Olivia Gates - One Night In…

Leaning out of the window the man laughed. ‘Miracles do ‘appen, chérie. I ‘ope you find one.’ He started the engine and winked at her. ‘You deserve it. Au revoir.’

Anna watched the van disappear round the bend in the drive, through the pine trees, then she turned and walked slowly back into the château. Inside the hot, late summer air was heavy with the smell of decay and her eyes travelled desolately around the once-splendid entrance hall. The duck-egg-blue silk that lined the walls was rotting and torn; pale squares were left where the men had taken down the paintings and darker patches showed the ravages of damp.

Her little low-heeled shoes echoed on the leaf-strewn floor as she walked slowly up the stairs. Above her, miraculously the stained glass dome was still intact and at that moment a shaft of afternoon sunlight sent shimmering pools of light on to the stairs. She smiled, remembering how she used to love trying to catch those rippling rainbows as a child, and how they used to fall in vivid splashes on the white bride’s dress she’d got for her birthday that summer when she’d played the wedding game.

That last summer before her mother had died.

She jumped as her mobile phone rang, and slid it out of her bag.

‘Fliss, I’m on my way. The auctioneer people just left, so I’m just going to lock up and leave.’

‘OK, honey, I’ll order you a very strong Martini.’ Fliss’s voice was warm with compassion and understanding. ‘Are you getting the bus?’

‘No. One of the guys in the GreenPlanet camp has a bike I can borrow. It’s only a few miles.’

From the other end of the phone Fliss gave a snort of laughter. ‘You’re joking, right? Anna, no one has ever arrived at the Hotel Paradis by bike. Are you going to get it valet parked?’

Stamping up a narrower flight of stairs to the attic, Anna scowled. ‘Don’t be silly. I don’t see why I should pump carbon monoxide into the atmosphere just to keep the parking valets at the Paradis in tips.’

‘OK, OK, spare me the environmental lecture.’ The laughter died in Fliss’s voice, leaving her sounding suddenly subdued. ‘Talking of which, how’s life in the Green Planet camp? Have you finished saving the world for the rest of us yet?’

Anna wandered over to the forlorn stack of boxes and old trunks the men had left piled in the middle of the dusty attic. ‘We’re still working on it,’ she said stiffly, lifting the lid of a metal-banded trunk at her feet and finding herself looking down at a jumble of old clothes. ‘Saving Château Belle-Eden from this … this vile property developer would be a good start, though.’

‘Well, if word in our office is correct and the “vile property developer” in question is Angelo Emiliani you don’t stand a cat in hell’s chance of saving it,’ Fliss retorted, then, hearing Anna’s soft gasp, said, ‘Anna? What’s the matter?’

‘Nothing. I’ve just found my old dressing-up box. All my ballet stuff is in here—my first pointe shoes.’ Reverently she wound the trailing ribbons around the tattered slippers, then slowly pulled out a crushed tumble of heavy cream satin from the depths of the trunk. ‘The wedding dress!’

Anna held the dress out at arm’s length, gazing wonderingly at it. She’d thought it was so perfect, but now she could see how home-made it looked, how obvious that it had been inexpertly cut down from one of Grandmère’s gowns and trimmed with mismatched bits salvaged from other garments. The fabric had yellowed with age and was spotted with mildew in places. Wedging the phone against her shoulder, she held the dress up against her and twirled slowly around.

‘To think I truly believed this made me look like a real bride,’ she said vaguely. ‘A fairy princess … I must have been spectacularly naïve …’

That was an understatement.

Abruptly she tore the dress away from her body and dropped it back into the box. ‘Anyway,’ she continued briskly, ‘like I said, there’s nothing left for me to do here. I’m on my way.’

‘Great. I’ll be in the terrace bar, provided we can get a table. Don’t forget it’s Saskia Middleton’s twenty-first tonight too, so wear something suitable. You are wearing something suitable, aren’t you?’ Fliss added, sounding worried. ‘Only I haven’t quite got over the puffball-skirt-and-biker-boots combo from Lucinda’s party at Christmas. Her poor mother didn’t know what to say.’

Anna glanced down at the subdued black dress. ‘Don’t panic, I’m looking deeply respectable,’ she said ruefully. ‘And it’s entirely in your honour, as I have absolutely no intention of going to Saskia Middleton’s party. I’d rather spend an evening with Lucretia Borgia and Hannibal Lecter. But go and grab a table on the terrace and get those Martinis ordered. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.’

Hanging up before Fliss could argue about the party, Anna turned back to the wedding dress, stroking her hand over the slippery satin.

How much had changed since that long ago summer, when she had thought that life was simple.

Nothing was simple. Nothing was what she’d thought it was.

Herself included.

The château was just about all that was left of that old life. And that, she thought fiercely, standing up and walking quickly across the room and down the stairs, was why she had no intention of letting it go without a fight. It was nothing whatsoever to do with any lingering fantasies about white dresses and wedding bells, but her mother was dead, her dreams were broken, her own sense of who she was shaken to the core. That was why she had to hang on to the last shreds of the person she used to think she was.

A door slammed below.

Crossing the landing, Anna stopped dead. A little gust of air seemed to shiver through the building, then everything sank back into stillness. But the atmosphere had changed. There was a charge in the air, like electricity before a storm, and with a pulse of horrified certainty Anna knew she was no longer alone in the house.

She froze and then, with agonizing caution, tiptoed to the top of the stairs.

For a long moment there was no sound at all.

Then, with a mounting sense of panic, she heard footsteps moving across the hall. Instinctively she recognized them as male: slow, measured and sounding like the footsteps of the axe-murderer in every horror film she’d ever seen.

The footsteps stopped.

Forcing herself to lean forward, she tentatively peered over the banisters, then drew back with a sharp intake of breath.

She was right.

He was male. Very male. And very blond. Perhaps it was just because she was looking down on him from directly above that he seemed to have the broadest shoulders she’d ever seen.

‘Hello?’

His voice was deep and faintly accented. He didn’t sound like a murderer. He sounded gorgeous. Anna swallowed. The ability to speak had inexplicably deserted her, but the pounding of her heart seemed to echo through the whole building, declaring her presence with every beat.

‘Who’s there?’

She opened her mouth but the only sound that came out was a dry croak.

There was a muttered curse from below. ‘All right then, I’ll come up.’

Oh, God. She was being utterly ridiculous and in a moment he—whoever he was—was going to come up and see her cowering on the landing like some frightened animal. Drawing herself up to her full five foot three inches, she smoothed down the slightly creased linen of her dress. ‘Don’t bother,’ she called, clenching her fists into balls of determination and desperately trying to assume an air of insouciance. She moved to the top of the stairs and began to descend.