From the glimpses Amy was getting, she wouldn’t disagree with Billie. The new arrival was tall and slim, casually but elegantly dressed, with a feathering of grey in his dark, conservatively cut hair and defined crows’ feet around sharply intelligent brown eyes. Amy settled him at being in his late thirties, maybe forty, and was about to pigeonhole him as Clare’s favourite older brother when Clare did something which threw that assumption very firmly out of the window. It also had Amy completely confused.
Clare and the man kissed, lips to lips, his hands cupping Clare’s face as she slipped hers around his expensive-looking tailored shirt. And as Amy turned for Tad’s reaction, her confusion deepened, because Tad wasn’t launching an attack on the interloper, or yanking Clare away from his evil grasp. Instead, Tad looked completely calm.
* * *
It didn’t take a genius to work out who the unexpected new arrival was, Tad thought – at least he presumed there could be no confusion, seeing as Clare had glued herself to the bloke. Unexpected though his arrival might be, this must be James Gardner.
Clare had explained the previous evening that the guests she’d arrived with were James’s brother, Luke, and his wife, Maggie. That she’d been hoping James would make it on the trip, but he’d needed to go into work, to speak to some professional witnesses for a large case he was heading up as lead lawyer. Something complicated involving a multinational company and tax issues. Tad had tried not to glaze over as Clare had been telling him, but she’d noticed anyway, thumped him and told him, in hushed tones, that she didn’t find it particularly thrilling either, but that James’s work wasn’t the reason she’d fallen in love with him.
As Tad watched, and the newest arrival peeled himself away from Clare, then greeted his brother and sister-in-law, a thought struck him. Had him frowning. Because Clare had shown him photos of her first husband, Grant, along with their little girl, Lucy. In all those photos, Grant was smiling, his blue eyes alive with mirth. He’d been blond, like Clare, and wasn’t particularly tall, but Clare told him how Grant had brought sunshine to her life in a way she hadn’t believed possible.
Clare’s childhood had been dour and dusty. With her mother in her late forties when Clare arrived, both parents were uninterested in their child, preoccupied instead by academia and then by her mother’s failing health. Clare had told Tad how Grant had lifted her out of her grey existence, had turned her idea of family into something bustling with vibrancy and fun.
But James Gardner had yet to smile. He shook hands with his brother as though they were in a business meeting, pecked his sister-in-law on the cheek like a pigeon taking crumbs, then looked around, assessing his environs in a detached manner. He was also dark, and tall. The polar opposite to Grant.
Despite Tad’s misgivings, Clare threaded her hand into James’s, giving Tad barely enough time to package away his observations before being formally introduced.
‘Tad, I’d like to introduce you to?—’
Clare didn’t get to finish her sentence, instead, James spoke over her.
‘James Gardner. It’s good to meet you. I’ve heard a lot about you.’
Was there a hint of irritation in that final sentence? James pulled his hand from Clare’s and thrust it out for Tad to shake. Tad took it, his hand crushed by an unexpectedly robust grip, which reminded him of the time he’d shut his fingers in the hinges of a cupboard door.
Tad had to tilt his face to keep eye contact with him – the bloke was remarkably tall – and he could imagine being on the receiving end of the intensity of James’s stare in a courtroom. It was intimidating even in this relaxed setting. Tad swallowed, then countered James’s greeting.
‘Good to meet you, too. Although to be honest I’ve not heard much about you,’ he said, wondering why he felt the need to claw back some kind of superiority. ‘I look forward to putting that right,’ he added, immediately weakening his position.
James finally released his hand, but not his gaze.
‘As you probably know, Clare likes to keep her cards close to her chest.’
Tad frowned. Why was this man talking about Clare as though he knew more about her than Tad did?
‘Aye. I do know that.’
‘I keep telling her she’d make the perfect barrister.’ James raised a single eyebrow and for a second Tad imagined him in the lead role in a silent movie, twisting at his evil moustache.
Clare – a barrister? Did the man not understand her character at all? Never in his life had Tad wished more intensely to be taller. When the extra four or five inches needed to be able to stare down on James Gardner didn’t magic themselves into his frame, Tad sighed and settled for an unprovocative question. ‘How long have you known Clare?’
‘Never mind that,’ Clare said, reclaiming James’s attention. ‘What I want to know is how you’re here. I thought you had to work?’
‘Plans changed; the interviews aren’t happening for another couple of weeks. I wanted to surprise you yesterday at the airport. But the flight was full, so I caught the first plane out this morning instead.’
Clare slipped her hand into his again. ‘Well, this is perfect, James. I’m so glad you managed to make it after all.’
‘As am I, Beetle.’
Their focus on one another was intense, so Tad edged away. But Beetle? Since when had Clare had a pet name? And why was it such a weird one? Never mind the strangeness of Clare being named after a member of the insect family, more worrying was the fact that Tad could feel himself taking an instant dislike to James Gardner.
Tad cleared his throat and brought the rest of the guests’ attention to him.
‘Shall we make our way back into the teaching kitchen in, say, five minutes?’ he said. With sous-chef, Matteo, still absent – although due to be back for evening service – Tad would have to move it to get everything ready for the students. ‘Maybe ten? We’ve still got plenty of food to prepare. Pan-fried sea bream and tiny new potatoes, served on a bed of local cherry tomatoes and olives. How does that sound?’
* * *
The food planned for lunch sounded top-notch, and tasted even better, in Hugh’s opinion. Especially with the latest development brightening the day. He’d been as convinced as Amy, the previous evening, that all bets were off where Tad was concerned. As they had sat at that restaurant table, in the twilight of the previous Mediterranean evening, he had felt Amy’s disappointment radiating out of her as strongly as the sun that had beaten down on them all day.
