Chapter Fourteen
Emme sat outside a bakery enjoying a chicken and avocado baguette in the chilly sunshine.
She could not stop thinking about the man from the balcony.
The man from the airport. The arrogance of him.
His burning gold-brown eyes, boring into her while he hugged the woman he had just cheated on.
Making Emme complicit. Finding it funny.
The arrogance!
She wondered who the brunette was. How long the blonde had been put-upon. She thought about what the man might be like in bed, and tried to push that thought to the back of her mind. She was getting frustrated now.
Was Tom the only decent man out there? He had always been respectful of his dates and girlfriends, and treated them well.
Emme had been on plenty of dates and seen guys too.
Dates that had turned into sex and Sunday lunch, theatre trips and dinners, but neither of them had ever had a serious partner until Chrissy.
Tom would never cheat on Chrissy like that dirty dog on the balcony.
Emme’s heart sank again, as she looked up at the church and the bells rang 3pm.
Time to go back to the apartment.
She needed to unpack, she needed to settle in.
Emme wound through Kristalldorf and up the hill, getting hotter with each step in her fluoro coat and multitude of layers.
The man on the balcony had stirred something inside her.
The image of his hard-on in his boxers made her feel flustered.
She thought about the empty apartment, and wondered whether to spend her first Saturday night watching a movie, or perhaps she would have another bath and finish herself off.
That guy. His molten eyes. His electric smile. His cock.
Inside the apartment, Emme finished unpacking, familiarised herself with the schoolbag station, the fridge and list of all the foods the kids liked to eat, and looked over the notes she had made.
Harry goes to bed at 8pm; Bella at 7.30pm.
Bella likes to listen to audiobooks; Harry needs ambient music and sounds of nature to drift off.
Harry is a fussy eater; Bella is more gung-ho.
After rereading her notes Emme settled down to watch some TV, except she couldn’t find the TV, let alone work out how to turn it on.
A loud buzz sounded from the system by the front door and made Emme jump.
Shit.
She looked at the video screen by the front door but couldn’t see anyone.
She opened the door. No one. It was someone downstairs, she could hear chatter on ground level.
They’d probably pressed the wrong button.
Emme closed the door and continued her hunt for the TV – Lexy had said the children were allowed to watch cartoons when they had performed their ablutions so there must be one.
The door buzzed again and Emme tentatively pressed the button with a microphone symbol on it.
‘Hello?’
‘Hey!’
Emme recognised the voice.
‘Cat?’
‘Are you gonna let us in or what?’
Emme wasn’t sure where friends stood in the Harrington house rules. Lexy and Bill didn’t allow overnight visitors of course, but they hadn’t specified whether the nanny was allowed to have friends over. But it wasn’t like she’d invited her, or planned a party or anything.
‘Emme?’
‘Sorry. I’ll buzz you in, come up!’
Emme pressed what she thought was the button to release the downstairs door but she couldn’t hear any movement. The buzzer on the intercom sounded again.
‘Still here!’ Cat chimed.
‘Shit, sorry. How’s this?’ Emme tried another button with a key on it, opened the oak front door of the Harrington home again and leaned over the balustrade. The intercom inside buzzed again.
‘Still here …’
‘I’ll come down!’ she said, cursing as the door swung closed behind her, before remembering she didn’t need a key.
Deep breath.
It was OK. Lexy had told her the upstairs video entry recorded without sound. Emme still had a chance of being Mary Poppins and not Mary Pottymouth.
Emme hurried downstairs, giving her reflection a cursory glance in one of the stairwell windows as she went.
She fluffed her soft chestnut hair. It was usually glossy and smooth but looked a little frizzy in the altitude.
Why was she worrying? Cat wasn’t one of these women who had to have their hair blow-dried to perfection that she’d seen around town.
As she reached the ground floor a nervousness fizzed in her stomach. She definitely hadn’t expected to see Cat at Chalet Stern only a day after meeting her.
‘Hey Catalina!’ she said, as casually as she could. Next to her stood a beautiful man with rich brown hair that bounced in curls on top of his head and a sweet, shy smile.
‘Please,’ she frowned. ‘Call me Cat!’ Then she remembered her manners. ‘This is Tiago.’
‘Nice to meet you,’ Emme said with a smile, and beckoned them in.
‘My family are away …’ Emme said cautiously, as she led them up the stairs.
‘Yeah, the Borromeo wedding. The Kivvis are there too. Everyone who’s anyone in this town is there today.’ She let out an acerbic giggle.
Emme punched in the code and let them all in.
‘Well this is a nice surprise, thanks for coming by.’
Cat strode in confidently and looked around the capacious living room. Tiago looked dreamily out to the balcony, as if the Silberschnee were luring him. Emme tried not to sweat that they hadn’t taken off their shoes.
‘It’s T’s only night off, like, probably all season, isn’t it?’ Cat turned to him.
Tiago nodded, his face earnest as he ate an apple he’d brought.
‘So we’re going out … you coming to party?’ Cat looked to the corridor beyond Emme’s shoulder to check the kids weren’t about.
‘Yeah, erm, I don’t know, I was going to …’ she trailed off. She was going to spend the evening trying to find the bloody television.
Tiago returned to the kitchen area and jumped up to sit on the thick worktop; Cat examined the appliances.
‘Nice …’ she said appreciatively, gliding a finger along the Gaggenau oven. ‘Clearly never used.’
Emme smiled as if to say that’s about right, but also had a feeling that house guests sitting on the kitchen surface, banging their trainers together like balls in a Newton’s cradle, might be frowned upon.
Emme thought it might be a good idea to go out as soon as they could.
She looked at the clock on the slick oven, almost 5pm.
‘So what’s the plan?’ she asked with a new sense of enthusiasm. She was here to start a new life, and she needed to push herself out of her comfort zone.
‘Well Tiago can get us dinner at the Steinherrhof …’
Emme thought this was presumptuous, but noted Tiago nodded genially.
‘Then there’s live music in Down Mexico Way.’
‘Perfect. What do I wear?’ Emme was mentally going through her wardrobe.
Cat turned around, appraising Emme. She was wearing jeans, a white T-shirt, and a thick Breton-striped rollneck jumper. Cat and Tiago wore jeans and ski coats. Emme thought they made a cute couple, all chocolate eyes, off-duty snowboard wear and beautiful olive skin.
‘You’re fine,’ Cat concluded. ‘It’s very casual here.’
‘OK great, I’ll just grab my purse and a lip balm.’