Forget Me Knot Read Online Free PDF

pulse sped up and she started to feel sick. Abby didn’t ride in elevators. The last time she had been in one was the summer of 1984.
    She had been on holiday in Corfu with her parents. One evening, while Hugh and Jean were having a drink in the bar, Abby and another English girl who was staying at the hotel decided to play in the elevator.
    They rode it up and down for twenty minutes or more. Then, without warning, the elevator stopped between floors and the light went out, leaving the two nine-year-olds in complete darkness. Terrified, they screamed for help, but it was several minutes before anybody heard them and an hour on top of that before the elevator engineer managed to get the thing moving again.
    From that day on, the fear of being trapped in an elevator had never left Abby. When she told people that she would rather take the stairs to their office on the tenth floor because it was good exercise, they looked at her as if she had a screw loose.
    There were stairs at Covent Garden, of course, but since Abby had waited ages for a train at King’s Cross, she was now running seriously late. Trudging up all those stairs would add at least another ten minutes.
    Her choice was stark. She could give in to her phobia by taking the stairs and thereby suffer the wrath of the fearsome Lady Penelope, or she could close her eyes, hold her breath and do what the rest of the world did and take the elevator.
    There was no choice. Lady P’s wrath was infinitely preferable to the grizzly, suffocating, heart-stopping panic she would experience the second she set foot in the elevator. Her mind was totally and absolutely made up.
    She felt the train slow down and pull into the station. Abby stood up and headed toward the doors. On the other hand, she was desperate to make a good impression on Lady P. If she arrived late, the woman would interpret it as a snub and hold it against her forever. Their relationship would be over before it had begun. It went without saying that Toby would be livid as well and probably wouldn’t speak to her for days.
    As she thought about taking the elevator, beads of sweat began to break through her foundation. She couldn’t do it. She simply couldn’t. Then she tried to convince herself that, unlike the rickety contraption in Corfu, the Covent Garden elevator was large, air-conditioned and modern. On top of that, the journey couldn’t possibly take more than a few seconds. And she would be surrounded by loads of people.
    It didn’t matter. There was still no way she was about to set foot in the elevator.
    The train doors slid back. Abby got out of the car along with two or three other passengers. She stood on the platform and stared at the sign pointing toward the elevator. Her heart started to race. By now the platform was filling with other people who had gotten off the train. She looked for the sign to the staircase but couldn’t see it. The crowd was moving toward the elevator, and she was trapped in the middle. Knees trembling, feeling that she was somehow detached from reality and walking through porridge, she found herself unable to break free. She was aware of her breathing becoming shallow and rapid.
    At one point, she stepped aside to let through a party of boisterous French schoolchildren who had been on her train. The kids charged toward the row of elevators. Almostimmediately, a set of doors opened and they piled in, along with the other passengers who had been waiting. Abby, her eyes firmly shut to block out the terror, tried to squeeze in, as well, but there wasn’t quite enough room. She and another traveler had to get out and wait for the next elevator.
    It arrived straightaway. “After you.” Her young male companion smiled, gesturing toward the entrance.
    Abby hesitated. The impulse to run for the stairs— wherever they might be—was overwhelming.
    “Thank you,” she said, returning his smile. She stepped into the elevator and waited for the doors to close.

THE HEAVY STEEL