CHAPTER THREE
ALEX was glad the sun was finally lowering itself behind the trees and rhododendrons, changing the neat lawn’s wide stripes a dirty gold colour. Garden parties were, by definition, a daytime pursuit, and he’d soon be able to legitimately say his goodbyes. Inside his jacket pocket, his fingers traced the flat buttons of his mobile phone. He imagined sliding it open and dialling the number of the local cab company he’d programmed in earlier.
When his senior partner, Edward, had suggested this event to thank the staff and schmooze their most important contacts, Alex hadn’t been slow in voicing his objections. The beginning of September wasn’t really the perfect time for an outdoor event, was it? But Edward wasn’t cutting his annual sailing trip in Barbados short for anyone, so September it had been.
Luckily, the fickle English summer had only got into her stride around mid-August and had decided to linger awhile yet. The day had dawned bright and sunny and all afternoon a warm breeze had rippled the petals of the late roses in Edward’s borders. But then Edward was an annoyingly lucky man.
Alex sighed and sipped his cold beer. He supposed it had been a good party. To be honest, he’d coasted through it, moving his mouth when he’d had to, smiling if he really must, but he hadn’t retained a single fact about anyone he’d talked to. He couldn’t even remember what he’d filled his plate with at the buffet table. Unless it was connected with work, it seemed details were beyond him these days.
He found a lone wicker chair in the corner of the lawn and waited for the crowds milling in and out of the vast conservatory, or under the rose-twined pergola, to thin. It would look bad if he was the first to disappear, but once others had started to drift off he could follow their lead. The last thing he wanted to do was stand out in this crowd. That would mean they would expect him to be brilliant and eloquent, dazzle them with stories of trials lost and won. And, while he had stories aplenty, he knew that the greyness inside him would invade the telling. So, while he kept his distance, he let them whisper about his aloofness, his distance. Better that than let them find out the brilliance, the eloquence, only happened when he set foot inside the Old Bailey.
He’d got used to this—sitting at the sidelines, watching everyone else have fun—and he knew it should bother him, but he couldn’t muster the energy. He wasn’t unhappy. And at least he knew what to expect from life. No drama. No nasty surprises. He’d had his fill of those. He knew some of his junior colleagues joked that, if attached to a heart monitor, he’d produce a monotonous line instead of peaks and valleys, but he didn’t care about that either. They were young. They didn’t understand that peaks were often overrated and valleys could sink below the threshold of what you could bear. Let them laugh.
The sky grew bluer and bluer, from peacock through to sapphire, but still the guests didn’t diminish. If anything, there seemed to be more of them. When someone turned a switch somewhere, and the paths, shrubbery and whole pergola lit up with a million little white lights, everyone cheered. Blues music started to play, and people under the pergola started to dance. Alex just frowned.
Great. Trust Edward to have a garden party that turned into an all-night rave.
‘Should have guessed I’d find you sulking out here on your own.’
He turned to see Edward’s wife, Charity, smiling down at him. She’d been a trophy wife fifteen years ago, but Edward had certainly struck gold. Far from being a blonde airhead, Charity was an astute businesswoman herself now, and there was no one more elegant and poised. She was the sort of wife men in their position should have.
Mocking laughter filled the inside of his head. He silenced it by standing and giving Charity a soft kiss on the cheek.
‘I’m not sulking.’
Charity just smiled. ‘Edward’s been asking for you. Some bigwig he wants you to impress. He’s out on the terrace.’ She pointed to a huddle of dark suits at the other edge of the garden.
Alex sighed and gave his partner’s wife a little salute but, before he managed to set off in Edward’s direction, she tugged at his sleeve.
‘It’s about time you let her go, Alex.’
She didn’t need to mention a name.
He looked at Charity, her face soft with compassion, and it made a nameless part inside him even colder. ‘I don’t seem to remember having any say in whether she came or went,’ he said without expression.
‘You know what I mean,’ she replied, a glint of her inner strength appearing behind that softness. ‘It’s been almost four years. You’ve got to forgive her and move on.’
Forgive her? Even if he knew how, he wasn’t sure he wanted to.
He shrugged one shoulder and nodded, hoping that would be enough of an answer, and set off in the direction of the group of suits. At least he wouldn’t have to talk about this kind of stuff with them.
Talking to the suits wasn’t hard, either. They didn’t want small talk; they wanted legal facts and arguments. Even so, when he’d done his bit, he extricated himself from the group as soon as possible and wandered away from the house, down the lit path to the patio under the large pergola. He kept going, weaving through the other guests, until he reached the far edge, leaned against a post and let his gaze follow the way the grass changed from artificial green to inky blue as the glow from the fairy lights diminished.
He stayed that way for minutes, until something happened behind him. He was never able afterwards to quantify exactly what it had been—whether the noise level and laughter had increased, or the lights had flickered brighter. He’d half-thought he’d sensed a soft warm breeze, like the memory of the afternoon’s sunshine, but whatever it was, he’d turned round.
His eyes locked instantly on the woman in front of him. A jumble of images rolled over him, each in shocking high definition. Pale blonde hair, the colour of sand on a Highland beach. The graceful flick of a hand as she illustrated a story she was telling. A smile that just seemed to grow and grow and grow. The fairy lights above his head seemed to buzz louder in response to her presence.
Everywhere around her there was colour, life. And not just around her—it seemed to be coming from inside of her. That wasn’t possible, was it? But he just had to look around him to see that something had happened. Suddenly, people were laughing more, dancing with more abandon.
She swayed along to a song as she laughed briefly with someone who’d been trying hard to catch her attention, then moved on. And then he realised she was moving towards him, and he was standing as stiff as one of his golf clubs with his mouth slightly open. He tried to blink and failed.
She looked straight at him, and her smile lifted at one side. ‘What’s this?’ she said, her voice soft and slightly husky. ‘Someone not enjoying the party?’
Alex didn’t know how it had happened, but suddenly he was inside the bubble of noise and colour that seemed to follow her everywhere. He felt different. Lighter. Stronger. As if he wanted to laugh, shout and sing all at once. And the electricity! Had he stepped on a loose wire? Because that was the only possible explanation for the warm buzzing feeling travelling all over him. At once he stopped resting on the post and stood up. And then he smiled back. Not the fake pulling of lips over teeth his colleagues normally saw him do. This one just crept over his mouth and expanded all on its own.
‘Who told you that?’ he said, then smiled even harder as he sensed a slight irregularity in the rhythm of her breathing. How he’d sensed it, he didn’t know. He just had. He wasn’t alone in this. She felt it, too.
Her smile was warm and sassy. Inviting. It made her pale pink lips practically irresistible. So Alex bent forward and tasted them. She didn’t start or pull away. She just closed her eyes and met him.
A while later he began to hear things again, feel something other than her softness under his fingertips. He realised