But I didn’t know that much about him, even if every instinct was telling me that he was far more of a prince than Rolf would ever be.
“It’s just that …” How could you say it without sounding rude?
“What?”
“It’s just that I don’t really know you,” I blurted out. “You don’t seem like the abducting type, but then who does? I mean, I don’t know where we’re going, no one knows where I am. …”
Brilliant, Amy. That’s exactly what you should say to a potential abductor: “No one knows where I am.”
To his credit, Leo didn’t laugh or look outraged. “That’s fair enough. Do you want to get a cab instead? That’s fine with me too. Do you want to call Jo? You can give her the registration if you want.” He kept a straight face.
“You could have false plates.”
“That’s true.” He pressed his lips together. “What if I give you my wallet?” He took it out of his inner pocket and offered it to me.
I actually considered that, but then reasoned that if he was an abductor, he’d probably have fake ID too. “No, it’s okay. But be warned, I have a really sharp shin-kick move.”
“I’ll bear that in mind,” he said gravely, and got into the back of the Range Rover. After a second’s pause, I did too.
*
We headed away from Berkeley Square through the illuminated carriage drive of Hyde Park, and out toward the lights of Kensington; then the car stopped in a square of white townhouses surrounding a gated garden with tall bare-branched trees arching over the perfectly flat-topped hedge that hid the gardens from public view.
Leo leaped out and went to talk to the driver, then opened my door for me.
“What are we doing here?” I asked. “Is this where you live?”
“Ah, nearby.”
Blimey, I thought. Even the flats round here ran into the millions, let alone the houses. Ted and I didn’t have many clients in this area; if you could afford a house, you could afford a full-time gardener, as well as a nanny, a cook, a driver, and an assistant.
Leo walked up to the padlocked gate and rummaged in his pocket. He held up an old-fashioned key on a ring, undid the padlock, and swung the gate wide for me to go through.
Any lingering paranoia was swept away by rampant curiosity; I’d always longed to nose around a private garden. They were rarely open to passersby, even on those Show Off Your Garden open days in London; and I didn’t know what the groundskeepers did to their hedging shrubs, but they were so dense there was no way you could see through. Even if you practically shoved your head in there (cough).
These gardens were about as exclusive a chunk of London air as you could get—even owning one of the astronomically expensive houses around it didn’t guarantee you entry. There were committees to go past, and key-holder agreements, and annual fees. Jo had a friend of a friend who lived near one with a tennis court in the middle that was about as easy to get a game on as Centre Court at Wimbledon.
I stepped into Leo’s private garden, my eyes darting everywhere as I tried to take it all in at once. It was a medium-size gem, and although it was meticulously tended, it had park benches and croquet hoops—signs that the resident actually enjoyed spending time in it. The garden was laid out formally, in squares like a Battenburg cake, with sections of mown lawn next to knot gardens, all separated by low box borders that sent a dark green scent into the night air. Converted Victorian gas lamps threw warm yellow pools of light over raked flowerbeds, while scatterings of delicate snowdrops stippled the clean borders—not in the ramshackle clumps I planted but in elegant sprays like paper doilies.
“Wow,” I breathed, completely enchanted.
“I thought we’d eat in the summerhouse,” said Leo, indicating a wooden gazebo in the middle, with white-painted shutters and a beautiful scalloped roof. “If that’s fine with you? I know it’s not exactly summery, but there are heaters. And blankets.”
“It’s fine with me,” I said, virtually running toward the summerhouse to see what was inside.
Leo followed me and flicked on a couple of electric lights, which spoiled the Secret Garden effect, but he flicked them back off and started opening cupboards instead, using the moonlight to see by.
“There should be some candles. … Would you mind inspecting the garden for a minute, please?” he said, flapping his hands to make me leave.
It wasn’t easy to walk on the gravel in my heels, but I didn’t want to take them off; fortunately the third glass of wine was taking the sting out of my blisters. I followed one of the paths round to a stone fountain and pretended to inspect a statue of a leaping salmon, but I couldn’t concentrate. I was buzzing with delight. The only thing that felt real about this entire evening was the tiny stone now wedged in my shoe.
I reached for my phone to text Jo, to prove to myself that this was actually happening, but stopped. Bad idea. She’d ask me where I was, I’d be bound to blurt something out about seeing Rolf, then she’d want to know where I was and with whom.
I knew I should tell her, or someone, where I was—but every minute I spent with Leo made me feel more and more as if I’d known him forever. In fact, the worst thing that could happen would be to text Jo or, worse, Ted.
“Amy?”
I saw Leo on the steps of the summerhouse, waving me over, and my feet started to move without me even having to think.
Inside, it smelled dark and green, but in a nice way. The wooden table was spread with a white cloth, and in the middle were three big candles, casting shadows around the already shadowy room. On either side was a china plate with proper silver cutlery and a snowy napkin, and between them were three small domed dishes.
“Where did they come from?” I asked.
“I asked the chef at the club if he could rustle up a takeaway, and Billy brought it in from the car. The cutlery and stuff is here all the time, for picnics.” Leo looked pleased. “My idea, actually. It’s a great garden for picnics in the summer—quick game of croquet after, convenient for cabs. …”
The sensation of being inside a fabulous dream went up another notch. This was Leo’s idea of a takeaway? Silver dishes and porcelain? What was going to be under the domes? Swan fricassee? The Mad Hatter?
“Dinner is served!” He flicked out his napkin with a flourish, then peered under one of the domes. “But don’t get your hopes up too high. If I’d had a bit more time to warn the kitchen, they might have been able to do something a little more, um …”
Leo whisked off the dome to reveal a pair of club sandwiches. The second dome revealed three packets of crisps.
“Perfect picnic food. And they’re good crisps,” I pointed out. “Organic. Handmade.”
“Only the best.” Leo decanted half a packet onto my plate as if he were sharing out caviar. Then he opened the wine—pre-chilled in a silver sleeve—and poured us each a glass.
“Cheers,” I said, and raised it. “To picnics and gardens.”
He smiled, dimpling in the candlelight. “Picnics and gardens.”
I inched off my heels under the table and heard the lump of gravel fall out.
“So.” I took a sip of wine. It was probably the nicest wine I’d ever tasted, all honeyed and crisp. “Tell me how you come to have a key to this amazing garden.”
“I’m a volunteer on the gardening committee.” Leo picked a gherkin out of his club sandwich. “And I can tell you that, because you won’t think it’s sad. Most people do.”
“By most people, do you mean Rolf?” We’d already had a few jokes about Rolf in the car on the way over. I’d confessed all about the fate of the thong and how we’d been using the latest box of chocolates as a tea tray; Leo had told me how much worse some of his earlier ideas had been. I didn’t think Jo would have thanked him for a Vietnamese house pig. Neither would Badger.
“Rolf’s idea of a good garden is anything with a sun lounger in it,” said Leo. “I once won a hundred quid off him, betting that oranges grew on trees and not in a
big orange pod. I’m sure you could make a fortune off him.”
“I’m sure I could,” I said, then, before I could stop myself, I added, “if he can’t even remember who I am, there’s no way he’d remember I’m a gardener.”
I wished I hadn’t said it, because at once Leo looked mortified.
“Not that he has any reason to remember me.” I scrambled to fix it but it was too late; Leo was fiddling with the stem of his wineglass as if he was just waiting for me to stop talking so he could launch into something himself. “I’m sure he meets a lot of people … being a prince and … going to four parties a night. But, you know, I am taking deliveries for him most days, and I’m not that …”
“The fact that he’s a prince means he should know better than to hurt someone’s feelings so carelessly,” Leo interrupted, with a Mr. Darcy-ish impatience that turned my insides to pure water. “He should be grateful for the gracious way you handled his ridiculous behavior earlier. Is it too much to ask you to ignore it? Rolf’s honestly not that bad when he doesn’t have an audience. His reputation goes ahead of him and he always chooses the wrong people to try to impress. And …” He paused, obviously weighing whether or not to share a confidence.
“Go on,” I said. “Whatever you’re going to tell me about Rolf can’t be worse than him thinking a girl would take the gift of a piglet in a good way.”
Leo smiled. “Not that. I was going to say that the reason he didn’t recognize you tonight was that one of his lenses fell out on the way to Jo’s—please don’t ask me how—and he was too vain to wear his glasses. He’s blind as a bat without his lenses, but he’s too scared to get laser treatment. I think that might be why he almost fell off the balcony.”
“He managed to find the loo all right,” I pointed out. “And the drinks.”
“Rolf’s developed a bat-sense for loos and drinks. Years of practice in darkened environments.”
“It’s fine,” I said. I didn’t want to look as if I was bothered that I hadn’t registered on the Rolf Scale. If anything, I was a teeny bit more bothered that Leo hadn’t told Rolf who he was seeing for dinner. “I don’t have a very memorable face.”
“No,” said Leo. “No, I don’t think you could be more wrong about that.” He looked at me intensely from under his lashes. “There’s no way I’d have forgotten it, lenses or no lenses.”
My heart expanded in my chest like a peony opening in speeded-up motion. This was an actual date, wasn’t it? This wasn’t about his garden at all. He couldn’t mean this garden; it clearly had gardeners already. We hadn’t even talked about his own place. Unless …
I knew I should say something, but my mind went blank; and then a clock somewhere outside struck the hour, and Leo looked at his watch in surprise.
“Midnight? How did that happen?”
“Do you turn into a pumpkin now? Or do I?” I inquired. My voice sounded a bit too high. I really didn’t want this evening to end.
“Neither. I’m afraid I turn into someone with a squash lesson tomorrow morning at seven. And I’m useless enough on a full night’s sleep.” He wrinkled his nose apologetically. “Sorry to be so boring, but I have to call it a night.”
“I never thought I’d meet someone who actually played squash at seven in the morning,” I said, impressed. “I thought that was just in films.”
“If only. I bet you get up early, though.” Leo offered me the last profiterole (under the third dome) and then finished it himself when I declined. It was nice to see a man who enjoyed a pudding, I thought; Mum would love that.
“Well, yes. But that’s only because if I get a couple of hours’ work in early on, I can have a bacon sandwich at ten and not feel guilty.”
“I have a similar arrangement with a danish pastry. I’ve found an amazing bakery round the corner from my office—I should send you some croissants.”
“I’d take a decent croissant over a Vietnamese house pig in diamond earrings any day,” I said. “I’m a very cheap date.”
Leo held my gaze, and I held my breath, wondering if he was going to lean over the table and kiss me.
He didn’t, but his eyes darkened and sent electricity tingling right through me, as his beautiful mouth curved in a smile. “That’s not cheap. That’s discerning.”
*
We tidied away the crockery in the sputtering candlelight—him washing, me drying—and when everything was packed up, he locked the summerhouse, and together we walked to where the car was parked. It still felt quite dreamlike, even though I had my flats on now. Leo didn’t comment on the sudden drop in my height. So gallant.
The Range Rover was waiting where we’d left it, and as we approached, I saw the driver hastily put away a newspaper and leap out to take the picnic basket from Leo. I felt sorry for him, sitting there doing the crossword while we ate dinner.
I felt Leo’s breath on my ear. “Don’t worry, I got Billy a sandwich too,” he murmured. “I’m not a complete slave driver.”
“Glad to hear it,” I replied. Not because it was very witty but because I wanted an excuse to put my lips as close to Leo’s ear as his had been to mine.
When he’d handed over the basket, Leo turned to me. “Amy, can I drop you home first?”
“Thank you. That would be nice.” It came out more stiffly than I’d meant. Now that I was facing the social obstacle course of ending the evening, I was nearly palpitating with fear of doing the wrong thing and ruining everything.
I gave Billy my address, and he drove there far more efficiently than most London cabbies would manage, using all sorts of cut-throughs I’d never known about.
Leo chatted but didn’t try to kiss me or put his arm round me; by the time we pulled up outside Leominster Place, the outside of Leo’s knee was only just resting against mine—damn those luxuriously wide backseats—but even so my heart rate had reached practically Olympic levels.
“Well, here we are,” I said.
Oh, God. How to leave? Handshake? No. Kiss? Bit forward. And which side first?
“Thanks for a lovely evening. And we never even got to talk about your garden!” I squeaked nervously.
Leo looked at me as if I were joking, then realized I wasn’t. “Amy, that was my garden. That’s where I live.”
“I mean your balcony garden. For your flat. The fig tree. The vegetable patch.”
“I don’t have a flat,” he said patiently. “I’ve got a house in the square. I want you to do something in that garden.”
I made a faint noise. That put a very different perspective on things.
Leo touched my hand. “Sorry we didn’t get round to talking about it. I suppose I’m going to need to see you again for that. Is that okay?”
“Yes. Yes, it is.”
He leaned forward, and for a dizzy second I thought he was going to kiss me; instead, he brushed his lips against my cheek, and I nearly fainted anyway, from the scent of him and his warmth.
“Good night. I’ll call you.”
I managed to splutter a good night back, and then let myself out of the car. It was a long way down and I nearly fell out, but managed to recover myself, say thank you to the driver, and stumble up the stairs.
I probably looked drunk, but I’d never felt more sober in my life. It was all the stars exploding around my head and in my blood that made me so deliciously uncoordinated as I tiptoed up the sweeping staircase to our darkened flat. And as I trailed my hand along the worn oak handrail, trying to not wake anyone up, I felt like winking at the naughty spirits of Leominster Place who’d once danced home with stars in their eyes and pearls around their throats. I felt like we finally had something in common.
Nine
I didn’t sleep that night, thanks to the endless replay going on in my head, but I didn’t even feel tired when I got up the following morning and headed off to prune Mrs. Troughton’s wisteria in Chelsea.
Ted’s flat singing (he liked to dig to the sound of hymn tunes, not always with the right words) did not
bother me.
Badger rolling around in a pile of fox poo at the bottom of Mrs. Troughton’s big garden did not bother me. (It did bother her, to be fair.)
Even getting home and discovering, (a) a four-foot teddy bear from Rolf lolling suggestively against our door, and (b) our postwoman storming down the stairs from Dickon’s flat, clutching her regulation jacket firmly to her chest, and (c) another overdue gas bill on the post table did not bother me.
Nothing bothered me because I was happier than I could remember being in London. Or, in fact, anywhere. The last time I’d been this happy was the summer I did my GCSEs, before Kelly screwed everything up and we moved and … all that.
Badger ran into the flat ahead of me, looking for Jo and/or food. I left the gas bill on the kitchen table and the bear sprawling on the sofa, and after I’d fed Badger, I waltzed into the bathroom for a long soak, with my phone propped up against the window for best reception in case Leo called.
While I was submerged in the warm water, I replayed various key moments from the previous night, lingering over the bits where Leo’s eyes had locked with mine or our hands had brushed, in the car, in the club. I didn’t have to edit out any cringe-worthy faux pas or fast-forward over awkward pauses. I wasn’t struck too late by much wittier things I should have said. I’d never had a date like that.
I guessed it was a bit like what my dad used to say about playing cricket with the one decent pro cricketer Hadley Green CC ever had—Dev Bhattacharya was so talented with the bat that he made everyone else play better too. It was the same with Leo. He was so charming and natural he made it easy for me to be natural too. Even quite charming.
As I twiddled the big brass hot tap with my foot to top up the cooling water, the front door opened; I sank back into the bath and waited for Jo’s screech of horror at the enormous teddy to echo round the flat. I knew her routine: come in, drop bag, wail skyward about the ineptitude of builders, check answering machine for invites (many) or calls from her agent (fewer), ask if there was any wine needed finishing up for economy reasons, and so on. But tonight Jo walked straight in and hammered on the bathroom door.