fix. I now consider myself fortunate to have survived.’
He bent down and picked up what was left of the choco late leg, which was now covered with a thick layer of whatever was on the fine parquet flooring from the feet of the guests. Only he squeezed it a little too hard, and the chocolate burst to release a gooey white chocolatey sticky mess over his white vampire costume gloves.
Sara held out a couple of napkins at arm’s length. ‘Don’t get the chocolate on your gloves—you’ll never get the stain out!’
Leo nodded wisely, tried to wipe the fragments of melted dark chocolate from the white fabric, gave up, then picked up a fresh piece of broken chocolate from the tray with his fingertips and bit into it. ‘Might as well make the most of having messy fingers and be reckless. White fondant icing and bitter dark choc. Um … not too bad at all.’
Leo lifted the box from the display like a waiter and wafted them in front of Sara’s nose.
‘Miss Golightly, please allow me to replace your crushed confectionary in exchange for a nibble. And try saying that after one of Caspar’s cocktails without getting slapped.’
Sara laughed out loud, making him raise his head, and he gave her a warm smile, which was slightly set off by the chocolate on his teeth—but warm nevertheless, with a certain twinkle in his eye which was infectious enough to make it impossible for her to refuse.
‘Only if you can spare one, dear Count? How kind, thank you.’
Sara turned her head and nodded over her shoulder. ‘All ready for your party piece? I have to warn you, Helen is relentless. Nobody will escape.’
He looked from side to side and leant closer, giving her a free whiff of a stunning body wash. ‘Ze Prince of Darkness does not do diz party piece. No, no. It ees no elegant.’
‘Can’t sing for toffee?’ Sara asked in a light voice, eye brows raised.
His reply was a small shrug and a flip of one hand. ‘So many talents.’ Then he dropped his head and said through the corner of his mouth, ‘Every dog in the village would start howling at the moon if I started singing. Tone deaf. Tried before. Crashed and burned. Not going to embarrass myself again.’
Sara was about to reply when a large gentleman in a huge gorilla suit joggled her arm en route to the buffet table, almost causing her to lose her dinner plate, and she had to snatch it away from catastrophe.
‘I have a suggestion,’ Sara whispered in her very best conspiratorial voice.
She glanced from side to side around the room. The way onto the patio was blocked by the karaoke machine and Helen and her workmates, who were setting up some fiendish plan to persuade them all to sing. Drat! That was one exit down. Time to get creative.
‘What would you say if I told you that I knew a secret exit onto the garden and we could escape the karaoke machine and eat our dinner in peace?’
Dracula’s reply was to take a surprisingly firm hold around her waist, which made her gasp, and a firmer grip on his dinner plate before he whispered, ‘I would tell you that I will follow you to the ends of the earth, my precious beauty. But make it fast. Caspar is on the prowl, looking for victims. And he has found a plastic machine gun.’
‘Okay, now I am intrigued,’ her fellow escapee whispered as they casually strolled along the wide terrace which ran around the full length of the hotel.
The sound of clinking glasses, tunes from the classic musicals, really bad singing and lively chatter floated out into the summer evening through the open patio doors from the drawing room. Helen’s party was in full swing but they had escaped and enjoyed their dinner in luxurious calm—and without the hindrance of evening gloves.
‘How on earth did you know about that secret staircase leading down from the hall to the back door?’
Sara looked up at him and her lips curled into a smirk before she replied, ‘Oh, I know every hidden passage and room and secret stair in that hotel. But of course you wouldn’t know … I’m a local girl. In fact—’ and at this she paused ‘—you might say I am very local.’
Then she took pity on his confusion, smiled and leant forward before adding, as casually as she could, ‘I grew up in that house. Kingsmede Manor used to be my home.’
She stopped suddenly, dropped her shoulders back and pointed towards the upper floor of the building. ‘Do you see the arched window with the stained glass? The room just at the corner on the left-hand side with the tiny balcony? That was my bedroom. I could lie in bed at night and watch the stars and the trees through the big picture window. It was magical!’
‘Now I’m really confused,’ he replied. ‘Are you telling me that your family used to own this house?’
‘That’s right,’ she answered with a shrug. ‘I am officially the last in the line of a family of Victorian eccentrics who built this house many generations ago. My grandmother passed away three years ago and left the whole place to my mother.’
Sara tilted her head and was grateful for the darkness in their corner of the garden so that he could not see the glint in her eyes. Talking about those sad times still hurt. ‘Mum didn’t want to live here—there were huge debts to clear and I’m sure you can imagine how expensive this house would be to run as a holiday home.’ Sara waved one hand, then let it fall as she turned back to face him. ‘And now it is this lovely hotel.’
‘Wow,’ he replied, with a look of something close to awe in his face. ‘Are you serious? Did you really grow up in this amazing place?’
‘Oh, yes,’ she answered with a tiny shrug. ‘I was sent to boarding school at the age of eight but this was the place I came back to every school holiday. We didn’t have much money to spend on luxuries but it was paradise for a child.’
She stopped talking and stood still for a moment, her eyes scanning the whole front of the building. ‘I have wonderful memories of my life here.’ She turned back to him with a smile and raised her eyebrows to ask with a lift in her voice, ‘How about you? What is your old castle like back in Transylvania?’
‘Oh, the usual problems of living in a dungeon,’ he replied with a sniff. ‘You just cannot get the staff these days. Draughty. Cold. There is a lot to be said for central heating.’
‘Oh, I so agree,’ Sara said with a nod. ‘The modern vampire needs his central heating.’
‘Even so,’ Dracula said, leaning against a wrought-iron balustrade at the edge of the terrace and peering out across the grounds in front of the house, ‘I envy you growing up here.’
Sara moved closer so that she could stand next to him with her arms stretched out on the metal railing. The cherry trees in front of the house had been strung with white party lights so the front entrance looked like a picture from a children’s fairy tale. A pergola filled with climbing white roses and multicoloured clematis in pinks and purples had been built on the western side of the house to capture the last rays of the setting sun and as Sara and the vampire looked out onto the lawns a light breeze lifted the perfume and surrounded them with warmth and fragrance.
It was a magical evening and Sara felt her shoulders relax for the first time in many days. A new moon appeared in the night sky, which was clear and already twinkling with the first stars.
She
