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“When did you say you open again?” Agnes said in a breathless voice Kirsty hadn’t heard her use before.
Lake smiled slightly. It was smug. He turned to Agnes.
“Couple of weeks.” He flashed her a movie star grin that made Kirsty suck in a breath, even though she knew he was faking it. “I hope I’ll see you there.”
Agnes was nodding so hard it must have caused brain damage.
“Wonderful,” Lake told her, oozing false charm.
Kirsty elbowed her way between the two of them, biting her words as the twins helped themselves to another cake each.
“In the meantime, don’t forget to use that voucher. The deal isn’t running forever and you wouldn’t want to miss out.”
Agnes’s eyes flicked from the leaflet she had clutched in her fist to the store window, then to Lake. She blushed again.
“I’ll be seeing you,” she told Kirsty with solemn certainty.
As she herded her children towards the primary school, she actually fanned herself. When Kirsty turned towards Lake, he was leaning casually against her front window munching on a cake he’d stolen when she wasn’t looking.
“What are you doing over here? Shouldn’t you be over there scheming?”
“I’m all done with the scheming for today. Now I need to paint some walls.”
Kirsty puffed her fringe out of her eyes. It was time for a trim, but who knew when she would fit that in? Another reason to be annoyed with Lake Benson.
“You thought you’d come spy on me first?”
Lake did that eyebrow raise thing that she assumed made him feel like he was James Bond.
“You need to look up the definition of spying. There’s nothing covert going on here.”
Lake reached for another cake. Kirsty snatched them out of the way. He smiled a little, making her stomach clench.
“I like you, Kirsty Campbell,” he told her. “You’re the most fun I’ve had in a long time.”
“See, that’s my point exactly. This isn’t fun for me.”
“No?” He pushed away from the window and sauntered towards her. He leaned in to whisper in her ear. “It could be, Kirsty. It could be a lot of fun for you. Trust me on that.”
Her jaw hung open as she felt his breath on her skin. Then he was gone. Taking two more cupcakes with him.
“Honestly, Kirsty love, there isn’t any story here. Maybe we should just run your advert and leave the editorial for another day.”
Kirsty chewed on her lower lip as she glanced around her office. The pity in the local newspaper editor’s eyes made bile form in her stomach.
“No, we need the coverage,” she said. “There must be an angle we can work.”
He leaned back in his chair and ran his hand through his overlong black hair, making it stand up in odd places.
“We could write about this lingerie war, that’s interesting.”
“And pointless. It will give Betty’s shop just as much exposure as mine. Why, exactly, should I pay for that?”
Unconsciously, Malcolm patted his beer belly to help him think. It’d been a rumour in Invertary that his brain was stored in his gut and needed the stimulation.
“How about the ‘ex-model makes good’ angle?” he said at last. “We can talk about how far you’ve come since the accident and how well the shop is doing now.”
Kirsty shook her head as she fingered the string of papier-mâché beads that sat in a bowl on her desk. They were the last tangible item from her previous life and a bitter reminder of all she had lost.
