‘I only meant to say that it was a bally good trick,’ Bertie said bracingly.
‘Not sure the comparison quite matches up, Bert,’ Nick said dryly. ‘After all, there wasn’t exactly much talent involved in old Bullhammer’s artichoke stunt, and very little risk to life and limb for anyone but the idiot himself.’
Goodie ignored them both and moved across the kitchen to Claire. ‘I am sorry,’ she told her. ‘I did not mean to scare you.’
‘Oh … I wasn’t … I mean …’
‘Yes you were, but I promise there was no risk.’
Claire smiled.
‘Oh, I know that, dear. I was just a little … taken aback. Anyway, now you can teach me and Mrs B. how to do it, can’t you?’
‘Oh yes, that would be wonderful,’ put in Mrs B. ‘Did you train with a chef in London?’ Goodie tilted her head to the side, a small smile playing on her mouth.
‘Not … exactly,’ she replied.
‘Splendid, we can all learn,’ put in Nick’s Aunt, who had rarely taken any interest in cooking but whose eyes were now bright with enthusiasm.
So the rest of that afternoon was spent in the kitchen. Even Nick’s dad and uncle, who usually absented themselves from anything even vaguely related to food preparation, hung around watching Goodie as she showed the adults how to slice and dice at warp speed (the kids much to their disgust were relegated to audience status and it was made clear that in their cases knife-play of any kind was strictly forbidden – although Nick did catch Goodie’s wink at Benji during one of these lectures; he had a feeling that she’d already crossed that bridge with him in the past).
Once everything that could be chopped had been, Goodie started to slope away. Nick was about to head her off when he saw that his dad had beaten him to it, steering her over to the armchairs by the huge Aga and extracting his chess set from the shelf above. Goodie hesitated before she sat down, but Monty simply carried on setting up the chess pieces. After a few moments she sank into the armchair opposite and made her first move. It reminded Nick of the times as a child that he’d watched his father with an unbroken horse: he never pushed, he waited for the horse to come to him, keeping his voice low, no sudden movements. His dad was a clever bastard.
Nick decided to take the same approach and went back to the group around the kitchen table, all of whom were now grilling Ed about cold fusion. It had not escaped Nick’s notice that his sister, not known for her fascination with anything scientific (the only science GCSE she hadn’t failed miserably at school had been Physics, and only then because she’d convinced some of the boys to set up her circuits for her), was hanging on Ed’s every word as if he was Albert Einstein himself. Nick was hoping this would make the ejection of Clive from their lives slightly easier.
After an hour had passed, Nick quietly got up to boil the kettle. He made a pot of tea, which his mum bustled off with, but then after remembering that Goodie hated tea he went to the cupboard for the cafetiere.
When he placed the coffee-filled mug and a plate with oat and raisin biscuits next to Goodie, she looked up at him and for once the blank mask slipped. Her wide eyes flicked from him to the mug and back again and her features softened. He reached down to tuck a stray lock of blonde hair behind her ear and she blinked, staring at his hand as he withdrew it. He watched her swallow before she shook her head as if to clear it and her attention went back to the chessboard. She didn’t flinch away from him, she didn’t close down; he was getting somewhere, he felt. Before he moved away, his dad caught his eye and he smiled.
* * *
Monty Chambers looked downat the chessboard again, his smile still in place despite the fact he was losing to this woman for the second time in a row. His son had brought a fair few women home in the past. They had all been perfectly reasonable fillies: attractive, well-bred, personable types, but what they hadnotbeen was a challenge.
Everything in his son’s life had come easily to him; his charm, his good looks, his intelligence had meant that there had been very few bumps in the road. But Monty knew why Nick had expanded the business, why he was on the brink of changing the energy industry throughout the world: he was a risk-taker, a thrill-seeker; he loved a challenge. So maybe it was a strange outlook to have, but Monty rather thought a beautiful, mysterious, knife-wielding Russian suited Nick far more than any of the lukewarm women he had presented to his dad in the past. Life was there to be lived and this woman … this woman could help his son live it as he was meant to.
Monty jumped when he heard ‘Anya!’ shouted across the kitchen, then looked down to see that the two-year-old had made her way over to where he was sitting and was reaching for his tea. He tutted at her and ruffled her hair. When she stretched out her little chubby arms he pulled her up onto his lap to help him with his next chess move. She was such an enchanting child that he did not notice Goodie’s head shoot up when Anya’s name was shouted out. Nor did he notice his son’s eyes widen as he took in her reaction.
* * *
Nick walkeddown the corridor at pace. His mobile was already clamped to his ear and he was waiting impatiently for his call to be answered.
‘Anya,’ he snapped when the ringing was finally cut off.
‘Hello to you too, mate,’ Walker’s voice said patiently. ‘Bloody freezing over here by the way – thanks for that.’
‘I’ve got a name for you: Anya.’
‘You sure?’
‘Ninety per cent.’
‘You realize that’s still fuck all to go on, don’t you?’
‘It’s more than you had before.’
‘Yeah but –’
‘I’m paying you enough to be out there,’ Nick clipped, losing patience. ‘You’ve never come up empty-handed on other jobs before.’
