‘Swonbee.’ Josh spoke through a mouthful of half-pounder. He swallowed. ‘Sorry. SwapBnB. You literally swap properties, with some obvious caveats. We’ve done it three times. Some great places on there. You start by putting a ballpark rental value on your own property but you can go higher or lower if you and the other party agree. Where are you looking at?’
‘Somewhere commutable to both Boston and New York, but probably somewhere rural. I want to look at investing in some ecotourism businesses.’ The whole idea was sounding more and more appealing.
‘Two of the three swaps we did were in the US. Both great.’
‘Thanks, mate. I’ll check it out this evening.’ James was liking the sound of SwapBnB. Really liking it. If there was a great-looking house on there in a good location he might genuinely go for it.
It turned out that Emily had been back while James was out. Henry, on security, had been primed, so she hadn’t made it inside; but she’d left a bottle of wine for James. He passed the wine to Henry.
He was liking the idea of a US sabbatical more and more. A sabbatical involving calm, solitude and no women.
Four
Cassie
‘Goddid,’ Dina slurred. ‘Totally got it.’
Cassie blinked and shook her head. Serious googling was hard work on the island. You either had to stay up late or set your alarm and get up in the middle of the night, or you had to sit in the garden to get reception and squint at your phone. Tonight it was raining, so they’d gone for the staying up option. They’d combined it with wine and now Cassie’s eyes feltheavy.
‘Got what?’ she said, still blinking.
‘You wereasleep.’ Dina pointed an accusatory finger in Cassie’s face.
‘No.’ Cassie shook her head again. ‘I was just resting my eyes. They hurt.’ They’d been staring at the screen for alongtime plus it was four o’clock in the morning. Ofcourseshe’d been asleep. And now she was really, really aching because a kitchen chair for a mattress and her forearms on the table for a pillow were a poor substitute for her lovely comfortable actual bed, and when forty wasn’t that many years off youreallyvalued your own pillow for not getting neck-ache at night. Maybe she’d take herself back to bed in the morning for a bit more sleep once she’d got the chickens up and sorted their water and feed.
‘Anyway. Look at this.’ Dina moved round to Cassie’s side of the table, pulling her laptop with her. ‘Got to be him. James Grey. Director of a company registered to the same address. He looks like astud. I’d be totally happy for you to swap with him. He looks like he’d be agreatneighbour.’
‘You cannottell whether someone would be a good neighbour bylookingat them,’ Cassie said. She peered at the photo on Dina’s screen. Oh. Okay. No, she’d been wrong. You couldtotallytell. ‘No. He’d be a shit neighbour. I mean it. And I don’t want to swap with him.’
‘What? Whaddya mean? He’s got the most amazing apartmentever, in what looks like an amazing location, he wants to swap for the right length of time, and he’s got a smart haircut and a good suit so he’s probably someone who’d be anal and look after your property well. He’s the dream swappee. And he’shot.’
‘He is not the dream swappee. Someonelookingneat and tidy means nothing. You can’t judge a book by its cover. I think he’d be a terrible swappee. I think he’d be unsupportive, untrustworthy and, basically, horrible, and I don’t want him in my house.’ Whoops, Cassie’s voice was shaking.
Dina was staring at her. ‘Honey, are you okay? You’re sounding a little nuts. You don’t know him at all, right?’
‘I know his type.’
‘But you just said you can’t judge a book by its cover. Honey, what’s wrong?’
‘He looks very similar to my ex.’ Simon had betrayed her when she was at her most vulnerable and she didn’t like to be reminded of that time.
‘You do know that two people can look similar but be very different? This man is not your ex, he’s a completely different person.’
‘I suppose so. I mean, obviously, yes. I suppose he doesn’t lookexactlythe same. It’s more the impression he gives. That blond, good-looking, swaggery look.’
‘Two things. You cannot see a swagger from a corporate headshot. And you cannot dislike all blond, good-looking, confident-looking men for the rest of time. It isn’t good for you disliking people on sight.’
‘Not always good for youlikingeveryone on sight.’
Dina was looking for a happily ever after and had a tendency to like men very quickly, and it often ended in tears.
‘Honey. I get a lot more sex than you do and that’s a good thing. But I tell you what: you stopdisliking gorgeous men on sight and I’ll stoplikingthem on sight. And do not cut off your nose to spite your face. Please? This is the perfect apartment for you. It’s the perfect swap. And it’s not like you’ll ever have to meet him anyway.’
Yeah, maybe Dina was right.
* * *
‘I just got an email from James.’ Cassie gave her coat to Dina, put her phone back in her bag and took the glass Dina was holding out. ‘Thank you.’ She took a big sip. Wild blueberry sparkling wine was a relatively new speciality from a southern Maine vineyard that Cassie and Dina had visited on a wine tasting last summer. It was delicious, at least as good as champagne or Prosecco. Oh, God. Cassie was really going to miss her life here. ‘This wine issogood. So anyway, he wants to speak before we sign on the dotted line.’
