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“That’s fine.”
“The Winter Wonderland opens on the evening of Friday the thirteenth. We’ll have VIPs and members of the press coming in then too. The whole team will be on-site for training and light testing during the day. HR will send your contract over later today, and Hannah, our entertainment coordinator, will be in touch soon. She will be your supervisor and main contact.”
“Great,” Lucie said. “It’ll be nice to get back into acting. I’ve missed it more than I realised.”
Mara stood and opened the door. Lucie followed and shook her hand again.
“It’s wonderful to have you on board,” Mara smiled.
“Thank you.”
As she let go, a slender woman striding through reception caught her eye. Black heels added to her already tall stature, their pointed clicks echoing across the wooden floorboards. She carried herself with easy confidence in a sharp, navy skirt suit that brought out the deep blue of her eyes. Dark blonde hair twisted into a butterfly clip exposed the elegant line of her neck and the finely chiselled angles of her face.
Lucie’s breath caught as their eyes met. A warm, tingling sensation stirred deep in her chest.
Who is that?
Mara’s voice cut across her thoughts. “I assume you can find your way out?”
“Yes, of course,” Lucie replied, already stepping back into reception, her gaze flicking past Mara in search of the woman. “See you soon.”
She retraced her steps to the spiral staircase. The click of heels echoed up from below, suggesting the woman was still on the stairs. Not hearing the door open at the bottom, Lucie hotfooted it down the stone steps, hoping for another glimpse.
Nearing what had to be the bottom, she felt a jolt in her left foot — her lace had caught beneath her other boot. With the narrow step beneath her unable to offer any security, her arms shot out, and she fell forward, into the dim lighting below. Trying to grip anything to prevent herself from crashing down the last few steps, a pair of strong arms caught her.
Her breath was knocked sideways, but the woman righted her. Lucie’s stomach twisted with embarrassment. Falling down the stairs was bad enough. Landing in the arms of a woman who had, in a single glance, made her feel something she hadn’t felt in years was something else entirely.
“I’m sorry, I...” Lucie trailed off, grappling for words.
“Are you okay?” the woman asked.
The concern in her voice made Lucie want to lean closer.
“Yes, sorry. Thanks for, erm...”
“The stairs can be a bit hazardous if you’re not used to them. Be more careful next time,” the woman said in a low stern voice, leaving Lucie feeling as though a teacher had just told her off. It did nothing to steady her thudding heart.
The woman opened the door, allowing a bright stream of light to flood in. She gestured for Lucie to go ahead.
“Thank you,” Lucie replied, stepping out into the long, high-ceilinged corridor, the woman following behind.
With a sharp nod, the woman strode off. Lucie watched her go as she tied her shoelace, unable to stop herself from noticing the hypnotic sway of her hips beneath the fitted pencil skirt. Catching herself staring, she straightened and tried to regain some composure.
CHAPTER 3
Frances Delaney stalked down the corridor. Glancing at her watch, she quickened her pace. Her mum would be waiting for lunch; there was no time to be dealing with falling women.
A scent caught her as she moved. She raised her hand and inhaled. It reminded her of The Body Shop’s White Musk, though she hadn’t smelled it in years, if at all this century, and she didn’t recall it being quite so vinegary. It must have been transferred from the woman’s clothes.
Something had struck her when their eyes caught; the woman had a tanned complexion. She didn’t look like someone who’d been living in the UK. Her long, brown hair suggested that, wherever she had come from, there wasn’t a hairdresser within one hundred miles.
She wore black jeans, a white T-shirt, and a thin coat, which was wholly inappropriate for the weather, much less for an interview, if Frances was in fact right about her being a new recruit. She didn’t recognise her. Not that she knew all four hundred and fifty-two staff members, but she could pick some out in a crowd. Those who’d worked on the estate since before she was born were more familiar to her; she could probably name their children.
Something else had struck her, something Frances barely dared to entertain. There was a distinctiveness to the woman’s appearance that had caught her completely off guard. As she’d left the office and descended the spiral staircase, she’d considered returning under the guise of forgetting something, just to get another look at her, but as she reached the bottom, the woman had appeared from nowhere and fallen directly into her arms. Was that not serendipitous?
Pushing the thought aside, she made her way through the hall’s many staterooms. Taking the west wing door, she stepped out into Holly Court, a secluded courtyard beside the main building lined with small, single-storey staff homes.
She would need to be quick with lunch. There wasn’t much time until her next meeting, and it was a big one. All department heads were coming together to go over the finer details of the Christmas schedule — or so they thought. It was more a chance for her to remind them of the importance of the next nine weeks and how vital they were to the success of the hall’s conservation programme.
