Love on the Rocks Read Online Free PDF Page B

job like that? In the cold light of dawn, her resolution melted away, her principles faded, her righteous indignation dissolved and she felt rather sick. She’d completely overreacted.
    She shivered as she imagined the sort of revenge that Tony and Milo might cook up between them. They were both the sort of people you wanted on your side, people who didn’t take kindly to being crossed, and she’d heard tales about them that in the past she’d chosen to ignore. Only now the rumours became amplified in her imagination, and she pictured slashed tyres at best. Or a mysterious house fire. She tried to reassure herself – what had she done, after all? She hadn’t committed a crime. But her performance would have made a fool of Milo, and he in turn would have made Tony suffer for it. She could imagine the two of them talking, planning their revenge . . .
    What should she do? She must have been mad. Not only had she made enemies, she had a mortgage to pay, not to mention the loan on the car she’d taken out. Lisa hadn’t overstretched herself, but she certainly couldn’t afford not to work. It was too early to call Tony and give him a grovelling apology. But even as she toyed with this possibility in her mind, Lisa knew that a situation like yesterday’s had been brewing. Her heart hadn’t been in her work for a long time. She couldn’t backtrack, or they would win. Nevertheless, she felt slightly unsettled at the thought that she might have burned her bridges.
    She slid out from between the sheets as quietly as she could and pulled on her jeans from yesterday. George was out for the count, and she didn’t want to worry him. She knew that this was the time when fears were imagined, and that it might all seem better in the light of day. She crept down the corridor, down the thick carpet of the main stairs. A cuckoo clock informed her that it was ten past seven. Not as early as she thought. What she needed was a cup of tea. She pushed open the door of the dining room and was surprised to find that the heavy brown curtains had already been pulled back. Fingers of early morning light were tentatively filtering through the windows as Lisa threaded her way through the tables to look outside.
    What she saw made her gasp. The view was absolutely breathtaking. She hadn’t realized last night that The Rocks was perched on the edge of a cliff, only separated from a vertiginous drop by twenty yards of sloping lawn. Fifty feet below, giant waves hurled themselves against the eponymous rocks, the force throwing up rivulets of spume like celebratory champagne shooting from a bottle. The sea was grey. No, green. No, surely blue? It moved through the spectrum with the ever-changing light, impossible to pin down. Clouds were scudding furiously across the sky, like a flock of sheep frightened by a wayward dog, and as she watched they parted to reveal a patch of brilliant blue sky. To the east, around a thick finger of land that obviously separated Higher Mariscombe from Lower, she could see the golden sands of the resort, the spectacular surf rushing in with an enthusiasm that belied the time of day, for anyone with any sense must surely still be sleeping. And to the west, a rocky cliff jutted far out into the sea, still shrouded in the last of an early morning mist that was gradually receding.
    Lisa shivered as the cold air insinuated its way through the flimsy fabric of George’s T-shirt. She spotted an electric fan heater. Bending down as surreptitiously as she could, she flicked the switch to full.
    ‘That’s it. You make sure you’re warm enough. I’m used to this bracing sea air, but I expect you’re used to central heating on all night. Mine doesn’t kick in till half seven.’ Webby sailed past, still in her rose-pink dressing gown, bearing a metal teapot. ‘Lovely cup of tea for you.’
    ‘Thank you.’
    ‘You’re up early.’
    ‘I’m terrible. Once I’m awake that’s it. And I wanted to start exploring.’ Lisa