Taut with nerves, heart fluttering, resisting the urge to wash the dryness from my mouth with another drink, I not so surreptitiously watched my secret boyfriend and soon to be fiancé from across the room and wished he’d hurry up and get on with it.
I had always dreaded Christmas. Particularly these last few years when it had simply been another day alone, opening the same gift card sent by my dad and watching someone else’s television. Waiting to hear from Richard, despite him telling me that he’d probably not get a moment to call.
But this year – surely I’d be spending it on his family’s estate in the Highlands? I had already planned the clothes I would pack, and spent a frantic afternoon searching for the perfect ‘last-minute’ gifts for his parents and younger brother.
For the first time, in so long that it made my heart ache just thinking about it, I would be spending Christmas with a loving, happy family.
I took a deep breath, smothered my smile and, for the millionth time that day, silently practised my surprised, thrilled and senior-partner’s wife worthy ‘yes’。
Chapter One
When the house had been described as like something out of a fairy tale, I’d been picturing Snow White’s cottage, or a quaint gingerbread house （minus the evil witch, whom I’d left behind in Edinburgh）， not a shrunken, grottier version of Sleeping Beauty’s derelict outhouse. And, in my storybook, there hadn’t been an old pram, two sagging armchairs and a turquoise toilet blocking the driveway.
I peered through the taxi window, trying to kid myself it would look better once I was out of the car. Or it had stopped raining. Or if I took my glasses off. The driver pulled up in front of a rusted mangle.
‘Could you get any closer to the door?’ I asked, tugging the zip a bit higher on my jacket.
He swivelled his head to look at me, one eyebrow raised.
‘What about parking on the lawn?’
‘That ain’t a lawn. It’s a jungle. I ain’t risking my tyres on that.’
I blew out a sigh, and unbuckled the seat belt.
‘Fifty pound.
What?’ My hand froze halfway to my purse. ‘We agreed thirty.’
‘That was before the ford, the mud pit and the overgrown branches scratching my paintwork. The car needs a full-on valet and the extra won’t even cover it. I’ve got standards to uphold.’
I cast my eyes around the faded upholstery, scuffed trimmings and air freshener designed as a topless woman.
‘You knew the address was on an unnamed road in the middle of a forest and you still said thirty.’ I tried to keep the tremble out of my voice. The extra twenty pounds might not pay for a car valet but it would help me not starve for the next couple of weeks.
‘I’m the only taxi-driver round ‘ere who’ll come out this far.’ He grinned. The big bad wolf. ‘I’m the only taxi full stop. If you want out of ‘ere any time soon, best stay in my good books.’ He tipped his head towards the house. ‘And, trust me, you won’t be wanting to ‘ang around.
‘Are you threatening me?’ I did my best to channel some of the experience I’d gained working for sharks who’d sell your own baby back to you, and straightened my shoulders. After enduring a lifetime of being treated like a worthless wimp, this was supposed to be a fresh start. The new, improved, over-it, Jenny.
I opened my purse, and deliberately placed three notes on the plastic ledge between the front and back seats. ‘I’m giving you the thirty pounds you asked for, and not a penny more.’
He curled up one side of his lip, leant towards me and growled. ‘Are you sure about that?’
Letting out a squeak, I unclasped my purse again. ‘And a tip! Of course. Here. I’ll make it twenty.’ Yanking open the door, I tumbled out into the freezing January rain, slipping and sliding round to the car boot. Hauling out my suitcase, followed by a rucksack, I stumbled out of the way just in time to avoid injury, but not a generous splattering of filthy spray from the revving wheels.
Wiping a smear of mud off my glasses with a sodden sleeve, I stared at my new home.
A semi-detached old woodsman’s cottage; the grey plaster frontage streaked with grime, slumped chimney and patchy roof confirmed it hadn’t worn the years well.
I squelched through the puddles, rucksack on my back, hand-me-down Mulberry suitcase dragging behind, and peered in through the ivy-smothered front window. Rummaging in my jacket pocket for the key, I gave up attempting to make out shapes in the gloom beyond.
‘Right. Might as well get it over with. Get out of this rain and put the kettle on.’ I wiped the worst of the dirt from the keyhole, congratulating myself for having had the foresight to have the utilities reconnected before I arrived, and forced the key in, slowly wiggling it until it unlocked.