‘You’ll be doing the floors, Lucy,’ Mrs West tells me, pointing at an industrial-sized cleaner.
I stare at it. I’ve never been very good with machines. ‘Can you show me how it works?’
‘Irina and Elena will give you a demonstration,’ she says, and communicates this to them. They nod obligingly and smile at me, which makes me relax a little.
The girls seem really nice. When Mrs West has gone, we introduce ourselves and Irina, who speaks better English than Elena, tells me they’re from Poland. They came over to the UK together to find work.
I hoover the main factory floor first, then the girls help me fill the tank with the special cleaning liquid and Irina demonstrates how the machine works. It seems simple enough, so I thank her and start on the floor.
After a few minutes getting the hang of it, I’m motoring along like a professional and feeling much more optimistic about finishing in time to meet Gabe. But moments later, I realise there must be something wrong with the machine because it’s leaving copious amounts of water on the floor in my wake.
Irina shakes her head. ‘Old machine. I think perhaps it’s squeegee blades.’
‘Should we phone Mrs West?’ I ask, but they quickly shake their heads and Elena unplugs the machine and tips it on its side. She turns the blades over, which seems to work.
But after a while, I’m finding I’m having to stop every fifteen minutes or so to turn them over again, and water is still lying on the floor, which means I need to find a mop and bucket to get rid of it.
All of this stopping and starting takes time, and when it gets to three and I haven’t even started on the office, canteen and reception areas, I’m starting to panic.
‘We come back tomorrow,’ says Irina, seeing that I’m worried about the time. ‘You can finish floors then.’
I nod gratefully, and when six o’clock arrives, I say my goodbyes, telling them I’ll see them in the morning. On the way out, I catch my weird spiky hair in the mirror and heave a sigh. What the hell am I going to do with it?
Irina taps me on the shoulder. ‘You okay?’
I smile. ‘Yes. Well, not really. I…have a date. And I cut my own hair.’ I shrug as if to say it’s hopeless.
Irina grins. ‘You pretty girl but you look like scarecrow. I fix?’
My eyes widen. ‘You can cut hair?’
‘Oh, yes. Quick tidy up?’
‘Great!’
She brings some scissors from her bag and begins snipping away, watched by a smiling Elena. And within a few minutes, she says, ‘Ta-dah! You look in mirror?’
So I do, and the difference is amazing.
She’s evened the ends up so it looks like a proper style. I smile, turning this way and that. ‘Thank you, Irina. I like it this length.’
‘You look beautiful for your date now,’ says Elena, nodding.
I give them both a hug and dash away.
I feel guilty leaving, especially when Irina and Elena are still working away, cleaning the canteen. But I remind myself that I’ve worked a nine-hour day with just a twenty-minute break for lunch.
Surely Mrs West will be happy with that?
*****
After all the dashing about, I’m glowing the same pink as my summer dress when I arrive at the harbour. At first, I think maybe I got the time wrong. But then I glimpse Gabe over by the artisan huts, chatting to the woman who sells pottery.
I’m so busy looking over at him, thinking how good he looks in well-fitting dark jeans and a white shirt, that I almost collide with a lamp-post. Managing to swerve nimbly aside just before I knock myself out, I step into a pool of melted ice-cream on the pavement.
Damn!
I fish in my bag for a paper hanky, just as Gabe turns and spots me. He raises his hand and starts walking over, and as the butterflies in my tummy flutter out of control, I can’t help smiling to myself. When I arrived here, I was desperate to be invisible, just in case Eleanor was on my tail. But since knowing Gabe, the paranoid feeling that I was being watched seems to have faded – to the extent that I’m currently hopping on one foot in the middle of the high street, endeavouring to wipe Mr Whippy vanilla off my sandal!
The restaurant is lovely. We have a table in the window and Gabe pulls out my chair for me, and I feel all fluttery inside. It’s so long since I went out for dinner with a man. And never with someone I feel so attracted to…
We both settle for the catch of the day, and I order a glass of white wine while Gabe has an alcohol-free lager as he’s driving back, having borrowed his dad’s car.
As we chink glasses, I’m feeling on top of the world.
Fate has certainly come up trumps. What were the chances of me bumping into this gorgeous man – not just once, but three times!
But when it flits through my mind that this would be a lovely story to tell the grandkids, I pull myself up short and decide I’d better not have any more wine, if this is the effect…!
He gets up to fetch more tartar sauce, taking his phone out and looking at it then leaving it on the table. I watch him weave past tables to the bar area.
While he’s gone, I get a chance to catch my breath and look around at my surroundings. I’ve been so focused on my dinner companion I didn’t even notice the colourful seascapes and the beautiful ceramic fish on the walls.
I glance at the floor, noticing what looks like a business card lying there. It must have dropped out of Gabe’s pocket when he took out his phone. But when I bend to pick it up, I see to my surprise that it’s advertising for a Martin Forbes, private investigator. It can’t be Gabe’s, I think, as I turn it over curiously, wondering what sort of adventures this particular P.I. gets up to. I’ve always thought of private investigators’ work as exciting but a bit seedy at the same time…
A name has been hand-written on the reverse. For a second, when I read it, I smile to myself, think it’s another weird coincidence. I know an Amber Winters…
Then my heart starts to beat faster.
What if it’s her? What if it’s my Amber Winters?
I look over at the bar, feeling bemused. But it can’t be my Amber. It doesn’t make any sense. What would my best friend’s name be doing on the back of a private investigator’s business card?
A card that fell out of Gabe Jackson’s pocket…?
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
I sit there, stunned, unable to make any sense of it.
Then I have a terrible thought.
What if I’m imagining things again?
Not spiders in a drawer this time. But my best friend’s name mysteriously scribbled on the back of a business card?
In a panic, I snatch up the card and stare at the name written there.
Amber Winters.
I’m definitely not imagining it!
‘Everything okay?’
Gabe is back with my drink.
I look up at him uncertainly, and he frowns and sits down, and I hold up the card. ‘Is this yours?’
He looks at it and his expression freezes. He doesn’t even have to look at it more closely. I can tell he knows exactly what it is, and that somehow, he’s slipped up.
My heart thudding, I force the words out. ‘Who’s Martin Forbes? And why is my friend’s name written on the back?’
I’m desperate for there to be a simple explanation; for him to smile and shake his head and tell me something that allays all my fears. But instead, he stares at me with the saddest look. Then he closes his eyes and bends his head, running both hands slowly through his hair.