time coming down,’ he commented, pulling out a chair for her. ‘I thought you might have had second thoughts and gone to bed.’
‘Not without saying goodnight!’
‘Goodnight, Connah,’ he ordered. ‘We’re supposed to be on first name terms, but so far, Hester, I’ve yet to hear mine from you.’
‘I find it difficult,’ she said awkwardly.
‘Why?’
‘For obvious reasons.’
He eyed her challengingly. ‘How did you address your last employers?’
‘As Leo and Julia,’ she admitted, ‘but it was a very informal household.’
‘So is mine. From now on you say Connah, or I shall address you as Miss Ward.’ He smiled suddenly. ‘Loosen up, Hester. This is a holiday. Forget your scruples and enjoy the break from humdrum routine in Albany Square.’
Hester couldn’t help laughing. ‘During my brief but eventful time in Albany Square, life has been anything but humdrum.’
‘That’s better—you should laugh more often,’ he approved. ‘Have a glass of wine.’
Oh, why not? thought Hester. ‘Thank you,’ she said sedately.
After a comfortable silence Connor asked what she would like to do the next day. ‘The local shops will be shut on a Sunday, but we could drive somewhere, if you like.’
‘Speaking in professional nanny mode,’ said Hester, ‘I think a day of doing nothing much at all would be good for Lowri after the journey today. She can swim and sunbathe, maybe watch a DVD or even take a nap when the sun gets hot, and if she gets restless I can take her for a walk later when it’s cooler. Then, maybe, on Monday you could drive us into Greve and drink coffee in the square while Lowri and I look round the shops.’
‘I’ll come shopping with you,’ said Connah, surprising her. ‘And afterwards I’ll take you to lunch somewhere.’
‘Thank you. Lowri would adore that.’ So would Hester. ‘By the way, when you need time to yourself with your laptop, just say the word and I’ll keep Lowri occupied.’
Connah stretched out in his chair with a sigh of pleasure. ‘At the moment the thought of even opening my laptop is too much effort. Maybe I’ll just stick to lotus-eating for a while. God knows, this is the ideal place for it.’
‘You said you’d stayed here before?’
‘Twice. But on both occasions the house was packed with the Anderson family and various friends. Great fun, but definitely not peaceful.’ He turned to look at her. ‘I’ll join you and Lowri to laze the day away tomorrow—including the daily swim.’
Hester liked his programme very much. Even the swim.
‘Tell me,’ he said idly, as though the answer were of no particular importance, ‘why was there such a gap between your last job and the next one, Hester?’
‘It wasn’t planned. When Leo and Julia won the leads in a new television series in LA, I looked for another post right away and sorted the one in Yorkshire quite quickly. But the Herricks were needed in LA weeks sooner than expected and the Rutherford baby isn’t due until early October, so a temporary job seemed the ideal way to fill in the time.’
‘Wouldn’t you have liked a holiday before getting down to work again?’
Hester was silent for a while. ‘I’d been asked to go to the South of France,’ she said at last, gazing out at the starlit garden, ‘but the holiday fell through at the last minute.’
‘So what went wrong?’
‘The friend who invited me cancelled at the eleventh hour.’
‘Why?’
‘He received a sudden job offer and barely had time to apologise before boarding the plane to head west for fame and fortune.’
Connah shot her a searching glance. ‘Were you unhappy about that, Hester?’
She shook her head. ‘Only where the cancelled holiday was concerned.’
‘You mentioned fame and fortune, so I take it the man is an actor. Would I know him?’
She shrugged. ‘You might. He played a psychopath in one of those film noir type thrillers recently. It won him rave reviews, which led to a role as Julia’s wicked brother in the American series she’s starring in with Leo. Though the fact that he really is Julia’s little brother probably helped with that.’
‘What’s his name?’
‘Keir McBride.’
Connah shook his head. ‘Never heard of him.’
Hester chuckled. ‘He’d be mortified if he knew.’
‘Is he very pretty?’
‘Very. He’s fair, like Julia, with bright blue eyes and angelic good looks. They made his psychotic performance all the more chilling.’
Connah’s face looked stern in the dim light. ‘Had you known him long?’
‘Off and on for the three years I worked for his sister. But in the period before the Herricks’ big break he was out of a job and came to “rest” for a while at their house. Leo and Julia were out in the evenings, performing in their respective shows, so Keir took to spending time with me most evenings after I put the twins to bed. We got on so well he asked if I fancied a holiday with him in the Herricks’ farmhouse in the Dordogne once Julia and Leo left for LA. But then, out of the blue, he got the offer of a lifetime, so no holiday.’
‘Will you see him again?’ said Connor, seized with a sudden desire to rearrange the actor’s angelic face.
‘I doubt it. If Keir makes a success of his part in the series—which he will because, pretty face or not, he’s a brilliant actor—he’s bound to get more offers over there. If things go well for him, I doubt that he’ll come back to this country any time soon.’ Hester smiled crookedly. ‘Believe me, it was no romance. Keir was out of work, short of funds and I was right there, captive company for him every evening. The bird in the hand.’
Connah gave her a searching look. ‘If you’d gone with the Herricks to LA you could have gone on seeing McBride. Why did you refuse?’
‘It was too far away from my family. Also, at that stage Keir was based in the UK and wanted us to see something of each other now and then. But in the end he went off to LA too.’ Hester shrugged. ‘At which point I answered a couple of advertisements for temporary summer jobs and one of them was yours.’
‘Which is my great good fortune—and Lowri’s.’ He frowned. ‘You do so much more than just look after her, I should be paying you a far larger salary than I do.’
‘Certainly not,’ she said promptly. ‘A free holiday in a place like this is recompense enough.’
‘I wouldn’t
