Secrets of a Teenage Heiress. Katy Birchall

a porter tipped his hat at me as I walked past, and guests wandered by on their way to their bedroom or the tearoom. The only thing that was different was that the extravagant flower arrangements around the lobby had been changed from pink flowers to purple ones.

      ‘Ah, Flick, I’ve been waiting for you.’

      I grimaced as Audrey came down the stairs. Before this whole Skylar-Chase thing distracted me, I’d been planning on racing straight to my room when I got home, thus avoiding any run-ins with Audrey or Matthew. My dawdling had cost me.

      ‘I’m impressed. I thought you might run straight to your room and try to avoid me,’ she admitted.

      ‘Why would you think that?’

      ‘Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because on any other occasion that your mother has asked you to help someone in the hotel, you’ve rushed to your room, locked the door and pretended to be asleep.’

      ‘Did you want something, or were you just looking for me to tell me off ?’ I huffed.

      ‘I need your help with a small task in the restaurant.’

      ‘Great, OK, but I have to go and walk Fritz and then I’ll be with you.’

      ‘I thought you might say that, which is why I asked Jamie to take Fritz out about fifteen minutes ago. I’m sure Fritz is having a marvellous time in the park right now. So, to the restaurant.’ She smiled, ushering me towards it. ‘You can help set up for the first dinner sitting.’

      I was surprised by how mild the job allocation was – how hard can it be to set out a few knives and forks? – but I groaned loudly for effect so she wouldn’t think I was getting away with it.

      ‘Ah, Timothy.’ Audrey beckoned over one of the waiters folding napkins. I recognised him from the other day when he annoyingly interrupted my conversation with Mum about the selfie stick. ‘Flick will be assisting you for the next hour. Is it OK if I leave her in your charge?’

      ‘Absolutely,’ he said cheerily. ‘Welcome to the team, Flick.’

      I did my best unimpressed face.

      ‘I’ll let you get started then,’ Audrey said, clapping her hands together before sauntering back to reception.

      Timothy gestured for me to follow him to a trolley on which there was a large, shiny silver tray. Piled up on it was what looked like a hundred different pieces of cutlery.

      ‘Terrifying, isn’t it?’ He chuckled. ‘Don’t worry, you’ll soon get the hang of it. I’ll run through what each knife and fork is for, and so on and so forth, and then you can watch me do some settings before having a go yourself. Does that sound like a plan?’

      I pursed my lips together.

      ‘Er . . . great,’ he said nervously. ‘Let’s begin with the forks.’ He selected several forks from the tray and held them up. ‘This is a fish fork, this one is a dinner fork and this one is a salad fork. Then you’ve got this little mite, the cocktail fork.’ He chuckled but stopped at my expression, placing the forks down quickly. ‘Now, the knives. This one is a –’

      ‘Timothy!’

      Another waiter walked briskly towards us. ‘Apologies for interrupting, Miss Royale. Timothy, you’re needed briefly in the kitchen.’

      ‘Right, well, Flick, you just wait here a minute, I’ll be back in a tick. And then we’ll go through the knives.’

      ‘Can’t wait.’ I rolled my eyes and sat down.

      Timothy and the other waiter shared a look before they hurried away. I picked up one of the forks and examined the patterns engraved into it, wondering why we didn’t have such fancy cutlery in our apartment. Mum is so stingy.

      Throwing the fork on the top of the cutlery pile with a loud clang, I looked impatiently about me at the vast, empty dining room. I eyed up the door in the far corner which led to the piano room, a much smaller event space for musical performances – Cal and I used it to spy on dinner guests when we were little until we got told off for getting in the way. Timothy was nowhere to be seen and, no doubt, he would be kept busy for a while in the kitchen. Technically, I’d done what I’d been told to do and the person in charge of me was shirking his duties. Smugly, I rushed over to the door. I hesitated when I heard Timothy’s voice coming down the corridor towards the restaurant. It was now or never. I pushed the door, slipped through and closed it behind me quickly, leaning back and breathing a sigh of relief. No more fish-fork lectures for me.

      ‘Mwahahaha,’ I whispered gleefully to myself, revelling in the silence of the piano room and my cunning escape. It would be easy to slip up to my room from here using the back stairs without being seen by Audrey and Matthew who are always front of house. No one would catch me here.

      ‘Hi.’

      I yelped as someone stood up from the stool behind the grand piano.

      My breath caught in my throat as I saw who it was.

      Skylar Chase.