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Tim’s eyes reflected the ragged pain that was swirling around his heart. ‘Rupert has always been irresponsible and impulsive in everything he does, so it’s no surprise he’s carried that trait through to his business dealings and investment decisions. Sometimes that works to his advantage; sometimes it’s disastrous. I have no idea what possessed him to choose a start-up mining company in the Australian outback to sink his cash into, but I’ve told Claudie we have to be pragmatic. We have a fabulous project to get our teeth into in St Lucia. She has lots of plans, as you know, and as soon as we get over there in January, I’m sure a dose of sunshine therapy will do wonders to raise her spirits. I hope so after the year we’ve had.’
Millie saw Tim flick a glance in her direction from beneath his lashes and knew that there was something else apart from the problems with Stonelea Manor that he wasn’t telling her. Something much more personal that upset him even more than the loss of his home. She wondered what it could be, but she didn’t want to pry. It was just another mystery to add to the list. If he had wanted her to know he would have told her, but her heart squeezed with sadness for the challenges they both faced.
Tim had turned his back on her and sunk into silence, clearly battling his demons as he fiddled with the plug of a circular saw. She decided to press a little more on the subject of Claudia’s cousin’s imminent arrival in the hope she could find a way of helping, even if it was in a small way.
‘So, Rupert is coming on Thursday? Does he know that ourFestive Feastguests are still going to be here?’
‘Claudie tried to put him off, but he’s bringing the guy who wants to buy the manor with him because that’s the only day in his “very busy schedule” that he can squeeze in a trip to look around.’ A flicker of irritation stalked across Tim’s expression. ‘He’s apparently some kind of Swedish entrepreneur. You know the type: young, wealthy, a privacy-obsessed internet celebrity, which is a complete oxymoron if you ask me! Never heard of him, of course, but he wants to turn Stonelea into a sort of retreat from the prying eyes of his adoring public. Wants to dig out the foundations to make a gym and leisure complex! What I really object to, though, are his plans to erect a three-metre-high fence around the perimeter of the estate. Sven Andersen doesn’t sound like the kind of guy who’s going to welcome the interference of the local community, or get involved in anything himself, and that’s what’s upsetting Claudie.’
Tim wiped his forehead with the back of his hand leaving a trial of soot. The temperature in the workshop had been getting progressively higher as they had been talking and Millie could feel perspiration tingling at her temples and beneath her breasts. It was time to leave Tim to his experiments.
‘I’m really sorry about the house, Tim. If there’s anything at all I can do to help…’
Despite being keen to make her excuses and escape, she thought she had better mention the acidic stench of scorched metal that was invading her nostrils and scorching the back of her throat.
‘Erm, Tim?’
‘Mmm?’ muttered Tim distractedly as he leaned down to retrieve his wrench and consider his next move in the invention of the century.
‘What’s that smell?’
‘What smell…? Oh, Jesus!’
In a flash, Tim whipped the fire extinguisher from its hook and blasted the rear wall of the workshop with a blanket of foam before reaching for what looked to Millie like a long wooden stick with a rubber end to cut the electricity supply. However, by removing the stick so carelessly, Tim managed to dislodge another of his weird contraptions which tumbled down from the rafters, jettisoning a protruding plank of wood into the roof, which in turn dislodged several terracotta tiles that fell to the floor and smashed to smithereens.
‘Oh my God!’ Millie squealed, cowering as she watched the events unfold through splayed fingers. She felt as though she was in the audience of a particularly realistic stage farce where she knew the main protagonist was about to blow the place up.
‘Don’t panic, everything’s under control!’ said Tim calmly as if that sort of thing happened every day.
It probably did happen every day, thought Millie as she tried to make her getaway only to trip over the cardboard box Tim had discarded in the doorway. Claudia was right. Ten minutes in Tim’s company and you had to take your life in your hands!
Chapter Ten
On Tuesday morning, Millie spent a leisurely extra hour in bed, hugging a cup of coffee and leafing through one of Claudia’s cookery books, drooling over the recipes and the glossy photographs that accompanied them. She had carried up a selection from the library the previous evening and had fallen asleep with her favourite –The Baking Blend– hugged to her chest like a treasured teddy bear. How wonderful it must be to have your own cookery book published, thought Millie, never mind twenty!
She glanced around her suite, so tropical and bright, but the ambience was spoiled by the bibliographic paraphernalia scattered around the floor. So much for her resolution to reign in her untidy tenancies. Pippa would be disappointed. She leapt out of bed, gathered up the cookery books and piled them neatly on her bedside table. Next, she scooped up her discarded clothes and hung them in the wardrobe before collecting her toiletries and lining them up, Zach-style, along the glass shelf in the bathroom.
Better, she sighed, contemplating taking a quick snap to send to Pippa to prove to her that she was a reformed character. But her friend deserved more than a swift text and she resolved to call her that night before she went to sleep.
After a refreshing shower, she grabbed a short tartan skirt, black roll-necked sweater and woolly tights, and slotted her toes into a pair of Gucci-style flats. She fluffed up her curls and, with minimum attention to makeup, galloped along the corridor to the top of the stairs where she paused, a crazy thought running through her mind.
Could she?
She knew Leo and Mike would be sequestered in the library on their business calls and she had seen Gina and Marianne drive away in Leo’s Mercedes for the highly anticipated Christmas shopping trip to Cheltenham over an hour ago. It was the perfect opportunity to indulge in a childhood fantasy.
She took a quick glance over her shoulder to see if anyone was lurking in the shadows of the split gallery landing, then cocked her leg over the banister. She was about to let go when she recalled Claudia’s story about Rupert breaking his wrists whilst doing precisely what she intended to do. But the tickertape of trepidation was interrupted by Zach’s voice urging her to go for it, to try everything once and see where it took her, so she gritted her teeth and let go. The sense of exhilaration as she slid all the way to the bottom was huge, despite landing in an undignified heap on the parquet flooring.
As she picked herself up, triumph whipping through her chest, Zach’s laughing face floated across her vision. Her newly acquired adventurous streak was purely down to his encouragement, whether it be zip-lining through the rainforest, riding on the back of a snow mobile, or learning how to move on from heartbreak and contemplate the possibility of falling in love again – as scary as that had once seemed after the debacle with Luke.
She filed away that last possibility for later contemplation because she and Claudia had a jam-packed morning of culinary preparation to do for that afternoon’s tutorial on creating the most sumptuous Christmassy-themed afternoon tea. She had just set the kettle to boil and scooped a generous measure of freshly ground coffee into the cafetière when Claudia arrived in the kitchen, one of her signature scarves tied around her neck, this one screaming the colours of the St Lucian flag; sunshine yellow, cerulean blue and black.
‘Morning, Millie. Did you sleep well?’
‘Better than ever, thanks. I really wish I could wrap up the Hummingbird Suite and take it home with me to London. I feel so relaxed here. Stonelea Manor is an amazing place.’
‘Thanks, darling.’
Claudia turned away from Millie on the pretext of collecting a freshly laundered apron, but Millie knew her emotions had got the better of her friend again.
