Page 12 of The House on Waterfall Hill

‘Not really.’

‘Live for now, my friend, live life with no regrets. Worry about the future when it gets here.’

‘Are you saying I should just sleep with her and then leave? Casual sex really isn’t my thing.’

Even if that was on offer, which he highly doubted.

‘There was nothing casual about the way you two were looking at each other. And I’m not saying you should do that. I’m saying enjoy the next few weeks and find out if you have anything worth fighting for. It could be over very quickly once you sleep together.’

‘Oh, thanks very much.’

‘I didn’t mean that. I just meant sometimes there is a spark and it’s just sexual, it goes out once you’ve done the deed. Like eating a really nice slice of chocolate cake – sometimes, no matter how nice it is, you couldn’t possibly eat another slice.’

‘And what happens if that spark ignites a fire that never goes out?’

‘Well that definitely sounds like something you would fight for.’

‘That’s what I’m worried about.’

Quinn stared at him in disbelief. ‘Are you seriously telling me you don’t want to get involved with thiswoman in case she turns out to be the love of your life and that would be too inconvenient?’

‘No, of course not.’

But if Luke was being completely honest with himself, he wasn’t avoiding starting anything with Flick because he thought it would end in marriage and babies and a happy ever after. It was because he knew he could fall in love with her very easily and that would only lead to him getting hurt when she inevitably didn’t feel the same way.

Quinn wasn’t to be deterred. ‘Let me tell you, real love only comes around once in your life, if you’re lucky. If you have the slightest inkling that this could be that for you, then grab hold of it with both hands. And if it isn’t, well at least you’ll have fun finding out.’

Quinn made it sound so simple but it wasn’t. Even if Luke wanted to pursue something with Flick, it was highly unlikely she’d want to take that step with him.

CHAPTER FOUR

Flick waited nervously in the old café for the artists to arrive for their meeting. She’d been round to them all and introduced herself and told them there would be a meeting today. Some of them had looked at her warily as if she was going to come in and change everything about their happy little status quo. She was dreading telling them that that was exactly what she was here to do.

She had bought some nice biscuits and cakes from a little bakery in the town and hoped that would go some way to placate them. One by one they filtered in, eyeing her and the cakes suspiciously. Flick thought that her nan had probably never called a meeting before. She definitely hadn’t told Luke about the financial problems Waterfall House was facing, even though she lived with him, so it was very unlikely the other artists knew either.

She glanced around at their faces. Her nan had toldher they wouldn’t like change and she could see they already had their defences up. Luke gave her an encouraging smile which made her feel fractionally better.

‘Thank you all for coming,’ Flick said.

‘Not sure we had much choice,’ Aidan muttered.

‘Shut up, this is important,’ Luke said.

Everyone looked at Luke in surprise. Clearly they weren’t used to him speaking up but Flick was grateful for it. Although she was capable of defending herself, she decided to ignore it and press on, not wanting to antagonise anyone just yet.

‘I’m not sure how much my nan has told you but Waterfall House is in trouble. The way I understand it is that none of you pay any rent here but you have an arrangement where you pay twenty-five percent of any sale to my nan. But there aren’t any sales, not one single sale since Christmas, for anyone, and last year wasn’t much better. So no money is coming in and, while the mortgage on this place was paid off many years ago, there are still bills and overheads. Some of you may know that she sold her house in the town a few years ago and moved in here and has been using the money to pay the bills for this place ever since. That money has now run out and, in true Audrey style, she’s been burying her head in the sand and hoping something miraculous would happen. She’s now run away to Australia for six months and left me to deal with it.’

Flick knew that sounded harsh but this was her nan all over. She loved her nan but Audrey was a dreamer not a doer.

‘We’ve now reached a turning point. We have six months to turn this place around or my nan will sell it.’

There was a gasp from Rose. ‘Waterfall House has always been here.’

‘I know but it’s not making any money. The café isn’t in use so we’re not getting any money from that and there’s only five artists here when there used to be so many more. By the sounds of it, my nan has given up on the place. She said a developer has been after her for years to turn this place into a hotel and my nan has reached the point where she’s willing to let him if we can’t do something to save it.’

‘Can’t you do something?’ Katherine said to Luke, which Flick thought was odd.

‘As Flick said last night when I offered to help, throwing money at it isn’t the answer, we need to think about a long-term solution here. We need to be the ones to change.’

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