Chapter 13
Florrie had barely stirred for the rest of that afternoon, waiting on her bed behind the bolted gate up in her mezzanine for them all to clear out.
It hadn’t helped that they’d stayed for ages, and around four o’clock, when it was dark outside, the clamour had risen to such a racket she’d held a pillow over her ears.
She was sure it had been McIntyre leading the impromptu rendition of ‘Santa Claus is Comin’ to Town’.
After a while there was a lot of ordering about and sounds of things shifting, followed by the flash of a camera.
When she’d peeked over the railing to see what was going on, all the repairers had arranged themselves for a photograph with the finished Christmas light sculptures assembled before them.
McIntyre was in the middle with his arms folded for a job well done.
Rhona, she noticed, was right at the back and so tiny she couldn’t possibly be in shot at all.
It was all so very wholesome, and she couldn’t deny that she liked this strange bunch of people who seemed dedicated to making their town a better, brighter place to be. Much like Hamish.
But she hadn’t been sent here to assess if this was a good community with wholesome values and people who looked out for each other.
It wasn’t her job to quantify kindness or gauge Christmas spirit.
She wasn’t the Ghost of Christmas Present here to fix anything at all.
She was here to do her father’s bidding.
And frankly, if she’d known it was going to make her feel so pulled in every direction, she’d have stayed in Bormio flipping breakfast pancakes for the Lamontagnes.
Rhona had asked her why she had taken this posting, and the first thing that had come to mind, and the only part she could admit out loud, was to get closer to her dad.
And that was true. When his message came through that day just a few weeks ago, she’d dropped everything, told Juliette and Callixte she’d work her notice period then and there.
Florrie knew she was the very definition of daddy issues.
Parents at war always inflicted some collateral damage, and she was theirs.
First there’d been the years of her mum unhappy and disillusioned with Maxim, then there was the period where her dad never seemed to be at home, then there came the big break when she’d overheard a conversation she shouldn’t and learned that he’d bought a house overseas and was never coming home.
Soon after, her brothers followed him, studying in America and living with him, and she’d seized the chance to bask in Omma’s love and care for a while, just like her mama was.
Florrie had never really got to know the real Maxim Norheim in all this.
He’d become more of a myth than a man to her.
Now, however, she was on the brink of actually knowing him.
But there was more to it than all that. Hamish had wondered if she liked being ‘the big boss’, as he’d called her, and yes, there was something satisfying about having this degree of responsibility, of being trusted, and this line of thought peeled away another layer of her motivation.
It was something of a relief to escape her hop skip jump lifestyle around the resorts of Europe.
There was no denying this job could be the start of something more grounded, after years of running.
She’d turned thirty earlier that week, flying over the Atlantic.
Other thirty-year-olds had their lives sorted out by now, hadn’t they?
She’d seen so many of her mountain resort worker friends paired off by the end of the ski season and leave holiday temping jobs behind to live lives of domesticity and romance down at sea level.
She hadn’t envied them, as such, but there must have been a seedling of homesickness and longing that had burst into full painful bloom around about the time her mother was marrying Oskar and the only family home she’d ever known had been sold without her being there to say goodbye to it.
And then, there was no getting away from it, the money from this job was appealing.
Her dad had asked her to name her price.
She hadn’t a clue and nervously suggested three months’ of her chaleting salary.
He hadn’t even blinked before agreeing. Living itinerantly meant she had zero savings.
There was a lot to be said for a big wodge of cash hitting her bank account the week she turned thirty.
But still, so much of this just didn’t sit right. She wished she could tell her mama about it. She wished it didn’t have to be Hamish’s living she was spoiling.
Another message had only a moment ago come through from her dad while she battled with her conscience. A lone question mark demanding an answer to his previous message.
She told herself she didn’t have to hurry any of this. She had this place to herself for the whole week. She’d seen nothing whatsoever of the region yet. There might still be something she hadn’t taken into consideration.
She composed a message for her dad and sent it.
I’ll have this sewn up by Monday
And her breath stilled to see his reply appear in mere seconds.
I’m proud of you my girl
The words shone like a Christmas star on top of a tree.
A sign that the next stage of her life would take her back to Aspen and on to wherever her dad dispatched her as his representative.
It wasn’t exactly a bad feeling, except when she thought of Hamish Skelton kicking his feet on that broken-down ski chair, the way she’d found him on Wednesday morning, staring up at the mountains as though the granite peaks held the answers to all his questions.
The mountains? A thought sparked to life within her.
‘That’s it!’ There was one more question she must ask Hamish before she signed off on any report that would bring the axe down on his future.