me, Flora. It’ll be you she’ll be launching forth next.’
‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ But she wasn’t as sure as she sounded. Now thirty was just a year away there had been ominous rumbles about settling down along with the usual thinly veiled hints about getting a proper job, buying her own house and why couldn’t she be more like her elder siblings? ‘You’re one of the family. Better. The Golden Boy. You know they think you can do no wrong.’
Alex had spent every single Christmas with the Buckinghams after the year his father and new stepmother had chosen to spend the festive season in St Bart’s leaving eleven-year-old Alex at home in the housekeeper’s charge. The next Christmas Flora and her family had taken it for granted he would join them, a stocking with his name on the chimney breast, a place set at the table.
Five years later he had packed his bags and left his father’s house for good, taking up permanent residence in the attic bedroom next to Flora’s own. He’d never told her just what had led up to his bitter estrangement from his father and Flora had never pried.
Turned out there were places even best friends didn’t dare go.
‘Don’t worry, we’ll be back for Christmas. There’s no way I’m missing out on your father’s Christmas dinner. He’s promising goose this year. I watched him prepare it on a video on the Internet. Nothing is keeping me away.’
‘That’s all right, then.’ She took a deep breath of relief. One day surely even Alex would manage more than six months with one of his identikit, well-bred girlfriends and would have to spend the holiday season with her family, not the Buckinghams. Each year they managed to hold onto him was a bonus.
She stared at her empty glass regretfully. ‘If I need to pack, find my passport and be ready before the crack of dawn I’d better get going. What time shall I meet you?’
‘Oh, no.’ Alex pushed his chair back and stood up, extending a hand to Flora to help her out of her seat. ‘I’m not risking your timekeeping, Flora Buckingham. I’ll send a car for you. Five a.m. sharp. Be ready.’
* * *
Alex looked down at his tablet and sighed. So much for briefing Flora on the flight—although to be fair he should have known better. It was a gift he envied in her. No matter where they were, what the time was, she would fall asleep at the first sign of motion. She’d slumbered as the taxi took them through the dark, wintry pre-dawn streets of London to the airport, waking long enough to consume an enthusiastic breakfast once they had passed through passport control, only to fall back asleep the second the plane began to taxi down the runway.
And now she was snoozing once again. She would definitely give Sleeping Beauty a run for her money. He elbowed her. ‘Flora, wake up. I want you to take a look at this.’
‘Mmm?’ She stretched. ‘I wasn’t asleep, just dozing. Oh! Look at that.’ She gazed, awestruck, out of the car windows at the snow-covered mountains, surrounding them in every direction. ‘It’s just like a Christmas card.’
‘What do you think—is it as pretty as you imagined?’
She turned to him, mouth open in indignation, and he stifled a smile. She was far too easy to wind up. ‘Pretty? It’s so much more than mere prettiness. And look, there are actual chalets. Everywhere!’
‘Well observed, Sherlock.’
She didn’t react to his sardonic tone. ‘I didn’t realise Austrian people actually lived in them. I thought it was like thatched cottages. You know, people assume England is all half-timber and cottage gardens but in reality you’re far more likely to live in some identikit house on a suburban estate. Oh, I wish I lived in a chalet. They are utterly beautiful.’
‘I hope you feel the same way about the hotel.’ It was the moment of truth. She had a keen eye, could always see straight through to the heart of his ideas. Would she appreciate the stark simplicity of the hotel, or think it too modern, anachronistic in this natural paradise?
‘I always love your designs but this one sounds even more exciting than usual; I have to admit I am really looking forward to seeing it in all its finished glory.’
The car had been steadily taking them along the busy roads that led towards the Tyrolean capital, Innsbruck, but now it veered away to follow a smaller road that wound ahead, climbing into the footholds of the Alps. The snow lay inches upon inches deep on the sides of the roads.
‘Just look at it, look at the light.’ Flora’s fingers flexed. ‘Oh, why didn’t I pack my sketchbook? Not that I could really capture it, not the way the sun plays on the snow. Not that light—it’s like a kaleidoscope.’
A knot unravelled in the pit of Alex’s stomach. She saw what he saw. The interchange between light and the snow. She would get the hotel.
‘I have never seen so much snow in my life, not if I took every winter and added them together.’ Yep, she was fully awake now, her dark eyes huge as she stared out at the mountains. ‘How come England grinds to a halt at just the hint of snow and yet everything here is running normally despite tonnes of the stuff?’
‘Because this stuff is what keeps the local economy ticking over. You can’t market yourself as a winter wonderland without the cold white stuff.’
‘It’s like Narnia.’ Flora leaned back and stared with enraptured eyes as the car took them higher and higher. On one side the mountains soared high above them, on the other the town was spread out like a child’s toy village, the river cutting through the middle like an icily silver scarf. ‘How much further? I thought the hotel was in Innsbruck itself.’
‘No, it’s above the town, close to the ski lifts. The guests are transported in and out at will so they get the best of both worlds. That’s the idea anyway, nothing too much effort for them.’
‘They are paying enough for it,’ Flora pointed out. ‘I cannot believe I get to stay somewhere this luxurious. Even the staff quarters are probably one up on a tent in the rain.’
‘You’re not in the staff quarters. Could you really see Lola in anywhere but a suite? You’re doing her job, you get her room. Tomorrow is the soft opening so nobody who stays at the hotel this week is an actual paying guest. We’ll be helping to wow travel journalists, bloggers and some influential winter sports enthusiasts.’
He paused, searching for the right words. He knew how awkward she felt in crowds and amongst strangers. ‘Flora, it’s crucial that they all leave at the end of the week completely bowled over. And it’s equally crucial that I leave with fully approved designs. You can manage, can’t you? I can’t emphasise enough what a big deal this week is. For me, for my firm as well as for Lusso Hotels.’
‘Really? How good of you to warn me. I might have put my foot in it otherwise.’
Warning bells tolled through Alex’s mind. She sounded frostier than the branches on the trees outside. It was the same tone she’d used the day he’d told her that one day she would grow out of boy bands, the tone she’d used the day he had told her that her first boyfriend wasn’t good enough. The same tone she’d used the never to be forgotten day she’d chopped her hair into a pixie cut and he had agreed that, yes, she did look more like a marine than like Audrey Hepburn.
‘I only meant...’
‘I know what you mean: be professional,
