took a step back and held both of her arms out wide as his gaze stayed locked onto her wonky feet.
He flicked one hand in the air and tutted. ‘My hands are tied. No choice—you can either slip your shoes off and go barefoot the whole evening, or you pop back inside and change into something you can walk in and stand in for several hours. What’s it to be?’
Tea, glorious tea. A celebration of teas from around the world.
The tea a person chooses to drink for pleasure is as unique as their fingerprint. Personal and special. And a true insight into their character.
From Flynn’s Phantasmagoria of Tea
‘I hope that you are not going to inspect the contents of my entire wardrobe,’ Dee snorted as Sean bounded up the stairs from the tea shop to her apartment and followed her along the narrow corridor. ‘Because I’m going to tell you now that my selection of footwear suitable for a conference dinner is rather limited.’
‘Not at all.’ Sean smiled, enjoying the view as Dee skipped up the stairs in front of him and trying not to ogle too blatantly. The memory of her judo training was still too fresh to forget in a hurry. ‘Your delightful choice of clothing has been inspired this week and I expect nothing less.’
Dee came to a dead stop outside a white-painted door and he held onto the bannister as she looked down at him with something close to nervousness in her eyes.
‘What is it?’ he asked with a smile. ‘Worried that I will reveal the terrors of your boudoir to the world?’ He pressed his right hand to his chest, lifted his head and said in a clear voice, ‘As a true gentleman, I promise that your secrets are safe with me.’
Dee lifted both eyebrows high. ‘No doubt. But that’s not the problem. It’s just that—’ she coughed and Sean caught a shy blush at the base of her neck ‘—Lottie is the only person who has seen my bedroom before, and I am actually quite shy about showing my space to other people. In fact, I think it might be better if you wait downstairs. I shouldn’t be too long.’
Sean shook his head very slowly. ‘Not a chance. I’m not going anywhere.’
Dee sighed and folded her arms. ‘Has anyone ever told you that you are annoyingly stubborn?’
‘Frequently. It is one of my finer qualities,’ he replied in a light, lilting voice. ‘Once I make my mind up about how to do something or a particular plan—that’s it. My plans are not for changing.’
She gazed at him for a few seconds before slowly unfolding her arms.
‘This tea festival has a lot to answer for,’ Sean heard her mutter, but she turned and opened her bedroom door, swinging her shoes in one hand.
Sean stood at the door and took a breath as he tried to take in what he was looking at.
For a small bedroom Dee had managed to squeeze in a wide pale-wood wardrobe and a table under the window. An upright bookcase stacked with papers, magazines and books of all sizes took up the rest of the wall as far as her bedside cabinet.
The walls had been painted in a warm shade of cream. All of the soft furnishings in the room were variations of shades of lavender and primrose yellow, including a cream quilted bed-cover embroidered with tiny blossoms.
The whole room was calm, orderly, clean, serene and tranquil. Feminine without being over-the-top girly or pretty. It was the type of colour scheme and arrangement several of his interior designers had introduced for the new boutique-hotel range his sister was running.
Sean realized with a shock that it was the exact opposite of what he had been expecting. Shame on him for making judgements about the choices Dee would make in her home. Shame on him for judging her. Full-stop.
A smile crept up on him unannounced.
Dee Flynn was turning out to be one of the most astonishing people that he had ever met.
‘You can come in if you promise not to touch anything or criticize,’ Dee said as she lifted a silk kimono from the bed, swung open her wardrobe door and pulled out a hanger.
‘Thank you. This is...a lovely room.’
She coughed and whirled around to face him.
‘Don’t sound so surprised. What exactly were you expecting? Did you think I had made a nest of straw from old wooden tea chests or something?’
Sean held up both hands. ‘Not a bit. I simply didn’t think that you would go for a Scandinavian colour scheme with an English twist. Most of your clothes seem bright and Far Eastern. I thought you might have chosen an ethnic style—something bright. That’s all.’
‘Ah, you were expecting to see rainbow colours and dark wood. I see what you mean. This must be really quite shocking. But you forget that this is where I come to relax at the end of the day. I need this quiet space to help me centre myself and calm down and focus. Otherwise, I think I really would go nuts with the chaos that is my daily life.’
‘Well, I know what that feels like. Especially with jet lag,’ Sean replied and squeezed past her and picked up a silver-framed photograph from her computer desk.
A tall, slender, grey-haired man in white tunic and trousers was standing with one hand resting on a wooden balcony, the other hand across the shoulders of a dark-haired woman wearing a bright azure top and wrap skirt. All around them was exuberant green foliage, and a riot of flowering plants of all shapes and colours spilled out from pots and planters.
‘Are these your parents?’ he asked, and gestured with his head towards the photo.
Dee put down a shoe box and came and stood next to him.
‘Yup. That’s Mum and Dad on the veranda of the house they are renting in Sri Lanka. They love it there and I certainly cannot see them coming back to the UK now that they are both retired, especially in winter. The lifestyle is so different for retired people in a hot climate. And they can make their pension go a long way.’
‘Do you see them often?’
‘Once a year I save up for a flight and set up some appointments at the tea plantations. It’s an amazing treat, and tax deductible. Actually, the owner of the estate where my folks live will be at the tea festival next week. It will be nice to see him again, even if he is a tough negotiator when it comes to his best tea. Mum and Dad get on with him and he treats the estate workers very well.’
‘So you only see them once a year? That must be tough. Do they have Internet?’
She threw back her head and laughed out loud. ‘Oh please, don’t make me laugh. It took Lottie an hour to put this make-up on and she will go mad if I wipe it all off. But in answer to your question...’ she dabbed the corner of her eyes with a tissue ‘...my folks are anti-technology in a big way. That place they are renting has a generator which breaks down at regular intervals but they get by without it most of the time. So, no—no Internet, computer, mobile phone or anything close to what they think is the curse of western culture. But they do write lovely letters. And for that I am thankful.’
Then she paused. ‘And I’m talking way too much and not looking for shoes and we have a deadline. Righty; how about these?’
Dee turned and was about to dive into the shoebox when Sean stepped closer and took a gentle hold of both of her arms and smiled. ‘I would much rather listen to you talking about your parents all evening than face the trainee managers. My seminar on time management and productivity can wait until tomorrow. Because right now I have a much more pressing task. I owe you a huge apology, Miss Flynn.’
She cleared her throat and stared back at him wide-eyed. And blinked. Twice. Then waited in silence for him to finish.
‘When I fell into the tea shop the other evening and you decked me so delightfully, I filed you neatly away into a box labelled “sexy baker lady”