to a place that’s eight miles from a train which comes…how often a day?’
‘Three or four times, but it only stops here once.’
‘Once,’ he said faintly. ‘It stops once, eight miles away from a place that has no mobile phone reception, with a grandmother who even her granddaughter appears to be feeling homicidal about.’
Uh-oh. She ran her fingers through her hair and tried to regroup.
‘Not that it’s not a very kind invitation,’ he added and she choked. She was so close to the edge…
‘I thought it was kind,’ she managed.
‘Kind?’
‘I could have left you in the office.’
‘Or not. It was you,’ he reminded her, ‘who got me into this mess.’
‘You could have listened to the news on the radio this morning as well as me,’ she snapped and then thought—had she really said that? What little hope she had of keeping her job had finally gone.
‘That’s what I pay you for,’ he snapped back.
Well, if she’d gone this far…‘I left the office at eleven last night. I was at your hotel just after six. I don’t get eight hours off?’
‘I pay you for twenty-four hours on call.’
‘I’m not fussed about what you pay me,’ she snapped. The tension of the last few hours was suddenly erupting, and there was no way she could keep a lid on her emotions. ‘I’m fussed about the ten minutes I spent washing my hair this morning when I should have been listening to the radio and hearing about the airline strike. I’m fussed about being stuck with my boss, who doesn’t seem the least bit grateful that I’m doing the best I can. And now I’m stuck with someone who has the capacity to mess with my family Christmas if he doesn’t stop making me feel guilty and if he spends the rest of Christmas playing Manhattan Millionaire stuck here, and it’s All My Fault.’
She stopped. Out of breath. Out of emotion. Out of words. And it seemed he was the same.
Well, what could he say? Should he agree? He could hardly sack her here, right now, Meg thought. If he did…she and Letty really could be axe-murderers.
Or they could just leave him here, sitting on the Tandaroit station until the next train came through late tomorrow.
‘Don’t do it,’ he growled, and she remembered too late he had an uncanny ability to read her mind. He hesitated and then obviously decided he had no choice but to be a little bit conciliatory. ‘It’s very…clean hair,’ he ventured.
‘Thank you.’ What else was there to say?
‘This…grandmother…’
‘Letty.’
‘She’s backed up by other family members? With other cars?’ He was obviously moving on from her outburst, deciding the wisest thing was to ignore it.
‘Just Letty.’
‘And…who else?’
‘Scotty. My kid brother.’
‘You said no children,’ he said, alarmed.
‘Fifteen’s not a child.’
‘Okay,’ he conceded. ‘Who else?’
‘No one.’
‘Where are your parents?’
‘They died,’ she said. ‘Four years ago. Car crash.’
He was quick. He had it sorted straight away. ‘Which is why you took the job with me?’
‘So I could get home more,’ she said. ‘Ironic, isn’t it?’
But he was no longer listening. Had he been listening, anyway? ‘Could this be Letty?’ he demanded.
Oh, please…She stared into the darkness, and there it was, two pinpricks of light in the distance, growing bigger.
Headlights.
‘Deliverance,’ she muttered and her boss almost visibly flinched.
‘Just joking,’ she said.
‘Don’t joke.’
‘No jokes,’ she agreed and took a deep breath and picked up her holdall. ‘Okay, here’s Letty and, while you may not appreciate it, we really are safe. We’ve organised you a nice private bedroom with Internet. You can use our telephone if there are people you need to contact other than over the Web. You can stay in your room and work all Christmas but Letty is one of the world’s best cooks and here really is better than camping in the office.’
‘I imagine it will be,’ he said, but he didn’t sound sure. ‘And I am grateful.’
‘I bet you are.’
‘It’s lovely hair,’ he said, surprisingly. ‘It would have been a shame to leave it dirty for Christmas.’
‘Thank you,’ she managed again. Cheering up, despite herself.
Letty was coming. She could send W S McMaster to his allocated room and she could get on with Christmas.
Anger was counterproductive. Anger would get him nowhere. Yes, his PA had messed up his Christmas plans but the thing was done. And no, he should never have agreed to come with her to this middle-of-nowhere place. If he’d thought it through, maybe he could have rung a realtor and even bought a small house. Anything rather than being stuck at the beck and call of one wiry little woman called Letty who seemed to own the only set of wheels in the entire district.
They hadn’t passed another car. The car they were in sounded sick enough to be worrying. There was something wrong with its silencer—as if it didn’t have one. The engine was periodically missing. The gearbox seemed seriously shot. They were jolting along an unsealed road. He was wedged in the back seat with both his and Meg’s gear and Letty was talking at the top of her lungs.
‘I’m late because Dave Barring popped over to check on Millicent. Millicent’s a heifer I’m worried is going to calve over Christmas.’ Letty was yelling at him over her shoulder. ‘Dave’s our local vet and he’s off for Christmas so I wanted a bit of reassurance. He reckons she should be right,’ she told Meg. ‘Then I had to pick up three bags of fertiliser from Robertson’s. Robby said if I didn’t take it tonight the place’d be locked up till after New Year. So I’m sorry it’s a bit squashed in the back.’
‘I’m fine,’ he said. He wasn’t.
Anger was counterproductive. If he said it often enough he might believe it.
‘We can swap if you want,’ Meg said.
‘You won’t fit in the back,’ Letty said. ‘Not with Killer.’
Letty was right. The combination of Meg and Killer would never fit in the back seat with the baggage.
Killer looked like a cross between a Labrador and an Old English sheepdog. He was huge and hairy and black as the night around them. He’d met Meg with such exuberance that once more William had had to steady her, stopping her from being pushed right over.
While Killer had greeted Meg, Letty had greeted him with a handshake that was stronger than a man’s twice her size. Then she’d greeted her granddaughter with a hug that made Meg wince, and then she’d moved into organisational mode.
‘You in the back. Meg, in the front with Killer. I told Scotty I’d be back by nine-thirty so we need to move.’
They were moving. They were flying over the corrugated road with a speed that made him feel as if he was about to lose teeth.
‘So what do we call you?’ Letty said over her shoulder.
‘I told you;