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‘I’m always that good on the night.’ He fixed her with the moss-green eyes that had so captivated the rest of Fittlescombe’s womenfolk. Laura felt suddenly naked.
‘Look, I’m sorry if I’ve been a bit hard on you.’
‘If?’ Laura spluttered.
Gabe frowned. ‘I’m apologizing. Don’t interrupt.’
‘Sorry. Go on.’
‘Actually, that’s it. If you want we could have a drink tonight, bury the hatchet and all that.’
Laura looked at him suspiciously. Was this some sort of setup? Some sort of joke? He seemed sincere. The awkward shuffle of the feet, the clumsy way with words. Daniel was a master of communication, firing off witticisms and insights like a champion archer shooting arrows. Gabe Baxter was the opposite, a farmer from the top of his blond head to the soles of his muddy work boots. He certainly wasn’t stupid. The annoying truth was that he’d run rings around Laura ever since they’d started this play; he was an expert manipulator. But Gabe was a man’s man. Verbal communication was not his strong suit.
Laura decided she might as well meet him halfway. ‘That would have been lovely, but I’m afraid I can’t tonight. I’m going up to London later for the weekend.’
Gabe’s face instantly darkened. ‘To see Daniel, I suppose.’ He spat out the name like a mouthful of rotten meat.
‘Yes, to see Daniel.’ Laura stiffened. ‘What’s wrong with that?’
‘Nothing.’ Gabe turned away, helping himself to another two mince pies and mumbling ‘none o’ my business’ through a mouthful of crumbs.
Laura was so frustrated she could have hit something, preferably Gabe’s broad back, now turned towards her beneath his thick, hole-ridden Aran sweater.
‘If you must know, it’s Daniel’s birthday,’ she found herself explaining, unnecessarily. ‘We’re going to dinner and a show and I’m going to go shopping for a dress for the Furlings Hunt Ball.’
For some reason this got Gabe’s attention. ‘You’re going to the ball?’
‘Of course.’
‘With him?’
‘Probably,’ said Laura. ‘What do you care, anyway?’
‘Oh, I don’t care,’ Gabe said nastily, his olive branch of a few minutes ago now apparently withdrawn. ‘Not in the least. I’m sure you and Daniel will have a lovely time shopping in Harvey Nicks.’ He mocked Laura’s accent with ruthless accuracy, laughing as he walked away to join the shepherds on the other side of the room.
Counting to ten to stop herself from screaming, by the time Laura got to eight her mobile rang. Seeing Daniel’s name flash up on the screen, she felt her spirits lift. Fuck Gabe Baxter and his childish mind games. What do I care what he thinks?
‘Hi,’ she answered happily. ‘I’m just finishing up here. I should definitely make the six thirty train.’
* * *
From across the room, Gabe watched out of the corner of his eye as Laura took the phone call. From her smile, and the way she cupped the phone, turning away like a child with a precious new toy they don’t want to share, he knew at once who must be calling.
He was angry, at himself more than anything. Ever since they were kids, Laura Tiverton had had the power to unnerve him, to throw him off stride. He’d envied her so much then, with her beautiful house and her happy family and her perfect, Enid Blyton-esque existence. Gabe’s parents had divorced acrimoniously when he was eight. The summers that Laura had found so idyllic and perfect, Gabe remembered as times of ingrained domestic misery, of shouting and crying and plate throwing. He was out on his bike all day because he couldn’t bear to go home. Against the backdrop of his own, crumbling family, Laura Tiverton’s happiness had felt like a personal affront.
And now she was back, beautiful and successful and independent, swooping into Fittlescombe and taking over like a swan returning to lord it over all the ugly ducklings of her childhood. Simply being around her made Gabe feel like a helpless eight-year-old boy again, or at least reminded him of a time that he had spent the last twenty years trying to forget. He knew he was being a dick to Laura, and he didn’t like himself for it. But the impulse was too strong to resist. Ever since that prick Daniel Smart had come onto the scene, it had been getting stronger. Gabe distrusted Daniel deeply and instinctively. Everything about him – from his floppy hair, to his smug, entitled manner, to his metrosexual, trendy clothes – reeked of fakery. The fact that Laura couldn’t see it, that she so obviously thought the sun shone out of the guy’s arse, kept Gabe awake at night. He resented Laura for that, too.
‘Shouldn’t we be getting back to work?’ Arthur McGovern, the sweet old man who ran McGovern’s Garage in the village and who had played a shepherd in every Fittlescombe Nativity play since 1988, tapped Laura on the shoulder. ‘I’m sorry to nag you, but I promised my wife I’d take her to the pictures in Chichester at six, so I can’t be late tonight.’
‘Of course, Arthur, my fault. Let’s get to it.’
As they walked back to the stage, Gabe noticed the change in Laura’s face. Her happiness of a few moments ago had vanished like snow on a warm spring day.
‘Is everything all right?’ he asked.
‘Everything’s fine,’ Laura snapped. She was growing mightily tired of Gabe’s hot-and-cold treatment. ‘Let’s just get on with it, shall we?’
* * *
The rest of the rehearsal seemed to go on for ever, but at last Laura made it to the sanctuary of her car. Turning the key, she blasted up the heat to full and turned on a CD on Carols from King’s, hoping the soothing choirboys’ voices would ease her frazzled nerves.
They didn’t. Disappointment and frustration hit her like a double punch to the stomach. Daniel had cancelled. He’d been very sweet about it. Something had come up with one of his sons, the school had asked for a meeting, and he had to go.
‘Couldn’t we meet afterwards? Or tomorrow, at least?’ Laura had asked, hating herself for sounding so needy. But surely a teacher meeting couldn’t take up an entire weekend?
‘I wish I could, angel, believe me. But Rachel wants us to have lunch on Saturday to talk everything through. Apparently, Milo’s grades have fallen through the floor since we split and she’s worried about him. I have to show willing, especially with the final divorce hearing right after Christmas. If I don’t, she’s bound to paint me as a crappy parent in front of the judge. Divorce is so petty and political, you have no idea.’
He was right, of course. Naturally, his son must come first. But Laura still felt robbed. It bothered her how much the prospect of spending this weekend alone, and not with Daniel, depressed her. She’d vowed never to depend on a man for happiness again, and yet here she was, depending away, as if all the pain of last year had never happened.
Deciding to take the back way to Briar Cottage, she turned left up Lovett’s Lane, which took her directly past Furlings. The house was a Queen Anne gem, one of the finest examples of eighteenth-century architecture in the country. In perfectly square red brick, its façade almost completely covered with wisteria, Furlings managed to combine grand, stately-home proportions with quite unparalleled prettiness. The symmetry of the original sash windows – facing onto formal gardens famous for their topiary, as well as for a two-hundred-year-old maze – was softened by the rolling parkland that surrounded the house on the other three sides. Tonight, lit from within and with its chimneys cheerfully smoking, the house looked as warm and inviting as any fairytale castle. Suddenly Laura realized just how badly she wanted to have Daniel as her date for the Christmas Hunt Ball, to play Prince Charming to her Cinderella. What was the point in spending money she didn’t have on a beautiful dress if no one who mattered was going to be there to see it?
Just as she had this thought, there was an ominous splutter from the Fiat’s ancient engine and the car quite suddenly lost all power. Thankfully, Lovett’s Lane was deserted, and Laura was able to glide to a stately halt on the grass verge. But without headlights, and with nothing but a crescent moon and the distant lights of Furlings to guide her, she could barely see more than ten feet in any direction. Worse still, she’d left her coat back at the church hall, and was woefully underdressed for the December chill in jeans and a thin Uniqlo sweater. Pulling her mobile phone out of her bag, she saw that it was completely dead.
‘Fuck!’ she shouted out loud, getting out of the car and stamping her foot in anger on the frozen ground like a thwarted child. Could today possibly get any worse? The walk home to Briar Cottage from here was about thirty minutes in daylight, but at night and without a torch she was afraid she might not make it all. She could walk up Furlings’s drive and knock on the door, but she barely knew the Flint-Hamiltons, and this was an annoyance rather than emergency. The third option was to walk back to the village and ask for help there. Hugging herself for warmth and rubbing her hands together against the cold, she began to trudge down the hill.
After only about a hundred yards, she saw headlights coming her way. Thank God. Standing in the middle of the road, she flagged the car down.
‘Bit late for a walk isn’t it?’ Gabe drawled, rolling down the window of his Land Rover. It looked warm and luxurious inside. Coldplay were playing on the stereo, and a smell of new leather wafted out into the crisp night air. ‘I thought you were going to London.’
‘Change of plans,’ said Laura through gritted teeth. Gritted, chattering teeth. ‘My car just gave up the ghost.’
‘Uh huh,’ said Gabe. Was he smiling? Bastard. ‘I expect you’d like a lift home then, would you?’
Laura nodded grudgingly. Why, why, why did it have to be him? Of all the people who could have driven past. She tried the passenger door but it was locked.
‘Aren’t you going to ask me nicely?’ said Gabe. He was clearly enjoying himself.
Laura bit her tongue. If she played along she’d be home in the warm in five minutes, as opposed to being stuck out here for the next hour. ‘May I have a lift?’ She smiled sarcastically.
‘Please,’ said Gabe. ‘Go on. It won’t kill you.’
‘May I have a lift … please?’ said Laura.
With a click, the door unlocked. ‘Hop in.’
‘So,’ said Gabe, as she fastened her seatbelt. ‘Mr Perfect stood you up, did he? Got a better offer?’
Laura watched his arrogant features break into a grin and felt suffused with loathing. Why was he such an utter, utter dick? And why could nobody else in Fittlescombe see it? OK, so he was handsome in a rough-and-ready, farmhand sort of a way. But it hardly made up for his fatally flawed character, his rudeness, his vindictive streak masked as humour.
‘He had a meeting about his son,’ she said stiffly. ‘It was last-minute and it couldn’t be helped.’
‘And you buy that, do you?’ Gabe asked casually, not taking his eyes off the road.
‘I’m not going to dignify that with an answer.’ Folding her arms, Laura stared out of the window in silence.
Gabe responded by turning up the music, ejecting Coldplay and tuning into Radio 1. Some awful teen band were playing, one of those Christmas songs with synthesized sleigh bells and cheesy lyrics about snowflakes and children’s wishes. Gabe hummed along tunelessly, strumming the steering wheel in time to the music until at last they arrived at Briar Cottage.
‘I’ll walk you inside.’
‘No, thank you. I’m fine,’ said Laura.
‘I wasn’t asking,’ said Gabe. ‘It’s not gonna be my fault when they find you on your doorstep tomorrow morning, dead from hypothermia because you’ve forgotten your key.’
The garden path was treacherously icy. In her flimsy loafers, Laura found herself slipping all over the place. Throwing her arms out wildly to try to get her balance, she ended up leaning on Gabe, whose work boots gripped the ice like crampons. Halfway to the door, without asking, he scooped her up under one arm as if she were a stepladder or a Nativity play prop, depositing her on the front step like a Christmas parcel. Blushing furiously, as much from anger as embarrassment, Laura jammed her key in the lock so hard she almost snapped it.
‘You might want to invest in some boots,’ said Gabe as the door swung open and she practically fell inside. ‘And an AA membership. Next time I might not be driving by.’
‘Oh no! What on earth would I do then?’ Laura said waspishly.
Gabe scowled. ‘You might be a bit more grateful.’
‘And you might be a bit more—’
‘What? A bit more what?’
He stepped forward, so he stood just inches away from Laura, his broad shoulders filling the narrow cottage doorway like a marauding Viking warrior. It was a challenge, and Laura’s cue to step back, but something kept her rooted to the spot. For a few seconds words failed her. They remained locked in standoff.
‘Never mind,’ she said eventually. ‘To be honest with you, Gabe, I’m cold and I’m tired and I would like to go to bed.’
‘Fine. Goodnight.’ Gabe turned to go, a look of cold thunder on his face. Ungrateful cow.
Just as Laura was about to close the door behind him, resisting with some difficulty the urge to slam it, Gabe suddenly changed his mind. Turning around he said bluntly, ‘He’s lying, you know. Daniel. He’s using you.’
‘Oh, my God!’ Laura practically screamed with exasperation. ‘Using me? Using me for what? Daniel’s an amazing, talented, phenomenally successful playwright with a flat on Pelham Crescent and God knows how many millions in the bank. I’m an unknown, ex-television writer with a defunct Fiat Punto, a fat dog and an arsehole on my doorstep who I’m going to be forced to work with every fucking day between now and Christmas Eve and whose sole purpose in life seems to be to make my life hell! What could Daniel Smart possibly, possibly want from me?’
For a moment Gabe just stared at her. He’d never seen Laura lose her rag quite so comprehensively before. Her cheeks were flushed apple red, a combination of her high emotion and the biting cold, and her mass of dark curls had escaped their elastic band and fell to her shoulders in a gloriously tangled cascade. The overall effect was disturbingly sexy, but Gabe pushed the thought aside.
‘I’m not going to dignify that with an answer,’ he said coldly. Stalking off down the path, he heard the cottage door slam loudly behind him. Serve her right if it falls off its hinges in the night and she freezes to death. Stupid, stubborn woman.
* * *
Laura slumped down on the sofa, shaking like a leaf. There were too many emotions to process at once: disappointment, anger, frustration. And something else, underlying all of them, something that she didn’t want to admit to. A tiny, poisonous seed of doubt had found its way into her heart, planted by Gabe Baxter and his malicious insinuations.
Had Daniel told her the truth?
She could think of no particular reason why he should lie. And Gabe’s motivation was so obviously jealousy – he couldn’t stand the fact that Daniel was more successful than he was. Gabe Baxter might be a big fish in Fittlescombe. But in the real world he was a humble farmer, while Daniel was a bona fide theatrical star. Even so, once planted, the doubt was there. Laura resented Gabe for that with a passion that brought her close to tears. Everything seemed to bring her close to tears these days.
Sensing her mistress’s unhappiness, Peggy shuffled along the sofa and inserted her wrinkled, piglike face under Laura’s arm. Laura stroked her smooth fur gratefully. ‘Looks like it’ll just be you and me for Christmas, old girl.’ Was it weird to put up Christmas decorations that only you and your dog would see? ‘Perhaps we’ll do Christmas lunch at The Fox,’ Laura mused out loud. ‘That’s a bit less tragic than turkey for one, don’t you think?’
The phone made both Laura and Peggy jump. After the miscarriage and her months of deep depression, Laura’s London friends had all stopped calling. A ringing phone these days meant her mother, or Harry Hotham calling about the play, or just occasionally—
‘It’s Daniel.’
Just the sound of his voice was like a shot of pure happiness in the arm.
‘Look I’m about to go into this school thing. But I wanted to call and say I really miss you. I’m gutted about this weekend, I really am.’
‘Me too,’ said Laura, exhaling with relief. The seed that Gabe had planted was already beginning to wither.
‘And I was wondering – do say if you think this is too forward, or you’re not ready – but I thought maybe the two of us should spend Christmas together.’
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_868db241-73a7-5bf6-8d70-c89f7c8ba3c7)
Daniel Smart walked into Harrods with a spring in his step.
This was going to be a great Christmas.
The last year had been an utter nightmare from beginning to end. The divorce, the bitter end of his affair with Lenka, not to mention the immense stress of producing his most recent play had all weighed heavily. But, quite unexpectedly, fate had brought Laura Tiverton back into his life at exactly the opportune moment. And now here he was, picking up a new dinner jacket to wear to the Furlings Hunt Ball of all things, now only a week away. He felt as excited as a schoolboy about to break up for the holidays. So much rested on this trip to Fittlescombe, but Daniel was ready for the challenge.
Few places on earth were as festive and Christmassy as Fittlescombe village, but Harrods food hall was one of them. As he stepped inside, Daniel’s senses were immediately assaulted by the scents, sights and sounds of the season. Wafts of cinnamon and nutmeg drifted over from the bakery, where smiling chefs were cheerfully sloshing brandy into bowls of Christmas pudding mixture. At the confectionary counter, mountains of marzipan glistened in every shape and colour, and sugar mice sported Christmassy red bows, piped in icing around their necks. There were hams and turkeys and huge bowls of glistening cranberry jelly. There were mince pies and candy canes, and vats of piping-hot mulled wine served in bone-china mugs decorated with holly and ivy. Carols rang out through the loudspeakers and everybody, it seemed to Daniel, was smiling.
Picking up a box of German sugarplums for Laura, because the packaging was so exquisite, and a single warm mince pie for himself, Daniel hopped on the escalator up to menswear. Given the pressures on his finances right now, he’d perhaps been hasty in splashing out quite so much for a new, bespoke dinner jacket. But Furlings Hunt Ball was the hottest ticket in England this Christmas, and was bound to be teeming with influential people: writers, producers, actors, investors. Telling himself it was a work expense and tax-deductible, Daniel mentally reduced the price by 40 per cent and pushed the image of his accountant’s disapproving face out of his mind.
‘I’m here about the jacket. Is it ready?’
The gay assistant looked wounded. ‘Of course it’s ready, sir. We are never late on our bespoke orders. If you’d like to follow me.’
He led Daniel into a changing room. The jacket, in pure wool and immaculately cut, was duly produced and lovingly slipped onto Daniel’s back. While the assistant fussed around him, pulling at the hem and straightening the cuffs, Daniel admired his reflection in the mirror. The deep, true black of the jacket contrasted marvellously with his tanned skin and dark-green eyes, and clever tailoring at the waist accentuated the breadth of his shoulders. It had cost an arm and a leg, but the confidence it gave him was priceless.
‘Is sir satisfied? We’re quite happy to make further changes if sir feels the sleeves are too long or the stitching at the lapel is a little too fine.’
‘It’s perfect,’ said Daniel.
* * *
‘It’s perfect, Mrs Worsley, absolutely perfect. You’ve done a marvellous job.’
Tatiana Flint-Hamilton dropped her suitcases in the grand marble hallway at Furlings and beamed at the housekeeper. Tati had known Mrs Worsley since childhood and was well aware of the importance of keeping the old battleaxe sweet. With Mrs Worsley on her side, she had a chance of deflecting at least some of her father’s anger. But, with the two of them ranged against her, this unexpected trip home was bound to be a disaster.
‘You said you weren’t coming.’ The housekeeper’s face was set like flint. Tati could have struck a match off it to light her much-needed cigarette. ‘We rearranged the entire seating plan.’
‘I know. The thing is, I was so cross with Daddy about the Bertie thing, I sort of lashed out.’
‘Bertie?’ Mrs Worsley wrinkled her nose in distaste. ‘You mean the duke? The married man you took off with, breaking your poor father’s heart?’
‘Yes, but we’re not together any more.’ Tati cocked her head to one side and pulled her most adorable mea culpa face. It never failed to work with men, but Mrs Worsley was unmoved.
‘You upset Mr Flint-Hamilton no end, you know. First the affair, and then writing to him like that, saying you wouldn’t bother coming home. You know how much this ball means to him.’
