Page 98 of Cooking Up a Christmas Storm
Pavel winced. Play it cool, Mum. Play it cool.
Diane didn’t seem to have noticed any weirdness. But why would she? Why would you think that two people you’d only just met were conspiring with an admin assistant from your holiday destination to convince you she had a fake name? ‘This whole day was lovely. And I was talking to the chap who runs this place. Apparently they’re having a whole big do for Hogmanay.’ She sighed. ‘It’s so far to travel but honestly I’m tempted. I love this part of the world. Always have.’
‘Oh, you should come. It’s going to be so much fun.’ Gemma beamed. ‘And staying in an actual castle. Can you imagine?’
Diane laughed. ‘You need to be careful. Aren’t you supposed to work for the opposition?’
Gemma froze.
‘Oh, we’re all one big happy family around here,’ Nina reassured her.
Diane made her farewells. ‘It was so good to run into you,’ she told Gemma. ‘You look well. I’m pleased.’ She smiled. ‘I shall tell your mother I saw you.’
Gemma nodded. ‘OK.’
‘She misses you.’
‘Are you going to see your parents for Christmas?’ Nina asked.
Gemma shook her head. ‘I think we’ll be too busy here.’
‘Hopefully you’ll make it back in the new year?’
‘Yeah. Maybe.’
Nina turned away. ‘I’d best go make myself useful.’
‘There’s a lot of making yourself useful around here,’ Gemma laughed.
‘Tell me about it. Mum and Anna were born to run the world, I think, but the universe landed them with a tiny Scottish village instead.’ Pavel paused. He didn’t want to ask any more about her family. Not right now. She’d tell him when she was ready. He wasn’t going to push. ‘Today was really nice.’
‘I don’t know. I thought yesterday had a certain something.’ She looked up at him to catch his eye.
‘I meant this was a nice event for the whole community.’ He looked around to where Flinty was now roping anyone she passed into helping out. Absolutely anyone. ‘The whole community and Jay from Redd Level.’
Jodie leaned into Pavel’s body. He was right. Apart from the scare with Diane and Fiona the day had gone well. Really well. ‘So do you want to stay tonight?’ she asked. ‘You don’t have to. I mean, if you feel like we’re rushing into things a bit. We could take it slow, or…’
‘Do you want me to?’
More than she could put into words. She didn’t really want to let him out of her sight. He was a solid point of reality in this web of confusion she was creating around her. ‘Yeah.’
‘OK then.’
‘The Dower House is quite…’ She searched for the word. ‘Feminine. And chintzy.’ She tried to picture Pavel’s tall, broad frame in amongst the florals and the doilies.
‘I’m not really coming for the décor.’
‘They did say I could redecorate, but I never got around to it.’
‘I can help if you want to decorate the place.’
‘Oooh,’ she sighed. ‘And you’ll do it all properly, won’t you? With straight edges and no splashes of wall colour on the woodwork.’
‘Absolutely.’
Now she could picture Pavel very easily in the great-aunt’s-knicker-drawer aesthetic of the Dower House – paintbrush in hand, pencil behind his ear, and, for reasons that had nothing at all to do with his decorating skills, stripped to the waist.
‘Are you all right there?’ he asked.
