Never Say Never (Lakeview Contemporary Romance Book 3) (3 page)

“Really sir, there’s no need …” The voice of the stewardess trailed off as she realised that Ben wasn’t to be placated.

“I’m so sorry,” Robin said, mortified, as another stewardess had to be called to open the aircraft door. “I’m so sorry.”

Providing a peanut-free zone for passengers like Robin was at the discretion of the individual airline, so really Ben had no right to be so hard on them. But she suspected he was tired of the fact that the condition could be so all-pervading when it came to their lifestyle.

Sitting in the taxi on the way back from the airport to their Lower East Side apartment, yet another weekend ruined, Robin smarted with the embarrassment of it all.

“I made it clear when I made the booking, Ben, really I did,” she said, looking miserably at him and trying to convince herself more than him.

Ben turned to her and took her hand in his. “Hey, don’t you be feeling guilty about this. It was my decision to get off that plane. Anyway, I didn’t want all those people staring at us all the way to Washington, did you?” he grinned. “So don’t be silly,” he added ruffling her hair. “There’ll be other weekends, and anyway it’s not your fault.”

But Robin thought sadly, there was no getting away from the fact that without her allergy, there wouldn’t have been a problem at all.

So of course it was her fault – it was
always
her fault.

L
eah Reid took
a deep breath – a very very deep breath. This was easily the most terrifying experience of her life. She had done many frightening things over the years – bungee-jumping in France, white-water rafting in Belgium, not to mention going through the very scary motions of setting up a business in Ireland – but this, this was the most terrifying of all.

The night before, she hadn’t been able to sleep, she was so sick with nerves, and she had spent much of the night in her kitchen experimenting with new recipes for her handmade chocolates. It hadn’t been a wasted night either she thought with a grin, as she’d come up with a raspberry and fluffy white chocolate truffle combo that was absolutely delicious –
Berrylicious
actually, which was just what she intended to name the new creation.

She took another deep breath and sat for a few moments more in her little Fiesta before getting out. You can do this, she told herself. You’ve succeeded in your career and you will succeed in this – you can do it. Unfortunately, the message wasn’t being relayed to the butterflies in her stomach.

Despite her student ambitions to become a pasty-chef, Leah found that time abroad after her degree had unexpectedly led her catering career in a totally different direction.

Having qualified and eager to further her knowledge and experience, she had spent a few years in France working under the stewardship of a renowned Belgian dessert chef and chocolatier. Her own speciality at college had been pastries and desserts, but working alongside such an artisan and master of his work, Leah unexpectedly fell in love with the intricate handmade chocolatier craft. In order to hone her growing skills, she spent a further eighteen months away in Brussels. While there she approached with gusto the challenge of marrying delicious and unusual flavours with the finest chocolate; the sheer pleasure of creating something that looked irresistible and tasted like pure heaven.

By the time the initial apprenticeship was over and her own skills were polished to perfection, Leah was hooked on the artistry of chocolate-making. There was no doubt in her mind as to where she wanted to go with her career, and when she returned to Ireland she immediately set about going into the confectionery business.

At the time of her return two years before the country was still in the throes of the economic boom and, following a huge leap of faith (and an equally huge start-up loan from her bank), Leah began her own specialised handmade chocolate company. She named the business Elysium, the Greek translation of which meant ‘a condition of ideal happiness’, which she felt went some way towards doing justice to her handmade creations.

She did her research beforehand and discovered that while the handmade chocolate business was a thriving Irish industry, there was little in the way of high-end artisan gift chocolates. Having experienced various selling-methods and chocolate boutiques during her time in Belgium, she eventually decided that the packaging and presentation of Elysium chocolates should be equally as important as the chocolates themselves. Her signature use of rich purple and gold-coloured ornate boxes, beautifully covered in beaded silk and wrapped in delicate muslin, soon became hugely popular with card-and-gift stores and tourist retailers.

From humble origins in her own kitchen to eventually securing a tiny shoebox in the local Enterprise Centre, Leah worked hard to supply her growing number of trade customers. It was true what they said about finding something you loved and never working a day again she thought, because she absolutely adored her job. Josh, her boyfriend, often complained that she worked way too hard, but as far as she was concerned it was the best job in the world.

Recently she and Josh had set up home together in a one-bed luxury – but rented – apartment on Dublin’s southside. Their relationship was going great, the business was going great, Leah was a few months away from her thirtieth birthday and life was great.

But, she thought finally getting out of the car, if she could just get today over and done with, then life would be even better. As Josh had pointed out before leaving for work that morning, all she could do was her best. Unfortunately, Leah knew from experience that her best would probably not be enough.

She jogged up the steps and into the building, her dark ponytail swinging as she went. She felt strange wearing her hair like that outside of the kitchen, always thinking that the style looked particularly childish on her, probably because of her huge brown eyes and round face. The ponytail had been Olivia’s suggestion – apparently it never failed. And seeing as the ponytail trick had evidently worked for Olivia, Leah was prepared to take her word for it. She was prepared to try
anything
if it helped her through today’s ordeal.

She gave the rather dour-looking receptionist a friendly smile. “Leah Reid,” she said by way of announcement when the other woman didn’t reciprocate. “My appointment’s at ten o’clock.”

The receptionist gave her such a look of derision that Leah wondered if she had somehow inadvertently announced to the girl that she was the Queen of England. It was one of those ‘if you think I give a hoot about who you are and why you’re here, then you’ve got another think coming’ looks – the ones that were so prevalent when it came to what passed for service these days. Leah immediately regretted being so friendly. ‘Smile and the world smiles with you,’ her mother used to say, in the hope of instilling manners into her children. These days, it was more like ‘Smile and the world thinks you’re a nutter,’ Leah thought, with a self-effacing grin.

From the receptionist’s eventual curt nod towards somewhere behind her, Leah deduced that she should take a seat on one of the plastic chairs lined up along the wall. She sat back, and despite herself began nervously wringing her hands together. Then she stopped herself, realising that at a time like this, greasy, sweating palms were exactly what she didn’t need.

She picked up a magazine and was about to check her horoscope when she realised that that particular issue was almost three months out of date. She turned instead to the problem pages, thinking that troublesome spouses and illicit affairs were always in vogue.

“Ms Reid?” She looked up, startled, to see a small, middle-aged man with a clipboard and more importantly, what seemed like a kindly face, looking questioningly at her. She nodded.

“This way please.” He made towards an office doorway.

Leah stood up, relieved. This guy looked like a bit of a pussy-cat. Maybe things were looking up and maybe just maybe, this mightn’t be such a disaster after all.

But the questions were an absolute nightmare. Leah had quickly scanned
The Rules
the night before but had been unable to concentrate. She was too busy worrying about the main event.

“Great day, isn’t it?” Leah babbled as she followed him inside, habitually falling back on the great Irish conversation starter. Well, it was either that or the Dublin traffic and Leah could hardly start moaning about that with him, could she? Certainly not in the circumstances.

Two minutes in the room and all Leah’s hopes about this guy being a pussy-cat were cruelly dashed. He asked to see her driver’s licence and, when Leah handed it to him, he recoiled as if he’d been burnt.

“Take it out of its sleeve, please, Ms Reid,” he ordered, his expression po-faced as Leah obliged. Uh-oh. It seemed she’d already got off to a bad start.

Nonetheless, she steeled herself and tried to act confident – but not too confident – as he began the questioning. The first question was actually quite simple for her, something about the correct situation in which you should dip your headlights.

“Well I never drive at night,” she answered pleasantly, “so that question doesn’t really apply to me.”

He looked at her. “Can you answer the question please, Ms Reid?”

Leah thought for a second. “Well, when another car is coming towards
you
I suppose, otherwise you’d blind him. Not that it makes any difference, people just tend to blind you anyway, which is exactly why I avoid driving at night.”

He said nothing and went straight on to the next question, this one about the right of way on roundabouts. Leah was pleased – this was one she knew very well. The rules were very simple really.

“When you approach a roundabout, you have automatic right of way.”

He looked at her. “Explain further?”

“Well when you approach a roundabout and you’re not planning to go round it and you just want to go straight through it, then you are automatically free to do so.”

“I see.” By his face, Leah wondered if she had said something wrong. But no, roundabouts were her thing, the one driving situation where she was completely confident she was in the right. The problem was with the other drivers who didn’t know how to use the thing properly and Leah thought wearily, there was always one. She hadn’t the heart to beep her horn at the poor eejits (usually men) who didn’t know what they were doing, but the problem was
they
always beeped at
her
.

Leah sat back in her seat, feeling better already and confident that she had aced that bit at least.

A few minutes later it was time for the main event, and Leah walked out of the building ahead of the tester, leading him to where she had parked the car.

To her utter surprise, he then asked her to walk around the car, ostensibly checking for broken mirrors and lights etc, and refused to entertain Leah’s protests that of course everything worked fine, wasn’t the car only two years old? Then he mortified her by asking her to recite the car’s registration. Why would anyone need to know that Leah thought, when, if she had forgotten where she’d parked it, the car could easily be found by pressing the alarm-button on her keys and following the sound? She knew it was a two-year-old Dublin registration but that was about it. The embarrassment.

Would something that simple mean a fail? she worried, as she moved up a gear and drove towards the main street. She had just about remembered to put up her ‘L’ plates beforehand, Olivia having reminded her that not displaying her learner plates would definitely mean an instant fail. It had taken her close to an hour to find a place that stocked the stupid things, and nearly another one trying to stick them to the blasted windscreen.

Leah cast a quick eye towards the tester in the passenger seat, being careful not to swing her ponytail too much – the more elaborate swings, Olivia warned her, were only for checking her rear-view and side mirrors. He was marking boxes and, as far as Leah could see, wasn’t watching her driving at all. That’s a bit rude, she thought. Despite herself she began to get annoyed. All these months she’d been dreading taking this test – for the
third
time – and hardly sleeping these last few days thinking about it, and then your man couldn’t even be bothered to test her properly. It was true what they said about them deciding in advance how many they were going to pass or fail, she thought, remembering an article she had read about the nature of the testing process and how it was all down to luck, or the mood of your tester. It had nothing to do with your driving, or your ponytail-swinging or whether or not you knew the blasted reg of your car.

Leah looked up and quickly slammed on the brakes when she realised she had just been about to drive right through a zebra crossing – with of course the obligatory mother and buggy directly in her path. Yikes! She gripped the steering wheel and smiled beatifically at the tester. “Well, I suppose you could consider that great reflexes and reaction time, couldn’t you?” she said, a little unnerved by her own forthrightness. It must be the adrenaline making her giddy, she thought, checking her rear-view mirror before moving off again.

The roads were crazy this afternoon – the traffic was crawling at a snail’s pace and it was as though the entire population of Dublin knew Leah was sitting her test and were out to make things hard for her. Take this person, she thought, spying a woman in one of those huge SUVs coming towards her, probably on her way back from the morning school run, a determined look on her face that suggested she wasn’t going to stop for anyone. As she came closer it became even clearer that this particular woman
wasn’t
going to stop or give way to anyone, Leah included.

She mentally recited the rules of the road. The other driver’s side of the road was obstructed by parked cars and Leah’s was clear. Which meant Leah had the right of way, didn’t it? It meant that she was perfectly entitled to keep going, and the other driver had to stay out of
her
way didn’t it? Right, so she would keep going and Missus would just have to wait until she passed and the road was clear.

So Leah did keep going and … oh blast her, Missus kept going too. They were getting closer and closer, each eyeing the other, neither willing to give an inch, until finally, in sheer desperation, Leah edged up on the kerb and onto the path. Of course Missus drove past with a face on her that would sink the
Titantic
and not a wave, a nod of thanks, nothing! Leah steered to her right and the Fiesta’s two wheels toppled none-too-gently back onto the road again.

Leah’s heart pounded. Blast it, blast it, blast it … would your man see that as initiative or would it be an instant fail? She wasn’t sure. No no, nobody was supposed to drive on the path, surely? There was nothing in the rulebook, mind you, but … Leah groaned inwardly, just wishing she could open the door and tell the bloody tester to sod off for himself. This was
not
going well. First she’d been a bit vague on the questions for the oral exam, then she couldn’t remember the Fiesta’s registration, not to mention the close call with the zebra crossing and now this! Was there anything else could go wrong at this stage? Anything at all? Well she might as well keep going and hope for the best.

But, no sooner had Leah made her brave decision to proceed, than one of the ‘L’ plates she had so painfully positioned on her windscreen earlier came unstuck from the glass and fell neatly into her lap. Well, she’d definitely failed it now, hadn’t she?