Page 35 of A Billionaire for Christmas

AN IRRATIONAL, UNSTOPPABLE LAW OF ATTRACTION

Molly woke up freezing the following morning.

There was no heating. She threw on several jumpers over jogging bottoms and a thick pair of ski socks and padded through to the lounge area where Levi was already sitting with his laptop on his knees, in front of a roaring fire.

She spotted Freda emerging from the archway at the far side of the room with a padded quilt around her shoulders.

‘Where were you last night?’ Freda asked her brother animatedly, walking over to the sofa in front of the huge fireplace and plonking herself down next to him.

‘You just disappeared after poor Molly got all the blame for the wine, when I’m sure it was Lucca.

You know what he’s like. Anyway, you missed the best dinner I’ve ever tasted.

It was amazing. I don’t know how she did it, but Molly served up the best crispy pork dish I’ve ever eaten.

It literally melted on my tongue. Like a snowflake. ’

Levi continued tapping away on his keyboard.

‘Busy working I presume?’ she said. ‘When’s the electricity going to come back on? My phone is like, completely dead.’

Not looking up, Levi shrugged, his fingers tapping away, his focus on the screen. Annoyance flickered in Molly’s chest. A simple ‘don’t know’ would have sufficed.

Molly heard him complaining about the limited battery life left on his computer and had to stop herself from tutting.

Freda was obviously trying to spend time with him.

Toby was outside trying to fix the generator while Molly prepped for the day ahead.

Without electricity, cooking was going to be difficult.

Valerie had ordered a keto-based breakfast in bed and wanted to discuss the changes to the menu for the day.

Valerie feared there wasn’t enough tomato and cilantro bisque featured and wanted very much to enquire as to why.

Freda came over to her. ‘Need some help?’

Molly didn’t need any help. ‘I’m just cooking breakfast for your parents.’

Freda’s eyes lit up. ‘Could you show me how to make eggs Benedict, please? It’s Rooby’s favourite. He would die if I learned how to make it. It would be incredible. He’d marry me regardless of my bonkers family.’

Yes. Of course it would be the eggs that would attract him.

Not your extreme beauty or your fabulous glossy hair or your billions of pounds , thought Molly begrudgingly.

She shook the terrible thoughts away. The incident with Levi in the pantry the previous evening had left her bereft.

Even worse was getting the blame for opening the expensive wine.

She desperately wanted to explain to Levi properly, hating that he had such a despicable opinion of her.

She had not been able to sleep a wink. Rising early, she had knocked on his door early this morning and had heard him moving around but he had refused to answer.

Then, against her better judgement, she had yelled rather loudly through his door, ‘As soon as you’ve finished sulking, come and find me! ’

Levi seemed to bring out the worst in her. She smiled dutifully at Freda. ‘Of course I’ll show you.’

Molly noticed Levi glancing over while she and Freda got to work.

Freda’s frequent squeals of delight, the hilarious dropping of ingredients for Molly to mop up and the sporadic yelps of pain as Freda repeatedly failed to listen properly were attracting attention.

Freda was finding new and inventive ways to burn herself.

Lucca now approached them. ‘Freda, our lovely parents are arguing again. When you’ve finished self-harming, could you have a word with Mother, please? You know she never listens to me.’

‘She won’t listen to me either. Can’t Levi do something?’

‘He hasn’t a clue about this family. Why would he even care? Look at him, he hasn’t looked up from that damn computer once. I just heard him organising an airlift out of here if the generator isn’t fixed within the hour. He’ll leave us all here to freeze to death. No, it will have to be you.’

Freda stopped sautéing Molly’s asparagus tips to bite a nail, deep in thought.

Molly caught the tips on the verge of burning and took them off the heat just in time.

She considered reminding Freda that timing was everything in the catering business but thought better of it.

Freda seemed as scatterbrained as they come.

Molly also suspected Freda was already a couple of drinks deep.

The Sauvignon in the fridge had gone down considerably over the last hour.

While Freda hopped up to sit on the bench as though she was not right in the middle of cooking, Molly busied herself finishing off the breakfasts for Valerie and Armand and pretended not to listen.

‘Thank goodness you’re getting married. Otherwise, I think they’d be divorced by now,’ Lucca said, leaning on the bench next to her. ‘It’s the obsession with golf and him finding every excuse to be away from her.’

‘I’m not surprised he avoids her because all she talks about is the wedding. Perhaps they just need to spend more time together. Doing something that isn’t golf or wedding related.’

Molly listened to Lucca and Freda come up with a list of ideas, each one rejected because of the lack of Wi-Fi or electricity.

‘How about a candle-lit dinner?’ Molly couldn’t help suggesting.

‘Set them up on a date. Give them a list of safe discussion topics and questions to ask each other. Or even make a game of it. Like a “Mr & Mrs” or something. If they get it right, they get the next course. I could do a tasting menu of ten courses.’

Freda’s face lit up. ‘Some of the questions could be to guess what’s in the food,’ she said. ‘There could be a few tasks in each round. Seriously, I love this.’

‘Molly, you’re a genius!’ Lucca exclaimed, coming round into the kitchen area to grab her and kiss her on the forehead. ‘That’s it. That’s what we’ll do. We’ll invent a degustation game. Tell them it’s their anniversary present so they have to do it.’

As Freda squealed, Molly noticed Levi had stopped tapping at his laptop and was watching the scene.

She stepped quickly away from Lucca, wiping her hands on her apron.

‘Okay. All we need to do is make sure they turn up for dinner and tell everyone else to make an excuse to eat in their rooms tonight.’

‘No problem,’ Freda said. ‘Levi is eating in his room tonight anyway if he’s still here.’ She made a face at him. ‘He has a conference call with Japan or something.’

‘I’ll let Toby know,’ offered Lucca. ‘I can also give you both a hand in the kitchen.’

‘Perfect.’ Molly was pleased to see Lucca and Freda smiling from ear to ear.

‘Okay. Now that that’s sorted, we can plan a menu and table setting when I get back from taking them breakfast.’ She picked up a tray laden with freshly hand-squeezed orange juice, coffee, bowls of chopped fruit, eggs Benedict and a host of mini-French toasts pan-fried with herbs and cheeses, seeing as none of the kitchen appliances worked without electricity.

‘We’ll list all their favourite foods,’ said Freda.

‘Did you know your mother has developed a fear of leafy greens? So nothing with kale, spinach or watercress. Or gluten. Or peas.’

Lucca rolled his eyes.

* * *

As Molly approached Valerie and Armand’s room, she heard loud bickering. She knocked on the door and waited several minutes for Armand to answer it. Although he was forcing a smile, he looked red-faced and frazzled.

‘I just wanted to say again how sorry I am about the mix-up with the wine last night. It really wasn’t me who chose the?—’

‘ Merci beaucoup ,’ Armand said flatly, cutting her off.

He was clearly in no mood to hear her out, just like the previous evening.

He quickly took the tray from her, but as he nudged the door shut with his hip, Molly caught a glimpse of Valerie standing at the far side of the room in her dressing gown, fragile-looking without make-up, face tear-stained, shoulders hunched, arms folded tightly, far from the elegant poise of last night.

They clearly had issues. Molly resolved to make tonight’s dinner the best she’d ever cooked. But without electricity it would be a challenge. And most of the food would go off within days. She went to Toby’s room to find his door open and him pulling on extra jumpers over his salopettes.

‘We really need that generator working,’ he said.

‘The fire and cooker run on gas, but everything else is electric. The fridge, the freezer, the boiler for the central heating, the sauna, the pool, the TV, the phones, all need electricity.’ Toby looked stressed.

‘And that lot are no help. They don’t even know what a generator is, never mind how to fix one. ’

‘I’ll help. What do we need to do?’ Molly offered. ‘I’ll just grab my snowsuit and gloves. Have you got a toolkit? Screwdrivers, monkey wrench, multimeter, that sort of thing?’

‘Molly, that would be amazing but I haven’t got the first clue what you just said.’

‘I’ve got an old generator at the restaurant that keeps blowing. I’m sure we’ll work it out.’

‘You have no idea how happy I am to hear that. The resort maintenance manager reckons the power outage will last several days so we really need that generator up and running as soon as possible. Levi will go ballistic if his laptop runs down. He says he’s calling for a helicopter and leaving.

Then that’s the family holiday ruined. They’ll all leave. ’

Molly did not want Levi to run off without having the chance to explain herself properly.

She needed to reverse his low opinion of her.

And Lucca and Freda seemed so excited to help their parents, it would be a shame if they didn’t get this chance.

Valerie and Armand clearly had bigger issues going on.

Molly raced back to her room to grab warm clothes.