Under an Amber Sky: A Gripping Emotional Page Turner You Won’t Be Able to Put Down. Rose Alexander

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СКАЧАТЬ and also true that he did have a higher voltage power drill than me. She didn’t go because of that, though.’

      Frank dangled the hammer from his hand as he began to examine his handiwork closely. He didn’t seem inclined to elaborate on the leaving-wife saga and Sophie didn’t ask. That was another thing she had got out of the habit of over the last few weeks and months – being interested in others, wanting to find out about them.

      Before, she had always been curious, especially about people and their families. Relationships fascinated her and she was almost alone among teachers in enjoying parents’ evenings, relishing the opportunity to see the students with their mums and dads, or occasionally their grandparents or older siblings, which often proved so revealing.

      ‘I think you need a new lock.’ Frank had been absorbed in his inspection of the door but now he peered inside, up the ramshackle stairs to the bare, wide hallway above and the rickety door that led to the garden. His eyes wandered back down to the paint pots piled up in the centre of the floor, alone in the emptiness. ‘Not that there’s much to lock up.’

      ‘I’ve only just moved in,’ retorted Sophie, defensively. ‘It’s – well, it needs a bit of work.’

      ‘You’re not wrong there, gel.’ Frank stepped further inside and Sophie moved aside to make way for him before she realized that she hadn’t invited him in. He looked around, appraisingly, running his hand over the exposed stone walls. He took a pair of glasses out of his pocket to investigate the roof beams, then, appearing satisfied with what he’d seen of the ground floor, moved towards the stairs.

      ‘What are you doing?’

      ‘I need to have a good look around if I’m to help you sort this mess out.’

      ‘I haven’t asked you to sort it out.’ All Sophie’s earlier goodwill deserted her and she felt rage flare up inside. ‘I don’t know if I want you to. Hell, I don’t even know you.’

      Frank paused, slowly looking back over his shoulder in her direction. ‘Name’s Frank Savill, Savill’s General Builders and Roofers. No job too big or too small. I think you’ll find you need me.’

      ‘I don’t want help.’ Sophie’s tone was obdurate and reinforced by her body language, arms folded across her chest, feet wide apart, grounded. ‘I can look after myself – and the house – perfectly well.’

      The expression on Frank’s face said everything about what he thought of that response. Sophie glanced down at herself, at her filthy torn jeans and tatty sweatshirt, and then at her house, taking in its air of neglect, the rotting stairs in the corner. She thought for a wild moment of making up an ‘old man’ who was about to come home and would not be best pleased to find a stranger there, but then thought better of it. Such a lie would only be found out and it was a bit primeval, really, to think she had to invent a husband when she already had a perfectly good one, if only he weren’t dead.

      ‘Well, maybe I could do with another pair of hands, just for a bit,’ she reluctantly conceded, at the same time as a wave of nausea struck her.

      This strange man, this uninvited visitor, had made her think of Matt in a joking way. She could not believe she could be so callous, so uncaring. As she followed Frank around the house she became more and more appalled at her betrayal of Matt’s memory.

      Back downstairs, Frank took a seat on the stone between the two front doors that Anna had dubbed the coffee stone, and produced from his bag two bottles of beer. Sophie, unable to articulate or even properly understand her distress, sank down beside him and wordlessly accepted the bottle he proffered towards her.

      ‘I’ve actually got a local builder coming round to see me tomorrow.’ It was not strictly true – all she’d done was ask Darko if he could recommend someone – but she couldn’t, at that moment, think of any other way to put Frank off, to get rid of him. ‘I know you mean well but I don’t know how it would work, to have more than one person on the job.’

      She took a swig of beer.

      ‘Do you speak the language?’

      ‘Well, no.’ Sophie pursed her lips cautiously, her resolve wavering already. ‘But – I’m sure he’ll speak some English and he knows how to restore these old houses. I don’t want anything fancy; I just want it habitable. I can’t afford anything other than that.’

      Frank shrugged and drained his bottle.

      ‘Well, luv, if you think a pretty smile and a heap of charm is enough to get you by, then good for you. But to my mind, you can’t do without me. I’ve been working in Belgrade for a few years, I can make myself understood in the local lingo, plus I can start straight away. You’re going to need new plumbing and electrics; I can see that already. All those rotten beams and floorboards need replacing, not to mention new plasterwork – and I haven’t even had a good look round yet so I should imagine that there’s a lot more of what we like to call hidden nasties lurking, awaiting discovery. All the methods you use have to be earthquake compliant. You get lots of tremors in these parts; I’m not sure if you’re aware of that, not as much as those poor buggers across the sea in Italy but still, enough to have to take notice of …’

      As Frank elaborated on the myriad jobs that must be done, all of which Sophie was only too aware of, she found herself drifting away, to Matt and how she would have handed all this over to him, let him deal with it, left him to strike the bargains and so on. Now Matt wasn’t here and she had to take the lead. You can do it, she whispered internally to herself, incanting the words like a prayer. She had always thought that she couldn’t do it alone, that she didn’t know how. But maybe she could. Maybe she had just never given herself the chance because she’d never had to; but now she had to she would find that she was more than capable of rising to the challenge. She hoped so, anyway.

      She looked at Frank, still opining about all the problems that simply had to be addressed in this ridiculous old pile she had landed herself with. He was right, she couldn’t possibly do the heavy work herself, even if she knew the first thing about how to go about it. There was no other builder waiting in the wings and she had been shrinking from the challenge of finding one. She called to mind one of her mum’s favourite phrases: Never look a gift horse in the mouth. It seemed that Frank was indeed that thing and so she should take advantage of his serendipitous arrival.

      ‘Something funny, luv?’ He snorted sardonically. ‘Not much to smile at that I can see. This is going to cost you an arm and a leg, getting this lot sorted.’

      Sophie resolved to remain strong. ‘It can’t cost an arm and a leg because I haven’t got that much.’ She considered for a moment. ‘I can give you a forearm. Perhaps a calf. No more than that.’

      Frank drained his beer and gave a hearty sigh. ‘You go and get us another beer,’ he instructed. ‘And while you’re at it, I’ll get my notepad out and start making some plans.’

      ‘OK.’ Sophie went back into the house to find her purse. She wobbled slightly on the uneven stones and realized she was a bit tipsy. It was so long since she had drunk alcohol. The sensation was pleasant, like floating, and she wanted more of it.

      At the mini-market, she bought four beers and a couple of bottles of wine. Might as well get some stocks in while she was here, she reasoned. The shop lady, who had chestnut brown hair with an immaculate permanent wave, smiled as she always did and greeted her in Montenegrin. Sophie had already established that she didn’t speak any English, and together with Sophie’s incompetence in the local language that meant that meaningful communication СКАЧАТЬ