Читать книгу Sunshine After the Rain: a feel good, laugh-out-loud romance - Daisy James - Страница 13

Chapter Six

Evie massaged her temples in an effort to alleviate the nagging headache that had burgeoned since the flight had left the runway at Stansted. The autumn sweater she had hastily selected in London for her last-minute dash to Corfu clung to her skin and perspiration collected around her neckline and beneath her cleavage.

She glanced out of the window of the speeding taxi as the driver pulled away from the airport – a chaotic experience in itself as she and her fellow passengers had been forced to wait over two hours for their luggage to appear on the carousel. She could have liberated her suitcase from the hold quicker herself. Tempers had frayed, children had moaned vociferously, and babies had screamed for their next feed. It wasn’t the serene start she had been expecting to her sojourn in the Ionian isles.

The next thing she knew she was head-butting the headrest of the passenger seat in front of her and the shrill screech of brakes reverberated through her ears like nails down a chalkboard.

‘Oww!’ she cried as a sharp spasm of pain shot through her nose.

‘Sorry. But the tourists around here are crazy!’ declared the driver, throwing his hands in the air and issuing a stream of Greek expletives at a gang of intoxicated revellers who had lurched into the taxi’s path from one of the tightly packed bars that lined the roadside before making their unsteady way to the narrow pebble beach on Evie’s right.

As she stared after them, one of their number whipped off his football shirt, circling it above his head like a lasso whilst he sang a raucous tune from the terraces. Evie prayed he didn’t intend to take a dip in the sea. She had no doubt it was a refreshing experience during the day, but at eleven o’clock at night the water looked like an infinite sheet of rippling tar and, to her mind, looked quite foreboding.

Through the taxi’s open windows, she could hear the thud of disparate tunes, from ballads to bouzouki music, echoing along the neon-bright strip. She sent up a missive of grateful thanks that she wasn’t staying in the resort, heaving a sigh of relief when the taxi left the partying resort behind to continue their journey north of Ipsos.

‘How much further is it?’

‘Nissaki is not far now,’ declared the driver, raking his fingers through the gelled tufts of his ebony hair. The young Greek Adonis in the front seat may have decided to emulate one of his favourite movie star heroes with his Mediterranean-hued good looks and toned biceps, but he had clearly modelled his driving skills on Lewis Hamilton.

Evie checked her seat belt before tipping her head back and allowing her thoughts to float over everything that had happened in her life in such a short space of time. A spasm of fear shot from her chest and radiated out to her fingertips.

Was she just as crazy as the drunken holidaymakers planning a midnight swim?

The answer was a resounding yes!

Why on earth had she let Pippa persuade her to catch the next flight out to Corfu? She felt like she had been unceremoniously evicted from her hectic life and sent into exile. Surely the right thing to do would have been to stay and face her problems, not run away like a frightened rabbit, which was how she was feeling at the moment, devoured by guilt, as she stared out into the darkness across the Ionian Sea. It was exactly the desolate view she expected to see from her self-imposed rabbit burrow.

However, she had no regrets about terminating her relationship with Dylan – that was something she should have done months ago. She couldn’t feel guilty because, if she knew Dylan at all, he would be camping out at his grandparents’ home until one of his musician friends offered him a bed, or, possibly a more likely scenario, he fell into a new relationship with one of the band’s numerous fans. Evie wasn’t surprised when there was no accompanying pang of loss and if this had been her only problem then she could have coped with that.

What she should have done when she woke up on Saturday morning was call James and explain what had happened at the gallery the night before. Told him that she had checked the documentation attached to the painting and that it had definitely been endorsed with his signature. James would have been able to check the paperwork, acknowledge the mistake and, utilizing his immeasurable conciliatory skills honed over a thirty-year career as a barrister, would have found a way to smooth Jaxx’s, and his agent’s, ruffled feathers. Then she could have carried on where she had left off.

But was that truly what she wanted? A tickle of excitement had started to form at the base of her stomach that she was here, in Corfu of all places, and she had her artist’s rucksack on the seat next to her.

Yet, despite the uplift in her spirits, her head was about to explode and her eyes sparkled with unshed tears because, in the mad rush to leave for the Saturday afternoon flight, she had left her mobile phone charging on the kitchen worktop. The fact that she had inadvertently severed all contact with the outside world left her feeling bereft, like one of those little rowing boats cast adrift and floating aimlessly in the open sea to her right. She felt like one of her arms had been amputated.

How on earth was she going to get through the next two weeks without her phone?

She took refuge in her misery – indulgent, she knew – but it was better than engaging in a falsely cheerful conversation with someone it was unlikely she would ever set eyes on again. She glanced out of the window and inhaled a deep steadying breath to continue analysing the catalogue of catastrophes that had befallen her when her reverie of self-pity was rudely interrupted.

‘Argh!’

‘What’s the matter?’ she asked, her battered heart performing a backflip. What else could go wrong? Had they run out of petrol?

But Evie didn’t need a reply to her question. She too had seen the spectacular fork of light illuminate the scene in front of them, followed swiftly by a deep low rumble of thunder, and within seconds, the heavens opened. She had never seen rain like it. It was as though the Greek meteorological gods had decided to take a power shower.

The taxi’s windscreen wipers provided no competition for the downpour and the route ahead became obliterated behind a curtain of rain. Bearing in mind the road to James’s villa in Nissaki snaked around the eastern coastline, she wasn’t surprised when the taxi drew to a halt in an opening at the side of the road, which fell away sharply to her right where she could hear the waves crashing on the beach.

It was like being in a car wash. Rain hammered down with angry vengeance. Fast-flowing rivulets had formed and were chasing their companions down the sloping footpaths towards the sea, the tall thin cypress trees bending perpendicularly to the storm’s demands. Evie cursed the sojourn into misplaced optimism she had indulged in on the plane whilst sipping a glass of Prosecco rosé; when she had dreamed of sun-soaked days stretching out on a sun lounger by the pool, a cocktail in one hand and a paintbrush in the other, a gentle tropical breeze cooling her brow and defrosting her bones.

‘Are we waiting here until the rain stops?’

The taxi driver turned in his seat, his lips bracketed with cute dimples, his mahogany eyes kind but laced with an edge of guilt.

‘No, madam. We arrive at your destination.’

Evie squinted through the velvety darkness but all she could make out were a battalion of trees on both sides of the road.

‘Erm, I don’t see a villa?’

‘The driveway is very steep. I can’t risk taking the car down in this.’

The taxi driver waved his arm at the weather in disgust before flashing her his matinee idol smile. For some reason, an image of Pippa floated into Evie’s mind as she suggested she should consider a dalliance with a handsome Greek guy. A twist of interest snaked through her veins until it dawned on Evie what the driver was expecting her to do.

‘What? You want me to get out and walk?’

But the driver had already sprung from his seat, dashed to the boot to extract her suitcase, and yanked open the passenger door. She stared at him with incredulity.

‘You can’t be serious? How far is it?’

‘Only a few metres.’ He pointed to a hidden gap in the vegetation, where, if she concentrated hard enough, she could just about make out the curled ironwork of a black metal gate.

She gritted her teeth, gifted the driver with what she hoped was a stern grimace, and swung her jean-clad legs out of the car. Within seconds she was soaked to her knickers as a volley of raindrops the size of grapes attacked her with cruel retaliation. She twisted her lips at the amusement she saw dancing in the driver’s eyes and snatched the handle of her suitcase from his hands.

Oblivious to the bouncing rain and Evie’s irritation, the driver had the audacity to whip out a business card. ‘I am Andreas Scoumpouris. I am sure our paths will cross again.’

She had no choice but to accept the card, then watch from beneath an overhanging branch as the taxi’s red tail lights disappeared into the deluge. The final scene of her desertion was accompanied by a loud melodious blast of bouzouki music, as the deserter sped away to a no doubt more lucrative night on the streets of Ipsos.

Evie squared her shoulders, tossed her sodden hair behind her ears, and stalked through the gate just as another crack of lightning enabled her to see that the villa was at least fifty metres away at the bottom of a very steep driveway. She briefly fought the urge to sit down at the roadside and dissolve into a bucket-load of tears. Why had she thought her life couldn’t get any worse? Clearly her guardian angel was enjoying yet another a night off – perhaps she was partying in the cafés and bars with the rest of the tourists, and who could blame her?

But what good would crying do? All she wanted was to strip off her clothes, sink into a hot bath, and take refuge in the oblivion that sleep offered. She inhaled a deep, fortifying breath and made her way down the drive. Despite the downpour, the sweet fragrance of crushed wild rosemary mingled with damp soil met her nostrils as she dragged her suitcase and her exhausted body through the exotic vegetation down the almost vertical incline towards the house.

She swished her hair from her eyes again and wished she had thought to tie it back. Unfortunately, the jerking movement dislodged a bottle of Evian from the top of her shoulder bag. Before she could catch it, the bottle had tumbled to the ground and rolled away down the hill, picking up speed until it had disappeared from sight.

She rolled her eyes at the ridiculous predicament she had found herself in. The rain had clearly followed her from London to Corfu! She had made the journey for nothing. There was an abundance of rain-soaked sights to capture in paint on the streets of the capital without having to invest in the expense of airfare. She thought of the rucksack containing her artist’s materials she had hurriedly packed and decided that the current weather would give a whole new meaning to her dream of producing a portfolio of beautiful watercolours.

How had she attracted such bad luck? She felt like a character from a cartoon in which a heavy black rain cloud followed her around whilst the sun shone down on her companions. An upsurge of emotion threatened to overwhelm her. Not only was she soaked to the skin, her lungs burning with the exertion needed to control the barrelling suitcase so that it didn’t race away down the hill in the wake of the Evian bottle or, a much more likely scenario, knock her to the ground like an out-of-control juggernaut.

Just as she caught a glimpse of the cheery powder-blue front door of the Bradburys’ whitewashed villa, a random gust of wind caused her to miss her footing on the cobbled path and she tumbled down the final few feet to land in an undignified heap on the doorstep, the suitcase veering over her ankle.

‘Ouch!’

She remained on her bottom for a few seconds waiting for the pain to recede before she began scrambling in her bag for the key Pippa had given her. She found it and, with shaking fingers, shoved it into the lock, already envisaging the ecstasy of sinking under a mountain of aromatic bubbles to soak away the vagaries of the day from hell.

But the key refused to turn. She twisted it to the right, and then to the left, and even gave the door a sharp kick for good measure. Nothing happened so she succumbed to the overwhelming urge to allow her hot tears to trickle down her cheeks when she realized she would be spending the night outside on the doorstep. Fortunately, despite the deluge, the temperature still retained some warmth so she wouldn’t freeze to death, but curled up like a bedraggled lost dog wasn’t how she had envisioned spending her first night in Corfu.

She dragged her suitcase under the canopy and stalked along the wooden wraparound veranda. A twinkling necklace of solar lights lit the walkway until she arrived at the front aspect of the villa. Despite her mood after the ordeal of her journey, she found her breath whipped from her lungs as the view from the balcony came into focus. She had never gazed on anything so awe-inspiring in her life. The storm clouds had moved away southwards, leaving behind only a light drizzle.

Spread before her was the Ionian Sea, disappearing into infinity like a flat black mirror, its surface interrupted by a series of tiny pinpricks of light from boats filled with night-time revellers and fishing trips gathering the next day’s lunch.

In the foreground, and maybe a couple of hundred metres or so over to her right, was a beachside taverna, its roof outlined with strings of fairy lights and emitting a gentle ripple of music. But her final jaw-drop was reserved for the rectangle of luminous turquoise at her feet. For the first time since the rogue painting had been revealed in all its glory at Jaxx Benson’s exhibition, the corners of her lips turned upwards and a blanket of calm descended.

Perhaps with inspiration like this, she could regain her passion for painting.

She turned around to look up at the Bradbury family villa: a whitewashed sugar cube concealed from the busy coast road by row upon row of giant cypress trees. The house was more akin to a luxury ocean liner moored at anchor in an emerald sea than a building, with purple bougainvillea crawling around its walls and the adjacent gazebo and flanked by rippling palm trees.

‘Ahh!’

Evie sighed as she remembered that this was not where she was supposed to be staying and her eyes fell on the more modern addition to the property – a garage block on the far side of the pool, with the windows of a tiny studio jutting from its eaves.

The rain had stopped so she trotted back round to the front door to collect her belongings and made her way to the door at the back of the poolside building. This time her key slotted into the lock without resistance. She heaved her luggage up the stairs and found herself in a small, but perfectly formed room with the benefit of a large balcony overlooking the same view she had been admiring moments earlier.

The studio had everything she needed: a tiny kitchen, an even smaller bathroom – sadly no bath to soak away her troubles in – but the sofa was huge and would, she hoped, convert into a very comfortable bed. Every surface had been painted white: the ceiling, the floors, even the furniture. The plain walls provided an ideal backdrop for a series of framed pencil drawings that Evie recognized as Esme Bradbury’s work.

She lay down on the sofa, closed her eyes, and within seconds tumbled into the oblivion offered by sleep, a state she had craved since leaving London.