After last night’s exploits, she’d decided to just have a quiet day lazing by the pool. While Valentina had mentioned that there’d be more guests arriving, Annie certainly wasn’t anticipating having to do a meet and greet.
Standing up above the terrace now was the mousiest-looking girl she’d ever seen. She had luminous red hair tied up in bun, with plastic-framed glasses on her face, and pale freckled skin.
Her clothes were reminiscent of the kind of hand-me-downs Annie would’ve worn in her teens, but at least her figure wasn’t too bad. She had that and her flaming hair going for her – even if there was little else.
‘I’m Annie. Are you staying here?’ she asked, jumping up from the sun lounger. Poor thing looked harmless and a bit terrified, to be honest, and instinctively Annie’s heart went out to her.
‘Colette,’ the other woman answered in a very definite English accent. ‘And yes, I think have a reservation here, but I’m not sure where I’m supposed to check in exactly.’
‘Ah, things are pretty casual round here,’ Annie commented airily. ‘There’s no check-in as such, but someone will be coming round later. You the one from England then?’
‘Yes.’
‘Right. I didn’t think you looked very American. The manager, landlady – or whatever they call them in Italy – told me that there were two other girls arriving this week,’ Annie supplied, throwing on a sarong.
She put on her flip-flops, hopped up the steps and led the new girl through the courtyard and into the house.
‘Oh. So how do I get my room key?’ Colette was still holding onto her humongous suitcase for dear life as they went through to the kitchen. She looked to be a couple of years younger than her and so timid, Annie thought, even in the way she moved.
‘Like I said, Valentina will be around this evening. In the meantime, just relax and rest up after the journey. It’s hot out there today. Did you have something to eat? Are you here for long?’
‘Yes, three weeks. Just a break away from work, really.’
‘Wow, you must have some job,’ Annie chuckled, ‘if you can afford that much time off.’
‘No, it’s not that. It’s a family business, a bakery in Brighton. My mother and sister arranged this trip for me as a gift,’ Colette explained.
‘So you’re here on your own?’ Annie probed, suddenly conscious of the fact that she was the one asking all the questions. Hairdresser’s habit. But she was intrigued by the fact that she was a fellow lone traveller.
‘Yes, it’s a bit of a dream of mine to come to Italy. I meant to after uni but it didn’t work out. But I know a bit of Italian, so …’
‘Well, you’ll be handy to have around so. I haven’t a word. In fairness, I was lucky to get through school, let alone learn a foreign language,’ she laughed. ‘I work as a hairdresser in Dublin.’
‘Dublin, Ireland?’ a third voice called out then, and Annie and Colette both turned to see a gorgeous blonde standing under the front door arch.
She was naturally tanned, model-thin, and looked as if she’d stepped straight out of the magazine Annie been reading, with her expensive designer clothes, artfully tousled hair, designer bag on her arm and obligatory Louis Vuitton suitcases at her feet.
All this doe-eyed beauty yet unashamedly sensual, and with a confident air that made Annie feel threatened on sight.
‘The American?’ she asked rhetorically.
‘Yeah, the American,’ the other woman drawled. ‘Kimberley Weston. You guys can call me Kim,’ she introduced herself as she glided into their midst, extending a hand to Colette and then Annie.
Colette greeted her eagerly, a look of undisguised wonderment on her face. Annie wasn’t so easily impressed, and she tried to restrain the naked envy crawling up her spine. Colette might not be a trust-fund baby, but this girl certainly was.
Annie had an innate issue with rich people. She wasn’t – obviously – and those who were had made her life hell every day for as long as she could remember. Especially in secondary school.
It was bad enough to be the adopted child of a lower working-class family with few lessons in etiquette, no friends and few prospects for improving your situation. The only reason Annie was even at that particular school was because her mother cleaned the parish priest’s house and everyone knew it. The mostly well-off pupils took particular delight in tormenting her because of it.
Kim looked exactly like one of those girls who took pleasure in Annie’s pain.
‘So your own names?’ the American asked, sitting down on a stool and crossing her long legs under the countertop. She casually flung her expensive bag on the seat next to Annie’s as if it had come from a high-street chain instead of a Fifth Avenue designer boutique.
‘Annie O’Doherty,’ she finally answered as the question began to loom uncomfortably in the air. ‘And this is Colette. She’s just arrived, too.’
‘Turner,’ she supplied. ‘Colette Turner, but Colette is fine.’
She really was too sweet, Annie thought as she looked at how the younger woman responded to questioning. Her words were soft, her eyes seemed to seek out anything but the gaze of others. She also watched how the younger girl covertly studied Kim’s attire and then her own. There was no comparing the two.
