In her dreams she and her dream lover were always in this bed, although in her dreams…Guiltily Annie reminded herself that she was going to be late picking up her friends if she didn’t make a move.
Her face slightly more pink than it had been, she headed downstairs.
‘Goodness, this place looks busy this evening,’ Helena commented as Annie carefully reversed her car into the single parking space left in the restaurant’s car park.
‘Yes, they did say when I originally booked the table that they were expecting a busy evening. Apparently Petrofiche are having a dinner for their new consultant marine biologist.’
‘Oh, yes, I heard they’d found someone to take Professor Salter’s place. They’ve headhunted him from one of the Gulf States, or so I’ve heard. He’s extremely highly qualified and relatively young—in his thirties. It seems he’s actually worked for Petrofiche in the past.’
‘Mmm…It’s odd to think of a marine biologist working for the petrochemical industry,’ Bob cut in.
Helena gave him a wifely smile and then exchanged a conspiratorial look with Annie as she teased him,
‘I suppose you think of marine biologists as people who make underwater films of sharks and coral reefs…’
‘No, of course I don’t,’ Bob denied, but his sheepish look gave him away.
‘These days all the large multi-nationals are keen to ensure that their customers see them as greener than green and very environmentally aware,’ Annie told them both. ‘And because of the effect any kind of oil seepage has on the world’s seas and oceans, and their life forms, for companies like Petrofiche it makes good sense to use the services of such experts.’
They were out of the car now and heading towards the restaurant. Originally a private house, it had been very successfully converted to an exclusive restaurant, complete with a conservatory area and a stunningly beautiful garden which ran down to the river. As they walked past the wrought-iron gates that led to the private garden they could see inside it, where skilful lighting illuminated several of the specimen trees as well as the courtyard area and its decorative statues.
The restaurant was owned and run by a husband and wife team in their late thirties, and as she recognised them Liz Rainford gave them a warm, welcoming smile.
‘I’ve kept you your favourite table,’ she whispered to them as she signalled to a waiter to take them through to the dining room.
Liz was on the committee of a local charity that Annie helped out, by volunteering for fund raising duties when she could, and Liz was aware of the history of Annie’s accident and her relationship with Helena and Bob.
‘I know tonight’s a special night for all of you.’ She smiled.
Their favourite table was one that was tucked quite discreetly in a corner by one of the windows, through which one could see down the length of the garden and beyond it to the river, and as their waiter settled them in their chairs and produced their menus with a theatrical flourish Annie gave a small sigh of pleasure.
Sometimes she felt almost as though she had been reborn on that morning five years ago when she had opened her eyes in her hospital bed to see Helena looking back at her. Although now she could remember her childhood and her teenage years, they were somehow in soft focus and slightly unreal, their edges blurred, so that occasionally it was hard for her to remember that those years, those memories, actually did belong to her.
It was the effect of the huge trauma her mind and body had experienced, Helena was quick to say, to comfort her when she worried about it; her mind’s way of protecting her.
The restaurant was full, with the doors to the conservatory closed to protect the privacy of the party from Petrofiche dining inside it. The girls in the office had been talking about the new consultant when Annie had been at work earlier in the week.
‘He’s got his own business and Petrofiche is just one of his clients,’ Beverley Smith, one of the senior personal assistants, had told them importantly. ‘He’ll only be coming in here a couple of days a week when he isn’t out in the field.’
‘Mmm…I wonder if he needs a PA. I certainly wouldn’t mind a couple of trips to the Barrier Reef,’ one of the other girls had remarked enviously.
‘The Barrier Reef!’ another had scoffed. ‘More like Alaska. That’s the current hot-spot for marine biologists.’
Annie had listened to their good-natured bantering with a small smile.
Although she was regularly invited out on dates by male members of the staff she never accepted. Helena had warned her gently that she was in danger of allowing her dream lover to blind her to the reality of real live potential mates, but Annie was quietly aware that there was more to her reluctance to accept dates than merely a romantic figment of her own idealistic dreams.
It was almost as though, in some way, something deep within her told her that it would be wrong for her to start seeing someone. Quite why she should think this she was at a loss to know, and, indeed, her feelings were so nebulous, so inexplicable, that she felt too foolish to even confide them to Helena. All she did know was that for some reason it was necessary for her to wait…but to wait for what? For whom? She had no idea. She just knew it was something she had to do!
CHAPTER TWO
‘OH, WE didn’t order champagne,’ Annie began as the waiter suddenly appeared with a bottle and three glasses, and then stopped as she saw the look of smiling complicity Helena and Bob were exchanging.
‘This was supposed to be my treat,’ she reproached them as the waiter filled their champagne flutes.
‘Yes, I know, but it is our celebration,’ Bob reminded her fondly.
Annie agreed quietly, her eyes large and dark with the emotional intensity of her thoughts, tears just beginning to film them as she turned to Helena and told her huskily, ‘If it hadn’t been for you…’ She stopped, unable to go on, and the three of them sat in silence as they each shared the others’ emotions.
It was Bob who broke the emotional intensity of the moment, picking up his glass and lifting it, announcing in a firm voice, ‘To you, Annie…’
‘Yes, my love. To you,’ Helena joined in the toast.
As she looked at Annie’s flushed face Helena marvelled at the recuperative powers of the human body and its capacity for endurance. Looking at Annie, it was hard to equate the healthy young woman she was now with the comatose, badly injured accident victim she had seen lying inert on the hospital trolley as she’d hurried through the Accident and Emergency unit.
Later, whilst they were waiting for their pudding course, Annie excused herself to the other two.
‘I’m just going to the loo,’ she announced, getting up and walking towards the cloakrooms in the foyer. She was just about to walk past the entrance to the conservatory when the door opened and a party of four men came out. Two of them Annie recognised as executives from the company she worked for, the third she didn’t know, and the fourth…
Her heart gave a stunned leap inside her chest wall, shock rooting her to the floor where she stood as she stared open-mouthed at the fourth member of the quartet in total disbelief.
It was him! He…The man…From her dreams…So exactly identical to him that she could only stand and stare in silent shock. Her dream lover come to life! But how could that be possible when he was only a figment of her own imagination, a creature she had conjured up within her own mind? No, it wasn’t possible. She must be imagining it…hallucinating…She had drunk too much champagne she decided dizzily.
Quickly she closed her eyes and counted to ten, and then she opened them. He was still there, and what was more he was looking at her. She felt as though her blood was quite literally draining from her veins, leaving her empty, her body cold and in danger. Panic filled her. She tried to move and couldn’t. She tried to speak but no sound emerged from her paralysed throat…A hideous, horrible sensation of fear invaded her. She wanted to move. She wanted to speak. But she couldn’t. With horrible certainty Annie knew that she was going to fain
t.
When she came round she was in Liz’s private quarters and Bob and Helena were hovering anxiously over her.
‘Darling, what is it…what happened?’ Helena was asking her worriedly as she chafed her hand. Helen’s fingers were on her pulse, Annie recognised shakily, and she could see the professional beginning to take over from the concerned friend. Determinedly she forced herself to sit up.
‘I’m all right,’ she insisted. ‘I just felt faint, that’s all,’ she whispered, still too much in shock to be able to tell Helena what had actually happened.