One Christmas Kiss in Notting Hill

by Mandy Baggot

  Isla swallowed. What had her sister said? ‘Hannah, what have you done?’

  Hannah smiled. ‘Well,’ she said. ‘Your heroic sister – that’s me, by the way – might just have freaking saved the whole of Notting Hill.’

  Forty-Six

  The Royale, Hyde Park

  ‘Thank you for watching the girls, Denise,’ Chase said. ‘I really appreciate it.’

  He was tired. He didn’t want to talk. He wanted to pour himself a bourbon, drink it slow, and relive every skin-tingling second of his kiss with Isla. She might regret it, but he was going to be remembering every moment of it for the foreseeable future. She had smelled like fondant and ice and … Christmas … and her sweet lips had matched his, riding slow at first and then hotter, their tongues rolling latently together. He closed his eyes until—

  ‘Are you all right, Mr Bryan?’ Denise questioned.

  He came to quickly. ‘Yeah … I apologise … it’s late. I should let you go.’

  Denise put her bag over her shoulder and headed for the door. ‘We ordered room service. Macaroni and cheese and a couple of burgers. I hope that was all right.’

  He nodded. ‘Sure.’

  ‘Then Brooke went on about extra salt so …’

  His eyes widened. ‘You didn’t …’

  ‘I said she could order some cheesecake so we had that too, and popcorn, and half of a rather large chocolate Father Christmas.’

  He sighed. ‘I’m wondering if that thing will ever disappear.’

  ‘I ate a whole leg,’ Denise informed her boss. ‘So he won’t stand up any more.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Chase answered.

  ‘See you at work tomorrow,’ Denise said, opening the door to the suite.

  ‘Goodnight, Denise.’ Chase pressed a fifty-pound note into her hand. ‘Thank you again.’

  ‘Oh, thank you, Mr Bryan.’ She looked at the money then up at him. ‘Any time.’

  He took a step back and closed the door, leaning heavily against it. Closing his eyes again, he thought about Isla. How she had barely spoken to him on the drive back to her home. She had sat, small, knees bunched together, her body pressed against the door, eyes gazing out into the dark. He’d wanted to talk about it, say something, anything to promote a conversation, but instead he’d said ‘So I need to make an appointment to meet with Rod Striker.’ And she had responded with: ‘I’ll call him in the morning.’

  ‘Daddy.’ Maddie’s voice had him opening his eyes and there was his daughter, too-long pyjama bottoms covering her feet, eyes heavy with sleep.

  ‘Hey, Pumpkin, what are you doing awake? Is it your spots?’ he asked, going towards her and putting a hand out to ruffle her hair.

  ‘No. My nose is stuffy.’ She sniffed long and hard.

  ‘You want me to get you a Kleenex?’

  ‘Can I have a glass of milk?’

  ‘Sure,’ he answered. ‘Let’s get you back in bed and I’ll call room service.’ He put his arm around her, shepherding her back toward the bedroom.

  Pushing open the door he saw Brooke was asleep. No headphones in her ears, hair brushed, gently breathing. She looked completely different when she wasn’t snarling at the world. Younger. Innocent.

  He pulled back Maddie’s duvet cover and she slipped back into bed. Running the flat of his hand over her hair he tried to encourage her to lie down.

  ‘Did you have a good time with Denise?’ he asked.

  ‘We watched Ratatouille,’ Maddie answered. ‘Then a Christmas film with Arnold Schwarzenegger.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘I think Denise has a crush on him.’

  Chase smiled. ‘It’s the muscles.’ He flexed one of his arms strongman style.

  ‘Did you have a good time with Isla?’ Maddie inquired.

  ‘Yes,’ he breathed. ‘We had a good time.’

  ‘Was she wearing a pretty dress?’ Maddie continued.

  ‘Yes, she was wearing a very pretty dress.’

  ‘Did it have sparkles?’

  It had had sparkles but the ones on the dress hadn’t beaten her eyes. He swallowed, smiling at his daughter. ‘You need to lie down and I’ll go order that milk.’

  ‘I like Isla,’ Maddie said, slowly slipping down into a prostrate position. ‘She’s real pretty and she’s clever and she’s funny.’

  Yeah, his Go-To Girl was all of those things and more. Like super-sexy and opinionated and so damn right about most things. And good. She was so good. He felt like the Devil himself stood alongside her. And maybe that was the crux of the problem. That’s why maybe forgetting the kiss was the only thing he could do. Because he had been sent here to literally rip up the part of the city that was part of her. God, was that really what he was going to do? He shook his head. It was the right place for the super-village. He had looked at it carefully, the board had looked at it, it was ultimately their decision not his. And he had to do what was right for the company, didn’t he? He was fresh in at this job, needing to make it work, so badly. He sat down on his daughter’s bed.

  ‘Do you think Isla’s funny, Daddy?’ Maddie inquired, eyes drooping slightly.

  ‘Yeah, Pumpkin, she’s real funny.’

  ‘And pretty,’ Maddie continued.

  ‘And pretty.’

  ‘And she likes you.’

  He swallowed. ‘You think she does?’

  ‘Oh yeah,’ Maddie said grinning. ‘She totally does that thing that Brooke does when she’s trying to catch the attention of a guy.’

  ‘What’s that?’ He really wanted to know what his teenaged daughter was doing to hook the interest of a boy. He would be looking out for it and putting an immediate stop to it.

  ‘She looks.’ Maddie looked at him, all wide eyes with an intense expression. ‘She looks away.’ She dropped her gaze to the duvet cover. ‘Then she looks again.’ She hit him with another killer glance that definitely struck a chord, but possibly one in a minor key.

  ‘Wow,’ Chase said. ‘Brooke does that to attract boys?’

  ‘And Isla does it to you,’ Maddie said. ‘She did it on the Tube after she had finished wiping up from the Santa explosion.’

  ‘I think that was probably a look that said she wanted to kill me.’ He sighed. And after tonight how much more awkward was it going to be?

  ‘But tonight she had a date with you,’ Maddie reminded him.

  ‘I told you, Miss Matchmaker, it was a work thing.’ He stood up. ‘I’ll go order that milk.’ He stroked her hair again. ‘Close your eyes.’

  ‘Daddy,’ she said softly.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘If I fall asleep, will you drink my milk?’ Maddie asked, eyes already closing.

  ‘Sure,’ he responded with a smile.

  ‘Promise?’

  ‘I promise, Pumpkin.’

  He watched her breathing slow and knew she was going to be asleep before he even put in the order. He closed the door of the bedroom and took a breath. Bourbon for one it was.

  Forty-Seven

  Beaumont Square, Notting Hill

  Hannah had broken into number eleven. Isla’s wheelchair-bound sister had committed a crime. And it wasn’t road rage – which she committed at least twice a day, once during the morning commute and the other on the way home – it was breaking and entering and … robbery.

  Isla was still staring at what was spread out over the coffee table, not able to take any of it in. It couldn’t be true, could it? Although it would explain a whole lot of things.

  ‘Well, aren’t you going to say anything?’ Hannah asked.

  ‘I … don’t know what to say,’ Isla said, eyes still flashing over the contents of the coffee table.

  Hannah shifted in Ronnie, leaning a little and pointing. ‘That’s the Breekers logo, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ Isla replied.

  ‘And this is a big-arse map of most of Notting Hill and beyond.’

  She swallowed. ‘Yes.’

  ‘And this,’ Hannah continued, ‘this other drawing is of some ridiculous
ly crazy big hotel-cum-Milton-Keynes of a thing.’

  Yes, the other plan was the same plan she had been looking at with Chase. The nine-hole golf course and the ice rink and the circus …

  ‘It doesn’t take a genius to put two and two together, does it?’ Hannah squawked. ‘So, tell me … are Breekers going to demolish our town and build that on it?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Isla responded. What else could she say? She didn’t know, not about Notting Hill, and she was bound by her contract not to tell anyone about anything else either.

  ‘Isla! You work there!’ Hannah screamed.

  ‘Hannah, it might be that Isla don’t work in that department, right?’

  Raj had finally said something and Isla was almost grateful. Perhaps she could go with that suggestion for now, until she found out more … until she grabbed Chase by the throat tomorrow and demanded to know what the hell was going on. Could she grab him by the throat? Or was that going to see her destined for Wasabi-peas-ville?

  ‘Crap!’ Hannah spat back. ‘This is exactly the department she works in. And now we know why the big head of the company is over here right now. He’s making plans to seek and destroy.’ She turned to Raj. ‘Can they do that? I mean there are loads, hundreds of historic things here … and the market … and the Ladbroke Estate and it was the whole basis of a movie, for God’s sake.’

  ‘I dunno,’ Raj replied.

  ‘And our house,’ Hannah continued. ‘Our house is just on the edge of that red line. Inside the red line!’

  Isla couldn’t think properly. Her mind was buzzing and trying to come up with answers and all the while, as she begged her brain to compute what she was seeing and try to rationalise it, all it was doing was sending her images of her and Chase, in the snow in Larkspur Gardens, on her grandmother’s bench, kissing like they needed to get a room.

  ‘Isla!’ Hannah shouted.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said. Her fingers went to the map and she pulled it a little closer to her.

  ‘Our house is on this map,’ Hannah continued. ‘The whole of Beaumont Square could be turned into a pile of rubble and then something like Donald Trump used to build is put in its place! And why do Verity and John have this stuff in their house anyway?’

  That was a very good question and perhaps, for now, until she had a chance to regroup and make sense of this, she should focus on that element of it.

  ‘I can’t believe you broke into someone’s house, Hannah,’ Isla started.

  ‘Actually, though, that was me,’ Raj cut in.

  ‘And technically it wasn’t really breaking in,’ Hannah added. ‘We thought we heard a baby crying.’

  Isla shook her head at her sister. She had definitely been watching way too many episodes of Line of Duty.

  ‘We thought it could be in danger so we had to …’ Hannah began.

  ‘You had to do what?’ Isla asked.

  ‘Mrs Edwards was so upset after you left,’ Hannah continued. ‘We couldn’t just sit here and do nothing.’

  ‘And the baby was crying though,’ Raj pointed out.

  ‘Are Verity and John going to be calling the police and am I going to have to pay for a broken window to be fixed?’ Focus on this crime, not the crime that was these plans sitting in front of them.

  ‘No, I have keys,’ Raj announced.

  ‘Keys?’ Isla queried. ‘To number eleven? Have they started inviting you in for coffee too? Or is this a Royal Mail thing?’

  ‘They’re skeleton keys,’ Hannah interrupted. ‘You know … like locksmiths have.’

  ‘And burglars,’ Isla said, one hand on her chest. ‘Like burglars have.’

  ‘I borrowed them, innit. From a mate.’

  Isla didn’t really know what to say.

  ‘So we let ourselves in and there this all was. On the dining table. All these plans and photographs and documents and …’ Hannah’s voice was starting to become emotional. ‘Did you know about it, Isla? Did you know and not tell me?’

  She shook her head furiously. ‘No, I didn’t know.’

  ‘But you’ll do something, won’t you? I mean, it can’t happen. We won’t let it happen, will we? They can’t just decide on something like this without meetings and consultations and public opinion, right?’

  ‘Right,’ Isla said. Her mind started to recall Chase’s animated conversation with Rod Striker. That’s why he had been so keen to meet that particular councillor. Because Notting Hill was the chosen site … and she’d shown him almost every street of it.

  ‘The council like meetings though,’ Raj added. ‘They is always having meetings about the crews near my crib.’

  ‘This isn’t about your hood though, is it?’ Hannah remarked sadly. ‘It’s about mine.’ She sighed. ‘I can’t believe we invited John and Verity for dinner.’

  And Chase, Isla thought. They’d invited him too. And he was the driving force behind this. He had known Notting Hill was where he was going to build his monstrosity and he’d charmed her with his hot accent and his gentleman routine – shrouding her in his jacket, clearing snow off a bench …

  ‘And John obviously ain’t in insurance,’ Raj added.

  That was a puzzle. Who exactly were John and Verity? And why on earth did they have Breekers’ supposedly secret schematics?

  ‘I’ll get to the bottom of it,’ Isla announced suddenly. ‘We should return these.’ She began to fold up the map and plans.

  ‘Return them!’ Hannah exclaimed.

  Raj looked concerned. ‘I don’t think we should be doing that though.’

  ‘How can we keep them?’ Isla asked. ‘They’re not ours.’

  ‘They’re evidence,’ Hannah stated. ‘Evidence that everything Mrs Edwards has been saying is true. Evidence that something’s literally going down … and it’s not Time Team.’ She breathed loud and hard. ‘And if we give them back how are we going to explain how we got them in the first place? Say we thought we heard a baby crying so we opened the door with a gang member’s keys, discovered there was no baby, and then this huge, random, snow-infused gust of wind just blew everything out of the front door and back here?’

  ‘That’s not a bad idea, innit.’

  ‘It’s a terrible idea, Raj.’

  Isla could see how worried Hannah was and, as always, that was her priority. She needed to ease her concerns, tell her everything was going to be all right. Even if she didn’t have all the answers yet, she would get them. God, she would definitely get them. She was seething, quietly so as not to alarm her sister, but inside she was screaming.

  ‘Hannah, you mustn’t worry,’ Isla spoke calmly. ‘If I don’t know anything about this then it can’t be very far along in the planning state, can it?’ She attempted a smile. ‘And if Verity or John works for Breekers I would know, wouldn’t I?’

  ‘That’s what I said,’ Raj said proudly.

  ‘But—’ Hannah started.

  ‘The likelihood is Breekers are just trialling a few ideas. It happens all the time. It might even be … an old plan from eons ago that they’ve … accidentally on purpose let slip to a competitor …’ This was good. It was vaguely plausible. Sort of. ‘Perhaps Verity and John work for Blox Limited.’ She swallowed. Had that sounded convincing?

  ‘Do you think so?’ Hannah queried.

  ‘It’s possible.’ She bit down on her tongue. ‘And if it isn’t then … well … it’s almost Christmas. Nothing moves very fast at Christmas.’

  ‘But it’s an old plan you think?’ Hannah continued.

  Her conscience just wouldn’t let her tell an outright lie. Because if their worst fears ended up being realised, Hannah would never forgive her for it.

  ‘It looks old, doesn’t it?’ Isla yawned and checked her watch. ‘Gosh, is that the time? It’s so late.’ She stood up, hoping Raj would take the hint.

  ‘I should go, like,’ Raj said, getting to his feet.

  ‘I’ll show you out,’ Isla said, perhaps a little too eagerly.

  ‘I can do t
hat,’ Hannah said, wheeling forward. ‘He’s my guest.’

  ‘Of course,’ Isla replied. ‘Goodnight, Raj.’

  ‘Night, Isla.’

  Isla kept the smile on her face right up until they both left the room. Then she sank down on to the sofa and wondered just who in the universe hated her enough to deal her a little piece of Christmas romance then snatch it back, screw it up into a ball and stomp all over it.

  Forty-Eight

  Canary Wharf

  You’re going to ask, aren’t you? As soon as you get in … or sooner. Can’t you email someone? Or call Chase? I mean, he shared lasagne with us! How could he share lasagne with us if he was planning to knock down our home!

  These were the questions Hannah had thrown at Isla as she had rushed around the house hoping a text from Poppy didn’t come in. And it hadn’t. Poppy had turned up … with no mention of her grandmother’s hospital visit but limping a little herself. A leg injury didn’t bode well for future visits.

  Of course they were all things Isla was already thinking herself. And she went from panicked to rational as quickly as the winter wind seemed to change direction that morning. It seemed crazy to think that two people who lived opposite them in Beaumont Square worked for Breekers and she had no idea. Which meant, realistically, if you weren’t a believer in all things TV drama, it couldn’t possibly be the case. So that left them being employed by a rival, the idea of which she liked just as little, because it meant there was someone at Breekers passing on information and plans. But, whatever was true it still left only one conclusion for the map of Notting Hill: it was the desired location for the super-village and Chase had neglected to tell her. Had he really planned to somehow get her on board with this development? Had ‘confiding’ in her about his marriage and his brother and kissing her been designed to soften the blow? Did he really think she could ever support the destruction of her precious part of London?