She gave the window display the once-over before turning the key in the lock. The old-fashioned bay window of what had once been a fishmonger’s was now backed with a collage of elegant and romantic destinations: Paris, Venice, the Orient Express. A deserted Caribbean beach with a startling turquoise sea. A picture of a couple silhouetted by the sunset on the verge of what promised to be a meaningful kiss.
Knowing that brides-to-be were drawn to anything that hinted of weddings like a kleptomaniac to something shiny, Claire had draped white tulle around the window and had added a bouquet of silk flowers and a couple of wedding invitations. She’d then tossed a handful of rose petal confetti across everything, so it looked as if had been blown in by a soft wind. And at the bottom of the window in gold lettering it said, After the perfect wedding, the perfect honeymoon … Her post-wedding bookings had doubled since she’d opened up shop here.
She unlocked the door and stepped inside. Like many buildings in the Victorian courtyard, her shop stayed fairly cool in summer, but London was in the grip of a heatwave and this was the stickiest May on record for more than two decades. It had only been a short walk from the bus stop, but the back of her neck was already damp under her blonde bob and she could feel her tailored red shift dress sticking to her skin. Before she headed for her desk, she propped the door open to encourage fresh air to flow into the space.
She’d only just sat down in her office chair when she heard a rap on the glass of the open door. She looked up to find one of her fellow ‘wedding ghetto’ traders leaning against the jamb.
‘Hey,’ Peggy said, smiling. Today she was in all her vintage glory. Her platinum blonde hair was curled to resemble Marilyn Monroe’s and she wore a fitted pale pink dress covered with small white polka dots. The look was finished off with matching pink stilettos with spotty bows at the toes.
Claire had been friends with Peggy even before she’d rented the office in Old Carter’s Yard. It was through Peggy, who worked two doors down at Hopes & Dreams as a proposal planner, that Claire had discovered the shop space had been available to rent.
Claire smiled back. ‘Hi. Need help with a proposal?’
Peggy nodded and came and sat down in the chair opposite Claire. ‘Nicole asked me to pop down. We have a client who wants to pop the question – sunset at the top of the Eiffel Tower. That bit we can manage, but we’d like you to handle the first-class Eurostar tickets, and give us suggestions of half a dozen romantic hotels in Paris. He hasn’t got a five-star budget, but he’d like it if his fiancée-to-be didn’t guess that.’
Claire smiled. ‘I know some great little boutique hotels on the Left Bank, where you get a bit more pizazz for your euro. What sort of timescale are we looking at?’
‘Their anniversary is on the fourteenth of July. He’d like to do it then.’
‘No problem.’ Claire opened her browser and clicked through a couple of hotel websites. ‘I’ll have preliminary details to you by the beginning of next week.’
Peggy clapped her hands together and grinned. ‘You’re a star! And I’m so glad you took this office over. It’s so much more fun coming down for a visit than sending off a boring old email.’
‘I’m glad too.’ Carving a name for herself in the travel business had been hard. She needed a niche, she’d realised, and thanks to Peggy and Hopes & Dreams she’d found one. Six months after she’d started doing bookings for them she’d moved from general travel planning to concentrating on romantic trips of all kinds – proposals, honeymoons, special anniversaries.
She’d even planned a couple of holidays to help couples conceive. Okay, well, she didn’t actually help them conceive – that was up to them and God – but giving them some much-needed time together where they could relax and let nature take its course, that she could manage.
‘How about a Frappuccino?’ Peggy asked, nodding towards Sweet Nothings, the organic café and bakery just at the entrance to the yard.
Claire frowned. ‘It’s only ten past nine and you’re having a break? I thought you were supposed to be just “popping down”.’
Peggy’s smile didn’t fade one iota. ‘I’m still working,’ she said sweetly. ‘We’ll discuss the Paris trip while we slurp.’
Claire shook her head gently and considered Peggy’s temping offer. When she arrived for work in the mornings, she usually dived straight in and didn’t surface again until her stomach started to rumble, but this morning her throat was dry and a fine bead of sweat was tickling its way down between her shoulder blades. ‘Oh, go on then,’ she muttered.
Peggy sprung up from the chair, grinning harder. Then she held out her hand. It took Claire a couple of moments before she worked out what was going on. Rolling her eyes, she fumbled through her purse then dropped a ten pound note into Peggy’s hand. ‘I want change!’ she yelled after the polka-dotted figure that practically skipped out of the shop.
There can’t have been much of a queue in Sweet Nothings, she thought, because less than a minute later she sensed a presence in the doorway, hardly enough time to blend the ice, let alone dowse it in ice-cold milk and espresso. ‘I need to talk to you about the film club meeting tonight,’ she said, still looking at her computer screen. ‘How do you feel about being our new treasurer?’
A dark silhouette strode into the shop. ‘You know I’d do anything for you,’ a smooth, deep voice said.
Claire’s head snapped up.
‘Treasurer of what?’ Doug Martin asked.
Claire shook her head. ‘Nothing you’d be interested in,’ she said, laughing. She saw enough of Mr Martin as it was. ‘Sorry, I thought you were someone else.’
He took a couple of steps into the office. ‘A boyfriend kind of someone else?’
Claire fought hard to keep her denial unspoken. She pasted on her best professional smile. ‘How can I help you, Mr Martin?’
He smiled at her indulgently. ‘Doug. I thought we agreed you were going to call me Doug.’
They had. And it did feel rather old-fashioned to be talking to a customer that way. He was a nice enough man, maybe a little closer to forty than she was, with an unthreatening, slightly boyish face.
‘Okay, Doug … What can I help you with?’
He didn’t have a chance to answer, because Peggy swept back in the door, a giant Frappuccino in each hand. She took one look at Doug and stopped in her tracks. ‘Oh, sorry … Didn’t realise you had company.’
Claire shot her a ‘save me’ look. Peggy just trotted over to the desk, popped Claire’s drink down two inches to the left of a coaster and whispered so Doug couldn’t hear. ‘Not a chance. Both you and I could do with a few more Y chromosomes in our lives.’
Claire’s brow lowered. You have him then, she mouthed.
Peggy gave her a dazzling smile and headed for the door. ‘I couldn’t possibly poach a client, but you never know …’ She blew a kiss at Doug, who received it gratefully. ‘If things go well, he might be knocking on my door soon anyway.’
Claire resisted the urge to throw the fountain pen sitting on her desk at Peggy and impale her to the doorpost with it. She did not need more Y chromosomes in her life. She’d only recently got free of one man and she wasn’t about to fill his space either quickly or indiscriminately.
And, as harmless as Doug was, he just didn’t float her boat. ‘So …’ she said, turning her attention back to him, hoping he hadn’t heard their muttered conversation. ‘Where do you want to go this time?’
Doug dropped into the chair Peggy had recently vacated and looked intently at her. ‘I think an island in the South Pacific.’
Claire looked over her shoulder at the world map that sat behind