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But as she reached the hall, the front door opened and Jonathan came in, white flakes of snow clinging to his hair and dark overcoat.
He checked when he saw her. ‘Oh, I’m sorry. Dad forgot his scarf.’
‘It’s there on the hall table.’ She paused as he retrieved it. ‘Jon, please apologise to your parents. I—I had no idea the evening would turn out like this.’
He gave a short, harsh laugh. ‘That goes for me too. What on earth was Cilla doing—coming on to that man like that?’
Ginny bit her lip. ‘She wanted a favour from him. Maybe she was just trying to improve relations—make him more amenable.’ She tried to smile. ‘You know how she is, when her heart’s set on something.’
‘I’m beginning to,’ he said. ‘But after tonight, I’m not entirely convinced that it’s me.’
Ginny groaned under her breath. This was serious stuff.
She said, ‘Jon, you can’t really believe that. Cilla interested in someone like Andre Duchard? Never in a million years. She may have behaved unwisely at dinner, but none of us are altogether rational at the moment.’
She added vehemently, ‘Besides, no one in her right mind could ever prefer him to you.’
He said more gently, ‘You’re a good friend, Ginny. Better than I deserve, I think.’
He bent suddenly and to her surprise and alarm she felt his lips touch hers. It was only a fleeting caress, but she stepped back instantly, aware as she did so of a sound like the soft closing of a nearby door.
She forced a smile. ‘And I’ll be an even greater sister-in-law. Goodnight, Jon, and don’t worry. Everything will work out just fine. You’ll see.’
She saw him out, and locked up, remembering as she did so the time before Cilla had returned and taken him captive. When she’d hoped that one day he might take her in his arms and kiss her.
And now, suddenly, it had happened. Jon had kissed her—and she’d felt—what? Just a vague embarrassment, if she was honest, plus a deep relief that neither Cilla nor her mother had chosen to walk into the hall at that inopportune moment.
I think quite enough hell has broken loose for one day, she thought.
While tomorrow I have to go to work—and tell Miss Finn the bad news. And, for me, that’s the worst prospect of all.
CHAPTER FOUR
GINNY WOKE THE following morning to find the world covered in a blanket of snow. Not enough to cause major disruption, but sufficient to be annoying, she thought as, wrapped up and booted, she took Barney for an early walk on the common.
He clearly thought the snow was wonderful and bounded round happily. On their return, he shot into the kitchen and through the door into the hall where he was shaking himself vigorously at the exact moment that Rosina was descending the stairs.
‘That dog,’ she exclaimed with real venom as Ginny arrived in pursuit. ‘He’s going just as soon as the vet can come for him.’
‘No, you can’t do that.’ Ginny caught Barney’s collar and quietened him. ‘Andrew loved him.’
‘More than he loved any of us, apparently,’ her mother snapped.
‘At least let me try and get him another home,’ Ginny pleaded.
‘You have a week,’ Rosina flung over her shoulder as she headed for the dining room. ‘Until then, he can stay in one of the outhouses. I don’t want to set eyes on him again.’
And I didn’t want to wake up this morning, Ginny thought wearily, towing the reluctant Barney back to the kitchen. I now see how right I was.
She’d had a restless and miserable night. As she’d guessed, Rosina and Cilla, when she’d re-joined them, had been full of their grievances, admittedly with some justice after this new thunderbolt.
Andrew must have been making his plans for a long time, she thought unhappily, and there was no doubt he’d deceived them all. Yet, at the same time, she could not forget Andre Duchard’s harsh and unexpected riposte to her mother when she’d mentioned cheating.
I should have asked her about it, she told herself, and I will when I get the opportunity.
But at least Rosina seemed to accept the inevitability of Keeper’s Cottage and had even agreed, grudgingly, to look it over, armed with Ginny’s list of suggested refurbishments.
Now Barney, who seemed briefly to have regained some of his former exuberance, had become another addition to her list of problems, she realised unhappily as she changed into a chestnut tweed skirt and a black polo-necked sweater for work.
She had her interview with Emma Finn during her lunch break, and it was just as difficult as she’d feared.
