Saul picked Stevie up at 7pm. Stevie didn’t really want to go and it was all Betty’s fault. Mostly. Some of it. The old woman had done her best to put Stevie off Saul.
‘He’ll break your heart,’ she had warned ominously. ‘I know his type.’
‘And what type is that?’
‘Love ’em and leave ’em. You love him, and he’ll leave you.’
‘I’m not going to fall in love with him,’ Stevie protested.
‘Good. Because you want to save all your lovin’ for someone who’s lovin’ you.’
‘I think Gloria Gaynor said that,’ Stevie pointed out. ‘Only she did it better.’
‘I can sing it, if you like.’
‘No thanks, I’ll pass.’ Stevie smiled. She was really going to miss Betty when she returned to her own home.
‘I’m being serious,’ Betty said. ‘I’ve seen the way Nick Saunders looks at you.’
Unconsciously, Stevie put her fingers to her lips before she realised what she was doing and hastily snatched them away.
‘I’ve seen the way you look at him, too,’ Betty carried on, oblivious to the scowls Stevie was sending in her direction.
‘You’re imagining things,’ Stevie returned. ‘I’ve got to go, Saul is here.’
With Betty’s “hmmph” following her down the stairs, Stevie dragged a smile from somewhere and made sure it was firmly in place – Saul didn’t want a miserable cow for a dinner companion and neither did he need to know about her problems. So with that in mind, she resolved to enjoy the evening. Or make the best of it, at least. It had been five days now since the awful reviews on TripAdvisor, and Stevie could have sworn there was a downturn in customers. Not her regulars, but tourists and visitors. Although, it might just as easily be explained by the continuing damp and drizzly weather. She’d just have to wait and see what happened when the weather improved. Karen, bless her, had been furious when Stevie had told her what had happened, and she’d left a glowing review, and had got quite a few of her friends to do the same, in an effort to counteract the poor ones.
‘I hear you’ve got a problem,’ Saul said, as soon as she opened the car door and slid into the seat.
‘You could say that.’ Stevie’s miserable look was instantly back in place.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’ he asked, and she heard only sympathy in his voice.
‘No thanks. I want to forget about it, for tonight at least.’
‘Fair enough, but I’m here if you need a shoulder.’
A part of her thought “that’s nice of him”, but another part thought “does everyone know my business?” If she was in London the odds of some farmer (OK, maybe not a farmer – a media consultant, or a doctor, or a banker) knowing she’d had a series of one-star reviews on TripAdvisor was so slim it couldn’t even squeeze through the gaps in the polished floorboards of the country pub Saul was taking her to.
It irked her a little that he knew, but in another way, she was actually relieved. At least she didn’t have to explain to her date why she was a bit down.
‘Mum said “Hi” and wants to know when you’re coming to lunch again,’ Saul said, and Stevie was grateful for the change of subject.
‘I really did enjoy myself on Sunday,’ she said. ‘Your mum is a great cook.’
‘My annoying family didn’t put you off then?’
‘No, it was nice, actually.’ Seeing the warmth between them all, despite their teasing and bickering, had been lovely, and each one of them had made her welcome.
Since Sunday and the flood, Stevie felt she was finally starting to fit into the village. Even Mads wasn’t so bad, once you got to know him – and although Stevie hadn’t ventured into The Hen and Duck since, she’d bumped into him in the street now and again, and he always asked how she was and how she was settling in.
The rest of the short drive consisted of the pair of them discussing food and when the car pulled into the car park, Stevie was delighted to see that The Griffin was actually a pretty, old, converted farmhouse on the main road to Brecon. Ironically, she’d looked it up on TripAdvisor and had noted it had a good reputation, so she was really looking forward to her meal
She loved eating out. For her, there was nothing like analysing the balance of flavours, the ingredients, the textures, the choices, the cooking methods, the way the food was displayed on the plate and seeing if she could steal any ideas.
Tonight, though, Stevie found she had little or no idea what she was eating, because sitting at a table behind Saul was Allegra Johnson herself.
Thankfully the woman in question had her back to Stevie and hadn’t noticed her, but Stevie could feel the woman’s malevolence all the same. It lingered in the air like an expensive perfume, and although Stevie did her best to try to pretend AllegraJ83 (the woman’s TripAdvisor name) wasn’t there, Stevie couldn’t prevent herself from glancing at her occasionally.
The man Allegra was with must be her husband, Stevie surmised. After all, only a man and woman who were in a long-term relationship could look so thoroughly disinterested in the person they were with.
Allegra didn’t look too interested in her meal either, Stevie noticed, because she sent her plate back with almost as much on it as there had been when the waitress brought it to her table. He had more or less cleared his, Stevie saw. And she had no clue why the woman bothered to look at the dessert menu at all, because even from this distance, Stevie could hear the hard time Allegra was giving the waitress, quizzing her about what exactly was in each dish, then when she’d received an answer, dismissing the dessert in question and moving on to the next item.
In the end, her husband had what looked like a pavlova and Allegra had nothing except for a coffee.
‘…and the hippo climbed out of the spaceship, wiped the dust from his visor and handed over a jar of Mars air,’ Saul was saying, as Stevie dragged her attention back to him.
‘You what?’ She looked around as if expecting to see the hippo.
‘You’ve not been listening to a word I’ve said, have you?’ Saul asked, cheerfully.
‘Um, no. Sorry.’
‘Understandable. Although you should have said if you wanted to swap places.’
‘Thanks, but I prefer to keep her where I can see her,’ Stevie grimaced. ‘I didn’t realise you knew she was there.’
‘I saw her the minute we arrived,’ Saul admitted. ‘I did think about walking straight back out, but it’s Friday, and the nearest decent place is usually full and it’s not half as nice as this, and—’
‘It’s OK.’ Stevie smiled across the table at him. ‘At least being here has given me the chance to see it’s not just my place she gives a hard time to. She doesn’t seem to like it here, either.’
‘You did, though, thank goodness,’ Saul pointed out, and Stevie was surprised to see she’d eaten every scrap of whatever had been on her plate, although she couldn’t remember a single mouthful of it.
Stevie deliberately looked away when Allegra and her husband departed and she left it to Saul to tell her whether Allegra had spotted Stevie or not (she hadn’t), but the whole experience, together with Stevie’s rather lukewarm attraction to Saul, didn’t make her want to share a kiss with him. So when Saul dropped her off at the tea shop, and leaned over the gearstick, Stevie gave him a swift peck on the cheek and scarpered, leaving Saul staring after her with a bemused expression on his face.
‘I take it a coffee isn’t on the cards then?’ he called, as she went to shut the car door.
Stevie gave him a rueful smile and shook her head.
‘Didn’t think so,’ he said, his own smile fairly cheerful, and Stevie wondered if anything actually got this man down.
She fished out her keys and opened the door, and as she turned to give him a quick wave Saul called through the open car window, ‘Do yourself a favour and phone him,’ He winked at her. ‘You’ll regret it if you don’t.’
Stevie had no intention of doing any such thing, but it wasn’t until she was through the door and locking it behind her that what Saul had said sank in and it occurred to her Saul must have known exactly how she felt about him.
And about Nick.