Chapter 32
Thirty-Two
Eva arrived at Hawthorne Manor the day before the Kind-Morrison wedding for her final checks.
It was early, the hum of the air conditioning and the distant drip of the fountain the only sounds.
Eva liked it that way. She liked having the space to examine every detail without the chaos of guests, venue staff, and parents interfering.
She adjusted her clipboard under her arm, took a deep breath, and reminded herself this was just another walkthrough, another job.
And she was really good at her job. She would give Maddy a perfect day, and all she’d remember in a few years was the day she married her husband, how smoothly it all went.
The compliments from friends and family on what a wonderful day it had been.
Nothing concerning lips and massage tables.
Jen appeared suddenly, clutching a coffee. ‘Morning, boss. Ready to torture yourself with details?’ she asked, grinning.
Eva smiled dryly. ‘Let’s go.’
They moved into the banquet hall, Eva scanning the tables, imagining the flowers, the seating, the way light would spill across the guests. Jen followed, muttering over her notes, occasionally glancing at Eva as if readying herself for Eva’s inevitable discovery of a catastrophe.
But there was no catastrophe so far.
Oh no. Scratch that. Maddy was here.
She was standing at the other end of the room, in the middle of the tables, wearing an oversized brown cardigan, hair up in a quick ponytail, hands on her hips, looking around with a neutral expression. She looked great.
Seeing her there hit Eva like a jolt of electricity.
Maddy looked up, and they locked eyes over the tables. Eva almost smiled and then stopped herself. Then she realised it was weirder if she didn’t and let her mouth just get on with whatever it wanted to do.
‘Eva,’ Maddy said, smiling, her eyes filled with horror.
‘Hi, Maddy,’ Eva replied, trying to affect calm and overshooting it to the extent that she sounded slightly drunk.
‘I didn’t expect to see you here,’ Maddy said lightly, though Eva caught the tremor in her voice.
Eva forced a shrug. ‘Well, I’m contracted for a day-before walkthrough.’
‘Oh. I guess I missed that.’
‘Mm.’
A horrible silence cropped up. Maddy jumped to fill it. ‘I thought I ought to come, take an interest. I mean, more so. Obviously, I was already very interested.’ Her eyebrows shot up. ‘In my wedding.’ She was pink now. ‘I meant that I wanted to be proactive. I thought I should be.’
Eva decided to put Maddy out of her misery. ‘That’s what you pay me for,’ she said with a half-smile. ‘But we can do it together.’
Maddy nodded and gestured around the room.
‘Let’s start with the tables.’ They moved together, shoulders accidentally brushing as they walked, and the faint contact made Eva acutely aware of every detail about Maddy.
The curve of her body underneath that ludicrous and adorable cardigan, the tilt of her head, the subtle warmth radiating from her presence.
Jen trailed behind, oblivious, scribbling in her notebook.
‘Do you think the DJ will have enough space?’ Maddy asked.
Eva checked her calculations. ‘As long as he doesn’t bring his smoke machines. Which he promised not to.’
Maddy leaned in over her tablet, close enough that their shoulders brushed again. They both ignored it. ‘Have we thought about the acoustics?’ she said. ‘With all that glass, won’t the sound just bounce everywhere?’
Eva looked at her in surprise.
‘I’ve been doing some research,’ Maddy said apologetically. ‘Reading up on common, er, errors. Which, obviously, you wouldn’t make.’
‘I might,’ Eva said. She didn’t know why she’d said that. Talking up her human inclination to error wasn’t really on brand.
But of course, there were plenty of mistakes available to make, other than acoustically. If you weren’t careful.
Eva tilted her head to consider. ‘As for your question… It will, a bit,’ she said. ‘Glass throws sound back, so you can get some echo. But once the room’s full of people and furniture, it’ll settle. We just need to be sensible with speaker placement.’
Maddy nodded, satisfied. ‘Cool.’
And on they walked.
But as they reached the door of the ceremony hall, a problem was immediately obvious.
The polished wood near the far wall was a different colour from the rest of the wood, darker. The cause soon revealed itself as a drop fell from above to add to the spreading dark puddle. Then another.
Eva’s gaze lifted slowly to the ceiling. A bloom of water was pushing through the plaster.
Before she could say anything, a door banged somewhere down the corridor. Footsteps approached at a gathering speed, then a man in a Hawthorne Manor waistcoat half-ran, half-skidded into the room, clutching a toolbox. Ralph, the manager.
‘Morning. So sorry, just, er, small issue,’ Ralph said breathlessly, already dragging a bucket under the leak. ‘We’ve got it completely under control.’
Another drop hit the bucket loudly. Then another. Then a small, steady stream. Eva folded her arms.
‘I see,’ she said.
Ralph laughed a little too loudly. ‘Yes, well, these old buildings, you know how they are.’
As if on cue, there was a soft crack above them. A thin line split across the ceiling.
Maddy made a small noise. ‘Is it supposed to do that?’
‘Yes,’ Ralph said immediately. ‘Absolutely. Totally normal.’
A piece of plaster broke off and hit the floor with a wet thud. They all looked at it.
‘That,’ Eva said, very evenly, ‘does not look great.’
‘No, well,’ Ralph said, crouching to examine it as if that might help, ‘it’s… part of the process.’
‘What process?’ Maddy asked.
Ralph opened his mouth. Closed it again. ‘Umm…’
Another crack, longer this time. Water began to seep through properly now, not dripping but leaking, spreading across the ceiling. Ralph stood up quickly, wiping his hands on his already damp trousers. ‘Right. Nobody panic.’
‘Has anyone ever told you that using the word panic actually induces the feeling?’ Eva repeated.
He laughed nervously. ‘Ha, yeah. I’m just going to pop upstairs. Won’t be a moment,’ he said, already backing away.
Another chunk of plaster dropped behind him as he turned. He paused, glanced back at it, then at them, and gave a big shit-eating smile.
‘All fine,’ he said, and disappeared.
Water continued to fall, steadily now.
Maddy turned to Eva. ‘This doesn’t feel fine.’
Eva watched the spreading stain, the widening crack.
‘No,’ she said. ‘It doesn’t.’ She sighed. But it felt good. A problem to solve. Eva liked it. It made sense to her. Unlike anything else.
‘I’m on it,’ she told Maddy.
Maddy nodded. And Eva fled happily in the direction of the disaster.
***
‘So, you do have maintenance on site,’ Eva was saying to Ralph, who was standing in the large bathroom above the leak as if there could be an easy fix from this side of the problem. But there was nothing to see, not from here.
‘Yes, yes, absolutely. Barry’s been with us for years. Knows the building inside out.’
‘Does Barry know plumbing?’ Eva asked.
‘He’s very handy. What he doesn’t know, he learns quickly,’ Ralph said, walking around, pointlessly pushing his foot gingerly into various parts of the floor, looking for a weak spot with no success.
Eva closed her eyes briefly. ‘That’s not going to cut the mustard here.’
Ralph tapped a fresh spot. ‘Our usual plumber—’
‘—is on holiday,’ Eva finished. ‘Yes. I gathered that.’
Eva exhaled slowly, already reaching for her phone.
‘Right,’ she said. ‘We’re not using Barry.’
‘Well—’ the manager began, clearly about to object on financial grounds.
Eva looked up sharply. ‘Do you want this fixed properly, or do you want a recurring issue that destroys your ceiling the night before a wedding?’
‘Errr…’
Eva scrolled through her contacts, found the number, and hit call. It rang once.
‘What’s busted?’ asked Sue.
Eva turned slightly away, pacing as she spoke. ‘Pipe failure in a ceiling cavity. Bathroom above a function room. Active leak, plaster compromised. I need it isolated, repaired, and signed off today.’
Sue whistled softly. ‘Love a dramatic one. Location?’
Eva gave the details. ‘How fast can you get here?’ she asked.
‘Forty minutes.’
‘Good.’
‘And Eva?’ Sue added. ‘This is not a cheap call-out.’
Eva glanced at Ralph. ‘Why would you be cheap?’ Eva asked. ‘You’re a miracle worker. Send the invoice to the venue,’ she said, hanging up.
Ralph laughed nervously. ‘We’ll discuss that…’ he started.
‘No,’ Eva said. ‘We won’t. You have a structural issue in a booked event space less than twenty-four hours before a wedding. The emergency plumber is not optional. Unless you’d like to explain to your clients why their reception is happening under a tarpaulin.’
Ralph nodded with the air of a man accepting defeat. ‘Fine.’
Eva gave a single, satisfied nod. ‘Good choice.’
Crisis mode. Her natural habitat.