Page 37 of Return Ticket

“That’s true.” She had not liked the pressure to marry a good Italian boy and have babies. Not at all. “They would have fifty fits if I brought James home with me.”

“What do you mean? You haven’t even brought him home tous.” Dominique lifted her head and turned, face showing exaggerated outrage. “And best you do, young lady. I demand to meet this person.”

Gabriella laughed. “I’ve meant to so many times, but it’s so hard to say when he is and isn’t working. Why don’t we organize a picnic in Hyde Park on a Sunday afternoon, unless it’s raining? If James can make it, all good. If he can’t, it will still be fun.”

“And what if it is raining?” Dominique asked.

“Then we go down the pub.” Gabriella shrugged.

“Deal. I’ll send a note to Trev, you send one to Ben, find a date that works. I’m curious as a cat about your man.” Dominique had gone out a lot since she’d moved to London, but no one had lasted more than a few dates. They wanted to go too far, too fast, she’d told Gabriella. And some got ugly when she pulled the brakes.

“It’s like they think they’re entitled to my body in exchange for a meal of fish and chips,” Dominique had told Gabriella, outraged. “Like I can’t buy my own bloody fish and chips. Like that’s all I’m worth. No thank you.”

It was a strange new world from the one their parents had grown up in. Boundaries were being pushed, but both Gabriella and Dominique didn’t see why they should be forced into anything they didn’t like or want.

“Some of the girls don’t have enough self-confidence to say no,” Dominique told her. “I see it at work. They try to pass it off as being hip, but they look a little lost.”

The bus turned a corner, pushing them both up against the window, and Dominique got to her feet. “This is me.”

Gabriella often got out with her and walked her home, then walked home herself, but tonight, staying in the bus seemed like the sensible option.

They hugged goodbye and Gabriella watched the fog swallow Dominique up in a single gulp as she stepped out into the night.

“Filthy tonight, it is,” the bus driver said to her as he pulled the doors closed. “Where you getting out, love?”

“Notting Hill,” she told him. Taking this bus meant she and Dominique could travel most of the way together, but it dropped her off at the far end of Notting Hill. Not her usual route.

Still, the slightly longer walk was worth the extra time with Neeky.

When the bus reached her stop, she stepped out into slightly yellow-tinged smog, and the sulfur smell caught her in the back of her throat. She lifted her scarf around her mouth as she coughed her way across the street and started walking home.

A breeze began to swirl around her as she walked, clearing the way ahead almost perfectly and then sweeping the fog around her to obscure absolutely everything again.

She kept her eyes on the ground and almost walked straight into a light pole, jerking back just in time. She stood still for a moment, getting her heart beat under control, and suddenly the way cleared again, the breeze parting the yellow smoke so that she was looking straight at a dark green Jaguar, parked facing away from her, three houses down from her building.

She could just make out the number plate, and it was the same as the one she’d seen the other day, outside of headquarters.

She stood, rooted to the spot for a moment, fear a tingling, crawling spider on her skin.

She shuddered. He was watching her house.

How had he known where she lived?

She would have to work that out later. Right now, she needed to decide what to do.

Confront him, or slip around the back way and come into the building from the rear courtyard?

She knew if she snuck in, she would be aware of him lurking out here, watching.

The thought of it was unbearable.

So, confront, then.

She gripped her bag strap a little tighter, and tried to bolster herself with the memory of how quickly he’d run away last time. Although, this time he wasn’t in front of the traffic warden’s headquarters on a work day afternoon. He was on an empty, fog-darkened street, late at night.

He might be braver this time.

Then she’d have to be braver, too.

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