Jacques had no idea what she was talking about either but it was good to hear her talking. He had been worried by how quiet and pale she had been in Gerard’s car.
‘Are you ready to get down?’ he asked her as they got to a reasonably uncrowded area behind the rope cordon no one really took much notice of.
‘If no one looks at the front of my coat,’ came the reply.
He swung her down and steadied her as her trainer-clad feet hit the snow and she rocked a little, looking slightly unstable. ‘OK?’ he checked.
‘I think so,’ she answered, unconvincingly.
Wherewasthe other woman? And, also, where was this pregnant reindeer he had been promised? He was beginning to think the whole thing was a ruse just to get him here in the midst of the community on one of the busiest nights of the year. He knew he should have been integrating a little more now but old habits died hard and there were always those dark memories at the back of his mind…
‘Stand here,’ Jacques ordered her. ‘By the fire. Do not move. I will be back.’
He was going to get the girl a hot drink and then he was going to find the woman he seemed to have lost. Why was he even concerned? He had zero responsibility for any of this. And that was exactly what he had wanted when he’d moved here. It was just him, his dog, Hunter, and the mountain. He strode fast, towards the stall selling coffee and an alcoholic drink that tasted as bad as it smelled, which he had only ever had once. Then suddenly…
‘Oh!’
Someone had walked into his path and sideswiped him and was now rocking on their feet. He acted quickly, pulling them towards him before they fell into the queue waiting for hot beverages. It took him a second to realise who it was. Who he was looking for. The sister of the smaller one.
‘You,’ he stated. ‘What are you doing? And why can none of you tourists stand up in the snow?’
‘You walked into me,’ the woman replied. ‘And now you’re crushing my arm. Please let go.’
Jacques did as she asked and she stood still very briefly until her trainers seemed to disappear fast into a clump of snow and she was losing her balance again. He reached out to save her.
‘I’m good!’ she answered roughly, steadying herself and quickly planting her feet on more secure ground. ‘Perfectly OK.’
She didn’t look perfectly OK, she looked angry. Her eyebrows were narrowed over her large blue eyes. There was frost in her shoulder-length blonde hair. And then the look in her eyes intensified, quickly turning from mad to concerned.
‘Where’s Erin?’
‘Who?’
‘My sister,’ she said. ‘The person you had on your back and obviously isn’t on your back now. You didn’t leave her on her own, did you?’
‘Relax,’ he answered. ‘She is fine. But she could use a coffee. I was just?—’
She was moving now, pulling her feet out of the snow and making moves through the gathering crowd. He tutted and followed. This was the best plan. To reunite them while he found Delphine and got away from the whole mess of the situation. Except, as his eyes found the spot he had definitely left the girl, he realised she was no longer there.Merde.
‘So, where did you say Erin was?’
The blue eyes were looking kind of accusing now.
‘Just over there,’ he answered and pointed in a very vague way. Simultaneously he was scanning the features of every person around, looking for the girl in the puffy jacket.Come on, Jacques. This was slack. But finding people in a crowd, recognising faces, it was one of his specialities. And he needed that ability to kick in fast now before the next question came.
‘Over where?’
‘Er, not far.’ Where could she have gone? Yes, there was a crowd here, but it was scores rather than hundreds. And, with his skills, he should be able to pick out a tourist at this time of year from the others around.
‘How far?’
‘Just… a little further.’Come on, Jacques. Look. Look hard.
‘There is no further,’ the woman answered, sounding very concerned now. ‘There is rope!’
Merde. Merde.Where was the girl? And why had she wandered off? He had left her where it was warm. Where she could regroup. No one here would have…
‘Someone might have taken her.’ The woman’s words were almost whispered, like if she said them too loudly it would make them come true.
