AT HALF PAST six in the morning the beach was deserted, apart from a few joggers and an early-morning dog-walker. After a hot, sticky night, the breeze from the sea was refreshing.
‘You look like something the tide washed in...’
Euan Scott dropped into the faded deckchair that was set out, waiting for him. The temptation to close his eyes was almost irresistible. ‘Yeah, I know. If it’s any consolation, I feel...’
‘Worse?’ Canvas and wood creaked alarmingly as David Watson leaned across from his own deckchair, and swept Euan’s face with an assessing gaze. ‘What happened?’
‘One of the kids from the clinic, Kirsty...’ Euan blinked, trying to drive the picture of Kirsty’s golden hair and blue lips from his mind. ‘She took an overdose yesterday.’
David shook his head. ‘How is she?’
‘Hanging on. Her heart stopped three times and she’s had intercranial bleeding. Her parents are with her.’
‘Dammit. And she was doing so well...’
Euan didn’t want to think about that. He didn’t want to think about how Kirsty might be, either, when she woke. If she woke.
‘Yeah.’ He scrubbed his hand across his face, trying to banish those thoughts. There were other kids who needed him, and he couldn’t afford to fall apart over just one of them. ‘So what’s on the agenda for this week?’
‘First thing is you go home and get some sleep.’
‘What about the Monday morning meeting?’ Euan nodded towards the sea in front of them. ‘The boardroom’s all set up...’
The two directors of the Driftwood Drugs Initiative hardly saw each other during the week, David doing what he did best, raising funds and keeping everything running, and Euan working with their clients. The Monday morning meeting was the only uninterrupted time they got together and it was so sacrosanct that it didn’t even take place in the office. When the weather was bad they were the first customers in the coffee shop by the pier, and when the sun shone they adjourned to the beach.
David shrugged. ‘My side of things is fine. Your side needs some sleep.’ He closed his laptop with an air of finality and slipped it into his bag. ‘Any other business?’
There probably was, but it was dancing somewhere in the haze of fatigue that seemed to have suddenly blown in from the sea and Euan couldn’t pin it down. ‘Not that I can think of.’
‘Right, then. Mel’s on duty today, she’ll deal with anything that comes in, and I’ll see you in the office at lunchtime.’
‘What’s happening at lunchtime?’
‘The software guy’s coming down from London, remember? To demonstrate his program.’
Euan could happily pass on that one in favour of another hour in bed and a very late breakfast. ‘Do you need me? This is your baby.’
‘That’s why I need you there. I’m sold on the idea, it’s you who needs convincing.’
This morning wasn’t exactly the time. But he’d promised David he’d give the software a fair evaluation, and he wouldn’t go back on that. ‘Okay. I’ll be there at twelve.’
‘Half eleven. And wear something suitable.’ David grinned at him.
‘Suit and tie?’
‘You possess such a thing?’
Euan shrugged. ‘Maybe. Somewhere.’
David chuckled, rising from his deckchair and folding it. ‘In that case, just don’t wear shorts. I want to impress this guy that we’re a bona fide organisation, and that we’ll be a good place for him to launch his software.’
‘I can type in shorts. I do it all the time...’ Euan broke off, laughing, as David shot him a glare. ‘Okay. Half past eleven. Showered, shaved and without the shorts.’
* * *
At ten to twelve Euan sat in the large, bright room that doubled up as David’s office and the meeting room. The door had been firmly closed to indicate that they were unavailable, and the window was wide open in an attempt to dissipate some of the midsummer heat.
‘Maya’s going to bring the coffee...’ They’d spent twenty minutes going over their requirements, and now David was fiddling with the chairs that stood around the conference table.
Euan batted a fly that had found its way into the room and it shot upwards, buzzing around the ceiling. ‘We’re a charity. We throw our money at our work, not our office accommodation.’
David eyed the fly as if it had the capacity to spoil all of his arrangements single-handedly. Footedly. Whatever. Euan reached for the newspaper on the desk beside him, waited for his chance and swatted it. ‘Look, you know this isn’t really my thing. But I’ve said I’ll back you all the way on it, and I will. If this guy isn’t right for us, we’re not just going to forget about the computer project, we’ll find someone else.’
The phone rang and Euan hooked it from its cradle. ‘Yeah, Maya...’
‘Sam Lockyear in Reception for you...’
‘Thanks. Send him up. I don’t suppose you could bring some coffee, could you?’ He could do with something to dispel the lingering fuzz in his brain.
A stifled giggle sounded down the phone and Euan wondered what was so funny about coffee. ‘I’ll bring some with the sandwiches in half an hour.’
David sprang into action. This was what he did best, and Euan knew he’d have little to do in the next couple of hours other than to think of a couple of questions to ask and try to look interested in the answers. David would steer the meeting effortlessly from the moment he met their guest at the top of the stairs to the final handshake.
‘Sam, meet Euan, my co-director here.’ If David felt as wrong-footed as Euan suddenly did, he gave no sign of it.
‘Pleased to meet you.’ The woman smiled and held out her hand. A small, perfectly manicured hand, which, when he grasped it in a momentary handshake, turned out to feel as soft as it looked. A subtle waft of scent, which couldn’t be anything other than expensive, assaulted his senses and the room began to spin.
Her suit was unmistakeably designer, although Euan wasn’t really up on these things. She would have fitted in effortlessly in any business gathering, from a top-level meeting to corporate entertainment. But fitting in was clearly not what she wanted. No one wore that shade of red unless they wanted to stand out from the crowd.
She sat down quickly, as if she took it for granted that the men would wait for her to take a seat before they did and didn’t want to keep them standing. Another practised smile, and then she slid a laptop from her bag, along with two small tablets.
‘Thanks for coming.’ David was about to go into the standard spiel about what Driftwood did, and Euan stared at the ceiling. It was that or look straight at her, and that was strangely unsettling.
‘It’s good to be here. I’ve been reading about your work with a lot of interest.’
‘Yes?’ David was well versed with this kind of interview, and he called her bluff.
‘The Driftwood Drugs Initiative.’ She paused. ‘Any particular reason for the name?’
‘When