Chapter 9
Peter
“This is unacceptable.”
I wake with a dead arm, a stiff neck and Mandy leaning over me like a woman about to deliver bad news in a consulting room.
For several seconds, I have no idea where I am.
The ceiling is wrong. The pillow smells faintly of lavender and Mandy’s shampoo. My belt is digging into my hip because I am, for reasons that return to me in a slow and deeply inconvenient order, fully dressed on top of her duvet.
Cottage pie.
Wine.
Nairobi.
Karim apologising to an entire aircraft in three languages.
Mandy’s hand in mine.
Her moving closer.
Me telling myself I would leave in five minutes, then treating five minutes as an ambitious opening offer.
I blink at her. “Good morning to you too.”
“You stayed.”
“So did you.”
“I live here.”
“Strong point.”
She is already awake, hair flattened on one side and sticking up slightly at the back, and I find the whole thing far too endearing.
I am in trouble.
Not the fun kind involving kitchen counters, missing buttons and bad decisions. This is worse. This is waking in a woman’s bed, after no sex at all, and realising I am reluctant to move in case I disturb the shape of the morning.
Deeply inconvenient.
Mandy looks down at herself, then at me. “We are still dressed.”
“Very mature of us.”
“Disturbing.”
“I feel we should be praised.”
“I feel we have upset the natural order.”
I smile. “Usually I would blame you, but I think the cottage pie has to take some responsibility.”
“You brought it.”
“I brought ingredients. You helped create it.”
She shifts onto her back, stretching her arms above her head. The movement pulls her top tight across her stomach and does absolutely nothing to help the sudden and enthusiastic interest my body has taken in the situation.
Mandy turns her head towards me. “We need to restore balance.”
The words land exactly where she aims them.
I lift an eyebrow. “Doctor’s orders?”
“Absolutely.”
“What treatment are we recommending?”
“Dick time.”
I laugh.
I cannot help it. The woman is lying beside me with creased clothes, messy hair and a face far too serious for the phrase dick time.
Her mouth twitches. “Do not laugh. This is a clinical intervention.”
“I would never question a doctor.”
“Wise.”
I roll onto my side, ignoring the protest from my dead arm, and lean over her. “To clarify, the prescription is sex before breakfast?”
“Breakfast is too domestic.”
“And dinner was what?”
“A nutritional error.”
“Delicious nutritional error.”
“Still under review.”
I dip my head and kiss the corner of her mouth. “I am very committed to your recovery.”
“You had better be.”
She reaches up, hooks a hand into my shirt and pulls me down.
The kiss starts with laughter still caught between us, but it does not stay there.
Mandy opens her mouth beneath mine, and the room seems to tighten around the sound she makes when my hand slides to her waist. Morning light filters through the curtains.
The house is quiet. Her bed is warm beneath us.
No hurry.
Then the doorbell rings.
We both freeze.
Mandy pulls back first. “No.”
The bell rings again.
“Yes,” I whisper.
Her eyes narrow. “Do not find this funny.”
“I am not.”
“You are smiling.”
“It is a stress response.”
“You are a terrible liar.”
Her phone starts buzzing on the bedside table.
We both look at it.
Alexandra.
My smile disappears.
Mandy closes her eyes. “Absolutely not.”
The phone stops.
For three seconds, there is silence.
Then it starts again.
Mandy snatches it up and looks at the screen as if she can diagnose it with something fatal. She does not answer.
Through the window, faint but clear, my sister’s voice carries up from the path.
“Her car’s here.”
Another voice says something I cannot make out. Male. Polite.
Old cottages are romantic until you are trapped half-dressed upstairs and discover they have the acoustic privacy of a biscuit tin.
Mandy looks at me.
I look at her.
Downstairs, Alexandra says, “I’ll try her again.”
Mandy jabs the screen before it can ring a third time. “Hi.”
Her voice is light.
Too light.
The voice of a woman trying to sound as if she has not been horizontal beneath my body less than a minute ago.
Alexandra’s reply is loud enough for me to hear the shape of it even through the phone. “I’m outside your house.”
“Yes,” Mandy says. “I gathered.”
“Are you all right?”
“Fine.”
“You did not answer the door.”
“I was upstairs.”
I put a hand over my mouth.
This is not the time to laugh.
It is absolutely not the time to laugh.
“I brought Mark,” Alexandra says.
Mandy’s gaze cuts to mine.
I shake my head, as if I have any authority over this situation.
“Mark,” she repeats.
“For the cooking lesson.”
“Cooking lesson.”
“The one I told you about.”
“You mentioned the possibility.”
“I said Sunday morning.”
Mandy closes her eyes again. “Did you?”
“Yes.”
“I may have filed that under things you were threatening rather than arranging.”
There is a pause.
Then Alexandra says, “Are you letting us in?”
Mandy looks at me properly now.
At my creased shirt. My bare feet. The very obvious fact that I am in her bedroom, nowhere near my boots, my jacket or any acceptable explanation.
“Give me one minute,” she says.
She ends the call.
For one second, neither of us moves.
Then she shoves me.
“Ow.”
“Move.”
“I am moving.”
“You are not moving fast enough.”
“I still have a dead arm.”
“You are about to have a dead everything if she finds you.”
That gets me upright.
Mandy throws the duvet towards the end of the bed as if it has offended her personally. “Stay here.”
“That is the entire plan?”
“Yes.”
“What about my boots?”
“Where are they?”
“Kitchen.”
“Jacket?”
“Also kitchen, I think.”
“Peter.”
“I did not anticipate a morning inspection.”
“It is half past nine.”
“Still aggressive.”
She points at the bedroom door. “Do not come downstairs.”
“I had not planned to stroll into brunch.”
“And be quiet.”
“I am famously discreet.”
She gives me a look.
Fair.
Then she hurries out and pulls the bedroom door almost closed behind her.
I hear her feet on the stairs, quick and careful. A cupboard opens downstairs. Something thuds. The front door latch clicks.
Mandy is hiding evidence.
My boots, presumably.
Possibly my jacket.
Possibly the entire concept of me.
The front door opens.
“Sorry,” Mandy says. “I was just upstairs.”
“So you said,” Alexandra replies.
“I hope this is not too early,” Mark says.
Bless him. He sounds genuinely apologetic.
“No, not at all,” Mandy says, in the same voice people use when a medical procedure is about to hurt. “Come in.”
Footsteps cross the kitchen.
I ease the bedroom door open half an inch.
Pointless, really. I can already hear everything. These old cottages may have stone walls, but inside they carry sound like village gossip. Every cupboard door, every footstep, every sentence travels straight through the floorboards with the enthusiasm of a postman on pension day.
“I did say Sunday,” Alexandra says.
“I am sure you did,” Mandy replies.
“You forgot.”
“I may have not remembered.”
“That is the definition of forgot.”
“It sounds harsher when you say it.”
Mark gives a small laugh. “Honestly, I am happy to come back another time.”
“No,” Alexandra says. “We are here now.”
Mandy makes a sound.
It is small.
It is controlled.
It is also unmistakably furious.
I press my knuckles to my mouth.
Downstairs, they move into the kitchen.
My stomach sinks.
The cottage pie.
We had left the remaining half in the dish on the worktop, covered with cling film because we were too full, too warm and too busy pretending lying fully dressed on her bed meant nothing.
Mark says, “Oh, that looks good.”
I close my eyes.
Alexandra says, “What does?”
“The cottage pie.”
A silence opens beneath me.
I can feel Mandy searching for a lie and finding only cutlery.
“Thank you,” she says.
Alexandra’s voice changes at once. “You made cottage pie?”
“Yes.”
“You.”
“Yes.”
“Made cottage pie.”
“That is what I said.”
“You once burnt soup.”
“It was more complicated than it looked.”
“It was tomato soup.”
“It caught.”
“It was from a tin.”
Mark, poor doomed man, says, “The mash has browned nicely. Good texture on top.”
I look towards the ceiling.
Mandy says, “Thank you.”
“Can I try some?”
“It’s cold.”
“That's okay.”
There is a brief clink of cutlery against the dish.
“Nice balance,” Mark adds. “The Worcestershire sauce gives it depth.”
“Depth,” Mandy repeats.
Alexandra’s silence becomes so sharp I can almost hear it slicing through the kitchen.
I need help.
Unfortunately, the only available help is Hunter, who will enjoy this enough to be insufferable.
I find my phone in my pocket and tap his name.
He answers on the fourth ring. “Peter, unless Morton Hall is on fire, this is poor timing.”
I whisper, “I need you to call Mark.”
A pause.
“Our Mark?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because he is in Mandy’s kitchen. And Lexi is there too.”
Another pause.
A much better one, from his point of view.
“Why are you whispering about Mark being in Mandy’s kitchen?”
“Because I am in Mandy’s bedroom.”
Silence.
Then Hunter says, “I am going to treasure this moment for the rest of my life.”
“We do not have time for treasuring.”
“Oh, we do. We absolutely do.”
“Hunter.”
“You are in Mandy’s bedroom.”
“Yes.”
“While Mark is in Mandy’s kitchen.”
“Yes.”
“With Alexandra.”
“Yes.”
“Are you dressed?”
“Yes…ish.”
“Shoes?”
“No.”
“I knew it.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“Because if you had shoes, you would already be halfway out of a window.”
I glance towards the window.
He is not wrong.
“Can you help or not?”
“I can. I am deciding how much to enjoy it first.”
“Quickly.”
Downstairs, Alexandra says, “When did you make this?”
“Last night,” Mandy says.
“With what?”
“Ingredients.”
I close my eyes again.
“Hunter! Call Mark,” I whisper shout.
“What is the emergency?” I can hear the grin in his voice. He is enjoying this.
“I do not care.”
“You should. A bad emergency creates suspicion.”
“You are very calm for a man whose best friend is about to be discovered.”
“I am not the one without shoes.”
“Hunter.”
“All right.” He pauses. “Kitchen problem?”
“Yes.”
“At the hotel?”
“Obviously.”