I'm back!
Nick leant back in his chair and flicked briefly through his emails on his phone before casting it to one side. He picked up a glass of nectar from the table and took a few sips. From downstairs came the sound of the door shutting softly, and Vita’s heels clicking upstairs. She didn’t look at all happy.
“Evening. Lovely weather, isn’t it? My umbrella broke.” She dropped her bag onto the floor and went into the bedroom to change into something that wasn’t soaking wet. Finally, she sat down on an armchair, running her fingers through her hair in an attempt to dry it. Nick glanced out at the sheets of rain falling outside and grimaced. There was a rumble of thunder and the windows creaked ominously.
“The police station’s flooded, City Hall’s leaking in at least twenty different places and we’ve had to close down the autumn festival early. I’ve been running all over town today trying to hold things together.” She examined the bottle of nectar. “This any good?”
“I’ve tried worse, I suppose.”
“It’ll do.” She poured a glass and drained it in a few gulps, then shuddered. “You’ve had worse nectar than this? It’s putrid.”
“Each to their own.”
She raised an eyebrow. “The quality of this stuff really isn’t negotiable. Listen, I had a call from Gunther. He was wondering if we’d heard from Nancy? Apparently she said she’d stay in touch, check up with work every day, and Gunther being Gunther he’s wondering why she hasn’t called.”
“I certainly haven’t spoken to her. Maybe she’s having such a good time in France she forgot?”
“That would be ironic,” Vita said pensively. “Either that, or something’s happened to her.”
“Like what?” Nick’s voice was scornful. “Sorry, but that’s ridiculu-” He stopped, and looked at Vita in amusement. “Vi, you’re not feeling guilty about this, are you?”
“You have to admit, it was a little underhand.”
“Underhand? Since when has that been important? When the Morans arrive they’ll meet us and we’ll have the chance to win them over. If we have to be underhand about it, then why shouldn’t we?”
“All I’m saying is that they left on Saturday. It’s Thursday now and nobody’s had any word from them. That’s not like Nancy at all.”
As if on cue, the doorbell rang.
“I’ll get it!” Holly’s voice echoed up the stairs. Vita heard the door open and Holly’s voice again: “Oh, hi Mrs Landgraab.”
Nick’s eyes widened and he stared at Vita. His meaning was clear: “What’s she doing here?”
They couldn’t hear Nancy’s reply, but Holly came running up the stairs, looking more than a little confused.
“Um, Nancy’s here, and she looks really angry. I mean, seriously angry.”
Nick swore under his breath. “Oh, tell her to come up. May as well get this over with.” Vita pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed.
Holly hadn’t been exaggerating – Nancy was seething with rage. It took her a moment to compose herself.
“I could almost, almost forgive the pair of you conning us and sending us off to France. Oh yeah. We’re not stupid. We worked it out eventually, your little ploy with the text messages. Cute. But the fact of the matter is that you tried to fry us. Me, my husband and my ten-year-old son. It only took Geoff a few hours to disable it, but that’s hardly the point. You really thought this an appropriate measure to take to win this stupid election thing, so you can build Bridgeport mark two?” Her voice rose with every word, and she was clenching her fists.
“Wait, wait,” Nick said quickly. “What do you mean, fry you?”
“That’s right. Play dumb. I’m referring to the flame throwers around the Chateau du Landgraab, you idiot.”
“Flame throwers? Ok, I confess to the text message thing-”
“Just so there’s no mistake, that was my idea,” Vita interjected. Nancy glared at her.
“-but I assure you we had no intention of hurting you or your family.”
“So you’re suggesting that someone else thought that it would be fun to have me incinerated.”
“Well...”
“Here we go,” said Vita, glancing up from her phone. “From the internet, and I quote, ‘Admiral Landgraab the First was well-renowned for his paranoia, and unconfirmed rumours suggest that his house was rigged with defence mechanisms a few months before his untimely demise.’”
“You could have posted that.”
“Why would I? If we’d actually been trying to get rid of you, we wouldn’t be having this conversation at all, for a myriad of reasons, and we wouldn’t need to prove our innocence.”
Nancy pursed her lips, but then stumbled forward, apparently losing her balance. Instinctively, Vita put out a hand to steady her.
“Sorry, sorry,” she muttered. “I haven’t really slept in days.”
“Why on earth not?” Vita asked, sounding genuinely concerned. She gestured to a chair. Nancy regarded it for a moment, and then perched on the edge, wringing her hands.
“Oh, I don’t know. Worried about what might be happening back in Sunset, with you thinking I wouldn’t be coming back? That and trying to book an early flight back. We’ve been in a hotel in Paris most of the week. We only landed a few hours ago, actually.” Her anger was fast giving way to exhaustion.
“And you didn’t call because you knew what we’d done and suspected we were up to something, so you didn’t want to give the game away?”
Nancy nodded.
“Listen, Nancy, for what it’s worth I’m sorry. We’d never have tricked you like that if we’d known we were putting you in danger. Right, Nick?”
His expression said it all, and Vita turned back to Nancy. “Well, I wouldn’t have.”
“So why did you want me gone? If not to, y’know...”
“It doesn’t matter now. Irrelevant.”
“No, it’s not.”
Vita hesitated, apparently wresting with her conscience. “Oh, fine. David Moran, owner of the Sunset Valley Llamas-”
“I may not know much about sports, but I do know who he is.”
“-is moving into town. He arrives on Saturday with his son Lukas and we didn’t want you around to meet him first, so we could, y’know, do some schmoozing and hopefully recruit him to help us out.” Her eyes widened. “I know! We’ll invite them to dinner, and you and Geoffrey can come too. Then we can meet them at the same time we’re even; everything’s fair. Happy?” She spoke quickly, as if trying to finish before she changed her mind.
“Vi!” Nick cried. “Why are you telling her this?”
“Because, quite frankly, Nancy deserves an explanation.”
“What? No she doesn’t.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.”
“I am here, you know,” Nancy said.
“Oh shut up,” Nick snapped, bristling with rage. “You’ve got what you came for, now how about you leave us to it?”
An icy silence descended on the room. Nick narrowed his eyes at Nancy, and she looked away.
“Fine,” she murmured, getting to her feet. With a final, searching look at them both, she left the room. The front door clicked shut beneath them.
“What was that about?” shouted Nick. “Why did you have to go and tell her everything, ruining a month of planning and-”
“Oh, for goodness sake Nick! Is your memory that poor? The Morans are arriving tomorrow. We are having dinner with them
tomorrow.”
“You told Nancy it was Saturday,” said Nick, bemused.
“Yes. See what I just did?”
Nick looked at Vita in bewilderment, which quickly turned to admiration as he realised what had happened. “That was quick thinking. Absolutely brilliant, Vi.”
“Nancy’s really going to hate us, isn’t she?”
“Oh yes,” chuckled Nick, pulling her into a kiss.
Vita wondered if she'd done the right thing. And wondered why she cared.
Chapter 8 is actually finished; it was meant to be part of this chapter but it got too long so I split it. I'll post it in a couple of days
