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‘It is normal business practice to issue one,’ he said.
She couldn’t be certain that he was mocking her, but it felt very much like it. He was pretty sharp for a man with such a louche lifestyle, but presumably financing it required a certain amount of ruthlessness. Was that why he felt responsible for Ria’s problems? She was full of life, looked fabulous for forty, but good-looking toy-boy lovers—no matter how occasional—were an expensive luxury.
‘You do have one?’
‘A receipt? Not with me,’ she hedged, unwilling to admit to her own rare lapse in efficiency. ‘Ria will have entered the payment in her books,’ she pointed out.
‘Ria hasn’t made an entry in her books for weeks.’
‘But that’s—’
‘That’s Ria.’
‘It’s as bad as that?’ she asked.
‘Worse.’
Sorrel groaned. ‘She’s hopeless with the practicalities. I have to write down the ingredients when we experiment with flavours for ice cream, but even then you never know what extra little touch she’s going to toss in as an afterthought the minute your back is turned.’
‘It’s the extra little touch that makes the magic.’
‘True,’ she said, surprised that someone who thought ice cream unimportant would know that. ‘Sadly, there’s no guarantee that it will be the same touch.’ While she wanted the magic, she also needed consistency. Ria preferred the serendipitous joy of stumbling on some exciting new flavour, which made a visit to Knickerbocker Gloria—the glorious step-back-in-time ice-cream parlour that was at the heart of the business—something of an adventure. Or deeply frustrating if you came back hoping for a second helping of an ice cream you’d fallen in love with. Fortunately for the business, the adventure mostly outweighed the frustration.
Mostly.
‘You have to learn to live with the risk or move on,’ Alexander said, apparently able to read her mind.
‘Do I?’ She regarded him with the same thoughtful look that he had turned on her. ‘Is it the risk that brings you back?’ she asked.
His smile was a dangerous thing. Fleeting. Filled with ambiguity. Was he amused? She couldn’t be certain. And if he was, was he laughing at himself or at her pathetic attempt to tease information out of him? Why did it matter? His relationship with Ria had nothing to do with her unless it interfered with her business.
It was interfering with her business right now.
He was standing in the way of what she needed, but she needed his co-operation. In a moment of weakness, she had allowed her concentration to slip, but she wouldn’t let that happen again. She didn’t care what had brought Alexander West flying back to Maybridge, to Ria. She only cared about the needs of her own business.
‘When it comes to ice cream,’ she said, not waiting for an answer, ‘Ria’s individuality is my biggest selling point.’
Having practically torn her hair out at Ria’s inability to stick to a recipe, she had finally taken the line of least resistance, offering something unrepeatable—colours and flavours that were individually tailored to her clients’ personal requirements—to sell the uniqueness of her ices.
It did mean that she had to work closely with Ria, recording her recipes at the moment of creation to ensure that she delivered the ices that her client tasted and approved and didn’t go off on some last-minute fantasy version conjured up in a flash of inspiration. It wasn’t easy, she couldn’t be here all the time, but it had been worth the effort.
‘Where is Ria?’ she asked, again. ‘And where’s Nancy?’ She glanced at her watch. ‘She has to drop her daughter off at school, but she should have been here an hour ago to open up the ice-cream parlour.’
‘She was, but, since there’s no possibility that the business will continue, it seemed kinder to suggest she use her time to explore other employment opportunities.’
‘Kinder?’ He’d fired her? Things were moving a lot faster than she had anticipated. ‘Kinder?’ she repeated. ‘Have you any idea how important this job is to Nancy? She’s a single mother. Finding another job—’
‘Take it up with Ria,’ he said, cutting her off in full flow. ‘She’s the one who’s disappeared.’
‘Disappeared?’ For a man so relaxed that he looked as if he might slide down the door at any minute, he moved with lightning speed. That capable hand was at her elbow as the blood drained from her face and long before the wobble reached her knees. ‘What do you mean, disappeared?’
‘Nothing. Bad choice of words.’ He knew, she thought. He understood that beneath Ria’s vivid clothes, her life-embracing exuberance, there was a fragility...
He was close again and she caught the scent of the lavender that Ria cut from her garden and laid between her sheets. Ria... This was about her, she reminded herself. ‘She can’t hide from the taxman.’
‘No, but, if you know her as well as you say, you’ll know that when things get tough, she does a good impression of an ostrich.’
That rang true. Ria was very good at sticking her head in the sand and not hearing anything she didn’t want to know. Such as advice about being more organised. About consistency in the flavours she sold in the ice-cream parlour, saving the experimental flavours for ‘specials’. ‘Have you any idea which beach she might have chosen? To bury her head in.’
‘That’s not your concern.’
No. At least it was, but she knew what he meant. Since Ria had left him in charge he must have spoken to her and doubtless knew a lot more than he was saying.
‘I’ve been trying to organise her,’ she said, bitterly regretting that she hadn’t tried harder. She might not approve of the ‘postcard’ man, but she hated him thinking that she didn’t care. ‘It’s like trying to herd cats.’
That won her a smile that she could read. Wry, a touch conspiratorial, a moment shared between two people who knew all Ria’s faults and, despite her determination not to, she found herself smiling back.
‘Tell me about it,’ he murmured, then, as she shivered again, ‘Are you okay?’
‘Absolutely.’ But as her eyes met his the wobble intensified and she hadn’t a clue what she was feeling; only that ‘okay’ wasn’t it. Alexander West was too physical, too male, too close. He was taking liberties with her sense of purpose, with her ability to think and act clearly in a crisis. ‘I’m just a bit off balance,’ she said. ‘I’ve had my head in the freezer for too long. I stood up too fast...’
‘That will do it every time.’
His expression was serious, but his eyes were telling a different story.
‘Yes...’ That and a warm hand cradling her elbow, eyes the colour of the sea on a blue-sky day. A shared concern about a friend. ‘Tell me what you know,’ she said, this time to distract herself.
He shook his head. ‘Not much. I got back late last night. The key was under the doormat.’
‘The key? I assumed...’ She assumed that Ria would have been on the doorstep with open arms. ‘Are you telling me that you haven’t seen her?’ He shook his head and the sunlight streaming in from the small window above the door glinted on the golden streaks in his hair. ‘But you have spoken to her? What exactly did she say?’
‘There was an electric storm and the line kept breaking up. It’s taken me three days to get home and she was long gone by the time I got here.’
Three days? He’d been travelling for three days? Where in the world had he been? And how much must he care if he’d travel that distance to come to her rescue? She crushed the thought. She wasn’t interested in him or where he’d come from.
‘Where? Where has she gone?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘Someone must know where she is,’ she objected. ‘She wouldn’t have left her cats to fend for themselves.’
That provoked another of those fleeting smiles. ‘Arthur and Guinevere are comfortably tucked up with a neighbour who is under the impression that Ria is dealing with a family emergency.’
‘I didn’t think she had any family.’
‘No?’ He said that as if he knew something that she didn’t. He didn’t elaborate, but said, ‘This isn’t the first time she’s done this.’
‘Oh?’ That wasn’t good news.
‘She’s had a couple of close calls in the past. I had hoped, after the last time, she’d learned her lesson. I did warn her...’ Warn her? ‘It’s not fair on the people who rely on her. Suppliers, customers...’ Perhaps realising that he was leaving himself open to an appeal from her, he stopped. ‘She knows what’s going to happen and doesn’t want to be around to witness it.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Why else would she have taken off?’
Sorrel shook her head. He was right. There was no other explanation.
‘In the meantime nothing can leave here until I’ve made an inventory of the assets.’ As if to make his point, he finally moved and began returning the large containers of ice cream to the freezer.
‘Hold on! These aren’t assets.’ Sorrel grabbed the one containing tiny chocolate-cupcake cases filled with raspberry gelato. ‘These are mine. I told you, I’ve already paid for them.’
‘How? Cheque, credit card? I’ve been to the bank and Ria hasn’t paid anything in for weeks.’
She blinked. The bank had talked to him about Ria’s account? They wouldn’t do that unless it was a joint account. Or he had a power of attorney to act on her behalf. Was that what Ria had left for him?
She didn’t ask. He wouldn’t tell her and besides she had more than enough problems of her own right now. And the biggest of them was waiting for an answer to his question.
‘Not a cheque,’ she said. ‘Who carries a cheque book these days?’ He waited. ‘I, um, gave her...’ She hesitated, well aware how stupid she was going to look.
‘Please tell me you didn’t give her cash,’ he said, way ahead of her.
It had been a rare, uncharacteristic lapse from the strictest standards she applied to her business, but the circumstances had been rare, too. Alexander had no way of knowing that and with a little shrug, a wry smile that she hoped would tempt a little understanding, she said, ‘I will if you insist, but it won’t alter the fact.’
‘Then I hope,’ he said, not responding to the smile, ‘that you kept the receipt in a safe place.’
She had hoped he’d forgotten about the receipt. Clearly not.
Brisk, businesslike...
Busted.
THREE
There are four basic food groups; you’ll find them all in a Knickerbocker Glory.
—from Rosie’s ‘Little Book of Ice Cream’
‘I was in a rush. There was an emergency.’ It was no excuse, Sorrel knew, but you had to have been there. ‘I told her she could give me the receipt when I picked up the order.’
He didn’t say anything—he clearly wasn’t a man to strain himself—but an infinitesimal lift of his eyebrows left her in no doubt what he was thinking.
‘Don’t look at me like that!’
No, no, no... Get a grip. You’re the professional, he’s the...
She wasn’t sure what he was. Only that he was trouble in capitals from T through to E.
‘I’d called in to tell Ria that the Jefferson contract was signed,’ she said, determined to explain, show him that she wasn’t the complete idiot that, with absolutely no justification, he clearly thought her. That was twice he’d got her totally wrong and he didn’t even know her name... ‘I had the list of ices the client had chosen and we were going through it when my brother-in-law called to tell me that my sister had been rushed into Maybridge General.’ His face remained expressionless. ‘As I was leaving, Ria asked if she could have some cash upfront. It was a big order,’ she added.
‘How big?’ She told him and the eyebrows reacted with rather more energy. ‘How much ice cream did you order, for heaven’s sake?’
So. That was what it took to rouse him. Money.
Why was she surprised?
‘A lot, but it’s not just the quantity,’ she told him, ‘it’s the quality. These ices aren’t like the stuff she sells in Knickerbocker Gloria, lovely though that is.’ Having finally got his attention, she wasn’t about to lose the opportunity to state her case. ‘Certainly nothing like the stuff that gets swirled into a cornet from our van.’
‘You have an ice-cream round?’
Oh, Lord, now he thought she was flogging the stuff from a van on the streets.
‘No. We have a vintage ice cream van. Rosie. She’s a bit of a celebrity since she started making a regular appearance in a television soap opera.’ Put that on a postcard home, Alexander West.
‘Rosie?’
‘She’s pink.’ He didn’t exactly roll his eyes, but he might as well have done. So much for making an impression. ‘The ices we commission from Ria are for adults,’ she continued, determined to convince him that she wasn’t some flaky lightweight running a cash-in-hand, fly-by-night company. ‘They need expensive ingredients. Organic fruit. Liqueurs.’
‘And champagne.’
‘And champagne,’ she agreed. ‘Not some fizzy substitute, but the real thing. It’s a big outlay, especially when things are tight.’
‘So? What was the problem with your debit card?’
‘Nothing. Ria’s card machine was playing up and, since I couldn’t wait, I dashed across the road to the ATM.’
‘You fell for that?’ he asked in a way that suggested she could wave goodbye to her credibility as it flew out of the window.
Sorrel let slip an expletive. He was right. She was an idiot.
Not even her soft-as-butter sister, Elle, would have been taken in by that old chestnut. But this was Ria! Okay, she was as organised as a boxful of kittens, but so warm, so full of love.
So like her own mother.
Right down to her unfortunate taste in men.
She sighed. Enough said. Lesson learned. Move on. But it was time to put this exchange on a business footing. Alexander West hadn’t bothered to ask who she was, no doubt hoping he could shoo her out of the door quick sharp, and forget that she existed.
Time to let him know that it wasn’t going to happen.
‘How is your sister?’ he asked, before she could tell him so. ‘You said she was rushed into hospital? Was it serious?’
‘Serious?’ She blinked. Hadn’t she said?
Apparently not. Well, his concern demonstrated thoughtfulness. Or did he think it was just an excuse to cover her stupidity? The latter, she was almost sure...
‘Incurable,’ she replied, just to see shock replacing the smug male expression that practically shouted, ‘Got you...’ ‘It’s called motherhood. She had a girl—Fenny Louise, seven pounds, six ounces—practically on the hospital steps. Her third.’ She offered him her hand. ‘I know who you are, Mr West, but you don’t know me.’ Despite a kiss that was still sizzling quietly under her skin, ready to re-ignite at the slightest encouragement. ‘Sorrel Amery. I’m the CEO of Scoop!’
Her hand, which had been resting protectively on the frosted container, was ice cold, a fact she realised the minute he took it and heat rocketed up to her shoulder before spiralling down into parts that a simple handshake shouldn’t reach.
