Page 8 of The Little Greek Guesthouse

‘Yes, yes, just getting it,’ he said. An elderly woman with her foot in a medical boot and thick dark hair that had a wide streak of white running through it hobbled out of the door. ‘Maria!’ he said, grinning and holding his arms open.

Perhaps this was the cleaner. Although Nina wondered at the family’s heartlessness at employing an old and clearly fragile woman for such a job.

The woman was chatting animatedly to Theo, wagging her finger as though he was a naughty child and waving the walking stick that she had been leaning on at him. ‘Ah,’ she said, catching sight of Nina. ‘You must be the daughter.’ She looked Nina up and down, taking in her smart, too-warm clothing and designer sunglasses. She sniffed. ‘City girl, eh? Look like your mama, though.’

She turned to Theo. ‘The key?’ he asked in English.

Maria nodded and hobbled off, and Nina wondered who on earth this woman was, and how she knew her mum. Her heart beat fast. There were so many questions she wanted to ask, so much she needed to know. But when Maria returned, holding out a key that Theo took, Nina said nothing. Just followed him back out of the garden. As they reached the gate, she turned back to see Maria standing in her doorway.

Nina smiled. Maria nodded and turned away.

‘Who is she?’ she asked Theo, too distracted to wonder why they were turning away from this pretty house and walking a little further up the path.

‘Maria,’ he said, not very helpfully. ‘Here. Home!’

He gestured to the building they’d reached, a rather tumbledown house, bigger than the other one, that had no doubt once been beautiful but was now definitely more faded than grandeur. The shutters hung skew-whiff, paint peeled from the walls and weeds sprouted between the slabs Nina and Theo stood on.

‘See,’ he said, his face pink with satisfaction. ‘Stunning, yes? Lovely view of the sea.’

Nina peered in through the broken window, looking up through the hole in the ceiling and roof. ‘And of the sky,’ she said.

Chapter Four

Nina’s mind was spinning. This was not how she’d imagined the summer in Kefalonia going; where was the beautiful house with blue shutters? Where was the nightlife? So far it seemed that Metalios, although pretty, had little to offer a newly single woman in the prime of her life. Where was the air-con? she thought as she pulled at the neck of her t-shirt.

Theo had duped her, enticing her here with promises of sun and sea and cocktails. Well, now she considered it, he might not have actually promised cocktails . . . but it was all implied, wasn’t it?

No. She’d been tricked, and there wasn’t even anywhere decent to stay. The village was hardly going to have a five-star spa hotel was it? Oh, a spa. What she wouldn’t give.

Her phone buzzed and she glanced down, her heart stopping when she read the name: Mags.

She should’ve blocked her.

Nina couldn’t resist reading the message, her fingers shaking as she opened it.

I’ve typed and deleted this so many times, but I want you to know that I’m sorry we hurt you.

Nina felt sick. She read on. Mags had always spelled and punctuated her messages perfectly, as though they were letters, and Nina had found it quaint and charming. Now it just felt pretentious.

I’m sure you think we’re bad people but I want you to know that we didn’t do this for nothing. Sam and I have a deep connection, and I know how it started was wrong, but we were drawn to each other for a reason, and I really hope that one day you’ll be able to be happy for us. Let’s face it, I think you know in your heart that you and Sam were never meant to be. You were always more focused on work than him, and I know that will work out for you and you’ll have a wonderful career while the rest of us concentrate on mundane things like relationships and families.

Nina almost threw the phone across the room. Was Mags seriously hinting that she thought she and Sam were going to have a family? And suggesting that Nina would have some glittering career, even though she knew she’d been made redundant, so it didn’t matter that Mags had stolen her boyfriend?

Please know that I wish you nothing but the best, and I hope that one day you will learn to forgive me. Xx

Ugh. Nina slammed the phone onto a dusty windowsill and pressed her hands into her eyes, trying not to cry. Mags’s ‘apology’, such as it was, was all about excusing herself and had done nothing to make Nina feel better about the double betrayal she’d endured. She must be a terrible judge of character if those she trusted could treat her like this. If she could even think she loved and wanted a future with Sam. She couldn’t deal with this; she just wanted to hide away from the world and try to forget everything that had happened.

Thank god she had Baba. And this place to come to, away from every aspect of her old life. She shook herself and wiped away the tears that had leaked onto her cheeks. How dare Mags intrude into Nina’s escape with her self-pitying so-called apology? She didn’t deserve a second thought from Nina, let alone a reply.

Nina sighed and lifted her clumped hair from the back of her sticky neck, wandering aimlessly through the house, fragments of brick and broken crockery crunching under her feet as she tried to concentrate on the here and now, and forget the car crash that was the life she’d left behind. Light fell through the dirty windows in slices of lemon-yellow, gilding the dusty floor tiles. The house must’ve been lovely, when it was looked after. She moved to the window and gazed down at the beach, a golden stretch of sand below with waves lilting gently as little white fishing boats bobbed on the glittering surface of the water. Had her mum walked on that very beach? Swum in the sea? Nina had always thought her mum would’ve been proud of the strong and successful woman she’d become. What would she think of this daughter, the one with no job, no boyfriend and no clue how to put her life back together? Would she be as disappointed as Nina was in herself?

Nina blinked back tears and, with some effort, heaved the window open. She was immediately greeted by a cool sea breeze, smelling of salt and the fragrance of flowers. If she looked only at this, and ignored the chaos and disrepair of the house itself, she felt almost soothed for a moment.

She should leave, of course. By rights, she’d walk out now, and jump on the next flight home. Leave Theo to his pipe dreams and begin the business of her real life: looking for a job and a flat. She imagined, briefly, returning to Manchester, spending the rainy summer with Heather while she applied for job after job and scrolled Sam’s Instagram for pictures of him and Mags while drinking pink wine. Not appealing.

Nina blinked at her reflection in the dirty glass. Just like her mother, Maria had said. Had the old woman known her mum? Nina’s parents had met on this island, Clare had stayed here for several months. Maria clearly knew Theo; it was perfectly possible that she’d met Nina’s mum too. Perhaps had even known her a little, spent some time with her all those years ago, when she was the young woman Nina so longed to learn about.

Perhaps she’d stay a little while.