‘Have either of you seen—’
Fran didn’t get to complete her question. Louis waved his knife at her, an extension of his hand, a shiny, sharp finger to quieten her as he continued to listen.
‘Merde. If they aren’t careful, the fires will get away from them,’ he said, eventually.
‘Fires?’ Fran looked between the two men, searching for an answer.
Harry answered her, his tone low and serious. ‘They think the first one was probably someone’s discarded cigarette, maybe thrown from a passing car, but everything’s so dry that the fire managed to take a serious hold before anyone realised what was happening. It took out an entire area of farmland not far from here. Another one got too close for comfort to a small village. Nobody got hurt, but apparently some sheds and outbuildings were lost before the firefighters got there.’
‘Les pompiers,’ Fran said without thinking, the corner of her mouth quirking up.
‘Oui,’ Louis replied. ‘Bravo. Les pompiers. Mais…’ He waved his knife at the radio again, then shook his head as he turned his attention back to his work.
Fran frowned, glancing at Harry for clarification.
‘I don’t know. I suppose it’s been so hot and dry for weeks now, if wildfires and accidental fires start popping up all over theplace, they’re worried about the authorities being able to cope. They’re urging everyone to be vigilant, be extra careful with barbecues, not to light bonfires, stuff like that.’
‘Les pyromanes.’
Louis’ words had Harry pulling a face.
‘What did he say?’ Fran asked.
‘I’m guessing he means pyromaniacs.’
‘Yes.’ Louis nodded to reinforce his reply. ‘It has happened before, when we have weather like this. Fire breaks out which is an accident, but some people enjoy the flames too much, you know? They decide to make the fires more, bigger. They light their own. It is a big worry.’
‘But we’re safe here, aren’t we?’ Fran said. The stream flowing through the grounds to the front of the chateau must go some way to protect the building from the possibility of fire from that direction. Although, as she spoke, Fran frowned. The long, unkempt grass at the rear of the property where she’d found Red, its endless swathes leading to the neighbouring farmland with their vineyards stretching away into the distance, the pockets of woodland, the dry vegetation in every direction, even the meadows chateau-side of the stream – that was all flammable.
Louis gave a dramatic shrug. ‘Chateau les Champs d’Or has been here for many centuries. I do not worry for this place.’
‘Do either of you know where Penny is?’
Harry caught Fran’s gaze. He looked conflicted, upset even – a long way from his usual demeanour whenever Penny was mentioned. For a moment, Fran thought he was going to say something, then he shook his head and went back to his work, lips tight and expression serious. With the conversation seemingly at an end, Fran headed out to get ready for anotherwaitressing shift. If she didn’t find Penny beforehand, she supposed she would be sure to see her in the dining room.
Harry was also wondering where Penny was. He wished she hadn’t shot away after their conversation, but it was very her to rush off at a hundred miles an hour without waiting for him to try to explain further.
In a strange way, she’d almost done him a favour. It had been bad enough trying to juggle with his thoughts in order to give her some kind of an insight into his behaviour, and he was well aware the explanation he had managed to give her had been a long way away from what she wanted to hear. It was killing him to disappoint Penny. He hadn’t realised how much he wanted to make her happy until the moment he’d told her about Sophie. Harry didn’t think he’d ever be able to erase her expression from his memory or bury the way she’d done her best to remain composed while she managed to ask valid questions about his life back home.
He wished he’d been able to give her some definitive answers. Up until he’d met Penny, decisions in Harry’s life had been messy enough, but at least he’d been sure about Sophie. Or rather, he thought he’d been sure about her. There wasn’t anything about Sophie which had ever made Harry question his situation with her. They’d always got on, she was cute. It made sense.
So, it had come as a shock to him that getting to know Penny – even though she was exasperating at times – was like being handed something you hadn’t even realised you needed, but within no time was so central you weren’t sure it would be possible to live without it. Like imagining what life would be like without something as fundamental as a mobile phone, even though logic dictated people had managed to communicate perfectly well before their invention. Not that he was comparingher to a piece of tech – it was far more complicated than that. But while the analogy might be weak, the sentiment wasn’t.
The idea of heading on somewhere new, somewhere Penny wouldn’t be, didn’t seem to compute. What if she followed through with her comment about leaving Chateau les Champs d’Or and he never saw her again? Harry didn’t play many computer games, but that thought was like unlocking a new fear, rather than a new weapon.
With a hectic dinner service just beginning, Harry had plenty to keep him occupied on a physical plane, but the food wasn’t what was on his mind. Decisions. He had to start making some serious decisions, before it was too late.
Johnny opted for room service again that evening, ordering a single glass of wine rather than a bottle this time. As he forked up what remained of an excellent risotto, he stared through the window.
Fran had been right. In his messed-up desperation, he’d somehow expected her to agree to what amounted to throwing herself and everything in her life high into the air, then waiting to see how it all landed. It was selfish for him to expect anyone else to have such a cavalier attitude towards their life. Just because his existence was a total dumpster fire right now didn’t have to mean anything to anyone else. This was his mess, and it was up to him to sort it out.
And while Fran would make her own decisions about what she wanted, or didn’t want, perhaps it was time for Johnny to be clearer about whathewanted. The evening had brought him back around to the realisation that making some fundamental changes to his life was inescapable. More than that, it was time to do so. The events of the last few days had given Johnny the wake-up call he’d been needing for some time – possibly for the whole of his adult life.
And nestling close to the top of his shiny new to-do list was creating a new business in Chateau des Rêves.
Fran’s reaction during the viewing with Henri Blanc had thrown Johnny off-kilter, had caused him to pull back. If Fran hadn’t given him a dose of reality, Johnny would almost certainly have put in an offer on the chateau. In effect, she had given him some breathing space, some time to cool off. The time, and her reticence, had been a useful test. A test of whether he was considering Chateau des Rêves, and the whole move to France, for the right reasons – or whether he was desperately grabbing at the place, at Fran, to deflect his own sadness.
With his plate scraped clean, Johnny settled his laptop on his knee. Time to get serious. Time to stamp out his burgeoning emotional attachment to a woman he’d only just met – a woman for whom his feelings might be nothing more than a rebound from his break-up from Natalie.
