Page 77 of The Secret Holiday Kiss

A light rain had started to fall, but it didn’t dim the magic of Norwich a week before Christmas. Market vendors were shouting about their wares, the striped awnings bright in the drizzle, while golden lights twinkled from the bare branches of the trees, and the scent of roasting hazelnuts drifted on the breeze. A jazz band stood underneath the department store’s overhang, playing ‘I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day’, the sheer festive delight breaking through Daisy’s anxiety. Christmas was a time for magic and miracles. Maybe everything would be all right.

She wove through the shoppers to the place she’d seen Avery before. She didn’t know if he turned up at the same time every week, so it could be a fool’s errand, but she had to try. She looked obvious, standing there in the rain with her blonde hair turning to frizz, so she sneaked inside the stationer’s, reminding herself that she couldn’t get distracted by the foil-covered notebooks, which weren’t a patch on Sophie’s, and pretended to be interested in the fountain pens while she peered out of the window.

She only had to wait five minutes until he appeared. He had his navy jacket on over a grey hoody, his head down, his hair darkened by the rain. Her ribs tightened, as if they were being squeezed in a vice and she couldn’t suck in enough air.

She watched Avery walk up to the black door, and knock on it with the side of his fist. Daisy hurried to the exit, but a woman was coming in with a pushchair, so she held the door open for her, smiling through gritted teeth, accepting her grateful thanks.

Then she was out in the rain, but of course she was too late. The black door was closed, and Avery was nowhere in sight.

She strode up to it and tried the handle, but it didn’t budge: the door was locked. Daisy put up her hood, stared straight ahead – if she glanced around her, she would look too furtive – and reached into her bag for the tool she’d bought online earlier that week, after her last abortive conversation with Avery.

Who knew you could be inspired by your secret holiday kiss to buy lock-picking tools, then spend an hour in your brother’s house practising with them, purely so you could find out what was going on with the aforementioned secret holiday kiss? Daisy had come a long way from polite dinner parties and a morning routine that involved meditation and lemon water.

She fumbled with the tiny metal rods before she got them inside the lock, then twisted them, trying to snag them in the mechanism. Her heart was beating double-time, and her hands were sweaty, which didn’t make things easier. But she was standing close enough to the door that anyone who noticed her – and who was likely to amid the hustle and bustle of the Christmas shoppers? – would think she was waiting to be let in. She twisted and twisted and twisted, and was about to lose hope when she heard it, felt the satisfying click. She turned the handle and it swung inwards.

Daisy had a moment of elation, followed by a rush of panic. She was in. What the fuck was she supposed to do now? Ahead of her was a bare, gloomy entrance, not big enough to call a hall, and a set of stairs that led upwards. There was a door to the left, but Daisy could hear voices coming from upstairs.

She wrapped her hand around the handrail and kept her steps slow and gentle, hoping beyond hope that the wood wouldn’t creak. But as she crept slowly up the stairs, she realized the voices were too loud for anyone to hear her, and that one of them was Avery’s.

‘This is the final payment. We’re even now.’

‘Didn’t you read the last letter we sent? We found more damage, more problems you caused. These flats can’t go on sale until your shoddy work has been undone, and that takes time and money.’ The other voice was silky smooth, too calm, and Daisy shuddered.

‘We both know my work was good,’ Avery said, frustration bleeding into his voice. ‘That it was up to code. My solicitor is—’

‘Unable, so far, to prove your case.’

Daisy crept around the turn in the stairs and, fumbling, took out her phone. She started recording, even though she had a wall in front of her, but she hoped she would be able to get a visual, as well as their voices, when she reached the top.

Avery’s laugh was miserable, and the pressure in Daisy’s ribs tightened. ‘But that’s part of your scam, isn’t it? All those surveyor reports, the photos you took, they’re fake.’

Daisy rounded the corner, her whole body shaking now. The door at the top of the stairs was half open, and she could see Avery’s shoulder and the other man, shorter than him, in a smart suit, with salt-and-pepper hair and dark, gleaming eyes. She knew she was hidden, out here in the windowless corridor, so she zoomed in, focusing on the man talking to Avery.

‘If that’s the truth,’ the man said easily, ‘where’s your evidence? You pay in full, and there are no more meetings like this. No more … unpleasant altercations.’

Avery ran a hand through his hair, the movement jagged. ‘You went to my neighbours. I’ve been paying you every week without fail, but you need to stop now. This has to be the end of it.’

‘Why?’ The man laughed. ‘Because it’s Christmas? We only spoke to your neighbours because you disappeared.’

‘I left Norwich so you would stop going to my flat. So you would leave them alone. You’re doing this to me. It has nothing to do with them.’

The man stepped forward, and his face came into focus in Daisy’s shaking phone screen. She didn’t think she was breathing, didn’t think she could breathe, but it felt so important to get this on film. ‘You’re right. And, as I said, the damage needs to be paid for in full. I’ll hand-deliver as many letters to your flat as I need to. I have the surveys and photographs to back me up. Once it’s all paid for, we’re done.’

Daisy waited for Avery’s comeback, for his angry retaliation. What would he say? But he didn’t say anything at all. Instead, he reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a roll of notes, and handed it over.

The other man took it and patted him on the shoulder. ‘That wasn’t so difficult, was it? Same time next week.’

‘Next week is Christmas Day,’ Avery said flatly.

‘You’ll have to come up with an excuse to slip away from your loved ones then, won’t you? Take care, Avery. It’s a pleasure doing business with you.’

Daisy stopped the recording and slipped her phone into her bag. She realized, as she turned around, that she was crying. This was what Avery was dealing with? Some awful scam where this man had made out he’d botched a job, and was forcing him to pay for it? Her despair was only matched by her anger, and she had to resist the urge to storm in there, to give his accusor a piece of her mind. But that would make the situation worse, so the best thing she could do was—

The first step creaked, and the room behind her fell silent. Daisy thought her heart might explode out of her chest. No longer caring about the noise, she flew down the stairs, glad her hood was still up, her breathing haywire as she navigated the steps in the gloom.

She didn’t look behind her, just got to the bottom as quickly as she could, her hand finding the handle and flinging it open, the sinister staircase replaced by the drifting, festive tones of the jazz band and the colourful shoppers. It was still raining, but there was a streak of sunlight breaking through the cloud.

Daisy hurried back to the stationer’s, pushed open the door and stepped inside, returning to her place by the fountain pens. Had she made things worse for Avery? In her haste to escape, she’d left the door open, and for a second it was just as she’d left it, but then a large man – not the one she’d seen, but a tall, rangy man with a buzzcut, was standing in the doorway, face hard as he stared out at the busy pedestrian street. Daisy resisted the urge to duck.