Page 76 of The Cornish Cream Tea Holiday
She laughed. ‘I can’t tempt you with my lasagne: it’s currently raw, in a fridge that’s no longer cold, and I have no way of cooking it.’
‘You don’t need a lasagne to tempt me,’ he said softly, then pushed open the door.
They ran through the rain to Sunfish Cottage, and before she’d got the key in the lock, Ben leaned towards her, his lips inches from hers. ‘Shall we—’
‘Thea?’
At first she thought she must have imagined it, her name a creation of the wind and rain, but then Ben squeezed her shoulder and she turned, blinking through the downpour to where two figures were emerging from a car she hadn’t even noticed was parked next to hers.
She ran her hand over her sodden face, opened her mouth and closed it again.
One of the figures laughed and took a few steps towards her. Her hood was pulled up, obscuring her features so, until she was closer, Thea didn’t quite believe it.
‘Surprise!’ she said, in a singsong voice that was achingly familiar.
Thea looked from her friend, to the other hooded figure, to Ben, then back again. ‘Esme?’ she said, shouting to be heard over the storm. ‘Alex?’ For quite possibly the first time in her life, she wasn’t happy to see either of them. ‘What on earth are you doing here?’
