An Isle of Man Ghostly Cozy Collection - DEF

by Diana Xarissa

“Yes,” Fenella sighed.

  “And you turned him down,” Shelly said. “I’m not sure I would have.” When Fenella gave her a shocked look, she quickly continued. “I mean, I would now, but if I were you, I’m not sure I would have. He’s rich and gorgeous and sexy, and I’m sure he would spoil you absolutely rotten, given the opportunity. Flying off to London on a moment’s notice just sounds so romantic. I’ve never done anything that romantic.”

  “He’ll be tied up in meetings and I’d be on my own, sitting in a fancy hotel, afraid to touch anything in the room,” Fenella said.

  Shelly laughed as Mona rolled her eyes. “You should go and take yourself out to see the sights,” Mona said. “Flirt with unsuitable men, drink too much, let Donald worry about where you are when he gets back from his meetings.”

  Fenella couldn’t think of any way to reply to that, so she was glad she had Shelly as an excuse to ignore her aunt.

  “What time is lunch, then?” Shelly asked.

  “We’re meeting Lance at noon.”

  “I think I’ll go and pace anxiously around my flat until then.”

  “Let’s go and do something instead,” Fenella suggested.

  “We could go get some groceries,” Shelly said. “Then maybe we won’t have to eat stale bread for breakfast tomorrow.”

  5

  Two hours later Fenella’s cupboards and refrigerator were full and she was starving.

  “I’m glad we have lunch plans,” she told Shelly. “I don’t want to take the time to cook anything.”

  “I’m just going to go and freshen up,” Shelly replied. “I’ll be right back.”

  Fenella ran a brush through her hair and touched up her makeup. Mona was nowhere to be seen as Fenella made sure Katie had her lunch and a fresh bowl of water. Ten minutes later, five minutes after they should have left for the restaurant, Fenella started to worry about Shelly.

  When her friend didn’t answer her knock, Fenella grew even more concerned. She walked back to her apartment and rang Shelly’s mobile number.

  “I can’t do it,” Shelly said in a low voice. “Tell him I’m sorry, but I can’t do it.”

  “Okay. If you don’t want to come, that’s fine,” Fenella said quickly. “I’ll go and talk to him. Can you give me any tips on things to test him on?”

  “Ask him what John’s favorite color was and where John and I met. If John truly did write to him about me, he would have told him that. Ask him how John proposed, too. He’d have mentioned that. Maybe, if he can answer all of those questions, I might agree to meet or talk to him another time.”

  “You have to do what’s best for you,” Fenella said firmly. “If you don’t want to talk to the man, don’t.”

  “I’m sorry that you’re having to have lunch with him alone, though.”

  “It’s my own fault. I made the arrangements.”

  “I can ring you in ten minutes and pretend that there’s an emergency.”

  “Thank you, but I think I’m too hungry to agree to that. I may have to talk to Lance, but at least I’ll get lunch.”

  Shelly chuckled. “You’re almost temping me, but not quite.”

  “Do you want me to bring you something back?”

  “No, thank you. If I can’t go along, I don’t deserve to have the lovely food.”

  “That’s silly. You have to do what’s right for you. You still deserve lovely food.”

  “Maybe we could go somewhere for lunch tomorrow,” Shelly suggested. “But you’d better get going now.”

  Fenella glanced at the clock. She had less than a minute to get to the restaurant on time. “I’m going to be late,” she sighed.

  “Tell him I’m sorry,” Shelly said. “I just need more time.”

  Fenella nodded and then grabbed her handbag. There was no sign of the elevators, so Fenella raced down the stairs and then dashed across the lobby. She walked into the Chinese restaurant at five past twelve. Lance was nowhere to be seen.

  “He couldn’t possibly have given up on me so quickly,” Fenella said.

  “I’m sorry?” the restaurant’s host said.

  Fenella shrugged. “I’m meeting a friend for lunch, but I’m a few minutes late. I hope I didn’t miss him.”

  “I don’t believe that you did. I haven’t seated anyone on their own, anyway.”

  “I suppose I need a table for two, then.”

  “Will this do?” the man asked a moment later. “I thought you’d like to be near the door so that you can watch for your friend.”

  “This is fine,” Fenella replied. She didn’t generally like being seated so close to the front of the small room, but it made sense to be near the door. The table felt far less intimate than the booths at the back that she and Shelly usually preferred. That was definitely better for today.

  “Can I get you a drink while you wait for your friend?”

  Fenella ordered a soda and then picked up the menu. She nearly always ordered the same thing, but maybe today she would try something different. Reading the entire menu three times didn’t take nearly long enough, she thought as she sipped her drink. It was twenty past twelve, and she felt that she needed to either order or leave in the next few minutes. It wasn’t so much that the small restaurant was busy, as there were still a few empty tables scattered around the room, but Fenella was starving.

  She’d just decided to leave when the door swung open and Lance strolled into the room. He glanced around and then nodded at her.

  “This isn’t really what I was expecting,” he said as he dropped into the seat opposite her. “I suppose as I’m used to London, I was bound to be disappointed, wasn’t I?”

  Fenella swallowed a dozen replies. It was important to be nice to him until she could work out exactly what he wanted from Shelly, she reminded herself.

  “Can I get you a drink?” the waiter asked, giving Fenella a smile. She flushed as she wondered if he thought Lance was a blind date.

  “Just water,” Lance said. “Do you have daily specials?”

  “No, sir. We have a fairly extensive menu, however,” the waiter replied.

  Lance picked up the menu from the table and began to flip through it. “There’s no way one chef can make all of this well,” he said loudly. “Not unless he’s buying most of his sauces already made.”

  “I can assure you that our chef makes all of the sauces himself,” the waiter said stiffly.

  Lance shrugged. “My drink?”

  The waiter nodded and walked away, leaving Fenella wishing she’d walked out after fifteen minutes of waiting.

  “Shelly wouldn’t come?” Lance asked.

  “No, she’s not ready to talk to you yet,” Fenella replied.

  “The yet is encouraging, anyway,” Lance replied. “But without her here, I’ve no idea what we shall talk about.”

  “Tell me about you. You grew up on the island?”

  “Yes, and then left for university and never came back. London just had so much more to offer than the island did, at least to my younger self. The fact that I’m back here now suggests that I may have underestimated the island’s appeal all those years ago, of course.”

  “Your water,” the waiter said, putting the glass on the table. “Are you ready to order?”

  Fenella ordered her usual, a platter with small portions of several of her favorite dishes. Lance ordered plain steamed rice with steamed vegetables.

  “Why have you retired back to the island, then?” Fenella asked as the waiter walked away.

  “Tax advantages, for one thing. Once I stopped working in London, it seemed silly to pay London prices, for another. Since I’m retired, I can live anywhere in the world. It seemed smart to look for a place to live that was relatively inexpensive. The island seems to fit the bill.”

  “Has it changed much since your childhood?”

  “I hope you aren’t implying that I’m significantly older than you,” Lance said coolly.

  Fenella forced herself to chuckle. “Not at all. But
I left the island when I was two. I don’t remember it at all.”

  “That explains your accent,” Lance replied. “How long have you lived here, then?”

  “Only about six months.”

  “Has it changed much? Yes, it has, actually. In many ways I preferred it forty years ago. It isn’t really the island I remember.”

  “Have you been able to locate any of your other former friends?”

  Lance shook his head. “John was the only person I stayed in touch with after I left. I suppose there may be a few people still around from my school days, but I’m not sure I’d remember them if they spoke to me. It was a very long time ago, after all.”

  “Yes, and a long time for you and John to have stayed in touch.”

  “It was sporadic at best. I’m sure today’s teens won’t have the same difficulty. They’ll just use social media to stay connected forever, but John and I didn’t have that option. When I first went away, we wrote back and forth almost regularly, but that soon tapered off to not much more than cards at Christmas and for birthdays. Every once in a while one or the other of us would send a longer letter, whenever something significant happened in our lives, mostly.”

  “So John wrote to you about Shelly?”

  “Occasionally. I remember him always saying how beautiful and special she was. I wish I’d kept the letters, but when I got them they didn’t seem especially significant. I’m sure Shelly would love to see them, though.”

  “It’s a shame you didn’t keep them,” Fenella agreed. “I don’t believe Shelly ever found any letters from you in her husband’s papers, either.”

  Lance frowned. “That was one of the things that I wanted to ask her about. I’m not sure if I’d be happy if some were found or not, though. There’s a part of me that would love to revisit my younger self through the letters, but I’m rather concerned with how immature I must have seemed, especially in the earliest ones.”

  “Here we are,” the waiter said, putting plates down in front of each of them. “Do you need anything else right now?”

  “More water,” Lance replied.

  “Yes, sir. Right away.”

  Fenella ignored the chopsticks next to her plate and picked up her fork. Lance unwrapped his chopsticks and began to eat with a level of expertise that annoyed Fenella.

  “What about your friends?” she asked after a few bites. “Are they all planning to retire to the island as well?”

  “I couldn’t possibly answer for any of them, but I believe they are all considering it,” Lance said as the waiter delivered another glass of water.

  “And how do you know Neil Hicks?”

  “We worked together in London. All of the men who were with me at the party last night are associates from London. Did you like Neil? He was quite taken with you.”

  “No, I didn’t,” Fenella replied, unwilling to be polite about the man.

  Lance chuckled. “He came on too strong to you. But he isn’t really that bad. He’s wealthy and well connected, you know.”

  “I don’t look for either of those things in men.”

  “No? You’re unusual, then, especially for a woman who is involved with Donald Donaldson. According to Neil, he’s one of the wealthiest men on the island and he has a reputation with women that isn’t the best.”

  “Donald and I are just friends,” Fenella replied.

  “Of course you are,” Lance said patronizingly.

  Fenella bit her tongue. It didn’t matter in the slightest what this man thought of her, she reminded herself. After today, she might never have to see him again.

  “What will it take to persuade Shelly to see me? Money is no object.”

  “Money? You can’t buy an audience with Shelly.”

  “But can I buy some of your time and effort on my behalf? I’d really like you to try to convince Shelly to meet with me.”

  “Why?” Fenella demanded.

  Lance flushed. “For all manner of reasons,” he said stiffly.

  “I understand that you and John were friends, but I can’t see why that makes you so determined to get to know Shelly,” Fenella pushed.

  “Everything John told me over the years has made me want to get to know Shelly,” Lance told her. “You’ll laugh, but she’s always been the standard by which I judge women.”

  “Simply based on John’s description of her? What if he lied?”

  “He didn’t. John never lied about anything. I think that was part of why I stayed friends with him for so many years. I knew I could trust him.”

  “You simply need to give Shelly some time. Let her get used to the idea of your being here for a week or two. Maybe wait until after the first anniversary of John’s death before you try to see her.”

  Lance frowned. “I don’t want to wait that long,” he said. “I was hoping we could try again tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow? I don’t know about tomorrow.”

  “How much would it take to convince you to talk Shelly into tomorrow?”

  “I’m not for sale, so don’t even go there,” Fenella snapped. “And I’m on Shelly’s side in all of this. I’m not going to try to talk her into doing something she doesn’t want to do.”

  “I think talking to me will be in her best interests, though. Surely she’d like to hear stories about John’s childhood? I remember our school days as if they were yesterday. What I did yesterday, on the other hand, well, that I tend to forget.”

  “That’s going to have to be a decision for Shelly to make. I’m sure she’s heard plenty of stories about John’s school days over the years. She may not be interested in hearing any more.”

  “Did anyone want pudding?” the waiter asked as he cleared away the empty plates.

  “No, thank you,” Lance replied. “Just the bill, please.”

  Fenella thought about arguing, as she liked several of the items on the dessert menu, but she had no interest in prolonging her time with Lance.

  “I don’t think this has been very productive,” Lance complained as they waited for the bill. “I was hoping you’d come around to seeing things my way.”

  Even if you had to bribe me to persuade me, Fenella thought. “I’m sorry, but I’m going to do what I think is best for Shelly,” she repeated herself.

  “And you don’t think she should meet with me?”

  “I think she should do whatever feels right to her. I don’t think you should be putting so much pressure on her. I’m still trying to understand why you’re so determined to get to know her.”

  “As I said, John made her sound incredibly special. I simply want to find out if he was right or not.”

  “She is very special, which is why I’m so protective of her. Why don’t you give me your number and I’ll have Shelly call you if she decides she wants to see you?”

  “I have her number,” he reminded her. “I’ve already left two messages on her answering machine. I gave her my number in both messages.”

  “Then she can find you if she wants to see you. I think, for now, that will have to be good enough.”

  Lance frowned and then nodded slowly. “I won’t keep ringing her, not if you feel it might upset her. Perhaps I could have your number? I won’t ring you often, but maybe I could check in with you once in a while to see how Shelly is doing?”

  Fenella hesitated. She really didn’t want the man calling her, but she would rather he called her than Shelly. “Fine,” she said after a moment. She dug around in her handbag and found a scrap of paper and a pen. She wrote down the number for the apartment rather than her mobile number. The apartment had an answering machine.

  Lance handed her a card with his name and number on it in exchange. Fenella glanced at it and then dropped it into her handbag. A moment later the waiter brought the bill. Lance studied it and then pulled out his wallet.

  “How much do I owe you?” Fenella asked.

  “Lunch is on me,” Lance told her. He pulled a note out of his wallet and Fenella nearly gasped as she noticed how
full the wallet was. From where she was sitting it looked thick with twenty and fifty pound notes.

  “I got in the habit of carrying a lot of cash when I first moved to London,” Lance said carelessly. “In those days you needed cash for meals and taxis. It’s a habit I’ve not broken.” He handed the waiter some money and then stood up. Fenella got to her feet as well.

  “Are you heading home?” he asked as they walked toward the front of the room.

  “Yes, I need to get lunch for my cat or she’ll start eating the furniture.”

  Lance laughed. “I had a cat for a very short space of time. What he didn’t try to eat he clawed into pieces. I ended up giving him to the woman I was seeing at the time. Their relationship outlasted hers and mine by a considerable margin.”

  A light rain had begun to fall, so Fenella began to walk quickly as soon as they were outside the restaurant. Lance kept up with her, but neither spoke again until they were within steps of their building.

  “Lance, there you are,” a loud voice said.

  “Neil, I told you I had plans for lunch,” Lance replied.

  Fenella forced herself to smile at Neil Hicks as he and Lance’s other friends walked toward them.

  Neil was frowning. “It isn’t like you to try to snatch a woman away from me behind my back,” he said to Lance.

  “Fenella was meant to be bringing her friend Shelly to lunch with us today,” Lance said quickly. “Shelly was married to my oldest friend, John. I’m hoping to get to know Shelly better, not Fenella.”

  Neil nodded and then took a step closer to Fenella. “How are you today?” he asked her in a low voice.

  “I’m fine, thank you,” Fenella replied, taking a step backwards.

  “I’m sure Donald was annoyed with me last night,” Neil said, keeping his voice low and intimate. “I don’t normally chase after his women, but there’s something incredibly attractive about you. I hope you and Donald didn’t quarrel about me.”

  “Donald knows me better than that,” Fenella said, desperately trying to think how Mona would act under the circumstances. Be distant but polite, she told herself.

  “And what does it take to get to know you as well as Donald does?” he asked.