Meanwhile, I wipe the droplets off my phone screen and look through my contacts. Dana and Fiona are out. They’re in France. Nur is visiting her mother-in-law this weekend in Birmingham. Ginny and Rob don’t have cars. I flick through my contacts, dismissing one after the other. In the end, there’s only one name I can come up with. And he did say he would be there for me. What were his words?Every time, everywhere.
I hit dial.
“Cora.” Anders manages to sound surprised, suspicious, and pleased all in one word. He can probably guess I’m not calling to chat.
“I need help,” I say with a sigh, and I tell him about my car and the breakdown service.
“Send me a pin,” he says. “I’ll be there as soon as.”
After doing as he asked, I let my phone lapse into standby mode. I need to conserve charge in case, by some miracle, the recovery truck calls to say they’re on their way. I busy myself hauling Effie’s car seat out and rigging up a rain cover for it with my emergency umbrella. She gives me no argument when I suggest she climbs into it. I stand outside in the rain, with myhoodless coat held above my head. The wind picks up, wrapping freezing fingers around my torso. I shiver. This is miserable.
The stream of traffic from the park has tailed off but this brings an added danger as the cars on the road are moving at a faster speed, often not registering the hapless Lucinda until dangerously close. We wait hours, although it’s only forty minutes before an electric SUV whispers to a stop just ahead of my poor car. Orange lights blink on and Anders climbs out of the vehicle. I’ve never been more pleased to see my boss in my life.
But as he draws close, I notice what he’s wearing. Shiny Oxford shoes, a wool overcoat and a Yale blue suit. He’s even sporting a gold patterned tie, although this has been pulled loose, his top button undone. Anders never wears formal wear. Unless…
“Where were you?” I ask.
His forehead wrinkles, his surprise evident. “Aurora’s wedding.”
“But that was Saturday. People get married on a Saturday.”
“Not Aurora. Greg was pissed at me leaving but he’ll get over it.”
I’m flooded with guilt. It’s one thing to drag him away from his laptop screen on a rainy night. Totally another to interrupt someone’s wedding. “Oh no! Why didn’t you tell me? I shouldn’t have called you!”
Anders’s trademark grin appears. “I’m glad you did. Besides there was some tanked Irish girl who was getting a little too handsy. Another ten minutes, she might have had me hogtied and stripped. You did me a favour.”
“No, no. You need to get back to the wedding.” I’m about to stuff him into his car when Effie emerges from her shelter, her headphones down around her neck.
“Who are you?” she asks. “Have you come to make Lucinda better?”
Immediately, Anders drops to a squat, putting himself nearly on her level. The front of his coat drags on the wet path but he disregards that and offers her his hand like a formal introduction. “I’m sorry, I’m not a car doctor. I’m Anders. I work with your mom.”
She ignores his hand. Effie's not big into physical contact, especially with strangers. “That’s an odd name,” she says. This from a girl whose class ranges from the cute Snowdrop to the appalling Kila.
Anders isn’t phased. “It’s Norwegian,” he explains.
“Are you Nor’gian?” she asks.
“No, I’m American. But my great-great-granddaddy left Norway for America a long time ago. My daddy’s called Anders and my granddaddy too.”
“My daddy’s called Mike. And my granddaddy’s called Gramps. He’s in Angola. But I don’t think I have a great-great-granddaddy.” Anders's eyebrows rise. I’m not sure if it is the information onslaught or the information itself.
“Everyone has one,” he says unhelpfully, because now I’m going to face a barrage of questions from arch-interrogator Effie.
“Maybe we can discuss genealogy some other time? When we’re not on the side of a road in the rain?”
Two heads swivel up to look at me.
“Mummy’s grumpy,” Effie explains, and Anders grins. This time I don’t admire the dimple. I’m frozen and Anders is wasting time. A shiver, which has nothing to do with desire and everything to do with my bone-deep cold, passes through me.
“Here.” He whips off his coat and wraps it around my shoulders, even as I’m holding up my own as a makeshift umbrella. “You take my car and I’ll wait for the tow truck.”
I want to protest but I know it’s the sensible option. I’m racking up a sizeable debt in favours here. And he’s enough of abusinessman to capitalise on it later. But I can’t see any better choice. “Okay.”
“May I?” Anders asks permission and waits for Effie’s nod before he scoops her up. I pick up her seat and strap it in the rear of his car. He carefully places her in it. We swap car keys. I return his coat and hand him the umbrella. He’s going to need it. In about fifteen minutes, he’s going to regret his gallantry, and I intend to be long gone by then.
Clambering up into the driver’s seat, I sigh in relief to see a phone charger and plug in. Shamelessly, I drag the seat forward and change all the settings so I can reach the pedals and use the rear-view mirror without stretching like a goose. One quick glance at Effie shows her with her headphones back on her ears as she looks out of the window. Then I switch off the hazards, check behind, signal and pull out onto the road.
