Ondine (19 page)

Ooompfh. She turned and walked straight into Cybelle, whose arms were filled with dirty plates.

Arms filled no longer.

The load crashed to the floor with a clang of cutlery and a smash of breaking plates.

‘I'm so sorry.' Ondine scraped up the mess with her hands and threw the pieces in the bin. ‘I didn't see you.'

Through clenched teeth, Cybelle said, ‘You did it deliberately.'

With her usual, uncanny sense of good timing, Ma appeared. Their mother knelt down with a dustpan
and brush to sweep up. ‘Happens to the best of us. Ondi, get back out front of house and take table seven's order. Belle, everything's OK.'

Straightening herself out, Ondine stood at the kitchen door and drew a steadying breath before she faced the public. Just as she took her first step, she felt a hard push in her back and she sprawled forwards, arms whirling. For a horrible sickening moment she thought she'd land face-down on the carpet. At the last nanosecond her feet came forward. With a wobble she righted herself, and ran a nervous hand through her hair. The push in the back had to be Cybelle's doing, but having an argument in full view of the public would only prove that restaurant reviewer correct.

Pasting on a smile, even though she wished for the ground to swallow her whole (something she knew would never happen, but that didn't mean she stopped wishing it), Ondine headed to table seven.

‘Did you enjoy your trip?' Lord Vincent asked. His face split with a smile.

Omistars he's here. He's here and Ma sent me out deliberately to his table when she could have sent Belle.

‘Er, yeah, just tripped on the new carpet.'

Again she waited for the furious blushing. Again it didn't come. Did that mean she was getting better at handling boys? Confidence returning, Ondine stood poised with pencil and paper. ‘Are you ready to place your orders?' she asked.

Lord Vincent gave her a devastatingly gorgeous smile that made her insides go flippy-floppy. To keep on the task at hand, she turned to the rest of the people in his group. She had to do something to stop naughty thoughts invading her senses. If Lord Vincent tried that inside-wrist-kiss again she'd melt into a puddle.

Only the night before, she'd seen the true Hamish and decided he was far more handsome – and attainable – than Lord Vincent. But that was because she never thought she'd see Vincent again. Now Vincent was here and Hamish was a ferret once more, and she couldn't help losing her head a little bit.

She mentally told herself off for being so inconsistent with her affections.

Lord Vincent said, ‘Thank you Ondine,' after she took their orders – top-range stuff too, none of this
we're-only-students-we'll-order-the-cheapest-thing-on-the-menu-and-then-share-a-dessert stinginess. With Vincent's smile fixed in her mind, Ondine's feet barely touched the floor on the way back to the kitchen, although she kept a keen eye out for Cybelle to avoid another collision.

‘How is table seven?' Ma asked as she walked past, her arms full of plates of delicious, steaming food.

‘Dreamy,' Ondine murmured, then gave a mental shake of her head as she heard her mother chuckle.

For the rest of the night, Ondine kept her distance from Cybelle and had only necessary conversation with Chef and the odd sly smile from her mother. Lord Vincent, on the other hand, seemed keen to talk every time she delivered food or took their plates away or refilled their carafe of water. His friends had excellent manners, Ondine noted – knife and fork placed together in the centre of the plate when they were finished, instead of a scrunched-up napkin.
⁶³

‘That was delicious,' Vincent said, locking eyes with Ondine and making her heart skip a beat.

Delicious indeed. ‘I'll pass your compliments on to the chef.'

‘Is the beer garden open tonight? We might take our coffee out there.' His gorgeous eyes burned into hers. The noise of the restaurant died away, making Ondine feel like the world only existed for the two of them. Her brain felt woozy and sluggish under his attentions, as if she'd been at the cooking sherry. All the while, her pulse beat loudly in her ears.

‘Let me set up a table for you. Give me a couple of minutes and I'll come back and get you.'

‘That sounds promising,' Lord Vincent said with a saucy grin.

This time Ondine did blush, as that familiar bothersome heat seared her skin, but she turned away before he could see how much he'd affected her.

Outside, they still had the fairy lights in the trees from Margi and Thomas's party, so she turned them
on and set to work, flicking the tablecloth into the air and laying it down on to a table. The last time she'd done this, Shambles had raced in and skidded along the top, before turning into a very handsome man who'd delivered Ondine her first real kiss.

And he'd warned her about Vincent.

Jealousy did strange things to people
, Ondine thought.

But she missed Hamish all the same. Yes, he was still around (judging by the copious sausages Chef kept turning over on the stove), but the rules of her grounding meant they shouldn't talk to each other.

But oh, how she missed him. Seriously missed him, which was more than she thought was good for her. What was the point of falling in love with a man if he turned back into a ferret when the moon went down?

Falling in love! Oh no, that's not what she meant to think at all. Not when she thought she might have the attentions of Lord Vincent. Admittedly, he was completely out of her reach socially, but a girl could dream, couldn't she? And he'd asked to be seated outside and was flirting so outrageously with her, he must be interested, surely?

Then why had her thoughts been filled with the delicious Hamish?

Gah! Ondine shook the images from her mind as she straightened out the wrinkles in the tablecloth, all the while chiding herself for such foolishness. If a person looked up ‘confused' in the dictionary, it would say ‘Ondine de Groot'.

‘Beautiful,' Vincent said, strolling outside. There were no clouds tonight and the moon along with the bud lights cast small amounts of magic over the garden.

Ondine kept straightening out the tablecloth, even though it didn't need doing. Anything to keep busy. To keep from falling under Vincent's spell.

‘It is a beautiful garden,' she managed. Something tugged at her, reminding her to keep thinking of Hamish.

‘Not the garden, you.' He closed the distance between them.

How did a girl respond to that? A sensible girl would say, ‘You're very kind. Now I'll bring out the tea and coffee orders for your table of friends,' but by this
point ‘sensible' and Ondine had long parted company.

She giggled.

Like a twit.

Burning heat spread from her neck all the way to her forehead. If only her feet would work, then she'd walk out of here and back into the kitchen. Even with her shove-in-the-back sister, the kitchen was a much safer prospect right now.

No such luck. Vincent took a step closer while Ondine stood mute. Another step, and he was only a metre away. Less now as he took another step.

One more step and they were almost touching. His hand cupped her chin. Tingling heat spread over her skin and down her body, making her pulse hitch in her throat and her mouth turn dry.

Quick, find something to say, or this is going to get way out of hand.

Her brain fled as Vincent's lips slowly closed the distance between them.

She tried to swallow, but her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. Her voice croaked as she blurted out, ‘How come your da wants to close us down?'

Vincent paused a centimetre from his target.

‘Don't talk about my father. I don't want to be thinking of him when I'm with you.' His voice sounded smooth and hypnotic.

When his lips came down on hers, Ondine expected to swoon, but she didn't. Instead her eyes flew open while his cold, wet tongue darted into her mouth in an altogether uncomfortable and completely baffling experience.

There was even a bit of slobber.

Ondine's hands came up and pressed against Vincent's chest, keeping their bodies apart, but only just.

‘Stop fighting it, you know you want it.' His lips continued to make a mess of her face.

‘This isn't going to happen,' Ondine said, surprised at how confident she sounded. A girl of her years should have been revelling in the intimacy, but instead it felt . . . not wrong, because that would mean she felt something. No, this was more of a sad hollowness, a disappointing sequel to their earlier encounter.

How quickly her emotions had changed. She
would have sworn she'd heard birds singing in her head when she'd first laid eyes on Lord Vincent. Now she felt a bit grubby as he continued his Braille conversation.

‘That's enough.' Ondine pushed Vincent backwards, so that their faces were a good few centimetres apart and she could breathe properly without having him pressed so tightly against her.

‘Now you're going shy on me? Take what you can get, honey, I won't offer again.'

Anger bubbled in Ondine's veins. ‘And I won't accept either. I'm going back inside.'

She took a sideways step to get past him, but he blocked her exit, his nostrils flaring. ‘No you don't. Not until I get what I came for.'

Cold, horrible, paralysing fear glued Ondine to the spot.

‘L-leave me alone,' she said, only it came out as a squeak, so she said it again, hoping it would come out stronger. Nope, still a squeak.

‘Where is it?' Vincent said, closing the distance again so they were almost nose to nose, body to body.
Each time Ondine took a breath, her breasts touched his chest.

No more squeaks. All she could do was whisper, ‘Where's what?'

‘Don't play dumb with me. Where's the money?'

‘I d-don't know what you're –'

Slap!
Lord Vincent's hand came down hard across her face. His voice took on a growling demand. ‘Where's the money?'

Her cheek burned, but it didn't hurt as much as her heart, which felt like it could shatter into a million pieces. ‘I'm going to scream,' Ondine whispered, but her squeaky voice made the threat completely pathetic. All the while her pulse hammered in her ears.

‘You have one sister damaging the piano and the other's howling at the moon.
Nobody
will hear you. Now tell me where the money is.'

Trapped. Utterly trapped. In the quiet, between the thudding of her own heart, Ondine could hear loud music from inside the pub. Vincent was right; they wouldn't hear a thunderbolt out here, let alone one sad girl's screams.

Her face stung from his slap, but it was more a pain of disappointment. She thought she'd been a fairly decent judge of character until now.

‘We've spent it,' Ondine confessed.

For a second Lord Vincent's face fell, before a nasty sneer took hold. ‘Nice try. I almost believed you. Tell me where it is.'

‘I've told you we sp–'

His hand flew up, ready to smack her again.

‘It's inabox underthefloorboards inthepub,' Ondine blurted. With a burst of strength she didn't know she had, she pushed him away and made a run for it.

A hard hand gripped her arm, swinging her back so sharply her shoulder felt like it would pop out of the socket.

A growl came from deep within Ondine. ‘Get your hands off me!'

The back door swung open and a murderous scream erupted. ‘Arrrrgggghhh! Hands off what's nawt yers!'

Familiar black fur blurred past Ondine. Relief washed over her at Shambles's timely intervention.

‘What the . . .' Vincent stumbled backwards in shock as something raced up the leg of his trousers. A howl of pain sprang from his throat as he fell down with a thud, hard on his bottom. Then he battered madly at his leg with his hands. ‘Get off!'

‘Leave her alone!' Shambles cried out.

‘I am, I am.' Lord Vincent swatted at the rapidly moving lump under his trousers. He managed to hit himself a few times, which made him wince. Changing tactics, he stood up, crazily shaking his leg to free him of the demon possessing it.

With a battle cry of victory, Shambles rolled away from Vincent's leg. Then he rounded on his victim and gave him a nasty swipe against the ankle. It drew blood.

‘Stitch that, Jimmy!'

‘It talks!' Vincent gasped at the sight of his pint-sized enemy.

‘I don't just talk, pal,' Hamish said, swiping at Vincent's ankle again and making another cut.

Vincent made to stomp on his attacker, but Shambles darted out of the way, then doubled
back and charged up Vincent's leg.

‘A ferret!' Vincent tried to shake him away before he could reach anything sensitive. ‘You set a ferret on to me? Say goodbye to the hotel, I'm going to close this place down!'

With her heart beating a tattoo in her chest, Ondine felt her body trembling all over from fear and indignation.

‘Yer all pish and wind,' Shambles said as he leapt free of Vincent and then made for the safety of Ondine. When he reached her shoulder, he made ready to launch himself at Vincent's stricken face.

‘That's enough, Shambles. I think he's got the message.'

‘You're finished, witch!' Vincent said. ‘I'll have you charged with treason.'

‘Oh really?' Shambles asked. ‘Exactly how'r ye gonna explain what ye were doin' when ye got cut, eh?'

The colour drained from Lord Vincent's face. The shock value was priceless.

Courage stirred in Ondine. ‘Everyone knows Shambles is always with me, and I'm happy to tell
people what you tried to do to me. So go ahead, tell everyone you came off second-best to a ferret.'

They stared at each other for a moment, but it was Vincent who blinked first. ‘Watch your back,' he said and made to leave. The words carried a veiled threat, but his voice cracked in the middle, exposing it as nothing but bluff.