Page 80 of A Scottish Country Escape

Nadia. The thick, dark hair and sea-blue eyes were unmistakeable. This sweet little thing was Dexter’s daughter.

Chapter Forty-Nine

Questions buzzed around my head.

What’s Nadia doing here? Didn’t Dexter say he was returning to London to be with her?

Gran looked at Nadia and then at me with dawning realisation. I could see her slotting the pieces of the jigsaw into place. She too must have deduced who the little girl was.

Gran offered another friendly smile at Nadia and Elsa. ‘You’re both soaked through. How about a nice hot drink to warm you both up? There’s some hot chocolate and marshmallows through the back.’

Nadia broke into a gap-toothed grin. Elsa rolled her eyes. ‘This one could charm the stars out of the sky.’

Just like her father.

While Elsa showed Nadia our array of unicorn erasers we had begun stocking, Grandma and I slipped through to the kitchen. ‘Dexter’s daughter,’ she said, filling up the kettle with cold water.

I glanced at her out of the corner of my eye. ‘But what I don’t get is why she’s suddenly come to Fir Haven? Dexter said she was one of the reasons he had decided to move back to London.’

Gran listened as she fetched a jar of marshmallows from the cupboard above the sink and unscrewed the lid. ‘Look, darling,’ she began in a low voice. ‘Please don’t be offended by what I’m about to say. I’m only thinking of you.’ She placed the jar down on the sink top.

Nadia’s giggle travelled through to us from the front of the shop.

‘Believe me, I can appreciate what you see in that young man. He’s very good-looking, intelligent, and charismatic.’

I toyed with my bangle. ‘I can sense a “but” is coming.’

Gran delivered an empathetic smile. ‘But he’s also very famous and you don’t know much about him – well, apart from what you read in the gossip columns.’

I let out a low, hollow laugh. ‘Ain’t that the truth.’

The kettle bubbled behind us and clicked itself off.

‘That’s what hurts the most,’ I confessed after a pause. ‘I thought I was getting to know him and then I hear he’s heading back home.’

I moved towards the kitchen door and peeked out at Nadia and Elsa. Their heads were huddled together, exclaiming a scented watermelon pencil while the rain persisted in streaming down the shop windows. ‘When he told me he had a little girl, I found myself trying to make excuses for him.’ My smile was tight as I turned back around. ‘But now I’m beginning to doubt whether I ever knew him at all.’

I gestured to Nadia. Conclusions thrust themselves to the front of my mind. ‘I’ve been so stupid. I thought that removal van was him getting ready to leave, but perhaps it wasn’t. What if Dexter arranged for Nadia’s things to be transported up here, so that she could get used to spending time with him?’

‘You don’t know for sure,’ Gran insisted.

‘Well, everything seems to be pointing that way.’

‘And what about the Carlucci curse?’ pointed out Gran, scooping hot chocolate into two mugs. ‘Where does that fit in?’

I let my hands fall back down by my sides. ‘Maybe Dexter thinks that being a good father – or being seen to be – is the way to break it.’

Gran’s brows angled. ‘I don’t follow.’

I watched her pour the steaming hot water into the mugs. The powder transformed into two pools of swirling milky chocolate. ‘Perhaps Dexter is out to prove what a good dad he is in order to get the curse lifted. He wouldn’t leave Fir Haven then.’

‘Oh, surely not,’ Gran tutted, scooping out some marshmallows and dashing a sprinkle of them on each of the two mugs. ‘Using his own daughter like that? Bringing her here, just for his own ends?’

The thought chilled me too. Even considering the notion made me flush with embarrassment.

Gran took the mugs of hot chocolate into the shop for Nadia and Elsa to enjoy. I admired his sweet little girl with the snub nose and rosebud mouth.

I didn’t want to even contemplate it, but perhaps Dexter Grayling had played us both.