‘And you,’ she hesitated unsure how to put it. ‘Undoing Ed’s shorts in the cabin when your new husband was on the boat; what was that all about?’
‘Go on,’ Ed said to Catherine. ‘You may as well spit it out.’
Izzy listened while Catherine admitted to having been in love with Ed since they kissed as teenagers. ‘He’s never seen me as anything other than some sort of cousin though,’ she narrowed her eyes and smiled at him. ‘Have you, spoilsport?’
‘Get on with it,’ Ed said, shaking his head and giving Izzy a reassuring smile.
‘I got into a bit of trouble, but I’m not sharing the details with you. Ed helped me out and I’d never intentionally hurt him. The cabin thing was me being an idiot and he told me off in no uncertain terms.’
‘Fine,’ Izzy said. ‘But why are you so antagonistic towards Marie? I know I am now, but what’s she done to you?’
Catherine closed her eyes as if trying to refrain from losing her temper. ‘She’s set her sights on my father and when I came back this time I could tell she’d been working on him, because he was far more interested in her than he’s ever been before. I’m not having that cow involved with him.’
Izzy could completely understand her reasoning, especially now she’d witnessed what Marie was capable of. ‘I think you’re right to send her packing,’ she said. ‘We’re going to have to ensure she makes amends for the stock she’s ruined, not to mention pay for the damage to the marquee; I don’t see why we should claim through our insurance for what she’s done.’
‘Too right,’ Jess said from the doorway. ‘I don’t mind her having her mega-tantrum, but the cow is going to pay for it.’
Izzy agreed. ‘I think we’re going to have a bit of a battle on our hands to resolve this, but we won’t back down.’ She looked at Catherine. ‘Marie’s incredibly manipulative and I think your father has had a lucky escape from her. She would only cause him grief in the long run.’
‘My sentiments entirely,’ Catherine agreed. ‘You had a lucky escape when she dumped you, Ed, and thinking about it, maybe that was when she’d decided to make a play for my father.’
‘Thinking back, I guess it must have suited her to have me out of the way on the trip, because while I was here he wouldn’t get involved with her out of respect to me.’
‘Exactly,’ Catherine said. ‘Then you went and spoilt it all by racing back here from the yacht, chasing after Izzy.’
Izzy liked this other side to Catherine. She was relieved she and Jess had been wrong about someone so close to Ed. Not that there was any future for them, however much she and Ed might be in love with each other.
‘And now you’re going back to live at the château anyway,’ Izzy said miserably. She was vaguely aware of Catherine and Jess leaving the room. She looked across at Ed to see he was watching her. ‘What are we going to do?’ she asked.
‘I’ve been trying to figure that out,’ he said, taking her in his arms. Holding her tightly against his chest, she could feel his heartbeat against her face. ‘I love you, Izzy. I don’t want to lose you, but I need to go back and help my parents and you look like you have a lot to contend with now where your business is concerned. You’ve worked so hard to build this up,’ he said frowning. ‘If you need me to help in any way with Marie, you must let me know.’
She put her arms tightly around his waist. ‘I will,’ she said. ‘About you returning to France and me staying here in Jersey, it’s a bit of a dilemma, isn’t it?’ she said. Tears were welling up in her eyes.
He lifted her chin gently with his finger, so she had to look at him.
‘You’re crying,’ he said, bending to kiss her.
‘I’m not,’ she lied.
‘Listen, Iz,’ he said, holding her by the shoulders. ‘I know it isn’t perfect, but neither of us can back out of our obligations. We’re committed to other people right now, you to Lapins de Lune, and me to my father and the château.’ He smiled at her. ‘But I’m only in France and your island is only fifteen miles off the French coast.’
‘True. But we’ll still be apart.’
‘But Izzy, catching the ferry from St Helier to St Malo to spend a few days together is nothing. It only takes seventy minutes to get there and after a ten-minute walk to the train station you’ll have and an hour and a half on a train to the station near the château.’
‘But if it’s such a quick trip why arrange for Jess and I to be collected in Paris, rather than take a train to the station near your home?’ It didn’t make sense.
‘Because it was Bastille Day,’ Ed explained. ‘The usual rail trip you’d have taken to get there was fully booked up.’
‘Oh, I see.’ It had been incredibly busy wherever they’d gone on that day, she recalled. She thought about it. Her mother used to go to lunch in London some days with Alex’s dad, and that was further. ‘Sounds OK,’ she said, warming to the idea.
He smiled, happy with her reaction. ‘If I come to you here when I have a quiet couple of days and you come to see me when you can, we could spend a fair amount of time together.’
His expression was filled with hope that she’d agree. It didn’t take her long to nod enthusiastically.
He lifted her by the waist and swung her round, kissing her as he lowered her feet back onto the ground again.
‘We’re actually going to do this, aren’t we?’ she asked laughing and knowing the answer already.
He nodded. ‘We are. You can stay here with me in the cottage when I’m in Jersey and at the château when you’re in France, that way we won’t get in Jess’s way when I’m over.’
They heard the van horn bursting into life several times. ‘I think Jess has had enough of waiting for me,’ Izzy laughed, leaning into him and breathing in the freshly showered smell of his body.
He held her tightly to him. ‘I think we’d better go before she interrupts Catherine’s rant to her father.’
‘Yes, good point.’
They walked around the corner to the van.
‘Hurry up, I want to get home and change.’ Jess stared from one to the other of them and shook her head slowly. ‘I might have guessed. If you can put him down for long enough, we can go home. I need an early night. I’m dying here.’
Ed laughed and opened the passenger door, holding it while Izzy stepped in and opened the window down fully. He leaned in and gave her a kiss, then looked across at Jess. ‘Funny that.’
‘What?’ she asked, half-glancing at Izzy.
‘Roman called me earlier and told me he was picking you up at seven thirty.’
Izzy gasped. ‘Jess?’ Izzy said, taken aback at this turn of events. ‘What about my brother?’
Ed winked at her. ‘It appears she’s decided to go out with mine instead.’
Jess laughed. ‘I like Alex, but I realised that it could make things difficult having a relationship with my best friend and business partner's brother.’ Izzy widened her eyes. ‘Imagine if we fell out, it could make things uncomfortable between us.’
Izzy pushed Jess’s shoulder. ‘Well, I appreciate it.’
‘Yes,’ said Ed, ‘now can we agree that I’ll pick you up in two hours?’
Izzy thought back to their enjoyable time the night before that had gone by far too quickly. ‘Yes, I think that’s a great idea.’ She leaned out of the window and grabbing him around the neck, pulled him to her and kissed him hard on his smiling mouth. ‘I’ll see you very soon.’
Still not the end…
A Jersey Bombshell
The Jersey Scene, Book Four
Georgina Troy
Chapter One
Daisy
‘It’s true, chocolate can kill you.’
Daisy shook her head as she stood outside trying not to take any notice of Fi’s chatter. She waved goodbye to two of their guests as the taxi drove them away cheered as she always was by the pristine white building that her boss had referred to as looking like a block of ice cream. To her it looked like a softl
y curved ship standing proudly at the top of the driveway. It spoke to her of history and Jersey between the wars and happy days filled with sunshine like the old 1930s posters she’d seen hanging up in the back office.
She smiled taking in the elegant white building with its Marine Blue thick stripe painted across the entire length of the frontage just above the second floor windows and its narrower triple stripes at either end. She loved this place with its history and what it meant to so many people in the island and those that visited.
‘I promise you, I’m right. Daisy, are you listening to me?’
She held back a groan and walked back inside returning to sit at her desk. Daisy glanced at the large, geometric clock behind her at the minimalist reception in the hotel in Jersey. She was determined to finish reconciling the hotel bookings before the end of her shift. Her boss needed to know where the hotel stood so alternative plans could be made. The unexpected fire in the orangery had come at the worst possible time, losing the owners money at the height of the season when they’d had to pass several parties out to other establishments.
‘You don’t believe me, do you?’ Fi added.
Daisy frowned. ‘Sorry?’ She tried not to ask her younger, bubbly colleague what she was going on about and focused on the screen in front of her. Her resolve lasted all of ninety seconds. ‘Oh, go on then, tell me.’
Fi giggled. ‘I knew you couldn’t resist any mention of chocolate.’
Daisy laughed. ‘You can talk. At least I only eat one bar at a time; you buy a family pack and wolf the lot down,’ she said looking in amazement at girl who must be at least five feet ten in height but remained skinny. She’d heard from other members of staff that Fi’s brother, Sebastian Fielding, was a hugely successful local business man, who was also very tall, so height obviously ran in their family.
‘So?’
Daisy turned her gaze on her assistant. ‘It must be in your genes, because you should be stones heavier than you are with what you consume in a day.’
Fi opened her mouth to speak, when a whirlwind in the form of Mrs Grey, the eighty-something co-owner of the hotel, pushed back the double black lacquered front doors and raced in. Daisy had grown very fond of Lydia since she’d begun working at The Encore. Although the huge white ship-like hotel was mostly run by Lydia’s daughter, Francesca, and son-in-law, Rick, both of them spent several months a year working away and Lydia always stepped in to oversee things in their absence. Despite her age, Mrs Grey had more energy than most people Daisy knew, and the older lady never ceased to amaze her.
‘Has he arrived yet?’
Daisy and Fi exchanged confused glances.
‘Who, Mrs Grey?’ Daisy asked, hoping she hadn’t missed a booking. She was usually vigilant about these things. She studied her computer screen, trying not to panic.
Lydia Grey rested her fine bejewelled fingers on top of the reception desk. ‘My grandson Gabriel, dear,’ she said. ‘He was supposed to be arriving in Jersey just after lunch time, but he hasn’t been to the house yet.’
‘Gabriel? Coming home?’ Fi smiled so widely, Daisy could see every tooth in her mouth. ‘He hasn’t been home for ages.’
Hearing the unusual name mentioned Daisy had to focus on not conjuring up the image of a man with the same name she’d met and fallen in love with in Vietnam when she’d been travelling two years before. She knew he was from Jersey, but his work kept him well away from the island. It was why she’d felt comfortable coming to work at this beautiful place two months before.
Lydia Grey sighed. ‘Ten months, just over,’ she said, twisting her gold watch around her slim wrist to check the time. ‘We’ve spoken on the laptop he bought me a few times and he sends me postcards and the occasional letter, but now the hotel’s had this fire trouble, and his parents have to go away on tour, Francesca has asked him to come home for a few months and help out.’
Daisy tried to picture her flamboyant actress boss, Francesca Fiore, as the mother of the Gabriel she knew. No, they didn’t look alike at all. She thought of Francesca’s equally extrovert American husband, Rick Malone, but his bright blue eyes were nothing like those of the man she’d loved in Vietnam. Anyway, she consoled herself, her Gabe’s last name was Wilson.
‘Where has he been, Mrs Grey?’ Daisy asked, relieved that the two couldn’t be connected or that she hadn’t messed up any bookings. She’d heard the older lady talking several times about her grandson but knew nothing about him other than that his grandmother doted on him and when he was in Jersey he stayed with her.
‘He’s a marine explorer,’ Mrs Grey said, her eyes shining with barely concealed pride.
‘A …’ Daisy couldn’t manage to say the words. The name Gabriel was unusual enough, but surely there couldn’t be many of them who were also marine explorers? Her heart pounded and her ears rang.
Mrs Grey must have misunderstood her confusion and said, ‘Essentially he identifies and collects new species of corals, fish, or whatever their current project is in aid of, in different waters around the world and works to secure protection of them. It’s a very worthwhile job.’
‘Oh,’ Daisy said unable to think of anything more intelligent to say.
Fi gasped and clamped her left hand on Daisy’s wrist, squeezing so tightly Daisy felt it growing numb. ‘He’s here, Mrs Grey,’ Fi squealed, pointing outside. ‘Look. He’s getting out of the pool.’
Mrs Grey’s ice-blue eyes widened, and she turned and hurried outside. ‘Darling, darling boy,’ they heard her calling as both girls stared after her.
Fi let go of Daisy’s wrist and ran to the door to watch. ‘Look, Daisy,’ she whispered. ‘Isn’t he gorgeous? My friends and I used to call him Angel Gabriel, because he’s so lush. And to think he’ll be working here, with us.’ She waved Daisy over to join her without taking her eyes off the figure in the pool.
Daisy watched, her breathing shallow, as the swimmer spotted his grandmother walking towards him and his mouth drew back into a wide smile. He grabbed a towel from a nearby sun lounger and shook his head, sending a shower of droplets around him as he walked towards her.
‘I’ve seen him in the pool before,’ Fi said breathlessly. ‘Those tight muscles, that gorgeous bum. He’s so hot.’
Daisy clenched her pencil so tightly she snapped it in half. He looked like some sort of Greek god with the sun shining on his tanned shoulders. This wasn’t happening. She heard the unmistakable deep voice that had pleaded with her to stay with him in Hội An. She would have given almost anything to say yes. Now he was here and she was totally unprepared. She took a deep breath and looked up from the remains of her pencil to see the unmistakeable face of the man she’d fallen desperately in love with in Vietnam and whom she thought she’d never see again.
As she watched him hugging his tiny grandmother, her brain slowly processed the realisation that not only was he here at The Encore Hotel, but he was also the son of her employers, actress Francesca and her American singer husband. No wonder she hadn’t connected them with Gabe; they had different last names to him. She couldn’t believe her stupidity: but of course, actors and musicians usually had pseudonyms. Well it was too late to leave now; she’d just have to face him and any resentment he still held for what she did to him.
His dark hair was much shorter than when she’d last seen him, she noticed as he bent his head down to listen to something his grandmother was saying. Throwing his head back in delight, he laughed loudly; it was a sound Daisy remembered only too well. Her heart was in her mouth.
She didn’t want him to see her here. What could she do? She saw him kiss his grandmother’s cheek.
Daisy stared in horror as Lydia looked over her shoulder towards her and pointed into the reception area. The next thing she knew he was following his grandmother inside. Willing herself to become invisible, she closed her eyes briefly, opening them as he stepped into the hotel. He stopped suddenly, a wide-eyed look of shock on his face as he registered who was standing in front of hi
m. Apparently, she was very much recognised and probably looking more gormless than professional. It wasn’t the best impression she would have liked him to have of her after all this time.
‘Daisy?’ He shook his head slowly as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. ‘Daisy Woods,’ he whispered almost to himself.
She sympathised with his shock. She still couldn’t believe he was in front of her and she’d had a few moments to get used to the idea of seeing him again. She cleared her throat, reaching out to shake his hand.
He brushed it away gently, hesitated a moment, and said. ‘You’re not going to greet me like that. Come here.’
Now it was his grandmother and Fi’s turn to look surprised.
He lifted the barrier and joined her behind the reception desk, holding out his arms. ‘It’s good to see you.’
She automatically walked towards him, breathing in the chlorine smell from his T-shirt-encased chest as he wrapped his arms around her. She’d missed this so much. ‘It’s good to see you too, Gabe,’ she said honestly, barely able to force the words out.
If Lydia or Fi spoke she didn’t hear them. It dawned on her that he was speaking. She leant back slightly and looked up, into those unforgettable eyes, the colour of the richest chocolate. She forced herself to speak. ‘Sorry?’
He looked down at her and smiled. ‘I can’t believe it’s you. Here in Jersey and at The Encore, too. How come?’
‘Never mind that,’ Lydia said interrupting their closeness. ‘How do you two know each other; Fi and I are intrigued.’
Daisy stepped back from him and shrugged. ‘We met in Vietnam,’ she explained, trying her best to sound calm. ‘Almost two years ago.’
Lydia clapped her hands together. ‘How perfectly lovely,’ she said. ‘You must come to supper tonight then, Daisy. It’ll give you and Gabriel a chance to catch up,’ she grinned. ‘And I can discover more about my grandson. I didn’t know you’d been away travelling too.’
The Jersey Scene series box set Page 89
