and five other stupid questions.

I hardly had time to notice the lovely wood-panelled landing between the various bedrooms, or lose myself in the ornate plaster ceilings, elegant furnishings and antiques.

Izzi had decreed that no one should see anyone else before the Great Unveiling Ceremony. Under no circumstances were we allowed to fraternise before six o’clock cocktails, when the murder-mystery rigmarole was going to commence. As a result, I was the only one allowed to see anyone in full costume before the allotted hour, and I was rushed off my feet running errands, pinning hair, finding lost gloves. Marcus even had the gall to pat me on the bottom and ask me whether I could fetch him a cup of tea. I gave him a look that left him in no doubt as to where I would insert that cup of tea if I ever returned with it.

I was most miffed with Izzi for laying down the law in this way. I had hoped I’d get at least half an hour to remind Nicholas just how gorgeous I was before Constance had to put in an appearance, but Izzi was into her character right from the get-go, cracking the whip and generally making sure we did nothing to spoil her elaborately planned fantasy weekend. I was starting to think the whole idea was more trouble than it was worth.

Finally, when I’d sorted out all the last-minute fashion glitches, I managed to scamper back to my room, close the door behind me and slump against it for a few seconds’ rest. This was the sort of room you saw in posh interior decorating magazines, and I could hardly believe I’d get to sleep in it for two whole nights. Everything was elegant cream and muted duck-egg blue. There was even a magnificent mahogany four-poster bed, so at least I could imagine I was a princess between midnight and dawn, if nowhere else this weekend.

I took in a few deep breaths, drinking in the serenity of my surroundings. I needed it. There was only a quarter of an hour left for me to get myself ready, and it was going to take half of that time to de-Coreen myself.

Taking off the fifties garb was easy enough, although I had a moment of mourning when I slid my feet out of my heels and sank them into the thick carpet. I looked at myself in the mirror. My suspicions had been right. My usual style of bra definitely had too much va-va-voom for a tweedy female missionary wannabe, and I had to replace it with something much plainer.

I left my make-up until last. I’d never gone anywhere in broad daylight without my liquid liner ‘wings’ and my Crimson Minx red lippy. Not even to the corner shop on a late-night chocolate run.

I stared at myself in the mirror for a few seconds. Really stared. This would be the last time I’d look like me until late Sunday afternoon. Constance was going to take over until then. I could already hear her tutting at the crimson lipstick, so I held up a tissue to wipe it away. The tissue hovered less than a millimetre from my lips and then my hand dropped to my side.

I couldn’t do it. Couldn’t wipe that last piece of myself away with just a few swipes of a tissue.

The eyes would have to go first instead. I wouldn’t have to watch myself. The liner needed a thorough scrub with a lotion-splodged bit of cotton wool, and I had to close my eyes to make sure I’d got into every corner. Once that was done I opened my eyes again and had another go at eradicating the Crimson Minx.

Another false start.

Another tissue dropped straight into the bin with not even smudge of red on it. I had a feeling I could have gone on like this all afternoon, but noises on the landing jolted me out of my repetitive loop. Voices. From what I could make out, the others were now all ready and impatient to show off their glad rags.

After taking a deep breath, I plucked another tissue from the box on the dressing table and did what I had to do without letting myself stop to think, scrubbing hard with the tissue until there was no Minx left, just smooth, soft pink skin.

I looked up. Met myself in the mirror. It wasn’t a pretty sight. There was black grit in the corners of my eyes and a faint red tinge to the skin around my lips, making it seem as if the ghost of a clown hovered about me. And she was there. Looking back at me. Pleading with me.

I turned away quickly, unpinned my hair and brushed it through, then put on the ghastly olive-green tweed suit I’d intended to force on Louisa and slipped my feet into a pair of sensible brown lace-ups. I then picked up my compact and got to work on my face, not making eye-contact with myself again until I was finished. Until I was Constance, with her severe bun and pinched expression, and the reflection in the mirror was safe again.

I walked away from the dressing table and surveyed the damage in the full-length mirror in the en-suite bathroom. I dared myself to take every detail in, to face what I had made myself. Well, if Nicholas wanted ‘less’ he was certainly going to get it from me this weekend. And, since Louisa Fanshawe definitely was the ‘more’, that should put me at an advantage, shouldn’t it? As I kept staring in the mirror I realised it wasn’t so bad. I might be prim and proper and prissy on the outside, but now I’d recovered myself I could see my inner minx was alive and well and blazing out through my eyes.

There was a knock at the door and I almost jumped out of my skin. ‘Who is it?’ I called back.

‘Me,’ came a lazy rumble I couldn’t help but recognise. Adam’s voice always makes me think of long Sunday lie-ins and rumpled sheets.

I took one last look at Constance in the mirror, thinking I’d show her a thing or two this weekend, and then went to open the door.

I hadn’t seen Adam at all since I’d starting primping and preening the other guests. I’d offered to help him, but he’d said that I bossed him around enough when he was fully dressed and he didn’t need me doing it while he was in his boxers too. Impossible man. I was sure I wasn’t that bad really.

When the door swung wide I don’t know why I was so shocked. It wasn’t as if I’d expected to see Adam in his soft, worn denim jeans and his usual just-fallen-out-of-bed hair-style, but even though I’d picked out his clothes myself—the dove-grey suit, the brogues and dog-collared shirt—I wasn’t prepared for the transformation. Too busy thinking about my own, I suppose.

I stepped backwards, letting Adam pass me and walk into the room. I’d always thought that vicars were supposed to be safe, almost gender-neutral kinds of creatures, but even with a nice suit on and his wayward hair smoothed down there was still a hint of…wickedness about him. Not helped by the mischievous smile he wore as he looked me up and down.

The warmth in his eyes deepened. ‘You look gorgeous,’ he said, doing a credible job of keeping a straight face.

I rolled my eyes. ‘I look like an over-stuffed olive,’ I replied, gesturing with my eyes towards the jacket buttons straining at my chest. When I’d chosen this outfit I’d imagined Louisa looking really frumpy, with the too-large jacket hanging off her bony shoulders. It didn’t look quite the same on me. I’d been particularly pleased with the thick pair of round-rimmed—

Glasses!

I’d almost forgotten them.

‘Just you wait until you see the finishing touch!’ I marched across to the dressing table, picked up the tortoiseshell specs and slid them on carelessly. One hinge was a little loose, and they wobbled precariously on the bridge of my nose. I turned and gave Adam a defiant look, daring him to contradict me.

He just ambled towards me, stopping when he was only inches away. Slowly he pulled his hands from his pockets and straightened the specs with a tiny nudge of his fingers at either edge, all the while smiling into my eyes. He must have got them at just the right focal length, because suddenly everything that had been blurry and off-kilter snapped into focus and I noticed for the first time how the warm conker in the centre of his irises melted into dark chocolate at the edges. He dropped the softest kiss on the tip of my nose and stepped back.

‘I’ve always had a thing for girls who wear glasses,’ he said in his Sunday morning voice.

I wanted to grin back at him, to thank him for knowing the right thing to say to make me feel better about my horrible tweedy costume, but my lips were temporarily glued shut.

At first all I’d wanted was for him to join me in my tweed-related ranting, but he’d sidestepped my invitation and done the opposite, making me feel warm and confident. He’d given me what I needed before I’d even known it myself. Just like the takeaways he brought me. But even as warmth seeped through me, I shivered a little too. Adam’s unusual gift for cheering me up was lovely, but it was out of my control. Something I’d never be able to coax or tame. Something he could deprive me of if he wanted to. And on that level I didn’t like it much.

‘Ready?’ he asked, and offered me his arm in an exaggerated formal manner.

I stood tall in my sensible heels, lifted my chin and placed my arm in his. This was no time to get maudlin.

‘Born that way,’ I said as we stepped through the door and headed downstairs.

I had a light-headed feeling as I walked down the vast carved oak staircase with Adam. I was aware of my laced-up feet treading on each broad step, of my hand skimming the banister, but I felt oddly disconnected from those sensations, and the excited murmuring of the other guests drifted up from the hall below in a muffled fog.

At the half-landing there was a tug on my sleeve. Adam’s fingers lightly gripped my upper arm and he steered me to look over the banister.

‘Look,’ he whispered, his breath warm in my ear. ‘Look at what you’ve accomplished.’

I blinked and was instantly back in my own body, totally aware of the warm pressure of his fingers on my arms and suddenly his words made sense.

Down below the rest of Izzi’s party had gathered, all dressed top-to-toe in the outfits I’d put together. Outfits I’d scoured the markets and auction houses of London for. Clothes and accessories that had kept me awake into the small hours of the morning as I matched and paired and mentally sorted them. And when I’d finally drifted off I’d had weird convoluted dreams about pearl buttons, Oxford trousers and hat pins.

‘Oh…’ I said.

Just for a moment I had the strangest feeling I’d been catapulted eighty years into the past and was spying, ghost-like, on a real nineteen-thirties house party. Were these really the same people I’d measured and had breakfast with only a fortnight before?

I spotted Izzi first, her grey crimped wig drawing my eyes instantly. She was holding an ebony cane, but every time she got excited she forgot to lean on it and started gesticulating wildly instead.

My gaze only lingered on her for a second, because I instantly searched the group for Nicholas. He stood out, taller than the other two men, looking all dark and handsome and dashing. I can’t say he looked an awful lot different. But what was I expecting? One could hardly expect perfection to improve upon itself.

Julian and Marcus had scrubbed up well, looking very dapper in their single-breasted suits, sharply creased trousers and stiff white collars. I’d done a good job. Satisfied, I moved my attention to the females of the group.

Jos was bobbing around in her maid’s uniform, and flirting with Nicholas in a manner that would certainly get her sacked if she really was the ‘help’. I tried not to look at Louisa. The bias-cut dress in burgundy silk I’d picked out for this evening looked far too good on her slender figure, and the finger waves framing her face just served to emphasise her amazing cheekbones, which even I had to admit were her least duck-like feature.

Izzi spotted Adam and me as we reached the bottom of the staircase and let out a squeal. ‘Oh, look at you!’ And then she shoved her cane into Julian’s unready hands and raced across the marble-tiled hall to inspect us more closely. A rather unbecoming smile for an elderly lady crept across her mouth as she looked Adam up and down. ‘Well, hello, Vicar,’ she purred. ‘Remind me to come and confess all my sins to you later. I’m afraid there are rather a lot. You won’t be too shocked, will you?’

Adam grinned back. ‘I’ll do my very best not to be, but it depends just how naughty you’ve been.’

The eyelash bat and pout that Izzi gave him pushed things a little too far for my liking. I thought we were supposed to be in character, but she looked ready to dribble down the black high-necked dress I’d found her. I coughed, partly to draw her attention away from Adam, but mostly to save the taffeta from drool marks.

Izzi dragged her eyes from the Reverend Michaels and started to walk around me, plucking at my tweed jacket and inspecting every little detail. ‘The transformation’s amazing!’ she muttered. ‘I would hardly have recognised you!’ As she came round to the front again, she spotted my glasses and let out another squeal. ‘Isn’t it a hoot?’ she said, grabbing my hand and dragging me towards the rest of the group.

‘I’m practically an owl,’ I replied, rather dead pan.

‘I just knew you’d be a good sport about this,’ she half-whispered, half-giggled into my ear.

I didn’t do anything to disillusion her. I needed to keep on Izzi’s good side this weekend, didn’t I?

Now we were all gathered, Izzi introduced the murder-mystery weekend organisers she’d hired, who were playing the parts of Lord Edward Southerby, Izzi’s character’s husband, and the housekeeper. They gave us a brief introduction to the weekend, which I mostly ignored, and then handed us large white envelopes with our characters’ names on them.

We were then led through into the drawing room. I could see why Izzi had decided to ‘borrow’ the family home for the event. It was perfect. The Chatterton-Joneses’ drawing room was chockablock with antique furniture, and stern-faced portraits were everywhere on the moss-green walls. The room was so huge that there wasn’t only one seating area but various groupings of sofas and chairs, the largest of which was in the centre of the room, close to the stone fireplace. They were upholstered in a deep plum jacquard, half hidden by a million tapestried cushions in all shapes and sizes. Anywhere else this decorating style would have seemed haphazard and messy, but in the drawing room of Inglewood Manor it just softened the effect of the vast fireplace and the grand plasterwork ceiling, making the space seem both elegant and comfortable at once.

I eyed my white envelope suspiciously. I had a horrible feeling that whatever instructions were inside were going to send my plans into reverse. I already didn’t like what I’d heard about the reason for our characters to be gathering this weekend. We were supposed to be celebrating the engagement of Rupert and Frances—Nicholas and Louisa’s characters.

‘Robert will serve us cocktails while we take a little time to read our character packs,’ Izzi announced, then dropped into one of the plum armchairs and got straight into being Lady Southerby by fixing us all with her beady eyes.

‘What would you like, miss?’ a silky voice asked from behind my right ear. I almost jumped straight out of my tweed suit. I turned to find Mr Discreet from Nicholas’s house standing there. I pressed a hand on top of my thumping heart and gave him a long hard look.

‘I wish you wouldn’t do that,’ I said, frowning. ‘I thought you worked in the London house, anyway.’

Mr Discreet—or Robert, as I know knew he was called—didn’t let his weariness with the whole situation show anywhere but his eyebrows, which drooped a little at the outer edges. ‘Sir thought I might enjoy a weekend in the country and a chance to…’ He paused, as if he couldn’t quite bring himself to utter the words. ‘To dress up and have a bit of fun.’

The eyebrows said otherwise. I suddenly felt a pang of sympathy for the poor blighter. I glanced across the room to where Nicholas and Louisa were standing by the fireplace. He was pointing out family photographs of when he was younger and she was cooing over them.

‘What have you got that’s got a bit of a kick to it?’ I asked grimly.

I could have been mistaken, but I thought I saw a hint of a twitch in Robert’s left cheek. ‘Perhaps madam would care for a Gin Sling?’

‘That sounds lovely. A Gin Sling it is.’

Robert gave a nod of approval, but before he’d got two steps away Izzi, who was still holding court from her armchair, announced, ‘Oh, no. That won’t do at all, Robert! We can’t have the vicar’s sister tipsy on hard liquor.’ An evil glint appeared in her eye. ‘None of the demon drink for you, Constance, dear!’ she added loudly. ‘You’ll just have to have something virgin!’ And then she collapsed into a fit of giggles, as if it was the funniest thing anyone had ever said.

Of course everyone else had stopped their chatter when she’d raised her voice, and now they all chuckled along with her. Even Nicholas. I just pushed my horrible tortoiseshell glasses up my nose and pretended I didn’t mind at all. The last thing I was going to do was let it show that her judgement of me had stung. Somehow, without my heels and my lipstick on, I couldn’t bat the comment away as I could have done if I’d been ‘me’.

I suppose I should have been grateful. I’ve been on the receiving end of plenty of chat-up lines involving filthy-named cocktails in my time. At least this was a joke in the other direction. But the joke was still on me, and I didn’t want anyone to think that the idea of me being anything but a floozy was hysterically funny. Just because I normally look the way I look, it doesn’t mean I’m…easy.

Adam suddenly appeared at my side and put his arm round my waist. ‘Well, if we’re drinking in character,’ he said, looking in Izzi’s direction, ‘I think you should hand that champagne to me and replace it with a tomato juice cocktail.’

I had to give Izzi her due. Whether it was class or privilege or cold hard cash that kept her armour-plated self-confidence intact, it was doing a terrific job. There wasn’t even the hint of a dent in it as she laughed back at Adam, downed her champagne, and then ordered the tomato juice from Robert, who was still standing beside me, waiting for my revised order.

‘Whatever you bring me is fine,’ I told him.

‘How about a Maiden’s Prayer?’ he said smoothly.

Izzi grinned and clapped her hands. ‘Oh, yes! That sounds much more suitable.’

I ignored her and nodded my appreciation to Robert.

‘Thank you,’ I whispered to Adam, and then deposited myself with as much grace and dignity as I could muster at the end of one of the sofas.

I looked across the room at Louisa, all slender elegance and perfection. Nobody would have made that crack about her. She had that otherworldly kind of beauty that made men think of medieval princesses and cherubic waifs. Whereas I was an easy target. Blessed with a figure that meant I was always labelled the same way—even in tweed, for goodness’ sake!

For a long time I’d thought my sex appeal was the source of all my power, but just then, just for the tiniest moment, I started to wonder if it might be a curse, if I might always be the object of lust but never of devotion…

No. That was stupid. Of course I inspired devotion. I had my puppies, after all. And what could be more devoted than a gorgeous little puppy? And with that thought I squashed the nasty, wriggling feeling of insecurity away and sat up tall.

Stupid stuffed-olive suit. It was messing with my head.

So I imagined myself out of my suit and into Louisa’s dark blood satin. I imagined my lipstick back on and four-inch heels on my feet, and instantly I began to feel better. Things improved even more when I tasted the Maiden’s Prayer that Robert brought me. One sip and I knew the drink hadn’t been named for its innocence. More likely because supplication would be the only way of saving oneself after two or three of these little babies.

My envelope was still unopened in my hand, so I decided to delve inside and see what the rest of the weekend might be about. When I leafed through the sheets of paper I had to stop myself from groaning. Izzi, in her mad-doggish fever about her project, had timetabled the weekend to within an inch of its life. How was I going to convince Nicholas how low-maintenance and laid-back I was if we didn’t get any down time to mingle?

Along with a lengthy itinerary of activities—both indoor and outdoor—designed to promote clue-solving, was a full character profile of Constance, a brief summary of the other house party guests and some personal objectives for the first part of the evening. I had one thing I needed to keep secret and another thing I needed to find out: why Harry, my big brother, had become so overprotective of me in the last few weeks.

I let out a sharp little laugh at that bit. Talk about life imitating art…or was it the other way ’round?

Adam had just plonked himself down beside me, in the space I’d mentally reserved for Nicholas, and he leaned over to try and read my sheet over my shoulder. ‘What’s so funny?’

I quickly rolled my papers up so he couldn’t see anything. ‘No peeking!’ I told him, looking over the top of my little round specs.

‘With those glasses on you’re actually quite cute when you’re being bossy.’ Adam didn’t sound chastised at all. ‘I might just let you order me around a bit more when we get home—if you promise to keep them.’

See? There was no winning with Adam. He was, and always will be, completely untrainable.

Since my character notes were still rolled up in my hand, I swatted him on the nose with them. ‘You’re not taking this seriously,’ I said. My gesture had the desired effect and he backed away, rubbing the bridge of his nose. ‘You can’t talk like that to me. It didn’t sound a bit like how a brother would talk to his sister.’

Adam came as close to frowning as I’d ever seen him. ‘Suppose I don’t want to be your brother?’

I sighed and fixed my eyes on Nicholas and Louisa over by the fireplace, toasting their pretend engagement with champagne cocktails. ‘Tough. We’ve got to make what fate’s given us work to our advantage…remember?’

Adam’s gaze followed mine and then he sank heavily back into the sofa cushions. ‘What idiot told you that?’

I grinned at him. Strangely enough, he didn’t grin back instantly, as he normally did. But I’m pretty persistent. I just kept going until one corner of his mouth tilted a tiny fraction.

‘So…brother of mine…I’m supposed to be finding out why you’ve gone all prison warder on me in recent weeks. Care to spill the beans?’

Adam shook his head and waved his own big white envelope at me. ‘Can’t tell you. It’s supposed to be a secret.’

‘Adam Conrad! You’ve never kept a secret from me in your life!’

‘But I’m Harry, remember?’ He rubbed his nose again and I started to regret whacking him there. An awkward Adam was twice as infuriating as the regular one. He planted his feet firmly on the Persian rug and stood up. ‘And, actually, Adam does know how to keep a secret—even from you.’

I shook my head and let out a low, disbelieving chuckle. ‘No, he doesn’t!’

His expression clouded over. ‘If you knew about it, it wouldn’t be a secret any more, would it?’

Before I could quiz him further, to find out whether he was actually pulling my leg or—rather alarmingly—telling the truth, he glanced across the room to where Jos was standing with Robert. By the look of Robert’s eyebrows he wasn’t too enamoured with his partner in crime.

‘Now, if you’ll excuse me,’ Adam said loftily, ‘I have to go and weasel some family secrets out of Ruby Coggins the parlour maid.’

CHAPTER SIX

Wishin’ and Hopin’

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 6—You know some people say they can’t see the wood for the trees? Sometimes I can’t even find the flipping forest.

I ENDED up being seated between Julian and Marcus at dinner. Nicholas was far, far away at the end of the ridiculously long table, deep in conversation with an enraptured Louisa. After the first two courses I still knew absolutely nothing about Julian, and was more familiar than I could ever wish to be with Marcus’s rugby injuries. I didn’t even have Adam to joke with, because he was being monopolised by Jos further down the table.

I toyed with the last of my lamb. I wasn’t actually hungry, but pushing it around my plate helped distract me from a lengthy and rather too-graphic account of Marcus’s latest shoulder surgery. When I did look up briefly I caught the eye of the party organiser who was playing Lord Southerby. He glanced at Marcus, then gave me a sympathetic smile.

Dinner was so dull I was about to jump up on the polished walnut table and do the Lambeth Walk, just to entertain myself. Thankfully, that rash plan was scuppered before I could make a fool of myself, because the lights suddenly went out and, with no big-city light pollution to provide a warm glow at the windows, the whole room was plunged into utter darkness.

One of the girls screamed. Someone—I could tell it was Izzi—chuckled with barely restrained glee, and the great rubgy-playing oaf next to me started making childish ‘spooky’ noises.

I ignored all of that, too busy working on rash plan number two. I was trying to calculate if, under the cover of darkness, I had enough time to sprint ’round to where Nicholas was sitting, plant a smacker on him, and then make it back to my place before the lights came back on again. Unfortunately, just as I scraped my chair back and hitched up my skirts, the inevitable happened, and we all sat there, blinking at each other and looking around.

And then we saw it. Him.

Lord Southerby, face down in his lamb cutlets, with a dagger sticking out of his back.

We all gasped together, as if we’d shared the same intake of breath. Well, everyone except Louisa, that is. Now I knew who the screamer of the bunch was. I turned to give her a scornful look and found her clutching on to Nicholas, so close she was almost sitting on his lap. Before I looked away in disgust, unable to watch my dream man being all gentlemanly and protective, stoking her back with the flat of his long-fingered hand, I saw a flicker of smug satisfaction pass across her features, just before she burrowed her face in his shoulder and he put his arm round her.

Thinking murderous thoughts, I focused once again on the supposedly deceased Lord Southerby. The drama of the occasion was ruined slightly by the fact that, from my ringside seat, I could tell he was still breathing. The intermittent puffs of air from his half-submerged right nostril were making ripples in the port gravy.

Izzi tried to get an appropriate wobble in her voice as she asked Robert to call the police, but it was obvious she was far from distraught at her fake husband’s death. In fact, she seemed to be enjoying herself immensely.

The actress-slash-party organiser who was playing the housekeeper entered and suggested we contaminate the crime scene as little as possible, then asked if we would like to retire to the drawing room for after-dinner drinks. Once we were all assembled there we were each handed a second white envelope, containing further information and objectives.

I discovered I was supposed to learn if Rupert’s fiancée was just a gold-digger, why Rupert had been out-of-sorts recently, whether Lord Southerby had left me anything in his will, and why Giles…

I looked up and spotted Nicholas standing in the large bay window that led onto the terrace, momentarily separated from Limpet Louisa while Julian quizzed her on whatever list had been in his envelope. I watched as Adam walked over to him and they began talking.

There was a large, brass-horned gramophone nearby and I drifted off into a little fantasy…

An old seventy-eight was playing on the gramophone, a sentimental thirties love song made only more romantic by the rhythmic crackle of needle on vinyl. The French doors at the centre of the bay window were open, giving a tantalising glimpse of a moonlit terrace. Nicholas would come over and ask me to dance, offering his hand, and I would graciously accept. How we’d actually end up on the shadowy terrace was a bit fuzzy, but eventually we would be dancing cheek to cheek in the moonlight. Barely moving. Definitely touching.

The little bubble of magic I’d created inside my head popped as Robert ushered a shabbily dressed man into the room. It was apparent after a few moments that he was another of the murder-mystery team, playing the role of a slightly clueless detective sergeant. I accepted Robert’s offer of a glass of port while the man summed up the case so far and offered a few suggestions about possible motives. We were then left to chat amongst ourselves, supposedly to wheedle more clues out of our fellow suspects, while he investigated the scene of the murder. When he returned he brought with him the murder weapon—an ornate gold letter-opener, which was quickly identified by Lady Southerby as being from her husband’s study.

Unlike a proper investigation, in which suspects would be interviewed privately, Detective Sergeant Moffat questioned us in front of the group, and soon a picture of the late Lord Southerby began to emerge.

He’d been a strict parent, fickle with his attention, favouring his elder son Rupert over Giles, the younger brother. He’d also been an inveterate womaniser and there were hints of dodgy financial dealings in the past. The detective made a one-sided phone call to an imaginary family lawyer and then revealed that Lord Southerby had visited the lawyer only a fortnight earlier to discuss changing his will.

We did a good job of keeping in character for a while, but once the sergeant had left and we were allowed to question each other the masks slipped and we started chatting informally, dropping our aliases and talking about last week’s football results, next season’s fashion and generally getting to know each other. All except Izzi, who remained stiff-backed and fierce-looking in her winged armchair, and refused to answer to anything but ‘Lady Southerby’ or ‘Evangeline’.

I slid my horrendous glasses off and hid them behind a photograph of Nicholas as a serious-looking toddler on the mantelpiece. Then I subtly worked my way around the room, asking carefully worded questions of the different ‘suspects’ until I was close to the group in the bay window and waited for a gap in the conversation.

Remembering what Adam had said about less is more, I did a rather demure version of my eyelash sweep and tilted my head fetchingly to one side. Much less obvious, I thought.

‘Cousin Rupert, let me offer my condolences on your loss.’

I placed my fingers lightly on his arm and left them there.

Nicholas turned and looked at me. I hoped he was just very good at acting, because his eyes were alarmingly blank. ‘Thank you.’

I inhaled gently. Gently, because I was trying to make sure the top button on my jacket, which rested right at the fullest part of my bust, didn’t pop off and give me a black eye.

‘But I’m curious about something. Lord Southerby—I mean, Uncle Edward—always had a soft spot for me. You wouldn’t happen to know why that was?’

Marcus let out a huge guffaw. ‘It’s obvious that the old rogue was a complete scoundrel with the ladies…’ He looked me up and down, and suddenly my tweed suit felt as transparent as muslin. ‘I can think of a couple of good reasons why,’ he added, fixing his gaze on my straining button.

Nicholas, however, didn’t even try to stare at my chest. ‘I believe my father had some other reason for favouring you,’ he said cryptically, ‘but beyond that I’m not prepared to say.’

Adam looked at Nicholas, then across to me and back again. ‘I don’t suppose it had anything to do with the meeting your father had with his solicitor, did it? I don’t like anyone suggesting my…sister…would do anything improper.’

Nicholas blinked slowly, and smiled a little, but it wasn’t the kind of smile where the corners of the mouth turned up. His lips merely stretched wider and flattened. ‘Possibly…’ He looked down at me—at least it felt that way. I seemed a lot shorter to myself without my heels. At last I could see something other than complete uninterest in Nicholas’s eyes. ‘I’m sorry if I said anything untoward, cousin. I didn’t mean to imply you were that kind of girl.’

I sucked a breath in through my nostrils and held it, only letting it out again as a wide smile blossomed on my face. I totally forget to do my normal Marlilyn-esque, parted lips thing, and just gave him the biggest, cheesiest grin in my repertoire. It’s not often that people assume I’m not That Kind Of Girl, and I liked the idea that Nicholas was being careful of my honour.

He seemed taken aback by my wide-toothed display of gratitude for a second, but then he smiled back at me—properly smiled—and I saw a glimmer of something banish the greyness from his gaze.

‘Bah. I’ve had enough of this foraging for clues nonsense,’ Marcus bellowed suddenly. ‘I think it’s high time we all went off duty!’

Much to my displeasure, the rest of the guests seemed to agree, and our small group peeled apart and headed back to the sofas, where Robert was serving brandy. The rest of the group caught up with each other’s news, chatting about friends I’d never heard of and relatives I’d rather not have heard of. After a long while the conversation dried up, and they remembered that Adam and I were sitting in the room and turned their attention to us.

Louisa fixed her gaze on Adam, who was lounging comfortably in the corner of one of the sofas, a goldfish bowl of a brandy glass held loosely in his fingers. ‘What is it you do, Adam? And please don’t tell me you work in an office like the rest of these poor chaps.’

Adam smiled at Louisa and shook his head. ‘It didn’t start out that way, but I’m finding myself office-bound more and more. I own my own company and we build outdoor structures.’

Before he could carry on I piped up on his behalf. I blame it on the fact I’d been left out of the conversation for so long, because the words left my mouth like a jack out of a box. ‘It all started when he was fifteen and built himself a treehouse to hide away from his three sisters in the back garden.’

‘Oh.’ Louisa didn’t seem quite as impressed by the non-office job now. She smiled at Adam, but her eyes were flat and dull. ‘How nice for you…to make a living out of something that used to be a hobby.’

‘If only I could do that,’ moaned Jos, who, despite still being in her maid’s uniform, had flopped down in a comfy armchair and joined the rest of us. ‘I’ve dreamed all my life that someone would pay me to lie in bed until noon and then shop all afternoon!’

I think the topic might have been dropped then if not for Julian. He lifted his gaze off his shoes and asked Adam, quite earnestly, ‘And what kind of outdoor structures do you build now, Adam?’

All of them swivelled their heads to look at him, as if he’d broken some unspoken rule.

Julian flushed, but held his ground. ‘Mother’s been talking about replacing the old summerhouse.’ He took a big swig of his sherry, then cemented his gaze back on his brogues.

Adam, however, wasn’t gazing anywhere but straight back into the eyes of those judging him, not perturbed in the least about the lack of enthusiasm for his chosen profession.

‘Actually,’ he said, shooting a meaningful glance at me, ‘it would be more accurate to say that my company specialises in custom-built wooden structures—lodges, garden buildings. Our most popular range is luxury treehouses.’

‘Treehouses?’ Louisa’s immaculately plucked eyebrows almost disappeared under her hairline. ‘How quaint! For children, I presume…?’

All eyes now turned to Adam.

‘Some,’ he replied, with the trademark twinkle in his eye. ‘But you wouldn’t believe how many grown-ups harbour fantasies about having a treehouse all of their own, somewhere to escape when life gets too hectic.’

There was a general murmur of agreement and nodding of heads.

‘But surely you don’t mean luxury luxury?’ Louisa said.

Honestly, I didn’t know what her problem was. Couldn’t she just let it drop and admit she’d been a wee bit patronising about Adam’s ‘hobby’?

Like you’ve been, a needly little voice in the back of my head whispered. You don’t really take much interest any more, do you? Too full of your own business, your own enterprises.

I silenced the voice with a swig of vintage port.

Adam’s twinkling eyes turned steely. ‘That’s what luxury usually means, doesn’t it?’

Louisa gave a fake little laugh. ‘But a treehouse is always going to be a bit…basic, isn’t it?’

‘Hang on a second…’ Izzi said, forgetting to stay in character for the first time that evening. ‘Do you mean the kind of thing Michael Dove has just had built? There was a feature on his new mansion in one of the Sunday magazines the other week.’

Jos leaned forward. ‘Michael Dove? The rock star?’ she asked in a breathy, hallowed kind of voice.

Adam nodded. ‘That was one of mine. And it was great fun to build—two rooms, complete with bathroom, kitchenette, home cinema system and audio gear that will wake the neighbours three miles away. He said he wanted a guest house with a difference.’

‘Up a tree?’ Louisa said, still not quite getting it.

Adam helped her out. ‘Up several trees, actually. We set it between three large pine trees at the bottom of his lawn.’

‘Bloody hell,’ Marcus rumbled. ‘How much would a pad like that set you back?’

Izzi, with the extensive knowledge gleaned from the magazine article, mentioned a price that rivalled the cost of my one-bedroomed broom cupboard in Lewisham.

I took a sip of my port to steady myself, and ended up inhaling rather than swallowing. The choking fit that followed was in no way ladylike. Adam gently led me outside into the hall, so I could hack my guts up without an audience, and motioned for Robert to fetch me a glass of water quick-smart.

When I could finally breathe again, I straightened and looked at the man I’d thought I knew everything about. ‘Why didn’t you tell me business was going so well?’ I croaked.

Adam gave me a look that was half-sad, half-affectionate. ‘Coreen, I’m always telling you about my work.’

‘But you’ve never boiled it down to a hard figure like that before. If you’d done that I would have paid a bit more attention!’

He pursed his lips slightly. ‘You’ve never asked… Anyway, if you actually listened, instead of nodding and pretending you were, you’d have worked it out for yourself.’

My insides slumped like a fallen soufflé. With great effort I looked my Best Bud in the eye. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I should have listened. I should have known you’d take something ordinary like a garden shed and do something wonderful with it. And I should have paid attention—I’m supposed to be your friend.’

Robert chose that moment to return with my glass of water, and I took it from him, all the while looking at Adam, who was regarding me with a very un-Adam like expression.

Finally he bent down a little and kissed me softly on the forehead. ‘It’s time you ripped those polka-dot blinkers off. You’d be surprised what you’d see.’

And then he walked back into the drawing room, leaving me clutching the cold glass against my stomach.

I was right about there being a lake at the Chatterton-Joneses’ estate. It lay beyond the formal gardens in artfully landscaped parkland. To the unobservant eye the small body of water might have seemed like a natural feature, but the diminutive island in the centre was almost painfully picturesque, and the weeping willows on the undulating banks were grouped together a little too harmoniously.

The blissful summer’s afternoon only intensified the sense of perfection. The breeze was just right: cool enough to take the edge off the bright sun, but only just strong enough to whisper through the reeds and willows. Dragonflies flitted happily around us, tiny iridescent flashes above the water’s surface.

I didn’t care if all that beauty was man-made and planned. Primped and preened a little. Mother Nature is a woman too, and us girls know we need to emphasise our best assets. I didn’t care if it was too perfect, either. Perfect was what I was here for, after all, and after the disastrous morning I’d had perfect was what I was determined to have.

After breakfast Izzi had frogmarched us through the woods on what was supposed to have been a restful country walk. There had been no mist—the clean sunshine had cut through the summer morning too well. There had been no bluebells—too late in the year, I discovered. No convenient rabbit hole. No being scooped into Nicholas’s arms as if I weighed nothing more than a feather.

Instead Limpet Louisa had monopolised him the whole time.

I had to give her credit, though. She was good.

If I could have been objective, I might have applauded her strategy—one scheming woman saluting another. But I wasn’t in the mood for being objective about that. Not in the slightest.

Izzi, meanwhile, had complained about all the ‘out of character’ chatter and behaviour the entire morning, and had moaned at us periodically for not having uncovered any significant clues yet. After lunch she’d announced her solution: a spot of boating, pairing us up with people we hadn’t talked to much yet, so we could interrogate each other further. And that was how I came to be sitting in the stern of one of a row of beautifully varnished little rowing boats tied to a short wooden jetty.

As the boat bobbed up and down I could barely contain my excitement. Perfection was within my grasp. Izzi had finally done something right! She’d paired me up with Nicholas, and in a few moments he would step into our little craft and row us off into Happily Ever After.

The setting couldn’t have been more romantic if it had tried. There was warm sun, a cloudless forget-me-not sky, and all this achingly perfect scenery. There was even a pair of devoted swans orbiting each other at the edge of the dark green water. Surely this was a sign? Surely the scales would fall from Nicholas’s eyes after this?

He walked along the jetty towards me, his long legs easily covering the distance in a matter of seconds, and then it was happening, just as I’d dreamed it would. Nicholas stepped into the boat and cast off, sat down, grasped the oars and rowed away from the jetty, leaving the others behind.

Nicholas and I were finally alone together.

I fixed my gaze on his strong arms and waited for that delicious tingle to skip from the base of my spine to the nape of my neck. Any moment now…

Okay, in a few seconds, maybe. Once we were away from the bank and he could build up speed, really pull on the oars…

I frowned and concentrated harder on his hands and wrists, since the rest of his arms were covered by his shirt and an off-white linen jacket, and I thought I felt a flicker of something. Unfortunately, after another few minutes, that flicker began to itch. The something turned out to be a mosquito bite.

Flickers and tingles don’t mean anything, I told myself. They weren’t what I was there for. I was there to make Nicholas realise how irresistible I was, remember? The only one who should be tingling was Nicholas, and I needed to focus on that objective without getting distracted.

I decided my next step was to engage Nicholas in conversation, to show him I had brains as well as beauty. In fact, since the ‘beauty’ bit of me was still well hidden underneath Constance’s tweed suit and specs, this was probably the perfect time.

We’d been told by the murder-mystery weekend organisers that we could reveal a piece of confidential information about our characters now, and I decided to set the ball rolling. I gave Nicholas a particularly enticing look and lowered my voice. ‘I can tell you one of Constance’s deep, dark secrets, if you like?’

For the first time since we’d left the jetty Nicholas took his focus off the oars and looked at me. ‘Okay.’

I scanned the small lake, keeping an eye on the other couples in their boats. I suppose it might have looked as if I was being careful who overheard us, but actually I wanted to make sure the other couples were at a safe distance and that I still had Nicholas all to myself.

I looked into his deep blue eyes and my voice became even more husky. ‘Well, this doesn’t seem like anything much, but here goes… I have—or I should say, Constance has—a travel book about India hidden in her luggage. Apparently, she wants to go there to help the poor and needy, but her brother, Harry, has refused to help her raise cash for her passage or give a reference to the missionary society on her behalf, so she’s planning it all in secret.’

Nicholas frowned. ‘I presume she needs significant funds?’

I nodded. ‘The missionary society will sort her out when she gets there, but she needs money for the boat—which I’m guessing must have been an arm and a leg in those days.’

He paused briefly, before taking another stroke with the oars. ‘Could be a motive, I suppose…’ He glanced over at Adam and Izzi’s boat, which was gaining on us a little. Adam had taken his jacket off and rolled his shirtsleeves up to his elbows, and their little boat was zipping through the water. I could tell just by looking at Adam’s back, just by the smooth grace of his oar-stroke, that he wasn’t even rowing at full capacity.

Suddenly I felt all hot and unnecessary. I dabbed at my forehead with Constance’s lace-edged hanky.

‘Is the sun getting to you? You’re quite fair-skinned, despite being a brunette,’ Nicholas said, looking deliciously concerned. ‘I can row into the shade near the bank, if you’d prefer?’

I smiled demurely back at him. ‘That would be marvellous,’ I replied. Not only would I avoid looking all pink and sweaty, but it would take us away from the other boats—especially Marcus and Louisa, who had also started to head our direction.

Nicholas and I chatted about the murder-mystery weekend as he guided the boat into the shadows cast by the willows. I liked listening to him. He had a very analytical way of thinking. Not like me at all. My brain seems to flit from one subject to the next with worrying frequency—although I suppose the compensation is that I have the odd flash of right-brained brilliance now and then.

Nicholas frowned. ‘So, why won’t Harry hear of you going to India? And what has all of that got to do with Lord Southerby’s murder?’ he asked as he lifted the oars out of the water and let us drift further into the shade.

‘I don’t know.’

I tried to drape, but it just wasn’t working. No matter what position I got myself in, it just wasn’t comfortable. I glanced across at Izzi and Adam’s boat. They were closer now. It wouldn’t be long before they swept past us, making a circuit of the lake.

‘I tried to get it out of Adam—I mean, Harry—last night, but he was annoyingly evasive.’

Nicholas nodded. ‘Yes, I couldn’t get any of the information I wanted out of him either. Very cagey. If he’s hiding something, it’s big.’

My eyes grew large and round. ‘You think it might be him?’ I whispered.

Nicholas turned to look at Adam. ‘Maybe. Who would suspect a vicar? But why? What possible motive could he have?’

I balanced my elbows on my knees and looked at Nicholas. I liked him even better when he stopped looking bored and was actually engaged in something. That carved-in-stone expression he always wore had cracked a little and it made him look more alive.

I tried really hard to think about Constance and Harry, and why my fake brother might have killed his rich uncle, but I kept being dragged back to the here and now by a rather annoying detail.

The conditions were perfect. Nicholas and I were alone together, and he was even leaning forward, looking right into my eyes. I’d dreamed about a moment like this ever since Adam and I had gone rowing in Greenwich Park, but now I was living the actual fantasy something was missing.

Still no tingle.

I trailed a hand in the water and gave Nicholas a sideways look. ‘I don’t suppose you could you roll your sleeves up, could you?’

He stopped mulling over suspects and motives and looked at me in clear astonishment. ‘I beg your pardon?’

I closed my eyes and shook my head a little. Even I didn’t know how I was going to explain my way out of that outburst. I did my best.

‘You must be getting awfully hot in that suit,’ I said, sitting up straight again and doing my best to look concerned.

A microscopic frown pulled his brows together and stayed there while he carefully removed his jacket, folded it, and placed it on the wooden seat behind him. Adam wouldn’t have done that. Adam would have shrugged out of his jacket in a jiffy and thrown it into a crumpled ball, leaving it wherever it fell. For some reason the neatly folded pale linen bothered me.

I became aware of other voices around us and looked round to see all three of the other rowing boats in our vicinity. Typical. Just as Nicholas started to roll up his sleeves, as well. How was I supposed to get my tingle going now, with all these onlookers?

‘Ahoy, there!’ Marcus yelled as his boat lurched in our direction.

I couldn’t see his face, as his back was to us, but Louisa was looking very beady-eyed indeed down at her end of the boat. It didn’t take much guessing to work out whose idea it had been to take a gentle row under the willows.

‘Watch out, Marcus!’

Adam, who was maybe twenty feet away in his boat, had stopped rowing and yelled out. It was too late, though. People like Marcus ought to have rear-view mirrors on their dinghies. He didn’t bother looking over his shoulder to see who was in his way; he just kept on rowing until he hit something.

And that something happened to be us. Our boat rocked and I had to grab onto the sides to stop myself from going head first into the murky green water. ‘Oi!’ I shouted, and then instantly regretted my obviously low-class outburst. I clapped my hand over my mouth.

Marcus was conveniently deaf to any criticism, though. ‘Listen here, Nick,’ he said, grabbing the edge of our boat with his puffy fingers. ‘My iffy shoulder is playing me up, and Louisa here is refusing to take the oars.’

I wasn’t surprised. Marcus’s rugby days were obviously over. What might have once been lean, hard bulk was now looking a bit flabby and squidgy. He must have weighed a ton.

‘We’ll have to give up on this rowing nonsense,’ he added, looking none too crestfallen.

Izzi and Adam’s boat had drifted closer now, and she must have heard his dissent. ‘Rubbish, Marcus. Surely you can keep going?’

Marcus shook his head, then rubbed his right shoulder and moved his elbow backwards and forwards, as if that was supposed to prove a point of some kind. ‘We’ll have to swap around.’

‘But that means one of the girls will have to row, and that’s not really on, is it?’ Nicholas said.

We all sat and looked at each other, our three boats haphazardly parked about twenty feet from the shore.

‘I don’t know how,’ Louisa said, and did a good job of hiding a smile.

Nicholas looked across at his sister. ‘You do, Izz.’

Izzi let out a hard laugh. ‘In this get up?’ she said, indicating the stiff black dress. ‘It’d rip in a second.’

She was right, as well. As Lady Southerby’s clothes were supposed to be old-fashioned even for the thirties, that particular piece had to be about ninety years old, made of crêpe de chine, and wouldn’t take much stress on its seams.

‘That’s okay,’ Adam piped up. ‘Coreen’s excellent at rowing. I’ve seen her myself. Strong as an ox.’

I very nearly stood up in the boat to call Adam out on that one! Apart from the fact he’d just compared me to a rather unattractive, hefty-looking farm animal in public, he knew I wanted to spend time with Nicholas. What on earth was he playing at?

I glared at him, but he just gave me that annoyingly serene smile he’d adopted in return.

Just then he was pretty lucky he was a couple of boat lengths away, because I would have wrung his neck if it hadn’t meant immersing myself in a freezing cold lake.

Then I became aware that no one was talking, and five pairs of eyes were on me. Nicholas was regarding me carefully.

‘You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,’ he said, just as carefully.

I knew he was waiting for me to make a decision; I just didn’t know which way he wanted me to choose. I looked round at the other faces—Louisa’s triumphant smile, Izzi’s pleading eyes, Adam’s warm, brown gaze.

I shrugged and looked over at Marcus and Louisa’s boat. ‘All right, then. I’ll swap.’ If I swapped with Marcus I might not be with Nicholas, but I could make sure Louisa and I rowed to the other side of the lake and kept right out of his way.

Marcus and Nicholas worked to bring the boats side-by-side, but before I could argue Louisa nimbly stepped across from one boat to the other. ‘You’re such a star,’ she said thinly. ‘I don’t think any of us wanted to go back indoors just yet. It’s such a beautiful day.’ And then she bestowed a glowing smile on Nicholas, who, as luck would have it, didn’t smile back—he was looking at me instead.

‘Sure about this, Coreen?’

‘Yes,’ I said, spurred on by something I saw in his expression. I don’t know how, but I knew that he was impressed with me.

He gave me a brief nod, his expression warming further. ‘Hold the boat steady, then, Marcus.’

I stood up, for once stupidly glad about Constance’s sensible lace-ups, and prepared to plant one foot and then the other in Marcus’s boat. Slow and steady was the plan. When the first part was done, and I was straddling both boats as elegantly as I could, I took a few moments to steady myself, aware of the growing silence as they all watched me. Even Adam and Izzi, who had drifted closer, weren’t moving.

However, just as I lifted the second foot, and was balancing one-legged in the other boat, Marcus decided to ease his shoulder with another set of arm rotations. He missed me, but hit one of the oars, the end of which made jarring contact with Nicholas’s boat. It also acted as a lever, pushing the sterns of both boats away from each other in a swinging arc.

The jolt from the oar and the sideways motion of the boat meant only one thing—I went from having one foot planted securely in each boat to not having any feet planted anywhere at all.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Can’t Take My Eyes Off You

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 7—As much as I hate to admit it, there is a time for fantasy and there is a time for looking facts (especially the numbers on the bathroom scales) in the face.

THE water that had seemed so perfect and tranquil? Well, it was cold and smelly and far from perfect. As the murky green water closed over my head I panicked. I’m not proud about that, but it was surprisingly cold, given the glorious summer we’d been having, and then something slimy touched my leg.

I hadn’t had time to think about closing my mouth before I’d fallen in, and lake water filled my mouth and nose. It was the same three-shades-dirtier-than-olive colour as the suit I was wearing and, believe me, the water tasted as good as the suit looked.

I flailed around, desperately trying to find the surface, but my hands hit something hard and ridged. It took me a couple of seconds to realise I was under one of the boats. I opened my eyes to see two fuzzy, hulking shapes above me and no obvious gap between them.

That was when I really started to freak out.

I kicked with my legs, propelling myself forwards and upwards, desperate to get to the surface. My head hit the hull of one of the boats and I let out a silent underwater yelp.

Then something grabbed my torso, pulling me sideways. I kicked and fought, the breath burning in my lungs. At least I did until my palm hit something soft, something that definitely wasn’t boat or muddy lake-bed.

I realised I wasn’t alone.

In some weird, slow-motion part of my brain I thought, How romantic! He’s jumped in to save me. But the slicing pain in my chest wiped those musings away, replacing them with more primal urges.

I clung to him, dragging myself against him as he pushed upwards, wrapping my arms and legs around him just before our heads broke the surface. After the billowing underwater silence the shouts and squeals of the rest of the boating party seemed sharp and deafening. I buried my face in the crook of his neck to muffle them.

Slowly, rational thought returned. I coughed and hiccupped, thinking that if I’d known this was all I had to do to get up close and personal with this finely-toned physique, I’d have hurled myself in the lake the moment I got here on Friday afternoon.

I could feel the graze of rough wet cotton against my cheek, could feel shoulder and back muscles hardening underneath my arms as I held on tight. I felt totally vulnerable, yet totally safe. I knew he had me, and that whatever happened he would never let me go.

Was it wrong that it was now I got my tingle?

Despite the freezing water, a strange, buzzing sensation raced up my legs, surged through my body and lifted the roots of my hair. All I cared about was clinging on to him, the feel of him, the breadth of him, the dream of him…

‘Is she okay?’

The voice drifted above me, merging with other phrases of concern in different tones and pitches.

I was okay. Shaken. Wet. A little humiliated, maybe. But okay. However, I didn’t seem able to open my mouth and tell him that.

And then it hit me.

The voice. The one flowing in the air above our heads. That safe-and-dry-in-one-of-the-boats kind of voice. It was Nicholas’s.

Recognition hit me like a punch in the head. I knew this warm, hard shoulder I was resting my head on. I’d relied on it for most of my life, in fact. But the knowledge that it wasn’t Nicholas I was hanging on to didn’t change anything. I just clung to him all the harder.

‘Coreen?’ Adam whispered in my ear. ‘Are you okay?’

It was only then I noticed the pounding of his ribcage as it was pressed against mine, the hitches of breath between his words. I could almost believe he’d been as terrified as I had been. I raised my head to look at him, hair plastered over my eyes so I could only half see him through the sodden strands.

There was something fierce, something basic and protective, in those usually cheery brown eyes. I shivered a little. The water temperature, which I’d hardly noticed since he’d grabbed me underwater, suddenly seemed to drop. I still couldn’t prise my jaw open. Our gazes hooked together and I nodded.

A flood of warmth replaced the fierceness in Adam’s eyes. I loosened my grip on him a little, let my legs float downwards, but drew them up again quickly when they hit something soft and sludgy. It was then I realised I’d lost at least one of my shoes.

I also realised Adam wasn’t kicking and splashing to keep us afloat, which meant that the sludgy stuff I’d felt with the tip of my toe… Yep. It was the lake-bed. My vocal cords ended their strike and I groaned aloud.

I’d thought I was drowning in just over five feet of water?

How humiliating! I couldn’t even begin to look at the others, who were still peering over the edge of their rowing boats at us.

I sent Adam a begging look, no eyelash sweeps or tempting lip-bites included this time. I just telegraphed my desperation to him. Eye to eye. Friend to friend. Woman to man.

He didn’t even blink. ‘Let’s get out of this over-sized paddling pool, shall we?’ And then he hooked one arm under my knees and started wading towards dry ground.

Thankfully we were close to a section of bank that wasn’t engulfed in reeds, even though it had flattened into a rather small and very muddy beach. Adam just walked right out of the water—although how he managed to do it with me, my curves, and my water-logged tweed suit I’ll never know.

Once we were back on dry land I tried to slip out of his grasp and put my feet on the beach, but Adam stopped me with a firm squeeze and a stern look. ‘You’ve got no shoes,’ he said grimly. I hoped desperately that the strain I could both hear in his voice and see on his face didn’t have anything to do with the effort of keeping me aloft.

‘You can’t carry me back to the house,’ I squeaked. ‘It’ll kill you!’

Adam planted his feet firmly on the grass and twisted round to shout to the others, swinging me with him and yelling that he was taking me back to Inglewood Manor.

What a pair we must have looked, dripping wet, smeared with mud, and covered with tiny flecks of bright green duck-weed. I hid my face in his damp, white and, now that I noticed it, slightly see-through shirt—which prompted a Mr Darcy flashback so intense that my legs began to shake. It was just as well Adam had decided against plonking me on the ground after all.

And then I was bumping gently against his chest as he strode across the grass towards the formal gardens that encircled the house.

‘I can walk…really,’ I said weakly.

‘Shut up, Coreen.’ He puffed the words out above my head.

I’d thought offering was the right thing to do, but was secretly glad Adam had refused. If I hadn’t been feeling horrendously sorry for him, having to heft me all that way, I might have let the drama of the moment get to me. I don’t get to play the damsel in distress very often—not for real, anyway—and I was tempted to enjoy it as long as it lasted.

I snuck a look over Adam’s shoulder, wondering if the soggy, slightly smelly and muddy reality of what had just happened might look a little bit romantic to our audience, who were now some distance away. I also wondered if Nicholas might be even the tiniest bit jealous.

Wow.

That was odd.

For the first time in two months the thought of Nicholas Chatterton-Jones hadn’t sucked a sigh from my lungs. It hadn’t filled me with warmth because that glow had been snuffed out by a rather important question: why hadn’t he been the one to jump in and save me? He’d been a heck of a lot closer than Adam.

The thrill wore off a little at that moment. Enough to make me feel sorry for myself, anyway.

‘I’m so humiliated,’ I mumbled against Adam’s shoulder.

‘If anyone should be humiliated it should be Louisa and Marcus.’ Adam took a few more steps before he explained. ‘She was sneaky and selfish, asking you to lug that big lump around the lake instead of letting Nicholas do it. And Marcus—well, he’s just…’

‘A plonker?’ I suggested.

Laughter rumbled against Adam’s ribcage, and that delicious vibration made my chilly self warm a little. I hooked my hands more securely around his neck.

‘Couldn’t have said it better myself.’ He smiled down at me. ‘Anyway…look on the bright side.’

There was a bright side to being wet, smelly and utterly embarrassed?

‘Well, first of all, the glasses have gone for good.’

My fingers flew up to my face and I realised he was right. My face was bare; I just hadn’t noticed in all the kerfuffle.

‘I’m a bit disappointed about that myself, actually,’ he added. ‘And, secondly, there’s no way you can rescue this suit for the rest of the weekend. You’re just going to have to find something else to wear.’

I lifted my head to look at him better. ‘You’re a genius! I knew there was a good reason I kept you around!’

I had a case full of ‘spares’ in my room. Vintage clothes could be very fragile, and I’d come prepared in case anyone spilled something down themselves or split a seam. Actually, there was a rather nice red dress I’d mentally ear-marked in case Louisa had such an emergency, but now I had an excuse to get out of the stuffed-olive suit I was claiming that dress as my own.

I rested my head against Adam again and sighed. We were at the edge of the rough grass now, just about to enter the rose garden near the back of the house. How had he got this far without dropping me? The tall, gangly teenager I’d known seemed to have hardened into a solid wall of muscle without me noticing. And that solid wall of muscle had gone awfully quiet.

‘Adam?’ I whispered.

There were a few seconds of silence before he answered, his words still slightly gruff, still laced with a smile. ‘What now?’

I closed my eyes and inhaled the spicy aftershave that somehow hadn’t been washed away by the dank lake water. ‘I don’t suppose I’m as light as a feather, am I?’

Well, a girl can dream, can’t she?

He just laughed in the back of his throat, hitched me up a little higher and squeezed me closer to him. Me? I squeezed back, smiled to myself and enjoyed the ride.

I had the biggest, brightest smile on my face as I tripped down the large oak staircase an hour later. I was clean, smelling of some gorgeous shampoo and body lotion Izzi’s parents kept in their guest rooms, and I was wearing the most divine red velvet dress. It wasn’t halter-neck or backless, like Louisa’s, but it was cute, with short flared sleeves, a long sash that tied under the bust, and its neckline was a wee bit daring.

Okay, Constance would probably have balked at the outfit—the V-neck plunged right into my considerable cleavage—but after the humiliation at the boating lake I deserved a confidence boost, and it was hardly as if I was dressed as an all-out vamp.

I looked up as I neared the bottom step and spotted Izzi there, scowling at me with hands on hips. I stopped bouncing from step to step and finished my journey a little more sedately.

‘What in heaven are you wearing?’ Izzi said.

I decided my best method of defence would be to bluff my way through this. I fiddled with the velvet sash. ‘It’s divine, isn’t it?’ Izzi opened her mouth, but I got in before her. ‘Don’t worry…it’s authentic.’

Now I’d reached the floor of the entrance hall, Izzi grabbed me by the arm and propelled me through a dark panelled door into a small room—a study of some sort.

‘I don’t care about it being bloody authentic,’ she said in a tight voice. ‘It’s not right for your character.’

I started to give a well-reasoned excuse for my attire, but stopped mid-flow when Izzi collapsed into an over-stuffed leather chair behind the antique desk.

‘What does it matter, anyway?’ she mumbled, sagging slightly. ‘Nobody else is bothering to keep in character most of the time as it is. The whole blasted weekend is going to be a disaster, red dress or no red dress.’

I wanted to tell her it wasn’t true, that we were all throwing ourselves into the murder-mystery weekend as hard as we could, but Izzi was right. I had only given thought to Constance, Harry and the grisly murder of Lord Southerby if it had helped me in my plans to snare her brother. I hadn’t been thinking about Izzi and what she wanted from the weekend at all.

She waved a hand in the air. ‘There are all these stupid clues laid out around the house. Look, there’s one—’ She picked up an envelope addressed to Lord Southerby, which had been sitting rather obviously on a blotter in the centre of an otherwise empty desk. ‘And do you think even one wretched clue has been found? No. Because everyone is too busy messing about.’

Her eyes started to glisten, and it made my stomach go cold. I’d never seen Izzi even close to tears before. I sat down on the edge of the desk and waited for her to look at me. ‘But surely as well as solving the murder, the reason everyone is here is to enjoy themselves? Have some fun?’

The rest of Izzi’s anger bled out of her face, leaving her looking closer to Lady Southerby’s age than I’d have thought possible. ‘Yes, I know. But how lame is it going to look when they all disappear back to London and tell their friends they went on murder-mystery weekend and nobody bothered to solve the murder?’

I swallowed. She had a point there.

‘Take a good look at me, Coreen,’ she said in a weary voice. ‘I’m not like you.’

I was just about to tell her that was a good thing, but she cut me off with a roll of her eyes. ‘I’m twenty-six and I have no qualifications to speak of. I can’t run my own business, like you do. I couldn’t even hold down a job! All I have is my reputation for being the most creative hostess in the South East of England. If this weekend is a disaster, I can kiss goodbye to all that.’ She stopped fiddling with the clue envelope and placed it squarely back in the centre of the blotter on top of the desk. ‘You’re lucky you don’t live in my world,’ she said, sighing. ‘The women are so vicious—always looking for an opportunity to trample you so they can be top dog—and in this world position is everything.’

She sat back in the desk chair and let out a dry laugh. ‘I might be close to being useless, but at least I’m the best at it—you know what I mean?’

I smiled and nodded, and then I stood up.

Izzi looked worried. ‘Where are you going?’

‘I’m going back upstairs to change,’ I said. ‘And after that you and I are going to whip those layabouts into shape and make sure they not only catch the killer, but have the time of their lives doing it!’

Once again they were all staring at me, speechless. It could have been the ugly beige floral dress I’d flung on, so I could run downstairs and catch them all before they went upstairs to get changed for dinner, but I suspected the silence was more a reaction to the lecture I’d just delivered on Getting the Most Out Of Your Murder-Mystery Weekend.

‘Come on,’ I said, in a slightly schoolmarmish voice. There were aspects of Constance’s character that lent themselves rather well to severity, and I was quite enjoying myself. For once, a whole room full of people was taking me seriously. ‘It’ll be fun to dust a few of those mental cobwebs off and use our little grey cells for once. And don’t these clothes just get you in the mood?’

There was a sheepish mumble from most of the group—all except Nicholas and Adam. The former was smiling and the latter was staring at me with an expression on his face that looked very much like pride.

Nicholas stood up. ‘Well, if there are clues to be found round this draughty old house we’d better go and find them.’

Of course once Nicholas was on his feet everyone else followed. They put down their cocktails and headed for the hallway. As he passed by me Nicholas paused, placed his fingertips on my bare arm and bent forward to speak words intended for my ears only.

‘Good on you,’ he said. ‘I thought this thing of Izzi’s was going to be a total waste of time, but now I think I’m actually going to enjoy myself.’

I stood and watched him leave the room, my mouth hanging open slightly more than could be considered attractive.

Nicholas Chatterton-Jones had just touched me of his own free will. Miracles really did happen.

Izzi had decreed that this evening we would all wear formal dress to dinner—evening gowns for the girls and dinner suits for the boys. After an hour of clue-solving we’d all broken off to get ready, promising to get right back to sleuthing as soon as we could. As I came out of my room I spotted Adam, his hand on a doorknob on the first-floor landing.

‘I don’t think you’re supposed to go in there,’ I said, coming up behind him. ‘I think that’s Nicholas’s room.’

He turned, his fingers stilled curled round the brass knob, and I had a reprise of the sensation I’d had when I’d first seen him in his costume yesterday evening, only this time it was ten times stronger. Adam and vintage dinner suits? They went together incredibly well. So well that my mouth dried.

‘This isn’t Lord Southerby’s bedchamber?’ he asked, frowning.

‘No.’ I shook my head gently. ‘Next one along.’

There were only a certain number of rooms in Inglewood Manor earmarked for our weekend of sleuthing, and the weekend organisers had prepared and ‘dressed’ them carefully. The rest of the house was supposed to stay undisturbed. Just as well, really. Otherwise it would have taken us a month to search Inglewood Manor for clues.

A wicked grin lit up the face of the man who was supposed to be a vicar. ‘Shall we take a peek anyway?’

I slapped his fingers away from the doorknob. And then I grabbed the hand that had touched him, clasped my other hand round it and hugged it to my chest. I’m not quite sure why I did that. I’d been slapping, elbowing, nudging and thumping Adam for most of my life and had never given it a second thought, but touching him just then had felt like crossing a line I hadn’t realised had been there before.

‘I was only kidding!’ He rubbed his hand. ‘And haven’t you got all turbo-powered about mystery solving all of a sudden?’

‘Turbo-powered is my middle name,’ I said haughtily, and stalked along the landing to the right door. When I turned to look back at Adam, he hadn’t moved.

‘Don’t I know it,’ he said, a hint of hoarseness in his tone.

Now, I’m used to telling exactly where men’s eyes have been resting while I’ve had my back to them. What’s the point of perfecting a sway that reduces them to dribbling wrecks if you can’t tell if it’s had the desired effect?

Was it my imagination, or had Adam’s eyes just flickered back from being much farther south than I’d expected them to be?

That awkward, not-sure-what-to-do-now feeling crashed back over me in a second wave, turning the thermostat in my cheeks to high. I waited for Adam to join me, and my hand felt slippery against the antique knob as I opened the heavy bedroom door and let it swing open.

I assumed he’d go past me, but he stopped opposite me, filling the rest of the doorframe. I don’t think we were even remotely close to touching, but somehow it felt as if we were just about to. He stood there looking at me for a few seconds.

‘I thought you were going to change.’

I looked down at the simple cream evening dress—not a patch on the red one hanging up in my room. It had short puff sleeves, a demure little collar, and beautiful little covered buttons than ran from waist to collarbone. I’d even been angelic enough to do all but the top four up, and my cleavage was completely going to waste.

It was obvious I had changed. But I hadn’t ended up in the sort of dress I normally would have chosen, given half a chance. Was that what Adam meant?

‘I did change,’ I said, the tips of my arched eyebrows drawing together.

Adam didn’t reply. He just looked at me. As if he was trying to see past the powder and foundation, past the restrained blusher and barely-there lipstick. As if he wanted to turn me inside out with the sheer weight of his stare. I slithered away from him, out of the doorway and into the room, and started hunting for clues, all the while feeling his eyes on me.

Eventually I turned and glared at him. ‘Well, don’t just stand there! Help me out!’

It didn’t take us long to find an ancient-looking piece of paper, folded carefully and hidden in an otherwise empty bedside cabinet. I unfolded it and let my eyes rove over what looked like an old-fashioned birth certificate. Before I’d even read to the bottom, I gasped.

‘It’s mine! I mean Constance’s! And look! There’s a space where the father’s name should be!’ I turned to look at him. ‘Does that mean what I think it means?’

Adam took the certificate from me and our fingers brushed.

It wasn’t an accident. I’d done it on purpose.

And, from the way our gazes locked and held, so had he.

I held my breath while the air stilled around us and my heart bumped loudly in my ears. If this had been anyone else staring down at me, his eyes darkening, I would have sworn he was thinking about kissing me. Odder still, I wasn’t the one to back away. It was Adam who wrenched his focus back onto the yellowing document.

‘Of course we have to ask ourselves not just why there is a blank space where the father’s name should be, but why a copy of your birth certificate is in Lord Southerby’s bedroom in the first place,’ he said, not looking at me.

I heard the words, but they slipped through my brain without taking root. Something weird was going on. It was as if I’d emerged from that lake into a parallel universe—a world that was deceptively similar, yet where ‘normal’ was a topsy-turvy version of itself. It made it very hard to think straight.

While I was trying to process the information Adam had given me, the dinner gong sounded somewhere in the distance. There were footsteps on the landing outside, and the sound of other people rushing back downstairs.

I waved the crinkly bit of paper in my hand. ‘I finally have a clue,’ I said, and folded it back into quarters once more. ‘It’s time we did something about it.’

Adam was giving me another one of his inside-out looks. And then he held out his hand. When I offered him the birth certificate he laughed, softly plucked it out of my fingers, and then slid it into his pocket. He repeated the gesture with his hand, and this time his large, warm fingers closed around mine.

‘It’s time,’ he said, and kissed my knuckle ever so softly. Then he led me from the room. ‘Time for us to see what new developments these revelations will bring.’

CHAPTER EIGHT

At Last

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 8—I don’t sing very often, and certainly not in public.

ADAM and I were seated apart at dinner. Maybe that was just as well. I had said I was going to help Izzi make this weekend a success, and random thoughts about Adam—how he’d looked at me upstairs in the bedroom, how he’d held my hand all the way down the stairs—were interrupting my clue solving. It would have been even worse if we’d been sitting next to each other. It was as if there was a new Adam here, a different one from the boy I’d watched grow into a man. And, while I knew the old Adam pretty well, I had absolutely no idea what this one was going to do next.

By the time the main courses had been served we’d hijacked the dinner table and made it our centre of investigations. It was amusing to see secret love letters, betting slips, a plastic revolver and a copy of Lord Southerby’s last will and testament strewn amongst the bone china, crystal glasses and silver candlesticks.

I did a fairly good job of paying attention as questions and accusations were shot across the dinner table and deflected back with equal speed and vehemence, but every time I looked down the other end of the table I caught Adam looking at me. To the untrained observer he probably looked quite serious, but down in the depths of those warm brown eyes was a smile. A just-for-Coreen smile. And I didn’t know what to do about it. Didn’t know if I wanted to see it there or not. Didn’t know if I was brave enough to ask myself what it meant.

I tried to ignore even the possibility of those questions by throwing myself into the investigation. We hadn’t pieced it together yet, but one thing was certain—the late Lord Southerby had been a very, very naughty boy during his lifetime.

It seemed his sons had good reason to worry about their inheritance, in danger as it was from money-grabbing illegitimate offspring and a gold-digging fiancée. Not only that, but Giles’s rather unfortunate string of bad luck on the gee-gees had led to him dipping into the family fortune and then trying to cover his tracks.

Each and every one of us had a motive for wanting the lord of the manor dead, and those motives ranged from jealousy to greed, from revenge to the protection of loved ones. It was all quite thrilling, actually. We were still arguing about competing theories when we retired to the drawing room after desert. One camp thought Rupert had murdered his father, keen to inherit the lion’s share of the family money before his father changed his will, and another group were sure it was poor little Ruby the parlour maid, who’d been fending off the old goat’s unwanted advances for months now and had acted out of desperation to preserve her virtue and her income.

I looked across at Izzi, sitting once again in her high-backed winged armchair. She was smiling, watching a heated exchange between Marcus, of all people, and Jos, as they discussed the real reason for the discovery of Lord Southerby’s bow tie in the maid’s quarters. When Jos threatened to sue Marcus for defamation of character—and I think she half meant it—Izzi stepped in.

‘How about some music, Jules? We could do with some light entertainment to help us let off steam.’ She nodded towards the grand piano in the corner. ‘I’m sure you know a tune or two from the right era.’

Julian actually smiled. He jumped up and headed over to the piano. ‘I’ve rather been hoping you’d ask,’ he said, pulling the stool out, flapping the tails of his jacket back and settling himself on it. ‘I’ve practised a few specially.’

Izzi rapped with her cane on the floor. ‘And there’s no reason why you youngsters can’t foxtrot later, or do whatever new-fangled dances you do nowadays. We can move the settees and clear a space near the bay window.’ She fixed the rest of the men with her beady little eyes and rapped the cane once more. ‘Well, hop to it, boys!’

Marcus paused, and I suspected he was going to pull the ‘shoulder’ excuse out of the bag again, but he took one look at Izzi and thought better of it.

Julian flexed his fingers and set to work, impressing us with a selection of tunes by the likes of Cole Porter and Irving Berlin. Mum had done a whole set of this type of songs once. Half of me didn’t want to hear them. I hadn’t been able to listen to her favourites for a long time after she’d died, and a familiar churning-in-the-pit-of-my-stomach feeling crept up on me.

But after the first pang of fear and grief I relaxed, welcomed those notes and melodies. Maybe it was because enough time had passed, or maybe it was because being Constance gave me some distance, but hearing the songs again now felt like meeting old friends. I could remember Mum singing them with appreciation and joy instead of fear and dread. Before long I was humming along and tapping on the arm of the sofa.

Marcus, who had been self-medicating his shoulder pain all evening with the contents of Inglewood Manor’s wine cellar, drowned me out. I tried not to mind, but when he started to murder ‘At Last’, Mum’s absolute favourite, getting all the lyrics wrong, I couldn’t look at him. I turned away, still humming.

‘You said your mother was a singer, didn’t you?’ Izzi said to me from her high-backed chair. ‘Why don’t you get up and sing it properly for us? It would save us from Marcus’s warthog impression and I’d be forever grateful.’

Marcus had been lolling on one of the sofas while he’d been singing. He raised his head in inch. ‘I’m doing a perfectly fine job, thank you very much.’ He swigged back another mouthful of red wine and glared at me. ‘But if madam here can do better, I’d like to see it.’

I shook my head. ‘It wouldn’t be becoming for a vicar’s sister and would-be missionary to sing in public like that,’ I said sweetly, hoping to put him off. Humming along was one thing; making a complete spectacle of myself was something else entirely.

He looked me up and down, his wandering gaze letting me know just how much unlike a vicar’s sister he thought me. ‘Pretend it’s a hymn,’ he said with a sneer.

I was tempted to get up and give him what for—that was what Coreen would have done—but Constance might have other ideas on the matter, and I didn’t want to spoil Izzi’s evening when things had been going so well. As much as it hurt, I was just about to meekly admit defeat when a tug inside stopped me.

Constance Michaels might be a gauche twenty-something who’d led a sheltered life, but she was also prepared to trek halfway around the world on her own to live in a strange land where she didn’t know anyone or even speak the language. She wasn’t afraid to look poverty and deprivation in the eye and not turn away. She even had the guts to do something about it. I reckon Constance Michaels had a bit more gumption than I’d given her credit for.

Besides, it was only Marcus, Julian, Izzi and I who’d benefit from my performance. The other four had wandered out onto the terrace with their drinks after Robert had opened the French doors.

‘You’re on,’ I said, then stood up and walked over to the piano. Julian started the song again and, before I even had a chance to get stage fright, the introduction was over and I was singing.

I closed my eyes.

While I might not have had my mother’s training, I had inherited her voice. I’d always shied away from being like her, copying her in any way, but now I was singing words that I had heard her sing so many times, and I felt as if it brought me closer to her. And not in a scary seeing-her-in-the-mirror kind of way. My mind was flooded with happy memories. Mum smiling and laughing and singing. And loving.

I remembered how happy she had been before my father had left, how her eyes had lit up and fixed on him when he was in the room. Even though it was only a memory I felt the warmth of her love. For the first time I understood her a little better, understood how intoxicating that feeling must have been, and how she’d have done just about anything to hang onto it.

My courage grew as I started the second verse and I opened my eyes. Bad idea. I’d discovered my audience had grown. Adam, Jos, Louisa and Nicholas were standing just inside the French doors, watching me with open curiosity. I thought I might choke, or trip over the words, but somehow I just kept on singing.

When I got to the bit about looking at someone for the first time and realising that you’d finally found that someone, that soul mate, I plucked up the courage to look over in their direction.

The expression in Nicholas’s eyes was everything I had fantasised about seeing there, and I meant to hold his gaze and lock it down, but somehow I slid right past him and kept going, until I felt as if I’d run full pelt into a brick wall. Or was that just a pair of warm brown eyes?

My breathing went to pot and I missed a note. But then I had another one of those weird out-of-body experiences. Singing Coreen recovered nicely and kept going, her voice rich and smooth, but the other part of me was hardly aware of her, caught in a strange bubble where only two things weren’t fuzzy and out of focus—

Adam.

And me.

I sang about smiling, and he smiled at me. I sang about magic, and he wove it around me just by holding my gaze. I sang about finding love, and something inside me warmed and melted. I couldn’t tear my eyes away until the last note had been sung and the piano had fallen silent.

The song was over. The feeling had gone. I was back inside myself, standing with my back pressing against the piano, the applause of my fellow house guests ringing in my ears.

Izzi stood up from her armchair. ‘I don’t think we can top that,’ she said. ‘So why don’t we stick some vinyl on the old gramophone and trip the light fantastic instead?’ She nodded to Robert, who made it so.

Julian prised himself from the piano stool and, very bravely for him, kissed me on the cheek. When he stepped away I saw Nicholas walking towards me. He came right up to me and offered his hand. ‘Would you do me the honour…?’

I nodded mutely and slid my hand into his. He led me to the space the men had cleared for dancing and drew me gently into his arms. Finally I was up-close-and-personal with Nicholas Chatterton-Jones. Exactly where I wanted to be.

I did.

Didn’t I?

Everything about dancing with Nicholas was perfect. His hand was warm and sure on my back as he guided me round the impromptu dance floor. He talked easily to me, all the while looking effortlessly drool-worthy and smiling into my eyes.

It was perfect. It was.

Only…

I was reminded of those cakes in the coffee-shop display case that I always yearned for but which never seemed to fit the bill. Finally I’d found one that matched what my tastebuds craved. It had all the right ingredients, looked divine, but now I’d taken a bite I’d discovered that it tasted all…wrong.

Dancing with Nicholas wasn’t a dream come true, it was an effort. What surprised me most was that I wasn’t bitterly disappointed. Instead I had that horrible, warm scratchy feeling you get when you know there’s somewhere else you need to be, something else you need to be doing. I was almost grateful to Louisa when the track on the gramophone changed and she nabbed the opportunity to cut in.

When I stepped out of Nicholas’s hold I knew Adam was standing behind me, waiting for me to turn around and glide into his arms. And I couldn’t stop myself.

‘I didn’t know you could sing like that,’ he whispered into my ear, and a whole series of teeny-tiny fireworks detonated up the back of my neck.

I controlled the resulting quiver well enough to answer him. ‘You’re not the only one to have secrets, Conrad.’

But I couldn’t keep the banter up. The air around us seemed too heavy for our usual frivolity.

Adam didn’t smile at me as we danced. He didn’t even talk. If he had, I might not have heard him. All I was aware of was his strong, capable fingers holding mine, of his broad palm at the small of my back. I couldn’t hold his gaze. It was too intense, too full of things I was scared to label, so when the needle on the gramophone scratched its way onto a slower song I rested my temple against his cheek and closed my eyes.

I have no idea how long we swayed and turned like that. Eventually, though, I noticed the air on my bare arms had become cooler, that the light behind my closed eyelids had dimmed to almost nothing. I flickered my lashes apart and opened my eyes.

We were on the terrace. In the moonlight. The warm yellow glow of the drawing room was only feet away, but it felt as if we were in a different world. The sheer curtains over the doors fluttered and curled in the light breeze, beckoning us back. Silently, by mutual agreement and the meeting of eyes, we ignored their call.

Had we stopped dancing? I wasn’t sure.

The way Adam looked at me…it brought tears to the backs of my eyes. Such gentleness. Such openness. Such acceptance. I couldn’t breathe with the intensity of it. Something deep down inside me turned over. It felt like a door being opened.

Adam brought his hand up to the side of my face and his fingertips traced the line of my cheekbone, then threaded up past my temple into the soft waves of my hair. I knew what was coming, and yet I didn’t know. Couldn’t quite get myself to believe it was true, that it was Adam and me standing here in the moonlight like this. I stayed completely still.

He dipped his head forward and our lips touched, just for a moment, and then he pulled back slightly, so he was only millimetres away. I closed my eyes and let the weight of my head rest in his hand, and then I waited, a well of longing rising up within me. I didn’t tease or taunt or dare. I surrendered. Maybe for the first time in my life.

And, as a reward, I got what I’d truly been longing for, because Adam really knew how to kiss. His lips brushed over mine slowly, teasing me, and then he deepened the kiss so swiftly I hardly knew what to do with myself. I felt as if I was falling and being caught all at the same time.

I lost myself. Along with all sense of time and gravity and reason.

And that’s why I had to put an end to it.

That’s why I had to push him away gently, my palms flattened on his chest.

Even so, it was my lips that clung as he drew away, my hands that bunched his shirt up into wrinkles before the cotton slipped through my fingers.

I blinked and looked at him. ‘What was that for?’

Eyes of warm espresso with caramel running through them. I didn’t have to look at his mouth to know he was smiling ever so faintly.

‘You know why.’

My heart hiccupped. Did I? Did I know why? Certainly not in my conscious brain. That part was freaking out. But somewhere else, somewhere instinctual and primal, I knew that I knew. I also knew I had to make sure those two parts of my brain never touched. Because if they did…well, I sensed there’d be trouble. And a whole heap of hurt.

Adam was watching me. I’ve been told that my emotions are easily readable in my face. From the way he was looking at me, I’d guess I was putting on a pretty good show.

‘Okay,’ he said quietly. ‘Have it your way for now.’ He didn’t say more, but the words later and soon hung in the air around us.

My gaze floated off in the direction of the beckoning curtains. I could see Nicholas in the middle of the drawing room, no longer dancing with Louisa. He kept glancing into the darkness as he talked to Julian, but I had no idea if he could see us. ‘You thought he was watching?’

The voice in my ear wasn’t Adam’s. Or at least it was a harder, steelier version of his. I snapped my head back round to face him. No caramel in those eyes now. Just gunsmoke.

‘I…I…’

I didn’t deny Adam’s accusation. Partly because my tongue wasn’t functioning well, still reeling from the best kiss I’d had in years, and partly because on some gut level I knew it might be safer to have an exit route. An exit route from what, and to where, I wasn’t sure, but the events of the last ten minutes had been so bamboozling I was operating purely on survival instinct.

He stepped towards me. Adam had never made me feel even the slightest bit nervous before, but this time I took half a step back even as my heart began to thump in anticipation.

‘I thought you were past playing games, Coreen, but if that’s the way you want it…’ His eyes glittered and my heart-rate accelerated, race-car-style. ‘Let’s make sure he gets a real eyeful.’

There was no tender touching of my face this time, no gentle breath on my cheek. While the last kiss had been soft and soul-churning this one was angry and potent and—oh, my goodness—hot!

I didn’t even have time to react as Adam yanked me back into his arms. For a few seconds my arms hung limp by my sides, my brain too overloaded with the information coming from my lips to bother to send signals to something as mundane as my arms and hands. But when the initial onslaught of sensation was over I decided those hands and arms could come in pretty useful. I grabbed Adam either side of his neck, let one hand slide up into his hair, pressed myself against him and gave as good as I was getting.

He made a ragged groaning sound and it tipped me over the edge. I had no idea who was in control, and normally that would have bothered me, but if I’d been at a disadvantage at the beginning of this kiss, I now had a hunch we were both as lost as each other.

Eventually, though, the mist cleared. Right about the time I sensed a change in Adam. Right about the time he stiffened and wrenched himself out of my grasp.

I’d never seen him like this before. Where was my smiling, twinkling, comfortable and safe Adam? I didn’t know if I wanted to swap him for one who could set my toes on fire with his kisses and yet look at me with such disgust. This one didn’t seem safe at all.

He ran a hand through his slicked-down hair, returning it to its more familiar messiness, and shook his head. ‘I’m such an idiot! Even after all these years…’ He took a few steps backwards, his expression hardening further. ‘That was quite a performance, Miss Fraser. You must really be desperate for this guy.’ And then he pivoted round and strode away from me, along the terrace and round the corner of the house.

I ran after him. ‘Adam? Adam!’

He stopped as I almost caught up with him and stood with his back to me, just breathing. No discreet floodlights here. Just Adam and me in the dark. I could only just see his outline against the blackness of the country night.

Slowly, he turned and faced me. ‘What?’ he asked, his voice low and weary.

My heart was thumping hard as I stepped towards him. I didn’t have a plan, and I always had a plan when it came to men. It’s impossible to train or manipulate or manage them without one. I was going on instinct again—something I wasn’t entirely comfortable with when it came to the opposite sex—but my instincts seemed to be primed and ready, as I didn’t even have to think before I lifted my hand to his face, mirroring his earlier gesture.

This was all new and I needed to explore him, to discover him.

I couldn’t see his face, but I think he closed his eyes, and he made a noise as if he might be in pain. A few moments later his hand shot up and stilled my roving fingers. ‘Coreen? Please…don’t.’

I shushed him and turned his face fully towards mine, using my hand against his cheek as leverage. Then I pinned him up against the rough brick wall and kissed him back. There was no one else to impress. There never had been.

I lay in the dark in my peach silk pyjamas trimmed with lace. Yes, they weren’t very Constance, but I’d reasoned if I couldn’t be my glamorous self during the day I might as well make up for it in the privacy of my room at night.

I was alone, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to be. Now, that was a scary thought.

Adam and me? Taking our relationship to that level? The thought made me shiver—in a good way and in a bad way.

He was my best friend. My Best Bud. Could that translate into something else? And what if it couldn’t? Would we lose everything we’d built up over the years? If Adam’s reaction when he thought I’d kissed him for Nicholas’s benefit was anything to go by, I’d guess we just might. I wasn’t sure I was prepared to take that risk.

But after this evening I also wasn’t sure I could bear not to.

If I’d known Adam could kiss like that I might have done something about it years ago.

I rolled over and punched my pillow—more because my thoughts weren’t letting me keep still rather than because the bed was uncomfortable. Far from it.

But you did know….

A memory hit me hard. Sharon Everidge’s eighteenth birthday party. Her parents had hired a hall. I’d set my sights on Tom Morrison, the coolest boy in school, but he’d pretended not to notice me. I’d made him pay for that later, of course. But at the time I’d grabbed the one prop I had to hand—Adam. I’d kissed him. Kissed him the way I’d been wanting to kiss Tom, hoping it would show the other boy just what he was missing out on. But before long I’d forgotten all about Tom, and Sharon, and every other hormone-laced teenager at the party, because I’d been too busy kissing Adam.

It had worked. Tom had sidled up and asked me to dance with him not long after Adam had stormed out. I blushed with shame as I remembered that I’d gone, telling myself Adam would understand, that he was my friend and would want me to be happy. And, after all…it was only a kiss.

I’d been such a coward.

I had known.

I had known that Adam could make my ears tingle just by looking at me, that our friendship had the potential to blossom into much, much more. But I’d ignored that fact. Put my little polka-dot blinkers on and pretended nothing had changed, that nothing ever would or could change. And I’d been so convincing I’d even believed it myself. How stupid could a girl get?

That moment when I’d sashayed away with spotty old Tom Morrison had been a defining point in my relationship with Adam. I could see that now. Whatever might have been…or should have been…I’d put the brakes on it—too cowardly to admit what had been right under my nose all along.

In some subconscious area of my brain I’d thought walking that path would be far too dangerous, so I’d clouded all of those warm feelings with friendship, insulated them, kept them safely at bay, and then I’d walked away from that idea. Heaven help me, I’d walked away.

And Adam had let me.

CHAPTER NINE

Body and Soul

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 9—Nan says there’s none so blind as them that don’t want to see. Why she keeps harping on about it to me, I’ll never know.

QUESTIONS were still churning in my mind when I woke, bleary-eyed and grumpy, the next morning. I reached over and bashed my travel alarm clock so hard it bounced off the bedside table and landed on the floor. The battery popped out of the back and rolled under the bed.

Back then, had Adam realised what a mistake it would be for us to get involved with each other? Had he walked away from the idea too? And if that had been his decision then would he make the same one again today? Was history about to repeat itself, with the shoe on the other foot? His foot instead of mine?

The breakfast gong sounded and I realised I didn’t have time to stress about that now. I needed to get dressed, to make myself presentable. I launched myself out of bed and dived for the shapeless beige floral dress and baggy cardigan that were Constance’s ‘back-up’ attire. I didn’t even mourn the lack of four-inch heels, or—heaven help me—any kind of dart or tuck in the dress’s bodice. I just forgot. And I didn’t even remember to put on lipgloss before I headed downstairs to see what the fresh summer morning—and fate—had brought me.

I’ve never been good with delayed gratification, so breakfast almost killed me. I’d shot myself in the foot by delivering that lecture the evening before on embracing the fun of the weekend and staying in character. Adam was supposed to be my brother, and the minute I laid eyes on him I had decidedly unsisterly feelings for him.

From the look in his eyes I could see he was struggling too, but, Adam being Adam, he managed to talk and smile and eat his way through it. Me? I just pouted and crossed my arms. When Marcus leaned over and told me my attitude that morning was somewhat unchristian, I was tempted to ram a sausage up his nose.

Bizarrely enough, my glowing mood only seemed to make Adam smile harder—the mongrel. I swear he was actually enjoying my discomfort.

The next hour or so was torture. Izzi decreed we were to scout Inglewood Manor for any remaining clues, as a few still hadn’t been uncovered. In the process, we managed to rule poor Ruby and the gold-digging fiancée out as suspects, but had added an over-protective mother who might have killed her philandering husband before he changed his will, leaving her two boys with nothing, and a college graduate who was in love with his best friend’s fiancée and might just have stabbed the wrong back when the lights went out.

I hardly got to see Adam at all, with Izzi marching around giving us all orders and sending us to different parts of the house. Whenever I was within thirty feet of him he drew my gaze like a magnet, and without fail he was already looking at me by the time I locked on to him. When we did get the chance to converse we had to do so as Constance and Harry, which meant keeping on topic, but hands off each other—which was all very trying.

‘Come on!’ shouted Izzi, rather like a general marshalling her troops. ‘The will we found was a fake and the real one is hidden in the house somewhere. I suggest we look in the conservatory.’

Jos, who was standing beside me, sighed. ‘Yes, because that’s the obvious place to keep important paperwork,’ she muttered, and trailed off after a striding Izzi.

I straightened my shoulders and followed her. After all, the quicker we solved this case, the quicker I’d have a chance to talk to Adam, or even have a few seconds to think about whether talking it over with Adam was a good idea.

The whole group trailed along behind its hostess as she led us through the entrance hall, through the library, and down a passageway past the kitchen that led to the football-field-sized conservatory. I would have followed her all the way, but a strong hand closed around my wrist, tugged me backwards, and suddenly everything went dark.

No, I hadn’t fainted. Really, do I come across as the fainting kind?

There were a series of little storerooms along the passageway and I was inside one of them, a narrow shelf digging into my behind and my foot held captive by what I thought might be a string bag. No lights. Hardly any space. Pressed up against someone who was warm and breathing.

‘Adam?’ I whispered. ‘Is that you?’

Dear Lord, I hoped it was Adam.

Mercifully, the pair of lips that found their way to my neck and worked their way upwards to my chin were heartstoppingly familiar. I grabbed hold of his lapels, threw myself at him, and unleashed the whole force of the fantasies that had been running round my head since we’d parted the night before.

It was quite some time before I recovered enough to think as well as kiss. The first wave of desire retreated, readying itself for a second surge, and I took advantage of the moment of lucidity to pull apart from him, breathing unevenly, and rest my forehead on his shoulder.

I kept on whispering, even though the rest of our party was long gone. ‘What are we doing, Adam?’ I needed to know. Were we risking our friendship just to mess around and have a fling?

He laughed softly into my ear and I went hot and cold all over.

‘I was under the impression you knew exactly what you were doing, but if you want me to walk you through it step by step…’ He pressed his lips to the hollow between my collarbones and I gasped. ‘I believe it started…like…this…’ he muttered in between kisses, and I had to delve my hands into his hair, grab on and pull his head back to stop him. By the vibrations of his ribcage I could tell he was laughing silently, playing with me. I didn’t know if I loved it or hated it.

‘No, I mean…’

Another thing I discovered about Adam: he liked to play dirty. Obviously I hadn’t been holding his head firmly enough, because he escaped and nipped gently at my left earlobe.

Oh, what the heck?

I let my head fall back, leaving him room to do what he wanted, and indulged myself at the same time, skimming my hands across his back and shoulders, exploring the delicious dips where one muscle met the next with my fingertips. Adam’s mouth found mine and I forgot to think about where my hands were or what my fingertips were up to.

‘Constance? Harry?’

We both froze. That was Izzi’s voice, and those were Izzi’s hard-soled black boots on the flagstone passage. She walked right past us, calling our characters’ names again, and then on towards the entrance hall.

I giggled against Adam’s lips and felt him smile back. We’d been in this cupboard or pantry or whatever it was long enough now for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. A silver rectangle of light round the edges of the door gave just enough illumination for me to make out his features.

He pulled me to him, bunching my dress up near my hips as he made fists, and kissed me again. Slowly this time, with the earlier frantic pace giving way to something more languorous and sensual. I don’t think I’ve ever been kissed with so much…feeling. It rocked me from the bottom of my stockinged feet to the tips of my unadorned eyelashes. I couldn’t even speak when Adam had finished with me. One last, feather-soft teasing touch of his lips and then he rested his forehead against mine. I could feel his chest heaving beneath my fingers, hear him dragging in the still, dark air.

‘You want to know what this is?’ he said quietly. ‘Where this is going?’

I nodded, keeping our foreheads in contact with each other.

‘You were right,’ he said, in his rumpled Sunday morning voice. ‘I have a secret. One I’ve run from for years. And I’ve never told anyone. I’ve even hidden it from myself at times… But now it’s time to open Pandora’s Box and see what comes flying out.’

Oh, my. Adam wasn’t secretly married, was he? Or suffering from a serious illness? I couldn’t stand it if—

‘Wh—what secret?’ I stammered.

He kissed me again. I lost my balance and kicked a bag of what might have been potatoes.

‘You.’

I wrinkled my brow. ‘Huh?’

He stopped smiling then. I could feel it in the way his shoulders tensed, in the way his lips felt against my cheek as he whispered, ‘You’re my secret, Coreen.’

My mouth opened but no words came out. To my utter horror, Adam’s confession had filled me with more cold dread than if he’d said we were just fooling around, and I wasn’t sure why. I didn’t know what to say, how to respond, but luckily I didn’t have to.

All of a sudden light pounded behind my eyes. I blinked and sheltered them with my hand. When I managed to make sense of what my forgotten retinas were telling me I saw Robert standing in the doorway, a jar of chutney in his hand, his mobile eyebrows hitched as high as I’d ever seen them at finding Adam and me wound around each other in what was clearly the pantry.

‘Excuse me, miss,’ Robert said in a level tone, and reached behind me to return the chutney to its home. He stepped back, but stopped with one hand on the door. ‘I would close the door and tell myself I’d gone momentarily blind, miss, but I think I’d better warn you that Miss Isabella has been looking for you, and the likelihood of you remaining undiscovered is slim.’

I nodded and tried to straighten my wrinkled dress, still within the confines of Adam’s arms. ‘Thank you, Robert,’ I said, in the most dignified voice I could muster.

‘No problem, miss,’ he said. ‘I’ll just push the door and give you a chance to…um…refresh your appearance.’ He swung the door half closed, leaving a few inches of light for us, but I swear as he walked away I saw a naughty little smile on his face.

Another voice—a new one—echoed down the corridor. ‘Talking to the jams and pickles again, Robert? I’ve told you before about the dangers of nipping at the cooking sherry.’ The snorting laughter that followed identified its owner as Marcus.

Adam lifted his finger to his lips. I nodded and tried to silently smooth my hair back into a bun that was now only half there.

Sunshine filled the pantry once more. This time, however, Adam and I were ready. We were standing as far apart as we could in the confined space. My hands were clasped firmly in front of me, and Adam’s were in his pockets. Didn’t do us much good, though. I reckon Marcus rumbled us from the guilty expressions on our faces. Something had to have given us away.

If being caught alone together in a darkened panty wasn’t enough, of course.

‘Well, well, well…’ Marcus said, taking every last detail in. I tried not to squirm, but to hold my head high and mimic that supercilious thing Robert did with his eyebrows. ‘I thought you two were supposed to be brother and sister? How delightfully naughty.’

Adam grabbed my hand and pushed past Marcus into the passage. ‘No,’ he replied, giving the other man a stern look. ‘Not brother and sister. Not in a million years.’

And then we escaped down the passageway into the unyielding brightness of the football pitch-slash-conservatory, where it seemed the sunny Sunday morning had been trapped and held to ransom.

The ancient woods on the fringes of the Chatterton-Joneses’ estate were full of twisting oaks, fresh green glades, dappled sunshine and the kind of quiet that normally got on my nerves. The earth was springy underfoot, carpeted with a layer of old dried leaves and fallen pine cones. Adam and I walked slowly through it, side by side.

These were the same woods Izzi had marched us through only yesterday, but I’d been so focussed on Nicholas up ahead of me that I hadn’t noticed how beautiful it all was, how perfect the stillness and quiet could be. I was starting to realise this wasn’t the only thing I’d failed to see as I bulldozed my way through life.

Izzi’s iron-clad timetable said we should all have some time to wander off on our own and meditate on the identity of Lord Southerby’s killer before we met back in the drawing room for the big finale. Adam and I hadn’t done much of that. We hadn’t done much talking, full stop.

Breathless kissing? Hand-wandering? Yep. There’d been plenty of that going on.

It was so easy to be with him. To be like this with him. And that astounded me. I couldn’t quite get my head around how our relationship seemed to have morphed seamlessly from one thing into another, and I had a horrible feeling it was all a shimmering mirage.

I couldn’t take my eyes off Adam. While everything about him was comfortable and familiar, at the same time everything was new too. I’d never noticed the grace in his easy stride before, had never found myself staring at his sexy little dimples and marvelling at their perfection. That twinkle in his eye I’d always loved? Now I realised it was only for me. When it glittered at me I felt conspicuously giddy.

Why had I never seen any of this before? Why hadn’t I let myself see any of this before? Each time this question wriggled through my thoughts and snuck its way to the front of the queue I sent it packing to the back of the line again. I didn’t think I’d like any answer I could come up with.

I must have been frowning, because Adam stopped walking and turned to face me. ‘What’s up?’ he said, his voice soft and low.

‘I’m a little…freaked out by all of this.’ I pressed my lips together and shook my head gently. ‘I don’t know. It’s all so…’

His expression became serious and he reached for my hand and squeezed it. ‘I know you, Coreen Fraser.’ The warmth in his eyes made my nose do that stinging thing again. ‘I know just how much heartache you’ve had in your life—down to the very last ounce.’

I looked away, unable to look at the truth of what he’d said in his face. He waited while I sucked in air through my nostrils and attempted to quell the stinging. I didn’t cry in front of people. Ever. Not the real kind of gluey, soggy tears that puffed my face up and ruined my eyeliner. I’m not proud to admit it, but I have squeezed a few perfect beads of moisture from the corner of my eye when the occasion demanded it, when it would help me get my own way. But I measured out my tears. I decided how many fell and when. I stayed in control always.

He carried on talking as I fixed my gaze on a holly bush and didn’t turn back. ‘I understand why relationships are something you’ve either deliberately avoided or sabotaged when they threatened to get too serious.’

Did he? I wished he’d tell me.

And I wished Adam couldn’t see past the polka dots and lipstick. I wished he couldn’t look inside me as if I was made of glass and tell me what the writing on my heart was when I couldn’t even decipher it myself. I couldn’t be mysterious and unpredictable with Adam. Those two things were my best weapons for keeping a man on his toes, for keeping him off balance while my stiletto heels were firmly anchored to the floor. And there wasn’t even a fair trade-off with Adam. He knew everything about me, and I had missed even the most obvious things about him.

I turned my head back, but focused on one of the buttons on his shirt instead of looking him in the face. ‘Do you think we’re doing the right thing?’ I asked. ‘Whatever is going on between us could spell the end of our friendship.’

He held my chin softly between thumb and forefinger and tipped my face up. ‘We’ve run from this for long enough, Coreen. I’ve loved being your friend, but I’ve finally admitted to myself that I want more, and I can’t keep pretending that I don’t. Don’t ask me to go back.’

The force of his honesty sent me searching for that nice, safe button to fix my gaze on again. My instinct was to gloss over this difficult topic by doing any one of the hundred things I usually did in similar situations—like blowing a kiss and sashaying mysteriously away without answering—but I found myself disarmed. In the literal sense. The only thing I had left in my arsenal was candour.

I took a deep breath. ‘I don’t know if I’m ready for this.’

He stepped forward and closed his arms around me. Even in his dull grey vicar’s suit he smelled amazing. I pressed my cheek against him. The shirt button was so close now I went cross-eyed trying to keep it sharp and in focus.

‘You won’t know unless you try, and I think you’re ready for more than you give yourself credit for.’

My eyes started to ache and the button became blurry.

‘How do you know? And how come you know when I don’t know it myself?’ I knew I sounded a bit sulky, but I couldn’t help myself.

He leaned forward and kissed me. His lips were warm and soft and teasing. I made a noise that was suspiciously like a purr.

‘Not fair,’ I said, but I smiled at the same time.

I arched the top of my back so I could look at him. He wasn’t smiling, but looking grave. ‘When you started mooning over old Nicholas, I knew it wasn’t just another fleeting crush. I knew this time it was different for you.’

I raised an eyebrow. ‘Oh? Did you?’

‘Yes, I did. And I decided it was time to explore whatever has been simmering under the surface between us for years. That thing we’ve always pretended wasn’t there. I realised I didn’t want you to want Nicholas. I wanted you to want me.’ One corner of his mouth twisted a little. ‘That’s why I agreed to come on this weekend with you. I had to do something to make that happen.’

I gave him a disbelieving look. ‘So you’re telling me you had a plan while I had none?’

‘Sort of.’ And then he grinned at me. That caught-you-out-this-time grin I knew so well.

Even though my upper arms were pinned under his more muscular ones, I wiggled a hand free and thumped him on the chest. ‘Insufferable big-head!’

‘Minx!’ he whispered, then shut me up with another heart-stopping kiss. When he drew away he was chuckling under his breath. ‘I think the plan worked out rather well, don’t you?’

I laughed too at first, but then I started to feel uncomfortable. As much as I was beginning to enjoy the added sizzle to our old banter, I didn’t like the idea of being a pawn moved around in someone else’s game. I pushed my way out his arms and walked away.

‘Don’t play games with me,’ I said over my shoulder.

Adam fell into step beside me, but I kept looking straight ahead. ‘I’m not playing games with you. What I feel for you is real—and I don’t think you’re in any position to lecture me on game-playing, anyway.’

I spun around to face him. ‘That was different! I didn’t… They never meant…’ I couldn’t finish that sentence. Couldn’t tell him this was on a completely different level to my little bag of tricks. What I did was harmless fun. The games Adam was playing could really get someone hurt.

‘This isn’t going to work! We’re already fighting.’

He gave me a sharp look. ‘Don’t do this, Coreen. It can work…’

I shook my head and started backing away. ‘This is all too much. Twenty-four hours ago we were just good friends—best friends!—and now you’re asking me to decide my whole future. You’re asking too much!’

Adam shook his head. ‘I’m not asking for eternity! Just a chance.’

I could feel the tears collecting behind my eyes and I squashed my face up to deny them exit. ‘It’s already poisoning our friendship! And I need that from you. You’re the one person in my life I can—’

Trust.

Go on, Coreen. Say the word. It’s only a tiny one. It can’t be that hard.

I gulped. The tears were trying to find an alternative escape route—up my throat and down the back of my nose. I shook my head again, more vigorously this time.

‘I’m not sure this is what I want,’ was all I managed to mumble.

He tried to reach for me, but I stumbled further backwards, watching his jaw harden as I did so.

‘And I can’t keep pretending friendship is enough for me any more. I’ve lied to myself, and to you, for too long.’ His stare was fierce, then he puffed out a breath and ran a hand through his hair before looking at me again.

‘Maybe this has been too hot and fast and heavy. Maybe we do need to slow down.’ He shoved his hands in his pockets. ‘You want space? You’ve got it.’ As he spoke his voice softened and the irritation melted away. That was harder to deal with, to be honest. He looked into my eyes. ‘You know where I stand. Take some time to think about this—not just react to it—and when you know what you want, come and find me.’

He turned and walked off, his shoulders bunched, head low.

Me? I did what any self-respecting drama queen would do in my shoes. I ran in the opposite direction and didn’t stop until I was out in the sunshine again and the unhealthy silence of the woods was far behind me.

We gathered at three in the drawing room. I didn’t sit with Adam.

He didn’t sulk, as I would have done. He talked with the other murder-mystery guests, and engaged in the proceedings, but every now and then he’d look at me and I’d feel heavy inside. There was no condemnation or accusation in his eyes, no sense of pressure. It only made me feel worse, because I really felt like throwing a wobbly to shake the awful lethargy that had settled on me, and I had nothing whatsoever to use as a justifiable trigger.

The shabby detective was back, and he laid the case out for us, summarising his interviews and our own interrogations of each other. Each clue had been clearly tagged and laid on the long cherrywood coffee table in the centre of the room.

I listened with one ear, but inside my head I was involved in a similar process. Sorting. Labelling. Remembering. My memory seemed determined to dredge up all sorts of strange little details. I didn’t even recall storing them away, but there they were, all neatly labelled and catalogued, just like the detective’s evidence…

The way Adam had always watched out for me and stood up for me, even when I’d still been in primary school. The way he was faithful and loyal now we were all grown up, despite my shenanigans. That playful glint in his eye when we argued, as if he enjoyed even that just because it was me he was sparring with. The way that playfulness had hardened into danger last night on the terrace.

After the general memories came the specifics. Thick and fast.

The bleakness in his eyes as he’d stood on his doorstep and listened to my apology after that fateful party. The squaring of his shoulders the first time he’d met Nicholas. The way he always inhaled deeply when he hugged me, as if he couldn’t help himself breathing in my scent.

They were fragments, really. Nothing more than that. But when I pieced them together there was only one conclusion I could come to.

Adam loved me. Had done so for a long time. And I’m not sure either of us had really known.

I sat there on the sofa, staring at the plastic gun on the coffee table and trying to work out what that meant, how I felt about it. But I was numb. Overloaded. Terrified.

The others were asking questions of each other, bandying theories around and knocking each other’s clever arguments to the floor with new insights, but I didn’t hear any of it. My memory had cranked into gear again, and this time the images being flung in my direction, the sounds and words, all related to me.

My face lighting up every time I saw him, no matter how glum I’d been before he walked in the door. The way he made me feel as if I could do anything, be anything. His hand my only anchor at my mum’s funeral, as we’d watched four strangers in black carry her into the chapel. I’d squeezed it so hard it had creaked for days afterwards.

I’d needed him then, more than I could express or even comprehend. But I’d never had to articulate those feelings. In fact I’d never had to ask him for anything that I’d really needed. Oh, I might have begged and wheedled and sulked to get him to agree to something I wanted, but that wasn’t the same thing. He’d always been there, ready with what I needed—like the takeaways. I’d just been too blind to see that what I really wanted, what I really needed, was him.

My gaze flew to his face. He was laughing with Izzi about some ridiculous theory she’d just put forward, his grin wide and his dimples creasing deep in his cheeks, and suddenly I felt as if I were falling. Not a gentle floating, but being dragged by gravity so fast it sucked the breath from my lungs, the words from my mouth. I felt clammy and twitchy, shivery and cold.

And then I hit the bottom of whatever I’d been falling down. But instead of it ending with a nasty, messy splat there was an explosion of warmth and light. It rushed outwards from my ribcage until pins and needles stabbed my fingers and toes, until the roots of my hair tingled to attention.

Finally the polka-dots fell from my eyes.

I stood up shakily, my mouth working, my eyes wide. A couple of people stopped talking and stared at me.

‘It’s you,’ I said to Adam across the room. ‘It was you all along.’

He broke off mid-sentence and our gazes snagged and held.

There was a reedy voice to my left. The detective. ‘Are you making a formal accusation?’ he asked.

I nodded dumbly. How could I deny it?

He was the one. The cupcake of my dreams.

I was in love with my best friend.

I was in love with Adam Conrad.

CHAPTER TEN

Fever

Coreen’s Confessions

No. 10—You might not believe it, but sometimes I take things too far.

THE next twenty minutes were mayhem. Everyone talked over each other, unravelling the remaining tangles in the mystery we’d all been trying to solve. More than once I was clapped on the back and congratulated for working it out, but I hardly registered it.

I’d finally worked it out. But I wasn’t clever. I was very, very stupid. The clues had been laid out for me, and all I’d had to do was take the focus off myself long enough to see them winking at me along the way. I never had. What did that say about me as a person?

I could see with such clarity now why I’d been so territorial about Adam with my friends, why I put up with his endless teasing. Why he felt like a part of me. And it had only taken me the best part of twenty years to work it all out.

Very, very stupid.

Stupid not to have seen it. Stupid to have allowed it to happen in the first place. By not opening my eyes to it, thinking that was the safer option, I’d actually left myself even more vulnerable.

Jos and Louisa were making a fuss of Adam, asking him how he’d managed to fool them all weekend. Even Nicholas gave him a handshake. Then they wanted to know what his motive had been. It turned out my supposed brother—brother? Hah!—had discovered his beloved younger sister was the product of his uncle’s affair with their mother. The late Lord Southerby had been getting sentimental in recent months, had regretted denying paternity and had talked about changing his will. Harry had been scared for Constance, had sought to protect a young woman who selflessly wanted to spend her life helping others from a scandal that would prevent her from doing just that. What missionary society would have sent the illegitimate daughter of a well-known cad overseas as an example of good Christian morals? Harry had acted out of love and rage and retribution.

I woke from my daze briefly. ‘When did you know it was you?’ I asked Adam.

‘I knew right from the start…almost.’ He gave a careless shrug, but his gaze was probing. ‘It was right there in my second envelope—the one we got straight after the murder.’

Marcus gave the pair of us a disdainful look. ‘I don’t know…’ he said, in a slightly petulant tone. ‘I think this young lady might have had a slight advantage over us when it came to solving the case.’

I knew he was thinking about the larder incident, and just letting my consciousness touch the edge of that memory was enough to make me tremble deep down in my core.

But Marcus was wrong. In the situation I found myself in now, I had no kind of advantage. No kind of advantage at all.

I slipped away while the others were still debriefing themselves, using the excuse that I had to go and pack up the clothes that were no longer needed.

Izzi had been generous enough to offer the clothes she’d bought to their owners, and most of the guests had elected to keep their outfits. I collected the evening wear that wasn’t in use and made sure it was hung up or packed properly for their journey home. Once that was done I still had the ‘spares’ to deal with. The extra clothes would return with me to Coreen’s Closet, where they’d go back on the rails.

I was hanging up the wonderful red velvet dress when I heard a soft knock at my bedroom door.

People in love are supposed to thrill at the thought of their sweethearts, aren’t they? So why did the adrenaline surge that hit me incite the fight-or-flight reflex? I looked across to the window. Unless I wanted to shimmy down a two-hundred-year-old drainpipe I only had one choice.

Rather than shouting an invitation to come in, I walked across the room and opened the door a crack, keeping most of myself behind its protective bulk. My eyes widened. It wasn’t Adam standing there, but Nicholas.

‘Can I come in?’ he asked, looking very serious indeed.

I stepped back, way back, and opened the door wide. He walked through and, after a second of hesitation, closed it behind him.

‘Is something wrong?’ I asked.

Nicholas stopped looking grim and his face broke into possibly the most beautiful smile I’d ever seen on a man. The sort of smile that undoubtedly turned the knees of countless society darlings to custard. All the more devastating because it was one hundred percent genuine. My knees, however, remained decidedly un-custard-like.

‘I wanted to thank you,’ he said, and when he spotted my raised eyebrows added, ‘for all you’ve done this weekend.’

I frowned. ‘I didn’t do much, and besides Izzi’s paying me. It’s work, really.’

‘No, not just that,’ he said earnestly. ‘For being so great to Izzi.’ He paused and glanced towards the closed door, and lowered his voice. ‘I know she gives the impression she’s indestructible…’

One side of my mouth lifted. It was obvious, despite her loopiness, that he clearly loved his sister.

‘Izzi has a lot of “friends”—I think parasites might be a more appropriate word—who hang around for what they can get out of her.’ He looked down at his shoes. ‘I’m ashamed to say that when I first met you I thought you were one of those people who’d take advantage of my sister’s gregariousness and generosity. I was wrong.’

Now it was my turn to look at my shoes. I had been guilty of that, or at least it had been that way in the beginning. I looked up again, to find him regarding me carefully.

‘You proved me wrong, went the extra mile.’

I’m not usually in the habit of stopping someone layering on the compliments, but this girl he was talking about? I’m ashamed to say she was nothing like me. I shook my head. I was the girl who thought of herself first and others second.

‘No,’ I mumbled. ‘I don’t think you understand.’

Nicholas was smiling again now. ‘I think I understand well enough.’

I turned back to the bed, where I’d flung the red dress, and picked it up. It was something to do to hide the heat creeping up my cheeks.

‘That’s a beautiful dress,’ he said.

‘Yes.’

I fetched a garment bag and began putting it inside.

‘Perhaps you’d consider wearing it out one evening…if you’d like to have dinner with me, that is?’

I literally had no words. Nicholas Chatterton-Jones was asking me out? Really?

‘Why me?’ I blurted out. ‘I’ve seen the world you live in, the people you mix with. I wouldn’t fit in.’

He considered that for a moment. ‘I know…but perhaps that’s the key. I always seem to go for the same type of girl…’

Didn’t I know it? I listed it out for him. ‘Beautiful, rich, thin—’

‘You’re beautiful,’ he said plainly.

Before, I would have lapped that comment up, demanded more, but I took his compliment with the same simplicity it had been given. ‘Thank you.’

He walked over to the bed, so we were standing either side of it. ‘You shouldn’t put yourself down.’

I laughed out loud as I walked over to the hanging rail and deposited the red dress in its protective cover there. He really didn’t know me at all, did he?

‘Oh, I don’t think you have to worry about that!’ I said, still giggling as I walked back to the bed. ‘But if it makes you feel any better I will add one more thing to the list. One thing I’m definitely not.’

He pressed his lips together in an amused grin and raised an eyebrow.

‘Duck-faced,’ I said, and then wondered if I’d taken things too far again.

Nicholas chewed this over. ‘You know,’ he said finally, a look of surprise lifting his features, ‘I hadn’t realised it, but I think you’re right!’

We both laughed then. He really was even more good-looking when he laughed. What a pity that his cheeks were missing a pair of roguish dimples, that his eyes weren’t chestnut brown, and that the sparkle that should’ve been there in them just wasn’t.

‘I’ve decided everything on that list is decidedly dull, anyway,’ he added. ‘I’ve certainly seen the attraction of a woman who has a little more to her.’

If he was talking pounds and inches he’d better duck, because a right hook was coming his way.

Thankfully, he saved himself with his next words. ‘A woman with pizzazz and sparkle.’

Ah, despite the show of loyalty to his sister he was still talking about the minx, and she certainly had all of that. Problem was…I wasn’t sure that girl existed in her pure, undiluted state any more. She seemed to have been watered down with some truly awful qualities—like compassion and bravery and honesty. Really, what was I going to do with her?

‘So how about it?’ Right now Nicholas looked the least stuffy and laced-up I’d ever seen him. He nodded towards the clothing rail. ‘You, me, the red dress and a table for two next Saturday?’

There was an awkward silence, and he must have read the confusion on my face—I’m really going to have to do something about that—because he gave a resigned smile.

‘I’m too late, aren’t I?’

I bit my lip and picked up the next item of clothing, but I didn’t say anything. I wasn’t quite ready to face what I felt for Adam yet, let alone admit it to anyone else. It didn’t matter, however. I think my traitorous face had said it for me. Nicholas cocked his head, the way an old-fashioned gent would have done when he doffed his hat to a lady, and then retraced his steps to the door.

‘Ring me if you ever change your mind…’

I just smiled weakly at him, clutching what I now realised was Adam’s dinner jacket to my chest. He gave me one last smile and closed the door, leaving me marvelling that, despite the horrendous timing, my minx-like attempt at less was the more Nicholas Chatterton-Jones wanted.

Pity the minx had left the building.

You know that elephant that everyone always says is standing in the middle of the room? Well, it hitched a ride home with us on Sunday evening. Adam was all calmness and civility on the outside, but his dimples had ironed out and his driving was even more atrocious than usual. I didn’t say anything. Because of the elephant, of course.

He stopped at Coreen’s Closet and helped me unload everything into the back room, then he drove me to my flat and helped me carry my suitcase up the stairs to my front door.

As he was leaving he said, ‘I’m going to Malaysia on Thursday, to do the finishing touches on the hotel project.’

I blinked and smiled. ‘How long will you be away?’

‘Two weeks.’

I nodded. Not because I was agreeing to anything but because I needed to do something. ‘How nice,’ I added, after I’d bobbed my head far too many times to look sane.

Nellie must have decided to stay in the car, because he gave me a long, searching look and then said, ‘Come with me.’

‘What happened to no pressure? To giving me time to think?’ I snapped.

The sparkle in his eyes was dim now. He looked tired. ‘Maybe some time alone together is just what we both need?’

It all seemed so reasonable. So reasonable, in fact, that it made my skin itch. I gripped the edge of the door. ‘That’s not quite right, though, is it? You don’t need any more time to figure it out.’

He was silent for a few seconds, and then he confirmed all my worst fears. ‘I want you in my future, Coreen.’

A future. Long, endless days stretching into the greyness ahead of us. An infinity in which we would grow old, tire of each other. I didn’t ever want to get tired of Adam, and while we’d been friends I never had.

I arranged my features into a neutral, serene expression. ‘I’ll always be in your future, Adam. No matter what happens between us.’

His jaw jutted forward just a millimetre and he licked his lips. I knew he could read the words ‘brush-off’ in my tone and body language. I was counting on it, in fact. I didn’t want to spell it out in words.

The horrible thing was, I knew he would take it slowly if I asked him to. He would put my wishes—my needs—above his own. Unfortunately, I was scared, and it turned out I just wasn’t that big a person.

‘What are you saying?’ he asked slowly. ‘Are you trying to tell me you don’t see anything changing between us?’

I threw my hands in the air. ‘Yesterday we were just good friends. Now everything’s been turned on its head. I don’t want to be rushed. I have to be free to make my own decisions.’

‘What you mean is that you have to be in control.’

‘No! That’s not true.’

‘Yes, it is.’ He stepped forward into the flat and I spun around and marched into the living room ahead of him. If we were going to have a good old ding-dong we might as well do it in private. My downstairs neighbour thought I was strange enough as it was.

Adam followed me. ‘Yes, control. That’s why you make all those poor saps who follow you around dance on their hind legs. As long as you’re in control, you’re safe. But love isn’t like that, Coreen. Love means giving a piece of yourself away, trusting someone else with it.’

I folded my arms across my chest and hugged my elbows. ‘You’re talking about love, but I think you’re forgetting I haven’t worked out how I feel about you yet.’

‘Haven’t you?’

So we were back to this game, were we? We both knew how we felt about each other, and we both knew that we knew… It wasn’t just tiring any more. It was dangerous.

I had already worked out that Adam wasn’t above playing dirty, and now he blew my carefully constructed denial to smithereens. He was suddenly across the room, his arms around me, his mouth only a whisper away from mine.

‘Tell me to stop if you don’t want this,’ he said softly.

I closed my eyes, trying to think of the words to do just that, but anything as simple as no or stop had exited my vocabulary by the back door, and the only things left were unintelligible sounds and lengthy explanations I sadly didn’t have time for.

I didn’t do anything as his lips began to move on mine. Okay, well maybe I did something. But how is a girl supposed to stop herself from wrapping her arms around a man when he’s kissing her like that? I’d defy any one of you to do better. I had to kiss him back. To do otherwise would have been rude. Maybe I took it too far by running my tongue along the edge of his lip, but I’ve always had a problem with that.

The problem with a kiss like that one was that I wasn’t stage-managing it. Usually I set the pace. I controlled how much and how hot. I played the part of vintage minx to the max, in other words. But with Adam I wasn’t playing anything. I didn’t even have my usual costume of red heels and even redder lips. Adam wasn’t kissing the minx; he was kissing me. I felt the shockwaves right down in my soul. They lapped at the shore of my identity, eroding it, rearranging it, as the surf does the pebbles. And I could sense a tidal wave on the horizon—one that would overwhelm and devastate.

I untangled myself and stumbled back. Adam reached out a hand to steady me, but he didn’t override my decision to stop. Neither of us said anything, but as the seconds dragged on his expression grew both softer and darker. I was transparent again, I could tell.

‘You can trust me,’ he said quietly, emphatically.

Oh, I knew I could trust Adam. Adam was practically manufactured from the stuff. Despite the fact I’d been dazzled by a sexier, more dangerous side to him in the last few days, I knew that if you sliced him open, like sugary seaside rock, he would say ‘loyal and true’ right to the core. It was me I couldn’t trust.

‘I know what you’re thinking,’ he said. ‘What you’re afraid of. But love isn’t total surrender. It isn’t one person sacrificing themselves totally for another.’ He glanced at the black-and-white picture of my mum on the mantelpiece. ‘Real love isn’t like that. It’s a two-way street.’

I looked at the photo of Mum. She’d been about twenty when it had been taken and she looked so jaunty and happy, strolling down the road with her cute little mini-dress and her big sunglasses pushed up on her head. Before she’d met my dad. Before he’d sucked the life out of her. I’d bet she thought love was a safe pastime too.

When I turned my attention back to Adam I had a shock. He looked so like the boy who’d used to promise me he’d always look out for me with that grim sense of earnestness that only youth can provide. My lips trembled and my insides churned. I wanted so much to believe him, but there were things he hadn’t thought of…

When you gave that little piece of yourself to someone else for safekeeping, how did you know when to stop? How did you know if you’d given too much of yourself away? Once it was gone, there was no getting it back. And I knew just how destructive that kind of imbalance in a relationship could be. Had seen it first-hand.

I took a step back—mentally, at least—and let out a dry laugh, causing Adam to frown.

This was me we were talking about, wasn’t it? The girl who manipulated people, situations, just about anything, to get what she wanted. The girl who knew everything about taking and nothing about giving. I was just Scrooge in a circle skirt and eyeliner. Surely if anyone was safe from my mother’s fate it was me?

But that left me with another problem.

I walked over to my retro, cherry-red fake leather sofa and sat down with a bump. ‘Why on earth do you want me, anyway, Adam?’ I kicked off my shoes and dug my toes into the shaggy rug. ‘I play games, I’m demanding and selfish…’ For the first time that evening I looked him straight in the eye. ‘The truth is, I don’t know if I’m even capable of the kind of love you’re talking about.’

He came and sat beside me, took my hands in his and made me look at him. ‘It’s the girl who disguises herself in the vintage clothes who does all of those things. The girl who practises her walk. The girl who is never seen without her trademark crimson…’ He dragged the pad of his thumb across my bare lips. ‘But I’m not in love with that girl. You don’t need to be that girl with me.’

A tear slid down my face. And then another, and another. He really meant it. He loved me that much, and I didn’t deserve it. A space inside myself that I hadn’t even realised was achingly empty started to fill up. And with the fullness came more tears.

I don’t know how long I cried, but Adam just held me, whispered soft words into my ear: he believed in me, he knew what I was capable of, and it was much more than I gave myself credit for. Eventually, worn out, I hiccupped to a halt. Still Adam didn’t move. I was so exhausted I started to drift in and out of a leaden sleep. I was only vaguely aware of him moving away and fetching the duvet from my bed, of him draping it over me and kissing me tenderly on the head. I fumbled for his hand and found his trouser leg instead. I didn’t care; I held on with all the strength I had left.

‘Don’t go,’ I mumbled. ‘Stay. I need you.’

There. The first time I’d ever said those words to another human being. I’d never admitted to needing anyone before. Ever. Not even my mother. Especially not my mother.

Adam didn’t hesitate. He just squidged down next to me on the sofa, pulled a corner of the duvet over himself and wrapped me up inside him. I wanted to touch as much of him as possible, to imprint his warmth on as much of my surface area as I could, and as sleep began to fog my mind once again I reached for his fingers and tangled mine with his.

And then I drifted off to sleep. Holding Adam’s hand.

Warmth. Touch. Those were the first blissful sensations I was aware of early the following morning. Adam’s fingers still loosely entwined in mine. His breath, warm and even, at the back of my neck as he lay spooned behind me. I tightened my fingers round his, lifted both our hands towards my face and softly kissed his knuckle.

He must have stayed awake long after I’d succumbed to dreams, because he was sleeping heavily now and I slid out of his hold fairly easily. There was a slight snuffle and a twitch as I stood up, but I tucked the duvet back around his neck and he drifted off again.

I didn’t leave the room straight away, but stayed there, watching him. Why that prickling at the top of my nose was back, I wasn’t sure. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that I felt as if I wanted to empty myself of everything I was, everything I ever would be, and pour it into him. The urge was so strong it was a physical sensation, welling up inside me, threatening to burst through the very pores of my skin.

I’d been wrong about not being able to love Adam the way he wanted me to. As I stood, unable to tear my eyes from him in the lemony dawn light, I knew I was my mother’s daughter.

Just before I tiptoed out of the living room, feeling raw and vulnerable, I grabbed Mum’s photo off the mantelpiece and hugged it to my chest. I took it with me and laid it on my bed before heading for the bathroom. After all that luxury I was desperate for the comfort of my own surroundings, my own temperamental shower that I knew just how to get the best out of, my haphazard and kitsch decorating style, with scarves over lampshades and classic movie posters on the wall.

When I came out of the shower, wrapped in a fluffy red towel, I paused and picked up the photo I’d left on the bed. The image of my mother, smiling and carefree, blurred. I hadn’t known her like that. Of course I’d seen her smile and heard her laugh, but I’d been too young to remember much of the time my parents had been together. After my dad had left, even if her face had been making all the right adjustments to portray happiness, it hadn’t rung true. There had always been that moment when she finished laughing, a pause when the sadness would seep back in, a moment when she returned to her default state.

I wish you were here, Mum. I wish you could tell me what to do.

But she wasn’t here. And the desire to have her with me was just yet another fantasy. While she’d been alive she’d only been half present in my life, both physically and emotionally. I kissed the tip of my finger and pressed it onto her smile.

I love you, Mum, but I can’t be like you. Sorry.

I placed the frame on my bedside table and got dressed, choosing my favourite black pencil skirt and a hot-pink wing-collared blouse, finished off with raspberry suede heels with roses on the toes. I twisted my hair into a French pleat, but left my blunt fringe loose, so it hung above my eyebrows like a curtain. The jet-black liner went on with little flicks of my wrists to create wings, and with each sweep of rich and luxurious lipstick across my lips I felt my power returning.

When I’d finished I walked into the hall to check my reflection in the full-length mirror. I looked like me again. But not the frivolous, carefree version of myself I had expected to see. The glimmer of fun in this Coreen’s eyes had hardened into iron.

I picked up my patent black handbag and took one last look around the living room before I left. It was far too early to open up the shop, but I needed a walk, some time to clear my head. Adam was still unconscious, but this time as I looked at him the welling sensation didn’t return.

I blew the sleeping Adam a kiss, ending with a little finger wave, and then walked out of the room and left my flat, my shiny black handbag swinging from my finger in synchronisation with my hips.

I turned the sign on the door of Coreen’s Closet to ‘Closed’ and sighed. I was very tempted to rest my head against the cool glass and let it soothe my aching brow, but Alice was watching me. She’d been watching me all day.

She was standing behind the counter, checking the till. I turned back to face her and gave her a wide Crimson Minx smile.

‘Out with it,’ was all she said.

I rolled my eyes.

Despite the swirling pregnancy hormones, my business partner was still able to pin me down with a look. ‘I mean it. How did the weekend go?’

I blinked innocently. ‘I’ve already told you all about it.’

Alice made a dismissive noise. ‘You told me about the fashion. Now I want you to tell me about the weekend.’

‘Oh,’ I said airily as I walked jauntily back to the cash desk. ‘Nicholas Chatterton-Jones only asked me to dinner, that’s all.’

Instead of squealing and dancing round the shop with me, Alice folded her arms. ‘And…?’

I shrugged. ‘And I’m thinking about it.’

‘Now I know there really is something wrong.’

I sagged against the counter, resting my well-padded behind on its edge, and blew out a long breath. It made me look like a horse, but I was past caring. Alice started packing things into her handbag, but I knew appearances were deceptive. She wasn’t going anywhere until I spilled my guts. Sometimes my willowy red-headed business partner was decidedly unbendable.

I crossed my ankles and fixed my gaze on a sequinned silver jacket that Gladys, our one-eyed shop dummy, was wearing. ‘I think I might be in love.’

‘With Nicholas?’

I didn’t answer. Couldn’t.

How could I make my feelings concrete with words when I knew I was about to behave despicably? Alice waited in silence, and I was just on the verge of screaming when someone gave the locked shop door a hefty shove.

Adam.

He was peering over the top of the ‘Closed’ sign, the afternoon sun tinting the tips of his messy-but-sexy hair gold. I held my breath to stop myself from running over to the door, yanking it open, flinging my arms around him and burying my fingers in that shaggy mop. I didn’t. My butt was frozen to the counter and I let Alice waddle over to the door and unlock it instead. She had steel in her eyes when she turned back. Steel and knowledge.

Oh, heck. I was rumbled.

‘Well, I’m off, then,’ she said breezily, grabbing her bag and swinging it over her shoulder. She kissed Adam on the cheek as he entered the shop, and then waddled out of the door, pausing briefly to turn back, smile meaningfully at me and let me have her parting shot.

‘Be good.’

I smiled weakly back, not promising anything, because I knew I wasn’t about to be anything but very, very bad.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Cry Me A River

Coreen’s Confessions

No more confessions. There’s nothing left to tell—except for how the story ends…

ALICE disappeared, and the compact and cluttered shop floor of Coreen’s Closet fell silent. I didn’t know what to say to him. However, Adam proved just how much he could say without pesky things like words getting in his way. The twinkle in his eyes—my twinkle—blazed out at me. Pretty soon it spread to the corners of his eyes, causing them to crease, and then it worked its way down to engulf his mouth. I was tempted to dive into that smile and lose myself in it.

‘Hi,’ he said, his voice low and warm. I reminded myself this was a Monday afternoon. I had no business thinking about Sunday mornings.

‘Hi,’ I said back.

We looked across the shop at each other.

‘Do you want to grab something to eat?’ he asked.

I sucked a mouthful of air in and held it in my lungs. ‘Maybe later.’ I glanced back at the open door to the office. ‘I’ve got some things I need to catch up on. After the weekend…’

It made me feel worse that he believed me.

‘Hold that thought!’ he said, his smile widening further. Then he walked over to me, dropped one sweet, intoxicating kiss on my lips and strolled out of the door.

After locking the door behind him, I went immediately to the washroom and reapplied my lipstick, and then I decided I ought to find something to do.

I found a couple of boxes to unload and reload, rooted around in my desk drawer for a lost stapler, and then rearranged my costume jewellery in its wood and glass display case. I was just about to turn my attention to the hatpin display when the door rattled. I didn’t have to look round to know who it was, and I didn’t need to ask what it was in the carrier bag he was holding—I could smell the delicious waft as soon as he entered the shop.

He plopped the bag down on the counter and headed straight through to the back office, flung his keys down on the desk and fetched the pink picnic hamper. I coughed before he unbuckled it, and he looked up.

‘Fish and chips?’ I asked, wrinkling my nose slightly.

The smile dropped from Adam’s face. ‘You don’t want fish and chips?’

I shook my head and clasped my hands low behind my back. ‘Actually, I have a hankering for Thai.’

He looked at the tightly wrapped paper bundles in the carrier bag. ‘But it’s hot, and I asked for onion vinegar especially for you.’ He started to unwrap the paper and a delicious acidic waft hit the back of my nose. Saliva pooled underneath my tongue.

I gave him my big-eyed ‘little girl’ look. ‘I really fancy Thai,’ I said, the lie sliding effortlessly through my evenly spaced teeth.

‘You’re sure about this?’ Adam gave the hot bundle of fish and chips a longing look. I nodded and blew him a kiss.

There was no eager yip, as one of my ‘puppies’ might have given, but he sighed and rubbed his hand over his face. I knew he was going to do it for me—not because I’d pushed him into a corner, but because his innate sense of chivalry had kicked in. ‘Okay, Thai it is.’ He shrugged. ‘At least it’s only a few doors down.’

I bit my lip.

On purpose.

‘What?’ he said, his voice heavy.

‘I don’t like that restaurant any more.’ I lowered my head a little and looked at him through my lashes. ‘I like the Blue Dragon.’

‘But that’s the other end of town!’

I did my coquettish little one-shouldered shrug. ‘You did say you’d get it for me…’

He gave me a long, hard stare, and then he picked up the hamper and disappeared into the back office again. While he was gone, I pinched a couple of chips from one of the parcels, stuffed them into my mouth and then quickly rearranged the packet so it looked as if none were missing.

My, those chips were good. Heavenly, in fact. I closed my eyes and licked the salt off my lips.

I had to swallow quickly when I heard Adam returning, minus hamper but in possession of his car keys. Something inside me sank. This was what I’d wanted, but a part of me hadn’t wanted it to be this easy, hadn’t wanted Adam to be predictable like all the others.

I was leaning against the cash desk, arms bracing me, and he peeled one of my hands off the shiny surface, turned its palm upwards. ‘I don’t play games and you know that,’ he said as he dropped the keys into my waiting palm. ‘If you want curry from the Blue Dragon, you’re going to have to get it yourself.’

My skin began to prickle. Damn it. I liked this new Adam with the menacing edge to his voice too much.

Okay, he might not have been as predictable as I’d both feared and hoped he would be, but that didn’t mean I was going to let him outmanoeuvre me. I pushed the keys against his chest and let go. He caught them on a reflex.

‘I’m not driving that hulking machine of yours ’round these narrow streets,’ I said, glaring at him and stood up. ‘Fine. I’ll get my dinner myself.’

‘Fine,’ he said, glaring back at me.

I didn’t really want to, but what choice did I have? I picked up my purse and stalked out of the shop and up the road to the Spice Heaven. Ten minutes later I was back, with a curry I didn’t really want.

Adam had moved into the back room, but his chivalry thing had decreed he wait for me. A parcel of fish and chips was waiting unopened on his lap. As soon as he saw me he dived in. I set to work opening my plastic tubs and dishing rice and curry onto a pink plate.

Adam wasn’t ‘twinkling’ so much now. He stared at his fish and chips in silence. It didn’t look appetising. But then cold fish and chips never do.

I ate a bit of my food, and then resorted to pushing it around my plate and taking the odd nibble when I felt Adam’s eyes on me—which was more often than not, unfortunately. Coconut milk and onion vinegar definitely did not make a good taste combination. This was no comfortable silence we were enjoying. I knew he was thinking hard, trying to work out what his next move would be.

‘I’m off in three days,’ he said as he bit into a chip, grimaced and dropped it back into the open parcel on his lap. ‘You sure you won’t change your mind and come with me? I think you’d really enjoy it.’

This was not just an invitation. I could tell by the wariness in his eyes that it was a test. I dabbed at the corner of my mouth with a pink paper napkin and shook my head. I needed Adam to go away on his own. This whole thing was going to be so much harder to accomplish if he didn’t.

He put his parcel down, stood up and walked across to where I was perched on the edge of my desk.

‘Please don’t, Coreen.’

I pretended not to understand. ‘I don’t do humidity,’ I said blithely, and attempted a cheeky smile. It wasn’t a good attempt. It stayed in place, but it felt as if it was only hanging there by a thread.

Adam took the plate out of my hands and put it on the desk behind me. ‘I told you that you don’t need to be this way with me. You don’t need to be that girl with me.’

And there, in a nutshell, was the problem. Because I really did need to be that girl with Adam. It was the only way I could keep myself intact. So if he didn’t want me this way then maybe he shouldn’t have me at all. I raised my chin a notch.

‘It’s who I am, Adam. If anyone knows what I’m like, you do.’

Liar. Coward. Those two words rang in my ears as I watched him digest what I had just said.

A siren sounded somewhere on my desk. My phone. My current ring tone was the song ‘The Girl Can’t Help It’ from the Jayne Mansfield movie of the same name, police siren and all. I never missed my phone ringing any more, but it drove other people nuts.

I retrieved it, grateful for an excuse not to look Adam the eye for a few seconds, but when I saw who it was calling I sent him straight to voicemail. Adam stared at me.

‘That was Nicholas,’ I said lightly, keeping a close watch on his reaction. ‘He’s not such an idiot after all, it seems. The plan worked. He wants me to go to dinner with him on Saturday evening.’

Reaction-wise, I got more than I bargained for. I don’t think sound escaped Adam’s lips, but he looked as if he were snarling. ‘Coreen…’

I slid my phone closed and smiled brightly at him. ‘Even Nicholas came to heel in the end. Just goes to show that no man is completely untrainable.’

Except Adam.

‘Stop it, Coreen.’

I don’t think my expression held quite the right level of innocence and guilelessness that I’d aimed for. Probably because everything inside me seemed four times heavier than normal. Even my face felt heavy. ‘What do you mean?’

He turned his head. Too disgusted to look at me, I guessed. I pretty much felt the same way.

‘I know what you are doing.’

And I knew that he knew. But I couldn’t stop. It was the only way to save both of us from a lifetime of heartache.

I didn’t say anything. I’d planned to tell him I was going to accept Nicholas’s offer of dinner, but it turned out even I wasn’t despicable enough to do that. It’s nice to have a least one redeeming feature: Coreen Fraser, not quite pond scum.

There was no point in lying any further, anyway. Adam knew Nicholas was just a diversion. He stood up, towering above me as I rested against the desk, only inches between us. Close enough to reach out and touch if I was stupid enough. Weak enough.

Soft fingers curled around my chin and pushed it upwards until I had no choice but to look at him. That’s when the tears started to fall, running down my cheeks and trailing down my neck, each one following the track of its predecessor. Adam’s expression softened. It was as if something in his eyes had opened and I could see deep down inside him, see all the treasure I’d been half-blind to all these years. Strength. Courage. Loyalty. All the qualities I lacked.

I knew my feelings for him were written clearly over my face, because I saw a spark of hope in his eyes. I couldn’t let it live. I tensed my jaw and the last pair of tears fell. With every ounce of my strength I arranged my features into blankness. I wound up my shutters, pushed him away without even moving. Without even breathing.

He saw it too. And I wished he hadn’t opened those windows to let me see inside, because now I saw it all turn to ash. I saw the desolation, the rage, the pain. I knew I was breaking both his heart and mine.

He stepped back, shell shocked, and I realised that up until that moment he’d never considered that there would be anything but a Happy Ever After for us, even if I had to be dragged into it kicking and screaming. That light, that welcoming light, the one that had always been there for me in his eyes, sputtered and disappeared.

Something really had been murdered this weekend. And I was the one who’d killed it.

I realised that holding all the power, having that ultimate control I had always craved, tasted nowhere near as sweet as I’d imagined it would. In fact it made me sick to my stomach.

Now Adam’s shutters came down too. He picked up his car keys, clenched them into his fist, and gave me one last rigid look. I knew those windows would never open again. Not for me, anyway. The thought of them doing so for another girl one day almost drew a cry from my lips, but I held it back, finally getting a handle on the ‘controlling my face’ thing.

Adam turned and walked away. Out of the shop and out of my life. I realised that somewhere in the back of my head I’d foolishly thought he’d eventually forgive me for this one day. After all, I was only being me. Vintage Coreen. He’d always forgiven me before. But as I ran to the doorway that led to the shop floor and hung on to the frame I saw him stride away down the road and realised he never would. I’d taken it too far.

I stood there motionless, hardly breathing, my fingernails folded into my palms. It would have been a good time for the violins to play, to swell around me in melody sweet and sad and sharp enough to make hearts bleed, but I made yet another discovery: there was nothing romantic about moments like this.

Nothing romantic at all.

A limousine arrived to pick me up at seven on Saturday evening. It took me over the river, wove skilfully through the London traffic and deposited me at an exclusive little restaurant in the West End. I was fussed over and shown to a table, where Nicholas was waiting for me.

He rose as I approached and kissed my hand. From anyone other than Nicholas I would have thought it was too smooth to be true, but he really was like that all charm and effortless manners.

‘You look stunning,’ he said as he pulled my chair out for me.

‘Thank you.’

I did look good. I hadn’t worn the red dress, though. I’d chosen an Audrey Hepburn-esque little black dress and put my hair up. Nicholas liked the pared-down minx, after all, and it didn’t go to give a man the impression he had even the tiniest bit of control over what a girl did. The lipstick was crimson, of course, but I’d faltered when it had come to the shoes.

I’d looked at the array of different styles and shades of red in the bottom of my wardrobe, had tried loads on, but discarded them all. I’d ended up nipping over to the shop and borrowing the black suede evening shoes with the bow on the front. But I was so used to wearing nothing but red on my feet that every time I looked down I had the feeling that something was wrong. They pinched my little toes as well, but what the heck?

As you can tell, I reverted to the original plan after Adam left.

Okay, straight after Adam left I stumbled home, ate two pints of Devilish Diva chocolate ice cream, watched three black-and-white movies back-to-back and then sobbed into my pillow until morning. But that had been five whole days ago now, and despite the fact I had repeated the process on the two following nights I had forced myself to get up and move on. Hence the plan.

It had been a good plan, after all.

Adam had been right—I was ready for something more serious than puppy-training. I was ready for a serious relationship. With someone like Nicholas. Someone who thought that girl was funny and sparkly and full of pizzazz. Someone who couldn’t see through the dizzying parade of polka dots, who couldn’t make them transparent with just one look.

Only…

As we ate the exquisite food and chatted in the candlelight I kept looking at my Perfect Man and noticing lots of silly little things.

The fan of creases at the side of his eyes, for one. They didn’t appear often enough, and when they did they didn’t make me feel like melted marshmallow inside. The eyes were all wrong, of course. Too clear. Too blue. No cheeky little glimmers inside that dragged the corners of my mouth up, whether I liked it or not. And I just kept wanting to lean across the table and unto his top button, or muss his hair up a little. Sometimes perfection can be a little too uniform.

I sighed. I was being picky, wasn’t I?

Deep down, I knew why. Deep down, I tried to tell myself all about it. But somewhere nearer the surface I squished it down again—a kind of mental sticking of the fingers in one’s ears and singing ‘la-la-la’, I suppose.

Nicholas topped my glass up with fizz that was a hundred times better than the stuff I usually got at the corner shop.

‘Coreen?’

‘Mm-hm?’

‘Is everything okay?’

I flashed him my Marilyn smile. ‘Absolutely wonderful.’

He glanced over his left shoulder. ‘You seem to be fascinated by something behind me. Is there something wrong with the restaurant? And you keep sighing.’

‘No.’ I shook my head emphatically. ‘The restaurant is lovely. I wasn’t looking at anything in particular…’ Not in these elegant surroundings, anyway. But I was hardly going to own up to the mental slide show that had been distracting me.

Adam’s grin as he stole yet another sweet and sour pork ball.

His face close to mine as he adjusted a pair of hideous tortoiseshell glasses.

The look in his eyes as I sang my mum’s favourite song.

I put those thoughts away and shuffled through the images of the previous weekend, trying to find a nice one of Nicholas—like the time when he’d congratulated me on geeing everybody up, or when he’d asked me to dance—but they were all fuzzy and out of focus.

I let out a breath, long and slow. Nicholas’s eyebrows dipped at the edges. Maybe he’d been taking lessons from Robert. He looked down at his architecturally beautiful dessert and then up at me again.

‘I’m still too late, aren’t I?’

I tried to deny it, but the words wouldn’t come. Dissolved by the fizzing bubbles of the vintage champagne, no doubt. Nicholas, gentleman that he was, said nothing further. He was charming and interesting as we finished our meal, attentive and amusing during coffee and on the limo ride home. The kiss he pressed on my cheek as we parted was decidedly platonic.

I stood with my key in the lock and watched the limo pull away into the starlit summer night. Not once did I sigh. I felt like Cinderella in reverse. I’d gone to the ball only to wind up with the pumpkin. No, that wasn’t fair to Nicholas. He was everything I’d imagined him to be.

It was just that he wasn’t my pumpkin, and no amount of wishing would make it otherwise.

I held up fine until I got into the flat and ran to the kitchen, but as I opened the freezer and reached for yet another tub of Devilish Diva I paused and my fingers numbed on its frosty surface. Seemed I was going to bypass the ice cream stage and fall headlong into the sobbing stage. Gluey tears, a waterfall at the back of my nose and some rather unattractive snorting noises to follow.

I pulled the ice cream tub out of the freezer, clutched it to my chest, and then closed the freezer door, turned around and slid down it until I was sitting on the kitchen floor.

Why did it still hurt? Why did it hurt more? I hadn’t made the fatal mistake of following him. I was doing the right thing, wasn’t I?

Suddenly I got really angry. I dropped the ice cream and stumbled to my feet with all the grace of a new-born giraffe, kicking off the uncomfortable black heels as I did so, and ran into the living room to stare at the picture of my mother, back in its proper place on the mantelpiece.

‘It’s all your fault!’ I screamed. ‘You did this to me. This is your legacy and I don’t want it! I don’t want it!’ I picked up the frame and hurled it across the room. It hit the fake zebra skin rug and shattered. I made a horrible gurgling noise down in my throat—it could have been the word no, trapped by the raw swelling there—and then ran over to the frame. Shards of glass lay on the floor, but the wood was still intact. I smiled. And then I cried. And then I cried harder.

Carefully, I bent down to pick it up and shook the loose glass onto the floor. Then I held it in both hands, my knuckles paling, and stared down at her. Although the laughing face never changed, her expression seemed to sober. I searched her eyes out and locked on to them. Laughing eyes, I reminded myself. Happy eyes. I didn’t want to see anything else.

But even that didn’t work. Clouds passed over the eyes too. It was as if she was looking back at me, trying to send me a message.

Don’t be a fool like I was. Don’t make the same mistakes I did.

‘I’m trying not to,’ I whispered, my voice thin and high. ‘But it’s not working. I just feel… I feel…’ I closed my eyes and wept silent tears. There was no point in denying it to myself any longer. No point in trying to wedge my blinkers back on my stubborn head.

I was in love with Adam and I always would be.

But it wasn’t in my genes to balance. Two-way street? Hah! Anyone who knew me understood that I hogged the road and behaved as if I had my own personal police escort when I drove. And it would be no different in love. As whole-hearted as I’d been at bending the world to my will and making it serve me, I’d show the same total commitment to loving Adam.

I knew I could give to him and never stop giving. Never stop until I was a grey shadow of myself, just as my mother had been. And then I wouldn’t be the woman Adam had fallen in love with any more. That’s when the rot would set in.

Oh, he’d stay at first. I didn’t doubt that. Adam didn’t disappoint, after all. But we’d stagnate, grow to hate each other, and he deserved so much more. So much more than a woman who would always be waiting for the moment when she found the note on the mantelpiece, when she found a dent in the pillow but the bed cold and empty…

If there was one person I couldn’t be Left Behind by, it was Adam. So maybe it was better that I’d taken fate into my own hands and chosen the moment we’d part, rather than having it thrust upon me years from now, when I’d been lulled into a false sense of security.

I risked a look at Mum. She was smiling again, eyes laughing. Had I imagined the rest?

Couldn’t you have found a nice man? I whispered mentally. A good man who wouldn’t have abandoned you and sucked you dry? A man with a safe pair of hands to hold your heart? Then you might still be here. I might have had you long enough to—

A safe pair of hands.

Oh.

I wasn’t sure whether I was frowning or smiling, and a nerve in my cheek worked overtime as it tried to decide which one. I was just like my mother, but it had taken me up until now to understand all that that meant. All that it could mean.

Perhaps my red suede ballet pumps hadn’t been the way to go. I know the boat driver had recommended sensible footwear, but for me this was sensible footwear. I’d heard Langwaki was a tourist hotspot, so I’d expected it to be quite cosmopolitan, but I hadn’t realised just how many islands there were in the archipelago. While some had bustling resorts, the island I was speeding through a turquoise sea towards was apparently home to only one hotel.

My hair, however, had lived up to expectations, so I wasn’t totally wrong-footed.

I soon forgot all about the frizz, though, because the scenery was stunning—full of mountainous islands covered so completely in rainforest that only a sliver of pale yellow at the water’s edge broke up their unrelenting green caps. I turned to look out of the other side of the boat, not wanting to miss a thing, and realised we must be nearing our destination. Rather than skimming past the closest island we were heading straight for it. As we rounded a jutting headland the resort came into view. I think I may have stopped breathing.

This was no ordinary hotel. It wasn’t the rough, wooden, tree-hugging backpackers’ base I’d imagined either. No, this…this was more like an exotic fairytale.

As far as I could see along the shore were wooden chalets on stilts, their legs in the water, some of them more than one storey, all with pointed red-tiled roofs. From the midst of the cluster of waterborne buildings a walkway jutted out towards us, with a larger structure on the end. The boat docked beside some steps that led up to what I now realised was a reception area, and the other passengers began to disembark.

I let them flow around me.

This was obviously a luxurious and well-established resort. Was I really in the right place? I checked the name with the boat driver and he nodded emphatically. I had no choice but to ascend the stairs and carry on my journey.

I arrived in the reception area and headed straight for the wide, glossy, dark wood reception desk. A young woman in a smart collarless red jacket smiled at me. I cleared my throat.

‘I’m looking for Adam Conrad? He builds—’

‘Ah, yes. Mr Conrad. I will arrange for someone to take you to him.’

She clapped her hands twice and a lad in the same uniform appeared from nowhere and motioned for me to follow him. I trailed along behind him, listening to his commentary in accented English on the hotel, its history, the fauna and flora of the island, and how excited everyone was about the new eco-friendly treehouse development on the resort. I just nodded vacantly as I followed him through a maze of walkways that linked the chalets and then finally led onto dry land, over the top of a silky white beach and on into the jungle into a section of the resort that wasn’t yet open to visitors.

After a few minutes we stopped at a plank bridge strung over a small ravine, which led to yet another stilted wooden chalet on the other side. But where the other chalets had been a traditional Malaysian design, this had a flowing, organic shape. Modern, yet beautiful.

My guide pointed across the bridge and nodded, then scampered away back towards the ocean.

I inhaled, then gently planted my ballet pumps on the bridge. It didn’t lurch or swing and I picked up speed. The canopy of leaves high over my head let in pale golden light. I knew the jungle was probably the same here all year round, but to me everything looked fresh and recently sprouted, ready to bud.

As I reached the chalet I saw it was merely another mini-reception area. From this point the bridges and walkways headed off into the trees in different directions. There was no polite young lady in red behind the desk this time, but a foreman in dirty work clothes.

‘I’m looking for Adam Conrad,’ I said.

He nodded, then pointed to the walkway on the far right.

‘Thank you.’ I began to walk again, and this time the planks took me upwards into the trees until I reached a platform that circled one of the larger trunks. Two further walkways sprouted from this platform. Which way now?

I looked back at the man in the hut and he made giant arm gestures, pointing me right yet again. I kept my eyes on my feet as I climbed higher, but after a handful of steps I stopped and let out a loud gasp.

The ground had dropped away beneath me. Down below I could see a stream, rushing over the rocky hillside towards the beach. There was even a small waterfall, framed with ferns. I shook my head slowly in amazement, but when I looked up even that stopped. In front of me was the most amazing thing I’d ever seen. A whole village of treehouses, dotted here and there in the jungle, some big, some small, all of them similar pleasing organic shapes, and all connected by a lattice of rope bridges, platforms and walkways. The design was asymmetrical, yet oddly harmonious.

Every pod-like chalet was set a short distance from the main walkway and could be reached by flowing wooden steps. Some had only short flights. Some curled round the trees like spiral staircases.

I spun around on my heels, taking it all in, letting the circular motion create a breeze where there was none, ruffling through my simple fifties sundress and cooling my skin.

I could hear voices, but I wasn’t sure where they were coming from. One of the treehouses close by, I thought. I set off, keeping my ears trained on the sound. Listening for Sunday morning.

I stopped when the voices were directly above me, in one of the treehouses that could be reached by a spiral staircase. A man appeared at the top of the steps and I waited until he was halfway down before I approached him.

‘Hi,’ I said, and he almost jumped three feet in the air. I suppose he wasn’t used to seeing frizzy-haired women in white sundresses wandering round the jungle. ‘I’m looking for Adam Conrad.’ He replied in broken English and pointed up the winding staircase. I smiled my thanks and climbed up.

The main room of the treehouse was stunning. Even though this part of the resort was still officially under construction, it was obviously very close to completion, because it was fully furnished and decorated. In the centre of the room was a large bed, covered in crisp white linen, surrounded by a dark-stained wood and cane frame. The walls were also white, and though such a stark colour scheme should have looked bare, the golden-green light from the jungle outside spilled in through a large opening at the far end, making the room seemed fresh and clean and inviting.

My ballet pumps made hardly any noise as I crossed into the centre of the room, looking all around.

‘Adam?’ I only whispered his name, overcome by a sudden attack of nerves. I had no idea how he’d react to my arrival on his territory. If I’d been him I wouldn’t have wanted anything to do with me.

For a moment all I could hear was the fluttering of the sheer white curtains that half covered an open space on the far side of the room, but then I heard a creaking noise outside, and as I looked more closely I realised there was a balcony built onto the edge of the room, joining it with the jungle outside, making it seem as if one flowed into the other.

And then I saw him. Adam. Standing by a wooden railing, gazing out into the unending foliage. I walked up to the threshold until I was half in, half-out of the room, my suede-clad feet silent on the polished wooden floor. But as I stepped out onto the balcony I let my foot slap down, announcing my presence.

Adam spun round and his mouth dropped open.

I’d thought I couldn’t ruffle Adam’s feathers, thought I’d lost the knack, but I’d never seen him so off-balance. It went deeper than momentary surprise, however. His face seemed different. The lines were etched in harder and there were smudges of darkness under his eyes.

My nose stung furiously. I’d done this to him.

I’d thought I understood how much I’d hurt him, but until this moment I hadn’t. I really hadn’t.

‘Hi,’ I said, and my heart clog-danced against my ribs.

I couldn’t hold his gaze. Stupidly, I’d thought I might see a flicker of the old warmth there, but there was nothing. I’d never realised brown could look so cold and uninviting. I couldn’t keep my greedy eyes off him for long, though. As much as it hurt, I had to let them feast on him. It felt as if I hadn’t seen him in months. In years. But I suppose that fitted. I’d spent a whole lifetime not seeing Adam Conrad. How stupid and cowardly and selfish I’d been.

‘What are you doing here?’ he said quietly, not moving—as if doing so would cause me to vanish in a puff of smoke.

I took a step forward. ‘I missed my best friend.’

He closed his eyes and then slowly opened the lids, his body sagging slightly. ‘I’m not sure you and I can ever be friends again,’ he replied carefully.

I was being stupid, edging my way up to what I wanted to say to him, and my first clumsy attempts had made it sound as if this was all about what I wanted, what I needed. It’s just that I was terrified. Terrified I really had taken things too far this time—beyond the point of no return—and that I’d destroyed the one thing I treasured most in the process. I didn’t deserve his forgiveness, but I had to try.

‘I know,’ I said in a quiet voice. ‘But while you’ve been away I’ve had time to think. Really think.’

Adam gave me a look that said he wasn’t sure ‘thinking’ would solve my problems. A swift kick in the pants, maybe…

I moved closer, until I was almost at the balcony railing with him, but the sentence I’d planned fluttered away as I took in the view.

Because of the steep hillside we seemed to be floating in the air. Before us was the jungle—tall trees, waxy-leaved plants, the odd bright spot of colour—and beyond that, just visible through the dense vegetation, the white gold of a beach, topped by a shimmering sea.

‘I think this is the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen,’ I whispered.

Adam turned away from me again and placed his hands on the railings. ‘I said you’d like it.’ His voice was flat and expressionless, but at least he was talking to me. He talked towards the jungle, keeping his gaze straight ahead. ‘What do you want from me?’

I swallowed. This was it. All the games, all the side stepping and self-protection had to end now. Telling the old Adam I cared for him would have been hard, but confessing it to the new Adam…it was nigh on impossible. This Adam was far more dangerous—and not just because I’d opened my eyes to the attraction that had been so very obvious to almost every other woman he met.

This Adam had the power to crush me, to turn me into that pining, hopeless woman I’d never wanted to be. Where old Adam would have grudgingly forgiven me eventually, this man I loved probably wouldn’t. Probably shouldn’t. But he had my heart anyway, and I knew that if I was ever going to have the slightest chance of repairing things with him I needed to offer it to him as a sacrifice. If he plunged a knife in it, so be it. I was helpless to do otherwise.

I matched his position at the railing, staring out over the lush greenery as I collected myself, but after a few heartbeats I turned to face him and waited until he looked round. He didn’t turn fully, just glanced warily over his hunched shoulders and stiff arms.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, and darn it if I didn’t start to cry again. What was wrong with me these days? I took a moment to hold the flat of my finger under my eyelashes, mopping up the moisture, and to still my trembling mouth. When I pulled my fingers away they were moist and grey. ‘I really am sorry…for all the things I said, all the things I did. All the things I tried to do…’

I inhaled, collecting my courage together.

‘But I also came to tell you that you are wrong.’

I saw a flash of surprise in Adam’s eyes, swiftly replaced by anger. Surely that had to be better than nothing, than the deadness I’d put there? I carried on, feeling braver. ‘Love isn’t a two-way street. Love isn’t about balance.’

He stood up and opened his mouth to contradict me, but the words died on his lips as I reached out and curved my palm around the side of his face, as I smiled into his eyes. He froze beneath my touch, and I knew I might be making the biggest fool of myself ever, but I couldn’t stop now. There were things that needed to be said. ‘Love does mean total surrender, because…’

I let my fingers brush across his cheek, his jaw, the contact thrilling me, connecting me to him. A pulse of electricity travelled all the way up my arm and detonated somewhere in my chest.

My voice was watery when I spoke again. ‘Because there is no balance in the way I feel about you, Adam Conrad. No balance at all. And it scares me…’ my voice wobbled and croaked ‘…so much.’

Still no thaw. Still no swirl of caramel in those hard eyes. I felt my stomach sink to the jungle floor, way below us.

‘The way I feel about you… It’s all that I am. It’s everything. I finally realised what my mother’s true legacy was, why I’m proud to be like her.’

He held my gaze, gave me a moment to gather my next words.

‘Just like her, I have the capacity to give my heart fully and completely. Without reservation.’ My face crumpled slightly. ‘She didn’t choose well, though. But I have. I’ve found a very safe pair of hands for my heart.’

In one swift movement Adam pushed himself up from leaning on the railing and pulled me into his arms. We stood forehead to forehead, chest to chest, our hearts thudding against each other.

‘I love you, Adam. More than life itself.’

I kissed him—slowly, softly, sweetly—on the lips, for the first time with the full knowledge of how I felt and what that meant. No more hiding, no more running. He didn’t respond at first, and I wondered if, despite his feelings for me, he might never be able to trust me with his heart in return. I really didn’t deserve it, after all.

And then I pulled back and waited, my hand still curved around his cheek. It seemed as if my heart had closed its eyes and counted to a hundred before he reacted, before I saw any change at all in his features.

His eyes melted and his hand closed over mine. He peeled my fingers from his face. He turned my palm over and graced it with the softest kiss. He opened his mouth, but I pressed a finger to his lips.

‘I haven’t finished yet,’ I said.

Adam smiled behind my finger, his eyes on fire, and his lips squashed into strange shapes as he tried to talk. ‘I love it when you get all bossy with me.’

I ironed out my answering grin and became serious again. ‘I’m giving everything to you because I know you will give the woman you love all of yourself in return.’ I placed my hand on his chest and stared at my fingers there. ‘This good heart is strong and loyal and faithful, and I wondered if, one day, you might trust me enough to make it…’ I risked a look up at him and said with a trembling voice, ‘Mine?’

Adam gave me a look so intense I thought the soles of my shoes would melt. Then he cupped his hand behind my head and kissed me until it spun.

‘Always yours,’ he said softly, his smile swinging back into place. ‘Always was, always will be.’

That was all I needed to know. I grinned back.

His gaze roved over me, drinking me in. ‘I see that girl hasn’t completely disappeared.’

I shook my head. ‘You wouldn’t have it any other way. Life would be very boring if she wasn’t around to keep you on your toes.’

He let out a gruff laugh. ‘I see we’re going to have to work on that one.’

He didn’t say any more, just stared at me, and I stared back at him. There was a whole conversation going on between our eyes, but I had no idea what language it was in. I didn’t much care, because while my mind didn’t understand the words, my heart had caught his meaning and was nodding in agreement.

Adam brushed his thumb across my bottom lip. My eyelids fluttered shut and I let out a sigh.

‘I see the red lipstick is here to stay,’ he said.

I tipped my head back and parted my lips further, ignoring his comments and replying with an invitation of my own. When he didn’t respond I cranked one eyelid open slightly.

‘Yep. It’s staying,’ I said, a smile warming my lips. And then I closed my lids again. ‘But you have my full permission to kiss it off any time you like.’

He chuckled. But, Adam being Adam, didn’t disappoint.

Housekeeper’s Happy-Ever-After

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

EPILOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

ELLIE gave in to the insistent nagging at the fringes of her sleep and woke up. She focused on the display from the digital clock next to the bed.

Two-sixteen—and she needed to go to the bathroom. But it was her first night in an unfamiliar house and she didn’t really want to be crashing around in the dark, even if she was the sole occupant.

She punched her pillow and flopped onto her other side, burying her head under the duvet. She could last. Clamping her eyes shut, she shifted position again, wriggling into the mattress. The seconds sloped by in the thick silence. She lay completely still, counting her heartbeats.

Apparently she couldn’t last. Bother.

She blinked and tried to see where the outline of the door was in the blackness of the bedroom. The dull green glow from the alarm clock lit the duvet but not much more. The edge of the bed was about as inviting as the edge of a cliff.

Ellie Bond, get hold of yourself! A grown woman has no business being scared of the dark. Even in the kind of huge old house that looked as if it might have ghosts or bats in the attic.

She flung the duvet off and planted her feet firmly on the carpet, but hesitated for a couple of seconds before she stood up and inched towards the wall.

Ouch! Closer than she’d guessed.

Maybe she should have paid more attention when she’d dumped her cases in here, but she’d been so exhausted she’d only managed half her unpacking before she’d fallen into the large, squashy bed.

She rubbed her shoulder and felt along the wall for the door. It was a couple of steps to the left from her point of impact. The antique handle complained as she twisted it millimetre by millimetre. She winced and opened the door slowly and carefully. Why, she didn’t know. It just seemed wrong to be too noisy in someone else’s house late at night, even if they were away from home.

Ellie leant out of the doorway and slid the flat of her hand along the wall in search of the light switch.

Where was the stupid thing?

Certainly not within easy reach. But as she crept along the hallway the clouds parted and sent a sliver of moonlight through the half-open curtains at the end of the landing. Bingo! She could see the bathroom door, right next to the window. She padded more speedily along the wooden floor, her bare feet sticking to the layers of old varnish.

Relief swirled through her as she scrambled inside the bathroom and yanked the light cord. A few minutes later she opened the door and froze. The moonlight had evaporated and she was left standing in the pitch-dark.

Don’t panic, Ellie. Think!

There had to be logical way to deal with this.

‘Okay,’ she whispered out loud, ‘my room is the—’ she counted on her fingers ‘—third on the left…I think.’ All she had to do was feel for the doors and she would be back in that wonderfully comfortable bed in no time.

She tiptoed close to the wood panelling, letting her left fingers walk along the surface in search of door fames.

One…

Two…

She meant to creep slowly, but with each step her pulse increased, adding speed to her steps.

Three…

She opened the door and made a quick dash for the bed. Ever since she was a child she’d had an irrational fear that some shadowy figure underneath would grab her ankles when she got close. She’d even perfected a sprint and dive manoeuvre in her teenage years. She decided to resurrect it now.

Big mistake.

She tripped over a discarded shoe and stumbled into a solid wall of…something.

It was warm. And breathing.

Oh, heck.

There was somebody in the house! A burglar, or an axe-wielding maniac…

Her brain short-circuited. Too much information at once. Too much to process. Thankfully, more primal instincts took over. She backed away, hoping she hadn’t got muddled and that the door was still directly behind her. But she hadn’t made more than two steps when a large, strong hand grabbed her wrist.

Ellie’s stomach somersaulted and she froze. Without even thinking about why or how, she lunged at him, whoever he was, and shoved the heel of her hand under his chin, causing him to grunt and stumble backwards.

Mother, I will never moan about the self-defence classes you made me go to in the village hall again!

In the surreal slow-motion moment that followed, she wondered why a burglar would be bare-chested in March, but before the thought was fully formed in her head his other arm grabbed her and he fell, taking her with him. She came crashing down on top of him, and then they lay winded in a tangle of arms and legs on the floor.

Here, he had the advantage. She didn’t know how, but she could sense he was taller than her, and if the chest she’d just landed on was anything to go by he had five times as many muscles. Somehow as they’d fallen they’d twisted, and she was now partly pinned underneath him, her legs trapped. She started to wriggle.

I should have paid more attention at those classes, instead of gossiping at the back with Janice Bradford.

Because the man obviously had no intention of letting her loose. In one swift movement he flipped her onto her back, his hands clamping both her wrists and digging them into the scratchy wool rug while his knees clamped her thighs together. The air left Ellie’s body with an ‘oof’ noise.

She flailed and struggled, but it was like trying to dislodge a lump of granite. Eventually she lay still beneath him, every muscle rigid. His toothpaste-scented breath came in short puffs, warming the skin of her neck. Panic fluttered in her chest.

It dawned on her that her original assumption that he was a burglar might be a tad optimistic. Things could be about to get a lot worse.

She had to act now—before he made his next move.

In a moment of pure instinct, she lifted her head and sank her teeth into the smooth skin of his shoulder. Then, while he was yelping in pain, she used every bit of strength in her five-foot-five frame to rock him to her left, getting him off-balance and thereby gaining enough momentum to swing him back in the other direction. The plan was to fling him off her so she could escape.

The plan was flawed.

He tumbled over, all right, but as she tried to crawl away he got hold of her right foot and dragged her back towards him. Ellie tried to stop herself by twisting over and clawing at the rug, but large tufts just came away in her fingers. And then she realised she was travelling further than she’d scurried away. She was being dragged back towards the bed.

That was when she started shouting. A wave of white-hot anger swept up her body.

How dared he?

‘Get out of my bedroom!’ she screamed. ‘Or I’ll—’

‘What?’

He was angry, but there was something more in his voice—confusion?

Harsh light flooded the room, accompanied by the click of a switch. Ellie peeled her face off the carpet and blinked a few times, desperate to focus on anything that might give her a clue as to where the door was. Her eyes began to adjust, and she made out a tall figure against the pale blue of the wall.

Pale blue? Oh, help! My room is a kind of heritage yellow colour.

She crinkled her eyelids until they were almost shut, and swivelled her head to face her attacker. Through the blur of her eyelashes she saw a pair of deep brown eyes staring at her. There was something about them…Had she dreamt about a pair of eyes just like that before she’d woken up? Half a memory was lodged somewhere, refusing to make sense.

Ellie’s chest reverberated with the pounding of her heart and she felt the fire wash up her face and settle in the tips of her ears. He looked as astonished as she felt.

She had seen those eyes before, but not in her dreams. They hadn’t been scowling then, but laughing, twinkling…

Ellie let out a noise that was part groan, part whimper as the memory clunked into place. She started to collect her limbs together and move away.

‘I’m…I’m…so sorry! I got lost in the dark…’ She shot a glance at him, but his face was still etched with confusion. ‘I mean, I thought you were a—a maniac.’

He blinked. Something told her his assessment of her hadn’t been dissimilar.

‘Mr Wilder…I…’

‘I know who I am. Who on earth are you?’

She licked her lips—they seemed to have dried out completely—and cleared her throat. ‘I’m Ellie Bond, your new housekeeper.’

One month earlier

Ellie’s limbs stopped working the moment she crossed the threshold of the coffee shop. The woman in the red coat was early. She wasn’t supposed to be here yet, but there she was, sitting at a table and reading a newspaper. After a few seconds the door swung closed behind Ellie, hitting her on the bottom. She didn’t even flinch, mainly because she felt as if she’d swallowed a thousand ice cubes and they were now all jostling for position as they slowly melted, spreading outwards through her body.

The woman’s long dark hair almost touched the tabletop as she bent over an absorbing story. Chunky silver earrings glinted in her ears when she flicked her hair out of the way so she could turn the page. Earrings that Ellie had given her for her last birthday.

The woman hadn’t noticed Ellie yet, and she was glad about that. She stared harder. Perhaps if she just stood here for a moment, took her time, it would come to her.

Something the woman was reading must have bothered her, because she stiffened and, even though her head was bowed, Ellie knew that three vertical lines had just appeared above the bridge of the woman’s nose. That always happened when she frowned. When people had been friends for more than a decade, they tended to notice little things like that about each other without even realising it. The brain collected a scrapbook about a person, made up of assorted images, sensations, sounds and aromas, all of which could be called up at a moment’s notice. And Ellie had plenty of those memories flooding into the front of her consciousness right now—untidy college bedrooms, the smell of dusty books in the library, the giggles of late-night gossip sessions…

A fact that only made the current situation more galling.

Ellie couldn’t remember her name.

Since the accident, finding the right name or word had become like rummaging around in the cupboard under the stairs without a torch. She knew the information she wanted was in her brain somewhere, but she was fumbling in the dark, not really knowing what she was looking for and just hoping she’d recognise it when she finally laid hold of it.

A waitress bustled past her, and the movement must have alerted her friend to the person standing at the edge of her peripheral vision, because she looked up from her newspaper and smiled at Ellie.

Ellie waved back, but behind her answering smile she was running through the letters of the alphabet, just as she’d been taught at the support group, to see if any of them jogged her memory.

Anna? Alice? Amy?

The woman stood up, beaming now, and Ellie had no choice but to start walking towards her.

Belinda? No.

Brenda?

The chunky earrings bobbed as her friend stood and drew her into a hug. Ellie just stood there for a moment like a rag doll, and then she made a conscious decision to contract her arm muscles and squeeze back. Not that she was opposed to hugging; it was just that her brain was far too busy ferreting around for the right letter, the right syllable, to get her started.

Christine…Caroline…Carly?

Carly. It seemed right and not right at the same time.

A whisper tickled her ear. ‘It’s so good to see you, Ellie!’

Ellie knew her friend would understand if she just admitted her memory blank. But Ellie was fed up with being understood. She just wanted to be—to live her life the way everyone else did, without the sympathetic glances. That was why she’d arranged this meeting in the first place.

A familiar sensation washed over her. She imagined it to be what it might feel like if portions of her memory were buoys, chained to a deep and murky ocean floor, and then all of a sudden one freed itself and floated upwards, arriving on the surface with a plop.

Charlotte Maxwell.

‘Hi, Charlie,’ she said, and finally relaxed into the hug. ‘It’s good to see you too.’

She tried not to, but as she pulled away and sat down Ellie sighed, deep and hard. Charlie tilted her head and looked at her.

‘How are you?’

Ah. How innocent that phrase sounded. How kind and well-meaning.

Ellie had come to hate it. People were always asking her that, normally wearing a concerned expression. Oh, she wasn’t fooled a bit. It wasn’t small talk. Chit-chat. What people wanted from her when they asked that question was a full psychological and medical rundown.

She smiled, but her lips remained firmly pressed together. ‘I’m great. Really.’

Charlie kept staring at her. ‘Still getting the headaches?’

‘Only occasionally,’ she replied, shrugging the observation away.

The wicked twinkle returned to Charlie’s eyes as she stood back and looked Ellie up and down. ‘You’ve had your hair cut,’ she said.

Ellie automatically raised a hand to feel the blunt ends of her tousled blonde curls. She’d only had it done a few days ago, and she still wasn’t used to finding fresh air where there had once been heavy ringlets that reached halfway down her back. The ends now just brushed the tops of her shoulders. It was shorter, maybe a bit younger, and a heck of a lot more manageable.

‘I was ready for a change,’ she said.

Change.

That was why she was here. She might as well get down to business and ask Charlie the question that had been burning her tongue all morning. If she didn’t do it soon she was likely to get distracted and end up going home without mentioning it at all. She opened her mouth to speak.

‘I don’t know about you,’ Charlie said in a grave voice, ‘but I can’t be expected to indulge in a month’s worth of gossip without a side order of caffeine—and possibly a muffin or three. It’s just not done.’

Ellie glanced over at the counter then stood up.

‘I’ll have a…’

Oh, flip. What was the word? She knew she knew it, but it seemed to be speeding away from her, like a dream that was fast evaporating with the last traces of sleep.

‘You know…the fluffy, milky drink with powder on top.’

Charlie didn’t bat an eyelid, bless her. ‘Two cappuccinos, please,’ she said to the barista.

Ellie leaned forward and looked at the girl over Charlie’s shoulder. ‘And a chocolate muffin, please.’

‘Make that two.’ Charlie turned and smirked at her while the barista rang up the sale. ‘That’s my girl. Couldn’t forget chocolate if you tried.’

If her mother or her sister had said something like that Ellie would have snapped at them, but she found herself laughing at Charlie’s sideways comment. Maybe she was too sensitive these days. And she’d wound herself up into a state about meeting Charlie before she’d even got here. No wonder her memory was malfunctioning. It always got worse when she was stressed or nervous.

Charlie understood. She made Ellie’s ‘condition’ seem like no big deal. That one positive thought gave her confidence. She was going to ask her. She was ready.

But the first cappuccinos had been drained and the second round ordered before Ellie finally worked up her nerve. She twiddled the silver locket she always wore between her thumb and forefinger.

‘Actually, Charlie, there was a reason I suggested getting together this morning. I need a favour.’

‘Anything. You know that.’ Charlie leaned forward and rubbed her forearm. ‘I’ll do anything I can to help.’

Ellie took at deep breath. She was asking for a lot more than the usual sympathetic ear or moral support at social functions. A lot more.

‘I need a job.’

Charlie just seemed to freeze. She blinked a couple of times. ‘A job?’

Ellie squeezed her bottom lip between her teeth and gave a little nod, but Charlie broke eye contact and took her time while she folded a corner of the newspaper page into a neat triangle. She glanced up once she’d scored it with a long, red fingernail.

‘I’m sorry, Ellie. I only need a couple of people in the office, and I’ve got all the staff I require at the moment.’

Oh, fab. Charlie thought she was asking her for a pity job—one with minimum responsibilities and no challenges. But Ellie couldn’t give up now. She was desperate. She stopped fiddling with her locket and folded her hands in her lap.

‘No. I mean I want you to put me on your agency’s books, preferably for a job where I can live in. I need to…get away from Barkleigh for a while. You must have something I could do? Something that uses my skills? You know I’m a fantastic cook.’

Charlie nodded and said nothing, but Ellie could see her mind working. She made a rather nice living running an exclusive little agency providing the well-off with domestic staff—from butlers and chauffeurs to cooks and nannies.

‘But are you…? Can you…?’ Charlie wrinkled her nose and paused.

Ellie knew what she was trying to ask, what she really didn’t want to put into words. Was the patched-up and rehabilitated Ellie capable of holding down a full-time job? The truth was, Ellie wasn’t even sure herself. She thought she was. She’d worked hard to put strategies and coping mechanisms in place to help with the memory and concentration problems that were so common after a serious head injury, but she was shaking in her boots at the idea of moving away from everything familiar and starting again somewhere new.

‘I just have to work a little bit harder than everyone else at keeping myself organised nowadays. But I can do this, Charlie. I know I can. I just need someone to believe in me and give me a chance, and you said you’d do anything you can to help.’

Okay, that was playing dirty, but she was desperate. The pained look on Charlie’s face was almost too much to bear. She wasn’t convinced. And if Ellie had been in her shoes maybe she wouldn’t have been either.

For a long time Charlie said nothing, and Ellie thought she might be creating brand-new wrinkles on her forehead with all the mental wrestling she was doing. Then, slowly, the lines faded.

‘Okay,’ she said, staring out of the window. ‘I just might have something. I’ll let you know.’

The cottage door slammed. There was something very final about the sound of the old door hitting the door frame. Ellie tried to remove the key from the worn Victorian lock, but it refused to budge.

Today was not going well. Lost keys, a case that wouldn’t shut and a pigeon stuck in the roof had already plagued her this morning. If she had been one to believe in bad omens she’d have run upstairs and hidden under her duvet a few hours ago. But the duvet was freshly laundered, waiting for someone else, and the rest of her life had been divided into packing boxes and suitcases. The cottage was now bare of all personal possessions, ready to be rented out by the week. The holiday lettings company had jumped at the chance of a child-friendly property in the picturesque little village of Barkleigh. Other families would build memories here now.

She caught the tip of her tongue between her teeth and resumed her negotiations with the lock. The choreographed sequence of turns, pulls and twists had long ago become a matter of muscle memory rather than conscious thought, and finally the key jerked free. It always did in the end. It just needed a little gentle persuasion.

It was time to leave. Ellie shoved her keys in the back pocket of her jeans and stared through the stained glass panels that filled the top half of the heavy old door. Once, the hallway had been warm and inviting, filled with discarded shoes, coats hanging haphazardly on a row of hooks. Now it was cold and empty, distorted through the rippling glass.

A large drop of rain splashed onto the top of her head. She shuddered, picked up the last piece of luggage, then turned and walked down the path towards her waiting car.

Ellie looked out across the fields. An overstuffed dark grey cloud was devouring the sunshine, heading straight towards her. Another plop of rain dropped on the back of her neck and ran down between her shoulder blades. She increased her speed. The boot of her old hatchback stood gaping and she slung the holdall in the back, slammed the door shut and hurried round to the driver’s door. The tempo of the rain increased. By the time she was inside it was drumming an unpromising rhythm on the roof of the car. Warm, earthy smells drifted through the ventilation system.

She glanced at the handbag sitting on the passenger seat. Poking out of the top was a worn blue teddy bear with one eye and bald ears where the fluff had been loved off. The backs of her eyes burned, but she refused to blink, knowing that any moisture leaking over her lashes would feel like acid. The pummelling on the roof of the car magnified, filling her ears and pulling the world away from her down a long, invisible tunnel.

Not now. Today of all days I need to keep it together.

She forced herself to sit upright in the driver’s seat and stared blindly into the blurry grey scenery beyond the windscreen, then turned the key in the ignition. The car rumbled grudgingly to life, coughed once, and promptly stalled.

Still she didn’t blink, just held her breath for a few seconds, then reached out to stroke the dashboard.

Come on, girl! Don’t let me down now.

She pumped the gas a few times and tried again, and when the engine rewarded her with an uneven purr, she released her breath and put the car into gear. She pulled away slowly, rumbling down the country lane, and didn’t allow herself the luxury of looking back.

An hour later she was sitting behind a caravan on the motorway. It was only going at about fifty, but she made no attempt to pass it. This speed was fine, thank you very much. Driving wasn’t her favourite occupation these days, and she hadn’t been on a motorway in a long time. She distracted herself from the haulage trucks passing her at insane speeds with thoughts of fresh starts and new jobs.

Everyone had been so happy when she’d come out of hospital after the accident, sure she was going to be ‘back to normal’ in no time. And after a year, when she’d finally moved out of her parents’ house and back into the cottage, her family and friends had breathed a collective sigh of relief.

That was it. Everything done and dusted. Ellie is all better and we can stop worrying now.

But Ellie wasn’t all better. Her hair might have grown again and covered the uneven scars on her skull, she might even talk and walk the same, but nothing, nothing, would ever be the same again. Underneath the ‘normal’ surface she was fundamentally different and always would be.

She focused on the droplets of rain collecting on the windscreen.

Water. That was all those tiny splashes were. Almost nothing, really. So how could something so inconsequential alter the course of three lives so totally, so drastically? She nudged the lever next to the steering wheel again and the specks of water vanished in a flurry of motion.

Thankfully, within a few minutes the rain had stopped completely and she was able to slow the squeaking wipers to a halt. Warm afternoon light cut clean paths through the clouds. Her shoulder blades eased back into their normal position and she realised she’d been clenching her teeth from the moment she’d put her foot on the accelerator. She made a conscious effort to relax her jaw and stretched her fingers. The knuckles creaked, stiff from gripping the steering wheel just a little too tightly.

A big blue sign was up ahead and she read it carefully.

Junction Eight. Two more to go.

She’d promised herself that she would not zone out and sail past the turn-off. Getting lost was not an option today.

The caravan in front slowed until it was practically crawling along. Ellie glanced in her wing mirror. She could overtake it if she wanted to. The adjacent lane was almost clear. Still, it took her five minutes and a stiff lecture before she signalled and pulled out.

She was still concentrating on remembering to exit at Junction Ten, visualising the number, burning it onto her short-term memory, when a prolonged horn blast startled her. A car loomed large in her rear-view mirror. It inched closer, until their bumpers were almost touching, its engine snarling. Ellie was almost frightened enough to speed up to give herself breathing room. Almost.

Flustered, she grabbed at the levers round the steering wheel for the indicator, only to discover she’d turned the fog light on instead. She fought to keep her breathing calm, yanked at the correct lever and pulled into the inside lane. What she now realised was a sleek Porsche zoomed past in a bright red blur.

A sigh of relief was halfway across her lips when the same car swerved in front of her. She stamped on the brake and glared at the disappearing number plate, retaliating by pressing her thumb on the horn for a good five seconds, even though the lunatic driver was now a speck in the distance, too far away to hear—or care.

It had to be a man. Too caught up in his own ego to think about anyone else. Pathetic. She had made a policy to keep her distance from that type of person, whether he was inside a low-slung car or out of it.

She shook her head and returned her concentration to the road, relieved to see she was only two miles from the next service station. An impromptu caffeine break was in order.

It wasn’t long before she was out of the car and sitting in an uncomfortable plastic seat with a grimy mug of coffee on the table in front of her. She cupped her hands round it and let the heat warm her palms.

The crazy Porsche driver had flustered her, brought back feelings and memories she had long tried to evade. Which on the surface seemed odd, because she couldn’t even remember the accident itself.

But perhaps it was better not to have been conscious as they’d cut her from the wreckage of the family car, the bodies of her husband and daughter beside her. Not that her battered memory didn’t invent images and torture her with them in the depths of the night.

She had no clear memories of the beginning of her hospital stay either. The doctors had told her this was normal. Post-traumatic amnesia. When she tried to think back to that time it was as if a cloud had settled over it, thick and impenetrable.

Sometimes she thought it would be nice to lose herself in that fog again, because emerging from it, scarred and confused, to find her lovely Sam and her darling eight-year-old Chloe were gone for ever had been the single worst moment of her existence.

All because it had rained. And because two boys in a fast car hadn’t thought that important. They’d been arrogant, thinking those little drops of almost nothing couldn’t stop them, couldn’t spoil their fun.

She looked down at her coffee. The cup was empty, but she didn’t remember drinking it.

Just as well.

Brown scum had settled at the bottom of the cup. Ellie shook off a shudder and patted down her unruly blonde curls, tucking the ends of the long fringe behind her ears. She couldn’t sit here all day nursing an empty cup of coffee. But moving meant getting back in the car and rejoining the motorway. Something she wanted to do even less now than she had when she’d left home this morning. She closed her eyes and slowly inflated her lungs.

Come on, Ellie. The only other option is admitting defeat and going back home to hibernate for ever. You can do this. You have to. Staying at the cottage is eating you alive from the inside out. You’re stagnating.

She opened her eyelids, smoothed her T-shirt down over her jeans, swung her handbag out from underneath the table and made a straight line for the exit.

Back on the road, her geriatric car protested as she reached the speed limit. She filtered out the rattling and let the solitude of the motorway envelop her. She wasn’t thinking of anything in particular, but she wasn’t giving her attention to the road either. Her mind was in limbo—and it was wonderful.

The sun emerged from the melting clouds and flickered through the tops of the trees. She flipped the visor down to shield her eyes. The slanting light reflected off the sodden carriageway and she peered hard at the road, struggling to see the white lines marking the lanes.

In fact, she was concentrating so hard she failed to notice the motorway sign on the grassy verge to her left.

Junction Ten.

CHAPTER TWO

WHEN she finally arrived, her new workplace was a bit of a surprise. Big shots like her new boss normally wanted their homes to shout out loud how rich and grand their owners were. Yet as she drove up the sweeping gravel drive and the woodland parted to reveal Larkford Place, she discovered a small but charming sixteenth-century manor house surrounded by rhododendrons and twisting oaks. The mellow red bricks were tinted gold by the rays of the setting sun, and the scent of lavender was thick in the air after the rain. The house was so much a part of its surroundings she could almost imagine it had grown up together with the ancient wisteria that clung to its walls.

For the first time since she’d decided to escape from her life she felt something other than fear or desperation. It was beautiful here. So serene. Hope surged through her—an emotion she hadn’t experienced in such a long time that she’d assumed it must have been wiped clear of her damaged memory banks with everything else.

The drive swelled and widened in front of the house, a perfect place to park cars. But this wasn’t where she was stopping—oh, no. It was the lowly tradesmen’s entrance for her. She changed gear and followed a narrower branch of the drive round the side of the house and into a cobbled courtyard. The old stables still had large glossy black doors, and Ellie admired the wrought-iron saddle rest that was bolted to the wall as she got out of her car and gave her legs a stretch.

Once out of the car, she stood motionless in the courtyard and stared at the ivy framing the back door. Wind rippled through it, making it shiver. With measured steps she approached it, pulling the key she’d picked up from the previous housekeeper out of her pocket, then sliding it into the old iron lock. She pushed the wooden door open and peered down a dark corridor.

The excitement she’d felt only moments ago drained away rapidly, gurgling in her stomach as it went. This threshold was where yesterday and tomorrow intersected. Crossing it felt final, as if by taking that step other doors in her life would slam shut and there would be no return.

But that was what she wanted, wasn’t it? To move forward? To leave the past behind?

She willed her right leg to swing forward and make the first step, and once she’d got that over with she marched herself down the corridor, her footsteps loud and squeaky on the flagstones, announcing her decision and scaring any ghosts away.

A door led to a bright spacious kitchen, with a pretty view of the garden through pair of French windows on the opposite side of the room.

Ellie turned on her heels and took a better look at the place that would be her domain from now on. It was a cook’s dream. The house had been newly renovated, and she’d been told the kitchen fitters had only finished last week. The appliances looked as if they’d walked straight out of a high-end catalogue. They even smelled new.

A long shelf along one wall held a row of pristine cookery books. She wandered over to them as if suddenly magnetised. Ooh. She’d been eyeing this one in her local bookshop only last week…

Without checking her impulse, she hooked a finger on the top of the binding and eased it off the shelf. She had plenty of time to explore the house—almost a whole week—before her new boss arrived home from his overseas trip. The wall planner and the sticky notes could come out tomorrow, when her brain was in better shape to make sense of all these unfamiliar sights and sounds. Right now she needed to rest. It had been a long and tiring day and she deserved a cup of tea and a sit-down. She opened the book and flicked a few pages. It was legitimate research, after all…

It didn’t take long to locate the kettle, the teabags and even a packet of chocolate digestives. While she waited for the water to boil she wandered round the kitchen, inspecting it more closely. What was that under the wall cabinet? It looked like a…

Oh, cool. A little flatscreen TV that flipped down and swivelled in any direction you wanted. She pressed the button on the side and a crisp, bright picture filled the screen—a teatime quiz show. She’d work out how to change channels later. For now it was just nice to have some colourful company in the empty house, even if the acid-voiced presenter was getting rather personal about a contestant who wasn’t doing very well.

She made her tea and hoisted herself onto one of the stools at the breakfast bar, the cookery book laid flat in front of her, and started dunking biscuits into her mug before sucking the chocolate off. Nobody was here to catch her, were they?

Now, what could she cook Mr Big Shot for dinner on his first night back? It had to be something impressive, something to make him want to hire her permanently when the three-month trial period was up.

Ellie suspected she wouldn’t have been offered the job if the man in question hadn’t been a) Charlie’s cousin and b) desperate for someone to start as soon as possible. Her new boss was something big in the music industry, apparently. She thought the name had sounded vaguely familiar, but she really didn’t keep up to date with that sort of thing any more.

Her oldest friend, Ginny, had actually seemed impressed when Ellie had made the announcement about her new job. She’d gushed and twittered and gone on about how lucky Ellie was. Ellie hadn’t stopped her, glad that Ginny had been too distracted to ask any difficult questions about the real reason for Ellie’s sudden need to uproot herself from her comfortable little life and flee.

But she wasn’t going to think about that at the moment. For once she was grateful for her brain’s tendency to flit onto a new subject without a backward glance, and turned her whole attention to the colourful book on the counter in front of her.

Now, was squid-ink pasta really as stupendous as those TV chefs made out? Or did they just use it because it made the pictures in their glossy cookbooks look good?

The cooking part of the job would be fun. She’d always enjoyed it, and had even taken a few courses at the local adult education college to hone her techniques before Chloe had been born. In the last couple of years it had become almost an obsession. But obsessions were something she could excel in these days, and since she’d been out of the workforce and had a lot of time on her hands it had been a perfect way to keep herself occupied. Funnily, it was the one skill she seemed to have clung on to without any deficit since the accident. She didn’t know why. Perhaps that knack of combining flavours and textures was held in a different part of the brain—one that hadn’t been shaken and swollen and bruised as the car had rolled and crumpled around her.

There it was again, that feeling that the world was retreating, leaving her in an echoey bubble all on her own. Her fingers automatically found her locket while she tried to distract herself with the book. Initially the print blurred and the pictures refused to stay in focus, but she blinked twice and forced her eyes to work in unison, and eventually everything slid back to normal.

The television was still on low in the background and Ellie glanced at it. The quiz show she’d had half an ear on was over and something else had started. It looked like some red carpet thing that was obviously going to clog up the TV schedule for the rest of the evening. An eager reporter in a low-cut top clutched her microphone and tried not to let on she was shivering in the brisk March wind.

Just then a graphic flashed up at the bottom of the screen. Ellie did a double-take, then lurched forward in an effort to get closer to the television—anything to help her unscramble the images swarming up her optic nerve and into her brain.

‘That’s—that’s him!’

The book lay on the counter, forgotten, and her finger, which had been scanning a list of ingredients, now hovered uselessly in mid-air. She jumped off the stool, walked over to the little TV and used that very same finger to drum on the volume button.

‘Mark Wilder’, the caption at the bottom of the screen said.

Her new boss.

Crumbs, she could see why Ginny had gone all twittery now. He certainly was very good-looking, all ruffled dark hair and perfect teeth. Not that those things really mattered when it came down to forging a long-lasting relationship. Nice dental work amounted to nothing if the man in question turned out to be a shallow, self-centred waste of space. She was much more interested in what a man was like on the inside.

She looked at Mark Wilder again, really looked at him. He was about the same age as her. Mid-thirties? Possibly older if he was aging well—and, let’s face it, his sort usually did. But who was he beneath the crisp white shirt and the designer suit? More importantly, what would he be like to work for? She stood, hands on hips, and frowned a little. When Charlie had phoned to offer this position she’d been too excited that her plan was coming to fruition to think much about her future employer. He’d been more of an escape route than a person, really.

Suddenly a woman slid into shot beside him—early twenties, gravity-defying bust and attire that, if it stretched in the wash, might just qualify as a dress.

Ellie sighed.

Oh, he was that kind of man. How disappointing.

The reporter in the cleavage-revealing top didn’t seem to be bothered, though. She lurched at him from behind the metal barrier. ‘Mr Wilder! Melissa Morgan from Channel Six!’

Oh, yes. That was her name.

This should be interesting. From what Ellie remembered, this woman had a reputation for asking awkward questions, being a little bit sassy with her interviewees. It made for great celebrity soundbites. You never knew what juicy little secrets she might get her victims to accidentally reveal.

Wilder spotted the reporter and strode over to her, his movements lean and easy. In the crowd, a couple of hundred pairs of female eyes swivelled to track his progress. Except, ironically, those of his girlfriend. She was looking straight at the camera lens.

Even the normally cool reporter was fawning all over him. Not that Wilder seemed to mind. His eyes held a mischievous twinkle as he waited for her to ask her question.

‘Pull yourself together, woman!’ Ellie mumbled as she brushed biscuit crumbs off the cookery book with the side of her hand.

Melissa Morgan blushed and asked her question in a husky voice. ‘Are you confident your newest client, Kat De Souza, will be picking up the award for best female newcomer this evening?’

Go on, Ellie silently urged. Prove me wrong. Be charming and gracious and modest.

He increased the wattage on his smile. The reporter looked as if she was about to melt into a puddle of pure hormones.

‘I have every confidence in Kat,’ he said in a warm, deep voice, appearing desperately serious. But then his eyes did that twinkly thing again. ‘Of course, having superior management doesn’t hurt.’

How did he do that? Special eye drops?

Of course the reporter fell for it. She practically tripped over her own tongue as she asked the next question. Wilder, in turn, lapped up the attention, deliberately flirting with her—well, maybe not flirting, exactly, but he had to be doing something to make her go all giggly like that.

Ellie reached for another digestive without taking her eyes off the television, and knocked the packet onto the floor. The man seemed to be enjoying the fact that a couple of million viewers were catching every second of his very public ego massage. And what was even more annoying was that he batted each of the reporter’s questions away with effortless charm, never losing his cool for an instant.

There was no end to the reporter’s gushing. ‘I’m sure you are not surprised to discover that, due to your success as one of the top managers in the recording industry today, Gloss! magazine has named you their most eligible bachelor in their annual list.’

He clasped his hand to his chest in mock surprise. ‘What? Again!’

Oh, great. Self-deprecating as well as shy and retiring. This guy was going to be a blast to work for. Just as well Charlie had said he spent the greater part of the year travelling or in endless meetings.

He stopped smiling and looked deep into the reporter’s eyes. ‘Well, somebody had better just hurry up and marry me, then.’ He looked around the crowd. The grin made an encore. ‘Anyone interested?’

The reporter blushed and stuttered. Was it just Ellie’s imagination, or was she actually considering vaulting the barrier? And Ellie didn’t think she was the only one. Something about the scene reminded her of a Sunday night nature programme she’d seen recently—one about wildebeest. A stampede at this moment was almost inevitable.

She flapped her book closed, ignoring the puff of crumbs that flew into the air, and let out a snort.

The reporter stopped simpering and suddenly smoothed her hair down with her free hand. Her spine straightened. About time too, Ellie thought. This woman was supposed to be a professional. How embarrassing to catch yourself acting like that on national television.

This time when she fired her question, the reporter’s voice was cool and slow. ‘Was it hard to rebuild your career after such…difficult beginnings, both in your professional and personal life?’

Her face was a picture of sympathy, but the eyes glittered with a hint of ice. Ellie almost felt a tremor of sympathy for him. But not quite.

Something other than lazy good humour flashed in Mark Wilder’s eyes.

‘Thanks for the good wishes.’ He paused as his stare hardened and turned to granite. ‘Good evening, Ms Morgan.’ And then he just turned and walked away.

The reporter’s jaw slackened. It was as if she’d been freeze-framed by her own personal remote control and all she could do was watch him stride away. The camera shook a little, then panned to include Mr Wilder’s companion. Miss Silicone pouted a smile and trotted after her man, leaving the floundering reporter to find another celebrity to fill the gaping space in front of her microphone. She turned back to the cameraman, looking more than a little desperate, and then the picture cut to a long shot of the red carpet.

Ellie shook her head, punched the button on the side of the TV and flapped it back into place under the cabinet. She was starting to fear that this whole new job idea was one of the random impulses that had plagued her since the accident—just another one of her brain’s little jokes.

She tucked the cookery book under her arm and tossed the empty biscuit packet in the direction of the bin. It missed.

With a few long strides Mark put as much distance as he could between himself and the trouble his smart mouth had caused him. Flashguns zapped at him from every direction. Suddenly his expensive suit seemed really flimsy. No protection at all, really.

He’d been bored enough to welcome the devilish urge to tease Melissa Morgan, but he’d forgotten that behind the batting eyelashes was an intelligent reporter—one who didn’t hesitate to go for the jugular where a morsel of celebrity gossip was concerned. She’d done a number on quite a few of his firm’s clients in recent years, and the opportunity for a little payback had just been too tempting. But it had backfired on him, hadn’t it? The story he’d wanted her to focus on tonight was Kat and her award nomination, not his own less-than-glorious past.

He glanced at the crowd bulging against the barriers as he overtook an up-and-coming British actress in a long, flowing gown. He should be loving every second of this. It was the life he’d always worked for. What most people sitting in front of their TVs with their dinners on their laps dreamed of—red carpets, beautiful women, fast cars, exotic locations, more cash than they knew what to do with…

So what was wrong with him?

He shook his head to clear the baying of the photographers, the screaming of the crowd, and became aware of determined footsteps behind him.

Oh, heck. Melodie. Ms Morgan must have got him more rattled than he’d thought. He gave himself a mental slap for his lack of chivalry and turned and waited for her. She was only a few paces behind him, and as she came level with him he placed a guiding hand on her elbow.

Melodie’s agent had called his PA a couple of weeks ago and asked if he would like to meet her. This was what the love lives of the rich and famous had come to. Relationships were practically conducted in the third person. My people will call your people…

He didn’t normally respond to requests like this, but he’d needed a date tonight at short notice, and Melodie was young, sexy and stunning—just the sort of woman he was expected to have on his arm at a bash like this. It didn’t matter that he suspected she didn’t have any romantic yearnings for him when he’d called to ask her out. And that the industry grapevine had confirmed that a certain C-list model was looking to kick-start a pop career.

It was all very predictable. But predictable was good. At least he knew what to expect from this self-serving approach, even if his choice in female companions only inflamed the tabloid gossip about his private life. He hadn’t even met half the women the papers had paired him with. And the ones he did date were just like the woman walking next to him: happy to use him for their own ends.

Good for them. It was a dog-eat-dog world and he’d learned one vital piece of wisdom early on: the woman who talked of love and commitment was the one who turned and bit you on the butt when you were least expecting it. He had the scars to prove it.

They moved inside the old theatre. Had they redone the décor in here? It had seemed opulent and elegant last time he was here, but now the crimson walls screamed at him, and the gold leaf everywhere just hurt his eyes.

He hadn’t planned on coming to the awards this evening, but duty had called. Or, to be more accurate, duty had cried and pleaded down the phone in the shape of his newest and youngest signing, Kat De Souza.

They reached a flight of stairs and he held back and let Melodie walk up the sweeping staircase in front of him. Her dress was shimmering silver, backless, with a neckline slashed almost to her navel. It clung in all the right places. And Melodie certainly had places. Mark did his best to appreciate the view, but his pulse was alarmingly regular. Just another indicator that he was out of sorts tonight. Must be the jet lag.

An usher led them to their table at the front of the auditorium. Kat was already there, with her boyfriend du jour. This one was a drummer, or something like that. Mark pulled out Melodie’s chair for her and made the introductions, then leaned across to Kat.

‘Nervous?’

Her head bobbed in small, rapid movements.

‘Sorry I woke you up and snivelled down the phone at you the other day.’ She paused to twirl one of her long dark ringlets around a finger with a bitten-down nail before looking up at him again. ‘The time differences are so confusing, and I was in a bit of a state.’

He remembered. Technically, although he’d been the one to ‘discover’ Kat, after he’d walked past her busking on the Underground, he wasn’t her personal manager. He was careful not to get too close to his clients nowadays, normally leaving the legwork to his junior associates. He’d been in the business long enough to pay his dues, and had ridden more tour buses and slept on more recording studio floors during all-night recording sessions than he cared to remember. He’d paired Kat up with Sasha, a hip, energetic young woman at his firm who had the potential to go far. But where he’d hoped there would be female bonding, there had only been friction.

In the end he’d decided to step in and take an active interest for a few months—ease the teething process, if you like. Kat was only seventeen, and a bit overwhelmed at her sudden shove into the spotlight. She needed stability at the moment, not constant bickering. A happy client was a productive client, after all.

Mark smiled back at Kat and waited for her to finish fidgeting with her hair. ‘Who needs sleep, anyway?’ he said, giving her a little wink.

‘I’m so grateful you changed your plans and flew in at the last minute. I’m frantic! I don’t know whether I’m more scared of winning or not winning. How crazy is that? And I reckon I need all the support I can get.’

The scruffy excuse for a musician sitting next to her swigged a mouthful of champagne out of the bottle and produced a proud burp. Mark shifted position and tried to block his view of him with the avant-garde floral arrangement exploding from the centre of the table.

Great choice of support, Kat. First class.

Proof, yet again, that his client was young and naive and definitely needed a guiding hand.

With the uncanny knack females had of confirming his opinions of them, Kat reached for the glass of champagne in front of her and swung it towards her lips. Mark’s arm shot out in a reflex action that stopped the flute reaching its destination.

‘Hey!’

He prised the glass from her fingers. ‘No, you don’t, young lady! You’re underage.’

Kat’s chin jutted forward as she had one of her teenage Jekyll and Hyde moments, switching from sweet and grateful to sour and belligerent in the snap of a finger. ‘Chill out, Mark! You can’t tell me what to do, anyway. You only manage my career, not my personal life.’

Okay, technically she was right. And if it had been anyone else on his agency’s books he would have minded his own business. But it just didn’t seem right to sit there and do nothing.

‘No, you’re right. I can’t tell you what to do, but I can advise you. It’s my job to look after your best interests. It’s what I take my fifteen percent for, after all.’ He placed the glass out of reach behind the spiky centrepiece. ‘Anyway, you don’t want to be tipsy when you collect the award later. And I mean when, not if.’

When in doubt, flatter. It always worked. He raised his eyebrows and waited for the thaw.

Kat’s blistering stare softened a fraction. Girls of her age could be fiendishly stubborn. It was just as well he seemed to have the knack of charming each and every female he met, whether they were nine or ninety. Kat continued to glower at him, but he knew he’d won. He would let her back down gracefully without pressing the point further.

‘Water is better for my voice, anyway,’ she said, lounging back on her revolting boyfriend to give him a defiant kiss.

Mark beckoned a waiter and smiled to himself while his face was hidden.

Six months ago no one had heard of Kat De Souza. Despite her youth, she had a wonderfully mature soulful voice. Not only that, but she wrote the most amazing love songs and played the acoustic guitar to accompany herself. Her pared-down debut single had been a smash hit, catapulting her to overnight fame. His firm’s expertise and connections had helped, of course, but she had ten times the talent of some of his other clients. Securing a recording deal had been a breeze. Now he just had to make sure that the pressure and the insanity of the music industry didn’t derail her before she got to where she was destined to go.

He watched Kat bite her thumbnail down to a level that surely had to be painful. Mature talent, sure, but she was still just a scared schoolgirl underneath all the bluster. He was glad he’d shuffled his life around to be here tonight.

At that moment a wave of unexpected tiredness rolled over him. He hid a yawn and ignored the jet lag pulling at his eyelids.

It was going to be a long night.

Once Ellie had rustled herself up something more filling than biscuits to eat from the well-stocked larder, she decided to give herself a tour of Larkford Place. Tomorrow she’d get her Post-it notes out and label every door in the house—which was saying something. It seemed as if there were hundreds of them, all leading to rooms and corridors you wouldn’t expect them to.

The scraps of coloured paper would be gone again by the time her boss returned, of course. It wasn’t everybody’s taste in décor. But in the meantime they’d help her to create some new neural pathways, remember the layout of the house. So, hopefully, when she wanted to cook something she’d end up in the kitchen and not the broom cupboard. She’d had to resort to this technique when she’d returned to the cottage after the accident, which had seemed utterly ridiculous. How could she have lived in a house for almost a decade and not remember where her bedroom was?

But it had all sunk in again eventually. And it would happen here at Larkford too, if she had time and a little bit of peace and quiet so she could concentrate. She mentally thanked Charlie again for organising things so she could have a week here on her own before her boss arrived back from wherever that red carpet was. Had Charlie mentioned New York…?

As she wandered round, she was pleased to find that the inside of Larkford Place was as lovely as its exterior. It oozed character. No steel and glass ground-breaking interior design here, thank goodness. Just ornate fireplaces and plasterwork, high ceilings and ancient leaded windows.

Ellie’s jaw clicked as she let out a giant yawn. Fatigue was a normal part of her condition—due to the fact she had to concentrate on things most people did automatically. And today had been a day that had required an awful lot of mental and emotional energy. No wonder she was ready to drop. It was time to check out the housekeeper’s apartment above the old stables, so she could crash into bed and become blissfully unconscious.

She pulled a couple of bags out of the boot of her car as she passed it, and made her way up the stairs to her new home. But when she opened the door, the smell of damp carpet clogged her nostrils. And it wasn’t hard to see why. Water was dripping through a sagging bulge in the ceiling, and the living room floor was on its way to becoming a decent-sized duck pond. There was no way she could sleep in here tonight.

So she dragged her bags back to the main house, up the stairs and into one of the guest rooms on the first floor. By the time she’d left a message with a local plumber and placed some kitchen pans underneath the damaged ceiling to catch the worst of the dripping water, the yawns were coming every five seconds. She only made it through half of her unpacking before she decided it was time to stop what she was doing and tootle down the hallway to the bathroom she’d spotted earlier before falling into bed.

But as she lay there in the dark, with only the creakings of the old house for company, she found she could close her eyelids but sleep was playing hide-and-seek. Running away from home had seemed such a good idea a few weeks ago, but now she was second-guessing her impulse.

What if she proved Charlie’s unspoken fears to be right? What if she wasn’t up to the job?

And she needed to be up to this job, she really did—for so many reasons.

She’d just about come to terms with the fact that the accident had not only destroyed her perfect family, it had also altered her brain permanently. She would never be the same person she’d been before that day, never be the Ellie she knew herself to be.

Sometimes it felt as if she were inhabiting the body of a stranger, and she could feel her old self staring over her shoulder, noticing the things she couldn’t do any more, raising her eyebrows at the mood swings and the clumsiness.

She rolled over and tried another position. Was it possible to haunt yourself? She certainly hoped not. She had enough ghosts to outrun as it was.

She sighed and clutched the duvet a little closer to her chest.

Maybe she’d never be that person again, but this job was her lifeline, her chance to prove to herself and everyone else that she wasn’t a waste of space. This was her chance to be normal again, away from the judging eyes and the sympathetic glances. She was just going to have to be the best darn housekeeper that Mr Mark Wilder had ever had.

As the awards ceremony dragged on Mark was proved right. It had been an incredibly long night.

Melodie was irritating him. The package was pretty, but there wasn’t much inside to interest him. He had tried to engage her in talk about the music industry, but even though she was trying to veer her career in that direction she seemed superbly uninformed about the business.

The show was good, but he had the feeling he’d seen it all before—the pseudo-feuds between cool, young indie bands, the grandpa rockers behaving badly as they presented awards and the hip-grinding dance routines by girls wearing little more than scarves. Well, maybe he didn’t object to the skimpy dresses that much, he thought with a chuckle. He was tired, not dead.

The only highlight of the evening had been Kat’s victory in the ‘Best Newcomer’ category. Nobody else might have noticed the way her hands shook as she held the supposedly funky-looking trophy, but Mark had. She’d accepted her award with simple thanks, then performed her latest single, sitting alone on the stage except for her guitar and a spotlight. The whole audience had been silent as her husky voice had permeated the sweaty atmosphere. When she’d finished, even the most jaded in the crowd of musicians and industry professionals had given her an ovation.

The remainder of the ceremony was a blur as Mark tried to keep his eyes open. He began to regret the two glasses of champagne he’d drunk. He hadn’t eaten since the flight this morning, and the alcohol was having a less than pleasant effect on him. Instead of mellowing him out, everything jarred. All he wanted to do was get home and sleep for a week solid.

The ceremony drew to a close and Kat leaned over to Mark. ‘Are you coming to the after-show party?’

Melodie, who was eavesdropping, looked hopeful.

Mark shook his head. ‘I’m tired and jet-lagged. I’m going home to bed.’

Melodie looked even more hopeful.

Erm…I don’t think so, sweetheart.

It was time to ease himself out of the situation. Melodie would probably be happier at the party, mixing with the boy bands, anyway. He gave her a non-commital, nice-to-have-met-you kiss on the cheek. ‘I know I’m being boring, but why don’t you join the others at the party? I’m sure Kat and…er…’

‘Razor,’ said Kat helpfully.

‘Razor will look after you.’

Melodie weighed her options up for a second, and decided the offer wasn’t too shabby after all. ‘That’s cool,’ she said in her little-girl voice and flicked her hair extensions.

Mark slipped away, leaving the theatre by the back exit, happy to distance himself from the muffled roar of the paparazzi as the stars emerged onto the red carpet out front. He fished his mobile phone out of his jacket pocket and called a cab, telling the driver to meet him in a backstreet close by, then ran a hand through his unruly mop of dark hair and made his way down an alley. Only when he had emerged from the shadow of the theatre did he loosen the top button of his shirt and breathe in a luxurious lungful of cool night air.

CHAPTER THREE

SO MUCH for sleeping for a week solid. Someone was making a racket on the landing. How inconsiderate could you get?

Mark sat up in bed, cold reality only just intruding on his nice, warm sleep haze.

After the awards ceremony he’d had the urge to get right out of the city, so instead of asking the cab driver to make the short trip to his flat on the river, Mark had made him very happy and told him the destination was Sussex.

There was another noise from the landing. Nothing loud, but someone was definitely out there. He hadn’t dreamt it. There was only one explanation. It was after two in the morning and someone was in his house. Someone he hadn’t invited because he was supposed to be here on his own. That wasn’t good.

Mark jumped out of bed, wondering what he might have to hand in his bedroom that would help in a situation like this, but it was pitch-dark and he didn’t have a clue where to start fumbling. He knew his squash racket was in the house somewhere…

But he didn’t have time even to reach for the lamp by his bed. Just then the door slammed open. Mark tensed, unable to see who or what had just invaded his bedroom. A split-second later something—someone—barrelled into him.

He didn’t have time to think, just reached out and grabbed him. There was no way some snotty youth from the village was going to swipe his silver, or his high-tech audio gear, or whatever it was he was after.

A struggle ensued and he finally got the lad pinned down on the floor. Now what? How was he going to call the police without—? ‘Ow!’

A searing pain radiated from his right collarbone. The little runt had bitten him! Actually sunk his teeth in and clenched hard! And now he was getting away, even though Mark didn’t remember letting him go. He grabbed for the intruder and was rewarded with an ankle.

Well, it was better then nothing.

Time to take the upper hand. And the first thing was to see who he was dealing with. They were both shouting at each other—although it seemed to be more sounds than words that he was deciphering. He lunged for the bedside lamp and switched it on.

And that was when things really got confusing. Maybe he was dreaming after all.

This was no lad from the village. Not with those soft blonde ringlets and wide green eyes. And she was wearing…pyjamas! He flushed hot at the thought, though he hardly knew why. They were thick brushed cotton and only hinted at the curves beneath. Now, he knew some women could be a little over-keen to meet him, but this was just ridiculous!

And then she started babbling, and in the string of words he heard his own name.

‘I know who I am. Who on earth are you?’

She looked up at him, breathless and blushing. The only motion he was aware of was the uneven rise and fall of the curves under her pyjama top; the only noise was their mingled rapid breathing. And then she spoke.

‘I’m Ellie Bond—your new housekeeper.’

He’d been clenching his jaw in anger, but now it relaxed. His eyes widened as the sleep fog cleared from his brain. She pulled her arms and legs into herself and sat ball-like at his feet, suddenly looking like a little girl. She began to shiver.

Truth was, he had no idea how to handle this. And it was better if she got out of here before he said or did something he’d regret in the morning.

‘You’d better get back to your room,’ he said.

She should have known something was up when she’d tripped over that stray shoe. She never left her shoes lying around. And last night had been no different. She’d kicked them off and placed them neatly beside her case before going to bed. At home, her make-up might be spilled all over the dressing table, her jeans might be hanging by one leg over the back of a chair, but she always put her shoes away. Mainly because she only wore something on her feet when absolutely necessary. Her feet liked freedom.

Ellie stretched. Apparently a bulldozer had run over her last night while she’d drifted in and out of sleep—and then had reversed and had another go. There was no point trying to drop off again now. She was an early bird by nature and she knew her body clock would refuse.

She gave up squeezing her eyelids closed and rolled over and looked at the curtains. Dawn wasn’t far away. Maybe some fresh air would stop her brain spinning in five different directions at once. She pulled a huge cable-knit sweater on over her pyjamas. Since she didn’t own a pair of slippers she tugged a pair of flip-flops from the jumble at one end of her case.

Once she was ready she paused, listening for any hint of movement from the room next door. There was nothing.

Now she was satisfied the coast was clear, she headed into the hallway and stopped briefly to reassess the scene of the crime, counting the doors on this side of the corridor. Four. There was a small cupboard opposite the bathroom that she could have sworn hadn’t been there before.

Not wanting to get caught in her pyjamas a second time, she turned in the opposite direction and went down the narrow staircase towards the kitchen, a room far enough away from the bedrooms for her to finally breathe out and think. Once there, she switched the kettle on and looked aimlessly round the room. The passageway that led into the cobbled courtyard was visible through the half-open door. Her car was sitting out there, ready to go. One of her mad impulses hit her.

What if she just ran out through the door this minute, jumped in her car and bombed out of the front gates, never to be seen again? Tingles broke out all over her arms. The urge to do just that was positively irresistible. It was only six o’ clock.

Breathe. Think…

She recognised this itchy feeling for what it was—another legacy of her head injury. It was all very well to know that her impulse control was permanently out of whack, but another thing entirely to tap into that knowledge when you were in the magnetic grip of what seemed like the best idea ever and find the strength to resist it.

She should be thankful, though. At least she was just a bit harum-scarum these days. Some of the other people she’d met during her rehabilitation had it far worse. How could she forget Barry, who didn’t seem to realise that grabbing the rear end of every woman he clapped eyes on wasn’t appropriate behaviour? Or Fenella, the posh old lady who swore like a trooper if she didn’t have an even number of peas on her plate at dinnertime, all lined up in rows? Ellie nodded to herself. Oh, yes. Things could be a lot worse. She just had to keep remembering that.

As if she could forget, when last night’s disastrous run-in with the boss was clearly going to get her fired.

She brewed herself a strong cup of tea and opened the French windows that led onto a wide patio. The garden was beautiful in the soft early-morning sunshine. She breathed deeply and walked along the smooth grey flagstones till she emerged from the shadow of the house into the warmth of the sunrise. She skirted the lavender hedge, sipping her mug of tea, and stepped onto a rectangle of lush, close-clipped grass. It was heavy with dew and springy underfoot. Her head fell back and she stayed motionless for a minute or so, feeling the sun’s rays on her cheeks and inhaling the clean, pure scents of the awakening garden.

This reminded her of mornings at her cottage years ago. Sometimes she would wake early and sneak out into the garden before Sam and Chloe stirred. The garden had been Ellie’s place to centre herself, to pause from the hectic pace of life and just be. She would walk out barefoot and let the soft blades of the lawn tickle her toes. Then she would wander about, clearing her head by talking out loud. Sometimes she just rambled to herself; sometimes she couldn’t help looking skyward and thanking God for all the amazing things that made her life perfect.

When she returned to the cottage she would be able to hear the machinery of the day starting to whirr—the clattering of toothbrushes in the bathroom, footsteps on the stairs. However busy the day got after that, she carried a sense of peace with her that had been born in the quiet of the day. It had been her secret ritual.

But she hadn’t done it for years—not since Sam and Chloe had died. There was no peace to be found anywhere. Did she think she’d find it under a bush in her own back garden? Not likely. And as for God, she’d been tempted to stand outside late at night and scream at Him for being so cruel. They hadn’t been on speaking terms since.

Ellie bent down to examine a cobweb glistening between the branches of a small shrub. Beads of moisture clinging to each strand reflected the sunlight like a thousand tiny mirrors.

What was she going to do? She was all alone and in a terrible mess. Her pretty dreams about being independent, free from the past, had come crashing down around her ears in less than twenty-four hours. What a fool she’d been to think she could outrun her ghosts.

A tear bulged in the corner of her eye. She sniffed and wiped it away with her middle finger. Thoughts were scrambling around inside her head, so she stood still and let the spring sun warm her inside and out. Then, when she was ready, she shook off her flip-flops and walked, and talked to the faultless blue sky until the words ran dry.

A floorboard on the landing creaked. Ellie stopped stuffing clothes randomly into bags and held her breath at the back of her throat.

She’d heard noises upstairs some time after noon, and had scurried up here not long after that. It was amazing just how long it could take a person to pack two cases and a couple of smaller bags. She’d made it last all afternoon.

But for once her reasoning panned out: the longer she left it before she saw him again, the less embarrassed she would feel and the easier it would be to handle her emotions when he asked her to leave. It couldn’t hurt to delay the inevitable confrontation with her soon-to-be-ex-boss until she’d finished packing and was on an even keel.

She squashed the T-shirt she was holding into the case in front of her and reached for her wash bag. It slid out of her fingers, but she managed to snatch at it, gripping it between forefinger and thumb before it reached the floor. Unfortunately her quick reflexes didn’t stop the contents spilling out and scattering all over the rug. With all her limbs occupied just preventing the bag from falling, she couldn’t do anything but watch as her tube of toothpaste bounced on the floor, then disappeared deep under the bed.

So much for an even keel. The world was still stubbornly off-kilter and refusing to go right side up.

She lifted Chloe’s blue teddy from where she’d placed it on her pillow the night before and pressed it to her face. For a while it had smelled of her daughter, but the scent of strawberry shampoo had long since faded. Ellie kissed it with reverence and placed it beside the case.

She’d only allowed herself a few treasures from home, and they had been the first things she’d pulled from her luggage when she’d unpacked. Propped on the bedside table was a single silver picture frame. The photo it held was her favourite of her and Sam together, taken on their honeymoon. They’d handed their camera to the retired couple in the next hotel room and asked them to take a snap on the day they’d travelled home.

She preferred this picture to the forced poses of her wedding photos. They were laughing at each other, hair swept sideways by the wind, not even aware of the exact moment the shutter had opened. She traced a finger over her husband’s cheek.

Her beautiful Sam.

He had been so warm and funny, with his lopsided grin and wayward hair. When he’d died it had been like losing a vital organ. Living and breathing were just so hard without him.

They’d met on the first day of primary school and been inseparable ever since, marrying one week after they’d both graduated from university. Sam had taken a teaching post at the village school and she’d commuted to the City, working as a PA for a big City firm, and they’d saved to buy the rundown cottage on the outskirts that they’d fallen in love with. They’d transformed the tumble-down wreck bit by bit, scouring architectural salvage yards for stained glass, old taps and doorknobs. They had even rescued an old roll-top bath out of one of their neighbour’s gardens—removing the geraniums before it was plumbed in.

When the last lick of paint had dried, they had proclaimed it their dream home and immediately started trying for a family. The following spring, they’d come home from the hospital with Chloe, a tiny pink bundle with fingers and toes so cute they’d verged on the miraculous. Ellie had almost felt guilty about being more happy than a person had a right to be.

But one wet afternoon had robbed her of all of it.

Her smile dissolved and she pushed the frame flat and folded the photo up in her pyjamas before tucking it into a well-padded corner of her sturdiest case.

When she’d moved back home after her rehabilitation, well-meaning friends and family had taken one of two approaches—some had wanted her to freeze-frame time and never do anything, the rest had dropped great clanging hints at her feet about moving on with her life. Their insensitivity had astounded her.

Move on? She hadn’t wanted to move on! She’d wanted things back the way they were before. Chloe’s pink wellies in the hallway. Sam bent over the kitchen table marking homework. But that was impossible. So she’d settled for hibernating in the present. But hibernating hadn’t taken long to become festering. Perhaps she should be glad that events in the village had forced her to leave.

She zipped up her bulging case, then sat on the edge of the bed and stared at the elegant surroundings.

Her journey had led her here, to Larkford Place. Unfortunately only a brief pit-stop. She hadn’t a clue what she’d do next. She could stay at the cottage for a few weeks if there weren’t any holiday bookings. But that would be going back, and now she was finally ready to move forward she didn’t want to do that.

However, she didn’t really have much choice after last night.

It was time she hauled her things down to the car. She picked up a case in one hand and stuffed a smaller one under her other arm, leaving her hand free to open the door. She tugged it open and froze.

Mark Wilder was standing straight in front of her, fist bunched ready as if to knock.

Mark dropped his hand, stuffed it in his back pocket and pulled out a wad of folded twenty-pound notes. He held them out to Ellie.

‘I thought you might need this.’

She stared at him as if he was offering her a hand grenade.

‘For the shopping,’ he added.

‘Shopping?’

‘Yes. Shopping. You know, with money…’

He waved the notes in front of her chin. Her eyes moved left and right, left and right, following the motion of his hand.

‘Money?’

This was harder work than he’d thought it would be.

‘Yes. Money. It’s what we use in the civilised world when we’ve run out of camels to barter with.’

‘But I thought…’ She fidgeted with a small silver locket hanging round her neck. ‘You’d…I’d be…’

Colour flared on her cheeks and she stepped away from him. He looked at the notes in his hand. She didn’t seem to understand the concept of shopping, which was a definite minus in a housekeeper. His decision to view last night as an embarrassing one-off started to seem premature.

He stepped through the door frame and followed her into the room. There were cases and bags on the bed. They were lumpy enough to look as if they had been filled in a hurry. The zips weren’t done up all the way, and something silky was falling out of the holdall nearest to him. He really should stop looking at it.

Ellie followed his gaze and dived for the bag, stuffing the item back in so deep that most of her arm disappeared. Now he was just staring at a pile of cases.

Cases? He tilted his head. Oh. Right. She thought he was going to give her the sack.

Well, as tempting as the idea might be, he couldn’t afford to do that at present. Firstly because he’d never hear the end of it from Charlie, and secondly because he really did need someone here to look after the house while he was travelling. He was due on another plane in less than twenty-four hours and he simply didn’t have the luxury of finding someone else. It had been hard enough to fill the position at short notice when Mrs Timms had decided to leave.

Maybe it was time to work some of the legendary Wilder magic and put this Ellie Bond at ease. If he showed her he was laughing off the incident last night, it might help her relax.

Mark waited for her to finish fiddling with the bag, and then pulled a smile out of his arsenal—the one guaranteed to melt ice maidens at fifty paces.

‘Well, I’m glad to see you’re still in your own room, anyway.’ He threw in a wink, just to make sure she knew he was joking. ‘With your track record, we can’t be too careful.’

Hmm. Strange. Nothing happened. No thaw whatsoever.

‘There’s no need to go on about that. It’s just that I wasn’t expecting anyone else to be here, and I’m not familiar with the layout of the house yet, and I just…the moon went in…I counted three instead of four…’ The babbling continued.

There was one thing that was puzzling him. If she’d wanted a bathroom, why had she trekked down the hall?

‘Why didn’t you just use the en-suite?’

She stopped mid-babble. ‘En-suite?’

He walked over to a cream-coloured panelled door on the opposite wall to the bed, designed to match the wardrobe on the other side of the chimney breast. He nudged it gently with his knuckles and it clicked open. Her jaw lost all muscle tone as she walked slowly towards the compact but elegant bathroom.

She shook her head, walked in, looked around and walked out again, still blessedly silent. Actually, his new housekeeper seemed relatively normal when she stopped biting and yelling and babbling.

He had a sudden flashback to the night before—to the baggy blue and white pyjamas that hadn’t been quite baggy enough to disguise her curves—and he started to get a little flustered himself.

‘I have a…bathroom…inside my wardrobe?’

He gave a one-shouldered shrug. ‘Actually, it’s not quite as Narnia-like as it seems. The wardrobe is that side.’ He pointed to an identical cream door the other side of the chimney breast. ‘We just had the door to the en-suite built to match. Secret doors seem to suit a house like this.’

The look on her face told him she thought it was the stupidest idea ever.

‘I thought it was fun,’ he said, willing her to smile back at him, to join him in a little light banter and laugh the whole thing off as an unfortunate first meeting. She just blinked.

‘Anyway,’ he continued with a sigh, ‘let’s just see if we can get through the next twenty-four hours without something—or someone—going bump in the night.’

‘I told you before. It was an accident,’ she said, scrunching her forehead into parallel lines.

It looked as if she was tempted to bite him again. Humour was obviously not the way to go. Back to business, then. That had to be safe territory, didn’t it?

‘Okay, well take this for now.’ He placed the money on the chest of drawers while she watched him suspiciously. ‘I’m getting a credit card sorted out for the household expenses, and a laptop so we can keep in touch via e-mail. I just need you to sign a few forms, if that’s all right?’

She nodded, but her eyes never left him, as if she was expecting him to make a sudden move.

Mark wandered over to the bed, picked up the sad-looking blue bear sitting next to one of the cases and gave it a cursory inspection. He wouldn’t have expected her to be the sort who slept with a teddy, but, hey, whatever rocked her boat. He tossed it back on the bed. It bounced and landed on the floor. Ellie rushed to scoop it up, clutched it to her chest and glared at him.

He raked his fingers through his hair. It was time to beat a hasty retreat.

‘I’ll see you at dinner, then?’ He raised his hands on a non-threatening gesture. An insane image of him as a lion tamer, holding off a lioness with a rickety old chair, popped into his head. He wouldn’t be surprised if she growled at him.

‘Fine.’ It almost was a growl.

‘Would you join us? I’ve invited Charlie to dinner, to say thank you for finding me a—’

The word hellcat had been poised to fall out of his mouth and he stopped himself just in time.

Not hellcat. Housekeeper! Just try and remember that.

‘—for finding me a housekeeper at such short notice. I thought it would be a good way to break the ice before I disappear again.’

‘Thank you,’ she said. Her eyes told him she’d rather walk on hot coals.

Fine. If she wanted to keep it cool and impersonal, he could keep it cool and impersonal. Probably.

‘If you could be ready to serve up at eight o’clock…?’

Her eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly.

He backed out through the door and started walking towards the main staircase. Charlie had a lot to answer for. Her perfect-for-the-job friend was perfectly strange, for one thing! He took himself downstairs and sat on the velvet-covered sofa in front of the fire. Jet lag was making it hard to think, and he had the oddest feeling that his conversation with Ellie had just been weird enough for him still to be asleep and dreaming.

She was clearly barking mad. If the ‘lost-my-bedroom’ incident had planted a seed of suspicion in his mind, their talk just now and what he had seen early this morning had definitely added fertiliser.

His body clock was still refusing to conform to Greenwich Mean Time, and last night he’d dozed, tossed and turned, read some of a long-winded novel and eventually decided on a hot shower to clear his head. On the way to his bathroom a flash of movement outside the window had prompted him to change course and peer out of the half-open curtains.

Down in the garden he’d spotted Ellie, marching round the garden, arms waving. She’d been talking to herself! At six in the morning. In her pyjamas.

Pyjamas.

Another rush of something warm and not totally unfamiliar hit him. The pleasant prickle of awareness from the close proximity of a woman was one of the joys of life. But he didn’t think he’d ever experienced it after seeing a woman wearing what looked to be her grandad’s pyjamas before. Silk and satin, yes. Soft stripy brushed cotton, no. There it went again! The rush. His earlobes were burning, for goodness’ sake!

He’d practically had a heart attack when she’d charged into him in the dark last night. He’d been in such a deep sleep only moments before he’d hardly known who he was, let alone where he was. The small frame and slender wrists of his captive might have fooled him into thinking it was a lad he’d held captive, but when the light had flickered on he’d realised he couldn’t have been more wrong. It certainly hadn’t been a boy he had by the ankle, intent on dragging him down to the local police station. He’d started to wonder if he’d been dreaming. Those soft blonde curls belonged on a Botticelli cherub.

Just then the bite mark on his left shoulder began to throb.

No, not an angel—his instincts had been right from the start. A hellcat.

It would be wise to remind himself of that. He didn’t have to like this woman; he just had to pay her to keep his house running. He would keep his distance from Ellie Bond and he would not think of her in that way—even if there was something refreshingly different about her.

Insanity, he reminded himself. That’s what’s different about her. A woman like that is trouble. You never know what she’s going to do next.

A yawn crept up on him. He told himself it would be a bad idea to fall asleep again, but there was something very soothing about watching the logs in the fire crackle and spark. He pushed a cushion under his head and settled to watch the flames shimmer and dance.

When he opened his eyes again the flames had disappeared and the embers were just grey dust. Now and then a patch of orange would glow brightly, then fade away again. He pulled himself out of the comfortable dent he had created in the sofa.

From somewhere in the direction of the kitchen he could hear female voices. Was Charlie here already? He looked at his watch. He’d been asleep for more than three hours. He walked towards the dining room and met Charlie, coming to fetch him. His stomach gurgled. His sleep patterns might be sabotaged, but his appetite was clearly on Larkford time.

‘Now, don’t go upsetting my friend, Mark. She needs this job, and you are not allowed to mess it up for her.’

Hang on a second. He was the employer. Surely this was all supposed to be the other way round? Ellie was supposed to do a good job for him, try not to upset him. At the moment he was wondering whether his house would still be standing when he returned in a few weeks.

He opened his mouth to say as much, then decided not to bother. There was no arguing with his bossy cousin when she got like this. It had been the same when he’d tried to talk her out of taking a stray kitten home one summer, when he’d been fourteen and she’d been ten. Charlie had worshipped that cat, but he’d never quite forgotten the lattice of fine red marks the animal had left on his hands and forearms after he’d agreed to carry it back to the house for her.

Unfortunately it had taken another twenty years before he’d been cured of the habit of trying to rescue pathetic strays of all shapes and sizes.

Helena had been like that. Soft, fragile-looking, vulnerable. And he hadn’t been able to resist her. Something inside him swelled with protective instinct when he came across women like that. And Helena had been the neediest of them all. Not that he’d minded. He would have gladly spent all his days looking after her.

Three months after Charlie had found the kitten, when its tummy was round and its fur had a healthy sheen, it had disappeared and never come back. That was the problem with strays. It was in their nature to be selfish.

So he avoided strays altogether now, both feline and female.

Oh, women always wanted something from him. But he made them play by his rules, only mixing with women who wanted simpler things: money, fame by association, attention. Those things were easy to give and cost him nothing.

Mark was pulled back to the present by the aroma of exotic herbs and spices wafting his way. Charlie didn’t need to steer him any more. The smell was a homing beacon, leading him up the corridor and into the dining room. He dropped into a chair opposite Charlie and waited, all his taste buds on full alert.

There was a glimpse of an apron and blonde hair through the doorway as Ellie disappeared back into the kitchen to fetch the last in a succession of steaming dishes. Mark swallowed the pool of saliva that had collected in the bottom of his mouth. He hoped she wouldn’t be too long.

She finally appeared. At least he thought it was her. She was cool and collected and quiet, and set down the last dish in an array of lavish Thai recipes. Not a hint of growling or biting about her.

Good. He was glad she’d pulled herself together.

His stomach, however, didn’t care how the transformation had happened. It grumbled at him to just get over it and start shovelling food in its general direction. Which he did without delay.

CHAPTER FOUR

ELLIE dished up. Her heart jumped so hard in her chest she was sure the serving spoon must be pulsing in her fingers. What was happening to her? Mark Wilder had done nothing but walk into the room and sit down and her body had gone wild. She finished doling out the food and sat down, careful to keep her eyes on her plate lest her stampeding hormones concentrate themselves and get ready for another charge.

The man was insanely good-looking!

The TV cameras hadn’t done him justice at all. No longer did she want to scold the reporter for drooling; she wanted to congratulate her for forming a coherent sentence.

Last night she’d been too shocked to register the weird physiological response he provoked in her, and this afternoon she’d been too angry. At herself, mainly, but she’d vented at him instead. It was her stupid brain injury that was to blame. She’d never had problems with runaway emotions before that. Now, any little thing could trigger overwhelming frustration, or rage, or despair.

Of course! She’d inadvertently stumbled upon the answer.

Her sigh of relief drew glances from her dining companions. She caught Mark’s eye and quickly returned her gaze to the king prawn on the end of her fork while she waited for her heartbeat to settle.

How could she not have remembered?

The doctors had warned her that some people noticed a change to their sex drive after a traumatic head injury. This intense attraction, this wobbly feeling, it was all down to her head injury. She didn’t like him that way at all, really. It was just her stupid neurons getting themselves in knots because of the damage they’d suffered.

What a relief!

It explained everything. She could never normally be attracted to a man like him—a man so…well, she didn’t have words for what he was so…But she’d never seen the attraction of bad boys. Who needed the heartache? Give her a man like Sam—warm, dependable, faithful—any day. Not a charmer who thought everything with two X chromosomes ought to fall at his feet and worship.

Now she had that sorted out in her head she could relax a little and enjoy the food. But as she ate questions started to float to the surface.

Why now?

Why, after four years of seeming perfectly normal in that department—even completely uninterested at times—had this symptom decided to rear its ugly head?

It didn’t matter. Whatever the reason, she needed to get a handle on it. This job was important to her and she didn’t want to lose it. She’d just have to read up a bit on the subject, introduce measures to cope with it, just like she had with her other symptoms. By the time he got back from his next trip she’d have it completely under control.

She made the mistake of glancing up at that point, just as Mark smiled at something Charlie said. He wasn’t even looking at her, for goodness’ sake, but Ellie still felt her body straining at the leash.

Down, girl!

Oh, my. This evening was going to be torture.

Thankfully, she had an excuse to keep herself busy. She would pay attention to the food, and only the food. And when the meal was over she’d plead tiredness and escape to her room. Charlie would understand. She’d have to.

Mark stole a handful of looks at Ellie as the clattering of serving spoons gave way to silence. She kept her eyes on her plate, only lifting them once to dish out another spoonful of rice.

The only information she’d volunteered during dinner had been about the plumbing disaster in the housekeeper’s apartment, which cleared up the final mystery of why she’d been sleeping in the room next door to his. She’d barely acknowledged his thanks for organizing the repairs.

So much for ‘breaking the ice’. It seemed the dining room was in the grip of a rapidly advancing cold snap. But he wasn’t going to push.

Instead, he turned to Charlie and asked after her brother, which led to a raft of hilarious anecdotes about his recent backpacking trip to Indonesia.

Ellie said nothing. It was almost as if she knew she was sitting a few feet away from him but was desperately trying to wish herself invisible, or at the very least make herself blend into the background. Whatever she was trying to do, it wasn’t working.

It was odd. She wore virtually no make-up, and the reckless curls were piled on top of her head and secured with a clip, and yet he couldn’t stop glancing at her. It must be pheromones or something, because she wasn’t his usual type at all.

Not any more, anyway.

A curl escaped from the long silver clip on top of Ellie’s head and threatened to dunk itself in her meal, but before it could slim fingers tucked it behind her ear. That tiny hand had packed quite a punch last night. He stared at it, watched her fingers as they pleated her serviette, closed around her fork…

Charlie caught him with his cutlery frozen between his mouth and his plate, eyes fixed on Ellie. She smirked. He retaliated with a warning kick under the table. He knew how much of a blabbermouth Charlie was, and he didn’t want her complicating things by teasing him, especially as he and Ellie had reached an icy truce. Besides, there was nothing to tease him about. She was his housekeeper.

Charlie glared at him and leaned underneath the table to rub her leg. A second later searing pain radiated from his shinbone.

‘Ouch!’

Ellie glanced up, puzzled by the exchange, and Mark decided to deflect the attention from himself before she realised the food wasn’t the only thing that was causing his mouth to fill with saliva.

He could do polite and businesslike. He could behave like a proper employer rather than a best buddy. And, with a sideways look at his cousin, he decided to prove it.

‘So…Where are you from, Ellie?’

Ellie chased some glass noodles round her plate. Mark stretched out, then rested his hands behind his head and waited.

‘Kent,’ she replied quietly.

‘The whole of Kent, or one spot in particular?’

‘Barkleigh.’

What was that edge in her voice? Was she angry with him?

That was a little unfair. After all, she wasn’t the one with teeth marks on her torso. And he’d done his best to wave the olive branch by chatting to her earlier on, and got his head bitten off for his trouble.

Pity. He liked a woman with a sense of humour.

Cancel that thought. She was an employee. He was her boss. He would make polite conversation and help her to feel more comfortable, right? Good. Here goes…

‘So, what made you decide to—?’

Ellie clattered the empty plates together before he could finish his sentence and vanished in the direction of the kitchen, muttering something about coffee. Mark waited a split second, then grabbed a couple of empty wine glasses as an excuse to follow her. He got the distinct impression he’d said something wrong, although he couldn’t think what it might be. His questions had been innocent enough—bland, even.

When he got to the kitchen Ellie was standing motionless near the sink, a couple of dishes still in her hands. She looked lost. Not in a metaphorical sense, but genuinely lost—as if she’d suddenly found herself in alien territory and had no idea of what to do or where to go next. Mark stepped forward to help her, and she jumped as if electricity had arced between them. The crockery leapt out of her arms and smashed against the flagstone floor.

She stammered her apologies and started to pick up the pieces.

‘No. It was my fault,’ he said. ‘I startled you.’

He bent down to help her. She looked across at him as they both crouched beside the kitchen cabinets, picking up the remnants of the dishes. Their knees almost grazed, and whatever had startled her shot through him too. An anonymous emotion flickered in her eyes and she looked away.

When they had finished clearing away the mess, he pulled out one of the kitchen stools and motioned for her to sit down.

‘I’ll do the coffee.’

Her eyes opened wide, and he could feel the heat of her stare as he turned to the coffee machine.

‘Dinner was stupendous,’ he said as he placed a cup and saucer in front of her.

‘Thank you,’ she replied, looking even more surprised.

Suddenly he didn’t feel like being the normal, wisecracking Mark Wilder everyone expected him to be. He didn’t want to dazzle. Some forgotten instinct told him to pare it all back, leave the charm behind and just talk to her, human being to human being. Actually, he did have something he wanted to ask her, something that might cement them in their right relationship without causing her to take offence.

‘Actually, I was wondering if you could do me a favour.’

Her eyebrows raised a notch further.

‘I mean, I love exotic food, but there is one thing I haven’t had for a long time and I’ve really got a hankering for. I wonder if you wouldn’t mind putting it on the menu some time?’

She looked at him, her eyes hooded and wary. ‘What’s that?’

He looked at floor before giving her a hopeful smile. ‘Shepherd’s Pie?’

Ellie Bond surprised him once again. Instead of scowling or rolling her eyes, she let go of all the tension she’d been holding in her face and laughed.

The kitchen was silent and empty when Ellie entered it the following morning. Dawn had come and gone, but the overcast sky produced an artificial twilight in the unlit kitchen. The state-of-the-art stainless steel appliances and barren worktop made the place look like a hotel. There was none of the usual clutter that made a kitchen the heart of the home. No family photos. No children’s drawings. No pet bowls.

She found a note on the counter from Mark, letting her know he’d already left for the airport. An itinerary was stapled to it, in case she needed to contact him while he was away. She read the note in full, and cheered up instantly when she discovered he’d given her permission to buy anything she needed for the kitchen. Some women loved shopping for shoes; Ellie had a worrying love of shopping for kitchen gadgets—and this house could definitely do with her attention. It needed a food processor and measuring spoons and a griddle…And that was just for starters. It wasn’t that there wasn’t anything in the cupboards, but most of the equipment fell into the ‘pretty but useless’ category. The designer grater she’d found had been an odd shape, and they’d almost feasted on grated knuckles instead of grated ginger in their curry last night.

Outside it was grey and chilly, but the grounds of Larkford were still beautiful. Daffodils—not the garish ones, but blooms the colour of clotted cream—had burst through the lawn in clumps and were now whispering cheerfully to each other in the breeze. Wood pigeons cooed in the trees, and the first cherry blossoms were now visible on the silvery grey branches. It was almost a shame to be inside, so she went out for a walk, and continued walking long after the bottom of her teacup was visible.

Taking her cup of tea for a walk became part of her morning routine. On her return to the kitchen she would pass the super-duper, multi-highlighted calendar on the large fridge and mentally tick off the days until Mark returned.

Twelve more days of blissful solitude…Eleven more days…Eight more days…

And she ignored the fact that she felt slightly elated, rather than disappointed, as each day went by.

Mark lounged on a wicker sofa, high on the roof terrace of his hotel’s penthouse suite. He was ignoring the traffic rushing round the corner and down Rodeo Drive in favour of the clear blue sky above his head. It had been an extremely long day schmoozing record company executives and their sharp-toothed lawyers in order to finalise the launch of Kat’s album in the US, but he’d come away with what he’d wanted from the meeting—eventually. He was very good at schmoozing, after all.

He’d had an invitation to go clubbing this evening, with a rather strait-laced lawyer who looked as if she’d be a whole lot of fun once she let loose, but he’d turned her down. For some reason he wanted to be on his own at the moment. He didn’t feel right, and he needed to relax a little and work out why.

Today he felt out of sorts, uncomfortable. As if he was wearing a suit that wasn’t cut quite right. He closed his eyes and sank into the deep cushions of the sofa.

Well, he wasn’t wearing a suit now. He’d changed into shorts and a T-shirt as soon as he’d got back to his suite. Unfortunately he still had that same itchy feeling, as if something wasn’t quite right. He shook his head and pulled his sunglasses down over his eyes. Even with them closed the sun was still a little bright, burning strange shapes onto the backs of his eyelids.

Slowly the blobs swam and merged, until they solidified into an image that looked suspiciously familiar. In fact it looked suspiciously like his new housekeeper. He snapped his lids open and let the white sun bleach his retina instead.

What was up with him?

This was the third time something similar had happened. He was seeing her everywhere. And he didn’t want to remember how sad and lost she’d looked when she’d smashed his best crockery to smithereens. He also didn’t want to remember how warm and alive she’d looked when he’d mentioned Shepherd’s Pie and she’d thrown her head back and laughed.

Housekeepers weren’t supposed to be memorable. They were supposed to fade into the background and just do their job. He knew from personal experience how important it was to keep the lines between personal and professional firmly in place.

Somewhere in the back of his head he heard laughing.

Like you’re doing with Kat?

That was different. He wasn’t going to make the same mistake with Kat that he’d made with Nuclear Hamster. Stupid name. He’d advised them against it, but they hadn’t listened. It was just that Kat was so young, she needed—

Okay, he was starting to act like a big brother towards Kat, but it didn’t mean anything. Most importantly, it didn’t mean he was setting a precedent of getting too close to his employees. He’d been cured of that fault a long time ago. Which meant he was totally capable of interacting with Ellie Bond without thinking of her as a woman—a woman who filled a pair of striped pyjamas very nicely, actually.

He sighed. He’d be back at Larkford in just over a week.

And Ellie would be there. It was what he’d hired her for, after all.

Suddenly the thought of the two of them alone in that big old house together seemed a little…intimate. He stood up, walked over to the parapet and stared out towards the Hollywood hills. A house like his—well, what it really needed was to be filled with people. Lots of them.

On the day there were only five spaces left on the calendar Ellie got restless. All her tasks were done, and she’d finished the book she was reading. She needed something to do. Something to clean out. Sorting through cupboards and purging the rubbish was a therapeutic activity she rather enjoyed. It made her feel as if she were in control of something for once.

The infamous cupboard opposite the bathroom had become the object of her obsession. As far as she could see it was full of boxes of miscellaneous clutter that had been sent down from Mark’s London flat and had yet to be sorted out. She’d found plenty of bedlinen, a squash racket and three boxes of books. The empty shelves in the study came to mind, so Ellie decided to liberate the volumes from the dust and cardboard and put them where they could be useful.

She carried the box down to the study and started pulling books out and putting them on the thick wooden shelves. As she got to the last book in one stack a slip of paper fell out of the pages and wafted to the floor. She picked it up and realised it wasn’t a piece of paper after all, but a photograph.

Not any old photograph. It was a wedding picture.

Mark and an anonymous bride.

Well, well, who’d have thought it? The bachelor playboy hadn’t always been a bachelor. Bet he’d always been a playboy, though.

She frowned almost instinctively and studied the photograph more carefully. Mark looked younger—maybe in his mid-twenties?—fresh-faced, and very much in love with his beautiful, sophisticated bride. Her expression softened a little. A man who could look at a woman like that had something. Exactly what, she didn’t know. Maybe he didn’t either, because he’d thrown it all away and was living a very different life now. What a pity.

Turning the picture over, she saw the words ‘Mark and Helena’ scrawled on the back. The date underneath was twelve years earlier. Ellie slid the photograph back into its resting place and put the book on the shelf, feeling a little bit guilty for having found out what she sensed was a secret.

She reached for the next book, but was interrupted by the shrill beckoning of the telephone—the house line, not the one here in Mark’s office.

Blast! She’d noticed the cradle in the hall was empty when she’d walked past with the box of books. She’d probably left the phone lying around again, which meant it might be anywhere.

She stood still and listened carefully.

The kitchen.

She raced down the passageway, skidding on the tiles in her socks.

It’s in here somewhere!

The ringing was louder now, but oddly muffled. She ransacked a corner of the kitchen near the hob. Nothing! She leant closer to the worktop, then started frantically opening drawers.

Nope. Nope. Aha!

There it was, nestled amongst the wooden spoons. Where else?

She jabbed the button and uttered a breathless hello, then snapped to attention as she heard Mark’s deep tones.

At first she didn’t listen to the words, the content of what he was saying, because she hadn’t been prepared for the way even his voice made her tingle. Oh, why couldn’t he have e-mailed her? She wouldn’t have had to concentrate on sounding normal if she’d been typing a reply!

Ah, but the phone call might have something to do with the fact she’d forgotten her password and hadn’t been able to check her e-mails for a while.

It was just then that she realised Mark had stopped talking.

‘Ellie?’

‘Uh-huh?’

‘Are you…? Is everything all right?’ She could hear him suppressing a smile.

Unfortunately she was more than a little breathless—from all the phone-hunting, of course.

‘Just…couldn’t…find the phone.’ She took a gulp of air and managed to croak, ‘Can I help you?’

‘Yep. I’ve decided to throw an impromptu party as a kind of housewarming when I get home. Only a few dozen guests—don’t worry.’

A few dozen?

‘My PA is handling the invites, and I’ll get her to send you a list of caterers. We’ve decided on Saturday.’

‘Saturday? This Saturday? That’s less than a week away!’

‘I know. I’ve been e-mailing for days, but you didn’t reply. Don’t stress. That’ll be plenty of—hang on—’

Ellie huffed and tapped the counter as Mark chatted to someone on his end of the line. She thought she heard a woman’s voice.

None of my business. I don’t care who he’s with.

‘Got to go, Ellie. I’ll be back on Friday evening.’

The receiver hummed in her ear.

He hadn’t even given her time to tell him that she couldn’t possibly organise a party in six days. She’d only just got to grips with the day-to-day running of the house, and the last thing she needed was something that was going to send all that into a tailspin.

However, it didn’t seem as if she had much choice. If she wanted to keep this job she would have to cater to her boss’s whims, no matter how inconvenient.

Catering.

Was that the best place to start? It was so long since she’d had a social life herself, thinking about planning a party seemed as run-of-the-mill as planning a trek up the Amazon.

She closed her eyes. Remember what you learned at the support group. Don’t panic over the big picture. Take things one step at a time. Start with the obvious.

Her eyelids lifted again. The cleaners were coming on Friday anyway, so no problem there. And she could get Jim the gardener to help her rearrange the furniture in the downstairs reception rooms, and the florists in the village could provide some arrangements.

After her initial panic she realised it wasn’t that different from what she’d done when she’d worked as a PA in the City after leaving college. Her cantankerous boss had had a penchant for drop-of-the-hat cocktail parties to impress the partners, where he would swan round being all sweetness and light, then return to being a sour-faced grump the next day. If she could create a party to blow Martin Frobisher’s socks off, she could certainly succeed with a lovely backdrop like Larkfield.

Yes, but that was before…

Shut up, she told herself. It’s all there inside your head still. She was just going to have to do a little…archaeology to uncover the buried bits.

She could do this.

Her brain began to whirr with excitement as menu ideas sprang up in her mind. This was her chance to prove to Mark Wilder that she wasn’t a loose cannon, that she could do this job.

She reached for the phonebook and flipped it open to ‘F’ for florists, her smile wide. Passwords could wait for later. For now she would use the phone.

If Mr Wilder wanted a party, she was going to give him a party!

Ellie slipped the straps of the little black dress she’d borrowed from Charlie over her shoulders. She wasn’t looking forward to this evening one bit. She’d tried hard to talk him out of it, but Mark had insisted she attend the party—partly to keep an eye on the caterers and whatnot, but partly to ‘have a bit of fun’. She’d have much preferred to stay holed up in her apartment with a packet of biscuits and a chick-flick.

She smoothed the bodice of the dress over her torso and looked in the mirror. She turned from one side to the other, scrutinising her reflection. Not bad. The simply cut black dress accentuated her curves, but didn’t cling in desperation. She slipped on a pair of strappy high heels—also borrowed from Charlie. Her ankles wobbled as she adjusted to the altitude.

Tyres crunched on the gravel outside. She exhaled wearily. Guests were starting to arrive, which meant it was her cue to go downstairs. While it wasn’t her place to welcome the guests, she wanted to make sure that the pair of local girls she’d hired to help with coats and suchlike had retained the pertinent information from their briefing yesterday.

Perhaps she could just stick it out for an hour or so and then slope off when he—when no one—was looking.

She left her room and headed for the main staircase. It wound down into a hall that was larger than the living room in her cottage. The banisters were solid oak, and still as sturdy as the day they’d been made. Ellie was rather grateful for them as she made her way down the stairs in Charlie’s disobedient shoes. They seemed to have a mind of their own. She watched each foot carefully as she planted it on the next step, and it was only as she neared the bottom that she looked up and caught a glimpse of Mark, standing by the huge marble fireplace, chatting to the first of the arrivals.

Unfortunately she’d discovered when he’d returned home the previous evening that time and distance had done nothing to dilute the sheer physical impact the man had on her. It was pathetic, really, it was. She knew better, knew what sort of man he was, and yet here she was, twittering along with every other female in a five-mile radius. She comforted herself with the knowledge that at least she had a medical reason for behaving this way.

She looked over at Tania and Faith, the girls from the village. Neither of them had thought to relieve any guest of a coat or a wrap; they were too busy standing in the corner and getting all giggly over a certain member of the male species.

Ellie forced herself not to look at Mark as she made her way across the hall and reissued her instructions to the two girls in a low, authoritative voice. They instantly sprang into action, relieving guests of their outerwear and delivering the items to one of the smaller rooms on the ground floor where Ellie had set up some portable clothing racks.

The only problem was that Tania and Faith were now so intent on proving themselves efficient they’d both darted off at once, leaving Ellie no choice but to act as hat-check girl herself when the next huddle of guests piled through the door. She approached the group that had just crossed the threshold.

Mark moved forward to greet them at the same time, and Ellie couldn’t avoid meeting his gaze. It was like being hit in the chest with one of those Taser guns. Her heart stuttered, fizzing with a million volts, and she disguised the resultant quivering in her limbs by breaking eye contact and smoothing out a non-existent wrinkle on her dress. All the same, the hairs at the back of her neck lifted, full of static. She just knew he was still looking at her. He inhaled, as if he was about to say something, but before the words left his mouth, another voice gatecrashed the moment.

‘Mark, you old dog!’ bellowed a good-looking blond man in a dinner jacket, slapping him across the shoulders.

‘Hello, Piers,’ Mark replied in his good-humoured tone. ‘Come in and find yourself a drink. What do you think of my new place?’

‘Bloody difficult to find, that’s what I say!’ he roared, slapping Mark a second time.

Ellie was standing there still waiting to take any coats. She felt like a prize lemon.

‘Let me introduce you to this trinity of lovelies,’ Piers continued, ushering a group of bejewelled women into the house. ‘Carla, Jade, and of course you already know Melodie.’

Of course. Ellie recognised her as the woman from the television. She didn’t say anything, but silently willed Melodie to hurry up and hand that pashmina over. Ellie wanted an excuse to make herself scarce.

Mark didn’t falter as he offered a polite greeting to all three women, but Ellie had a sense as she took hold of their wraps and coats that he wasn’t as comfortable as his relaxed stance implied. She was just about to scamper away to the temporary cloakroom when the pair of girls returned and relieved her of her only legitimate means of escape.

Then, just to make matters worse, Mark turned to her and asked her something. She saw his lips move, heard the words, but her brain retained none of the information. Why had he done that? She was the help. And she’d actually like to keep their relationship on that footing, thank you very much. Things were complicated enough as it was.

Just then a waitress with a large tray walked past the entrance hall en-route to the drawing room. Caterers! She was supposed to be here in a professional capacity, after all. She would inspect each and every trayful of over-priced morsels and make sure they were just what she’d ordered. She mumbled something about food, not so much to Mark but to the room in general, then fell into step behind the waitress, lengthening the distance between her and the group at the doorway. As she rounded the corner she could still hear Piers’s booming upper-class drawl.

‘Ding-dong!’ he said with a whistle. ‘Who was that?’

She didn’t wait to hear Mark’s explanation of her existence, but scuttled away even faster—high heels permitting. The last thing she wanted to do was actually have to talk to people tonight. They would expect her to be dazzling and witty. And if she had ever been dazzling and witty in her previous life she had certainly forgotten by now. Socialising was something other people did. Even the prospect of a night down at the Anglers’ Arms in Barkleigh filled her with fear and trembling. In comparison, this party was like purgatory with canapés.

A few dozen guests? Someone had underestimated a little.

The drawing room was like a Who’s Who of popular music. Wasn’t that…? You know, the guy who always seemed to be at number one? And that girl over there—Ellie had seen her latest music video only the other night on TV. Normal party nerves escalated into something far bigger and scarier. It would be really great if she could think of the girl’s name—if she could recall anyone’s name, actually. These were the sort of people who expected to be remembered.

She circled the drawing room, ‘fluffing’ the floral arrangements, hoping that no one talked to her and expected her to know who they were. But she wasn’t really looking at what she was doing, and more leaves fell off due to her attention than she cared to notice. As soon as she could she slipped out and made her way to the kitchen.

CHAPTER FIVE

THERE was a strange calm to be had amidst the noise and movement of the kitchen. At least in here Ellie knew what she was doing. Her lists and charts were pinned to the cupboard doors, her timetable clung to the fridge door with the help of a few magnets, and waiters and waitresses were all jostling each other, doing exactly as they were supposed to.

It didn’t take long before one of the catering company staff appeared with a question, and Ellie found herself busy for what seemed like a half an hour but turned out to be almost two hours. Eventually tiredness washed over her, the mind-fogging fatigue she knew she shouldn’t ignore. Dodging dashing bodies and clattering trays suddenly became too much of an effort and she crept up the back staircase. Before she went to her room she carried on along the landing and looked over the banisters into the hall, where the party was still in full swing. She’d done well this evening, and she wanted one last mental picture of her achievement, to cement it firmly in her memory before she fled back to her bedroom and shut the door firmly behind her.

From her vantage point on the landing she watched the glittering crowd ebb and flow. The clink of champagne glasses and jumble of conversation drifted up from below. Surprisingly, she found the sound soothing now she was no longer in the thick of it.

Her eyes drifted here and there, searching. It wasn’t until they fixed on Mark that she realised she’d been looking for him. He was the perfect host—she’d give him that. He was charming and smooth, always with a crowd around him. The group he was with laughed at something he said. So he was good company too, it seemed. But he didn’t dominate the gathering, forcing people to look at him. They just flowed around him, accepting the good time he offered them.

That woman from the awards ceremony was talking to him now, batting her lashes and jutting her ample chest under his nose. Ellie rolled her eyes. And, funnily enough, when the woman turned to grab herself a cocktail from a passing tray, Mark did a microscopic version of the same expression. That made her smile. It also made her look a little closer.

He smiled. He talked. But every now and then he just drifted off and stared at nothing for a second, until the next excited guest drew him back into the conversation. It was almost as if…

No. That was a stupid idea. Why would someone throw a party if they didn’t actually want to be at it themselves?

‘What are you doing skulking up here? I’ve been looking for you everywhere.’

Ellie stopped breathing momentarily as Charlie appeared from nowhere.

‘Don’t do that!’ Ellie whispered sharply, pressing her palm to her chest in an effort to slow her galloping heart. ‘And I’m not skulking.’

Charlie stopped smiling and looked concerned. ‘You’re a bag of nerves,’ she said, while giving Ellie’s arm a reassuring rub. ‘Come on, chill out. It is a party, after all…’

Ellie nodded. ‘I know. But I need this to go well. I can’t lose this job, Charlie, I can’t—’

Without warning her eyes filled, and the party below glittered even harder than before.

‘Hey!’ Charlie’s voice was gentle and her arm rested around Ellie’s shoulders, pulling her close. ‘What’s all this about?’

She took a deep breath. ‘Did you tell him…Mark Wilder…about me?’

Charlie’s three frown lines appeared above her nose. ‘All I told him was that you were an old friend of mine and I thought you’d be perfect for the job. I wasn’t lying, Ellie.’

Ellie scratched at a non-existent mark on the banister with a blunt fingernail. ‘No. I mean, did you tell him about how I have problems with…about my…?’

Charlie’s voice was low when she answered. ‘No, I didn’t tell him about the accident or how it’s affected you. It’s up to you whether you want to share that information with him.’

Okay, so Charlie had believed her when she’d sworn blind she had it in her to be a top-notch housekeeper. Now she just had to prove her right. Ellie’s chest rose then fell deeply as she let out a huge breath. ‘Right. Thank you.’

A soft look appeared on Charlie’s face. ‘Do you really think being here, moving away from home, will help you…you know…get over things?’

Suddenly Ellie needed to sit down. Her legs folded under her with the grace of a collapsing deckchair and she grabbed on to the banister with both hands. Charlie’s arm appeared, firm and protective, around her shoulders.

‘There’s more to this sudden desire for a new job than just needing fresh scenery, isn’t there, Ellie? Why did you really want to leave Barkleigh in such a hurry?’

Blast. Why did Charlotte Maxwell have to be so perceptive under her devil-may-care exterior? Ellie stared at the milling guests below. Their only problems were deciding which diamond to wear or which sports car to drive.

A feeling of loss washed over her, so deep, so overwhelming that she thought she might just dissolve into nothing right there on Mark Wilder’s landing.

Sometimes she wished her brain would just finish the job and give up working all together. Then she could just evaporate. She’d be happy then, feeling nothing, remembering nothing. It was this half-in, half-out thing her memory did that was driving her to distraction.

‘I can’t go home,’ she whispered. ‘I just can’t.’

‘Why?’

‘Remember Ginny? Chloe’s godmother and my oldest friend?’

Charlie nodded. ‘Yes, I remember her.’

Ellie didn’t want to say it. Hearing the words spill out of her own mouth would remind her of everything she’d lost. Of everything she longed for.

‘She’s pregnant.’

She didn’t look up. Couldn’t.

Charlie’s hand stopped stroking her arm and slid down over her wrist until their fingers meshed, Charlie’s red fingernails bright against her pale skin. Ellie gripped her hand, hanging on to it as if it would anchor her.

‘I know it’s awful, but I think if I have to see her every day for the next eight months, seeing her grow bigger, seeing how happy she is with Steve, I might just go properly bonkers. I just had to get away.’

She was happy for Ginny and Steve, really she was, but how could she watch them add to their happy little family when her own had been wiped from the face of the earth? It was too…too…blatant.

Charlie didn’t say anything, just hugged her tight. ‘Do you want me to get you anything? A glass of water?’

Ellie shook her head. ‘No. I’m just tired. I think I’ll just stay here for a few seconds and then go to bed. You go on and enjoy the party.’ She nodded to the hall below, where the rather good-looking man she’d seen Charlie with earlier was searching the crowd. ‘I think someone’s looking for you.’

Charlie smiled, and her eyes never left the man as he moved this way and that. ‘If you’re sure?’ she said.

‘I’m sure.’ Ellie gave her a shove in the right direction and Charlie headed off down the stairs. The man spotted her, and the look he gave her as she descended was pure magic. Ellie sighed. At least someone was happy.

She moved a little further to the left, so she could see more of the hall. Mark was still leaning on the mantelpiece, and he had that distant look in his eyes again.

Her mind wandered back to his smile in the wedding photo. She’d seen him smile plenty of times tonight, but not one of those smiles had lit up his face like his smile for the woman in the wedding photo. Where was she now? What had happened? For the first time she realised there were scars beneath his good-humoured persona. From wounds that maybe hadn’t fully healed. Her hand flew to the locket around her neck. She knew all about the pain those kinds of wounds could cause.

As if he sensed she was watching him, Mark paused, his glass raised halfway to his lips. And then he turned his head and met her gaze. She froze. Could it be any more obvious she’d been staring at him and only him? She didn’t think so.

Still, he didn’t look cross. He wasn’t smiling that irritating twinkly smile—wasn’t mocking her. The other occupants of the room melted away, their conversation drowned out by a loud thudding sound.

Oh. That was her pulse.

Heat crept up her cheeks, but still she hadn’t moved. And moving at this point would be a really good idea.

Still staring at Mark, she took a couple of wobbly steps backwards, then turned and fled along the corridor. For some reason she ignored her bedroom door and headed for the back staircase. She needed space, distance. And she didn’t think she’d get that with only a ceiling and a couple of walls separating her from Mark Wilder.

The stupid stilettos strangled her ankles as she clattered down the back staircase. She paused at the bottom. No one was around, so she tiptoed down the corridor into the kitchen.

Ellie stole a smoked fish thing off a platter of canapés and popped it in her mouth. As she slid past a waitress carrying a tray of cocktails she pilfered one of those too, knocking it back and shuddering as whatever it was hit the back of her throat.

She edged past the round table near the French doors. An abandoned tray stood on the table, cluttered with champagne flutes, some empty, some full. She plucked one of the full ones and nipped out of her favourite escape route into the garden.

A wave of muffled laughter wafted past her on the clear night air. She took a sip of champagne, but barely tasted it. There was something she had to do first, before she could enjoy it properly.

Her feet were killing her.

She sat on a low stone wall and fiddled with the microscopic buckles. Pretty soon she’d flicked the shoes off and she hooked the satin straps under her fingers and headed into the garden.

The flagstones were cold and rough on the soles of her feet, and she veered in the direction of the lawn and sank her toes deep into it. Heaven! She closed her eyes and took another sip of champagne. The canapé was the first thing she had eaten all evening, and on an empty stomach it wasn’t hard to feel the bubbles doing their work.

Funny how parties always sounded more inviting when you were on the outside. All she had wanted to do when she was in there was escape, yet now she was out here she felt strangely alone.

She took a few more steps on the springy grass, letting the blades invade the spaces between her toes. She wriggled them and drained the flute of its contents. Goosebumps flourished on her upper arms as she heard a low masculine voice behind her.

‘Caught red-handed!’

A powerful pair of hands clamped down on Ellie’s shoulders. The champagne glass slid out of her hand and bounced off her foot. She instinctively ducked down and forwards, wriggling out his grip, then swung round to face him.

He blinked groggily at her. ‘What’s the matter?’ he slurred. ‘Don’t you like me?’

His name might have deserted her, but she hadn’t forgotten this man. The floppy pale hair, the arrogant smirk. She didn’t know who he was to Mark, but if the rest of his friends were like this, he could keep them.

He draped an arm across her shoulders. ‘What d’you say we go for a little walk?’

She had to handle this carefully. He might be a pain in the behind, but he was Mark’s guest too, so losing her temper would only get her in trouble. ‘I’d rather not, thank you.’

His eyes were glassy and his breath reeked of whisky. She carefully peeled his arm off her shoulder. He lost his balance now he wasn’t leaning on her for support, his feet sliding on the dewy grass. His smile faded.

‘Hey! There’s no need to be hoity-toity about it.’

‘I didn’t…I…’Oh, what was the use? He’d probably take any conversation as encouragement of some sort. The best thing to do was get out of here before she really did get hoity-toity with him.

She turned and walked back towards the house. He lumbered after her, stumbling slightly, and managed to grab hold of her arm and haul her towards him.

Something flashed white-hot inside her head. She dreaded these surges of anger, but could do very little to contain herself when they struck. She was going to blow, whether she liked it or not.

‘Get off me!’ she yelled.

He made a curious gurgle that she interpreted as a laugh, and clamped her to his chest. His lips made contact with the skin beneath her ear and slid down her neck in a slobbery trail.

‘Ugh!’

Enough was enough. No more Miss Nice Guy. She swung Charlie’s killer sandals wide and brought them crashing down on his temple.

Mark had suddenly had enough of standing around talking to the same people, having the same conversations he’d had last week. He needed fresh air.

Instinctively he headed for the kitchen, then paused at the threshold. Why had he come this way? He had the feeling he was looking for something but had forgotten what.

Nonsense, his conscience said. You know exactly why you’re here…who you’re looking for.

But it didn’t matter. She wasn’t there.

So he ducked past the busy catering staff and out of the French windows to the small lawn.

The floodlights on the outside of the house made the dark night even blacker, and it took him a few moments to realise he wasn’t alone. A movement at the end of the lawn caught his eye and he made out two silhouettes. He almost grinned and shrugged it off as a couple of guests slipping away to get friendly, but something made him look again.

Piers was up to his old tricks, it seemed. He was a notorious flirt. The only reason Mark had invited him was because he needed his firm’s specialist legal knowledge on a recording contract he was putting together. Still, Piers was relatively harmless, and most of the females in their circle of acquaintance knew how to deal with him. Mark peered deeper into the darkness. Just who was he with this time, anyway?

And then he was running, the sound of his own blood rushing and swirling in his ears. He worked out regularly enough, and his legs were pumping beneath him, but somehow he seemed to make torturous progress, like the slow-motion running in a dream.

The woman Piers was slobbering over was Ellie.

And there was no way he was going to let some jumped-up little twit who worked for his daddy’s law firm foist himself on one of his staff. She might not know how to—

Mark almost slipped on the damp grass.

Perhaps she did.

He watched as Ellie gave Piers a first-class whack with her shoes. Piers stumbled and fell on the damp grass, clutching a hand to his head. Mark finally skidded to a halt in front of them and yanked Piers up by his collar. His right fist was itching to make contact with that pretty face. He ought to flatten him for treating Ellie that way.

‘Mark, no!’

The panic in her voice was all he needed to make him reconsider. He released the slimy runt and gave him a shove in the direction of the house.

‘Go home, Piers. You’re drunk.’

Piers wiped saliva from the edges of his mouth with the back of his hand.

‘Steady on, Mark!’

He marched towards Piers and stopped inches from his face. Piers might have a reputation for being a ladies’ man, but Mark had never suspected how nasty he could be with it. How could a man who appeared so polished during the working week turn out to be such a rat? Once again he’d believed the best in someone, only to be utterly disappointed.

‘No. You steady on,’ he said, with more than a hint of controlled fury in his voice. ‘Don’t ever set foot in this house again. In fact, don’t bother to set foot in my offices again, either. As of Monday I will be seeking new legal representation—you and your firm are fired.’

Piers tugged at his tie and stood as tall as the whisky would let him.

‘Now, look here. I could sue you for assault, manhandling me in that way!’

‘Yes, you could. And I could tell the paparazzi hiding in my front bushes how you got plastered at my party and tried to grope one of my guests. I’m sure the partners at Blackthorn and Webb would welcome the publicity, don’t you?’

Piers turned tail and lurched towards the house. Mark watched until he was out of sight, then faced Ellie. ‘I’m so sorry about that. Are you all right?’

‘Fine.’ Her voice quivered enough to call her determined face a liar.

‘You gave him one hell of a clout with those shoes!’

The shell-shocked expression gave way to a delightfully naughty smile. ‘You should have warned him I was dangerous to mess with.’

The fingers of Mark’s right hand wandered to the spot near his left collarbone, where she’d bitten him only a few weeks earlier. At the time he’d been livid, hadn’t found it funny in the slightest. Tonight, however, he found he couldn’t find it anything but, and he started to laugh.

To his surprise, Ellie joined him. Softly at first, with a giggle that hinted she was holding more of it in than she was letting out. But eventually she was laughing just as hard as he was, and the more he saw her eyes sparkle and her cheeks blush, the more he wanted to keep the moment going.

Look at her. When she smiled like that, lost the glare and the frosty expression, she was…Not beautiful. At least not in the way Hollywood and the media defined the word. But he couldn’t stop looking at her.

And why would he? She was laughing so hard she’d gone pink in the face and her eyes were squeezed shut. Any minute now he thought she’d keel over. It was adorable. Just as she threatened to make his prediction come true, she clutched at the air to steady herself. Her hand made contact with his upper arm and all the shared laughter suddenly died away.

Ellie looked away and tucked and escaped curl into the clip on top of her head. It bounced back again, unwilling to be leashed. His desire to reach forward and brush it away from her face was almost overpowering, but he’d done that so many times with other women. It would be too much of a cliché.

She looked up at him and shivered.

‘You’re cold.’

She started to protest, but he swung his jacket off and carefully hung it round her shoulders. It must be the night for clichés. This, too, was something he’d done more times than he could remember too—one of his moves, part of the game.

But it wasn’t like that with Ellie. She’d been cold, and he’d done something to remedy that. He wasn’t playing any games. Mainly because he didn’t know what the rules were with her. She made him feel different—unpolished, uncertain—as if he wasn’t in control of whatever was going on.

He looked at the warm light spilling from Larkford’s every window. He really ought to get back to his guests.

She moved slightly, and the friction of material between his fingers reminded him he was still holding the lapels of the jacket firmly. He really should let go. But Ellie was looking up at him, her eyes soft and unguarded, just as they had been when she’d stared down at him from the landing.

He’d liked that look then, and he liked it now. There wasn’t a hint of greed or artifice in it. And that was a rare thing in his world. It was as if she saw something that surprised her, something that everyone else missed.

He’d seen her skirting the edge of the party, boredom clear on her face. And when he’d turned back to Melodie and the record producer he’d been chatting to he’d suddenly seen the whole gathering through Ellie’s eyes, as if he’d been given X-ray specs that cut out the glare and the glitter, revealing everyone and everything for who and what they really were. Not much of what he’d seen would benefit from close scrutiny.

But out here on the lawn everything felt very real indeed. Uncomfortably so. His heart was hammering in his chest—and it wasn’t from his race across the lawn.

She was tantalisingly close, her feelings clearly written in her face, floating across the surface. He felt her warm breath on his neck, sending shivers to the roots of his hair. He clenched the lapels of the dinner jacket, pulling her closer until only a molecule of air prevented their faces from touching. Normally he’d go in for the kill now, take the advantage while he had it, but he waited.

What for, he wasn’t exactly sure.

The world seemed to shrink into the tiny space between his lips and hers. At least Ellie was aware of nothing but this, nothing beyond it. And, since remembering past or future was a struggle sometimes anyway, she finally let go and just existed in the moment. This particular moment revolved around a choice, one that was hers alone: to flow with the moment or push against it.

She was so tired of fighting herself, tired of pushing herself, of always keeping everything under constant surveillance. Just once she wanted to follow an impulse rather than resist it.

She wanted this.

Hesitantly, she pressed her lips against his, splaying her hands across his chest to steady herself. For a moment he did nothing, and her heart plummeted, but then he pulled her to him, sliding his hands under his suit jacket to circle her waist, and kissed her back.

All those women who fluttered and twittered merely at the sight of him would have melted clean away if they’d been on the receiving end of a kiss like this. Every mad hormonal urge she’d been fighting for the last few weeks roared into life and she didn’t resist a single one.

It was a kiss of need, exploration…perfection.

She didn’t need to think, to struggle to remember anything. And she wouldn’t have been able to if she’d tried, not with Mark’s teeth nipping at her lower lip, his hands sliding up her back until they brushed the bare flesh of her shoulders. Ellie reached up to feel the faint stubble on his jaw with her fingertips. He groaned and pulled her close enough to feel the muscles in his chest flexing as his arms moved. She let her head drop back when his lips pressed against the tingling skin just below her jaw, and she slid her fingers round the back of his head, running them through the short hair there and feeling him shiver.

A tray clanged inside the kitchen, and the noise cut cleanly and smoothly through the night air. They both froze, and the moment they’d shared shattered along with the glasses landing on the kitchen floor.

There was a horrible sense of déjà vu as they stared at each other, neither sure of what was going on and what they should do next.

Mark grasped for words inside his head. Say something!

He reached for her. ‘Ellie…’

Come on, smooth talker! Where’s all your patter now?

She stared back at him, wide-eyed and breathless. Then, before he could get his thoughts collected into syllables, she bolted into the house.

See? Unpredictable. He couldn’t have guessed she was going to do that. After all, it wasn’t the normal response he got when he kissed a woman—quite the reverse.

He raced after her and burst through the French windows into the kitchen. Precious seconds were lost as he collided with a fully laden waiter. The clattering of trays and muttered apologies masked the sound of her bare feet slapping on the tiles as she tore out of the kitchen and down the passageway that led to the back stairs.

He dodged another waiter and ran after her, only to be corralled by a group of guests.

‘Mark!’

He turned to find Kat, looking all dishevelled and misty. Her puppy-dog eyes pleaded with him.

‘It’s Razor…’

She sniffed, and a single tear rolled down her cheek. Mark looked hopelessly at the staircase to his left, then at Kat, and back to the staircase. Kat hung on to his sleeve. He knew her well enough by now to realise that full meltdown was only seconds away. He put his own desires on the back burner and guided her through the crush in the drawing room to his study.

The boy wonder had undoubtedly been his usual considerate self, and Mark’s shoulder was the one designated for crying on these days. He’d resisted that in the beginning, but he was too much of a sucker for a forlorn female to just pat Kat on the head and say, There, there.

As he ushered her into the study and shut the door he reasoned to himself that Ellie wasn’t going anywhere for the moment. It would probably be better to give her a few minutes before he went after her—some thinking time. So he allowed Kat to spill out the whole sorry story and soak his shirt with her tears.

Ellie sat in the dark, shivering despite the central heating. She couldn’t bear to turn on the light and see Sam’s picture on the bedside table. Her eyes were sticky with tears and her nose was running. With a loud sniff she toppled back onto the mattress and curled into a ball.

‘What was I thinking?’

Oh, but thinking hadn’t been the problem. It was what she’d done that had messed everything up. Thoughts were fleeting, easily lost, erased or misplaced. Actions, however, were a little more concrete. And in this case definitely more memorable.

Just the memory of Mark’s lips on hers was enough to make her flush hot and cold again.

How could she have done this to Sam? Wonderful, loving, dependable Sam? She was sure he would have been happy to think she would find someone else and rebuild her shattered life, but Mark Wilder! He was the worst kind of womaniser there was.

She searched the darkness above her head for an answer, desperate to make sense of it all.

But Mark hadn’t seemed like a womaniser tonight in the garden, quite the reverse. He’d sent Piers Double-Barrelled packing, backing her up and taking her side, and he hadn’t even taken advantage of the situation when she’d been vulnerable and heaving with hormones. She could have walked away…

Maybe it wasn’t about Mark. Maybe it was a symptom of her decision to break free, to learn to live again. Perhaps part of herself that she’d thought had died and been buried along with Sam had sprung to life again. She was a young woman still. It was just a healthy interest in the opposite sex, a natural response to a good-looking man.

But that train of thought derailed just as fast as the last one had.

It was only since meeting Mark that she’d been anything but numb. He was a catalyst of some kind. And…and if it was just about pent-up desires, she wouldn’t have rejected Piers. He was suave and attractive, but it didn’t stop her experiencing a wave of revulsion every time she thought of him.

So she was back to Mark. Her brain was swinging in wild arcs, but it always came back to Mark. What was she going to do about that…about him?

His attraction to her was genuine, there was no mistaking that, but it wouldn’t last. Men like him didn’t stay with women like her. After a couple of months it would fizzle out and she’d be left alone again. And in search of a new job.

She didn’t want an affair, or a fling, or a one-night stand. Settling for less than the all-encompassing love she’d had for Sam seemed like being unfaithful to his memory. It would be like losing the Crown Jewels and replacing them with paste and nickel that made your skin turn green. This thing with Mark, whatever it was, it couldn’t go anywhere. It couldn’t be anything.

She sniffed again and stretched out a little. Why? Why be interested in someone like him? She could say it was the money, or the success, his looks and his charm, but it wasn’t any of those things. Tonight she’d glimpsed something else behind the cheeky, boyish charm. Something darker and deeper that resonated with a similar something inside her too.

A faint hint of Mark’s aftershave drifted into her nostrils. She looked up, half expecting to see him standing there, waiting for her, but the room was empty. Then she realised she was still wearing his jacket. His masculine scent clung to it, and she was reminded of the moment he’d put it on her in the garden.

He’d seemed so vulnerable standing there. For a man who had women drop at his feet on a daily basis he’d almost seemed unsure of himself. Not at all what she’d expected.

She whimpered and covered her face with her hands, even though there was no one there to see her blush.

How was she going to face him in the morning?

CHAPTER SIX

MARK stumbled downstairs some time after ten. He’d intended to get up earlier, but he hadn’t dropped off until dawn and then his sleep had been heavy, full of dreams where he was running from unseen predators. He’d wanted to be fresh and calm this morning, to deal with the aftermath of last night’s events with just a little panache.

He didn’t have to search hard for Ellie, though; he could smell something delicious wafting from the kitchen, and he followed the mouthwatering smell like a zombie.

Well, almost like a zombie. His heart rate was pattering along too fast for him to be considered officially dead. Was he…was he nervous?

He’d spent hours last night in his study, going over and over it all in his head. Not that he’d come to any earth-shattering conclusions. He had a housekeeper. She kissed like a dream. That was about the sum total of it.

All he’d done was kiss her. It was hardly a big deal.

All he’d done… He should listen to himself.

If it had just been a kiss, his heart wouldn’t be flapping around inside his chest like a fish out of water.

He liked Ellie. And not in the let’s-have-dinner-at-the-Ivy kind of way he normally liked women. It felt different. As if this kind of liking had a different shape, was a different kind of entity all together.

Now, that was a scary thought.

Like Helena, Ellie was one of those delicate beings, beautiful in their frailty like an orchid or a butterfly. And that made her even more dangerous. He knew he couldn’t resist getting drawn in by women like that, finding himself wanting to protect them, to care for them until they were whole again. It was a weakness, he knew, but one that he channelled into his clients these days, by being the best manager in the business. At least they paid him for his devotion.

That kind of woman sucked everything out of a man until he had nothing left to give. And then she took what he’d done, all the tender, loving care he’d given, and bestowed it on someone else, someone who didn’t remind her of the pain. Someone who didn’t remind her of who she used to be when she was just a shell, empty and hurting.

He couldn’t do that again. He couldn’t be that for anyone again.

So he would just have to deflect Ellie, dazzle her, and move things back to where they should be—on a purely professional level.

If he could talk a highly strung diva down from demanding three-hundred-pound-a-bottle mineral water that had been blessed by a Tibetan priest in her dressing room, he could surely manage this. And then he would invent a reason to go and stay at his flat in London for a few days. It wasn’t running away; it was self-preservation.

‘Morning,’ he said, overcompensating a little and sounding much too relaxed as he entered the kitchen. Ellie had her back turned to him. She was stirring something in a saucepan on the hob and returned his greeting in a cool, clipped voice, not looking up from the pan.

‘What are you doing?’

Ah, yes. This is the smooth wit and banter you are famous for…This will charm the socks off her and sort everything out.

Ellie didn’t say anything, just stirred harder.

‘It smells great. What is it?’

‘I decided to make a big batch of bolognaise and freeze it in smaller portions for quick suppers,’ she said in a starchy voice. ‘Would you like me to stop and fetch you breakfast?’

That was the last thing he wanted. Far too awkward.

‘It’s okay. I’m more than capable of getting my own coffee.’

He grabbed himself a mug of coffee and sat down at the circular wooden table near the French windows that led to the garden. Ellie was pushing what he now recognised as beef mince round the pan with a wooden spoon. It spat and hissed, the only sound in the rapidly thickening atmosphere.

He cleared his throat. ‘Ellie, listen…’

‘Look, Mark, I know where this is going.’

‘You do?’ He rubbed his nose with the heel of his hand.

‘I do. And let’s not go there.’

Good. They were reading off the same page. Why, then, had his stomach bottomed out like a plummeting lift?

‘Okay,’ he said, not trusting himself with anything more complicated. It seemed as if Ellie was doing fine on her own, anyway. She took a deep breath in readiness for another speech.

‘You’re my boss. You spend your time flitting around the globe and living the high life. And I’m…’ She looked at the ceiling, searching for the right word.

‘I know I’m your boss—of course I know that—and you’re…’

Surprising? Appealing? Unforgettable? Those were the words that filled his head. None of them were the right ones to come out of his mouth, though.

‘You’re…’

Ellie’s gaze wandered down from the heavens and settled on him. ‘I’m your housekeeper.’

‘Right.’ That was correct. But it didn’t feel like the right answer.

She shook her head, her curls bouncing slightly. ‘To be honest, you and me, it’s just—’

‘Complicated?’

She shrugged one shoulder. ‘I was going for tacky or predictable, but your word works too.’

Ouch.

‘I’m your employee, and I think we should keep our relationship on a professional basis,’ she said, turning to face him fully.

‘I agree with you one hundred percent.’

He looked hard at her, trying to work out what she was thinking. Her words were telling him she was fine, but her tone said something entirely different.

‘You seem upset…’

She waved the wooden spoon in dismissal.

‘Upset? I’m not upset!’

‘Good.’

She gave him a blatantly fake smile, and returned her attention to the meat in the pan.

‘Annoyed, then?’

More frantic stirring.

‘Nope. Not at all.’ She started jabbing the wooden spoon at the remaining lumps.

Ellie might be different from a lot of women he knew in a lot of ways, but the whole pretending to be fine when she clearly was not was horribly familiar.

‘Ellie, I know I may have been a bit impulsive last night, but I don’t think we…I did anything wrong.’

‘Oh, you don’t?’ she said through clenched teeth.

‘No. Do you?’

Now he was totally lost. Why did women have this secret agenda that read like code to normal human beings—men, in other words?

The pan spat ferociously as Ellie added a jar of tomatoey gloopy stuff and mixed it in. She turned to face him and took a step away from the counter, still holding the dripping spoon.

‘You’re unbelievable, do you know that? You live in a lovely little Mark bubble where everything is perfect. You haven’t got a clue what real life is like!’

He thought he did a pretty good job of living life, thank you very much, and he didn’t much care for someone he hardly knew judging him for it.

‘I don’t?’

‘No! You don’t. Real people have real feelings, and you can’t just go messing around with them. You live in this rarefied world where you do whatever you want, get whatever you want and everything goes right for you. Not everybody has that luxury. And you waste it, you know? You really do.’

Something in her stare made him hold back the smart retort poised on his lips. Through the film of tears gathering in her eyes he saw determination and an honesty that was surprising—and not a little unnerving.

Something was very wrong, but as usual he was totally mystified as to what was going on inside her head. Why was she blaming him? He hadn’t been the one to start it last night. She had kissed him, remember? And he certainly hadn’t meant to mess around with her feelings, but perhaps he had…without realising it.

Maybe he was clueless. He needed to consider her accusation a little more fully before he gave a real answer.

Ellie made use of the silence to ram her point home. ‘I think it’s best for both of us if we just put that…you know, the…’

A crack in her anger showed as she desperately tried to avoid using the word ‘kiss’. It would have been funny if she hadn’t been giving him the brush-off.

‘Let’s just put what happened last night down to champagne and temporary insanity, okay? I don’t want to lose this job.’

He nodded just once. ‘And I need to start looking for a new housekeeper like I need a hole in the head.’

Finally she breathed out and her shoulders relaxed a little. ‘I’m glad we understand each other,’ she said with a small jut of her chin, and turned her attention back to the bolognaise sauce.

She was right. He knew she was right. It was just…

Aw, forget it. He’d spent the last decade fooling everyone—even himself—that he was ‘living the dream’. He might just as well return to that happy, alpha-wave state and forget that he’d ever yearned for anything more.

If you can, a little voice whispered in his ear. If you can…

Mark disappeared back to London the next day, much to Ellie’s relief. But it didn’t stop him coming back to Larkford again the following weekend. Or the one after that. During the week she could relax, enjoy her surroundings, but the weekends were something else. Stiff. Awkward. And, although she’d never expected anything more than a professional relationship with the man, now they were operating on that level it just seemed, well…weird.

And that was how it continued for the next month or so.

So, there she was on a Saturday afternoon, hiding out in the kitchen, preparing the evening meal, even though she needn’t start for hours yet. But it was good to keep herself busy and out of a certain person’s way. Not that it had been hard today. He might be at home, but he was obviously working; he’d hardly left the study all day. They were keeping to their separate territories as boxers did their corners of the ring.

She was still cross with herself for being too weak to control her brain’s fried electrical signals. They still all short-circuited every time he appeared. It was as if her neurons had rewired themselves with a specialised radar that picked up only him as he breezed around the house, as calm as you like, while her fingernails were bitten so low she’d practically reached her knuckles.

Blip. Blip. Blip.

There it went again. Her core temperature rose a couple of notches. He was on the move; she just knew it. She stopped chopping an onion and listened. After about ten seconds she heard what she’d been waiting for—footsteps in the hall, getting louder.

She kept her eyes on her work as Mark entered the kitchen. The coffee machine sputtered. Liquid sloshed into a cup. The rubber heel of a stool squeaked on the floor. Silence. The tiny hairs on the back of her neck bristled.

Just carry on as if he’s not there.

The knife came down hard on the chopping board—thunk, thunk, thunk—so close she almost trimmed her non-existent nails. She threw the onion pieces into a hot frying pan where they hissed back at her. According to the recipe they should be finely chopped. The asymmetrical lumps looked more like the shapes Chloe had produced as a toddler when left to her own devices with paper and safety scissors.

She sliced the next onion with exaggerated care and flipped the switch for the extractor hood above the hob. It was too still in the kitchen. Too hot. She plucked a papery clove of garlic from a nearby pot.

Only one more left.

That gave her an idea, stunning in its simplicity. She turned to face Mark with what she hoped was a cool stare. He sat looking straight back at her, waiting.

‘I need to go out—to get some things I can’t find at the local shops from the big supermarket. Is there anything you’d like me to get you that’s not on the shopping list?’ She nodded to indicate a long pad hanging on a nail where she always listed store cupboard items as soon as they’d run out. She even managed a smile on the last few words, so delighted was she at the thought of getting out of the house and into fresh, uncomplicated air.

He just lifted his shoulders and let them drop again. ‘Nope. Nothing in particular.’

Most housekeepers would be glad of having a boss with such an easygoing nature, but the contrast with her own jangled emotions just made her want to club him over the head with his large wooden pepper mill. She strode to the other side of the room and snatched her handbag from where it hung on the back of a chair.

It wasn’t more than a minute later that she was sitting in the driver’s seat of her car, turning the key in the ignition.

Nothing.

‘Come on, old girl!’ she crooned, rubbing the dashboard. ‘Don’t let me down now. You are my ticket out of here—at least for the afternoon.’ She tried again, pumping her foot frantically on the pedal. Her old banger coughed, threatening to fire up, then thought better of it. She slapped the steering wheel with the flat of her hands.

‘Traitor.’

She collected her bag and strutted back into the kitchen, chin in the air. Mark was still sitting on the stool, finishing his coffee.

‘Problems?’

‘Car won’t start. I’ll have to go another day, after I’ve had the old heap looked at.’

Mark stood up and pulled a bunch of keys from his pocket. ‘Come on, then.’

‘What?’

‘I’ll take you.’

‘No, it’s okay. Honestly. You’re busy.’

‘No problem,’ he said with that lazy grin of his, the one straight out of a toothpaste ad. ‘I could do with getting away from my desk and letting things settle in my head, anyway.’

Ellie groaned inwardly. Now the afternoon was going to be torture rather than escape. She followed him reluctantly to his car. It was a sleek, gunmetal-grey Aston Martin. She could almost see his chest puff out in pride as he held the passenger door open for her.

Boys and their toys. What was the theory about men with flash cars?

Mark didn’t need to take his eyes off the road to know that Ellie had shifted position and was now staring out of the window. He was aware of every sigh, every fidget. And her body language was yelling at him in no uncertain terms—back off!

What if she’d been right all those weeks ago when she’d shouted at him? He’d given the whole thing a lot of thought. Did he live in a ‘Mark bubble’? A self-absorbed little universe where he was the sun and all revolved around him? Did he now waltz through life—well, relationships—without a backward glance?

If he did, it hadn’t always been that way. His thoughts slid inevitably to Helena. That woman had a lot to answer for. He’d have stayed by her side until his dying day. Hadn’t he promised as much, dressed in a morning suit in front of hundreds of witnesses? Stupidly, he’d thought she’d felt the same way, but it turned out that he’d confused loyalty with neediness. She’d stuck around while he’d been useful and then, when he’d needed her to be the strong one for a change, she’d walked away.

And he hadn’t seen it coming. Before the news had broken, he’d been thinking to himself that Helena had finally reached a place where she seemed less troubled, and he’d even been thinking about broaching the subject of having kids.

But then his first management company had gone belly-up because he’d made the same mistake with Nuclear Hamster. He’d really believed in them, had remortgaged his house, emptied his savings accounts to give them a start in the business. Friends had warned him not to take a cut of the net profit in their first contract when most managers took a percentage of the gross. The album had sold well, but on tour they’d run up huge bills—having parties, chartering private jets—and at the end of the day fifteen percent of no profit whatsoever and creditors knocking at the door meant he’d had to declare himself bankrupt. It hadn’t been any comfort at all to know he’d walked into a trap of his own making because he made the mistake of trusting people he’d got close to.

He’d thought Helena’s coolness, her distance, had been because she’d been worried about money. Heck, he’d been terrified himself. He’d known how expensive it was to take a rock band to court. But what else could he have done? He couldn’t have let one bunch of freeloaders ruin his career and reputation, could he?

All at once the love and care she’d demanded from him for the previous four years had been deemed suffocating, and without the nice lifestyle there hadn’t been much incentive to stick around. Helena had declared she needed space, that it was time to stand on her own two feet. You name the cliché and she’d flung it at him.

Of course that hadn’t lasted more than two minutes. She’d soon found herself a rich TV executive to pander to her needs and the whole cycle had started all over again. Oh, she’d sniffed around again when he’d won his court case and rebuilt his company, but he hadn’t even returned her calls. If she couldn’t stand by him through the tough times—through living in a bedsit and eating beans on toast for months, through losing all his so-called friends and business associates—then she didn’t deserve even a minute of his attention. He’d surprised himself at his own hardness.

And it gave him a grim sense of satisfaction to know she’d burned her bridges too soon. Half a ton of debts was all she’d been entitled to in the divorce proceedings. If she’d waited a couple of years before she’d bailed she would have done a lot better for herself.

Light drizzle peppered the windscreen. He watched it build into a pattern of dots. A flick of a switch round the steering wheel created a blank canvas where a new and completely different design was free to form.

He turned off the main road into a narrow country lane and determined to concentrate on the road in front of him. The Aston Martin was heaven to drive. Normally he didn’t have time to sit back and enjoy it, always hurrying from A to B, always focusing on the destination instead of the journey. Ellie’s presence as his passenger made him want to savour the experience.

The trip to the supermarket had been fun, in a way. Spending time with her on neutral territory had been different. She’d relaxed a little. He felt strangely comfortable pushing the trolley along behind her as she’d browsed the aisles, squeezing avocados and reading the backs of packets. Of course he’d had no idea what she was doing half the time, or what she’d make with the assortment of ingredients she’d flung in the trolley, but the fact she knew gave her an air of wisdom.

The raindrops on the windscreen got fatter and rounder. They were going to have to get a move on if they were going to get home before it tipped down. The purr of the engine seduced him into going faster. He was pretty confident in his driving skills and was starting to become familiar with these lanes, anticipating the sweep and curve of the overgrown hedgerows as they got closer to Larkford. He glanced at Ellie. She was staring straight ahead, a grim look on her face.

He swung round a corner into a flat, fairly straight stretch of road and picked up speed. He loved the growl of satisfaction as the engine worked harder. It responded with eagerness to every nudge on the accelerator.

The sky darkened and the wild hedgerows whipped past, clawing at the car as if they were jealous. Inside the low-slung sports car the air was full of static. He could almost feel the crackles arcing from Ellie’s thigh as he changed gear, his knuckles threatening to stroke the warm denim of her jeans.

A pheasant burst from the hedge in a flurry of feathers. He heard Ellie’s sharp intake of breath, and out of the corner of his eye saw her grip the edge of her seat. After he’d braked slightly, he turned his head fully towards her, meaning to reassure her.

‘Mark…’ The trembling plea hardly escaped her lips.

‘It’s okay. We weren’t going to—’

‘Mark…please…!’

The urgency in her voice panicked him. Her face was frozen in stark horror. He looked back down the lane and his stomach lurched as he saw the farm vehicle pulling out of a concealed entrance. He squeezed the brake harder, slowing to a smooth crawl, and allowed the rust-speckled tractor to rumble past them. He pulled away and silently congratulated himself on not even leaving a skid mark on the tarmac.

‘Stop the car.’ Her voice was faint, but determined.

‘But we’re almost home.’

Her voice came in breathy gasps. ‘I said…stop the car…I want to get out.’

Mark’s faced creased into a scowl of disbelief as Ellie scrabbled at the door lever, desperate to free the lock. He pulled deftly into a passing place. Before the car had fully stopped Ellie had popped her seat belt and staggered out of the car, stumbling forward, gulping in damp country air. She was shaking, her whole body quivering.

Mark sat paralysed in the driver’s seat, too stunned to move. Then, coming to his senses, he unbuckled himself and ran after her. It didn’t take long to catch her as she straggled up the lane, half in a dream state.

He grabbed her wrist and pulled her firmly to him. Her head lodged just under his chin, and for a split second she moulded against him before pushing him away again.

He should have remembered she was surprisingly strong for a woman so soft and rounded-looking. He managed to grab one of her wrists before she darted off again down the middle of the road.

She turned to face him, fury in her eyes. ‘I asked you to stop the car!’

Her free arm waved around wildly and she pulled and tugged the other, trying to twist it out of his grasp.

Mark stared at her. What on earth was wrong with her? Why such angst over a stupid tractor? Puzzled as he was, he held on to her as gently as he could without letting her run down the lane into oncoming traffic. Ellie swung towards the middle of the road as she attempted to wrench her arm away from him again, all the while pressing a flattened palm to her chest and breathing in shallow gasps.

The nasal blast of a horn pierced the air and Mark grabbed her back out of the path of an approaching car. He stumbled backwards with her until his feet were on the grassy verge, the gnarled twigs of the ancient hedgerow piercing his back.

Ellie’s mouth worked against his chest. He could feel her jaw moving, feel the moist warmth of her breath through his pullover. She might have been trying to shout at him, but nothing remotely resembling a word was included in the few noises tumbling out of her mouth. Her tiny hands balled into fists and she punched him on the chest. Twice.

He might not know what was going on here—clueless, as always—but one thing was certain: whether she knew it or not, Ellie needed him in this moment. She needed someone to be angry with, someone to fall apart on. And, hey, wasn’t he the most likely candidate to light her fuse at the moment, anyway? He might as well take the brunt of whatever this was.

No way was he about to brush this situation off with a joke. It was time to face the challenge he’d walked away from so many times over the last decade. No amount of sequins or cash would defuse the situation. He was just going to have to be ‘real’ too. He hoped to God he still had it in him.

She was still trying to push away from him, but now the tears came. She gulped and cried and sobbed as if she’d never stop. He swallowed rising fear at such intense emotion, whispered words of comfort in her ear and waited for the squall to wear itself out. Eventually the sobbing became shallower and she surrendered to it, burying her face in his jumper. All those crying sessions with Kat now just seemed like practice sessions leading up to this moment—and he was thoroughly glad of the training.

How he wished he could do something to ease her pain. It was so raw. Perhaps if he held her long enough, tight enough, something of him she needed would seep through the damp layers between them in a kind of osmosis. He wanted to make up the missing parts of her. Loan her his uncanny ability to shield himself from everything, to feel nothing he didn’t want to.

His fingers stilled in her curls as he thought what a poor exchange it would be. He had nothing to give her, really. She could teach him so much more. Her determination, her ability to say what she felt whether she wanted to or not. She knew how to live, while he only knew how to dazzle.

The sky turned to lavender-grey as afternoon retreated. Mark let the thump of his heart beat away the minutes as Ellie became motionless against him, pulling in deep breaths. She peeled her face from his chest, the ridge marks of the wool knit embedded on her hot cheek, half blinded by the thick tears clogging her eyelashes. Mark held her face tenderly in his palms and looked deep into her pink-rimmed eyes, desperate to soothe away the tempest he didn’t understand.

Ellie stared back at him.

He could see weariness, despair, the ragged depths of her soul, but also a glimmer of something else. Her eyes were pleading with him, asking him to give her hope.

His voice was soft and low. ‘Tell me.’

It was not a demand, but a request. Ellie’s lips quivered and a tear splashed onto his hand. Never taking his gaze from her, he led her to the passenger door and sat her on the edge of the leather seat, crouching to stay on her level, keeping her hands tight between his.

Ellie let out a shuddering sigh as she closed her eyes. Her top lip tucked under her bottom teeth. He could see she was searching for words. Her pale green eyes flipped open and looked straight into his.

Her voice was low and husky from crying. ‘It was just a panic attack. I get them sometimes…Sorry.’

He wasn’t sure he was buying this. A forgotten voice inside his head—his conscience, maybe?—poked and prodded him and dared him not to let this slide. Whatever she needed to say was important. And it was important she said it now. So he did the only thing he could do. He waited.

For a few minutes no one spoke, no one moved, and then she dipped her head and spoke in a low, hoarse voice. ‘My husband and daughter were killed in a car accident on a wet day like this,’ she said, looking down at their intertwined fingers.

‘I’m so sorry.’

Well, that was probably the most inadequate sentence he’d ever uttered in his life, but it was all he could come up with. Lame or not, it was the truth. He was sorry for her. Sorry for the lives that had been cut off too early. Sorry he hadn’t even known she’d been married. He squeezed her hands tighter.

‘It was almost four years ago now. We were driving home from a day out shopping. I’d bought Chloe a pair of sparkly pink party shoes. She never even got to wear them…’

There was nothing he could say. Nothing he could do but let her talk.

‘The police said it was joyriders. They’d been daring each other to go faster and faster…There was a head-on collision at a sharp bend on a country lane. Nobody could stop in time—the road was too wet.’

How awful. Such a tragedy. He wondered how she’d found out. Had the police come knocking at her door? A word she’d muttered earlier came back to haunt him.

We?

He rubbed the back of her hand with his thumb. ‘You were in the car too?’

She sniffed and hiccupped at the same time, then looked at him, a deep gnawing ache in her eyes. ‘I was driving.’

Mark pulled her back into his arms. He could feel her salty tears on his own cheek, smell her shampoo as she laid her head on his shoulder. He closed his eyes and drank in her gentle fragrance. Her soft ringlets cushioned his face, a corkscrew curl tickling his nose.

‘Feel,’ she said. At first he didn’t understand, but she pulled his hand away from her back and placed it on the right side of her head. Where there should have been smooth bone beneath skin and hair there was a deep groove in her scalp. Mark stroked the hair there too. Gently. So gently.

‘The police told me there wasn’t anything I could have done,’ she said quietly. ‘But I don’t remember. And it’s like having a huge question mark hanging over my life. I’m never going to know that for sure. What if I could have reacted a split second faster or turned the wheel another way?’

She drifted off into silence again.

His voice left him. He’d never imagined…

And he realised how stupid he’d been now. He should have curbed the adolescent urge to show off around her, racing his car down the winding lanes. All this was his fault.

Ellie sighed and relaxed into him. It felt perfect, as if she’d been carved to fit there. In recent weeks he’d not been able to stop himself fantasising about holding her close like this, kissing her brow, her nose, her lips. Well, not exactly like this. But he knew if he gave in to the fierce pull of his own desire now he would desecrate the moment, and he knew it would never come again.

She stirred, pulling back from him slightly to drag her hands across her face in an effort to mop up the congealed tears.

‘I’m sorry.’ Her voice was so faint it was barely a whisper.

‘No. I’m sorry. For starting all this in the first place…’

‘You couldn’t have known.’ All the fizzing, spitting irritation she’d held in her eyes every time she’d looked at him since the night of the party was gone.

‘Well, I know now. And I am sorry. For anything—everything—I did to upset you. You must know I would never do that on purpose, however much of an idiot I may seem sometimes.’

Her mouth curved imperceptibly and her eyes never left his. He felt a banging in his chest just as hard as when she’d been thumping on it with her fist. He stood up and rested his hand on the door to steady himself.

‘Let’s go home.’

CHAPTER SEVEN

NO LIGHTS were on in the drawing room. The firelight flickered, playing with the shadows on the wall. Mark sat in his favourite chair and savoured the aromatic warmth of his favourite whisky as it smouldered in his throat. The only sounds were the cracking of the wood on the fire and the laborious ticking of the antique clock in the corner. Ellie had gone to bed early, and he was left to relentlessly mull over the events of the afternoon.

They had driven back to Larkford in complete silence, but it had been different from the combustible atmosphere of their outward journey. The calm after the storm. He hadn’t wanted to jinx the easy comfort by opening his big mouth. He hadn’t been sure if Ellie was lost in the recent past, or plumbing the depths of earlier memories, and it hadn’t felt right to ask.

The vivid evening sky had deepened to a velvety indigo by the time they’d drawn up in front of the house. Mark had carried the shopping in, forbidding Ellie to help, and had suggested she have a long hot bath. He’d realised, as he’d struggled with the dilemma of where to put the dried pasta they’d just bought, that he didn’t have a clue where stuff went in his own kitchen. He’d got down to a shortlist of two possible cupboards when he’d heard the unmistakable sound of Ellie’s bare feet on the tiles.

‘Top left,’ she said quietly.

‘Thanks,’ he replied, shutting the cupboard door he was holding open and walking to another one on the other side of the room. When he put the linguine away next to the other bags of pasta he turned to look at her. She was dressed in a ratty pink towelling robe that was slightly longer at one side than the other. Her hair was wet, the blonde curls darkened and subdued, but struggling to bounce back. Her face was pink and scrubbed, eyes bright. He had never seen her look so gorgeous.

She walked towards him. His heart thumped so loudly in his chest he thought she was bound to hear it. But she didn’t stop and stare at him. She didn’t laugh. Instead, she was smiling, eyes hesitant but warm. He was hypnotised.

‘Thank you, Mark. For everything.’

She was only a foot away from him now, and she stood on tiptoes and placed an exquisitely delicate kiss on his cheek.

‘Goodnight,’ she said gently, and she headed for the door.

‘Night,’ he replied absently, still feeling the sweet sting of her lips on his cheek.

Now, hours later, he could still feel the tingle of that kiss. He took another sip of the whisky and rubbed the spot with the tips of his fingers.

At least he understood that tragic look in her eyes now. Ellie was haunted; the ghosts of her lost family still followed her. She had lived through more hurt than he could possibly imagine and yet she had found the strength to carry on living.

He looked back at his own life over the last decade and berated himself for his self-centredness and cowardice. He’d been afraid to let anyone close because he’d allowed one gold-digging woman to discolour his view of the rest of her sex. Instead of moving on and growing from the experience he’d sulked and cut himself off from any possibility of being hurt again, learning to cauterise the wounds with sarcastic humour and a don’t-care attitude. He’d taken the easy way out.

Not like Ellie. She was brave. How did you pick yourself up again and keep on living after something like that?

He downed the rest of the whisky and sat for a long time, holding the empty glass. Once upon a time he’d written her off as fragile, but she was possibly the strongest person he’d ever met.

Be careful what you wish for, Ellie thought, as she exited the kitchen through the French windows and took her usual route round the garden. All those months in Barkleigh, longing for breathing space, the chance to be on her own without anyone fussing…

Well, now she had air and space in bucketloads. And for a while it had been good, and she thought she’d escaped that creeping sense of loneliness that had seeped into her bones at the cottage, but it had just followed her here.

Okay, most of the time it was pretty perfect. Like now, when the early-morning sun was gently warming her skin as she wandered a subconscious route round the gardens, her habitual cup of tea cradled in her upturned hands, but sometimes all this room, this space, it was a little…well…

She shook her head. She was just being silly.

It was hardly surprising she was finding life a little solitary. Only a couple of days after the disastrous trip to the supermarket Mark had disappeared, mumbling something about putting a big deal together, and she hadn’t seen him for more than a fortnight. She guessed he was staying up at his flat in London, going to meetings all day. She tried not to speculate on what he might get up to at night.

The view of the Thames from his flat must be stunning, the vibe of the warm summer nights exciting, but if she had a choice of living in a crowded city, full of exhaust fumes and scary commuters, and being here at Larkford, she knew what she’d pick.

She kicked her flip-flops off as she reached the edge of the lawn and sighed in pleasure as the soles of her feet met soft grass that was dry, but still cool from the early-morning dew.

It was silly, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that Mark was staying away deliberately. Maybe he was embarrassed. He wouldn’t be the first person not to be able to handle her unique circumstances. She’d tried to run away from that feeling too, hadn’t she? And now it had tracked her down and turned up on her doorstep.

She looked around the garden. The roses on the wrought-iron arches that lined the main path were in flower, a variety with frilly shell-pink petals. The smell was fantastic.

She sighed. Well, if Mark wanted to stay away, she couldn’t stop him. It just seemed such a pity he was missing how beautiful his home looked. Every day there was something new to admire in the garden, another flower opening its buds or shooting out new green leaves. Maybe Mark wasn’t the sort of person to notice these kind of things, but even if you didn’t notice the details you couldn’t help but feel rested here.

When she went back inside the house and checked her laptop she found an e-mail from Mark, and this time, instead of giving another boring, bland reply, she decided to add a little bit about Larkford—about the rose walk and how the wisteria on the back of the house was fairly dripping with flowers, how the hazy summer mornings burnt off into hot, bright afternoons. At least he wouldn’t miss the magic of his house totally, even if he wasn’t here to see it for himself.

Just as she was about to turn the laptop off she heard a ping, announcing the arrival of an e-mail. Thinking it might be from Ginny, informing her of the latest in a long line of pregnancy-related stories about absent-mindedness, she almost ignored it, but at the last minute she clicked on the little window and opened up the message.

She blinked and opened her eyes a little wider. It was from Mark. He must be online right now.

Hi Ellie

Thanks for the update on the plumbing situation. I’m sure you’ll be glad to have your own space when the repairs are finished in your apartment. Feel free to decorate as you’d like.

I’m glad the wisteria is stunning and the roses are happy!!! I didn’t realise you were a poet as well as a housekeeper ;-)

Mark.

What a cheek! Still, she couldn’t erase the image of Mark’s devil-may-care smile as she read it, and she was smiling too when she typed back her reply.

Fine. Now I know my boss is a Philistine I won’t bother sending any similar observations with my next message!

Of course he couldn’t leave it at that. And a rapid e-mail battle ensued. Ellie was laughing out loud when she finally admitted defeat and switched the laptop off. Maybe he was busy, after all. Maybe this whole ‘deal’ thing wasn’t just an excuse to avoid her.

And that was how communication continued the next week or so. The e-mails got less businesslike and more chatty. Mark always added winky faces made out of colons and semicolons—Sam would have said that he used far too many exclamation marks—and Ellie forgot her threat not to tell him anything about Larkford and ended up describing the way the wonderful house looked in the pale dawn light, losing herself in the images and getting all flowery about it…

And Mark, true to form, would reply with a teasing quip and burst her lyrical little bubble, causing her to laugh out loud and send back something equally pithy. She decided it was nice to communicate with someone who didn’t remind her constantly of what she’d been like before the accident, who just accepted her for who she was now and didn’t patronise her. He wasn’t just her boss now; he was an ally.

But she knew he couldn’t be any more than that. And that was fine, because that was exactly how she wanted it. Really, it was.

London late at night was stunning. Mark pressed his forehead against the plate-glass wall that filled one side of his living room and used his own shadow to block out the reflection of his flat so he could see the city beyond. Multi-coloured lights blinked on the black river below, endlessly dancing but never wearying.

When he’d bought this place he hadn’t thought he’d get tired of this view, but lately he’d found himself wanting to trade it in for something else. Maybe a leafy square in Fitzrovia or a renovated warehouse near the docks?

He decided to distract himself from his restlessness by turning on the TV, but everything seemed pointless, so he wandered into his bedroom, crashed so hard onto the bed that it murmured in complaint, then picked up the book on his bedside table. A Beginner’s Guide to Head Injuries. Only one more chapter to go and he’d be finished.

He got it now. Why Ellie had moments where she zoned out, why she forgot common words. It wasn’t just that she was scatterbrained. Not that it mattered, anyway. And he wasn’t entirely sure that all of Ellie’s unique qualities were down to a rather nasty bump on the head. He had the feeling that even if the head injury could be factored out of the equation she’d still be pretty unique.

He read to the end of the bibliography and put the book back where he’d got it from. He hadn’t checked his e-mail yet this evening, had he? And he had started to look forward to Ellie’s slightly off-on-a-tangent e-mails. She had a way of making him feel as if he were right there at Larkford, with her little stories about village life and descriptions of which plants were in flower in the garden.

Bluebells.

In her last e-mail she’d said that she’d seen a carpet of bluebells in the woodland at the fringes of the estate. Although he’d never been a man to watch gardening programmes, or take long country walks to ‘absorb nature’, he’d suddenly wanted to stand in the shade of an old oak tree and see the blue haze of flowers for himself. He wanted to see Ellie smile and turn to him, as if she were sharing a secret with him…

No.

He couldn’t think that way. He liked Ellie. He respected her. Hell, he was even attracted to her—majorly—but he couldn’t go down that path.

It had been a long time since he’d held a woman in such high regard. And that was why this was dangerous. All the things he thought about Ellie…Well, they were the basis for a good relationship. Friendship, compatibility, chemistry. But he couldn’t risk it. And not just for himself. What about Ellie? He wasn’t the man for her. She didn’t need someone who would probably cause her even more pain.

He jumped off the bed and started moving. Not that he had any particular destination in mind. He just seemed to get a burst of speed whenever he thought about a certain housekeeper.

And that was why he’d stayed away from Larkford. Because he was scared of what he was starting to feel for her. Yet even then she’d burrowed even further under his skin. Staying away hadn’t worked, had it?

He found himself by the window in the living room again, and placed his palm on the glass.

So why was he here? Bored and wishing he was somewhere else? If keeping his distance hadn’t worked, he might as well go and enjoy the house he’d bought for himself, because that was what he really wanted to do.

He wanted to go and see the bluebells for himself.

The gentle chiming of distant church bells roused Ellie from her Saturday morning slumber. Almost subconsciously she counted the chimes, not realising when she’d started but knowing the total by the time they’d finished. Eight.

Warm sunlight filtered through the curtains. She half sat in bed and rubbed her eyes. Her mouth gaped in an unexpected yawn. She shuffled herself out of bed, threw back the curtains and drank in the beautiful morning. The plumbing in her apartment above the old stables was now all fixed and she’d moved in. While her little kitchen looked over the cobbled courtyard, her bedroom had a wonderful view over the gardens. They were glorious this morning, bursting with life. She felt decidedly lazy as she watched a bee worrying the clematis beneath her window. It seemed completely unimpressed with her and disappeared into the centre of a large purple flower.

She turned from the window, full of great ideas for an al fresco lunch, and the sun glinted off the picture frame on the windowsill. She stopped to look at it, head tipped on one side. The photo had been taken at Chloe’s fourth birthday party. Chloe was grinning like the proverbial Cheshire cat, her freshly lit birthday cake in front of her on the table. Sam and Ellie leaned in behind her, faces warmed by the glow of the candles.

They all looked so happy. She kissed her index finger and pressed it onto the glass where Chloe’s smile was. It had been a wonderful day.

The memory came easily and painlessly now. She smiled as she recalled the incessant squealing of little girls and the pungent smell of blown-out birthday candles. Chloe had spent the whole party bouncing up and down in excitement, even when she was devouring pink birthday cake. She remembered Sam’s smile later that evening, when he’d silently beckoned her to come and look at Chloe. They’d crept through the post-party devastation into the lounge and found her fast asleep on the sofa, chocolate smeared all over her face and clutching the doll they had given her in her sticky hands.

She’d found it so hard to look at this photo in the past. Even so, she’d kept it on prominent display as a kind of punishment. What she was guilty of, she wasn’t sure.

Being here when they weren’t. Being alive.

Since their deaths she had lived life as if she was walking backwards—too terrified of the unfamiliar territory ahead to turn and face the future. She’d blindly shuffled through each day, just trying to keep going without meeting disaster again. Pain was to be avoided at all costs. No risk. No attachments. But no love, either. Her smile dissolved completely.

What would Sam think of the way she’d been coping?

She knew exactly what he would say. Her face creased into a frown. She could almost see his hazel eyes scowling at her, the trademark tuft of wayward hair slipping over his forehead.

Life should never feel small, Ellie.

That was what he’d always told her. Despite her secure family background she’d always been a shy child, but Sam had seen beyond the reserve. He’d asked her to play tag while the other schoolchildren had ignored the quiet girl on the wooden bench with her coat pulled round her. She’d been desperate to join in, but much too scared to get up and ask in case they laughed and ran away. But Sam had won her over with his gentle smile as he’d grabbed her hand and pulled her off the bench. Within minutes she’d been running after him, the wind in her hair and a smile beneath her rosy cheeks.

It had always been like that with Sam. He had encouraged her to dare, to believe. To make life count.

‘Sorry, sweetheart,’ she whispered, the glass misting as she talked to his face in the photo.

She sighed and pulled her tatty robe from its hook on the back of the door. Since the incident in Mark’s car, she’d felt different. Liberated, somehow. Perhaps the whole embarrassing scenario had done some good after all. She’d been clutching on to her grief for so long, and her reaction to Mark’s driving had finally provided an outlet—the last great emotional lurch in her rollercoaster stay at Larkford so far.

Ever since she had got here she’d been plunging into some forgotten feeling—panic, shame, anger—desire, even. She’d experienced them all in vivid richness. And somehow Mark Wilder stood in the middle of the maelstrom. Instead of making her feel safe, as Sam had, he made her feel nervous, excited and confused all at once. It was as if the universe had shifted a little when she wasn’t looking and she suddenly found herself off-balance when he was around.

Yet he’d surprised her with his understanding and sensitivity. Not once had she felt judged for her behaviour that afternoon. It had been so nice to sink into his strong arms and know that she wasn’t alone.

She tied the sash of her gown in a lumpy knot. With a heavy sigh she acknowledged that her relationship with Mark had changed in that moment. A boundary had been crossed as she had stood shivering against him in the lane.

She’d also noticed a change in Mark in the couple of weeks since he’d started living at Larkford again. But the way he was treating her now made her feel uncomfortable in a completely new way. Now he came home more evenings than he stayed away, even though the hour’s drive from London could double if the motorway traffic was bad. He was always witty and entertaining, and she no longer fumed at his humour, but laughed along with it. There was even the odd quip at her expense, but it was a gentle nudge rather than sarcastic teasing.

He obviously thought she was too fragile to be toyed with now. What a pity, because suddenly she was ready to find out if there was an upside to all these impulses and strong emotions she’d inherited from the accident, to see if love and joy and happiness might just be brighter and more multi-coloured than they had ever been before.

Ellie was working on a salad for lunch when she heard a car pulling up outside. That was odd. She’d assumed Mark had been sleeping late, because he’d had to attend a function the night before, but that sounded like his car. She blinked in surprise when he strode into the kitchen a few moments later.

‘You’re up early,’ she said, inspecting a bottle of rice vinegar to see how much was left—a complete cover for the fact her insides were doing the tango. He still made her catch her breath every time he walked into the room, but it was different. It wasn’t all about hormones fizzing and pure physical reactions. Somehow those sensations had grown beyond the superficial things they were, and now she sometimes felt as if there was a dull ache inside her chest that grew stronger the closer he was to her.

‘I had things to do,’ he said.

She noticed the little shopping bag he was carrying with the logo of a high-end electrical store and shook her head. ‘More gadgets?’ He was a typical man in that respect.

Instead of giving her a boyish grin and proudly showing off his latest piece of kit, he just looked a little awkward as he nodded his answer to her question.

‘Actually, I bought this for you.’

Ellie put the vinegar bottle down on the counter and stared at him. ‘For me?’

Mark handed her the bag and she pulled a small glossy box from it. A handheld computer. She stared at it, hardly knowing what to say.

‘You got me a PDA?’

He nodded again, still unusually serious and silent. ‘You can link it up to the laptop and keep all your calendars and notes with you wherever you go. It even has a voice recorder function. I thought it might be…you know…useful when you need to make a note of something in a hurry, before you forget.’

Ellie felt like crying. She hadn’t even thought of using something like this, but it was perfect. Just what she needed.

‘Thank you,’ she said, her voice wavering. ‘Why did you…? I mean, what made you think of getting me this?’

He shuffled backwards. ‘Just something I read…’

She frowned at him. Where was the normally cocky and devil-may-care Mark Wilder? Why was he looking so sheepish?

Oh, great. He’d been researching her condition—probably read up on it on the Internet. While it was still an incredibly sweet gesture, it just confirmed that his view of her had changed. Now she was just the poor brain-damaged housekeeper who couldn’t keep her facts straight without the help of a bit of technology.

She wanted to be cross with him, but she couldn’t rev up the energy. Instead she put the box back in the bag and stowed it in an empty cupboard. ‘I’ll have a look properly later.’

‘You like it? You think it’ll be useful?’

He looked so hopeful, so eager, that she couldn’t help but smile and nod. ‘It’s wonderful. It’ll be a big help.’

And it would. There was no need to be sad about a tiny computer just because it signalled what she knew already—that anything more than a professional relationship between them was a total impossibility.

Mark grinned. Suddenly he was back to his old self: cheeky, confident…impossible. Ellie picked up a cook’s knife and went back to chopping something—anything—to keep her mind occupied and her pulse even. But after a few moments he walked over to the chopping board and looked over her shoulder. Ellie fanned her face. It was very warm. Had he closed the window? She glanced over at the French doors, but the embroidered muslin panels were still billowing gently.

‘What are you cooking?’

Ellie put the knife down a little too quickly. It clattered on the worktop. Despite the fact her brain told her the crush she had on Mark was pointless, the neural pathways carrying that information to her body seemed to have gone on strike.

‘Vietnamese salad,’ she said, the words tumbling out.

‘Which is—?’ He waved his hand in a circular motion as her mouth moved soundlessly.

‘Chicken and noodles and a few vegetables, with a sweet chilli dressing,’ she replied, a wobbly finger pointing to each of the ingredients in turn.

Great! Now she was babbling like a bad TV chef.

His cheek twitched, yet his face remained a mask of cool composure. ‘Hot stuff, then?’

Under different circumstances, Ellie would have thought he was flirting with her. Heat licked at the soles of her feet. She swallowed. ‘It depends on the size of the chilli.’

The look her gave her was positively wicked. ‘And you girls try and tell us boys that size doesn’t matter.’

Ellie almost choked.

Mark picked up the half-chopped chilli from the chopping board. ‘How hot is this one?’

Ellie tried very hard to focus on the bright red chilli and not on Mark’s warm brown eyes.

‘Medium, sort of. The small ones are the hottest, funnily enough.’

Stop babbling! He already knows that. Everybody knows that!

She bit her lip and turned to peel the outer stem off a stick of lemongrass.

‘Do you want this back?’

She felt Mark’s breath warm on the back of her neck as he stood close behind her. She failed to still the tiny shiver that rippled up her spine as she turned slightly to take the chilli back from him.

‘Thank you.’

She carefully eased it from his grasp, avoiding brushing his fingers, and offered up a silent hallelujah as Mark stepped back and headed for the door.

‘I’m going for a shower.’

‘Okay. Let me know if you want any of this when you come out.’

He ran his hand through his hair and rubbed the corner of one eye with his thumb. That early-morning start must be catching up with him.

But then she realised what he was about to do. ‘Don’t put your—’

Mark yelped, screwed his eyes shut tight and slapped his hands to his face. She rushed over to him, wincing in sympathy. She peeled the hand from his face and led him over to one of the breakfast stools, where she ordered him to sit down. His right eye was squeezed shut and watering.

‘Try and open your eyes,’ she said gently.

‘Very funny!’

‘I mean it. If you can manage to open them and blink a bit, the eye can do its job and wash the chilli juice away. It works a lot faster than sitting there with your fingers pressing into your eyeballs, making it worse!’

Mark groaned again, removed his hand and attempted to prise his watery eyelids apart.

‘Wait there!’ she ordered, dashing to the sink and washing her hands vigorously with washing-up liquid and scrubbing under her nails with a little brush.

‘Here, let me see.’

She moved in close and delicately placed a thumb on the smooth skin near Mark’s eye. He flinched.

‘Sorry! Did I hurt you?’

‘Um…no, it’s okay.’

She gently pulled downwards, helping to open his eye. ‘It looks a bit pink. Is it still stinging? Try blinking a few more times.’

‘It’s fading now, thank you, Nurse. How did you know what to do?’

She blushed. ‘You think with a memory like mine that I haven’t done this to myself a million times?’

Mark’s laugh was deep and throaty. He blinked a few more times, opened his good eye, then attempted to do the same with the other, but it stayed stubbornly at half-mast.

Ellie’s partial smile evaporated as she became conscious of the warmth radiating from him. They were practically nose to nose. He was sitting on the stool, one long leg braced against the floor, the other hooked on the bottom rung. She was standing between his legs, only inches from his chest. She knew she should move. Mark was looking back at her through bleary eyes. She picked a spot on the floor between her feet and stared at it.

‘You’re lucky,’ she said, succeeding in inching backwards slightly.

Try not to look at him.

‘You only touched the chilli briefly. It would have been much worse if you’d been chopping them…’

Mark caught her hand as she attempted to shuffle back further. She made the mistake of looking up. A soft, tender look was in his eyes, despite the fact that one eyeball was still pink and watery.

‘Thank you, Ellie.’ The sincerity in his tone was making her feel all quivery.

She managed to shift her gaze to her hand, still covered by his. Static electricity lifted the hairs on her arm.

‘That’s—that’s all right,’ she stammered. Her hand jerked from his as she shook herself loose. She turned and headed for the door. ‘I’ll go and have that shower now, then,’ she added.

Perhaps a cold one.

She started to scuttle off down the passageway.

‘Ellie…?’ he called after her, a laugh underscoring his words.

The urge to keep going was powerful, but she turned and popped her head back through the open door. ‘Yes?’

Mark was grinning at her. She had the sudden sinking feeling she didn’t want to know why.

‘I was going to have a shower, remember? You were cooking.’

Ellie closed her eyes gently and darted a moist tongue over her bottom lip, trying to work out how to salvage the situation. She looked at Mark with her best matter-of-fact expression. ‘Of course.’

For some reason he looked very pleased with himself. He wasn’t going to tease her about this for months to come, was he? What if he guessed it was him who had got her all in a fluster?

Once her cotton wool legs had taken her back to the chopping board she set about peeling the garlic, trying to block Mark’s view of her shaking hands with her body. She heard the scrape of his stool across the floor as he rose from his seat. Every part of her body strained to hear his movements as he left the room. She stripped the skin off a clove of garlic, leaving it vulnerable and naked, and listened to Mark whistling something chirpy as he bounded up the stairs at least two at a time.

CHAPTER EIGHT

‘MARK!’

His head snapped up. Nicole, his PA, stood with hands on hips, a buff folder clutched in one hand, scowling hard. This wasn’t good news.

‘Huh?’

‘What is wrong with you this morning? That has to be the fifth time I’ve caught you admiring the London skyline while ignoring every word I say. You’re making me feel like my old maths teacher, Mrs McGill.’

Mark stopped staring through the glass wall of his office and turned to face Nicole fully. She was right. He hadn’t been paying attention. But now that he was she still wasn’t making any sense.

‘What?’

‘She was always throwing chalk at Billy Thomas for staring out the window during double algebra. I mean it, Mark! If you make me sound like Mrs McGill I’m going to do something drastic.’

He hunched over his desk and scribbled feverishly away on the pad in front of him. Nicole flopped into the chair on the other side of the desk and massaged her temple with her free hand.

‘What are you doing now? I’m feeling too grotty for your stupid games.’

When he had scrawled a handful of lines, he ripped the sheet off and thrust it in Nicole’s direction. She snatched it from his hand and started to read it out loud.

‘“I will not daydream in Mrs McGill’s class. I will not daydream in—” Very funny!’

He easily dodged her missile as she crumpled the paper into a ball and threw it back at him. He did the puppy-dog thing with his eyes he knew she could never resist.

‘Sorry, Miss.’

‘You’d better be! You were saying something about pushing the record company for a three-sixty-degree contract for the new band’s next deal, and then you just drifted off.’

‘Sorry, Nic. I promise I’m listening now.’

He rested his elbows on the desk and propped his chin on his fists, deliberately focusing on her and only her.

‘And I need to know what you want to do about this video shoot. We’ve only got five days before we leave for the Caribbean, and Kat’s in a state because Razor went AWOL. The director has changed his mind about one of the locations, and the stylist has had a strop and isn’t taking any of my calls.’

Mark did his best to listen as Nicole continued to brief him on the latest string of disasters to hit the upcoming shoot. It had been a nightmare from start to finish. He was starting to wish they’d opted for the other treatment, which had involved lots of time on a soggy moor in Scotland. When they’d set it up he’d been looking forward to going to Antigua. He’d planned on taking a few days off after the shoot—the closest thing to a holiday he was going to get this year.

But now the date was looming close he was starting to wish he could wriggle out of it. He didn’t want to leave Larkford. A week on the other side of the planet would be a week away from Ellie. Coming into London was different. He was away for the day, but in the evening he would be stranded on the M25 in the rush-hour traffic with a smile on his face, knowing he was on the way home.

Home. Ellie had made his house a home. He loved arriving back there and seeing a warm glow in the windows instead of faceless black. He would park his car, walk through the door and find Ellie pottering in the kitchen, cooking up something fabulous.

He had started to fantasise that she was there waiting for him, not because he paid her to, but because she wanted to be.

She worked so hard. Now he’d read up on brain injuries he understood how difficult it must be for her. And she never seemed to want a day off to go home. Perhaps there were too many memories waiting for her there. But it would be good if he could get her to relax now she had the household running like clockwork. He’d even cover the cost of a holiday if he thought she’d accept it from him. He almost felt guilty for jetting off to the Caribbean and leaving her behind.

Maybe there was something he could do about that…

Nicole slapped her folder down so hard that the papers on Mark’s desk lifted in the resultant breeze.

‘If you’re not going to listen, I’m going for a girlie chat with Emma at the end of the hall!’

He was only partially aware of the slam of the door and the meant-to-be-heard muttering as she click-clacked out of the office and down the hallway. He swung his chair round again and continued studying the busy city below. The Thames glinted between the mixture of glass office blocks and the pollution-stained masonry of older buildings.

The last few weeks had been both heaven and hell.

The prickly, reclusive Ellie who had arrived at Larkford in the spring was only a memory. The Ellie he returned to each night was warm and caring and funny. Clever and resourceful. He loved hanging around the kitchen watching her cook, savouring each bite of the meal and making it last as long as possible to prolong his time in her company. He always felt a little deflated when the coffee cups were cleared away and the mechanical whooshing of the dishwasher was the only sound in the kitchen.

She was still a little shy, but it added to her charm. He loved the way she was totally original—one of a kind.

Mark stood up. The afternoon sun was bouncing off the windows of the other office blocks, giving the whole city a warm yellow glow. He took a moment to process the revelation that had just hit him smack between the eyes.

He loved her.

His stomach lurched as he recognised his own vulnerability. Whether she knew it or not, that fragile woman had tremendous power over him.

But he didn’t want to push her, even if he guessed she might be feeling at least some of what he was feeling. He watched a jet puff out its white trail in the clear blue sky, the plane so high up it was only a silver speck in the air. Part of him exulted at the knowledge that she found him attractive, that he put her off-balance, but another part of him ached with the uncertainty of any deeper feelings on her part.

‘I need a sign!’ he whispered, waiting for something to happen.

But the plane kept on its course, its trail a no-nonsense line. No writing appeared in the sky saying Go for it. He scanned the horizon for a hint of divine thunderbolts, but the pale clouds refused to comment.

He continued to ponder his position as he sat behind a truck on the M25 later that evening. The crawling traffic gave him plenty of time for self-analysis. He sat for many minutes trying to predict the outcome of any romantic entanglement with Ellie and decided that prophecy was not his thing. It didn’t matter, anyway. Whether she loved him back or not wouldn’t change how he felt about her. He would just have to be patient. Wait in this horrible limbo until a sign appeared.

Butterflies wrestled in his belly as he turned the car into his driveway. His pulse quickened as he jumped from the car and bounded up the steps to the front door. As he put the key in the lock a mouthwatering aroma assaulted his nostrils. He followed the trail into the kitchen. Ellie bobbed up from behind the kitchen counter, causing his already racing heart to skip a beat.

‘That was good timing! I was just about to dish up. You’re much later than you said.’

‘Traffic jam,’ he said absently, his eyes following her every move. She reached to get a couple of plates from the cupboard and passed them to him.

‘Your PA called about an hour ago.’

Ah. He’d forgotten all about Nic, and had left the office without telling her.

‘She said she will not be coming back into work until you ring and tell her she is no longer Mrs McGill—whatever that means!’ said Ellie, searching for the oven gloves and finding them in the dishwasher.

Mark reckoned an apologetic lunch somewhere nice would probably help. And maybe a big bunch of flowers. Nicole’s bark was worse than her bite, and he didn’t know what he would do without her. His stomach complained noisily, returning him to the present.

‘What’s for dinner?’

Ellie opened the oven door and stood back from the blast of hot air before she reached inside to remove a scalding-hot earthenware dish. She looked very pink as she stood straight. If it wasn’t for the heat from the oven, he could have sworn she was blushing.

‘Shepherd’s Pie.’

Mark almost dropped the plates he was holding.

‘Thank you,’ he mouthed to the ceiling, before following her to the table.

Ellie was in the chemist’s in the village, picking up some supplies, when her mobile rang. The caller ID told her it was Mark, and she took a steadying breath before she punched the button to answer.

‘Hello?’

‘It’s me. Are you busy?’

Ellie looked at the tube of toothpaste, a box of plasters and the hand soap in her shopping basket. ‘I’m in the village shopping, but I’ll be finished in a few minutes. Do you want me to come straight back?’

‘Yes. I’ve got a bit of an emergency on my hands.’

And, without explaining anything further, he rang off. Ellie stared at the phone. Very mysterious. She quickly paid for the items in her basket and hurried back along the lane to Larkford Place, cutting through the gardens to make her journey quicker.

When she reached the back door and entered the kitchen she found it all quiet. Guessing Mark must be in his study, she dumped her shopping bag on the counter, prised off her trainers and socks—it was too hot for shoes—and headed off to find him.

He was sitting behind his desk listening to someone on the other end of the phone when she poked her head round the half-open door. She coughed gently and he motioned for her to come in and sit down, still listening to whoever it was on the line.

She sat in the small but rather comfortable leather chair on the opposite side of the desk and waited, noticing as she did so that the colour of her painted toenails clashed with the rug. He finished the call without saying much but ‘mmm-hmm’ and ‘bye’, and replaced the phone carefully in its cradle before looking at her.

‘I have an idea to run past you. I hope you don’t mind?’

Ellie shook her head. Although she was a bit puzzled as to why Mark would want her help with what was obviously a business problem.

‘I’m due to fly to Antigua at the end of the week and my PA, vital to keeping me organised during what is likely to be a chaotic few days, has come down with the flu. I need someone to fill in for her.’

Ellie studied her toenails again. Tangerine really didn’t go with the aubergine shapes on the abstract rug.

‘Can’t someone from the office fill in?’

‘Difficult. The whole place is in turmoil with a newly signed band. Their first single is out this week and it’s all hands on deck. Anyone who isn’t already with a client is involved in that. I did have two people in mind, but one is on holiday and the other is pregnant and throwing up every ten minutes. I seem to have run out of employees to commandeer.’

Ellie smiled at that. Nobody to boss around? What a hardship.

When she looked up, a wolfish grin was on his lips.

‘Well, almost run out of employees…’ he added.

She didn’t like the look of that smile. She felt like Little Red Riding Hood, lost in the woods. Mark’s eyeballs didn’t move a millimetre as he stared straight at her. Ellie began to shake her head.

No way! Don’t you even think it!

He nodded in slow motion as her ringlets bounced from side to side. Without warning he sprang from his side of the desk and bounded towards her. He crouched in front of her and tugged her hands into his.

‘I have got one employee who could help me out.’

Her heartbeat accelerated. It was difficult to think whilst looking into those bottomless brown eyes.

‘Come on, Ellie. I know you can do this. Charlie told me about how you used to be a PA.’

Ellie tried to stammer no, but her mouth refused to cooperate. His eyes looked like a spaniel’s. She’d bet this was the puppy-dog thing Charlie had warned her about. It would be like stamping on a poor abandoned animal if she refused. And it would be to help Mark out of a tight spot. She couldn’t really do this, could she?

Mark pressed on while he had the advantage.

‘Look at the way you run the house. You’re quick to pick things up, and you’ve got bags of initiative. Even with all your challenges you seem to handle any unexpected thing I throw at you. I know this is a different ball game, but I have confidence in you. Please!’

Ellie grabbed the lifeline he had thrown at her. ‘The house!’ she blurted out.

Mark frowned. ‘What house?’

‘This one! We can’t leave it unattended. Who’s going to look after it?’ She let out a relieved sigh and relaxed into the padded leather chair, feeling oddly deflated at her own success.

‘Mrs Timms could manage for a few days. I’ve asked her already and she said her daughter would be able to help her out.’

Ellie sat, mouth open, trying to find another valid objection. She’d only just got used to Larkford. To go somewhere else, somewhere completely foreign—literally—and do work she wasn’t used to doing. Well, the idea was just plain terrifying. And she hadn’t even factored in how difficult it would be to spend days upon end in a tropical paradise working even more closely with Mark.

He was smiling at her, his voice low and rich. Ellie could feel herself slipping. ‘Mrs Timms used to work here before you started. Mind you, she wasn’t nearly as good—or pretty.’ His eyes twinkled. ‘And she smelled of peppermints and disinfectant—’

‘Mark!’

‘I know. Not important.’

He took hold of her hands again, eyes pleading. ‘It’s only for a few days. I just need someone to handle the red tape while I look after fragile egos and deal with hissy fits—and that’s just the tea lady I’m talking about.’

Ellie couldn’t help laughing. She suspected he could persuade her that black was white if he put his mind to it.

She folded her arms across her chest. ‘I will think about it.’

‘Basket case!’

Ellie mumbled to herself as she watched the planes taxiing back and forth in the evening haze, her nose pressed hard against the plate-glass wall of Heathrow’s first class lounge. The sunset was tarnished by the pollution of the busy airport.

What an idiot to think she could do this.

She turned, leaning back on the cold window to survey her fellow travellers sprawled over the comfy sofas on the far side of the lounge. Mark was chatting to Kat and the other members of her entourage. He looked completely at ease. In fact he’d been looking pretty darn pleased with himself since she’d told him she would fill in for his sick PA at breakfast this morning.

Ellie sighed and banged the back of her head lightly against the glass. She’d made a valiant attempt to say no to Mark’s offer, but she hadn’t quite been able to bring herself to turn him down.

Of course her decision had everything to do with a free trip to Antigua, and nothing at all to do with spending the next few days with Mark instead of rattling round Larkford Place on her own. At least that was what she’d thought this morning. Somehow the universe had done a one-eighty between then and now. The fantasy of jetting off to a palm tree filled island in a sarong and flip-flops had fallen flat once they had arrived at the airport. Well, slightly before that, Ellie admitted, looking down at her un-flip-flopped feet and sarong-less legs.

She hadn’t realised they were going to be travelling with Kat and her ‘people’. Immediately she’d gone into tortoise mode, feeling she had nothing much in common with the assorted bunch of strangers. Kat seemed nice—very young, and much shorter than she’d expected.

She studied the other members of the entourage. There was a tall, burly guy with a pair of shades who she presumed was a bodyguard or something. The girl with the funky white-blonde hair had to be a make-up artist or hairdresser. But she couldn’t even guess what the others did. The woman in the lurid boob tube could be Kat’s personal grape-peeler for all she knew.

The young guy with the pierced nose finished telling a funny story and the whole group erupted into laughter. Ellie’s eyes followed Mark’s every move as he grinned away, pleased with the reaction. The funky-haired woman put a pressureless hand on his arm as she wiped a tear from her eye.

Ellie frowned and turned back to face the anonymous jets parading round the runway. Her forehead met the cool glass with a delicate thud.

Basket case.

At thirty-five-thousand feet she was still wondering what she was doing with these people. Sure, she’d been on aeroplanes before, but it had been rubber food, cramped leg room and fighting about who had the armrest. Not this. Not champagne and seats you could fit a small family into. It all seemed so foreign—yet it shouldn’t. Nobody else seemed to be pining for garish seat covers and lager louts singing football songs.

She felt like an impostor. Any minute now people would start pointing and staring, and she’d be dragged back to Economy, where she belonged. This wasn’t her world. What a huge mistake to think she could slide in here with Mark and find it a perfect fit.

However, the outsize chair was definitely comfy, and she sank into it, her eyelids closing of their own accord.

The next thing she was aware of was something brushing her cheek, something soft and slightly moist. She swatted it away without opening her eyes.

‘Ow!’

She pulled her eyelids apart with enough force to unstick her eyelashes and squinted at the fuzzy shape in front of her. As it came into focus she realised it was Mark, and his lips were slightly pursed.

‘Why are you holding your nose like that?’ she asked, shifting in her seat to get a better look.

‘I was trying to wake you up when you walloped me.’

‘I didn’t wallop. I swatted. There’s a difference.’ She rubbed the spot on her cheek that was still tickling her. ‘And how did I end up hitting you on the nose? What were you doing that close?’

In the semi-dark of the cabin she could have sworn his face turned a shade pinker.

‘I was just…Never mind what I was doing! I was waking you up because the pilot just announced we’d be landing in half an hour. I thought you’d want to get yourself together.’

She stretched her arms past her head, yawned and looked out of the window. It was so dark out there they could have been flying through a black hole.

‘What time is it?’

‘Our time or local time?’

‘Whichever.’

‘Well, it’s just after midnight local time. At least we get a few extra hours to catch up on sleep.’

Ellie made a face. ‘I think I could do with a whole week!’

He smiled, and she forgot to be grumpy.

‘You know, you look very cute when you’ve just woken up,’ he said.

Ellie snorted, then pulled a mirror out of her bag and inspected the damage. Just as she’d thought. All her mascara had migrated into a gloopy lump in one corner of her eye. Very cute.

‘You need glasses, then,’ she said as she threw the mirror onto her lap and searched for a tissue in a bag pocket.

‘Here—let me.’

Before she could refuse he’d whipped a handkerchief out of his pocket with a flourish and tipped her chin towards him with his other hand. He leaned so close all the hairs behind her ears stood on end. She did her absolute best not to look too pathetic as he gently dabbed her eye. Somehow, with him taking care of her like this, she didn’t feel so lost.

That incident set the tone for the rest of the journey. When she hauled her cases off the carousel at baggage reclaim Mark was there with a trolley before she even blinked. He shepherded her into one of the cars that appeared like magic out at the front of the terminal and saw her settled at the hotel.

It had been so long since she’d felt like this. Safe. Taken care of. Not struggling to do everything by herself. It was very tempting to give in and forget they’d be home in a few days. And that, technically, she was being paid to look after him.

Ellie shivered as yet another spider scuttled across her foot. The first time one had crawled over her today she’d almost freaked out. Big time. But the cameras were rolling, filming at the first location for Kat’s video, and she hadn’t wanted to sprint round the set like a lunatic in front of the crew.

Or re-live the incident when they watched the rushes at the end of the day.

Or feature in some TV out-takes compilation next Christmas.

So, although she felt as if she’d imploded with the effort, she stifled the screams, put on a stoic face and stood her ground.

She sighed and ran her fingers through the damp curls sticking to her forehead. The whole crew was packed into a tight knot at the end of an idyllic bay where the narrow beach met the rocks. Ellie was hiding out in the jungle-like greenery that fringed the white-hot sand. Hence the spiders. She’d thought she’d do anything to escape something with eight legs, but the need for shade and even a few degrees less heat had overruled her natural instincts. It was only after they’d arrived at the hotel that Mark had explained that summer could be hot and horribly humid on the island. Most of the tourists came in the winter months.

Kat was knee-deep in water, singing along to the track that was due to be her next single. The surf behind her looked mighty inviting. Ellie was fantasising about diving into the sea, acting like a fish and hoping nobody would notice. Nice dream, but in reality she was stuck under the nearest palm tree, wilting, while everybody else did something vastly important.

The heat was making her clothes stick to her skin. Even her skin was sticking to her skin. She longed for the air-conditioned haven of the hotel. Typical of many resorts on the island, the elegant low-rise main building was surrounded by lush tropical gardens and luxurious cabins. She wanted to be doing jobs she knew how to do: faxing things, shredding things. An evil glint flickered in her eyes. She wanted to be stapling things—preferably to Mark’s head.

No, that wasn’t fair. It was her own fault she hadn’t found out what she was letting herself in for. It was the jet lag making her tetchy. And she’d never been on friendly terms with this kind of heat. It made her hair frizz.

The director stood up and bellowed, ‘Cut!’

The music died instantly, but Ellie knew the song so well by now that it kept playing inside her skull, pounding against her temples.

The director barked instructions to anyone within earshot.

‘Baz, zoom out a little so I can see the sand. Jerry, check that last take to see if the light is still okay. Kat, my darling, could you just move to that rock on your left?’ Kat waded obligingly to the rock and took up her position. ‘That’s it. Can you put one foot on top of it? Good.’

Ellie admired her stamina. They’d all been standing on this beach for most of the day. She’d have dived in and floated away hours ago if it she’d been in Kat’s shoes. She massaged her forehead and listened to the pounding of the surf. She’d expected a little time to collect herself after they’d arrived, but it had been straight to work. No lounging by the pool under a yellow umbrella. No sipping coconut-flavoured cocktails in a hammock. Time really was money when video cameras were involved, it seemed.

‘Playback!’

The director’s yell was like a crack from a shotgun. Birds scattered from the treetops in terror. Ellie checked her clipboard. All her tasks were done. There was nothing left to do but drift over towards the director and watch Kat’s progress on one of the boxy little monitors.

The minute hand on her watch dragged itself listlessly through the next few hours and the sun began to set. They moved position a few times, and each move meant ages of checking the lighting, setting up cameras and other kit. Then Kat would have to sing her song another thousand times, this time in close-up, this time on a long-shot. See? She was even starting to learn the lingo.

Just as the sun had finally set, and Ellie was about to scream with the monotony of it all, Mark suddenly waded into the sea and scooped Kat into his arms.

‘Cut!’ the director bellowed, impotent with fury.

Ellie could only imagine the myriad expletives scalding the tip of his tongue. He spluttered, searching for the right word to unlock the torrent. Ellie turned quickly to face the trees and hid a smile. The prima donna on this set was definitely not the singer!

Mark said nothing as he carried Kat out of the water, but his eyes were blazing a warning as clear as if he’d shouted it. The director swallowed his rant. Mark unhooked his arm from under Kat’s knees and let her bare feet touch the ground in one controlled motion.

‘That’s a wrap for today, everybody,’ he said.

His voice was calm, but everyone from the director to the runners knew that negotiations were useless. The generator coughed to a halt. No one moved.

Ellie broke the tense silence with a scurry of movement. She tugged a fluffy towel out of the bag of provisions she’d hauled along with her and slung it over Kat’s shoulders. All that time standing in the water! The poor girl must be prune-like on the bottom half and baked on the top half. She glanced at Mark, and flushed as she saw the flicker of approval in his eyes.

Kat whispered her thanks as they headed to the speed boats that had brought them on the short trip round the coast into the small crescent-shaped bay. It had been chosen because they were practically guaranteed an uninterrupted shoot, with no onlookers or journalists to deal with as it was inaccessible by road.

Mark and Kat headed for the smallest boat, followed closely by Rufus, Kat’s bodyguard—or personal protection officer, as he preferred to be called. Ellie trailed along behind, still feeling like a spare part. The rest of the crew concentrated on unplugging and packing the expensive technical thing-ummy-jigs in foam-padded metal cases. They would follow on shortly, in the larger two boats.

They arrived back at the small marina in the neighbouring bay and made their way to the cluster of anonymous black people-carriers that were waiting for them in the car park. Mark pulled Ellie back to let Kat and Rufus walk ahead.

‘I’m going to wait here for our illustrious director and give him a piece of my mind. If he plans to roast Kat alive in the midday sun tomorrow he’s going to have to think again.’

‘You act more like her big brother than her manager.’

Mark frowned a little. ‘Babysitting the star is part of my job description. On the business side, I wouldn’t be doing my job if Kat couldn’t finish the shoot.’ His matter-of-fact manner softened. ‘But you’re right. I do feel protective towards her. It’s easy to forget she’s only seventeen and all her friends are still at school.’

He shielded his eyes with a hand and looked up the walkway after Kat as she slid the back door of the people-carrier open and climbed inside. ‘She’s a great kid. If she can get through the next couple of years without self-destructing she’ll have a long and successful career.’ He looked Ellie straight in the eye. ‘It would be such a waste if she burns out.’

The compassion in his eyes made something inside her feel very gooey indeed. She’d thought Work Mark would be different—harder, more remote. If it were possible, he was even nicer than Home Mark.

He turned away, stuffed his hands in his pockets and scoured the headland for a hint of the other boats.

‘She’s had a tough time recently,’ he said, and turned back towards her. ‘Will you look after her for me while I wait here?’

Ellie rubbed his arm lightly and nodded.

The clouds in Mark’s expression were banished by a smile. He planted a feather-soft kiss on the tip of her nose and walked down the pontoons to wait by the empty berths.

That kiss was the cherry on top of the weird feelings she’d been having since they’d arrived in Antigua less than twenty-four hours ago. It was as if she was in a parallel universe where, even though she was working for Mark, the ‘employer’ and ‘employee’ labels they’d stuck on themselves had peeled off in the heat, leaving only a man and a woman who were really, really attracted to each other.

CHAPTER NINE

WHEN Ellie reached the car she tapped on the mirrored window, assuming that Kat was taking advantage of the relative privacy to change her clothes.

‘Ellie?’

‘Yes. Are you okay?’

An exasperated grunt preceded Kat’s reply. ‘Well, yes and no—it’s okay to open the door.’

Ellie eased the sliding door open an inch or two. Kat looked more like a half-drowned cat than a sex kitten. Her eyes pleaded and she wore a weary smile.

‘The knot in my bikini top won’t come undone.’

‘Come here.’ She turned Kat to face the other way with the same kind of deft handling that she had used when making Chloe stand still to have her hair brushed. As Ellie set to work on the knot she couldn’t help noticing the angry pink on Kat’s shoulders.

‘You look like you’ve caught the sun, despite the lotion you slathered on.’

‘Great. And I’ve got to do it all over again tomorrow.’

Ellie released the tangle in the bikini top straps and stood back outside the car as Kat finished changing, leaving the door slightly ajar so she could catch her conversation.

‘The director will probably have me snorkelling with sharks or something,’ Kat said with a tired laugh.

‘I’m sure Mark would have something to say about that.’

‘He’s great, isn’t he?’

Ellie tried not to comment for fear of incriminating herself. She made what she hoped was an ambiguous noise to cover all eventualities, but knew she’d failed when Kat slid the door open for Ellie to climb in. Kat had obviously absorbed some of Mark’s mannerisms while she’d been working with him, because that smirk was pure Wilder. Ellie busied herself by doing up her seat belt.

Kat leaned across and whispered in a conspiratorial manner, ‘Don’t worry. Your secret is safe with me.’

Ellie’s eyes jumped from Kat to the back of Rufus’s head as he drove the car out of the car park.

‘Don’t worry about him, Ellie. Rufus knows all my secrets and his lips are sealed—aren’t they, Rufus?’

Rufus agreed by remaining silent, his thick neck motionless.

‘See?’

Ellie groaned. Was she really so transparent that every passing stranger could read the contents of her head?

‘I trust Mark one hundred percent,’ Kat said, giving her a meaningful look. ‘Some managers sign up young talent and work them like crazy until they drop. Then it’s on to the next fresh young thing. But Mark’s not like that. He always looks after me.’

Kat looked down at her lap. ‘I just split up from my boyfriend. I thought he was perfect. They do say love is blind, don’t they?’

Ellie squeezed her hand softly. Kat sniffed.

‘It’s hard to get over it when I see pictures of him in the papers almost every day. On a beach with some girl. In a nightclub with some other girl. At a premiere with—you get the picture, right? But Mark has been great. I can’t count the number of times he’s handed me tissues as I told him the latest sob story.’ A fat tear rolled down her cheek and she sighed and looked out of the window at the lush tropical scenery. ‘Sometimes I wish I could run away for a bit and have a little time to myself to get over it. But just when I think I’m on my own, bam! There’s a telephoto lens sticking out the bushes. I can see the headlines already: “Kat’s Secret Anguish Over Split.”’

Ellie felt her own eyes grow wet. Mark was right. Kat was a great girl, and she lived a difficult life for a seventeen-year-old. When she spoke, there was a croaky edge to her voice.

‘My husband used give me a piece of advice that I’m going to pass on to you—’

Kat jumped round to face her, eyes stretching wide open.

‘You’re married!’

‘I was married. I’m not now,’ Ellie said quickly. ‘Long story. Anyway, Sam used to tell me that life should never feel small. I’m a bit of a tortoise by nature, I’m afraid, much happier if I’m all tucked in inside my shell, where I’m safe and warm. But I’m starting to remember that safe and warm can be incredibly dull and lonely. Sometimes we’ve just got to have the courage to step out and live, no matter what happens.’ She turned to look Kat in the eye. ‘I can see that kind of strength in you. You will get through this.’

They hugged as far as the seat belts would allow, then Kat shifted in her seat and stared out the window.

‘What happened to…to your…? Did you get a divorce?’

Ellie tried to eliminate any trace of emotion in her voice. ‘No. He died.’

Kat’s head snapped round. An involuntary hand covered her mouth, trying to catch the words that had already escaped.

‘And here’s me snivelling about a man who doesn’t deserve my tears…’

Ellie’s smile was braver than she felt. ‘It’s okay.’

‘When did it…? I mean, how did he…?’

‘He and my daughter were killed in a car accident a few years ago.’ Ellie glanced down at the date function on her watch. ‘In fact, it will be exactly four years in a week’s time.’

A tear ran down Kat’s face. ‘Oh, Ellie!’

‘Don’t you start!’ She pressed the heels of her hands into her own soggy eyes. ‘Now you’ve got me going.’

A small noise from the front seat made them both look up. Did she really see Rufus dab a finger under his eye?

‘Does Mark know?’

Ellie nodded. ‘About my family? Yes.’

‘No, I mean about next Friday.’

Ellie shook her head as the car pulled up under the canopied front awning of their hotel. Rufus got out of the car, leaving it to the valet, and headed round to open Kat’s door for her.

Kat continued, despite Ellie’s shaking head. ‘You should tell him—you ought to, Ellie. He’s really sweet and supportive. You know, he even postponed an important business trip to come to an awards thing a couple of months ago. I was petrified—more of winning than of sinking into the background—and Mark cancelled everything to be there for me. You could do with a friend like that right now.’

Ellie had no chance to respond as Rufus opened the door and bundled Kat through the hotel lobby before anyone could mob her. Ellie followed in their wake, taking advantage of the invisible path before it was filled by holidaymakers and bellboys with trolleys. They walked out into the hotel gardens and Kat headed for her cool white cabin with its low tiled roof and wraparound veranda. Ellie stood alone on the terrace steps and watched their progress. Just before the mismatched pair disappeared behind a clump of bushes lining the path, Ellie saw Kat mouth a message to her: Tell him!

Tell him? Tell him what, exactly? There was so much to choose from.

Tell him it was the first time the dreaded anniversary hadn’t filled her with panic? That something had made it different this year, and that he was the something? There was too much to say, and most of it needed to be left unsaid.

She weaved her way back through the bustling lobby, confident in the knowledge that no paparazzi were going to be somersaulting from the light fittings in order to snap her picture, thank goodness.

The yellow umbrellas by the pool were calling to her. Time to get intimately acquainted with an outlandish cocktail with pineapple bits and paper parasols. She marched up to the poolside bar and ordered one that came in a glass the size of a small goldfish bowl.

The thick icy liquid struggled its way up the straw and she aimlessly watched the tanned bodies diving into the pool.

Kat was right. Mark was sweet and loyal and dependable—absolutely nothing like her first impressions of him. She’d been so blinkered. But now…Now she could see it all.

It reminded her of the visual neglect she’d experienced for a couple of months following the accident. For a while she’d only been aware of half the things in her field of vision. The weird thing was she hadn’t even realised anything was wrong. But she’d found reading confusing, because when she’d read a magazine she’d only seen half of each sentence on the page. And she’d only washed one side of her face. When the nurses had realised they’d developed strategies to help, and gradually, as her brain had started to heal itself, she’d been able to process information from both sides of her visual field again.

Why and how had she chosen to see only half of Mark? And only negative things too? Ellie put her glass down on the bar. She’d made up her mind about him, set its trajectory, before she’d even met him. Her thought patterns had got stuck in one of their grooves yet again.

But now she saw all of him…

Oh.

And she saw all of herself too—all the things she felt for him.

A jumble of images, sensations and smells hit her all at once. As if every moment she’d spent with Mark flashed before her eyes. All her blinkers dropped away and she felt as if she was floating, with nothing left to anchor her to cold, hard reality.

It was quite possible she was desperately in love with him. How could she not have known?

And how had this happened in the first place? He was nothing like Sam, and she’d always expected that happiness only came in that size and shape. How would it work with someone totally different? Could it work? Their lives were so different. Could she find joy in his fast-moving, flashbulb-popping world?

Talking to Kat earlier had stretched her conceptions of what being rich, successful and famous was like, had given her a fresh look at life from her side of the lens. Kat was surprisingly human. In fact she was just like thousands of other seventeen-year-olds who cried into their pillows every night because they’d fallen for the wrong guy.

Maybe it wasn’t all as impossible as it seemed. Maybe she could have a future with Mark. Everybody needed love, whether they were rich or poor, somebody or nobody.

Her head swam. Too much pineapple-rum stuff on an empty stomach. This was no time to be thrashing this problem out.

What she needed was a clear head—and a shower.

And with that thought she plopped the straw back into the half-full cocktail glass and walked through the gardens to her cabin, thinking that even if she never qualified for the former she could definitely manage the latter.

A knock on the half-open slatted door of the cabin caused Ellie to jump off the sofa she’d been dozing on. For a second her mind was blank and she was totally in the present, hardly aware of where she was and what she’d been doing to make her so sleepy.

There was another knock, and she swivelled to face the veranda. She knew it was Mark standing out there, knew it in a way that had nothing to do with the height and shape of his silhouette and everything to do with the way her skin prickled in anticipation.

‘Come in,’ she called out, and then realised too late that she’d been fresh out of the shower when she’d collapsed on the sofa and was still dressed in her old pink robe. Too late to do anything about it now; he was already pushing the door fully open. She tried to smooth her damp hair down, and pulled at the edges of her robe to get rid of the gap.

‘I…er…’ He stopped and swallowed. Where was the carefree, free and easy Mark Wilder banter? Probably evaporated in the heat. He tried again. ‘I wondered if…if you’d like to grab some dinner?’

‘Oh. Okay. That would be lovely.’

Although they’d finished early, the third and final day of shooting had left her absolutely ravenous. On the previous couple of evenings they’d joined Kat and some of her entourage in the rather trendy hotel restaurant. Ellie had enjoyed the gourmet food, but had felt a bit superfluous to requirements.

‘I’ll just go and get dressed,’ she said, pulling herself to her feet.

She wasn’t really in the mood for sitting on the sidelines of another round of industry chat and gossip, but the only alternative was sitting alone in her room, and at least this way she got to be with Mark.

As she emerged from her bedroom, wearing a simple long skirt and spaghetti-strap top, she glanced at the clock. ‘It’s only four-thirty. Aren’t we a bit early for dinner?’

‘I’ve been up since six this morning and I’m starving,’ Mark said. ‘I don’t know about you?’

Ellie nodded enthusiastically.

‘Anyway, there’s something I want you to see first.’

Instead of heading for the hotel restaurant, Mark set off in a different direction, his long legs helping him to stride ahead. She was too busy just keeping up with him to ask questions. He led them into the hotel car park, hopped into a Jeep with a driver at the wheel and sat there, grinning at her, as if he’d done the cleverest thing in the world.

Ellie put her hands on her hips. ‘Where are we going?’

She didn’t add alone together.

‘I’m taking you to the best place on the island.’

Ellie looked down at her floral-print skirt and flip-flops. She wasn’t really dressed for fine dining. And she was too tired to be on her best behaviour. When she felt all fuzzyheaded like this she knew she was apt to forget words and bump into things more easily.

He patted the seat beside him and gave her a meaningful look. Ellie climbed in, too tired to be bothered to walk back down to her cabin, flop onto her sofa and dial Room Service. At least doing it Mark’s way she wasn’t going to have to use her legs.

The driver put the Jeep into gear and they rattled their way through the neatly manicured resort, but it wasn’t long before they’d left it behind them, heading uphill. The road was lined with palms and aloes and breadfruit trees. Occasionally she saw pretty little clusters of yellow orchids dancing in the light evening wind.

Ellie breathed out and relaxed back into her seat. This was lovely, actually. Although they’d been to three different locations over the island in the last three days, she’d always been too caught up with her clipboard and ‘to do’ lists, terrified of missing something, to sit back and admire the scenery. This island truly was stunning, everything a tropical paradise should be. The beaches were soft white sand, the sea shades of cobalt and turquoise. If it wasn’t all so pretty it would be a giant cliché. But there was something comforting about having her expectations met rather than defied for once.

It was almost a shame that everything was over and they’d be flying back tomorrow. At least she assumed it was tomorrow. If Mark had told her the time of the flight, she’d already lost that bit of information in the maze of her brain.

Looking down the steep hill and out to sea, she asked, ‘What time do we need to get to the airport tomorrow?’

Mark didn’t answer right away, and eventually she stopped looking at the stupendous view and turned to face him.

‘Mark?’

He looked away, studying the scenery through the windscreen. ‘Actually, I’d planned to take a break—stay on for a few more days.’

Oh.

That meant she’d be going home alone. Suddenly all the hours of flying she’d be doing seemed a lot emptier. She nodded, following Mark’s lead and looking straight ahead.

Mark cleared his throat. ‘And I wondered if maybe you wanted to stay on too? Have a holiday?’

Ellie found her voice was hoarse when it finally obliged and came out of her mouth. ‘With you? On our own?’

‘Yes.’

There was a long pause, and all the air that had been whipping past their faces, ruffling their hair, went still.

‘I’m not ready to go home yet,’ he added.

She glanced across at him, and her heart began to thud so hard she felt a little breathless. He didn’t look like the normal, cocky Mark Wilder she knew at all. He looked serious and honest and just a little lost.

She had to look away. Scared that she might be imagining all the things she could see in his eyes. Scared this was just another impulse or trick her brain was playing on her.

‘Neither am I,’ she said softly.

And then the air began to move around them again. They both breathed out at the same time. After a few moments something tickled Ellie’s hand. She didn’t look, not wanting to spoil anything. And as Mark’s fingers wound themselves round hers she felt something hard inside her melt.

The Jeep climbed higher and higher, the road twisting and turning, and the lush banana trees and palms gave way to scrub and cacti. Now she could see down into the harbour, dotted with the white triangles of hundreds of yachts, and somewhere in the distance she could hear the unmistakable sound of a steel band.

Moments later the Jeep swung round a corner and was parked not far from a few old military buildings, obviously left over from the days of British rule. Reluctantly she let Mark’s hand slide from hers as he jumped out of the Jeep and then came round to her side to help her out. They left the Jeep behind and walked towards a huddled group of buildings on the edge of a steep hill.

Unlike the other ruins they’d seen on this part of the island, these had been restored. A crowd was milling around in an open-air courtyard, bouncing along to the calypso music played by a band under a roofed shelter. Mark handed Ellie a plastic cup of bright red liquid. One sniff told her it was rather toxic rum punch, and she sipped it slowly as she swayed to the rounded notes of the steel drums.

Oh, this was better than fancy-pants cooking and business talk. This was just what she’d needed. She looked at Mark, who was sipping his own punch and smiling at her. How had he known?

‘Come on,’ he said, putting his cup down on a low wall and holding out his hand.

Ellie shook her head. ‘I’m a terrible dancer—really clumsy.’ Especially these days, when remembering her left from her right was a monumental effort.

‘Nobody cares,’ Mark said, nodding towards the more exuberant members of the crowd, who’d obviously been enjoying the punch and were flinging their arms and legs around with abandon. ‘You can’t look any worse than they do.’

She put her cup down too, laughing. ‘I can’t argue with that,’ she said, and he led her to the uneven dusty ground that served as a dance floor.

Ellie discovered that she loved dancing like this. There were no rules, no steps to remember; she just moved her body any way that felt right. And, unsurprisingly, that involved being in close contact with Mark. He hadn’t let go of her hand since he’d led her to the dance floor, and she gripped it firmly, determined not to let it slip from between her fingers again.

As they danced, Mark manoeuvred them further away from the main buildings and towards a low wall. After a rather nifty spin Ellie stopped in her tracks, causing Mark to bump softly into her.

‘Wow!’

‘Told you it was the best place on the island,’ Mark said, as Ellie just stared at the scene in front of her.

The view was stupendous. The sun was low on the horizon, and the undulating hills and coastline were drenched in soft, warm colours. Ellie recognised this view as the one they always stuck on the tourist brochures for Antigua. It had to be the most beautiful place in the whole world. She moved forward to rest her hands on the wall, unaware for a moment that Mark hadn’t moved away and that her back was being heated by his chest.

‘Will you take a photo of us?’

Ellie looked round to see a sweet young redhead with an English accent holding a camera hopefully towards her. She was standing with a lanky guy in long shorts and rather loud, touristy shirt.

She shrugged and smiled back. ‘Okay. Sure.’

The girl beamed at her, handed the camera over, then snuggled up to the violent shirt. ‘It’s our honeymoon,’ she explained, glancing adoringly at him.

‘Congratulations,’ Mark said from behind her, and Ellie became aware of a slow heat building where their bodies were still in contact.

‘You’ve had the same idea as us, I see,’ the girl babbled. ‘Get here early to get a good view of the sunset. It’s our last night and we’ve watched every one. We’re hoping we’ll get to see the green flash before we go home.’

Ellie held the camera up and snapped a picture of them grinning toothily at her.

‘Green flash?’ she said as she handed the camera back to the redhead.

‘It’s a rare sight,’ the woman said as she checked the photo on the screen and smiled. ‘Sometimes, when the last part of the sun dips into the sea, you can see a flash of green light as it disappears.’

Loud Shirt Guy nodded. ‘Atmospheric conditions have to be just right. It’s all to do with astronomical refraction and—’

His wife laid a hand on his arm and he stopped talking. ‘Don’t bore them with all that, darling,’ she said, laughing. Then she whispered behind her hand at Ellie, ‘Honestly, he’s a scientist, and sometimes he just doesn’t know when to stop.’

Ellie could feel Mark smiling behind her. Although how you could tell someone was smiling only by being in contact with their chest she wasn’t sure.

‘Anyway, we’re not watching it for the physics, are we, Anton?’

Anton shook his head, and got a misty look in his eyes. ‘Island folklore has it that couples who see it together are guaranteed true love.’

A pang of incredible sadness hit Ellie right from out of nowhere. This couple were so sweet. She remembered being that besotted with someone, sure she was going to have a long and happy future with him. She almost wanted to go and give them both a great big hug, to whisper in their ears never to take the time they had together for granted, never to waste even a second. Instead she smiled at them, feeling her eyes fill a little.

‘Well, I hope you see it—and congratulations again.’

They nodded their thanks and turned to watch the sun, now dipping dangerously close to the clean line of the ocean. More people were wandering over to watch the sunset and Mark tugged Ellie’s arm, leading her down a path, away from the crowd. The view wasn’t quite so breathtaking here, but it was framed by trees and she relished not being hemmed in by lots of people, free to feel all the emotions washing over her without being watched. Her fingers crept up to the locket round her neck and she stroked it as she watched the sun go down.

Somehow Mark had hold of her hand again, and he stood beside her, warming her with his mere presence.

Slowly the air grew thick and silence fell as everyone further up the path concentrated on the wavering orange disc that was now dipping itself into the horizon. Ellie didn’t move. She hardly dared breathe as she watched the sun inch its way down.

She hadn’t thought it possible, just a few short months ago, that she could love again. But here she was, watching the most mesmerising sunset she’d ever seen, with a man who had turned all her rigid expectations on their heads. But did he feel the same way? Was it even possible this was more than a passing attraction for him? She wanted to believe that the look she’d seen on his face in the car was the truth, but she just didn’t trust her instincts any more.

A wayward curl blew across her face and she brushed it away so she could stare harder at the setting sun. He was here with her now, and that was what mattered. Who said love lasted for ever, anyway? She knew better than most that you had to grab the moment while you could. Maybe it was time just to ‘go with the flow’, as Sam had always encouraged her—as she had been doing when she’d danced to the hypnotic calypso music. Maybe it was time to let life feel something other than small again, no matter what that meant. No matter if for ever wasn’t part of the package.

Mark leaned forward and whispered in her ear. ‘Look.’

The sun was almost gone now, the very last traces only just visible, and she’d been so busy daydreaming she’d almost missed it. Why was it so difficult to live in the moment and not get distracted by wounds of the past or fears for the future? She concentrated hard on the sun, knowing that capturing this moment for her memory banks was important somehow.

And then it happened.

Just as the orange lip of the sun disappeared there was a sizzle of emerald on the horizon. Ellie froze. It lasted only a second or two and then faded away. Mark was standing slightly to the side and behind her. She could hear his breathing, soft and shallow, in her right ear.

Then he began to move, and she moved too, turning to face him.

He looked at her for a long time, a solemn, almost sad expression on his face, and then, just as her mind started to go wild with questions, he leaned in close and kissed her, silencing them all.

Later that evening Ellie wandered on to her veranda alone. She leant on the criss-cross wooden railing and stared in amazement at the confusion of stars jostling for space in the midnight sky. Light from Mark’s cabin, a short distance through the gardens, was casting a faint glow on the waving palms, but there was no sign of him.

It had been a magical night—starting with that kiss.

By the time they’d returned the short distance up the trail from where they’d watched the sunset the sky had been a velvety dark blue, the sun long disappeared. They’d danced to the steel band, eaten sticky barbecue food with their fingers, and hadn’t been able to stop smiling at each other.

Her relationship with Mark had definitely crossed into new territory, but neither of them had brought the subject up, preferring just to live in the moment, rather than spoil it with words and theories.

She wasn’t just a fling to him.

The knowledge was there, deep down in her heart—in the same way she’d known after that first day of primary school that Sam’s life and hers would always be joined somehow.

There was something between them—her and Mark—something real. Only she didn’t have the words to describe it. And for the first time in a very long while the fact she couldn’t find the right word, couldn’t label something instantly, didn’t bother her in the slightest.

The next few days were almost too much for Ellie’s mind to deal with. She’d been so accustomed to guilt and pain and misery, clanging round her ankles like shackles, that the light, airy happiness she was feeling took a bit of getting used to. And the glorious island she was on and the wonderful man she was with just made life seem even more surreal.

But who needed real life, anyway?

She’d rather live this dream, where she spent almost every waking moment with Mark. They’d eaten at the most amazing places, ranging from surfside shacks to exclusive restaurants. They’d been sailing and had walked across countless beaches. Some evenings they’d gone out into the bustle of nearby St John’s; sometimes they’d just found somewhere quiet to watch the sun set. They hadn’t seen the green flash again, but Ellie didn’t worry about that. Once must be enough, surely?

And Mark…

He astounded her. He knew her every mood, anticipated her every need. He knew when to hold her tight and when to give her space without her even having to try and get the jumble of an explanation past her lips.

Marrying up this version of Mark with the grinning playboy she’d seen on the television all those months ago was almost impossible. She’d been so blinkered. But, even so, she was sure the way he was behaving wasn’t something she’d conveniently blocked out. He was different. More free. He was changing too.

And it only meant she loved him more.

As the week wore on, she felt the shadow of the approaching anniversary looming close on her horizon. With that blocking her view of the sun, it was hard to think about where her relationship with Mark might go, what it would become when they flew home on Saturday.

She’d just have to get Friday out of the way first. Then she’d be able to think clearly. Then maybe, when the plane took off and she watched the ground drop away, the houses and cars all become miniature versions of themselves, she’d be able to leave her small life behind her once and for all.

CHAPTER TEN

MARK finally spotted her, walking down near the shoreline, kicking the wavelets with a half-hearted foot. He walked to the edge of his veranda and focused more carefully, just to make sure he was right. He was. It was Ellie, looking very much like a lost soul on the deserted beach.

A storm had passed over the night before, and he’d lain awake in the early hours, listening to the creaking of his wooden cabin as the rain had gusted against it, the rustling of the tall palms in the hotel gardens as they curved and swayed in the wind, wondering if Ellie was awake in her cabin too. This morning it was grey, and slightly overcast, but everything was clean and fresh and new.

Normally that was a good thing.

He watched Ellie as she turned to face the wind and stared out to sea, lifeless as a statue. Yesterday he’d thought all his prayers had been answered. Her smiles across the dinner table had been warm and sweet and just for him.

As they’d headed home the sky had darkened, and by midnight rain had been hurling itself out of the sky with the force that only a tropical storm could manage. He and Ellie had spent their time snuggled up on the sofa in his cabin, watching a bad action movie. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had so much fun.

Yet there had been no glitzy nightclub, no suffocating shirt and tie, no polished mannequin on his arm, laughing on cue at his jokes. Just him and Ellie having a late-night Room Service picnic on the carpet in front of the television. They’d talked about anything and everything, and sometimes nothing at all.

His celebrity-hungry girlfriends would have balked at such an evening. There was no point going out with Mark Wilder unless you were going to be seen out with him—and it had better be somewhere expensive! They would certainly have frowned upon scanning the film credits for the most interesting-sounding bit part. Ellie had won with ‘second tramp in explosion’. It had beaten his ‘teenager with nose-stud’ hands down.

Relaxing on the sofa with Ellie snuggled up under his arm, he’d realised that this was what normal felt like. He liked it. In fact, he could see himself doing it for a long time to come with her, and he hardly remembered why he had been so terrified of it for almost a decade. Now he had tasted it he wasn’t sure he could go back to living without it. It was kind of addictive.

What did that mean?

He tried not to think of the ‘m’ word, but no matter how he diverted his thoughts they kept swerving back to images of Ellie, dressed in white, a serene smile on her face as he slid a delicate gold band on her finger.

The wind ruffled his hair and his daydreams scattered like the bulbous clouds hurrying towards the skyline. Overnight something had happened. This morning she was withdrawn. No smiles. No bubbling laughter. Today, he hardly existed.

He kicked the railing of the veranda hard. Which was a big mistake—he had bare feet.

What was going on with her? Had she finally taken a good look at him and decided there was nothing more than schmooze and show? Hadn’t he criticised himself enough in recent months for the lack of substance in his life?

He raised his foot, ready to take another kick, but thought better of it. Instead he turned and walked through the cabin to his bedroom to get dressed. It was time to find out what was going on, whether the last few days had just been a mirage or not.

Five minutes later he felt the wet sand caving under the weight of his heels as he strode across the almost deserted beach. Ellie was now only a billowing speck in the distance. A remnant of last night’s wind lifted her loose skirt as she wandered along the shoreline.

He lengthened his stride.

She didn’t hear him come up behind her. She was busy drawing in the wet sand with a long stick. He didn’t want to startle her, so he stopped a few feet away and spoke her name so gently it was only just audible above the splash of the waves near their feet.

She stopped tracing a large letter ‘C’ in the damp sand. Mark’s heart pounded like the waves on the distant rocks as he waited for her response. Her head lifted first, but her eyes remained fixed on her sandy scrawlings a few seconds longer before she found the courage to meet his enquiring gaze. The rims of her eyes were pink and moist.

Any words he’d had ready dissolved in the back of his throat. Devoid of anything sensible to say, he held out the single pink rose he’d lifted from the vase in his room. Ellie started to reach for it, then her face crumpled and silent tears overflowed down her cheeks. He dropped the rose and stepped towards her, intent on gathering her up in his arms, but could only watch in horror as she buckled and sat weeping in the sand.

‘Ellie? Ellie, what is it?’

He sank down next to her and pulled her firmly into his arms. She tried to answer him, but her words were swallowed in another round of stomach-wrenching sobs. So he waited. He held her and he waited. Waited until the tide turned and the hot flood of tears became a damp trickle. She pushed away from his chest and stood up, shaking the sand from her skirt.

Her voice wobbled. ‘I’m sorry.’

Mark leapt to his feet and reached for her.

‘Don’t be.’ He pulled her close to his chest and stroked her wind-ruffled hair. ‘Is there something I can do?’

She swept her fingers over her damp eyes and straightened, seeming to have made a decision about something. ‘I need to tell you something…’ She took a deep breath and held it. ‘It’s the anniversary today. Four years since…since Sam and Chloe died.’

Her hand automatically reached for the silver locket she always wore. Mark didn’t need to be told what pictures it held. He’d had an inkling, but now he knew for sure.

He didn’t say anything. What could he say that wouldn’t sound patronising or trite? So he just continued to hold her, love her, and hoped that would be enough.

‘I didn’t mean to shut you out or push you away,’ she said. ‘I just needed some time to think. It’s different this year. So much has happened in the last few months…’

Slowly she unclipped the flat oval face of the locket and showed its contents to him. On one side was a little girl—blonde curls like her mother, as cute as a button. On the other side a sandy-haired man, with an infectious grin and a gleam of love in his eyes for whomever had been taking the photo. It was hard to look at the pictures, because it made him scared that she wasn’t ready to move on, but he appreciated what a big step it had been for her to show him.

Ellie stooped to pick up the discarded rose and peeled the crushed outer petals off to reveal undamaged ones underneath. Mark felt ill. What if she was still in love with her dead husband? And how horrible was he for being jealous of him? He was polluting the pure emotions Ellie had provoked in him by thinking this way.

‘It was the rose that set me off,’ she said, picking up the bud and bringing it to her nose. ‘Pink was Chloe’s favourite colour.’

He almost thought the conversation was going to end there, the gap was so long, but just when he’d decided she’d lapsed back into silence she continued.

‘I didn’t get to go to the funeral—I was only barely conscious, couldn’t walk, couldn’t talk—but my mother showed me the pictures. She thought it would help. Maybe it did.’

She broke off to look out to sea again.

‘Chloe had a tiny white coffin with silver handles, and Mum had chosen a wreath made only of pink roses that covered it completely. I planted a bush in the cemetery for her when I got out of hospital.’

Mark felt moisture threaten his own eyelids. She reached out and touched his cheek, stroking it with the fleshy pad of her thumb. ‘Thank you for coming to find me. Thank you for never telling me how lucky I was to survive. You have no idea how much that means to me.’

How did she do it? How did she think beyond herself so easily? She had every right to spend the day cut off from the world, wallowing as much as she wanted. Ellie had lost part of her life to a fog her brain had created. What must it be like to not have been able to go to the funerals? To never get closure? Part of her must yearn to remember something from those days.

In contrast, he was a coward. He’d chosen to forget Helena, forget about love and commitment. And that hadn’t helped him heal either. If anything it had just made him more shallow, less brave.

He gazed into her beautiful damp eyes. The pale green was even more vivid against their slightly pink tinge, and he caught her face in his palms.

‘You’re amazing, Ellie Bond.’

She lowered her lids. ‘I don’t feel very amazing. I’ve spent the last few years feeling terrified mostly, and recently—’ She looked back at him. The warmth in her weak smile quickened his pulse. ‘Recently I’ve just felt plain old crazy.’

‘How can you say that?’

Her lashes lowered and she gave a derisive laugh. ‘I would have thought our first meeting would have been ample proof!’

He smiled. ‘I think that, despite first impressions, you’re probably the sanest person I know. At least you know what’s real—what’s important. I’d forgotten.’

That made her smile, the thought that someone else might have to wrestle with their memories too, that she wasn’t entirely alone in that predicament. Their lips met briefly, tenderly. He could taste the salt from her tears.

‘How you survived what you went through I’ll never know. Lesser women would have crumbled.’

‘But I did crumble. That is until I met—’ she stopped and swallowed ‘—you.’ Her voice dropped to a whisper. ‘I’d forgotten how wonderful life could be.’

‘I still think you’re pretty amazing.’ He held her close and his words drifted softly into her ear. ‘You don’t see it in yourself. That’s one of the reasons why I love you.’

She froze in his arms and Mark’s stomach churned. Ellie pulled back slightly and scrutinised his face, analysing his expression. He willed his facial muscles to keep still, however much they wanted to collapse. He hadn’t a clue what she could see in his face. Honesty, he hoped. All he was aware of was the slicing agony as he waited for her to say something. Anything…

A couple more seconds and he was going to scream.

She blinked away a fresh tear. ‘You—you love me?’

Mark recognised that feeling he got in dreams, when he suddenly discovered he’d been walking down the street naked and everybody knew it but him. The familiar urge to bolt was so strong he could taste it. In response, he ground his heels a little deeper into the sand as an anchor.

‘Yes. I do. I love you.’

Just as he thought he was going to suffocate on the tension-thick atmosphere Ellie launched herself into his arms and covered his face with a hundred little kisses. At first he couldn’t move. He hardly dared ask himself what this meant, hardly dared to hope.

What was that sound?

She was laughing. In between kisses, she was laughing! That was all he needed. He hugged her so tight her feet lifted off the floor. Their lips sought each other out and he lost all sense of reality for a while. When they finally pulled themselves apart rays of sunlight were punching holes in the gruff clouds. He looked at her face, alive with joy, such a difference from the mournful expression she’d worn when he’d first found her. Tears still followed the damp tracks down her cheeks, but he hoped for a very different reason.

At that moment he knew he wanted to love her so completely, so thoroughly, that every speck of pain would be soothed, every wound healed. He might not be able to change her past, but he was going to make darn sure her future was filled with all the adoration and happiness he could give her. He felt strangely unafraid at the thought of for ever.

He linked his fingers in between hers and they strolled back along the shoreline. Every now and then he would spot one of Ellie’s random sand doodles. He knew now that the ‘C’ had been for Chloe. The selfish part of him dreaded seeing a letter ‘S’. But he hadn’t—yet. Only some squiggles, her name and a flower.

There was another one up ahead he couldn’t quite discern. He strained his eyes, trying to read it upside down. When he eventually made it out his heart nearly stopped.

It was an ‘M’, encased in a gently curving heart.

The words were out of his mouth before his brain had a chance to intervene.

‘Marry me?’

What had he just said?

There must still be static left in the air from the storm, because she felt tiny electric charges detonate all over her body. Then a sick feeling of disappointment hit her in the pit of her stomach. She’d heard him say something like this before. She yanked her hand out of his. How could he ruin the moment like this?

‘Don’t joke with me, Mark.’ If he was bright, he’d heed the steely warning hidden in her reply. She turned to face him, expecting to see the trademark grin across his big smart mouth, but it wasn’t there.

Another jolt of electricity hit her.

‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’

He scooped her into his arms and kissed her until she nearly forgot the subject of this surreal conversation. Nearly.

‘Of course I’m serious!’

She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Mark started to kiss her again, but she stepped back, holding him at bay.

‘Hang on a second, Mark. I can’t think straight when you’re that close.’ She’d thought he’d laugh, but he didn’t. She smoothed her wind-blown hair and turned a slow circle in the sand, scanning the horizon for an answer. He came up behind her and hugged her close, his warmth delicious against her cool skin.

‘What’s there to think about? I love you. Don’t you love me?’

‘Mark, it’s not that easy!’

He nuzzled in close to her neck. ‘It could be.’

Could it? Could happiness really be that easy? It was as if someone had told her it was okay to reach out and grab the stars if she wanted to.

For four long years she’d been living in the past. Trying to remember…Trying to forget…Recently she’d actually managed to live in the present, enjoy the moment. But did that mean she was ready to think about the future? That was something she hadn’t done for such a long time, she realised, for all her big talk about ‘breaking free’. She hadn’t really been looking forward when she’d taken the job as Mark’s housekeeper; she’d been looking back over her shoulder, running away from ghosts.

But now, standing here on this beach, she was starting to think that the future might be wonderful instead of scary. Today she’d found some peace. And Mark was a wonderful man, so much more than he gave himself credit for. Maybe it was that easy. Maybe this was one impulse she should follow one hundred percent, because, boy, she really wanted to say yes.

He turned her to face him without breaking contact, keeping her in the protective circle of his arms. ‘Ellie. I love you. I’ve never felt this way about anyone. Ever. I can’t imagine spending another second of my life without you.’ In a solemn gesture he took her hands in his, kissed them and lowered himself onto one knee.

Now she knew she really was dreaming! There was no way this could be happening to her. Still, she hoped the alarm clock wasn’t going to go off any time soon.

The earnest look on his face made her eyes sting again. ‘Ellie Bond, will you do me the honour of becoming my wife?’

She could feel his whole body shaking as she lowered herself to sit on his raised knee and kissed him sweetly, passionately.

‘Is that a yes?’

Her breath warmed his earlobe as she whispered, ‘Yes.’

Mark’s ferocious kiss destroyed their precarious balancing act and they both fell onto the sand, tangled but still joined at the lips. Ellie wasn’t sure how long they stayed there ‘celebrating’. Long enough for the tide to creep in a bit further and take a peek.

‘Mark, my feet are getting wet.’

‘Do you care?’

‘Not really.’

More jubilant celebrations.

By the time the salty water was lapping at the hem of her skirt she surrendered.

‘We can’t stay here all day, you know.’

Mark fell back into the sand and stared at the vivid blue sky. ‘Shame. I was hoping we could just float away to a desert island and never be heard of again.’

That night at dinner they suddenly remembered they needed to think practicalities if they were really serious about getting married.

‘What sort of wedding do you want?’ Mark asked Ellie as she dug into her creamy dessert, desperately hoping it wouldn’t be the three-ring circus Helena had insisted on. Weddings like that felt like bad omens.

Ellie swallowed her mouthful and thought for a moment. ‘Something simple.’ She dug her spoon into the coconut and rum thing again, but it stopped halfway to her mouth and hovered there, threatening to drop its contents back into the bowl while she considered his question further. ‘Something small…private. Just you and me on a sunny day, somewhere beautiful.’

That gave him an idea. ‘Somewhere like here?’

Ellie put her spoon back in the bowl and smiled at him. ‘That would be perfect! You mean come back in a few months?’

That was exactly what he’d been thinking. But then he thought about all the to-ing and fro-ing, all the hideous preparations and tensions in the run-up to a wedding. That would just spoil everything, ruin the atmosphere of perfection that was clinging to them at the moment.

‘How about we get married here? Now. In a few days.’ He looked at her earnestly. ‘As soon as possible.’

She opened and closed her mouth. Then she made that scrunched-up face she always did when she was trying to process something unexpected.

‘We’ll have a big party for friends and family when we get back home,’ he added. Ellie looked horrified, and Mark remembered the last party at Larkford. He took hold of her hand. ‘Real friends only, I promise.’

‘This isn’t another one of what you think are your hilarious jokes, is it?’

He was deadly serious. How did he make her see that?

‘Ellie, I’ve been hiding for too long, waiting for too long.’ He watched as the tension eased from her face and she smiled at him, nodding in agreement. He stopped smiling and looked straight into her eyes. ‘I don’t want to wait any more.’

She let out a happy sigh. ‘Mark, you’re asking the right girl, then—because I have this horrible impulse to go along with anything you say, and I just can’t be bothered to fight it.’

Ellie stared at herself in the bathroom mirror.

‘I’m getting married tomorrow!’ she screamed at the idiot grinning back at her. Then she screamed again, just because it was fun. Oh, get a grip, girl! You can’t just stand here all day smiling at yourself. You’ve got some serious shopping to do today. And a fiancé to corner before he disappeared off to do whatever secret things he’d planned and wouldn’t tell her about.

One more grin in the mirror for luck, and then she ran out of her bathroom and got dressed in the first things she found in the wardrobe.

The last few days had been madness. Her cheeks hurt from smiling so much. She’d thought she would be flying home days ago, but she was still here in paradise with Mark, and things were going to get even more perfect. She couldn’t think about anything else. Her mind just refused to prise itself from that track and she wasn’t inclined to let it.

Of course a voice in the back of her head whispered to her, asking her if this was all too quick, asking whether there was unfinished business she needed to sort out first. But she didn’t want to listen to that voice, so she drowned it out with a slightly off-key rendition of ‘Oh, What a Beautiful Morning’.

Happiness was within her grasp, here and now. She was going to snatch it before the whole dream disappeared in a puff of smoke. No more fear. No more trepidation. Just facing the future with Mark at her side.

But what about the past? the voice said. What are you going to do with that?

Ellie belted out the chorus of the song and ran through the garden. She burst through the unlocked doors of Mark’s cabin like a miniature whirlwind.

He was in the sitting room, poring over some faxes. His face lit up as he saw her. ‘Good morning. And what have you come as today?’

‘Huh?’ Ellie stopped and looked down, then burst into laughter as she took in her floaty floral-print blouse and her pyjama bottoms.

‘I had other things on my mind while I was getting dressed,’ she admitted with a wry smile.

‘Pyjama bottoms…hmm…’ Mark claimed his morning kiss. ‘They remind me of the first time we met,’ he said, making a feather-soft trail from her neck to her ear.

Ellie flung her arms around him. ‘If you really want to recreate our first meeting I think we need to be a little more—how shall I put it?—horizontal,’ she said, and let her weight fall backwards, pulling them both down onto the large sofa behind her. ‘And you! You should be wearing considerably less!’

‘You know I’m not that sort of girl,’ he quipped. ‘I thought I’d made it very clear. You have to sign on the dotted line before you get to sample the goods.’

‘Spoilsport!’

‘Only twenty hours to go. Surely you can wait that long?’

‘Only just.’ She pulled him close for another kiss. ‘Just a deposit,’ she assured him, making sure she got her money’s worth. Both sets of parents and Ellie’s brother were due to fly in for the wedding, so they’d planned a meal at the hotel after the ceremony. ‘Do we have to stay through all of the wedding breakfast? Can’t we leave early?’

Mark threw his head back and laughed. He pressed his lips against her forehead as he untangled himself and stood up. ‘We won’t have to stay long.’

‘Five minutes?’

‘Three at the most.’

It was her turn to laugh. He walked back to the desk. ‘Now, as for the rest of today, you have to go shopping. You can’t get married in another outfit like that. Carla, the stylist from the shoot, has faxed me a list of shops in St John’s that you can visit for a dress. Thank goodness Antiguan red tape is just as laid-back and flexible as everything else on this island, and I can go and pick up the marriage licence today, once some essential documents have arrived. And, talking of essential elements of our wedding, I have one last surprise for you.’

He grabbed her hand and dragged her with him to another cabin. When they got onto the white-painted veranda he gave her a little nudge in the direction of the open door. Ellie gave him a quizzical look, then stepped inside.

‘Charlie!’

Charlie jumped off the sofa and bounced over to Ellie, squealing, and dragged her fully inside the cabin. Then she flung her arms around Ellie’s neck and yelled her congratulations in her ear. Ellie was already having trouble catching her breath, and Charlie’s bear hug left her practically airless. She patted her friend’s back in a pathetic attempt to return the gesture.

‘I don’t understand. What are you doing here?’

‘Do you think I’d miss this? Mark called me the day before yesterday, broke the news, and asked me to fly over with birth certificates and such. I’m a rather stunning, elegant, designer-clad courier!’ She did a little twirl just to prove it.

Ellie grinned. ‘You’re more than that! And the first thing you can do to make up for almost giving me a heart attack is to come dress shopping. It’s the least my bridesmaid can do.’

Charlie’s high-pitched squeal almost shredded Ellie’s eardrums.

Sunrise.

Ellie and Mark walked towards the minister arm in arm as the sun lifted above the horizon. She loved Mark for suggesting her favourite time of day for the wedding. There was something so pure and fresh about the early-morning sun. And it was a beautiful symbol for her life. A fresh start, new hope. Light and warmth where she’d thought there could only be darkness.

Her bare feet sank into the cool, silky sand as they passed the few guests up early to share the ceremony. Charlie and Kat, who’d insisted on cancelling something important to be there, stood beside the minister in their bridesmaids’ outfits, smiling at Mark and Ellie as they approached. Charlie looked as if she’d already had to break out the emergency hanky. It was just as well Ellie had insisted she wear waterproof mascara.

Ellie took a deep breath and looked down at her feet. Her softly flowing white chiffon dress was blowing gently round her ankles. Her feet looked almost as creamy as the pale sand. Her toenails were painted a shade of deep pink to match the exotic blooms woven into her hair and in her bouquet. And on her left foot was a white gold toe-ring, beautiful in its simplicity. Mark’s gift to her this morning. Just until they got a proper engagement ring, he’d said. But she didn’t care; she thought it was perfect.

She wore no other jewellery. Not even her locket. Much as she loved it, she couldn’t wear it any more—especially not today. It wouldn’t be fair to Mark.

As they reached the minister they halted and turned to face each other. How could she be this lucky? Finding love once with Sam had been wonderful enough, but finding it with Mark was a miracle. She never thought she’d have a second chance. She was so thankful he’d made her see that happiness didn’t always come in identically shaped packages.

She almost didn’t hear the minister as he started the ceremony, she was so busy staring at Mark. She’d never seen him looking so devastatingly handsome. Her eyes never left him throughout the vows. They might as well have been standing on the beach alone for all she knew. Finally she heard the words husband and wife, and the minister gave Mark permission to kiss the bride.

She should have known from the naughty grin on his face that he was up to no good. He lingered a little longer than propriety suggested on the kiss, then swept her up into his arms, hooked one arm under her knees and headed off down the beach with her, leaving her dress billowing behind them and the small band of guests open-mouthed.

‘Mark!’ she gasped, when he’d gone a dozen or so steps. ‘Where are you going? We’ve still got the reception to get through!’

He slowed to a halt. ‘I thought you wanted to disappear as soon as possible after the wedding?’

‘I’m tempted, believe me, but we can’t leave our guests waiting.’

‘Just for you,’ he said, and let her legs glide down to meet the sand, then kissed the tip of her nose. Laughing, they walked back to the small group of guests, who were sharing indulgent smiles.

By the time they congregated in the hotel gardens under a flower-draped pergola for their celebratory feast, the sun was glowing gold and fully above the horizon. The hotel chef had been very inventive with the food, and a stunning array of mouthwatering dishes was ready for them. Since the numbers were small they all sat around one large table, sipping champagne and chatting.

After they had eaten, made the toasts and cut the cake, Kat surprised them by picking up her guitar, which had been cleverly hidden behind a planter, and proceeded to serenade them with a song especially composed for the occasion. Tears welled in Ellie’s eyes as she listened to the beautiful lyrics.

All my tomorrows are nothing but yours, all my yesterdays my gift to you.

It was the best wedding present anyone could have given them. The chorus stuck in her mind, and she found she was humming it as they prepared to leave for the honeymoon.

‘Where are we going, then?’ Ellie asked, puzzled, as Mark led her not to the front of the hotel, as she’d expected, but on to the beach. Mark just smiled an infuriating smile that said you’ll see.

A small speedboat, with a satin ribbon tied bridal-car fashion on the front, was sitting a few feet from the shoreline.

‘I thought we’d float away to that desert island we talked about and never be heard of again,’ he said, as he lifted her into his arms once again and waded out to deposit her in the boat.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

MARK was as good as his word, Ellie thought, as she rolled sleepily over in bed. Two weeks on their very own private tropical island had been absolute bliss. She snuggled back against him. A heavy arm draped over her waist and his breaths were long and even. Heaven.

The villa they were staying in was small, but luxurious. The local owners brought fresh food and supplies every day, but were discreet enough that Ellie had not caught sight of them yet. She found enough lazy energy to smile as she remembered how Mark had laughed when she had referred to them as the ‘shopping fairies’.

If only they could stay here for ever. But today was their last day. Tomorrow it was back to England. She frowned, and snuggled even further into Mark’s sleeping body. The last couple of weeks had been like a wonderful dream and she wasn’t sure she was ready for the cold grey slap of reality yet. Here they were just Mark and Ellie, besotted newlyweds. No labels, no outside expectations, free to be themselves. The thought of going home made her shiver. She loved Mark desperately, but she had an inkling that getting used to being Mrs Wilder was going to take some effort.

Warm golden light filtered through the sheer curtains. She guessed the sun had been up a while; it was maybe nine or ten o’clock. Her tummy rumbled in confirmation. No wonder! Their half-eaten dinner still lay on the dining table, abandoned in favour of traditional honeymoon recreation.

Wonderful as it is, lying here tangled with my husband, a girl’s gotta eat!

She wriggled out from under his arm and reached for her robe. Thankfully she had managed to buy something a little more appropriate for a new bride than her old ratty pink one. The ancient garment certainly didn’t come under the category of sexy honeymoon lingerie. She’d been astonished when Mark had seemed disappointed she hadn’t packed it. Weird. She slung the wisp of ivory silk over her shoulders, only bothering with it because she was afraid of running into the ‘fairies’. She left it unfastened and walked away from the bed. A sudden jerk of the sash trailing behind her arrested her progress.

A sleepy voice mumbled from under a pillow, ‘Don’t go. Come back to bed.’

‘I’ll be back in a sec. I’m starving!’

‘So am I.’

She laughed. ‘Why don’t I think you’ve got breakfast on your mind?’

A naughty chuckle from under the pillow told her she was spot-on. In a moment of feminine contrariness she decided to make him wait, and continued her journey to the kitchen. The sash pulled taut as he tried to stop her, but the slippery silk whooshed through the loops and she disappeared out through the door. She laughed gently as she imagined what he must look like with the sash dangling uselessly from his outstretched hand.

‘Ellie?’ he yelled from the bedroom.

She was still smiling as she reached into the fridge for the jug of fresh orange juice. ‘Sorry. Forgot what you said. You’ll just have to wait,’ she called back, pleased with her own self-mockery.

Mark’s effort at secretive footsteps was atrocious, but she pretended not to hear him and readied herself for his attack. She detected a flicking movement out of the corner of her eye, and before she could work out what it was her missing sash looped over her head and dragged her backwards into the hard wall of his chest.

His voice was very nearly a growl. ‘I said, Don’t go!’

‘Mark! I just spilled orange juice all over myself.’ She looked down and watched a bead of liquid travel down her torso towards her belly button.

He loosened the sash just enough to let her turn to face him. ‘We’ll just have to clean it up, then, won’t we?’ he said, a truly wicked glint in his eyes.

Ellie sighed as he started tugging her back towards the bedroom. She was pretty sure he wasn’t going to fetch a towel.

Ellie wandered outside and sank her feet into the dewy grass. The vibrant green carpet welcomed her feet and she sighed. It was wonderful to be home. She might have lived on in the cottage after Sam and Chloe had gone, but it turned from a home to a shell of bricks and mortar the day they died. She turned and looked at the majestically crumbling manor house. Larkford Place felt like home—but then she’d feel at home in a caravan if Mark was there.

She was surprised at how easy the transition had been. She’d been so worried that she would feel different when they returned from the Caribbean. Over three weeks later she still felt alarmingly peaceful. She’d experienced a strange sense of foreboding on the flight home, but if trouble was looming in the distance it was hiding itself round a dimly lit corner.

She looked at the open French windows and wished that Mark would stroll through them any second and join her. The curtains rippled in promise, but she knew he wouldn’t appear. He was off on business for a few days and due home first thing tomorrow. She’d had the opportunity to go with him. She’d already travelled with him once since they’d been back, but she’d been feeling a bit below par for a couple of days and had decided to stay home and recharge her batteries while Mark flew to Ireland. The idea of sleeping in her own bed rather than a hotel one, however luxurious the surroundings, was too much of a lure. She took a careful sip of her hot tea.

Yuck!

It tasted awful. The milk must be off. She would just have to make a new one. She walked into the kitchen and poured the rest of her tea down the sink, then put on the kettle for a fresh cup. While she was waiting for it to boil she went in search of the offending milk in the fridge.

A row of unopened bottles stood like pristine soldiers in the door. Where was the one she’d used earlier? She moved a couple of items around on the nearby shelf to see if the half-used bottle was hidden away behind something. Nope. Hang on! What were the teabags doing in here?

Oh, well. She popped open a fresh pint of milk and sniffed it, while keeping her nose as far away as possible. No, this one was fine. Having done that, she made herself another cup of tea and sank into one of the wooden chairs round the table. She took a long sip, scowled, then spat it back into the cup. What was wrong with the tea today? It would have to be orange juice instead. She returned the rather chilly box of tea bags to its proper resting place in the cupboard—or would have done if a bottle of milk hadn’t been sitting in its spot.

Obviously her absent-minded tendencies were getting worse. She’d been under the mistaken impression she’d been improving recently, but she was clearly deluded. She laughed quietly to herself as she returned the milk to the fridge.

Then she fell silent. These weren’t her normal memory lapses. This was something new. Should she be worried about that? She’d never been scatty like this before, unless you counted that time years before the accident when…

Oh, my!

Ellie continued staring into the open fridge, the cool air making no impact on her rapidly heating face. When she let go of the door and let it slam closed she realised her hands were shaking. She sat back down at the table, her thirst forgotten, and tried to assemble all the evidence in her cluttered brain. The milk, the tea, the lack of energy—it was all falling into place.

She’d completely gone off both tea and coffee when she’d been carrying Chloe—hadn’t even been able to stand the smell when Sam had opened a jar of instant coffee to make himself one. She’d made him drink it in the garden! And then she’d developed an overwhelming craving for tinned pineapple sprinkled liberally with pepper.

Her palm flattened over her stomach. She stood up, then sat down again.

I can’t be pregnant! Not already.

She hadn’t even considered the possibility, although it would certainly explain her sudden lethargy. A creeping nausea rose in her throat, but she was sure it was more a result of shock than morning sickness.

How could this have happened?

Er…stupid question, Ellie! You spent more time with your clothes off than on on honeymoon. Yes, they’d been careful, but nothing was guaranteed one hundred percent in this life.

She wasn’t sure she was ready to have another baby! Life was changing so fast at the moment she could hardly keep up. She needed to get used to being married before she could consider all the possibilities for the future.

And what was Mark going to say?

She hoped he would be pleased, but what if he wasn’t? They hadn’t even talked about this stuff yet, having been too caught up in a whirlwind wedding and being newlyweds to think about anything sensible.

Calm down! You’re getting ahead of yourself!

She didn’t even know if she was pregnant yet. All she knew for sure was that she’d had a dodgy cup of tea and had misplaced the milk. She didn’t have to turn insignificant minor events into a major crisis, now, did she?

Ellie shook her head. Talk about her imagination running away with her. What she needed to do right now was take a few deep breaths and have a shower. Which was exactly what she did. However, all the time she was washing she couldn’t shake the nagging voice in the back of her head.

You can’t run away from this one, Ellie. You can’t bury your head in the sand. But she hadn’t been running away from things recently, had she? She’d run to Mark, not away from something else. At least that was how it had felt at the time.

She stepped out of the shower and got dressed. She needed to find out for sure. She’d go down to the chemist in the village and buy a test. Strike that. She’d already got to know the local residents, and if the village drums were doing their usual work the news that she might be expecting would be round the village in a nanosecond. The fact that dashing Mr Wilder had married his housekeeper was still the main topic of local gossip. A baby on the way would be too juicy a titbit for the village grapevine to ignore.

She’d be better off going into town and shopping at one of the large chemists. Much easier to be anonymous then. At least when Mark got home tomorrow she’d have had a chance to absorb the outcome herself.

The thought that the test might be negative should have made her feel more peaceful. Instead she felt low at the prospect. If the test was negative, she would make a lighthearted story of it to tell Mark over dinner tomorrow. She’d tell him how freaked out she’d been, see what his reaction was, test the waters.

Two hours later she was standing in the bathroom, holding the little cellophane-wrapped box as if it was an unexploded bomb.

You’re not going to find out by staring at it.

She removed the crinkly wrapping and opened the box. How could something as mundane as a plastic stick turn out to be the knife-edge that her whole life was balanced on? She sat on the closed toilet lid while waiting for the result, the test laid on one thigh. Two minutes to wait. If someone had told her she was only going to live another two minutes, it would seem like a measly amount of time. How, then, could this couple of minutes stretch so far they seemed to be filling the rest of the day?

First the test window. Good. One blue line. It was working. Then wait for the next window. She waited for what seemed an age. Nothing. She stood up, threw the test onto the shelf over the sink and ran out of the room crying.

All that stress for nothing. She ought to be relieved! It gave her a little more time to think, to plan, to find out what Mark wanted.

Suddenly she wished he was there. She wanted to feel his strong arms wrapped around her, wanted him to hold her tight against his chest and stroke her hair.

She grabbed a wad of tissues from the box beside her bed and blew her nose loudly. She should get out of here, get some fresh air. Perhaps she should pick up the papers from the village shop. Mark liked to read a selection, from the broad-sheets to the tabloids, mostly to keep track of what attention his clients were attracting in the press.

She went back to collect the pregnancy test and picked it up, with the intention of putting it in the bin, but the moment she looked at it she dropped it into the sink in shock. The breath left her body as if she’d been slapped with a cricket bat.

The tears must be blurring her vision! She dragged the hem of her T-shirt across her eyes and stared at it again.

Two blue lines?

She took it to the window to get more light. Her eyes weren’t deceiving her. Granted, the second one was very faint, compared to the first, but there were definitely two blue lines. The hormones had to be only just detectable. She could hardly believe it, but there it was—in blue and white.

I’m going to have a baby. Our baby.

Suddenly the rambling old house seemed claustrophobic. She needed to get outside, feel the fresh air on her skin. The garden called her, and she ran down to it and kicked her flip-flops off. Her ‘engagement’ toe-ring glinted in the morning sun as she stepped onto the grass and began to walk.

A stroll through Larkford Place’s grounds should have been pleasant in high summer. The far reaches of the garden, unspoilt and untended, were alive with wild flowers, butterflies and buzzing insects. But Ellie noticed none of it. All she could think about was having a little boy, with a shock of thick dark hair like his father and eyes the colour of warm chocolate.

Was this how she’d felt when she’d realised she’d been expecting the last time? It seemed so long ago now, a memory half obscured by the fog of the accident. But her last pregnancy had been planned. This one was…well, a surprise to put it mildly.

She stopped and looked a bright little poppy, wavering in the breeze. Through the confusion and doubts, joy bubbled up inside her, pushing them aside. She wanted this baby. She already loved this baby—just as much as she’d loved…

Images of golden ringlets and gap-toothed smiles filled her mind, but there was something missing. A word missing.

Her hands, which had been circling her tummy, went still. Just as much as she’d loved…

No. Not now. Not this name. This was one name she was never allowed to forget, never allowed to lose. It was too awful. Ellie looked back at the house and began to run.

This couldn’t be happening. She couldn’t have forgotten her own daughter’s name.

Mark burst through the front door with a huge bunch of wilted flowers in his hand. They had looked a bit better before they’d spent two long, sticky hours in the passenger seat of the Aston Martin.

‘Ellie?’

No answer. She was probably out in the garden. He almost sprinted into the kitchen. The French windows, her normal escape route, were closed. On closer inspection he discovered they were locked. He ran back to the entrance hall and called her name more loudly. The slight echo from his shout jarred the silence.

Okay, maybe she was out. He was half a day early, after all.

He looked at his watch. Nearly four o’clock. She couldn’t be too far away. He’d just go and have a shower, then lie in wait. He chuckled and loosened his tie as he hopped up the stairs two at a time.

But as the afternoon wore on Ellie didn’t appear. He ended up in the kitchen, wishing she’d materialise there somehow, and he found her note near the kettle. Well, it wasn’t even a proper letter—just a sticky note on the kitchen counter, telling him that she’d gone.

He sat down on one of the chairs by the kitchen table and put his head in his hands.

Not again. She’d seemed so happy since the wedding.

That’s when they leave—when they’re happy. They don’t need you any more.

No. This couldn’t happen with Ellie. He loved her too much. More than Helena. So much more. He stood up. He’d be damned if he lost a second wife this way. But if she was really intent on going she bloody well owed him an explanation. He wasn’t going to let her waltz off without a backward glance.

The keys jumped from Ellie’s fingers as if they had a life of their own. She muttered through her tears and bent to scoop them up from the front step. Thankfully the holiday company had told her they’d had a cancellation this week. The cottage was empty. Perhaps if she went inside it would help.

Although she’d remembered Chloe’s name almost the second she’d reached Larkford’s kitchen, she still couldn’t shake the clammy, creeping feeling of disloyalty and guilt. She’d needed to come somewhere she could rid herself of this horrible feeling of being disconnected from her past.

She slid the key into the lock and started the familiar routine of pulling and turning to ease it open. It was feeling particularly uncooperative today. She gave the key one last jiggle and felt the levers give. The door creaked open.

For no reason she could think of, she burst into tears.

The cream and terracotta tiled hallway seemed familiar and strange at the same time. The surfaces were cleared of all her knickknacks and photos, but the furniture was still in situ. Even devoid of personal items it seemed more welcoming than when she’d left on that grey, rainy day months ago.

Ellie hadn’t planned to end up here. She just had. An impulse. She walked into the sitting room and slumped into her favourite armchair.

I should never have left this chair. I should have stayed here eating biscuits and never gone to Larkford. Then I would never have forgotten you, my darling girl.

But then she wouldn’t have this new baby. And she really wanted it. She clamped her hands to her stomach, as if to reassure the tiny life inside, and her eyes glittered with maternal fierceness.

If Mark didn’t want it, then she’d just bring it up on her own.

Ellie shook her head. She hadn’t even told Mark yet, didn’t have a clue what his reaction would be. She was just making the same mistake she always made: an idea had crept into her head and she’d sprinted away with it like an Olympic athlete, not even bothering to check that she was running in the right direction. Maybe she was so terrified of losing Mark that deep down she almost expected something to come along and demolish it. And at the first hint of trouble she’d been only too ready to believe her luck couldn’t hold out.

Sitting here moping was doing her no good. She pulled herself to her feet and started to walk round the house. As she visited every room different memories came alive: Chloe riding her truck up and down the hall; Sam marking homework at the dining table; the kitchen counter where she had made cakes with Chloe, more flour down their fronts than in the mixing bowl. And she realised she’d never been able to do this before, never been able to look at her cottage and see it alive with wonderful warm memories of her lost family.

As she sat trying to process all the new information Kat’s song from the wedding drifted through her head:

Yesterday is where I live, trapped by ghosts and memories.

But I can’t stay frozen, my heart numb, because tomorrow is calling me…

Ellie guessed the song had been about her break-up with Razor, but the simple lyrics about learning to love again had been so right for their wedding day too. ‘All My Tomorrows’ was the title. And she’d promised the rest of hers to Mark, willingly. Nothing in the world could make her take that promise back. So there was only one thing to do: she had to go back home—her real home, Larkford—and let Mark know he was going to be a father. Whatever fallout happened, happened. They would just have to deal with it together.

Her instincts told her it was going to be okay. She hoped she was brave enough to listen to them.

She grabbed her keys off the table and took long strides into the hall, her eyes fixed on the front door. A shadow crossed the glazed panel. She hesitated, then walked a few steps further, only to halt again as a fist pounded on the door.

‘Ellie? Are you there?’

She dropped her keys.

‘Ellie!’

‘Mark?’ Her voice was shaky, but a smile stretched her trembling lips. She ran to the door and pressed her palms against the glass.

‘Let me in, or so help me I’m just going to have to break the door down!’

She patted her pockets, then scanned the hallway, remembering she’d dropped her keys. She ran to pick them up, but it took three attempts before her shaking fingers kept a grip on them. As fast as she could she raced back to the door and jammed the key in the lock. An ugly grinding sound followed as she turned it, then the key refused to move any further. She wiggled and jiggled it, pushed and pulled the door, trying all her old tricks, but it wouldn’t budge. The key would not turn in either direction, so she couldn’t even get it out again to have another go.

‘Ellie? Open the door!’ The last shred of patience disappeared from his voice.

‘I’m trying! The lock’s jammed.’

‘Let me try.’

The door shuddered and groaned under Mark’s assault, but remained stubbornly firm.

Ellie sighed. ‘They don’t make doors like this any more.’

Between pants, she heard Mark mutter, ‘You’re telling me.’

She pressed her face to the stained glass design, able to see him through a clear piece of glass in the centre. He looked tired, disheveled and incredibly sexy. Without warning, she started to cry again.

He stopped wrestling with the door and looked at her through the textured glass. ‘We have to talk.’

She gulped. He sounded serious. Was serious good or bad? Good. Serious was good. Please God, let serious be good!

‘I know,’ she said.

‘Why are you here, instead of at home?’

She took a deep breath and turned away from him, pressed her back against the door, then slid to the floor.

‘How did you know where to find me?’

‘I phoned Charlie in a panic and she suggested I might find you here. I’d already been to your parents’ house and your brother’s.’

She nodded. Charlie knew her so well. Maybe too well. If her friend hadn’t guessed where she was she might have made it back to Larkford and Mark would never have known how stupid she’d been this afternoon. But why had her first impulse been to run? To come here? Did that mean something?

‘Ellie?’

She took a deep breath. ‘Do you think we got married too fast, Mark? I mean, did we get carried away? Should we have waited?’ Everything just seemed so confusing today.

She heard him sit on the step. His feet scraped the gravel path as he stretched his legs out. ‘Are you saying you want out?’ he said quietly. ‘Are you saying you want to come back here for good? I thought you loved me, Ellie. I really did.’

Ellie spun onto her knees and looked through the letterbox. He looked so forlorn, so utterly crushed, she could hardly speak. ‘I do love you,’ she said, in a croaky whisper. He looked round, and her stomach went cold as she saw the sadness in his eyes.

He tried a small smile on for size. ‘Good. Come home with me, then.’

Her fingers got tired holding the brass letterbox open and she let it snap shut. Carefully, because she was feeling a bit wobbly, she pulled herself to her feet. He stood too, and leaned against the door, trying to see her through the multi-coloured glass. Ellie raised her fingers to the clear green diamond of glass where she could see his left eye. It reminded her of the colour of the sunset flash. Of true love. Of coming home.

‘I’m sorry, Mark. It’s just…I just needed to be somewhere that reminded me of Chloe.’

The green eye staring at her through the glass blinked. She knew what he was thinking. He thought she’d come here to remember Sam too. But while she had unearthed forgotten memories of both the people she’d lost, it didn’t make the slightest impact on what she felt for Mark.

‘I love you, Mark. And as soon as we work out a way to get this door open I’m coming back home. I promise.’

He nodded again, but she could tell he only half believed her. Another wave of emotion hit her and she began to cry again. What was wrong with her today? ‘I don’t know why I’m doing this,’ she said, half-sobbing, half-laughing. ‘I can’t seem to get a grip…’

‘Perhaps it’s the hormones?’

Hormones?

She jumped as the brass flap of the letterbox creaked open again. Something plastic rattled through and clattered onto the floor. Her pregnancy test! She’d left it in the sink. So much for a cool, calm testing of the water on that subject.

‘When were you going to tell me?’ he asked, his voice going cold. ‘I didn’t expect to find out I’m going to be a father from a plastic stick. You could have called me at the very least.’

‘I was going to tell you, but then I…I forgot Chloe’s name. And that just freaked me out. I was scared. What if I forget her altogether when this new baby comes along? I couldn’t live with myself. You do understand, don’t you?’

She heard him grumble something under his breath. The heavy crunch of his feet on the gravel got quieter.

‘Mark!’ Ellie ran to the door and pressed her nose against the glass.

No answer. She’d finally scared him away with the ghosts from her past. Her unfinished business had caught up with her.

‘Mark!’ She sounded far too desperate, but she didn’t care.

She dropped the test and flung her full weight against the door. Unimpressed, it hardly rattled. She banged it with her fists, hoping to catch Mark’s attention. She needed to tell him how stupid she’d been, that she thought he’d be a wonderful father.

‘Mark!’ Hoarse shouts were punctuated by sobs as she continued to bang on the door.

She stopped.

No faint crunch on the gravel. No hint of a shadow moving up the path. She used the door for support as she slumped against it, exhausted. He couldn’t leave now, could he?

She managed one last hollow plea, so quiet he couldn’t possibly hear it. ‘Don’t go.’

‘I’m not going anywhere.’

She spun round to find him striding towards her down the hallway.

‘How did you—?’

He nodded towards the back door, not slowing until he crushed her close to him. His lips kissed her wet eyelids, her nose, her cheeks, and came to linger on her mouth. She might be confused about many things, but here in his arms everything seemed to make sense. When she finally dragged herself away, she looked into his face. All the passion, tenderness and love she had ever hoped to see there were glistening in his eyes.

‘Ellie, there is room in that massive heart of yours for all of us. Easily.’ He stroked the side of her face. ‘Just because we’re going to make new memories together—the three of us—it doesn’t mean you have to erase the old ones.’

He dipped his hand into his pocket and pulled something out of it. It was only as she felt cold metal round her neck that she realised he had brought her locket with him, and that he was fastening it at her nape, underneath her hair.

Her lip quivered. ‘But what if I do forget? My brain’s not reliable all the time, is it?’

He looked at her with fierce tenderness. ‘You won’t forget. I won’t let you. If you lose a name or a date I’ll remember it for you. We’re in this together, Ellie. You and me. And I want all of you. We have the future, but your past has made you who you are now, and that’s the woman I love.’

She raised both hands and stroked the sides of his face, looking just as fiercely back at him. ‘Oh, I love you too,’ she whispered, and pressed her trembling lips to his.

She had one thing left to ask. Just because she needed to be one hundred percent certain. ‘You do want children?’

Waiting for his reaction, she swallowed, trying to ease the thickening in her throat.

His hands moved from her back to splay over her still-flat stomach. She laughed. He looked as if he was expecting evidence there and then. He was just going to have to be patient.

‘I want it all. I want our baby. I want to change nappies and clean up sick and crawl around on the floor with him. I want to give him brothers and sisters and teach the whole lot of them to play cricket. I want to help our children with their homework, teach them how to drive, give our daughters away at the altar. And I want to do it all with you by my side. Will you do that with me, Ellie? Do you want that too?’

Ellie threw back her head and laughed with joy. Mark always had made everything seem so simple. She was the one who made it all so complicated. She kissed him with a fervour that surprised them both.

Then, for the second time that month, she said, ‘I do.’

EPILOGUE

ELLIE crept across the carpet in her bare feet and peered into the empty cot.

‘Shh!’ A low voice came from a dim corner of the room. ‘I’ve just got him off to sleep.’ Mark was pacing up and down, their two-week-old son cradled against his shoulder.

Baby Miles was sleeping the boneless sleep that newborns did so well. His mouth hung open and his brow was tensed into a frown. Mark and Ellie smiled at each other.

‘The trick to putting him into bed is to treat him like a stick of dynamite,’ he said, sounding like a total expert already as he lowered the infant into the cot with precision. ‘One false move and—’

‘The explosion is just as noisy and twice as devastating. I know. You’ve made that joke a hundred times in the last fortnight, and unfortunately I haven’t forgotten a single occasion.’

Mark grinned at her, then went back to what he’d been doing. He eased his hand from under his son’s head. They both froze as the little tyrant stirred and made a squeaky grunt. Mark’s mask of stern concentration melted.

‘I love it when he makes those noises,’ he said, reaching for Ellie’s hand and leading her from the room. She lifted their joined hands to look at her watch.

‘Midnight! Just the right time for a chocolate feast,’ she explained, and pulled him towards the kitchen. She delved into the fridge and pulled out a large bar of her favourite chocolate.

He turned the radio on low, and they ate chocolate and chatted until they were both doing more yawning than munching.

Ellie cocked her head. ‘Listen, Mark.’ He turned the radio up a notch. It sounded deafening in the quiet kitchen. They both looked at the ceiling and waited. When they were sure it was safe to make a noise, she added, ‘They’re playing our song.’

He started to hum along to Kat’s latest single, ‘All My Tomorrows’. It had been number one for three weeks already. The music-buying public couldn’t seem to get enough of the simple love song, performed with just the expressive huskiness of Kat’s voice and her acoustic guitar.

Ellie smiled and remembered the first time she’d heard it. She could almost feel the warmth of the Carribbean dawn on her skin and smell the hibiscus blossoms. Mark joined in the second chorus. She stood up and ruffled his hair before sitting on his lap. ‘Don’t give up your day job, sweetie. Kat might have you up on murder charges for doing that to her song.’

Mark pulled a face and Ellie hummed along with the music.

Treasure my heart and keep it safe, and I’ll spend all my tomorrows loving you.

Ellie wagged a finger at him. ‘Better do as the lady says, Mark.’

‘Always,’ he said, as he leaned in and stole a kiss.

The Ballerina Bride

Fiona Harper

Ballerina on the run!

Prima ballerina Allegra’s spent her life on stage. But now there are whispers that the superstar’s lost her sparkle... So when she’s offered a week on a tropical island, for survival expert Finn McLeod’s TV show, she leaps at it!

Finn’s frankly unimpressed—how will this fragile-looking girl survive life in the wild? But for Allegra, it’s not the island that’s the problem, but her all-consuming crush on the unavailable Finn! Gorgeous on TV, close up he’s devastating—and Allegra’s hours of disciplined dance practice are useless when it comes to resisting temptation....

When ordinary girls get their fairy-tale endings!

Who says fairy tales can’t come true? Once Upon a Kiss… is a miniseries featuring retellings of classic, well-loved stories. Immerse yourself in a little bit of fantasy for the modern-day girl, and be whisked away, along with our down-to-earth heroines, to the romances of your wildest daydreams!

Available this month is Fiona Harper’s captivating story The Ballerina Bride. We hope you enjoy this classic, beautifully written romance, based on The Little Mermaid but with a fabulous ballerina twist!

In love with the fairy tale? Go to www.millsandboon.co.uk to find the previous titles in this series:

Dear Reader,

We all love the magic of fairy tales, don’t we? There’s something in those enduring stories that resonates with us.

Some time ago now I was asked if I would like to write another book based on a fairy tale (I’d already done a modern-day Cinderella story in Invitation To The Boss’s Ball), and after researching many fairy tales, I settled on Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid. There was a sense of yearning in that story that stayed with me long after I’d finished reading it.

So that was how Finn and Allegra’s story was born, but I turned my “fish out of water” heroine into a privileged ballerina, thrust into the hero’s world, only to discover that reaching for her heart’s desire is much harder and more painful than she ever could have imagined.

I used the original fairy tale quite a lot for inspiration as I wrote this book. It influenced the major themes and plot points and even the colors of the hero’s and heroine’s eyes. I “borrowed” a hero who was looking for beauty in the wrong place, too blind to see what was just under his nose, and a brave heroine looking for a soul, who had the chance to destroy the object of her devotion in order to save herself. I hope you enjoy finding all the hidden—and not-so-hidden—parallels as much as I did putting them in between the pages of this book.

Blessings,

Fiona

As a child, FIONA HARPER was constantly teased for either having her nose in a book, or living in a dream world. Things haven’t changed much since then, but at least in writing she’s found a use for her runaway imagination. After studying dance at university, Fiona worked as a dancer, teacher and choreographer, before trading in that career for video-editing and production. When she became a mother, she cut back on her working hours to spend time with her children, and when her littlest one started preschool she found a few spare moments to rediscover an old-but-not-forgotten love—writing.

Fiona lives in London, but her other favorite places to be are the Highlands of Scotland, and the Kent countryside on a summer’s afternoon. She loves cooking good food and anything cinnamon-flavored. Of course, she still can’t keep away from a good book, or a good movie—especially romances—but only if she’s stocked up with tissues, because she knows she will need them by the end, be it happy or sad. Her favorite things in the world are her wonderful husband, who has learned to decipher her incoherent ramblings, and her two daughters.

To Tammy, a woman of both inner and outer grace, and an amazing friend.

Thank you.

Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER ONE

THE noise of the helicopter’s rotor blades made chit-chat impossible. Just as well, really, because Finn had no idea what to say to the tiny woman sitting next to him. Her eyes were wide, her knees clamped together, and her claw-like fingers clutched onto her seat belt as if it were a lifeline.

What on earth had Simon done?

I’ve found a fabulous replacement for Anya Pirelli, his producer had said. Just you wait! A real coup!

Finn knew sales patter when he heard it and after seeing the goods on offer he wasn’t sure he was buying. She certainly wouldn’t have been his choice for a celebrity guest star.

She was tiny, this woman. A ballet dancer, Simon had said. If they were standing she’d barely reach his shoulders. Nothing like the Amazonian tennis player, with her sporty curves and long blond hair, who was supposed to have been sitting beside him.

No, this woman was so thin she was hardly there. Would probably blow away in a stiff breeze…

Thinking of high winds, he turned to look past the pilot’s head through the windshield. The meteorological report had said the storm would hit in the small hours of the morning, but it seemed that the fickle tropical weather had decided to kick up a spectacular welcome for them. A greyish-purple cloud hung on the horizon and the sea below the helicopter was rapidly turning dark and choppy.

The pilot was also frowning and he turned to Finn and shook his head before focusing once again on the darkening sky.

Unfortunately, Finn knew exactly what that meant. He unbuckled his seat belt and reached for his rucksack. Twenty quid said the ballerina baulked at this latest development and he’d be making his way to their temporary desert island home with only Dave the cameraman for company.

Seriously? Had Simon really thought this woman—this girl, almost—was suitable for a gritty survival skills TV programme? He caught Dave’s eye. They both looked at the tiny, clenched woman sitting between them, then back at each other. It seemed Finn wasn’t the only one who thought Simon’s efforts at scraping the bottom of the celebrity barrel for Anya’s replacement had been unsuccessful.

The camera operator began to move, too, making sure he had all his equipment with him. A fuller crew would be arriving by much more civilised means later, but for now they only needed Dave, who was used to haring around after Finn and doing daft things. Despite his grumbling to the contrary, Finn was sure Dave secretly loved it.

The tiny ballerina was watching them as if she’d never seen anyone load a rucksack before. She was completely still, and the only parts of her that moved were her eyes, which darted between him and the cameraman.

‘What’s happening?’ she asked. But Finn didn’t hear the words; he just saw her mouth move.

He pointed emphatically to the dark clouds hovering over the island getting ever larger on the horizon and yelled at the top of his voice. ‘Storm’s closing in. We have to move now.’

Her mouth moved again. He was pretty sure she’d just echoed his last word back to him.

‘Now,’ he said, nodding.

She was lucky. If he’d been on his own he’d have jumped into the water, the helo still moving. But it was too dangerous for a novice. They would have to jump, but onto the wetter end of a wide beach. Not quite the luxury of a slow and steady descent on ropes as he’d planned. But there was one thing he could rely on in his life, and on his TV show—hardly anything went to plan. And that was just the way he liked it.

Finn prodded the ballerina’s seat belt buckle. She just clutched onto it harder, almost glaring at him.

‘Two minutes,’ he mouthed, and pointed sharply downward.

None of her features moved, not even her tightly puckered eyebrows, but her expression changed somehow. Something about the eyes—which he noticed were the colour the sea below them would have been if not for the storm. Bright, liquid-blue. The concern in their depths melted into panic.

Now, Finn wasn’t an unsympathetic man, but he didn’t have time to puppy-walk this girl. The helicopter needed to be well out of range by the time the storm hit. He just didn’t have the time to spoon-feed her the confidence she needed. The only course open to him was one of tough love.

‘Undo your buckle,’ he yelled, miming the action with his fingers. She hesitated, but he couldn’t have that. He yelled again, even as compassion tugged at him—told him to ease up. He batted it away, knowing from his days in the army that if he showed any kind of sympathy she might waver. Or freeze. Or panic.

He couldn’t have any of those things. The lives of the chopper crew could depend on it.

Fear was still swirling in her eyes, and she didn’t tear her gaze from his, but her fingers fumbled with the buckle and eventually it came free.

Good girl.

He shut that thought down before it showed on his face. He’d tell her later, when it was over. He used the same method of walking her through all the steps ready for their insertion as they hurtled towards their destination. He yelled; she obeyed. It was all good.

It seemed like an age before the helicopter was hovering only ten feet above the beach they’d be making their home for the next week. He jumped out of the open-sided helicopter without thinking, letting his knees bend, and rolled before standing up again. A Dave-sized thud beside him told him there was only one passenger left to disembark.

He turned back to the helicopter. She was standing in the doorway, her knuckles whitening on the edges. She didn’t look as if she was in a hurry to let go. Too bad.

‘Jump!’ he yelled, and thrust his arms up and forwards.

Almost instantly he was hit full-force by a flying ballerina. She must have flung herself out the moment he’d spoken, and he’d expected to have to yell at least once more. It took him totally by surprise, causing him to lose his footing, and they both went crashing to the ground. He was only half aware of the blurred shape of the helicopter moving away and the roar of its blades quietening.

He lay there, breathing hard. Damp sand cooling his back and a shaking ballerina warming his front.

‘S-sorry,’ she stammered. She didn’t move, though. Must be too shocked. Or mortified.

She needn’t have worried. Finn liked surprises. They produced a delicious little cocktail of adrenalin and endorphins that he’d decided he rather liked. Even when surprises came in the shape of flying ballerinas. He suddenly saw the funny side, and chuckled deep down in his torso.

‘What did you say your name was?’ he asked the unblinking pair of azure eyes just centimetres from his own.

‘Alle—’ she croaked out. And then she tried again. ‘Allegra.’

Finn grinned at her.

‘Well, Allie—Allegra—whoever you are…’ He lifted her off him with surprising ease and dumped her on the sand beside him. He really would have to anchor her to a tree if the wind picked up, wouldn’t he? Then he jumped to his feet and offered her his hand, grinning even wider. The sky was steel-grey and from the taste of the wind now whipping her long dark ponytail into her face he knew torrential rain was only minutes away.

‘Welcome to paradise,’ he said.

CHAPTER TWO

Forty-eight hours earlier

ALLEGRA stood rigid in the wings as the corps de ballets rushed past her and onto the stage of the Royal Opera House. Breathe, she reminded herself. Relax. You’ve done these steps a thousand times in rehearsal. Your body knows what to do. Trust it.

Too late for more rehearsal now. She’d be on stage in a matter of minutes.

Even so, she couldn’t stop herself marking the opening sequence on the spot, her arms and legs carving tiny, precise arcs in the air as they mirrored the full-blown sequence of turns and jumps in her head.

Frustrated, she stopped herself mid-movement, pulled her cardigan off and dumped it somewhere she’d be able to find it later before resuming her position in the wings. As she listened to the orchestra and watched the corps de ballet set the scene, she arched one foot then the other, pressing her shoes into the floor until there was a tight but pleasing stretch in her instep.

Pretend it’s just the dress rehearsal. Just another run-though.

She tried very hard to do just that but the adrenalin skipping through her system called her a liar.

Not just a rehearsal, but opening night.

No familiar role, either. Neither for dancers nor audience.

This was a brand new role created just for her. Created to prove the child prodigy, the ‘baby ballerina’ hadn’t lost her sparkle after seven long years in the profession. This new ballet, The Little Mermaid, was supposed to silence the critics who’d been prophesying for years now that Allegra Martin would burn brightly and then, just as quickly, burn out.

They’d been saying that since she’d turned twenty and now—three years past that sell-by date—she was sensing the creeping inevitability of that prediction every time she put on her pointe shoes. She almost dreaded sliding her feet into them these days.

Not tonight. It couldn’t be tonight. Her father would be devastated.

To distract herself from these unwanted thoughts, she checked her costume. No stiff tutu for this role. Her dress was soft and flowing, ending just below her knees. Layers of chiffon in deep blue, aquamarine and turquoise. And her dark hair, instead of being pulled into its habitual bun, was loose and flowing round her shoulders; only two small sections at the front were caught back to keep it off her face. She resisted the urge to fiddle with the grips, knowing it would probably only make things worse.

The orchestra began a new section of music. It wasn’t long now. She should try and focus, slow her butterfly-wing breaths and let her ribs swell with oxygen. She closed her eyes and concentrated on pulling the air in and releasing it slowly.

Behind her eyelids an image gatecrashed her efforts at calm and inner poise. A pair of dark masculine eyes that crinkled at the corners as an unseen mouth pulled them into a smile. She snapped her own eyes open.

Where had that come from?

Now her heart was beating double speed. Damn. She needed to get her thoughts under control. Less than a minute and she’d be making her entrance. She shook her head and blew out some air.

And then it happened again. With her eyes open.

But this time she saw the smile beneath the eyes. Warm and bright and just a little bit cheeky.

It must be the stress.

Weeks of preparing for this moment had finally got to her. She’d heard other dancers mention the strange random thoughts that plagued them before a performance, but it had never happened to her before. No sudden musings on what she was going to have for dinner that evening or whether she’d remembered to charge her mobile phone.

But why was she thinking of him?

A man she didn’t even know.

What was he doing here, invading her thoughts at such a crucial moment? It was most unsettling. The last thing she needed right now. And she really meant right now. The violins had just picked up the melody that signalled her entrance.

Thankfully, her body had been rehearsed so hard the steps were almost a reflex and it sprang to life and ran onto the stage, dragging her disjointed head with it. There was a moment of hush, a pause in the music, and she sensed every person in the audience had simultaneously and unconsciously held their breath.

They were watching her. Waiting for her.

It was her job to dazzle and amaze, to transport them to another world. And, just as she lifted her arm in a port de bras that swept over her head, preparing her for a series of long and lilting steps across the diagonal of the stage, she wished that were possible. She wished that she could escape into another world. And maybe stay there. Somewhere new, somewhere exciting, where no one expected anything of her and she had no possibility of failing to make the grade.

But tonight, while she made the audience believe she was the Little Mermaid, while they saw her float and turn and defy gravity, she would know the truth. She would feel the impact of every jump in her whole skeleton. She would hear the knocking of her pointe shoes on the stage even if the orchestra drowned out the noise for the audience. She would feel her toes rub and blister inside their unforgiving, solid shoes.

No, she knew the reality of ballet. It might look effortless from the outside, but from the inside it was hard and demanding. It was beautiful, but it wasn’t pretty or nice. A fierce kind of beauty that asked for your very soul in return for greatness, and then devoured it without compunction.

She had chosen this path and there was no escape. There was no other world. It was all an illusion.

But she would fool them all. She would dance like a girl who was full of sadness, trapped in a state of endless longing, wishing for a reality that could never be hers. And she would dance it well. She wouldn’t even be acting, because it was the truth. Her truth.

No escape. No matter how much you wanted it.

Truth like the pain of a thousand knives.

‘It was marvellous, darling. Absolutely stunning.’

Allegra air-kissed the woman whose name she couldn’t remember and smiled back. ‘Thank you. But, really, the credit has to go to Damien, for giving me such wonderful choreography to work with.’

Bad form for a principal dancer to hog all the credit. She was merely the vessel for someone else’s genius, after all. The blank canvas for someone else to paint their vision on.

‘Nonsense,’ the woman said, waving her glass of champagne and spilling a drop on the arm of one of the other guests. Neither one noticed. But Allegra saw it all. She saw every last detail of the after-show party in crisp, exquisite, painful detail.

She saw the Victorian steel and glass arches of the tall hall that had once been part of Covent Garden’s famous flower market, the white vertical struts and pillars so straight, so uniform that it felt they were penning her in. She saw the herds of people milling, champagne classes pinched between their fingers, half of them trying to gawp at her while not getting caught. Most of all she saw the tempting patches of midnight-blue beyond the glass and white-painted iron-work of the roof.

If colours could talk, she mused, blue would be an invitation.

Come to me…

She wrenched her eyes off the night sky with difficulty and focused them back where they were supposed to be. ‘Excuse me,’ she said, bestowing the woman with a gracious smile. ‘I see my father over there…’

The woman glanced over her shoulder to where her father was half-hidden by the ostentatious champagne bar filling the middle of the room and then smiled widely back at Allegra. ‘Of course, of course. Such a talented conductor and a wonderful man… And it must be fantastic to know that your father is close by on an opening night. What a marvellous sense of support he must give you.’

Allegra wanted to say, No, actually, it isn’t. She wanted to say that sometimes, having a parent so invested in one’s life was anything but comforting. She wanted to shock the woman by telling her how many times she’d wished her father was a builder or a schoolteacher. Anything but a conductor. Or how much she wished he’d sit in the back of the stalls occasionally, as the other parents did, rather than standing only a few feet beyond the footlights. Maybe then she wouldn’t feel weighed down by his gaze, weighed down by all the hopes and expectations of not just a parent but also her manager and her mentor.

She didn’t say anything, of course, but smiled softly in what the woman probably took for gracious agreement, then used the excuse of her fabulous father to make her departure.

Of course, the press loved the father-daughter angle—devastated widower conducts as ballerina daughter tops the bill, just as he’d done for her tragic mother when she’d been alive. They ate it up.

In her darker moments she silently accused him of loving it, too, of wanting double the glory. Double the adoration. But it wasn’t that, really. He just wanted things to be the way they’d been before, wanted to claw back time and resurrect the dead. Impossible, of course, so he’d had to settle for second best. Even so, Allegra hadn’t failed to see how he’d come back to life when she’d grown old enough to fill her mother’s shoes, dance her mother’s old roles.

But not tonight. This one was all hers. No comparisons could be made. She would stand or fall in her own right when the reviews came out in the morning.

She supposed that since she’d used her father as an excuse she’d better go and say hello, so she forged through the crowd, ignoring the people who tried to catch her eye. And there were plenty. She was the star of the show. It was her evening, after all.

But she didn’t want to talk to them. Not the ones she knew in the company who either envied or idolised her, nor the ones she didn’t know, who saw her as some strange creature imbued with magical powers. Gifted—or should that be cursed?—with a talent they daren’t even dream of having. They looked at her as if she was somehow different from them. As if she were an alien from outer space. Something to be studied and discussed and dissected. But not human. Never human.

What she wouldn’t give for one person on this planet to see past the tutus and the pointe shoes.

More than once she had to change direction when a gap between bodies closed up. Eventually, she just stood still and waited. Chasing the holes in the crowd was impossible; she would wait for the tide of bodies to shift once again and let the gaps come to her. Her stillness, however, was just another way to mark herself out from the other guests.

All around her people were celebrating. It had taken an army of people months to prepare for this night, and now they’d pulled it off their relief and joy was spilling out of them in smiles and laughter and excited conversation.

But Allegra felt nothing.

No joy. No bubbling. Nothing inside desperate to spill out of her.

Except, maybe, a desire to scream.

It was funny, really. For a few years now she’d wondered what would happen if one day she did exactly that. What would they all do if the habitually reserved Allegra Martin planted her feet in the centre of the room and split the hubbub with a scream that had forced its way up from the depths of her soul?

The look on their faces would be priceless.

She treasured this little fantasy, because it had got her through more stuffy cocktail parties, lunches and benefits than she cared to count. Only it didn’t seem quite as funny any more, because tonight she felt like making the fantasy a reality. She really felt like doing it for real. In fact, the urge was quickly becoming irresistible, and that was scaring her.

She had to start moving again, keep walking at all costs, even if she ended up momentarily heading away from her father, because she feared that if she paused, that if her two feet stayed grounded for long enough, she might just do it.

Despite her meandering progress across the Floral Hall, she had almost reached her father now. He hadn’t noticed her silent zig-zagging approach, however, because he was deep in conversation with the Artistic Director. She heard her name mentioned briefly above the din of the party. Neither man looked happy.

Had she done badly tonight? Had she let them all down? The thought made the panic racing inside her torso double its speed. And that internal momentum had a strange effect: just as she was on the verge of stepping into the circle of their conversation, a gap opened up to her right and, instead of ploughing forward and greeting her father, she took it.

Bizarrely, she found that once she’d started going in that direction she couldn’t stop. Not until she’d left the crush of the party far behind, not until she’d run down the minimalist wooden staircase at full pelt, leaving her warm champagne glass on the flat banister at the top, not until she was standing in the foyer. She rushed past the cloakrooms to the large revolving door and moments later she was amidst the pillars and cobbles of Covent Garden, the cold night air soothing her lungs.

But she didn’t run any further; she stood there, blinking.

What was she doing?

She couldn’t leave yet. She couldn’t escape.

Her father would be waiting for her. There were senior staff and investors and a minor Royal waiting to greet her.

No, her body said. Enough. And she was inclined to agree with it.

Now that the adrenalin high from the performance had evaporated, she ached all over. She’d been up since six, had done class this morning and then had spent most of the afternoon making last-minute changes to a pas de deux with her partner, Stephen, that the choreographer had insisted were essential. And the performance that had seemed so light and ethereal on the outside had been gruelling beyond belief.

She stood still for a few seconds, closed her eyes. Trap the breath then let it out slowly…smoothly.

Unfortunately, a sense of duty was hardwired into a dancer’s psyche.

When she had finished pushing the carbon dioxide out through her clenched teeth she opened her lids again.

And then the ballerina turned, with all the grace expected of her, and let the revolving door coax her back inside, let its momentum almost propel her back up the stairs and into the crowded bar. Her glass, full of warm and flat champagne, was waiting for her on the banister and she retrieved it before pulling herself up tall and losing herself in the tangle of bodies.

Allegra cranked open an eyelid and focused half-heartedly on the digital clock by her bedside. Definitely way too late still to be awake. Or should that be way too early to get up?

Ugh. Who cared?

She always got this way after an opening night—too tired, too excited, too aware of the reviews only hours away now in the morning editions.

Knowing she’d only get even more grumpy if she lay there in the dark chasing sleep, she fumbled on the bedside cabinet for the TV remote and then pointed it into the darkness. A bluish light flooded the room. She squinted and drummed repeatedly on the volume button, hushing the garish advert for oven cleaner. She didn’t want to wake her father.

She changed the channel a dozen times. And then a dozen times more.

There really was nothing on at this time in the morning, was there? Unless you counted infomercials, ‘channel off-air’ graphics and lengthy documentaries about long-forgotten prog rock bands. She carried on changing channels until she lost count, and she was just about to give up and turn the TV set off when the image replacing the previous one caused her thumb to freeze above the button.

A pair of crinkling brown masculine eyes. And a killer smile to match.

She held her breath. Then she looked towards her bedroom door and quickly back again to the television. Without tearing her eyes from the screen, she pressed down hard on the volume button until the noise from the set was only just audible, turning the subtitles onto compensate. And then, finally, she let out the air she’d been holding captive in her mouth.

Finn McLeod. My, he was gorgeous!

All rugged male energy, with a glint of adventure in his eyes.

His dark hair, that never seemed to sit quite right, flopped over one side of his forehead and a smile stretched his stubble-studded jaw. She’d had no idea they were showing late-night reruns of Fearless Finn. Just as well, really, because if she’d known she could have watched him jumping into rapids and hanging off mountains by his fingertips all night long, she might have done just that. Unfortunately, a sleep-deprived ballerina at the Royal Opera House would not have gone down well.

Sometimes, she thought, as she tugged an extra pillow from beside her and stuffed it behind her shoulders, she felt so old. That wasn’t right at twenty-three, was it? But she felt as if she’d been riding the same unrelenting merry-go-round of classes, rehearsals and performances for so long that her life had sped up, and she’d aged faster than she should have done. It was hardly surprising that, deep down, she longed for something fresh, something new.

Her gaze returned to the screen, where Finn McLeod, in his gorgeous, rolling Scottish accent, was explaining how to find food if one was unlucky enough to be stranded in the mountains.

She smiled. Really grinned. See? She’d never realised there were tiny little seeds inside pine cones that could be prised out and eaten.

Or had she?

She supposed she had. She had pine nuts on her pasta all the time. It was just that she’d never connected the tree on the mountainside with the tiny packet on the supermarket shelf, never thought about what bit of the tree the nut came from or how it could be harvested.

And that was why she loved watching Fearless Finn. It reminded her she was young, that there was so much of the world she had yet to see, so much to learn about life. The feeling would well up inside her until she wished she could literally climb inside the flickering rectangle on the wall and run down that hillside with him, or taste that pine nut fresh from the cone for herself.

Finn turned to the camera and grinned, getting right up close to the lens, before flinging himself off a rocky riverbank and into the fast-flowing water.

Okay, maybe education about the planet wasn’t the only reason she watched this show. But he was so…so…

She didn’t really know what he was, or exactly how he made her feel, only that she felt alive watching him, that she believed she could sprout wings and fly away when he was on the screen.

Another symptom of the narrow, ultra-focused life one had to live if one was going to get to the top in her profession. Ballet had to be everything. So, just as she felt she didn’t know much about the big wide world beyond the ballet studio, she didn’t really have a lot of experience with men, either.

But seeing that six foot hunk of testosterone and adventure, with his unruly dark hair and even unrulier dark eyes, made her want to learn a little more about both.

She blushed hard and bit her lip. It seemed her first teenage crush had finally arrived after a rather lengthy, ballet-related delay.

Well, so what? Everyone had their guilty pleasures, didn’t they? Finn McLeod was hers. And until the milk floats began to moan through Notting Hill, outside her father’s tall white house, she was going to forget all about ballet and mermaids and morning editions, and lose herself in a pair of captivating brown eyes.

Watching dawn break from the top of a glacier was definitely the way Finn McLeod liked to start his day. The horizon had been the clearest, purest cobalt but now as the sun pushed upward it slowly turned an icy, pale blue.

‘Wow,’ the A-list Hollywood actor who stood beside him said.

Wow, indeed.

‘This is, like, perfect,’ the guy said, nodding gently.

‘Yup,’ said Finn. It didn’t get much better than this.

He and Tobias Thornton, action movie god, stood there, silent, staring at the awesome display Creation was putting on for them, better than any celluloid car chase or exploding building.

Finn glanced across at the backpacks that were sitting a few feet away on the ice. ‘The helicopter will be here shortly,’ he said, his gaze drawn inevitably back towards the sunrise. It was swiftly blocked out by six and a half feet of movie star. Finn discovered that was because Toby was intent on crushing the life out of him in a bear hug. Not part of the plan, really, since they’d spent the better part of a week trying to survive this frozen wasteland.

‘Thanks, man,’ Toby said, thumping Finn on the back.

‘No problem,’ Finn replied, wheezing slightly.

The actor released him and stood back. ‘This has been life-changing, Finn. I mean it.’ He turned to face the sunrise once again, but carried on talking. ‘I feel as if I’ve stripped away all the garbage from my life and discovered who I really am.’

Finn just nodded. That was what spending a significant chunk of time in the wilderness would do for a man. It was why he loved it here. Or any place a man-made structure, or a power line, or even a mobile phone signal were many, many miles away. It made him feel alive. Connected to something indefinable, something bigger than himself.

‘I’m never going to be the same, man…’

Finn frowned. Of course, normally he travelled to places like this on his own. He’d planned to enjoy the silence. Not much chance of that now, as his actor friend continued to gush.

But this was what the TV company had wanted. Having a tag-along celebrity for the fifth series of the show hadn’t been his idea; he’d been quite happy with the previous format, where he’d spend a week in various remote locations showing the audience not only how to fend for themselves in that environment, but giving them a taste of a rarely seen gem of a place.

But that hadn’t been enough for the TV execs. He was too competent, apparently. He grunted out loud at that thought. What rubbish. Being competent at this stuff was why he’d got the job in the first place. Unfortunately, the suits thought the viewing public had got that message now, and were going to get bored with more of the same, so they’d come up with a plan to saddle him with a novice so he could pass on his expertise. And, of course, people loved watching celebs thrown out of their glitzy worlds and into the deep end. What could go wrong? the TV company had said.

Finn sighed. He supposed it hadn’t been that awful. The guy standing beside him had been okay company, and it had been fun to watch him build his confidence over the last week. Whether the experience would produce a lasting change in the well-known bad boy and womaniser was another matter altogether.

‘So who’s your next victim?’ the actor said, turning to him.

Finn smiled to himself. ‘Anya Pirelli.’

The actor let out a low whistle. ‘The tennis player?’

Finn nodded.

Toby slapped him on the back. ‘Lucky dog.’

‘Just don’t tell my fiancée,’ he said, grinning.

‘You have a fiancée?’ Toby pulled a face. ‘Too bad, man.’

‘Oh, I don’t think I’m doing too badly—she’s Natalie Cross.’

‘The chick who does the nature documentaries?’

Finn nodded, and Toby whistled again. ‘Definitely not doing too badly, mate!’ and then he frowned. ‘But spending a week stranded with Anya Pirelli… She’s not the jealous type, is she, your fiancée?’

Finn laughed and shook his head. He’d been joking. Neither of them were jealous types. That was what made them the perfect match. They both liked their freedom and, even though they were committed to each other, they both understood how destructive the urge to pin someone down and keep them for yourself could be.

‘When’s the wedding?’ Toby asked, and Finn stopped smiling.

He shrugged. ‘When we get around to it.’ They’d been engaged for two years, which seemed a long time to some people, but he and Nat travelled so much for their jobs theirs was almost a long-distance relationship. They’d find a date they could both manage eventually. Just the knowledge they’d agreed to do it some time in the future was enough for now.

‘No… Nat will be fine about it,’ Finn added.

Toby’s eyes glittered wickedly. ‘Still, you’ll be stuck alone with Anya in the jungle somewhere or up a mountain. Who’s to tell?’

Finn gestured over his shoulder to the camera operator who was standing a little way down the slope. ‘Who d’you think?’

Toby slapped himself on the forehead. ‘I’ve got so used to them being there, I kind of forgot we weren’t on our own.’

Finn shrugged. It was easy enough to do. Sometimes he threw himself headlong into risky situations while filming, completely forgetting he wasn’t on his own and that a camera, a producer and possibly a safety expert were trailing along behind him.

He took a few paces away from Toby, tried to create a little bubble of space and silence where he could let all this grandeur and beauty seep into him so it could mingle with all the other memories and experiences he collected on his travels. However, as mind-blowing as each location was, he always felt there was room for more, that a little piece of him ached for the ultimate destination, the ultimate adventure. That was what kept him moving, kept him searching.

There was a glint of silver off to the right in the sky, and Finn lifted his hand to shield his eyes further.

Yep. That was the chopper.

Time for the next adventure. And he couldn’t wait.

CHAPTER THREE

A NEAT stack of newspapers sat on the kitchen table in the basement kitchen. Other than the sound of her own breathing, Allegra could hear nothing. She tore her eyes from the stack and looked at her father.

‘Shall I read them to you?’ he asked.

Allegra shook her head and returned her gaze to the tower of newsprint in front of her. Instead of taking the top one off the pile, she picked one from the middle and eased it from its place. The critic who wrote for that paper was always the hardest to read. Not because he was vicious. He was blunt, yes, but never vicious. It was much, much worse than that.

By some magical power, this man always managed to hone in on those elements of the performance that Allegra fretted about herself and then shone a big, nasty spotlight on them. However, if she could read this review and get it out of the way, the rest would be a piece of cake. At least, that was what she was telling herself.

She pushed the pile of papers to the far edge of the table to give herself space to unfold the broadsheet and carefully turned pages, smoothing each one flat, until she reached the arts section.

There, filling almost half the page, was a grainy black and white photo of her and Stephen in the last act. Stephen, as always, looked like one of those sculpted marble statues, all perfect musculature and good bone structure, as he supported her in an arabesque.

She felt a little of the panic drumming beneath her ribs drain away. She didn’t look too bad herself. And the line of that back leg was perfect, even though she’d only hit that position for a split second before moving through it to the next step. Surely, a picture like that had to be a good omen?

She glanced down at the text beneath the picture and phrases swam in front of her eyes.

‘Astounding.’

‘Technically brilliant.’

‘Allegra Martin didn’t miss a step…’

She released the breath she’d been holding out through her lips and let it curve them into a slight smile. She risked a look at her father, but he was wading through another of the papers. The cup of chamomile tea he’d made her was now almost cold. She reached for it and took a sip, then grimaced.

Now her initial shakiness had subsided she went back to the beginning of the article and read it in whole sentences, taking it in slowly, weighing every word instead of fracturing it into phrases that had a tendency to jump out at her.

It all sounded good but as she switched from the bottom of the second column to the top of the third she started to feel chilly again. By the time she’d read a couple more paragraphs she knew why.

‘I’ve always been a huge Allegra Martin fan…’ the man had written.

The ballerina in question raised an eyebrow. Really? If that was the case, she’d hate to be on his bad side!

‘…but while her performance as the Little Mermaid was technically flawless, I still don’t think she has lived up to her early promise.’

Allegra’s stomach bottomed out and a faint taste of chamomile tea clung to her teeth, making her feel queasy. She read on.

‘Miss Martin seems to have lost the engaging sense of wonder and joy she had as a young dancer and, while I appreciate her virtuosity, I don’t feel she captured either the exquisite joy of first love nor the torture of unfulfilled longing that a truly great rendition of this part would require.’

She wanted to stop, but she couldn’t. It was like driving a speeding car when the brakes had failed. Her brain was frantically pressing on the pedal, but her eyes kept reading.

And it only got worse:

‘In Hans Christian Andersen’s original story, the Little Mermaid was a creature not blessed with a soul, and I’m afraid, with Allegra Martin in the title role, this was all too obvious.’

Allegra didn’t move. Nothing would work. Not her mouth, not her legs, not her arms.

Soulless? He’d called her soulless?

She pushed her chair away from the table and stood up, met her father’s eyes.

He didn’t say anything. Very unusual for her father. He always had something to say about her performances, some aspect she could improve for next time. Also, no matter how hard on her he was in private, when the reviews came in he normally got very defensive, would argue why the writer was wrong.

The chill in her stomach dropped a few degrees.

There was nothing to argue about, nothing to refute. She could see it now—the glimmer of disappointment in his eyes.

‘You think it’s true, don’t you?’ she asked, her voice almost a whisper. Even at that volume, it managed to wobble slightly.

He closed and opened his eyes slowly. ‘I don’t know what’s been wrong with you the last year or so, Allegra. You’re just not as focused as you used to be. Your work is suffering.’

She looked at him with pleading eyes. Yes, her father was hard on her, had always pushed her, but he was supposed to be her protector, her champion! Why was he saying this? Why couldn’t he dismiss the opinion of one ‘know-it-all hack’, as he liked to call them?

That was when she saw something else in his eyes, clouding out the original emotion, making it darker and harder. He wasn’t just disappointed with her; he was angry.

‘You can’t waste your gift like this. You’ve got to stop throwing it all away.’

There was a sharp stinging at the back of Allegra’s eyes. He wasn’t talking about losing the role of principal dancer—although that might be a possibility if her current artistic drought didn’t end—he was talking about the big picture, the vision he’d had for her ever since he’d put her name down for an audition for the Royal Ballet School, aged ten.

He wasn’t talking about jobs and salaries and reviews. He was talking about living up to her mother’s legacy, of carrying on where Maria Martin had left off on the road to becoming one of the greatest British ballet dancers in history.

He was saying she just wasn’t good enough. Might never be.

Allegra rose to her feet, looked at the paper still open on the table and then back at her father.

‘I want to see you bringing that same energy and commitment you used to have back to every class, every rehearsal, every performance,’ he said. ‘You owe it to yourself.’

You owe it to her. That was what he really meant, wasn’t it?

Didn’t he think she would if she could? I’m trying, she wanted to scream at him, but nothing’s working because I feel dead inside! I’m not her. I haven’t got her talent. I’m not sure I’ve even got my own any more! Or that I want it if I do have it.

The words didn’t even get close to being on the tip of her tongue; they swirled around her head instead, making her eyes blur and her throat swell. She licked her dry lips and forced something out.

‘I’ve got class at ten-thirty,’ she said. And then, without looking at her father again, she turned and headed up the stairs that led from their basement kitchen, pulled her coat from the hook near the door and walked with silent steps into the chilly morning air.

People were everywhere. Finn stood still and took a few moments to adjust. After a week in the frozen wilderness, where the only noise was the wind curling round rocks or the crunch of snow beneath his boots, a busy provincial airport terminal was an assault on the senses.

Not that he minded.

This was just a different kind of adventure, a different kind of wilderness. One that Finn considered far more dangerous, even with its thick sheen of civilisation.

And, while he hadn’t minded Toby’s company, he’d been secretly relieved when the man had been whisked away in a limo as soon as their helicopter had hit the tarmac. Now he was alone again. No need to use his vocal cords unless he really wanted to. No need to take anyone else’s needs into account. He could move at his own speed and choose his own route.

He ignored the moving walkway, clogged with bored-looking tourists with suitcases, hitched his rucksack higher on his back and set off down the near-empty carpeted area beside it, his strides long and his smile wide.

A buzzing in one of the side pockets of his cargo trousers tickled his legs. At first it made him jump, but then he realised what it was and bent to fish his mobile phone out of a slim pocket low down on his right thigh.

‘Hello?’

‘Great! Finn, I’m so glad your mobile’s finally on again. It’s all gone pear-shaped since I last talked to you…’

Finn gave a lopsided smile and began walking again as he waited for his producer to finish his mini-rant. Simon always got like this after a shoot. Finn knew he just had to let Simon vent until he’d either run out of steam or run out of breath—whichever came first.

When the sentences weren’t hurtling past at a hundred miles an hour and blurring into each other, Finn firmly squeezed a question of his own in. ‘So…what’s really up, Si?’

There was a slight pause at the other end, as if the other man’s unending monologue had suddenly encountered an unexpected hazard and had taken a split second to work out how to flow around it.

‘Slight snag, as they say…’

‘What sort of snag? We’re supposed to be off to Panama tomorrow. Can’t it wait until we get back?’

‘Ah…’

Okay. Now he’d managed to dry Simon up completely. This was news Finn probably didn’t want to hear.

‘It’s Panama we’ve got a problem with.’

Finn stopped walking altogether. ‘Oh?’

‘Anya Pirelli has injured her knee in a training session. Her coach says it’s going to be months before she’ll be ready to tackle a desert island.’

That wasn’t a problem, it was an unexpected blessing! Finn started striding again.

‘How awful,’ he said, feeling genuinely sorry for Anya, but he couldn’t help thinking there was a silver lining.

‘Don’t worry, though,’ Simon added quickly. ‘I’m working on a couple of possible replacements as we speak.’

Now, that was what Finn had been afraid of.

‘There’s no need, Si. We can go back to the old format. Me on my own.’

Simon’s silence was heavy enough to slow Finn’s pace yet again.

‘No can do, I’m afraid, Finn. The TV company have seen the rushes for the first new-format episode. They loved the Formula One star in the swamp. Said it did just what they’d been hoping it would. They’re adamant you need a celebrity sidekick.’

‘But—’

‘I agree with them, Finn. It makes you seem more human. Less of an indestructible force of nature yourself, someone the ordinary guy in the street can relate to.’

Finn had reached the end of the wide hallway now and he had to dodge people stepping off the end of the moving walkway as the space narrowed and funnelled them towards the gates.

‘Okay, okay,’ he finally said. ‘Let me know who you’ve got lined up when you’ve got something firm.’

He said his goodbyes and hung up. He was just about to shove his phone back into his khaki pocket and button the flap shut when he realised there was someone else he probably ought to call before he couldn’t use it again.

He punched a speed-dial button and waited. He got Nat’s voicemail. That was the problem with having a woman in his life who was as free-spirited as he was. He left a brief message, then checked his account for messages, too.

First in the queue was one from Nat.

‘Hi, Finn,’ her message said, sounding a little tense. ‘Look, the South Pacific shoot has been moved forward and I’ve got to fly out this evening.’

Finn frowned. He hadn’t seen her for four weeks, and he’d been hoping to catch up with her this evening. Oh, well. It couldn’t be helped.

‘Anyway,’ Nat continued, ‘your itinerary says you’re connecting through Schiphol, and so am I. I could get there early and we could meet up.’

Oh. Okay. That would be good.

Finn nodded to himself and waited to see if there was anything else. The pause was so long he’d started to pull the phone away from his ear when she spoke again.

‘Finn, I—’ Another pause, shorter this time. ‘We really need to talk, that’s all. Call me.’

And that was that. Finn tucked the phone back into his thigh pocket and shrugged.

Gate Ten loomed close and he moved swiftly and silently through the forest of people until he was standing near the desk by the doors.

The thought of leaving one point on the planet only to arrive somewhere different a few hours later always got Finn excited. And the sense of anticipation did a good job of stifling any niggling questions trying to take root in his brain. Like whether he should have been a little more heartbroken about not speaking to Nat in person. Or that perhaps he should wonder why she’d slipped from his consciousness as quickly and as completely as the phone bumping against his leg in its khaki pocket.

After class that day Allegra returned home. No one had said anything, but she’d known they’d all read every word of that review. It had been there in the surreptitious glances when they’d thought she wasn’t looking. It had been there in the barely contained smirks behind her back. She hadn’t even acknowledged the few sympathetic looks that some of the girls had tried to send her. Those had been the worst.

She’d been so much younger than everyone else when she’d joined the company, still a child almost. If the age difference hadn’t driven a wedge between her and her contemporaries, her meteoric rise through the ranks in the following couple of years certainly had. Now she had colleagues and dancing partners, but she didn’t really have any friends.

All she had was her father.

That was why she headed straight to his study after she’d let herself in. Even though they hadn’t argued, there’d been such a horrible atmosphere between them. She’d apologise. She’d make it right again. She’d swallow the rising tide of suffocation and live with it a little longer. Because she understood he didn’t mean it really. And he did try.

She pushed open the heavy wooden door and looked around. The room was empty. At least, she thought it was. She stepped inside to get a better look.

‘Daddy?’

Where was he? She wandered round to the other side of the large cherrywood desk with the green leather top, trailing her fingers along the edge as she did so. One of these days her father would have to give in and learn to use a computer, but for now he was steadfastly holding out. There was no scribbled note, no scrap of paper to hint at where he’d gone or when he might be back. She sighed.

Oh, well. She’d just have to find him later. She had a rehearsal in an hour and it had been tight fitting in a trip back home as it was.

She had reached the other side of the desk again when the phone rang. By the time she reached the door the answerphone kicked in and a male voice filled the empty room.

‘Hi. This is Simon Tatler again. I was wondering if you’d had a chance to think over the offer for Miss Martin to appear on Fearless Finn. As you know, the schedule is pretty tight, so could you possibly get back to me today?’

He added his number and email address and rang off.

Allegra stood, half in, half out of her father’s study with her mouth open.

An invitation to appear on Fearless Finn! A warm feeling surged up from her toes and burst up through her, leaving a smile on her lips. She’d get to meet him? Actually stand face to face with him? Her heart began to pound at the thought.

And then her excitement began to evaporate. This Simon had phoned before? Why was this the first she’d heard of it?

Her father found her moments later in the doorway, frowning. She jumped when he lightly touched her on the shoulder.

‘Are you okay, Allegra?’

On autopilot, Allegra nodded, but then she realised what she was doing. She turned to face him.

‘What was that message about? The one about Fearless Finn?’

Her father looked puzzled. ‘Who?’

‘The TV show…’

He blinked and shook his head faintly. ‘Nothing, really. They were looking for a celebrity guest. I tried to tell the man you couldn’t do it, but he insisted I think about it.’

‘You think about it?’

Her father nodded. ‘Yes.’

Allegra’s eyebrows pinched together. ‘Don’t you mean, he suggested I think about it?’

He shrugged and walked past her into the study. ‘It hardly warrants an argument over semantics, Allegra. You simply can’t do it. They wanted you to fly out to some godforsaken place tomorrow and stay there for seven nights. I don’t know what the man was thinking even approaching us about it—’

‘And you didn’t think to tell me about this?’

Her father smiled at her. That same soft smile he’d given her when she’d been a little girl and had tried to use a complicated word and had got it wrong.

‘I didn’t see the need.’ He walked round to the other side of the desk and rifled through some papers, effectively dismissing her. ‘As I said, it was impossible.’

‘I know it’s impossible!’ She paused and cleared her throat, got control of herself. ‘But that’s not the point,’ she said evenly. ‘It’s my career. It was my decision. You should at least have mentioned it to me.’

Her father looked up, a wad of papers clutched in his hand, looking perplexed.

He just didn’t get it, did he? It didn’t matter what she said, or what she did; he would never get it.

To him, she was just another thing to be conducted. He waved his baton and she jumped. He waved it again and she stayed silent. And she’d let him. All these years she’d let him, because she’d seen what he’d become after his wife had died, how he’d almost given up on everything. And she’d seen his renaissance when she’d started to excel at her mother’s art. How could she snatch that back from him and still live with herself?

She continued to stare at her father, who had paused rifling through the papers on his desk and was looking at her with raised eyebrows.

There was so much she wanted to say to him.

Let me live, Daddy. Let me breathe…

If only he would give her the same range he gave his musicians. At least they got to change tempo and mood. When he conducted them he made sure he breathed life into the music. He made sure it had light and shade, joy and despair, stillness and dynamism.

She had none of that freedom. She was always supposed to be the perfect little ballerina. Focused. Dedicated. Obedient. And, if her life had a score, no one would want to listen to it because it would be plodding and quiet and controlled. It would be dull.

‘You should have told me, Daddy,’ she said quietly, begging him to see past the even tone, the reasonable words. Begging him to look deep inside her and see what was longing to burst out.

He shook his head and shrugged. ‘Okay,’ he said dryly. ‘I promise I’ll tell you about the next ridiculous offer that comes along. Happy now?’

No, not really. Because this was just a symptom, wasn’t it?

He shook his head again. ‘Sometimes I just don’t understand you, Allegra. You have the life a thousand other dancers would kill for. The life your mother dreamed about, would have given anything to continue, and yet still it’s not enough for you. Sometimes I think I’ve spoiled you, and that you’ve grown up a little bit selfish.’

Allegra blinked at him, stunned.

Selfish? When all she’d ever done was try to please everyone else, try to ease their sadness by showing them her mother had left a little bit of herself behind in her child?

Well, the compliments were coming thick and fast today, weren’t they? First she was soulless, and now she was selfish, too. She wondered that anyone still wanted her around if she was really that awful.

Maybe she was ungrateful and spoiled because she couldn’t stand the weight of her mother’s mantle on her shoulders a moment longer. It had been weighing her down since just after her eighth birthday. Once she had loved feeling that her talent had connected her to her mother, but now she wanted that connection broken, severed once and for all.

Her mother was dead. Nothing was going to change that.

And Allegra feared that if something didn’t change soon all the life would be sucked out of her as well.

She looked at the floor and then back up at her father, giving him one last chance to really see her, see past layer upon layer of expectation he’d pasted upon her, but his face was closed. He was still angry with her. For the comment she’d just made, for the performance last night, for the review he’d have to defend himself against to his arty friends.

Suddenly she felt utterly and totally alone.

The only remedy was to throw herself back into her work and hope the boiling pot of emotions she was busy trying to keep a lid on would flow out in her next performance, and give that critic good reason to eat his words.

‘I have a rehearsal at two. I have to go.’

And, without waiting to be dismissed, she turned and left her father’s study.

Nat was waiting for him at one of the airport bars. It was a pity they only had an hour or so together, otherwise they might have been able to go into Amsterdam for a meal. Finn didn’t mind too much about that, though. This was the life they’d chosen and they were used to it. There’d always be another time.

He walked up to Nat and pulled her into his arms for a kiss. Nat kept her mouth firmly closed and then slid away. Finn stopped and looked at her. Same Nat, with the jaunty honey-coloured bob, the girl-next-door healthy glow about her faintly tanned skin. As usual, there was nothing girl-next-door about the clothes. They were designer all the way.

She pushed herself back onto her bar stool and took a sip of a brightly coloured cocktail with a lime-green straw and an umbrella sticking out of it. Finn frowned. Where was the usual vodka and tonic?

‘What’s that?’ he asked, nodding towards the garish drink.

Nat’s smile started in her cheeks but didn’t make it all the way to her lips. ‘Dutch courage, I think they call it. Want one?’

He shook his head. ‘I think I’ll stick to beer, thanks.’ And he waved to get the bartender’s attention and ordered just that.

‘Finn…’ Nat folded her hands in her lap and studied them for a moment, then she lifted her chin and looked him straight in the eye. ‘There’s no easy way to say this, so I’m just going to come out and say it.’

Finn went very still. She wasn’t pregnant, was she? Because that would be way ahead of schedule. He was only thirty. Plenty of time for that later.

Nat inhaled. ‘I’ve met someone,’ she said quickly and returned her gaze to her lap.

Huh?

‘Pardon?’ Finn said. It was the only word he could think of.

Nat sighed and reached for her cocktail. She held the umbrella-laden glass against her chest like a shield. ‘I can’t marry you, Finn.’

This wasn’t real. No, this definitely couldn’t be real.

This wasn’t Nat sitting opposite him sipping the wrong drink, saying the wrong thing. He must be having a weird in-flight dream and Schiphol airport must still be hours away.

‘Who?’ he said, and his voice sounded hard and flat. He couldn’t look at her.

He heard her fidget in her seat. ‘His name is Matthew, and he’s an architect. I met him at a charity do a few months ago, and then I bumped into him a few times after that. And, well, one thing led to another…’

How he hated that phrase. It implied that something couldn’t be helped, that the person in question had had no choice and, therefore, bore no responsibility.

‘He’s asked me to marry him,’ she said quietly.

That made him whip his head round. ‘But you’re supposed to be marrying me!’

‘I know,’ Nat said, looking at him from under her lashes. ‘I’m sorry.’

Finn just stared at her. He was feeling so many emotions that he wasn’t even sure which one to pick out of the bag first. How about anger? A good one, that. Much better than disappointment or the sting of rejection. Or the creeping sickness telling him he’d been stupid to let himself get too attached once again.

‘Sorry doesn’t cut it, sweetheart! We had a deal, remember? You’ve got a—’

He’d been about to say ring on your finger to prove it, but a quick glance at her hand left him without ammunition.

Silently, she reached into her handbag, opened her purse and handed his diamond back to him. He took it between thumb and forefinger and stared at it, felt its weight.

This was real.

Nat gave him a weak smile. ‘We weren’t really ever going to get round to it, were we, Finn? It was a nice game, pretending we were ready for a proper relationship when really we hardly spent any time together. We did it because it was easy.’

It had been easy! What was so wrong with that?

‘We worked together, Nat! Wasn’t it nice to know there was always someone to come home to? To have someone who wouldn’t moan about the long hours and weeks spent apart? Someone who knew how to pick up where they left off without a lot of fuss? Is the wonderful Matthew going to put up with all of that?’

Nat sighed. ‘It did work, Finn. Did being the operative word. “Us” was a habit we’d fallen into, a way of keeping our freedom while telling ourselves we were ready for more.’

What was she talking about? He’d been ready for more. Hadn’t he? The anger quickly dissolved into confusion.

He looked at Nat and she looked back at him.

‘Now I really am ready for more,’ she said.

‘Just not with me,’ he replied, then pressed his lips into a straight line.

She shook her head. ‘Matthew wants us to move to a nice big house in the country and fill it with kids.’ She smiled to herself. ‘I’m amazed to discover I want that, too. I’m even thinking about giving up Amazing Planet and doing something UK-based.’

What? Cutesy early-evening nature programmes? Nat hated those!

‘But you’ll go mad staying in one place for that long! You always said you didn’t want to be tied down like that. This is a mistake, Nat! You love your job.’

She looked back at him, unblinking and contrite. ‘I love him more,’ she said simply. ‘I want to be where he is, Finn. I can’t stand being away from him.’

Finn slumped back into his leather-backed stool. She was crazy, but there was no talking to her. She’d made her choice and, even if she regretted it later, he wasn’t going to stop her. And he certainly wasn’t going to beg. So it was time to cut ties, to let her loose, he supposed.

They sat in silence for a couple of minutes, watching the crowds bustle past. Families with whining kids and stupid big Spanish hats that no one born there would disgrace themselves by wearing. Elderly couples on city breaks who’d probably seen Amsterdam’s canals from the wrong side of a coach window.

He turned away, irritated, and found Nat watching him.

‘That was us, Finn. We were tourists.’

Finn glanced at the almost-empty cocktail glass. What exactly was in that concoction? Nat knew he’d never been on a package holiday in his life, knew he’d rather shoot himself first.

She stood up, looking very serious. ‘I want the real experience now, Finn. I don’t want to just whizz past the landmarks—dating, engagement, wedding—and still not really know what it’s like to live there.’

That drink had really gone to her head. She wasn’t making any sense at all.

‘I hate to ask, but would you do me a favour? Will you keep quiet about this until I get back from Tonga next week? I don’t want media speculation running rife while we’re both out of the country.’

He nodded. She could have anything she wanted. He didn’t care. He was numb. Just as well, really, because he was in no hurry to find out what a broken heart felt like.

She leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to his cheek. ‘Goodbye, Finn. I hope you find what you’re looking for.’

And then she was gone. Lost amongst the overladen trolleys and duty free bags.

The bartender plonked his bottle of beer in front of him and Finn took a long, long drink.

Jilted in the time it took to order a beer. Marvellous.

‘I want to see that lift again.’

Allegra picked herself up off the studio floor and glared at her partner. Damien, The Little Mermaid’s choreographer, continued to stare at them, his patience thinning rapidly.

So was Allegra’s.

‘It would help if you put your hands where they’re supposed to go,’ she muttered darkly to Stephen. He was in a particularly infantile mood this afternoon.

Stephen helped her up, spun her into his arms and proceeded to take hold of her a good few inches south of where he was supposed to. Allegra clenched her teeth, prised his hand from her left buttock and moved it to her hip.

‘You’re no fun any more,’ Stephen moaned, not in the least bit repentant.

She placed one hand on his shoulder, the other on his cheek and got into position. ‘You and I have never had that kind of fun, Stephen, and nor are we likely to,’ she said, as she tipped her head to the correct angle.

Pity, that. Because Stephen was blond and finely sculpted, and just about the only man under fifty she saw on a regular basis who wasn’t gay. But Stephen had the morals of an alley cat, and made the most of being a good-looking straight male in a predominantly female profession. When it came to women, flirting was Stephen’s default position. However, as long as any physical contact between them was strictly professional, Stephen was pretty harmless. Most of the time she ignored it and they got along fine, but this afternoon she really needed to impress Damien and her partner was not making it easy.

‘I think there are a few of the corps that you haven’t slept with lurking in the corridors hoping to catch a glimpse of you. Why don’t you see if you can rid them of their girlish illusions once rehearsal’s over and leave me alone?’

‘Careful, darling,’ he said as he dipped her backwards and then lifted her into the air. ‘Or soon they’ll be calling you the Little Cactus instead of the Little Mermaid.’

The rehearsal went fine after that. At least, Allegra had thought it was going fine. She lost herself in the dancing, just as she’d done in the early days, and forgot about everything—the reviews, her father, even the telephone call that had made her heart soar, just for a moment. Instead she concentrated on bones and joints and muscles, on shapes and lines and angles. It was a blessed relief.

‘No, no, no!’ Damien shouted as they got to the end of a particularly difficult combination. The pianist who’d been accompanying them broke off mid-bar.

‘You’re supposed to be the picture of innocent longing, my dear,’ the choreographer said, turning away from her and running his hand through his hair. ‘Do try and put some feeling into it or the audience will be dropping off to sleep.’ He turned to the pianist. ‘From the top—again.’

So they did it again. And again.

Allegra looked deep inside herself, pulled out everything she could find in there—and there was quite a shopping list, she discovered. Grief for a lost parent and a lost childhood. Resentment for every person who’d pushed and pulled and ordered her around in the last decade. And, yes, longing too. Longing for a pair of deep brown eyes and a crinkly smile, for a life of adventure that could never be hers. She poured it all in there and when they’d finished that section she was drained.

She broke away from Stephen and headed for her water bottle on the floor near the mirrors, then she picked up her towel and wiped the sweat off her face, neck and shoulders.

She turned to find Damien surveying her with hard eyes.

‘I can see you’re trying, Allegra, but it’s not enough. I need more.’ He nodded to the pianist. ‘From the start of the adagio…’

Allegra walked over to Stephen, a slight twinge in her right ankle making her favour the other foot, and they assumed the starting position for their pas de deux. The pianist pounded the keys and Allegra closed her eyes, told her exhausted body it could do this and started to move.

After no more than ten bars of music Damien interrupted them. ‘More, Allegra! I need more!’ he yelled as she turned and jumped, spun and balanced.

‘More!’ he shouted as Stephen propelled her into the air, turned her upside down and then swung her back to the ground.

Damien stamped his foot in time to the music, driving them on through the final and most physically demanding section. ‘More!’

I don’t have anything more to give, Allegra thought, her body on the verge of collapse. Surely this has to be enough.

The music ended and she and Stephen slid apart and sank to the floor, panting. The choreographer marched over and stood towering above them. Allegra looked up.

‘Not good enough, Allegra. I don’t know what’s wrong with you, but you’d better buck your ideas up by tomorrow’s rehearsal or I’ll replace you and Stephen in Saturday’s performance with Tamzin and Valeri. I will not have months of my hard work undone by one lukewarm ballerina. Now get out of my rehearsal and don’t come back until you’re truly prepared to commit to this role!’

His face was pink now. Allegra was speechless. She looked at the clock. They still had half an hour. He couldn’t really be—

‘Get out,’ Damien said, and pointed to the door.

So Allegra left. She quickly changed her shoes and pulled on her stretchy black trousers, then she picked up her things, pushed the studio door open with her hip and walked out.

And she kept on walking. Out of the rehearsal studio, out of the building and out of her life.

CHAPTER FOUR

ALLEGRA’S brain was swimming. She’d just jumped out of a helicopter and onto Finn McLeod! And now he was standing over her, grinning like a maniac while the wind whipped around them, offering his hand.

She took it. How could she have done anything else?

She couldn’t tell if this was better or worse than her late-night fantasies when she’d been stuck on an island with no one but Fearless Finn for company—and entertainment. A big blob of water fell out of the sky and crashed onto her scalp, but Allegra was only aware of it in a distant, out-of-body kind of way.

The awareness that came from the warm hand clasped around her own? Now that was very much up-close and immediate, and definitely, definitely in her body. Just that simple action had caused her flesh to tingle and her pulse to do a series of jetés.

She was touching Finn McLeod. Actually holding his hand.

And as she looked into his eyes once again she realised that while TV Finn was just plain gorgeous, In The Flesh Finn had the kind of presence that made a girl’s nerve endings sizzle and her eyes water.

Or could that have something to do with the rain?

To be honest, she didn’t really care. She didn’t care about anything now; she was a million miles away from her life and Finn McLeod was holding her hand and talking to her in that beautiful Scottish accent of his. All she wanted to do was stare into those impossibly deep brown eyes…

Oh.

He’d been talking.

And now he’d stopped. He was also frowning at her. Why?

She suddenly became aware of the tension in his arm muscles, of the tugging sensation in her shoulder socket. He was pulling her. She was supposed to moving, getting up. Not letting her behind get damp on the sand. Not gawping at the most gorgeous-looking man she’d ever seen in real life.

Thankfully, she was well used to telling her body to do things it had no real inclination to do. She issued a command to her feet and legs and they obligingly pushed down into the sand, levering her upwards with the help of Finn’s hand, until she was standing opposite him.

Nobody moved for a few seconds. Not even the guy with the camera.

She’d done what he’d wanted, hadn’t she? She’d stood up. So why was he staring at her as if he wasn’t sure if she was human or not?

The downside to not being able to tear her gaze away from the deep brown eyes was that she was now privy to the slideshow of emotions flashing through them.

Bewilderment. Concern. Uncertainty.

And since he hadn’t looked anywhere else but right back at her since she’d sent him crashing onto the moist sand, the only conclusion she could come to was that he must be feeling all of those things about her.

Not good, Allegra. Pull yourself together. You know how to do that, don’t you? You should do. Part of the training. It should come as naturally as the other basics, like pliés and tendus.

She wrenched her gaze from his and stared out to sea, fixed it on the retreating black blob of the helicopter flying low over the water. It was much farther away than she’d thought it would be. Just how long had she been sitting on the beach, staring into Finn’s eyes?

‘Okay,’ she heard Finn say. ‘We’d better start sorting out some kind of shelter before it gets dark, or tonight will be our most miserable on the planet.’

She turned to face the land and watched him as he trudged up the beach towards the dense green vegetation fringing its edge. The camera guy, however, didn’t move. He just kept pointing his lens at Allegra, his feet braced into the sand.

She’d forgotten about the unseen bodies behind the camera when she’d phoned Finn’s producer back and agreed to do this. When the show aired it often seemed as if Finn was totally alone in whatever strange and exotic world he was exploring. And that was what she’d latched onto when she’d marched out of the rehearsal studio and had dug for her phone in her pocket—the chance of her very own private adventure with Fearless Finn.

Another drop of rain hit her scalp, as fat as a water bomb. She stared back at the camera lens, doing nothing, saying nothing. Just what exactly had she got herself into?

‘Come on, Dave,’ Finn yelled from under a huge palm tree as the water bombs began to multiply. Allegra couldn’t be sure, but it seemed as if someone up there was aiming them directly at her, and they were an awfully good shot. Her long-sleeved shirt only had a few dry patches on it now, and water was dripping from her shorts down her bare legs.

Dave merely adjusted the focus ring on his camera, keeping it pointed straight at Allegra. ‘Not my job, mate!’ he yelled back. ‘I’m here to capture you two battling to survive the elements.’

She narrowed her eyes at the beady lens still trained on her, then took off up the beach, following her secret crush. If she stood next to Finn, that contraption would have to focus on something other than just her.

The camera—and Dave—followed.

‘You can look smug all you want,’ said Finn to his colleague, ‘but this storm is picking up fast and I doubt they’ll be sending the speedboat to pick you up and take you back to the hotel anytime soon.’ He bestowed a crinkly-eyed grin on Dave that made Allegra want to sit back down on the damp sand again. It was the hint of determination behind the laughter in his eyes that did it. The soft hairs behind her ears stood on end.

‘I reckon you’ve got two choices,’ Finn added. ‘Either you put that thing down and help us build a shelter big enough for three, or you can get all the footage you want, and when we’ve finished making our two-man lean-to we’ll make sure you get some great shots of us waving to you from the warm and dry.’

Fair choice, Allegra thought. Dave might not like it, but at least he had an option.

Dave grunted and pulled his camera off his shoulder. ‘I need to get the rain cover on, anyway,’ he muttered. ‘But I’m going to have to film some of the time—or Simon will have my hide.’

‘And a lovely rug for his office you’d make, too,’ Finn said, then pulled an absolutely huge knife from somewhere on his person and marched over to a clump of bamboo poles almost as thick as Allegra’s arms and began hacking at the base of one of them.

In no time at all he’d felled a good few. She stood there, watching him. It was odd, this sensation of being totally superfluous. Normally when she was at work everything revolved around her. She hadn’t realised how much she’d taken that for granted—or how much she’d actually liked it.

It was as if he’d totally forgotten she was there.

She coughed.

Finn hacked at bamboo.

She coughed again. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

Finn’s head snapped round, and she realised that her existence had indeed slipped his mind. He turned back to the bamboo before answering. ‘Yes. Go and collect some palm leaves and split them down the middle.’ And then he reached into a little pocket on his trousers, pulled out a small folding knife and tossed it onto the ground behind him.

Allegra reached forward and picked it up. She eased it open and stared at it.

She didn’t think she’d ever held anything like this before in her life. No need for tools like this in the cultured and contained garden squares of Notting Hill. She didn’t even know how to open it without cutting herself.

She almost opened her mouth to say as much, but then thought better of it.

She’d wanted something different, hadn’t she? No point complaining that ‘different’ was much less comfortable than she’d thought it would be. She just hadn’t expected to feel quite so much like a fish out of water.

The knife lay glinting in her hand.

Palm leaves? She looked around. Well, no shortage of them nearby, it seemed. It didn’t take more than ten minutes for her to gather a whole armful of such material. She dragged them back to where Finn was finishing with the bamboo and dumped them in a pile on the ground.

Finn rose from sitting on his haunches and put his hands on his hips as he scanned the area, looking for heaven knew what. She hoped it wasn’t snakes. But it didn’t matter what he was looking for or what he asked her to do. She’d seen every episode of his show and she knew he could look after himself in this jungle. And her. As a result, if Finn McLeod asked her to stand on her head and sing Twinkle, Twinkle, she’d do it. No questions asked.

So when Finn asked her to clear a patch of ground with a stick, she cleared a patch of ground with a stick, and she didn’t think about snakes. And when he showed her how to make rope out of vines and creepers, she plaited until her fingers were sore and numb with cold.

Meanwhile, Finn and Dave rigged up a simple triangular structure by lashing the bamboo poles together with her lumpily woven twine. It had a raised platform and a sloping roof frame that rose high at the front and joined the base at the back. Once it was steady enough, they blinked against the rain and worked on thatching the roof with the leaves she’d collected.

It was dry inside. Warm might have been stretching it a little.

They climbed inside, all three of them soaked to the skin, and sat in silence watching the water tip from the sky in skip loads.

You couldn’t call it rain. Rain didn’t blur the vision and make the sea boil. Rain was that delicate grey drizzle on a November afternoon in London. Or the short-lived exuberance of an April shower. This water falling from the sky with such weight and ferocity deserved another name entirely.

It might have been just bearable if she’d been sitting next to Finn, but Dave had barged his way between them when they’d climbed in, and she could hardly even see Finn past the cameraman’s muscular bulk.

‘Don’t suppose you could build a fire, could you?’ Dave asked hopefully.

‘Too wet,’ Finn replied. ‘We’ll have to wait for a break in the weather.’

Dave humphed. ‘Thought Fearless Finn’s motto was “Expect the impossible!”’

Finn just grinned back at him, then leaned forward to look at the sky again. ‘Just as well it isn’t rainy season,’ he said quite seriously.

Allegra was tempted to laugh. Really throw her head back and howl.

She didn’t, of course.

Instead she shifted from one buttock to the other. The only thing between her and the ground was a floor of hard bamboo poles. Finn had said they’d make it more comfortable with leaves and moss when there was dry foliage to be found, but until then it was bamboo or nothing. However, Allegra had very little in the way of padding on her derrière to make the former an attractive proposition.

Finn looked back at the pair of them, huddled nearer the back of the shelter. ‘Don’t think this is going to let off while it’s still light, though.’ He slapped Dave sympathetically on the shoulder. ‘You’re definitely stuck with us for the night.’

The hulk sitting next to her grunted again.

Hang on.

What had Finn said earlier?

‘D-did…’

Oh, bother. Her teeth were chattering. She clenched her jaw shut in an effort to still them, then tried again.

‘Did y-you say something about a hotel?’

Finn sighed. He had that bewildered-concerned-uncertain look on his face again. ‘Don’t believe all that internet chatter about me staying in five-star hotels and pretending I’m roughing it. On Fearless Finn, it’s the real deal.’

She’d said something wrong, hadn’t she? She looked at Dave. She was sure that Finn had said something about a hotel. Surely, they did something like that in emergencies? At times like this?

Finn caught her looking at Dave and read her mind. ‘Only the crew get that luxury. Dave needs to go back to base every evening to charge his batteries, get fresh tapes and to deliver the footage so Simon can watch the rushes. At night it should just be you, me, a night-vision camera rigged to a tree and a hand-held for us to use in case anything interesting happens.

Allegra felt her shoulders sag.

If that wasn’t bad enough news, she had a sneaking suspicion that her version of interesting when she and Finn were left here alone might be vastly different from his.

Just at that moment a crack of thunder split the sky above their heads, accompanied by a flash of lightning that seemed to arc from one edge of the horizon to the other. Allegra jumped so high she rattled the shelter. If it were possible, it began to rain even harder.

Finn stayed crouching at the front of the shelter, peering into the darkening chaos outside with a strange light in his eyes.

‘Isn’t it amazing?’ he asked, unable to tear his gaze away from the meteorological light show that was shaking the ground and rattling the very heavens.

‘Bloody fabulous,’ said Dave in a weary voice and flopped backward to sprawl on the bamboo poles.

Allegra really wanted to want to join Finn at the edge of the shelter, to mirror back to him the strange sense of awe in his eyes, but her bones felt so cold and damp she was sure they’d locked into position. So she didn’t do anything but sit huddled in a ball while the bamboo left permanent dents in her bottom, and tried to ignore the feeling she’d just made the worst mistake of her life.

The thunder was easing now, much to Finn’s disappointment. The rain continued, however. That he could have lived without. He and his two companions were still mighty damp, and there’d be no hope of drying out fully until the sun came up or he managed to build a fire. From the taste of the air, the smell of the bulbous clouds still dropping their loads, he’d guess the possibility was still hours away. That was a long time to wait with an out-of-sorts camera operator and a mouse-like ballerina.

Thinking of the ballerina… Night had fallen while the storm had been raging and she didn’t have much in the way of body fat to keep her warm. Dave, meanwhile, had more than enough. She’d be better off between the two of them.

‘Hey, Dave,’ he called into the darkness. ‘Why don’t you swap places with—’ what was her name again? ‘—Allegra?’

There was a short silence and then Dave sighed. The shelter shook, there was a whole lot of shuffling noises, an outraged female gasp followed by a mumbled apology, and then a reluctant Dave-type chuckle.

‘Just as well Anya Pirelli pulled out last minute,’ he muttered. ‘My missus would have confiscated certain parts of my anatomy and fried them up for breakfast if that had just happened with her.’

The taut little figure who was now beside Finn stiffened further and he winced on her behalf.

It wasn’t that she wasn’t feminine or attractive in her own understated, lean way. It was just that she wasn’t…well, Anya Pirelli. And there was nothing that she, or the other three billion women on the planet, could do about it.

‘I’m surprised Nat let you sign old Anya up in the first place,’ Dave added, snorting dryly.

A quiet voice murmured beside him in the blackness, almost as if she was speaking to herself and hadn’t meant to be overheard. ‘Nat?’

‘His fiancée,’ Dave said matter-of-factly. ‘Been engaged a while now. Took his time asking her, though. How long was it you’d been together? Three years? Four?’

The completeness of the tropical night meant he didn’t see the hearty slap Dave delivered to his shoulder coming.

‘Five,’ Finn said, noticing the defensive tone in his voice with no visuals to distract him. He really didn’t want to get into this right now. Having to build a shelter in the pouring rain had been a lovely distraction from the gaping chasm that had recently opened up in his personal life, thank you very much. And what business of Dave’s was it, anyway?

He shouldn’t be bothered by it, but people like Dave didn’t realise that he and Nat hadn’t had a traditional relationship. Their work schedules had meant they’d been apart more than they’d been together in five years, so it had been closer to one and a half years in normal people’s terms.

Dave sighed, his voice still tinged with good humour. ‘Didn’t think there was a woman alive who’d make old Finn here settle down!’

‘I’m not settling anywhere,’ Finn said quickly. And then he remembered his promise to Nat to keep quiet about the split and decided not to elaborate further. Settling down… Ugh. He hated that phrase, and probably would have reacted to it anyway. ‘I just felt I’d reached an age when it was time to stop wandering around and put down some roots.’

Nat’s comments from the previous evening started to swirl around his head, but he batted them away as if they were mosquitoes.

There was a mournful little sound from the huddled figure beside him. It started off almost like a moan but ended like a yawn. She must be exhausted. He and Dave were used to this relentless schedule, but it was hard on their guests. There wasn’t much to do now but wait until the rain stopped and talk amongst themselves, but Dave was as subtle—and as discreet—as a foghorn, and the sooner they ended this topic of conversation the better.

‘We might as well try to get some rest,’ Finn said.

All three of them shuffled until they were lying on the bamboo floor of the shelter. Finn was instantly still, but the other two fidgeted for quite some time. Hardly surprising, on a bed like this. Eventually, though, everything went still and quiet.

They weren’t quite touching, but he could sense Allegra was as stiff horizontal as she had been vertical. How odd. He was sure her name was more familiar now he thought about it, that Nat had dragged him along to watch her perform when they’d first been seeing each other.

Allegra Martin. That was her name.

He tried to sharpen the brief, fuzzy snatches of memory from that night. There wasn’t much to go on. He couldn’t remember where he and Nat had gone for dinner before the performance, or what either of them had worn, or even if they’d gone home together afterwards, but he remembered Allegra’s dancing.

Despite the fact he’d moaned loud and long about being dragged to Covent Garden, he’d actually been struck by the unexpected beauty of it all. Odd, really. Because to Finn McLeod beauty wasn’t normally found caged within four walls and a ceiling, no matter how grand the old building was. True beauty was usually found in wild, open spaces.

She must have been really young then. Little more than a kid. And yet he’d never seen something move that way before—so free and fluid and graceful. Except maybe the Northern Lights over the Arctic.

Didn’t seem to have much of that fluidity about her now, though, which was a pity. In the wild, you had to go with the flow. She was going to need every bit of flexibility she possessed if she was going to survive the challenges of the coming week.

He sighed, folded his hands behind his head and peered up into the featureless sky, hoping to see the twinkle of a star eventually. Perhaps conversation would have been better, because now the other two castaways were asleep he was left alone with his thoughts.

He’d thought he and Nat were the perfect couple. What on earth had gone wrong? He just didn’t get it.

Must still be numb, though, because he wasn’t feeling half as crushed as he’d expected to. Sad and disappointed, yes, but not devastated. But that was because he was strong, he supposed. Resilient.

He thought he saw a pinprick of light up above and stilled his thoughts for a few seconds while he tried to focus on it.

Hmm. Having a broken heart wasn’t nearly as bad as people said it was. He’d always thought those people who sang the whiny love ballads on the radio were being overly dramatic, and now he felt justifiably superior about being right about it all along.

He had a feeling his heart was mending already. In true Fearless Finn style, he was sure he’d survive.

The drip of water on the leaves above her head was keeping Allegra awake. At least, that was what she was telling herself. Drips and the cold. And the ridges of the bamboo poles, of course. It certainly wasn’t anything else.

Not the sense of being turned upside down and back to front. Not the electric charge thrumming between her and the man lying next to her. Or the fact it was almost certainly a one-way sensation. No, those things weren’t bothering her at all.

She sighed and rolled over onto her back. Every part of the motion was painful. She’d be bruised from head to toe in the morning, wouldn’t be able to dance properly for days…

Her stomach dropped to the same chilly temperature as the night air swirling around inside their makeshift shelter.

Dancing.

She wasn’t planning on doing any of that for the next seven days, was she? So it really shouldn’t matter. She wouldn’t be there to dance the Saturday evening performance of The Little Mermaid. Tamzin would be thrilled to take her place. So there was no need for Allegra to rehearse, no need to do class.

She sat up and hugged her arms around herself. Everyone would be furious with her. Stephen. Her father. The choreographer. The Artistic Director of the company… The list was endless.

She’d let them all down.

Guilt washed over her, matching its tempo to the crash of surf on the beach. She hugged herself tighter and rested her chin on her knees.

But she’d been letting them all down for months, anyway, hadn’t she? Who wanted a soulless robot as their partner, or their principal dancer? Or their daughter?

And now she was seeing the same hesitation in the eyes of the one man she’d hoped would save her from it. Collecting leaves and plaiting vines? He didn’t think she could do it, did he? Didn’t think she’d last a week on this island. She swivelled her head to look at Finn. Couldn’t see him, though, even though his feet must be right beside her. It was way too dark. She wanted very badly to poke him in the ribs right now and tell him he was wrong.

She didn’t, of course.

Mostly because she feared he was right. Escaping from her life had been such a wonderful fantasy. But that was all it had ever been—a fantasy. Too bad she hadn’t realised that before she’d snapped and turned it into a reality.

Now she was stuck here on a stormy desert island with a surly cameraman capturing her every shortcoming and a man who saw what everyone else saw when they looked at her. A disappointment.

To make matters worse, she’d probably kissed goodbye to her career as well. What had she been thinking?

Nothing.

She hadn’t been thinking at all, simply reacting. Like a tectonic plate that after years of crushing pressure had popped free, sending tremors in all directions. Every area of her life had been affected by this one rash decision. The only rash decision she’d ever made. She should have been thankful for her stale little life. At least last week she’d had a life.

Finn shifted position beside her and her heart did a little skip, a little flutter, and then settled back into place. She eased herself back down gently so she was facing him in the darkness, could feel the warmth of his even breath on her cheek.

The rain was easing off now, but she didn’t really register it because the drumming of her pulse in her ears picked up the insistent rhythm and kept it going.

This was stupid. She was reacting to his every movement, his every breath, as if she really were a love-struck teenager. At least, she imagined this was how teenage crushes went. She hadn’t really had time for them when she’d been the right age.

She’d lost herself in dancing in her teenage years—her way of coping with her mother’s death. When she’d been dancing, she hadn’t had to think about anything else. She’d been able to shelve the grief and let other emotions flow through her instead. Such a relief. But at some point in the last decade that well had dried up. She couldn’t seem to feel anything any more. She’d even stopped missing her mother.

Soulless…

She closed her eyes against the velvet darkness, even though it made no difference—shut out no extra light from her eyeballs.

In the utter and complete darkness senses other than sight started working overtime. Her whole body throbbed in response to the nearness of Finn. It seemed those set-aside teenage hormones had definitely caught up with her. She’d not really had many chances to release them before now. She’d had a few relationships, all brief and fairly unsatisfying, all eventually sacrificed to a career that didn’t believe in evenings and weekends.

And then one night after a performance, when she’d been too hyped up to sleep, she’d switched on the television and clapped eyes on Finn McLeod, and that had been that.

Teenage crush. Big time.

Except most teenagers didn’t get the opportunity to do anything but stare at a poster on their bedroom wall. If they were lucky, they might catch a fleeting glimpse of their crush outside a theatre or a TV studio. They certainly weren’t offered the chance to spend a week alone with him on a desert island.

And there lay the problem.

Crush and opportunity had collided, and now she was reaping the consequences. Unfortunately, sleep was nowhere to be found and in the silence and darkness consequences were hitting her fast and hard in the middle of her forehead.

She breathed out slowly and lay very still.

She’d done it now. There was no going back. She’d have to live with those consequences. Even the fact that Finn McLeod thought she was a hopeless substitute for the hot tennis player who should have been lying beside him in the shelter instead of her.

In the midst of all the doubts and fears swirling inside her, something happened. Something small hardened. A tiny seed. A kernel of determination and perseverance. The very thing that had helped her survive ballet school and the early days of the company and had rocketed her to where she was now.

She’d show him. She’d ace every task, follow every instruction to the letter.

Come morning, she’d show Finn McLeod—and the surly cameraman—exactly what she was made of.

CHAPTER FIVE

A NOISE startled Allegra from a shallow sleep. She’d been dreaming of being made to walk a tightrope over a deep, dark chasm, only the tightrope had morphed into an endless succession of bamboo poles. Somewhere below her she’d heard Finn McLeod, urging her to jump, telling her he’d catch her, but he’d been hidden in the darkness. She’d had no idea where he was or how far down she’d have to fall before he saved her, so she’d just kept walking the bamboo poles until her feet had throbbed and her soles had bled.

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