it just the usual effect he had on the opposite sex?
‘Uh—she certainly had marvellous taste,’ she said by way of turning aside her thoughts about Etienne Hurst as a man as well as not wishing to speak ill of the dead and regretting her earlier comments on his sister. ‘Anyway, I don’t think there’s much more I can show you, Etienne, but—’ She stopped on a sudden thought. ‘If there’s anything from the house you’d like as a memento of Margot—would you like to come up and have a look?’
He considered. ‘There is a miniature of our mother—’
‘Oh, I know it! It’s still on the dresser in their bedroom. Let’s go up now.’
This time he wouldn’t take no for an answer and insisted on driving her to the house in his car. Mrs Bedwell, who had been the housekeeper at Raspberry Hill for as long as Mel could remember, came out to greet them.
‘Just in time for lunch,’ Mrs Bedwell enthused. ‘I’ve set the table here on the veranda.’
‘But,’ Mel bit her tongue, ‘I mean, I’m not sure if Etienne has time for lunch—’
‘Of course he does!’ Mrs Bedwell resembled a tall, grey but colourfully attired stork and was renowned for her meddling. ‘Now, you just sit down, Mr Hurst—how about a beer? It’s such a lovely, hot day! I’ll get you one and that will give Mel a chance to duck under the shower.’
Mel opened and closed her mouth as Etienne replied that he could do with a beer, thank you very much, and Mrs Bedwell caught her wrist and steered her inside.
‘Will you stop pushing me around?’ she said to Mrs Bedwell once they were out of earshot. ‘And how can you give him lunch when you’ve only just laid eyes on him, and how about consulting me first before you issue invitations left, right and centre?’
‘How? It’s simple—I saw him drive in, I give you lunch every day and if you think I can’t stretch it to two you don’t know me very well, Mel! As for issuing invitations left, right and centre, I just knew it would never cross your mind to do it so I figured I might as well do it for you. You’ve got ten minutes!’
‘But why do we need him to come to lunch?’ Mel protested.
Mrs Bedwell put her hands on her hips. ‘Only you could be so thick, Mel. Now, you just do as you’re told and make sure you’re nice to him!’
Mel regarded Mrs Bedwell’s retreating back with smouldering eyes despite the fact that she was extremely fond of her, then she shrugged and went to shower.
Fifteen minutes later, she came out onto the veranda in clean jeans and a floral blouse and carrying the miniature carefully wrapped up in tissue paper. She’d run the gauntlet of Mrs Bedwell again, to be asked in exasperated tones why she couldn’t have worn a dress, and had answered simply that it hadn’t crossed her mind.
‘Sorry,’ she sat down opposite Etienne, who rose briefly, ‘to have left you alone like this but Mrs Bedwell is a stickler for the niceties.’
He looked at his watch then took in her appearance. All the dust and grease had disappeared. Her hair, released from the scarf, rippled and glinted like new pennies in a well-brushed loose cascade to her shoulders and her skin was smooth and fresh.
‘I was prepared for at least half an hour, so you did well.’ He reached for his beer but for some reason their gazes locked.
Something trickled along Mel’s nerve-endings as she couldn’t look away, a strange little frisson that made her feel excited but also vulnerable and somehow at the mercy of this man.
Then he cut the eye contact but not before Mel remembered the look she’d intercepted from him three weeks earlier. A look that, in the most surprising circumstances, had held her trapped at the sheer unexpectedness of it. It came back to her now, and left her posing a question to herself.
For the first time since she’d known him, was Etienne Hurst looking at her as a woman rather than a troublesome tomboy who’d always made it clear she didn’t like him? But, perhaps more pertinently, was she responding in kind to it?
‘How are the boys?’
She blinked and tried to deal with the change of subject smoothly as she thought of her three brothers, Justin, Ewan and Tosh, aged fifteen, twelve and ten respectively. ‘As well as can be expected. Still lost and bewildered. Tosh was having nightmares so I got him a puppy.’ She grimaced.
Tosh, short for Thomas, which Ewan hadn’t been able to pronounce so the baby name of Tosh had stuck, had been allowed to choose his puppy. The result was a three-month-old tan and white Jack Russell he’d named Batman, who was almost as mischievous and trouble-prone as his new owner. Although, since Batman had been allowed to sleep on Tosh’s bed, the nightmares had stopped.
‘Talking of Batman,’ Mel added as Mrs Bedwell came on the veranda pushing a trolley, ‘where is the little monster?’
Mrs Bedwell laid before them a minor feast. Cold chicken and ham, a green salad, her home-grown and cooked beetroot, new potatoes in their jackets sprinkled with parsley and drizzled with garlic butter and warm crusty rolls. ‘That dratted dog,’ she intoned, ‘is asleep, thank the lord!’
‘What’s he done this morning?’ Mel asked with resignation.
‘You wouldn’t want to know! There.’ Mrs Bedwell stood back. ‘Enjoy your lunch!’
The smile of thanks Etienne Hurst bestowed on her was dazzling and she retreated indoors in some disarray, causing Mel to think darkly that she resented being included in the universal effect on women this man had, however, well, slightly intoxicating it was.
‘So you’re not working today, Etienne?’ she queried as they started their lunch.
‘I am. I’m just taking a few hours off to make sure you’re coping, Mel.’
She broke open a roll and buttered it. ‘It’s going to be a bit of a battle, obviously, but—’
‘It’s going to be an uphill battle, Mel,’ he broke in, ‘let’s not beat about the bush. All your profits are going to go in repaying the mortgage on Raspberry Hill.’
She looked up, deep concern in her blue eyes. ‘Surely not. I mean, I can’t believe Dad would have let it get to this stage.’
‘Mel, as I probably don’t need to tell you, seasonal irregularities have made pineapples a dicey crop at the moment. Raspberry Hill would not have been the only property affected—it’s why more and more people have diversified. So it wasn’t so much that your father “let it get to this stage”. If anything the weather has been the problem or at least a significant part of it.’
She said nothing.
He put his knife and fork down. ‘But things having happened the way they have may mean that you have to face the fact that you won’t be able to save Raspberry Hill.’
Mel said huskily, ‘I can’t believe that. We all love it so much, the boys as much as I do.’
‘They…they’re young, Mel,’ he said.
‘Young
