Page 21 of The House Swap

The man straightened when he spotted her. ‘You’re Tom’s friend. He said you were coming.’

He had an English accent, west country, she thought, and now she was closer, she could see scarring on the side of his face. Although she made an effort not to focus on it, he self-consciously reached up to rub his cheek, seeming uncomfortable and unwilling to make eye contact.

She forced a bright smile, determined to make an effort. ‘I’m Poppy.’

‘Martin,’ he told her before gesturing towards the woman he was with. ‘This is Elena, one of my cleaners. She doesn’t speak much English.’

‘Yassou,’ Poppy said, smiling at her, hoping her pronunciation was understandable. The greeting was one of the few words she had learnt ahead of her visit.

Elena smiled back politely.

‘We’ll be out of your way soon,’ Martin said.

‘Of course.’

Poppy’s gaze quickly flitted towards the open patio doors. When she had left, Keira had been outside reading, but the sun lounger was empty now, her Kindle abandoned face down on the cushion.

She stepped inside, calling her friend’s name, but there was no answer. Heading down the hallway to the bedrooms, she checked the guest room Keira was using. The bed was neatly made and her cabin bag tucked inside the wardrobe, but there was no sign of her.

Where the hell was she?

Poppy dumped the bag of groceries in her own room, then quickly used the bathroom. As she stepped back into the hallway, a noise came from the kitchen, drawing her attention. The sound of a tap running and the clatter of crockery. For a brief, disorientating moment, she thought it might be Keira, but then she spotted Elena at the sink, busy washing up.

The woman looked over at her and smiled.

‘Have you seen my friend?’ Poppy asked, remembering belatedly, as Elena frowned in confusion, that she didn’t know any English.

Instead, she went back outside and asked the same question to Martin.

‘Friend? No. Sorry.’ He shrugged, seeming unbothered by Poppy’s concern, as she hunted outside for any sign of Keira.

She was nowhere.

At a loss for what to do, she headed back indoors and fetched her phone. There was nothing from Keira and she paced the hallway as she typed a brief message, asking her friend if she was okay. Glancing up, she could see Martin through the window, out by the pool, holding a telescopic pole with a net attached. He wasn’t skimming the surface though. He was looking straight at her.

Their eyes met through the glass.

Realising he had been noticed, he quickly turned away and dipped the net into the water, as though he had been working all along.

A prickle ran down Poppy’s skin. Had he been watching the house? Or just her?

Unsure what to do with herself while he and Elena finished, she went into her bedroom, where it was a little more private.

There, she continued to check her phone, waiting for a reply, and she tried not to think about how Martin had been looking at her through the glass.

By the time he and Elena waved goodbye and headed out to the van, Poppy was starting to really worry about where Keira had got to.

It was as she was wandering the perimeter of the garden again that she heard footsteps on the dirt track outside. The gate opened and her friend appeared, sunglasses on and her phone in her hand.

‘There are cats,’ Keira announced, as if it was breaking news. ‘About half a dozen of them, down by one of the closed tavernas.’ She held up her phone to show Poppy a series of photos she had taken. A variety of tabby and ginger felines, most of them sitting on a sun-warmed wall. ‘I’ve named them all,’ she added, showing a picture of a confident ginger cat with a pink nose, who was sticking his face close to the camera. ‘This is Gerald.’

Despite herself, Poppy laughed. ‘He looks like Dustin,’ she said, spotting the resemblance to Keira’s own cat. ‘I thought you were reading.’

‘I was. Then I heard a meow and decided to investigate.’ Keira slipped her phone into her pocket and raised her sunglasses to squint at Poppy. ‘Are you okay? You look paler than normal.’

‘I didn’t know where you were,’ Poppy admitted. ‘I got back from the shop, and you weren’t here. I messaged you.’

Keira had the decency to look contrite. ‘Sorry, I should have left a note. I didn’t expect to be gone for so long. And, well…’ She held up the phone. ‘No signal.’ She glanced to where the van had been parked. ‘Did you see the maintenance guy?’ she asked.