Hallie heard them coming through to the living room. Luke and her mother.
OK, this is mad . . .
‘There you are.’ Her mother wasn’t looking remotely amused. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Nothing, I just—’
‘You lied to me! I can’t believe you did that. Hallie, listen to me, this is serious. Luke’s your doctor, and if you’re having an affair with him, he could get struck off!’
‘Mum, stop it!’ Oh God, talk about mortifying; Hallie could feel herself going bright red. If there was anything worse than being wrongly accused of having an affair with someone, it was being wrongly accused right in front of them.
And if there was anything worse than that, it was having it all happen when you secretly fancied the person rotten and wished more than anything that you could have an affair with him.
‘Fay, there’s nothing going on,’ Luke said evenly. ‘I’m not having any kind of affair with your daughter.’
Fay stared at him. ‘So what’s she doing here, then? Why would she tell me she was going to Paris . . . why would she pretend she was there?’
‘Because I didn’t want to spoil your weekend away,’ Hallie blurted out. ‘Because I knew you’d come home if you found out I hadn’t gone to France. Mum, don’t look at me like that, it’s the truth. We got to the airport but I was feeling too ill to travel and there wasn’t anyone else to stay with me because my friends were all in Paris. So I called Luke and he said I could come here . . . and yes, I could have gone home, but it’s actually been quite nice having a change of scenery.’ She gestured around the cosy firelit living room. ‘But you have to believe me, there’s nothing going on, and the fact that you’re even thinking that is really embarrassing.’
‘Oh.’ Her mother’s fury abruptly subsided. ‘You promise that’s true?’
Together Hallie and Luke chorused, ‘Yes.’
Fay bit her lip. ‘OK. Well I’d better tell you now, I’m not the only one thinking it.’
‘What?’ Hallie sat up.
‘Don’t look at me like that. It’s your fault for sending me those photos.’
‘Why? What did you do?’
‘Well, Marilyn called me this morning for a chat and I told her we were having a lovely time in Edinburgh but I was a bit worried that the hotel people in Paris were ripping you off, dumping you in a room that wasn’t as nice as the others. So Marilyn asked to see the photos and I showed them to her. And the moment she saw them, she said that was no Paris hotel room you were in, it was Luke Hilton’s cottage.’
Oh God, of all the people her mother could have shown the photos to, she’d had to choose Marilyn, who had lived here in this very cottage before Luke had come to Carranford. How typical. And Marilyn, who now lived above the pub since taking over the running of it, was a brilliant person, but she did love to gossip.
Hallie said firmly, ‘You’re going to have to tell her the truth and ask her not to spread rumours. You know what people are like around here. It wouldn’t be fair on Luke.’
‘Right. I’ll do that.’ Fay nodded, apparently less than reassured. ‘OK, the thing is, when I say I showed Marilyn the photos . . . well, I kind of put them on Facebook.’
Hallie briefly closed her eyes. ‘Seriously? You told me you didn’t know how to put photos on Facebook!’
‘I know, I didn’t, but Marilyn showed me how to do it last week. It’s really easy. I had no idea!’
‘So everyone saw them,’ said Hallie.
‘Well, yes. That’s how we knew you were in Luke’s bed. Lynette recognised the pillows and that duvet cover straight away.’
‘I don’t believe this.’ Hallie winced and turned to stare at Luke. ‘How does she know what your bedding looks like?’
Because not being judgemental, but curly-permed Lynette was in her fifties and Hallie really wouldn’t have had her down as Luke’s type.
‘Lynette does all my laundry.’ Luke sighed. ‘Washing and ironing, once a week.’
‘When she isn’t busy on Facebook,’ said Hallie. Honestly, what were people like her mum and Lynette even doing on social networking sites? Didn’t they know they were too old to be meddling with such things?
‘Well I didn’t know, did I?’ Fay was defensive. ‘I thought you were in Paris!’
‘You’ll have to delete the photos,’ said Hallie.
‘OK, I’ll do that.’
From the look on her face it wasn’t hard to guess what was going through her mother’s mind.