She poured a serving of wine for Grace and then topped up the other two glasses already sitting on the counter. Once they all had a glass in hand, Miriam raised hers in a toast.
“To our new friends, Grace and Stanley,” she said.
Grace smiled, feeling touched by the warm welcome she had received from these people who were strangers, and on whom she’d imposed so rudely when she’d conscripted poor Ryan into helping her deal with the Stanley situation.
“To new friends,” Grace echoed, and clinked her glass against Ryan’s and Miriam’s in turn before taking a sip of the red wine. “Oh, thatisreally good,” she said, impressed with the complex flavours of the pinot noir. “Great choice, Miriam.”
“I’m glad you like it. Now, why don’t you two take your wine over to the sofa and sit down, and I’ll finish preparing dinner. Go on, scoot.”
“I said I’d help with the potatoes, Grandma,” Ryan protested.
“I have everything in hand. Off you go and let me enjoy my final bit of pottering at the stove.”
Ryan looked ready to insist again on helping, but Miriam shooed him away. “You will be more help by keeping young Stanley out from underneath my feet. Once I’m serving this casserole, I suspect he will be darting around in the hope of a spoonful or two, and the last thing I need is to go head-first over the scrappy little dog in my moment of culinary triumph. Now, off you go and keep our guest company.”
With a reluctant nod, Ryan left the kitchen area, but Grace noticed the enigmatic look he exchanged with this grandmother first. She wondered what message they’d given each other in thatlook—Grace was sure there was one, even if they had tried to hide it from her.
Once they sat down, Ryan kept an eye on his grandmother’s work in the kitchen while still being a courteous host to Grace. She could tell he was watching his grandmother’s movements carefully, and the flicker of concern on his face was impossible to miss.
Once more, Grace wondered about the older lady’s health. She might only have met her a few minutes ago, but she already liked Miriam a great deal and hoped all was well with her.
“So, how was your day?” Ryan asked as Grace settled into the deep sofa.
“It was busy,” she replied. “It’s always busy at the hotel, to be fair, but today was even busier than usual as we had events booked in every one of our function rooms this evening, which means there’s always extra work to ensure things go to plan and everyone sticks to the agreed schedules. I was in charge of coordinating the largest of the functions, a special wedding anniversary meal and party, and managing the staff beforehand and making sure the kitchen was ready for once the guests were seated and…”
Grace caught herself and offered Ryan an apologetic look. “Sorry. I tend to get a little carried away once I start talking about my job.”
“You must enjoy it, in that case,” he said and smiled. “It sounds like it might be a bit like a military operation behind the scenes.”
“That’s not a bad analogy. In a five-star hotel, the service has to be perfect, better than perfect, actually. Even when things are going wrong behind the scenes, we can’t let the guests know about it. When people are paying the sort of money charged by a place like the Hamblehurst Manor Hotel, they don’t wantto know that things aren’t going to plan. They just want to be treated like royalty. We live and die by our ability to do that.”
Ryan asked a few more questions about her job and her work at the hotel, and Grace reminded herself not to chatter on endlessly about it all as she answered. Ryan wouldn’t be the first person she’d bored senseless with her enthusiasm for the hospitality sector in which she worked. Eventually, she found a way during one of her answers to direct the conversation back onto safer terrain.
“One of the very small disadvantages of working in a place like the Hamblehurst Manor is that staff aren’t allowed to use their phones while they’re working,” she said, digging around in her bag for her mobile. “Obviously, that rule makes sense because we can’t have staff forgetting about the guests because they’re glued to their phones. But it meant that I wasn’t able to phone the dog warden again today to speak to him about the two of us fleeing the boarding kennels earlier with Stanley. I was able to sneak away during my breaks and make sure you hadn’t been in touch about any problems with the dog, but I had no time to ring the warden.”
“I thought you left a message with the warden’s service before you dropped me off here this morning?” Ryan said.
“I did, but I expected to find at least a few missed calls from him by the time I finished my shift,” she said, scrolling through her phone. “I even expected to find a voice message, telling me off for failing to follow the procedures. But I don’t have any missed calls or messages from him at all.”
She checked the phone logs again, just to be sure, but there were definitely no calls while she’d been working, at least not from the dog warden.
“You said the warden sounded rushed when you spoke to him today,” Ryan said. “Maybe he didn’t have time to get back in touch yet.”
“You’re probably right. He did sound harassed and fairly grumpy when we spoke, and said there were lots of other stray dog calls he had to attend to.”
“Well, maybe it’s a good thing you don’t have any irate messages from him. We didn’t want to leave Stanley at those boarding kennels, and the last thing either of us wants is to be harangued into taking him there.”
“Which we’re definitely not doing.”
“Agreed.”
“Having said that…”
When she trailed off, Ryan gave her a curious look. “Go on.”
“Nothing. It’s not your problem.”
His gaze raked across her face for a moment, his deep blue eyes searching hers and making her fidget in her seat beneath his intense scrutiny.
