Page 36 of Starry Nights over Dragonfly Lake

‘We’re just going to carry on putting on an act for Jeremy whilst he’s stuck here, that’s all,’ said Beth.

‘That’s all?’ repeated Ella, wide-eyed.

Beth gave her a firm nod. ‘I’m not going to fall in love with the guy who’s pretending to be my rebound guy,’ she told them.

‘Are you sure?’ asked Lily, sounding unconvinced.

‘Definitely,’ said Beth with a firm nod. ‘And that’s the best thing of all. Noah is completely and utterly wrong for me. He doesn’t even believe in love, can you believe it? He’s the perfect fake rebound boyfriend. At least for the night.’

‘What if it’s for two nights?’ asked Hannah.

‘Even better,’ replied Beth with a grin.

‘Well,’ said Lily, sounding somewhat shocked. ‘I can’t wait to see how this turns out.’

‘With me being happily single and Jeremy leaving to return to London as soon as this storm passes,’ said Beth. ‘And good riddance, I want him out of my life. For good this time.’

‘I’m still not sure about this fake romance with Noah,’ Hannah told her, a frown creasing her forehead.

Ella nodded. ‘I agree,’ she said.

Beth couldn’t see why her friends were so worried. To her it appeared to be the perfect solution. And with Noah willing to play along, what could possibly go wrong?

19

Despite being buoyed up by her fake dating approach to keeping Jeremy at bay, Beth was still troubled by the strained atmosphere over dinner that evening.

Walter’s accident had been a shock to everyone and had seemed to trigger a rather low mood amongst everyone. To add to the tension, Noah had turned down the offer of dinner from Faye, which had upset her, although she was trying not to show it, and he had returned to the kitchen to sit in sullen silence.

Noah’s sudden bad mood didn’t help her cause with Jeremy, in front of whom she was trying to pretend to have a passionate affair. Meanwhile Jeremy was winding everyone up, seemingly oblivious to the family’s stresses and trying to regale them with stories from around the world. It was only Beth who realised that most of his stories were in fact ripped off from other people. In the past, she had thought of it as merely embellishing a story, perhaps through a lack of self-confidence. But the rose-tinted glasses from their relationship had well and truly dropped away from her face and she could see that they were just bald-faced lies.

In the end she couldn’t take it any more and snapped at him, ‘I think we’ve had enough stories for tonight.’

‘Everyone’s off their game tonight,’ added Alex in a pointed tone. ‘It’s been a long day.’

As if to confirm his point, at that moment Tiny stood up and gave a long stretch and a yawn.

‘Of course,’ said Jeremy, breaking into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. ‘Perhaps I should retire to my room.’

‘Goodnight,’ said Lily quickly.

Jeremy raised his eyebrows at her sharp tone but swiftly left the table. Once somebody had checked that he had actually gone upstairs to his room, everyone gave a sigh of relief.

‘Thank goodness he’s gone,’ snapped Ella. ‘Another five minutes and I was going to have to head to that knife block over there and grab a weapon.’

‘Before there’s any violence, I think we’ll head back,’ said Dotty, with a weary smile. ‘It’s been a long day.’

Everyone wished Walter and Dotty a good night before Hannah walked them back to their cottage.

‘Poor Walter,’ said Beth in the end to break the sudden silence after they had left. ‘Hopefully his collarbone will mend easily.’

‘Yeah.’ Ben blew out a long sigh. ‘Trouble is, without Grandad I don’t know how we’re going to get those lodges finished by the spring ready for renting out. It’s a disaster on every level, to be honest.’

‘I can help,’ said Alex, in earnest. ‘The water sports centre is much quieter now that autumn is here so I’m a free pair of hands.’ He smiled. ‘Despite having absolutely no talent whatsoever in that regard.’

Although they had all seen Alex’s handiwork when he had tried to help with one of the new benches, thought Beth. She could still hear the laughter now when he sat down to prove apoint and the whole thing had promptly collapsed underneath him.

‘I’d teach you if only I wasn’t only marginally better,’ said Ben.