Christmas at Lilac Cottage - Holly Martin Page 0,97

are aware, we do this event every year to raise money for whichever charity is being supported by the Christmas ball. This year we are raising money for Kaleidoscope, who research the causes of miscarriages, stillbirths and premature babies and offer support and counselling to those families that have been affected.’

There was a huge round of applause from the crowd and Penny felt a huge lump in her throat that they were helping a charity that was so important to her. She caught Maggie’s eye across the room and smiled at her for choosing that charity.

Edward introduced the teams briefly, again introducing Penny as part of Henry’s family, which caused a few murmurs of interest amongst the crowd. He explained the rules , pretty much echoing everything that Penny had said, and then he started a countdown.

‘We’ll leave the rope till last so people don’t copy our idea, the cardboard box too,’ Henry whispered over the countdown. ‘We’ll just build the house first.’

Penny nodded, suddenly excited about their design and little bit of rule breaking.

‘…Three, two, one, go!’ Edward shouted.

Henry and Daisy immediately grabbed two panels, one back panel and one of the sides, positioning them so they were at a right angle to each other. They were a perfect team, each knowing what the other was going to do before they did it. Penny realised if everything went according to plan with her and Henry’s relationship, she would be joining their little team soon too.

She quickly started spooning the icing mixture into the piping bag as Henry got the two panels perfectly lined up.

Penny started squeezing the icing down the join, hopefully cementing the two panels together. As Henry held it firm whilst it dried a bit, Penny ran round and piped the icing down the other side of his panel.

‘It’s setting really quickly, what is this stuff?’ Henry said, tentatively letting go of the panel.

‘I don’t know, it’s not like any icing I’ve ever seen before. If I were you, I wouldn’t eat it,’ Penny said as she hauled over the front panel with a space for the door. Daisy quickly ran round to grab the end of Penny’s panel.

Suddenly Penny saw Henry glance across the marquee as if he had spotted something, and whatever he saw wasn’t good. She looked over to see what the other teams were doing, convinced they had also decided to use the cardboard box too, and saw Clara, striding between the teams. A look of panic crossed his face, which deepened when he saw that Penny had seen it too, before he quickly returned his attention to the house.

Henry had told Clara that he had a girlfriend. That surely should be the end of it. So what would cause Henry to be so worried?

* * *

Henry focussed on securing the front panel to the side they had already used, ignoring the questioning gaze from Penny as she piped the icing into the join.

This was not going to end well for him. Clara was an incredibly proud and arrogant person. The rejection and then the embarrassment in front of her assistant was going to be the final nail in his coffin.

But surely Clara wouldn’t make a scene here today, not in front of Daisy and Penny and certainly not in front of all these people.

He glanced over again. Clara was deliberately stopping to talk to each of the teams. On the surface, the audience watching would think that one of the managing directors of the company was just being sociable, cheering the teams on, but the look of surprise from the employees she was interacting with and even from Edward showed she had never done anything like that before. Henry knew why too, it was completely tactical. If she was seen talking to every team then when she came over to talk to him, which she undoubtedly would, no one would be suspicious.

He looked over at Penny who was watching him carefully. Shit, he should have told her. Now it looked even more suspicious when nothing had actually happened.

‘Grab the other bit, Daisy,’ Henry said and Daisy ran off to grab the panel.

Henry moved to the back on the pretence of checking the join and Penny followed.

‘She’s blackmailing me to sleep with her,’ he whispered then continued, ‘if I don’t, I lose my job. If I do I’ll probably lose my job, so it’s a win-win situation all round.’

She stared at him in shock.

‘Daisy, can you hold that side panel against the front?’