‘The love letter?’
‘Have I read the love letter?’ I looked so flabbergasted at the idea, I was surely in contention for an Oscar. ‘No! It’s a very personal thing, I would never, nothing to do with me, no sir.’
‘Well, can I read it?’ he asked.
You can when I’ve written it, I thought.
‘She was going to drop it off but she got caught up at work,’ I replied. ‘There was an emergency only she could take care of.’
And in certain circles, I was positive that making sure Mr Fluffkins got his walkwasconsidered an emergency.
Ren wiped a hand over his face, eyebrows raised, still altogether too surprised at the thought someone might take one look at him and fall head over heels. ‘You know, my grandparents always said they fell in love at first sight. They met at a dance, got engaged a month later and married six months after that. I guess there’s a part of me that always wondered what that must be like, to see someone and to just know.’
‘Part of me wonders what it would be like to climb Everest, doesn’t mean I’m going to find out,’ I said, momentarily forgetting my mission. ‘But I’m sure it does happen. Sometimes.’
‘So you don’t believe in it?’ He folded his arms across his chest, the white sleeves of his T-shirt straining against his brown skin. ‘We have ourselves a cynic.’
‘It’s a pretty thought,’ I replied. ‘And I love that it has happened to two people as wonderful as you and Bel.’
His grin faded away into something more thoughtful as he held my gaze, his face bathed in golden light. It was offensive how beautiful he was. Just sitting thisclose to him had even my stony heart skipping enough beats to set off the warning on my Apple watch.
‘Phoebe,’ he started to say. ‘I don’t know—’
‘Look!’ I leapt to my feet, cutting him off as a large shadow swept over the terrace. ‘There she is.’
Circling above us was the red-tailed hawk.
‘Do you think she was there the whole time?’ I asked, cupping a hand over my eyes to get a better look. ‘Watching in the woods like a creepy little madam?’
‘If she was, she sure knows how to pick her moments,’ he replied, eyes still on me. I flushed from head to toe, awash with an uncomfortable warmth I didn’t quite know what to do with.
‘There, in that tree, do you see?’ Ren pointed upwards to a tree behind his house. ‘That’s the nest, looks like a bundle of grey sticks.’
It was almost impossible to see the wood for the literal trees, but I searched and searched until the nest came into focus like a magic eye picture. As soon as I saw it, I couldn’t see anything else. The hawk swooped down into the tree, its branches rustling and protesting her arrival until everything settled and I lost her again.
‘You think Bel likes birds?’ Ren asked in a voice so low and soft, it felt like a caress.
‘I think she loves them,’ I replied, ignoring the whisper of doubt that gnawed at my bones. Was this a good idea?
‘My grandpa always said our house was lucky for love. Maybe it’s my turn.’ The left side of his mouth quirked upwards to form a dimple in his cheek, a charmingly resigned half-smile. ‘I guess I’m going on a date with your friend.’
‘She’s going to be so happy,’ I said, hugging my arms around myself as he looked back out into the trees. ‘You won’t regret it.’
But I had a horrible feeling I might.
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘When you asked if I could help you with a job, I assumed you meant the dog walking,’ I held up a pink bikini top and gulped. ‘Are you sure there aren’t a couple of Dobermanns out there, dying to stretch their legs?’
Bel bit her quivering bottom lip and hit me, her ridiculous anime eyes glassy and wet. ‘I’m so sorry, I would never ask someone I hardly know to do something like this, but I really feel a bond with you and the girl I usually work with has food poisoning and I really need money and no one else was free on such short notice and this is not the kind of gig you can do without full control of your colon.’
‘Funny you should say that,’ I replied. ‘Because I’m not sure I have full control of mine.’
‘If you want to back out, I totally understand. Everything happens for a reason, right? So what if I can’t pay my rent and have to give up my dreams and lose my shot at true love and move home and live with my parents.’
She really didn’t need to throw her arm across her eyes but it did add something to the overall dramatic impact.
‘OK, enough, stop.’ I held my hands out in front of me to shut her down, eyeballing the rest of my uniform with wary resignation. ‘We both know I’m going to do it.’
