A Perfect Paris Christmas - Mandy Baggot Page 0,135
him. On the map he had given her, it was the very last place he had marked.
Sixty-One
Notre Dame Marche de Noel, Paris
There was still repair work going on to the famous cathedral following the devastating fire, but the Christmas market set outside it was a picture of festiveness. Around thirty white tents with pointed roofs housed all kinds of gift ideas and were positioned around a central circle where, amid a ring of small decorated and snow-flecked firs, a band was playing Christmas tunes. It would have been idyllic, true December goals, if Keeley’s mind wasn’t tracking through everything she was going to have to say to Ethan in just an hour’s time.
‘You OK?’ Rach asked for somewhere near the twentieth time since their conversation on the balcony early that morning.
Bundled up in coats and the duvets from their beds, the women had shared coffee and tears as Keeley had told her best friend everything that had happened at the Opera hotel and later with Silvie. Rach had held her close and told her everything was going to be alright but Keeley knew in her heart that everything had changed now and there were no ‘alright’ guarantees. She had made the decision to tell Ethan the truth and she had decided on eleven a.m. Except now, even as the clock ticked just after ten, it still felt like an age away. Which was why, shortly after nine, they had decided to travel here. Christmas was still coming. Gifts still needed to be purchased. And Rach loved shopping. It was the ultimate distraction.
Keeley nodded, tightening the belt on her coat.
‘Stupid question. I just… don’t know what else to say,’ Rach admitted as they walked to the next tent selling hand-carved wooden ornaments.
‘It’s OK,’ Keeley answered, scuffing the snow with her boot.
‘It’s not though, is it? And some of it is my fault.’
‘Oh, Rach, it’s really not.’
‘It is!’ Rach carried on. ‘Because if I hadn’t made such a fuss about you not being Kidney Girl on this trip you might have just – I don’t know – met Ethan and told him straightaway about the transplant and Silvie and Ferne and then…’
‘And then I might not have had the most amazing time of my life getting close to him.’ Keeley sighed. Because that’s what she imagined would have happened if Ethan had known from the beginning. He would never have looked at her the same way. Would never have got to know the her she had managed to be since she arrived in France.
‘Well,’ Rach said, ‘like I said after the fourth cup of coffee before we ran out of sachets in the room, if Ethan cares about you like he says he does, then nothing you tell him this morning is going to change that.’
Keeley nodded at her friend, but she didn’t really believe that. Silvie had said Ethan had never wanted to meet the recipient of Ferne’s kidney. She pointed towards a hut a little further ahead of them. ‘Handbags.’
‘You’re changing the subject.’
‘I need to, Rach, seriously,’ Keeley said, taking the deepest of breaths. ‘Tell me something that’s going to take my mind off this.’ She clamped her hands to her body where her scars were. She turned to Rach then, remembering she hadn’t asked her a thing about her evening. ‘How did it go with the VIP client?’
‘OK,’ Rach said, beaming a lot more than the word ‘OK’ really warranted.
‘I’m sensing there’s more to this.’
‘It’s the Bradburys!’ Rach announced. ‘Confidentially of course!’
The Bradbury family were a big deal in the area. Kind of like a legitimate version of the Wallaces in Gangs of London.
‘The Bradburys only want to deal with me. Not Jamie. Not even Roland. Me. And they said, they might even have a few contacts they could recommend my excellent house searching expertise to!’
‘Rach, that’s brilliant!’
‘I know! And I’m thinking, I definitely need to ask for a pay rise if I’m going to start attracting clients of that kind of notoriety or, if Roland starts being a skinflint about it, perhaps I need to start thinking about my own agency. Maybe working from home at first and then, well, I don’t know, it’s just an idea. But I’m excited!’
‘I’m excited too!’ Keeley said. ‘It’s amazing.’
‘I know! So I… drank some tiny bottles of alcohol from the minibar and then I needed something else. So, I ordered some fizzy wine on Silvie’s account which I totally will pay for and…