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SEVEN

‘Is this legal?’

‘Behave. I need to clear my head and the main entrance is too far away. Fancy a walk?’

Lottie stared at the wooden sign that read in large letters: ‘Keep Off the Grass’, inhaled sharply, pulled her arm tight towards Rob and stepped over the low wooden white fence that separated the London pavement from the grass in the public park.

It only took a minute to skip across the grass and onto the path but her heart was beating a little harder when they were back on tarmac.

‘You don’t like breaking the rules. Do you?’ Rob smirked.

He was observant, too. ‘Not something I do very often. But I suppose it is a lovely evening and my headache needs an airing. Why don’t we take a tour of the park? I haven’t been in there for years.’

And it was a lovely evening, and Rob Beresford looked hotter than fresh bread just out of the oven. He smelt just as good, too.

Her treacherous heart had not completely got used to the fact that she was strolling along the pavement arm in arm with this dazzling man as he casually chatted to her as though they were old friends out for the evening.

Occasionally Lottie had to fire a hot glance in Rob’s direction to make sure that she was not in fact hallucinating and this was the same man who breathed dragon fire at trainees and made grown men cry on TV.

The arrogance and attitude were gone and in their place was this astonishing man who she now knew was responsible for kicking off her career with the finest award-winning patisserie chef in London.

And the transformation knocked the feet out from under her.

‘Ian was telling me about your idea for a birthday cake book. I like it. Could be fun.’

‘I think so. My cake shop is right in the middle of the high street and these days a lot of mums and dads simply don’t have the time or, to be honest, the skill, to come up with that perfect birthday cake. So I get a lot of orders. And you would be surprised at how many are for old-style family cakes for grandparents and even great-grandparents.’

‘Are you kidding me?’ Rob asked with a lilt in his voice.

‘Nope. That’s one of the reasons why I started the Bake and Banter club. To teach adults how to bake a cake they can make at home which the family will love.’

She shifted closer to Rob to avoid a group of tourists who had their heads down, totally engrossed in their tablet computers and oblivious to other people on the walkway.

‘You really get a buzz out of the baking, don’t you?’

‘More than I ever expected,’ Lottie replied with a smile. ‘So far I have made eight versions of that cartoon–racing car cake you saw this morning for little boys aged four to eighty-four and they all love it. Everyone is so different. Take next week, for example. The baking club want me to demonstrate how to make a chocolate birthday cake for one of our regular customers. Ninety years young. She wants loads of soft gooey chocolate icing. And three layers of chocolate sponge in the middle. Eat with a spoon. Whipped cream on the side. Delish.’

‘Oh, yes, I remember what it was like to have my hands in sticky icing sugar and chocolate all day. Don’t miss it a bit. But let me tell you—’ he tilted his head closer to hers and half whispered ‘—for a working baker, you look fabulous.’

‘Thank you, kind sir. My pleasure. You clean up nicely yourself.’

Rob exaggeratedly tugged with one hand at the lapel of the same dinner jacket he had worn for the gallery opening, while dodging the other pedestrians on the busy west London pavements. ‘Oh, this old suit? Thought I had better make an effort as the star pupil.’

Lottie gave his arm an extra squeeze before snorting out loud. ‘Shameless! Make that one of the many star pupils! How is your mum’s cold?’

‘She’s feeling a lot better today and went to the gallery this afternoon before heading off to tea with her pals,’ Rob replied as he negotiated around some dog walkers. ‘So I am officially off duty for a couple of hours and, unless you are desperate to get home, I think this calls for a small delay! Look across the street. What do you see?’

He slipped his dinner jacket around her shoulders and held her within it for a few seconds, bringing up the collar so that he could flip the ultra-soft fabric around her smooth neck.

She pretended not to notice as his fingertips gently moved against her skin to flick the ends of her hair back over the collar.

‘Thank you.’ She smiled back in reply, conscious that the hard cheekbones of Rob’s face were highlighted too sharply by the streetlight outside the swish, glossy shopfronts. He was too lean, but she knew that he had eaten something from every tray of the buffet at the hotel.

Maybe she could do something about that, if he stayed around long enough.

He smiled and surprised her by sliding around behind her, so that his arms were wrapped around her waist, holding her tight against him. She felt the pressure of his head against the side of her face as he dropped his chin onto her shoulder, lifted his left arm, and pointed.

Lottie tore her eyes away from Rob, and stared across to a very familiar sunlit stone building. Then laughed out loud.

‘It’s the old grand entrance to the catering college. We’ve come around in a circle.’

Rob nodded and looked up into the high carved stone entrance to what had been a 1930s art deco school of architecture before it was taken over by the catering school.

‘The first time I walked through those doors I was seventeen, angry, bitter, and furious with the world and myself. I was a mess, Lottie. And maybe not someone you wanted to be around.’

There was something is his voice that compelled Lottie to look over her shoulder into his face. This was the young man, so full of hope and dreams.

‘Why do you think that you were such a disaster?’ Lottie replied with a smile, looking into his face. ‘From my experience, most seventeen-year-olds feel that way.’

‘Oh, girl, if you only knew the truth of it.’

Then something shifted in his eyes as though a darker memory had floated up to the surface.

And in that moment the mood changed. His brow was furrowed with anxiety, his mouth moved back to a straight line, and his body almost bristled with tension.

‘Then tell me. Tell me the truth about why you were such a mess, because I really want to know.’

‘That’s one hell of a long story.’

‘Then let’s sit down and look at the college and reminisce together.’ She looked around and spotted an old and not very clean wooden bench, which she covered with Rob’s expensive jacket, liner side up.

‘Ah. This is perfect.’ Lottie shuffled back on the hard seat and folded her hands neatly on her lap.

‘It is June. It’s a relatively warm evening and I am sitting on your jacket, so there is no possible escape. I suggest that you start at the beginning and go from there. That usually works.’

‘Are you sure that you’re not an art critic? Because you are being damn nosy.’

‘One of my terrible character flaws; nothing I can do about it. Once I take an interest in something I have to find out everything there is to know. So fire away. Because I am not going anywhere until I find out why you were so very angry with the world the first day you walked through those doors.’

‘A-ha. So you are interested in me. At last she admits it.’

‘I want to know what kind of family my best friend is getting herself into. So far Sean has been great, but are there skeletons in the Beresford family cupboard which will burst Dee’s bubble? Not going to happen.’

‘Skeletons? Lottie, there is a whole pirate ship of skeletons moored offshore all armed to the teeth and ready and able to cause mayhem at any minute they are released. The problem is most of them are about my side of the family. Not Sean’s.’

‘I don’t understand. Sean told me that your mum and dad get on just fine even though they’re divorced.’

‘They do. I am lucky. Tom Beresford met my mother when he opened up the first Beresford hotel in New York City. She was living a bohemian life in an artists’ colony in the Hamptons most of the year, and holding exhibitions of her work in the city when she needed funds. Well...’ Rob smiled. ‘You’ve seen my mother. Gorgeous, fun, and so talented it’s criminal. I don’t blame my dad for falling for her one little bit. She was even more stunning back then and she must have really adored him to settle in the city. In the end they had six great years in New York before we had to move back to London to open the flagship hotel here. That was when things started to change. It was my mum who decided that she could not tolerate living here.’

‘Did she hate London that much?’

‘Not particularly. It was the sudden change in her routine that she hated. Mum likes her day and her life all laid out, nice and simple and familiar. London was too much, too fast, and she couldn’t get used to it. In the end the only way she could work was to go back to the Hamptons for a couple of months at a time with frequent trips back to London to see me. I was only a toddler so I stayed here with my dad and got used to airports.’

‘That must have been tough. But there are people who lead their whole lives like that. My dad used to boast that one year he spent a grand total of fifteen days sleeping in his own bed. The price of modern life.’

‘It might have worked for your family but it didn’t work for mine. My dad made plans to move back to New York but then my grandparents in Suffolk needed him and Mum was staying away for longer and longer periods...and they simply drifted apart. I was way too young to understand what divorce was and nothing really changed in my life. Until my dad met Sean’s mum. Maria. And for the next ten years I found out what it was like to have a mother who was there every minute of the day when I needed her and who even gave me a brother.’

‘Sean. Of course. You loved Maria. Didn’t you?’

‘Adored her. Oh, I knew that I had a real mother. At birthdays and Christmas the house used to be full of Adele Forrester and her friends and extended family who used to descend like a whirlwind then disappear again for another six months leaving chaos behind them. But that was the way Maria and my dad liked it. Open house. Maria was a very special person and Sean was great. I had a family who were willing to put up with a very confused teenager and help him make some sense of his life and what he wanted to do with it. It was all good. It was too good.’

Rob flicked his arm out in a wide arc towards the trees.

‘And then it was all taken away from me. And I went off the rails. Big time.’

‘Maria. Of course. I am so sorry. Sean told Dee that she had died when he was young.’

‘Unfair. So very, very unfair. One day when Sean is a lot older you might want to ask him about his mother’s life as a refugee fleeing war and destruction. Only to die of cancer in a country where she thought she was safe with a family she loved and loved her right back in return. Because I can’t talk about it without wanting to hit something very hard.’

Rob reached out and nipped off a large leaf from the bush growing behind their heads and slowly tore it into segments with his long, clever fingers as he spoke.

‘You want to know about my skeletons? I was seventeen years old, I had plenty of money and a driving licence, and enough fury and anger in my belly to burn down most of London. And that is precisely what I tried to do. I had grown up in this city and knew precisely where to find trouble and distraction in any shape or form. Drink, girls, gambling, and the kind of people my dad would throw out of his hotel. The whole package. Sometimes I got away with it by being smarter and faster than the other guy. Sometimes I didn’t and I have a police record to prove it. And a few broken bones along the way. My nose was a different shape then.’

‘What did your dad do? He must have been frantic and scared for you.’

‘The best he could. He was grieving and lost. Sean was desolate. And I was out of control and heading downhill faster than he could apply the brakes.’

‘How did you pull back from that life to find your way to catering college?’

‘The hard way. I woke up one morning in the bed of a girl whose name I couldn’t even recall and I must have had twenty messages on my mobile phone. All asking me to get back to the house. My mum had got herself into a mess in Thailand. And I mean a mess. Three hours later I was on a plane to Bangkok.’

Rob exhaled long and slow. ‘I had heard the words nervous breakdown but nothing could have prepared me for the emotional wreck I found in a Bangkok psychiatric unit. Her latest lover had stolen everything she had and left her broke and alone in the middle of nowhere. It wasn’t the first time that had happened but this was the worst. But she was lucky. One of the other artists on the retreat was worried about her and sent out a search party. They found her on the beach the next day. Crying. Distraught. Irrational and terrified of anyone touching her or coming near her. It was one of the worst twenty-four hours of my life.’

‘Oh, Rob. That’s horrific. For both of you.’

‘I made her a deal. It was very simple. I promised that if she came back to London with me and got some medical help for her problems, then I would take care of her. I would go to college and get the qualifications I needed to run the hotel kitchens. Sober and clean, a hardworking little drone. And that is what I did. I poured all of that bitter anger and fury at Maria’s death into my work.’

The shredded pieces of leaf fluttered through the air.

‘That’s why I am not surprised people found me scary. I was so desperate to prove that I could achieve something that I refused to allow anything or anyone get in my way. Relentless is actually not a bad description.’

‘Did she agree? I mean, did she come back from Thailand with you?’

‘My mum went into the best rehab unit money could buy and I already knew that she was going to be there a long time. My dad was going to see her when he could get away from the hotel business and Sean went along when the unit said that she was stable enough to cope. But apart from that it was just the two of us against the world. I thought that was going to be enough to get her through this dark time in her life and magically turn her back to the lovely mum I used to know and everything would be back to normal again.’

Rob shrugged. ‘I was so naïve about mental illness. So wrong. Badly wrong. Things have never been the same. Oh, she can go for a year or eighteen months without a major episode, and then she will fall for some hotshot man and life will be wonderful—until it isn’t. And I have to pick up the pieces and start all over again.’

Lottie hesitated before replying. ‘The other night at the gallery. Was that what you were worried about? That it was all too much for her and she would have a relapse?’

‘No. I was far more worried about what the killer combo of cold remedies and champagne would look like to the real critics who were standing outside with their cameras. A good news story about an artist who has come back after eight years with a wonderful inspirational show does not sell. But give them Rob Beresford’s rehab-refugee mother? Oh, yes. Let’s just say that I was tired of giving them what they want.’

Her fingers slid across the bench and found his. ‘Then Adele is very lucky to have a son like you to protect her.’

‘Is she? I haven’t always been there for her, Lottie. Not by a long way. I had replaced her in my life with Sean’s mother at the very time she needed me as a son. And that sort of guilt does not go away easily.’

‘But you kept that promise. That means a lot in my book.’

Her own eyes pricked with tears, and she laced her fingers between his, forcing apart his fingers, which had tightened into a ball.

Her touch acted like a catalyst, and he ripped his eyes away from the park and focused on her face as his fingers relaxed and squeezed hers back, leaving it to Lottie to break the silence.

Lottie stopped and turned so that she was facing Rob. ‘I have an idea. And you can tell me to mind my own business, but here goes.’

She took a breath. ‘I can see that you want to help your mum become the best she can be. I want to help. She is a remarkable artist and I adore her work. If you like, she can use my studio any time she wants when you are in London together. Room service, accommodation and as much lemon drizzle cake as she can eat, courtesy of the management.’

She clenched her teeth and pretended to duck. ‘What do you think?’

Rob looked into her face for a few seconds, before replying in a low intense voice.

‘You would do that? For us?’

‘In a heartbeat, yes.’

His reply was to take a firmer grip of her hand as he rose slowly to his feet.

‘Thank you, Lottie. Yes. I think that she would like that very much. Although I should warn you, for a skinny artist that woman can eat a hell of a lot of cake.’

Lottie looked up into Rob’s face and what she saw there was like a light in the darkness. He was not used to being shown kindness and was trying to bluff away the depth of his feeling.

Hell, she knew what that was like. She simply had not expected it in him.

And just like that the resentment she had held for the past three years and all of the imagined angst popped like a balloon. Gone. Finished. Over.

Time to start all over again with the Rob she was with right here and now.

Hesitantly at first, then more firmly, she grasped hold of both of Rob’s hands and slowly let him help her up from the bench and back on her feet.

And with that they walked casually, hand in hand, in silence, along the wide path as though it were something they did all of the time.

Rob could never know that her palms weren’t sweating due to the warm breeze, but the gentle way in which his fingertips stroked the tender skin. Her gaze moved over the happy groups of smiling, chatty couples who strolled across the park. Anywhere except Rob. She wanted to look at him so badly it was almost a physical pain.

Except that would mean giving in to the sigh of absolute pleasure that was bursting to escape.

This was what it would be like if she were Rob’s girlfriend. On a regular date.

Except, of course, this wasn’t a date, was it?

This was a kind gesture to his brother’s friend, who had been in the right place at the right time to help him out with somewhere for his mother to stay. That was all it could be. All it was ever going to be.

So, why not enjoy these precious moments and make the best of them while she could? These were the happy memories she would hold precious over the coming months when Rob and Adele had gone back to their exciting, busy lives, and she was merely a person they might see at social events with Dee and Sean.

In a few days she would be back in her normal, safe life. Which was just how she wanted it, wasn’t it?

Her brain was so distracted by the unfamiliar thoughts and feelings whirling around inside her head that she didn’t see the sudden break in the paving slab until the toe of her thin-soled evening sandal caught in the stone and she found herself falling forwards, hands outstretched. Into a pair of strong arms.

It was seconds before her brain connected with the fact that she was standing chest to chest with Rob with both of his arms wrapped around her body, her hands flat against his shirt front.

Just for a moment, Lottie closed her eyes and revelled in the warmth and the strength of his embrace. The exquisite aroma of aftershave, antiperspirant and clean pressed linen. Lemon, blended with the musky spice of light perspiration of the warm summer evening, and something else, something unique. Rob. His scent, his heat. And the strange magnetic pull that made her want to edge closer and closer to him every time they met. The pull that was going to make parting from him so very painful.

The overall effect was so totally intoxicating, that suddenly she felt light-headed and bent forward to rest her brow on his chest.

This was her dream, her fantasy. For a few precious seconds she could pretend that she was just like any other girl out for a stroll with her boyfriend. Pretend that this man cared about her, had chosen her, wanted to be with her.

A strong bicep flexed next to the thin fabric of her dress, and her eyes closed in pleasure. It had been so long since she had been held like this!

Drat Rob. Drat. She couldn’t do this. Why had she agreed to walk with him? He would be flying back to his real world, and she would be back to square one. On her own, holding it together.

‘Are you okay?’ Rob asked, with enough concern in his voice to bring a lump to her throat again.

His hands slid down as she pulled back and smiled up into his face, but instead of stepping away he simply linked his hands behind her back, holding her in place as she recovered.

‘Yes. I think so.’ She glanced down at her shoe. ‘How clumsy of me. Thanks for stopping me from falling flat on my face.’

Lottie leant back so that she could focus only to find him smiling down at her, his eyes scanning her face from side to side, as though looking for something before speaking.

His lips curved back into a wide, open-mouthed smile, so warm, so caring that she was blinded by it. The warm fingers of one hand slid up her back as he dropped his head forward and nuzzled his chin against her hair. ‘I’m pleased that I was here at the right time.’

Some part of her brain registered that she should make a response, and she forced herself to lift her chin.

Bad mistake.

Because at that precise moment Rob shifted his position and as she whispered, ‘Thank you,’ she felt the heat of his breath on her cheek. Lottie dared to slowly slide the palms of her hands up onto his chest. She could feel the hard planes and ridges of his body beneath her fingers. Emanating enough heat to warm deep inside her, melting away the last remnants of icy resistance that might have lingered there.

A young couple walked by, then a cyclist, but Lottie could hear nothing except the sound of Rob’s breathing as his lips pressed against her temple, and the stubble on his chin rasping against her cheek for a second before he released his grip on her waist and slowly, slowly, slid his hand up inside his jacket, and onto the bare skin of her back above her dress

The sensation was so unexpected, so delicious that she inhaled sharply, gasping in air.

It was as though she had given him a signal of approval.

As his fingertips stroked her skin his soft, sensuous mouth slid slowly and tenderly against her upper lip in the sweetest, most gentle of kisses. It was so brief that Lottie had only seconds to close her eyes and enjoy it before he pulled away from her, his fingers sliding down from the small of her back.

Leaving her feeling bereft.

‘Would you like some coffee? I know the perfect place.’