Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-Four
T he cul-de-sac lined with large, detached houses came as yet another surprise. Previously, Anna had had a vague notion of where Warren lived, but this wasn’t at all what she’d had in mind.
“I thought you said your place was small,” she remarked when he parked in the driveway of the furthest house.
“It is,” he replied, pulling the handbrake on. “This is my neighbour’s house.”
“Which one’s yours?” She looked at the houses on either side. “They all look pretty impressive to me.”
He didn’t reply but reached for the bag on the back seat, then stepped out of the car. “Come on.”
Curiously, she followed him up the drive to the front door, which opened when he got close.
“I thought I heard your car,” the elderly lady said. Her eyes flicked behind Warren and landed on Anna. “Oh, hello.”
“This is Anna,” he said. “Lewis’s sister.”
“Hello, dear.” She offered her hand, then clasped Anna’s hand in both of hers. “I’m Edith, but call me Edie.”
“Hi,” Anna said. “Lovely to meet you. ”
“I’m going to have dinner with Anna,” Warren told her. “So I’ll just drop yours off when I’ve warmed it up. I’d have called and let you know, but it was a last-minute plan.”
“Don’t worry about me. I can rustle something up for myself.”
“It’s no problem,” he said. “I’ll bring it over in a bit.”
“If you’re sure.”
“Of course. I can’t have you fading away. If you pop your clogs, I’ll end up homeless.”
Her eyes brightened as she beamed. “He likes to tease me,” she said to Anna. “But I can’t complain because he looks after me.”
“I’ll bring dinner over in ten minutes,” he said with a grin. “You can do one of your brain training exercises while you wait. Got to keep that mind sharp!”
Edie swatted a hand at him, but he dodged out of the way. “See what I mean about the teasing,” she said to Anna, but looked entirely amused.
Warren beckoned to Anna with a flick of his chin, and she followed him around the side of the house.
“Edie is my landlady and my neighbour,” he said, moving the shopping bag to his other hand and pulling a set of keys from his pocket.
When he stopped at the door on the side of the garage, Anna failed to hide her confusion. “Where are we going?”
“My place.” Turning, he gave her a sheepish grin. “I told you it’s nothing impressive.”
Taken aback, she remained quiet as she stepped into the converted garage.
Her eyes darted around the compact space.
In front of her, bright white kitchen units formed an L-shape around a wooden table and chairs.
To the left was a simple living space, and to the right, the bedroom door stood slightly ajar.
Presumably, the closed door beside that was the bathroom.
“It’s small,” Warren said, tossing his keys on the table .
Anna stepped further into the cosy space. “It’s cute.”
“It works for me.”
“Doesn’t the tiny kitchen drive you crazy?” she asked as he set his shopping bag on the sideboard.
“I never cook here. If I’m cooking on my day off, I do it at Edie’s place. She’s always happy to have me pottering around her kitchen.”
“She seems very sweet.” Anna smiled to herself, thinking of her earlier trepidation over the idea of Warren being so close to his neighbour.
“She’s great.” He retrieved a Tupperware container from the bag and pulled out a pan from a cupboard.
“Have you lived here the entire time you’ve worked at the hotel?”
“Yeah. To start with, it was appealing because the rent was so cheap, but then it worked out well.”
“How did you find it?” she asked, taking a seat at the table.
If it weren’t for his slight grimace, she’d have suspected he hadn’t heard her, given how long it took him to reply.
“It’s a long and slightly odd story,” he finally said.
“Now I definitely need to know.” She propped her elbows on the table and rested her chin on her interlocked fingers as she looked at him eagerly.
He pulled a face at her, then got to work transferring the stew into the pan. “Edie’s husband, John, was quite an entrepreneur. He converted the garage himself and jumped on the Airbnb bandwagon right from the start.”
He scraped the remnants of the stew out with a spatula, then gave the pot a stir before turning and leaning against the sideboard.
“I booked in for one night when I had my interview at the hotel. I didn’t know how long it would take, and I didn’t want to worry about getting back to London if it ended up being a long day.
In the end it would have been fine, but I’d booked and couldn’t cancel at the last minute, so I stayed anyway. ”
Glancing at the stew, he folded his arms across his chest. “I was just about to fall asleep when I heard someone shouting for help. I ran over to the house to find John collapsed and Edie hysterical. I waited for the ambulance with them, then drove Edie to the hospital. It turned out John had had a stroke. I ended up staying at the hospital with Edie all night. We hardly spoke, but it bonded us.”
A lump thickened Anna’s throat, and she struggled to speak. “He died?”
“Not that night. He survived the stroke, but never left the hospital. He had a second stroke a week later that killed him.”
Tears pricked at the back of Anna’s eyes, and she couldn’t think of anything to say.
“I kept in touch with Edie. We were talking on the phone every couple of days. When I told her I’d got the job and was moving to the area, she offered for me to live here.
She wasn’t keen to continue renting it to strangers without John around.
” He inhaled deeply. “I think we both expected it to be more of a short-term thing, but it just works. For both of us.”
Anna touched the corners of her eyes to catch tears. “How come I’ve never heard that story before?”
He turned to stir the stew. “I never told Lewis.”
“Why not?”
“We weren’t friends when I first came here. It felt like a weird thing to say to my new boss… like maybe he’d think I was a bad omen or something.”
It occurred to her once again that Warren really had kept his head down for the first year that he’d worked at the hotel.
Maybe it was because she was caught up in her relationship with Hayden, but she really hadn’t known Warren at all back then.
He’d only started socialising with them in the last couple of years, when he and Lewis had become closer .
“You could have told him later,” she said gently.
“I could have, but it still feels like a weird story to tell.”
“I think it’s a nice story.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Weirdo!”
“I mean, apart from the fact that Edie’s husband died. That’s not nice, but it seemed like good timing that you were here to help her, and it’s sweet how attached to you Edie is.”
“It’s mutual,” he said flatly as he took bowls from the cupboard.
After putting one portion into a bowl, he gave Anna a stern look. “Make sure the rest doesn’t burn while I take this to Edie.”
“I think I can manage that.” She beamed. “I promise not to get distracted by my phone. I don’t want you shouting at me.”
At the door, he turned back and poked his tongue out. The sparkle in his eyes made her stomach flutter riotously.
Left alone, she inhaled a full breath and fought to calm her swirling emotions.