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Liam flashed her another smile, looking as relaxed and unbothered as could be, and Alice resisted the urge to throttle him. Just once, she’d like to see him riled up about something.
Except that something would probably be throwing her out of the castle. So never mind.
‘I’ll see you at the shindig,’ Liam said. ‘Save me a drink.’
‘Will do.’ Alice gave him a weak smile and watched him go.
Then she grabbed her clipboard and raced towards her box room to get ready.
It was almost time for the schmoozing to begin.
* * *
Liam’s bow tie was strangling him. Oh, he knew that the networking and the dressing-up were all part of doing business these days, but usually he was talking about his work, his buildings. Not some ancient castle that still didn’t feel like his.
He’d spent the last week trying to familiarise himself with the estate he’d unexpectedly inherited. He’d explored the grounds, the house, checked blueprints and restrictions, talked to lawyers and contractors, and kept tabs on the day-to-day activities of the castle. And finally, after days of note taking and brainstorming and thinking out loud, he thought he might have found a solution to what he’d taken to calling The Alice Problem.
He couldn’t throw out women and children in need. But he couldn’t let them stay either. It was a conundrum.
He smiled to himself. Luckily, he’d always liked puzzles.
Now, he just needed to get Alice alone to persuade her to go along with it.
But first he’d discharge all his duties at this fundraiser, show willing, and hopefully get her guard down. The woman had been tense as anything since the moment he’d arrived—he’d assumed it was to do with him initially, but now he was starting to think it might be her natural state of being. Perhaps a glass or two of champagne—and a few fat cheques from the partygoers—would help her loosen up.
Snatching another glass of his own from the tray of a passing waiter, Liam smiled pleasantly at an older woman obviously wanting to talk to him, then managed to sidestep away before she reached him. He’d already spoken with enough people for one night, and that wasn’t even counting his toast.
All he wanted to do now was get Alice alone and get the deal done—and then kick all these people out of his castle so he could get some peace and quiet.
Making his way over to the secret auction table, he busied himself by pretending to study the offerings—which varied from afternoon tea with the Duke to a weekend on somebody’s yacht. Nothing he was at all interested in. Instead, he took the opportunity to scan the room, looking for Alice.
She’d done a great job, he had to admit. The ballroom was transformed from the Thornwood he’d become familiar with over the last week—no knitwear and screaming children, for a start. Not that he had anything against the kids—they were a lot more fun than most of the stuffed shirts in attendance tonight.
Looking around him, he could almost believe he was in a period drama. The chandeliers glittered, rivalling the sparkle from the diamonds and gemstones on display on the women in the room. The string quartet played the same pieces musicians had been playing at these events for centuries, and the usual small talk and chatter rose up to the high ceilings, along with the clinking of glasses. Maud’s canapés—so different to the hearty fare she’d been feeding him, and everyone else, for the past week—were gobbled down with delight by all the partygoers. Liam had to admit, they were delicious. But they weren’t a patch on the roast they’d had for dinner the night before.
His stomach rumbled, and he doubled his search for Alice. He’d seen her earlier, draped in a golden dress that left her shoulders and arms bare, and clung to her slender curves before flaring out over her hips. He’d actually done a double take at the sight of her—that dress was a far cry from the jeans and jumpers he was more used to seeing her in.
Really, she should be impossible to miss, looking like that. So where the hell was she?
Ah! There—off to one side, deep in conversation with a couple who’d cornered him earlier and talked for twenty minutes about the local sewage system. Well, she’d worked very hard on tonight. The least he could do was rescue her from that.
Then maybe they could go and find some real food—and talk.
* * *
Alice couldn’t quite decide whether to be thankful that Liam had saved her from the death by boredom that was conversation with Mr and Mrs Haywood, or annoyed that he’d dragged her away from the fundraiser she’d spent months organising.
‘I really shouldn’t stay away too long,’ she said as she followed Liam down the corridor away from the ballroom. ‘We need to announce the winners of the silent auction soon...’
‘Heather’s going to do it,’ Liam said, not even glancing back. ‘I spoke to her before we left.’
‘Really?’ She was about to ask what gave him the right to do that, before she realised that they were actually in his castle, and bit her tongue. ‘And what do we need to do that’s so much more important than my fundraiser?’
Liam flashed her a smile over his shoulder as they reached the kitchen doors. ‘Find some real food.’
Well. She supposed she could get behind that, Alice decided, her stomach rumbling. Two and a half canapés did not make a dinner.
‘Plus, I have some plans I want to run by you,’ Liam added, and Alice’s appetite faded. For a moment, anyway.
Since the New Kitchen had been taken over by canapés and serving staff, they edged cautiously around the outside, avoiding Maud’s glare as she directed the hired waiters and loaded them up with trays.
‘Where do you think she’s hidden last night’s leftovers?’ Liam asked, his mouth close to Alice’s ear to be heard over the din. Alice tried not to shiver at the sensation of his breath on her skin.
‘Probably in the mini fridge next door, in the Old Kitchen.’
‘Then let’s go.’ Grabbing her hand, Liam led her towards the second door that led through to the old-fashioned second kitchen space.
Alice pushed open the door between them and felt, as she always did, as if she’d stepped back in time. The scrubbed wooden table with low benches on either side, the open fire with cooking pots hanging beside it, the maids’ aprons and caps behind the door...everything harked back to an earlier age. A previous incarnation of Thornwood Castle.
She crossed to the smaller, out of place fridge that Maud kept in there, and wondered if she was about to hear what the latest incarnation would be.
Liam grabbed a couple of the old stoneware plates from the large dresser that covered one wall and placed them on either side of the table. Alice pulled out dishes of leftovers and laid them out in the centre, before rooting around to find cutlery for them both.
Liam folded himself on to one of the long benches that sat on either side of the kitchen table. Alice followed suit, sweeping her golden dress under her as she sat facing him. She handed him a set of cutlery, gripping her own so tightly that her knuckles turned white.
‘You don’t need to look so tense,’ Liam said, his Australian accent and mild tone making his words sound even more laid-back.
‘Don’t I?’ Alice asked. ‘I mean, you’re about to tell me your plans for the future of this place, right?’ She hoped so, anyway. Otherwise she’d read him totally wrong, and things were about to get worse, not better.
Oh, hell, what if he was just about to fire her on the spot, not discuss his plans? She hoped he’d let her finish her dinner first—even cold, Maud’s roasts always tasted amazing.
Liam chuckled, as if he’d read her mind. ‘Eat. We’ll talk when we’re both done. I never like to negotiate on an empty stomach.’
Negotiate. That sounded more positive than ‘instantly fired.’ But it did still sound as if she might be fighting an uphill battle. Alice was certain that Liam had
considerably more negotiating practice than she did.
She’d never liked conflict, a legacy from her peacemaker mother, she’d always thought. Mum had been an expert at smoothing over any situation, defusing every fight, and Alice had picked the habit up from her. It had served her well with her friends in her teenage years, and her housemates at university and in her early twenties.
But in her marriage the skill had evolved into appeasement. Into making herself smaller so there was less to fight about. She’d given up on things she’d believed in, just to avoid an argument. Stopped having her own opinions, her own thoughts. Even stopped fighting her own corner.
Until the day the fights stopped being angry words and slammed doors, and became something more.
The minute she’d woken up in that hospital, her whole life changed for ever, she’d promised herself she’d never give in and play nice, just to avoid a fight, ever again.
So if Liam wanted to negotiate, she would damn well negotiate harder than any businessman he’d ever had to deal with. Because she was fighting for what mattered to her—the well-being of the women who called Thornwood Castle their place. The castle might be Liam’s home, but it was their refuge. Their safe haven.
And that mattered more to Alice than anything else had since that hospital bed.
That, she would fight for.
