“But you didn’t answer my original question. When was the last time we saw each other?”
“Skiing. You snogged Sophie, who I’d been chatting up all weekend.”
She held up a hand. “Sophie?” She shook her head. “You dodged a bullet there. You should be thanking me. She was batshit crazy.”
I widened my eyes. Eliza really was a gigantic arse. “If I hadn’t already cancelled you, that comment would be grounds for it. I’d laid the groundwork all weekend for her.”
“Perhaps your game needs work, as I didn’t know that. But like I said, she turned into a bit of a stalker. Thank me later.” She smiled then, the first genuine one since we met.
It threw me off guard. Eliza’s smile was still like the sun. Warm, dazzling, and even though I knew I should look away, I couldn’t stop staring. Even after all these years, she still had this effect on me. But I was going to keep it under control.
“And the same weekend you pranged my car. As if I didn’t have enough to deal with.”
When I stacked up all the cards against her, even I had to admit it was quite the pile.
Eliza sighed. “That was my fault, and I did apologise. My divorce had just been finalised, and my head was all over the place. But I hope my insurance covered it.” She snagged my gaze. “I’m sorry again, Pops.”
The nickname hit me like a physical blow.Nobody called me Pops outside my family. Nobody apart from Eliza, back then. I could almost see us at 12 and 16, lying on her bedroom floor, planning our futures. Back when she was the most important person in my world.
“It’s Poppy.”
Eliza’s jaw tensed almost imperceptibly. She’d lost the right to intimacy, and we both knew it.
“Of course it is. All grown up.” She gave me a measured look. “But like you said, neither of us are jazzed about this. But we’regoing to get through it, and who knows, there might even be moments when we don’t hate each other.”
I sipped my drink. I really hoped that was true, because I couldn’t put up with months of pure hell.
“This is just a business arrangement with an end date. A transaction that could benefit us both. I get to put Voss on my CV, and you get to prove to your family that you can actually do this. Three months of full-time me, then after that, we can assess what you need.”
It sounded simple when she put it like that.
“Or you recommend that I can’t do the job, and the company gets sold out from under me.”
“Despite what you think, I’m not your enemy.”
I really wanted to believe her.
“I want you to succeed in whatever you do. You’ve had a rough few years and you deserve a win. If you want to take over Voss, I can help. However, I also think selling is a good call.”
She stared at me so hard, I squirmed in my seat. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear she could see through me.
Maybe once.
Not anymore.
“When I was told you wanted to take over, I was surprised. When you were a kid, you always said you could think of nothing worse than running Voss Watches. That you never wanted to end up like your mum. I remember being up in Scotland one summer, your mum working all the hours, and you swore to me then you would never turn into her.”
Her words winded me. Eighteen months on, I thought I’d dealt with my mum’s death. But sometimes, when someone from the past who truly knew her spoke about her, it made me realise how much I missed her. That I’d never see her again.
“I stand by 10-year-old me,” I told her, my voice steady. “I don’t want to run this business like my mum. But I do want to run it. There’s a difference.”
She looked like she wanted to reach across the table, the way she would have years ago. Instead, her fingers tightened around her gin and tonic.
“If that’s what you want, then let me help you. Even though we’re not close anymore, I still know what makes you tick.”
“You know nothing about my life.”
But no matter how much I’d changed over the years, I was still that scared 14-year-old Eliza knew well. Did people change that much from their younger selves? The older I got, the more I thought the answer was no.
