“What about you?” he asked after a moment, with the distinct impression of someone forcing himself to continue the conversation.
She started, caught in the action of surreptitiously studying him. “What?”
“Were you on the way back from work?”
“Oh right. No.” God, this guy must think she was a total idiot. She cleared her throat. “No, I was just running a few errands.” She took the handlebars of her bike in one hand, felt automatically for the letter with the other, then jolted when she realized it wasn’t there. She must have lost it in the road somewhere and not noticed.
“Everything OK?”
“Yeah. Sorry. It’s just…I was sending a letter, I think I must have dropped it.” That was OK, though, she told herself. She’d write another one tomorrow and post it then.
“A letter?” His voice was a little less clipped this time, almost incredulous instead. “People still write those these days?”
She shrugged. “Well yeah, I guess so. Memo—my grandmother, that is—is always writing letters, even though she’s the most technologically savvy person I know.” No need to tell him that’s not who she was writing to this evening.
He stepped out of the way of a jogger, quiet for a moment. “When I was a kid,” he said slowly, “I used to try and get my friends at school to write me letters in the summer holidays, but it never quite caught on.”
He said the whole thing completely deadpan, but Josie let out a snort of laughter. “Really?”
“Mmm. My best friend at the time, James Winterbourne, kept the letter I wrote to him and then read it out to everyone at school once we got back in September.”
She laughed again. “That’s so mean! What had you written?”
“God, I don’t remember. It was just the principle of the thing that stuck with me more than anything. I never did quite forgive him for it.”
“Aha. So James Winterbourne has been struck off the wedding guest list for a letter-writing faux pas.” Though he met her gaze, her smile wasn’t reflected.
“Quite.”
Damn, maybe she’d put her foot in it. Maybe he’d been married and it had all gone terribly wrong, or maybe he’d been jilted at the altar, or James Winterbourne had married the love of his life or something.
“So how come you’re out this way then?” she asked, her voice cringeworthily jovial at the forced change of subject. “Do you live in London?”
“No.” His voice was a little distant, but he shook his head and when he spoke again it was with a little more purpose. “No, I’m from Bristol actually. Well, from a few places, I suppose, but I grew up in Bristol, and live there now.”
“So you’re down here for Christmas?”
He grimaced. “No. Well, I wasn’t supposed to be.” He pulled a hand through his messy hair, and the coppery highlights in the brown caught the artificial light a little. “I was due to fly out to New York today, but my flight has been canceled because of some bloody storm.”
Josie frowned, looked up at the sky. It was cloudy, for sure, and the echo of misty rain still hung in the air, but it didn’t exactly seem stormy. She glanced at the man to see him raising his eyebrows.
“There’s obviously not a storm here,” he said, in a way that seemed condescending enough to make her flush again. “But somewhere over the Atlantic or something. Anyway. I’m now on standby for a new flight, but looks like I’m stranded here for now.”
“That’s so crap,” Josie said, hoping her voice was conveying adequate sympathy. “So will you go back to Bristol now then?”
“No, I need to be here in case of flights, so I checked in to a hotel I’ve stayed at before around here.”
She nodded as they came to a stop and gestured to her right at an old building. “It doesn’t look like much on the outside, but they do good beers, I think, and there’s a nice garden out back.”
“Ah yes, useful in this lovely English summer we’re in the midst of.”
It sounded like a joke. If he’d bloody smile or something, then she could be sure. “If you don’t like the look of it, I can…”
“I’m not fussy.” He turned to face her. “Thanks.” He pulled his hands out of his pockets and held one out to her. No wedding ring, so maybe the stolen love of his life theory was more likely. “I’m Max, by the way.”
She took his hand in her gloved one. His grip was firm, sure, and though she wasn’t exactly doll-sized like Bia, his hand made hers feel small. “Josie.”