LITMIR.BIZ

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him as neediness never could.

      Since when had he ever wanted to be involved?

      Horse nuzzled his hand. He patted the dog and said, ‘You fell for a king-sized rat?’

      Had he intended to ask? Surely not.

      ‘My boss.’

      He had no choice now.

      ‘You want to tell me about it?’

      She had no intention of telling him. She hadn’t told anyone. The guy she’d thought she loved was married.

      Her parents knew she’d split with Jonathan but both her parents were on their third or fourth partner; splits were no big deal. And in the office, to her friends, she’d hung onto her pride. Her pride seemed like all she had left.

      But here, now, sitting on the beach with Horse between them, pride and privacy no longer seemed important.

      So she told him. Bluntly. Dispassionately, as if it had happened to someone else, not to her.

      ‘Jonathan Ostler of Ostler Engineering,’ she said, her voice cool and hard. ‘International engineering designer. Smooth, rich, efficient. Hates mixing business with pleasure. My boss. He asked me out four years ago. Six months later we were sharing an apartment but no one in the office was to know. Jonathan thought it’d mess with company morale. So … In the office we were so businesslike you wouldn’t believe. If we were coming to work at the same time we’d split up a block away so we’d never arrive together. He addressed me as Nikki but I addressed him as Mr Ostler. Strictly formal.’

      ‘Sounds weird.’

      ‘Yes, but I could see his point,’ she said. ‘Sleeping with the boss is hardly the way to endear yourself to the rest of the staff, and Jon was overseas so much it wasn’t an effort. A few people knew we were together but not many. So there I was, dream job, dream guy, dream apartment, four years. Dreaming weddings, if you must know. Starting to be anxious he didn’t want to settle, but too stupidly in love to push it. Then two months ago there was an explosion in a factory where we’d been overseeing changes. The call came in the middle of the night—hysterical—our firm could be sued for millions. Jon caught the dawn plane to Düsseldorf with minutes to spare, and in the rush he left his mobile phone sitting on his—on our—bedside table. The next day our office was crazy. The Düsseldorf situation was frightening and the phone was going nuts. Jonathan’s phone. Finally, I answered it. It was Jonathan’s wife. In London. Their eight-year-old had been in a car accident. Please could I tell her where Jon was.’

      ‘Ouch.’

      ‘I coped,’ she said, a tinge of pride warming her voice as she remembered that ghastly moment. ‘I made sympathetic noises. I made sure Jonathan Junior wasn’t in mortal danger, I got the details. Then I left a message with the manager of the Düsseldorf factory, asking Jon to phone his wife. I told him to say the message was from Nikki. Then I moved out of our apartment. Jonathan returned a week later, and I’d already arranged to move here, to do my work via the Internet.’

      ‘But you still work for him?’

      ‘Personal and business don’t mix.’

      ‘Like hell they don’t,’ he snapped. ‘I’ve had relationships go sour between the crew. It messes with staff morale no end, and there’s no way they can work together afterwards.’

      ‘I’m good at my work.’ But her uncertainty was growing and she couldn’t put passion into her voice. ‘The pay’s great.’

      ‘Can you work for yourself?’

      ‘It’s a specialist industry,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t set up in competition to Jon. I could work for someone else, but it would have to be overseas.’

      ‘So why not go overseas?’

      ‘I don’t want to.’ But she’d been thinking. Thinking and thinking. She’d been totally, hopelessly in love with Jonathan for years and to change her life so dramatically …

      Why not change it more?

      Tomorrow. Think of it tomorrow.

      ‘And now I have a dog,’ she said, hauling herself back to the here and now with something akin to desperation. ‘So here I am.’ Deep breath. Tomorrow? Why not say now? ‘But I have been thinking of changing jobs. Changing completely.’

      ‘To what?’

      How to say it? It was ridiculous. And to say stone walling, when she knew how he felt …

      But the germ of an idea that had started today wouldn’t go away.

      Putting one stone after another into a wall.

      Crazy. To turn her back on specialist training …

      Oh, but how satisfying.

      It was a whim, she reminded herself sharply. A whim of today. Tomorrow it’d be gone and she’d be back to sensible.

      Don’t talk about it. Don’t push this man further than you already have.

      ‘I don’t know,’ she managed. ‘All I know is that I need something. Woman needs change.’ She hugged Horse, who was still gazing out to sea. ‘Woman needs dog.’

      ‘No one needs a dog.’

      ‘Says you who just lost one. I wonder if Horse’s owner misses him like you miss Jem.’

      ‘Nikki …’

      ‘Don’t stick my nose into what’s not my business? You’ve been telling me that all day. But now … I’ve told you about my non existent love life. You want to tell me why I can’t finish your stone wall?’

      ‘It’s my mother’s wall.’

      ‘And she disapproves of completion?’

      ‘She died when I was a child. She didn’t get to finish it.’

      ‘So the hole’s like a shrine,’ she said cautiously, like one might approach an unexploded grenade. ‘I can see that. But you know, if it was me I’d want the wall finished. Are you sure your mum’s not up there fretting? You know, I’m a neat freak. If I die with my floor half-hoovered, feel welcome to finish it. In fact I’ll haunt you if you don’t.’

      ‘You don’t like an unhoovered floor?’ They were veering away from his mother—which seemed fine by both of them.

      ‘Hoovering’s good for the soul.’

      His mouth twitched. Just a little. The beginning of a smile. ‘Do you know how much hair a dog like Horse will shed?’

      ‘He has to grow some hair back first,’ she said warmly. ‘He grows, I’ll hoover. We’ve made a deal.’

      ‘While you’ve been sitting on the beach, staring at the moon.’

      ‘It’s filling time. How long do you reckon it’ll take him to figure whoever he wants isn’t coming?’

      ‘Dogs have been faithful to absent masters for years.’

      ‘Years?’

      ‘Years.’

      ‘I was hoping maybe another half an hour.’

      ‘Years.’

      ‘Uh-oh.’

      ‘And years.’

      ‘I don’t know what else to do,’ she whispered.

      Her problem. This was her problem, he thought, and it was only what she deserved, taking on a damaged dog …

      As he’d taken on a damaged dog sixteen years ago and not regretted it once. Until it was over.

      He’d had his turn. Yes, this was Nikki’s dog, Nikki’s problem, but he could help.

      ‘I don’t think you’re doing

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