Page 11 of Christmas at Black Cherry Retreat
Chapter Six
Fee stared at the luminous red numbers on her alarm clock and sighed. Three a.m. The witching hour for insomniacs. Sleep wouldn’t happen again this side of daylight.
Oh, I found you out alright.
Had she really flirted with Tom? In her defence she’d only responded to his blatant interest. When Doctor Michael mentioned a quiet place in Tennessee wherea friend of his stayed the previous year she’d thought it sounded ideal but it was threatening to turn into a huge mistake. Fee shouldn’t have allowed the recent bizarre phone call from her mother, after five years of silence, to influence her decision but she had.
I wanted to talk to you about your father.
A long time ago Fee had made it clear she wasn’t interested when she sawa copy of her birth certificate with “Unknown” where her father’s name should be.
Which man are we talking about today?
Allain Dupre the Third of course.
Her mother hadn’t appreciated her sarcastic question about whether Dupre was the Southern gentleman from New Orleans who had wanted to turn Maddy into his own Scarlett O’Hara.
I got an email from Allain last week.He said that his wife died recently and he’d started thinking about me again. Allain looked me up online and found out about you. When he saw your birth date naturally he put two and two together.
To stop the conversation she’d agreed to let her mother send Dupre’s contact details on the condition that it was totally up to Fee whether or not she decided to get in touch with him. Beingon the same side of the Atlantic Ocean made the option more… feasible if she chose to let this thing play out.
Swinging her legs out over the side of the bed Fee decided to get a drink. Last year in Afghanistan she’d relied on an unwise mixture of Percocet and whisky to get through the nights meaning both were off limits. Regular tap water would have to do. Fee padded across the room,surprised at how warm the smooth, uneven boards were under her feet and loving the idea they’d been walked on by generations of Tom’s family. In the kitchen she ran the cold tap for a minute and filled a glass before wandering back into the living room. She eased one side of the red gingham curtains away from the window and stared out into the inky darkness.
A shiver ran through her blood.For all she knew two desperate men could be watching. She dragged the curtains closed and gripped onto the fabric for a few seconds before forcing herself to let go. Fee had no intention of being a victim. She returned to the bedroom and headed straight for the oak chest where she’d stored her clothes. Fee groped around in the top drawer beneath her neatly folded underwear until she found thelethal ivory handled knife she’d bought at the Kabul market.
Fee laid the knife on the nightstand and climbed back into her cold bed. She pulled the covers around her neck and prepared to wish the hours away.
A loud banging noise roused Fee and she struggled to open her eyes. She groped on the bedside table for her glasses and shoved them on before staring around the unfamiliarroom.Black Cherry Retreat.Okay. Tom’s warning flooded back and she tensed, reaching for her knife.Escaped prisoners aren’t going to knock on the door, stupid.
She hopped out of bed and kept the knife sheathed and out of sight as she crept down the narrow hallway towards the front door.
‘Fee, are you alright?’
Tom’s deep, warm drawl registered and she flung open the door.‘Did you have to scare me half out of my skin again? Wasn’t waking me up once enough?’
‘Sorry,’ he mumbled. ‘I was just checkin’ on everyone, that’s all. Thought you’d be up by now.’
A blast of cold air hit her bare legs and Fee remembered she’d removed her pyjama trousers during the night when she got too hot. The shirt barely skimmed the top of her thighs and when she tuggedat the pink flannel in a futile effort to make it longer the knife clattered to the floor.
‘What on earth are you doing with that?’
‘Uh, protecting myself?’
‘That’s what I’m here for,’ he declared. Fee couldn’t decide whether to laugh or cry. She’d love a thousand pounds for every time she’d been spunthatline.
‘What time is it anyway?’ she asked.
‘Ten.’
‘In the morning?’
A faint smile tugged at his wide, well-shaped mouth. ‘Yeah. The sun’s out so I’m going with daytime on this one.’
The last time she slept this long was in the hospital when she collapsed after Pierre’s death. That’d been an awful, drug-induced heaviness, but today she felt wonderful. ‘Goodness, that’s amazing.’
‘Good Tennessee air does that fora person.’
Fee laughed at Tom’s smug certainty and he joined in, the rich warm sound running like melted chocolate over her skin.
