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‘But where is she?’
Rupert’s eyes widened as they landed on the pyramid of dirty plates and cups piled next to the sink and abandoned on the draining board ready for their twirl in the dishwasher.
‘She’s…’
Millie glanced at the second man, his expression speaking volumes as he remained on the threshold, his upper lip curled in distaste. There was a touch of arrogance about the way he held his head, his electric blue eyes sharp and alert for the possible unwelcome approach of a rogue paparazzo. Taller than Rupert by at least four inches, with the most perfectly sculpted cheekbones and bleached blond hair teased professionally into spikes, she understood immediately how he had reached the dizzying heights of Sweden’s celebrity circus. Despite the revulsion evident on his face, he oozed charisma from every pore – it was just that it wasn’t directed at her. He obviously had an on-off switch and today it was resolutely switched off.
‘I’m sorry, Claudia’s indisposed.’
Ergh, thought Millie. She sounded like a Victorian governess, but that was the first word that had come into her head. She didn’t know how close Claudia and Rupert were after everything that had happened recently and had no idea whether he would rush upstairs to sit at her bedside and stroke her fevered brow or avoid the room like the plague.
‘So you’ve stepped into her shoes?’
‘Yes, I—’
‘What’s the matter with you? Haven’t you heard of tidying up as you go along?’ demanded Sven, fixing her with the most malevolent gaze.
Millie cringed as she realised that Sven belonged firmly to the irritating segment of the people spectrum. She knew it was the contents of his heart that had suddenly created the semblance of weasel-like features in her mind’s eye, because without his declared intentions to change Stonelea beyond recognition, she would have probably described him as handsome.
‘Yes, of course I have, and I was just about to make a—’
‘Where’s Tim? He’s supposed to be expecting us and he promised he would have everything ready for the tour.’
Maybe it was the way Sven was snarling at her like she was some kind of inconvenient minion who had no right to be in Claudia’s kitchen, an imposter who had little idea what she was doing. Or maybe it was because she experienced a sudden surge of indignation that shedidhave the right credentials to be standing where she was. Whichever it was, she decided to interrupt Rupert’s flow.
‘If I remember correctly, you were expected at three o’clock and it’s now…’ she glanced overtly at the clock above the refrigerator, ‘twelve fifty-five. You are over two hours early.’
Rupert opened his mouth to respond but thought better of it and turned to lead Sven back into the hallway – currently devoid of the magnificent Christmas tree to accommodate Sven’s declared loathing of all household adornments.
‘We’ll wait in the library…’ began Rupert, clearly a little flustered at the unexpected turn of events.
Millie saw his fingers tremble when he seized the brass door handle of Claudia’s favourite room, and a spasm of empathy erupted deep in her chest. She knew in that moment that Rupert had been forced into the situation of selling Stonelea Manor by the people he owed money to. She just wished he had been able to find a purchaser who would continue with the traditions of the village, and not this would-be recluse who intended to turn the place into something akin to a high security prison.
‘And bring us some coffee,’ ordered Sven, and without registering Millie’s jaw-drop, the men retreated to Claudia’s sanctuary.
The sound of their footsteps on the parquet flooring left a residue of distress in Millie’s heart. Well, as viewings go, that hadn’t started off so well, she thought as she set the kettle to boil and rinsed out the cafetière. She briefly considered the tin of rat poison she had noticed in the cupboard under the sink but discarded the thought as impractical – eliminating Sven would only provide a temporary reprieve to Claudia and Tim’s problems. A spark of sorrow ignited in her heart when she thought of the uptight, obnoxious millionaire becoming the new owner of the home in which Claudia and Tim had invested all their hopes and dreams.
She delivered the cafetière, along with a plate of sliced blueberry cream tea bread left over from brunch, to the library, feeling like the hired help. She was tempted to serve the coffee in Sven’s lap, but even she had to admit that sullying those impeccable Armani trousers would have been sacrilege. She could only hope that the sticky lemon icing would be so irresistible that Sven wouldn’t be able to stop himself from licking his fingers and allowing his mouth to twist into something approaching a smile– although somehow she doubted that had happened since he was a toddler.
‘Where did you say Tim was?’ asked Rupert, without even thanking her for the coffee.
‘In his workshop.’
Oh, God! Should she have said that?She knew Claudia had instructed Tim, under pain of death, to exclude his den from the Stonelea Manor Grand Tour.
‘Right.’
Rupert slung back his black coffee and rose to his feet, stress pulling at the corners of his lips. ‘Come on, Sven. I’ll introduce you to my cousin’s husband and we’ll get this show on the road.’
Sven simply nodded.
Clearly a man of few words, thought Millie, wondering whether it was because he saved his voice for more worthy causes, whether he thought her undeserving of his attention, or if he was still in a state of shock from the kitchen fiasco. Surely a bit of clutter couldn’t render a person so upset! She almost crumbled into hysteria when she saw him remove a bottle of hand sanitiser and rub a generous coating over his hands.
Was she mistaken or had his faced blanched at the sight of the higgledy-piggledy image of Claudia’s well-stocked library shelves?
Instead of guiding Sven through the kitchen to Tim’s workshop, Rupert sensibly decided to take a detour via the front door and round the west wing of the house to the courtyard, regaling his friend with a monologue of information about the more positive aspects of the exterior architecture like a super-powered robot estate agent.
Millie followed them as far as the door, her heart pounding out a cacophony of panic. Despite her trepidation over what was about to ensue, she still paused for a moment to drink in the bucolic landscape outside. The sun was struggling to remain above the treetops, but still managed to send slithers of bright light through the clouds, circling the whole scene with a golden halo. In her humble opinion, if Sven was unable to look beyond the surface to see the beauty beyond, then he didn’t deserve to own such a slice of magnificence.
