“I hope you’re hungry,” her dad said, bringing his signature beef stroganoff to the table. “I made too much as usual.”
“I’m starving,” Seren announced as he dished her up a healthy portion.
They ate in silence for a few minutes before her dad spoke again.
“I don’t suppose you going away this weekend has anything to do with your wayward cousin’s imminent arrival?”
Seren laughed and almost choked on her dinner. “Dad! He’s your nephew … maybe you should be more complimentary about him.”
“He might be my nephew, but the lad’s an idiot. He gets that from his mother’s side, I guess.”
“Cadan’s all right,” Naomi said. “You’re too hard on him.”
“Because there’s always trouble when he’s around, and he usually manages to get Seren involved in it.”
While Seren had to agree that her cousin could be a bit of an idiot, she also had a soft spot for him. He wasn’t a bad guy but had grown up with separated parents, neither of whom were good at setting boundaries. As a kid, he’d spent term time living with his mum in Bournemouth and school holidays with Charlie on St Mary’s. Seren had always enjoyed his visits – his rebellious streak had livened up many a dull school holiday.
“Creditmewith getting myself into trouble,” she said to her dad. “I didn’t need leading astray.”
“Funny how I never got calls from the police station on the nights you were out with Noah … only ever when Cadan was around.”
Seren exchanged an amused look with Naomi. “You make me sound like a teenage delinquent! You never even got a call from the police station – the friendly officer just escorted me home to make sure I got back safely.”
A guffaw erupted from her dad. “So nothing to do with you shooting fireworks into trees?”
“We weren’t firing them into trees.” She smiled at the memory. “That was Cadan’s bad aim. We were just having a bit of fun.”
“What about the time Cadan got you involved in drugs?”
She shook her head, amused. “I hardly think smoking a bit of pot at sixteen is the crime of the century.”
“I actually think you had it easy with Seren,” Naomi put in. “From the stories I’ve heard, her teenage years were pretty tame.”
“It wasn’t you who was staying up worrying every weekend.”
“You survived, Dad! And to answer your original question –no, I’m not avoiding Cadan. He reckons he’s staying for the whole summer, so I’ll have plenty of time to get stoned with him and burn down trees.” She smiled mischievously, but only Naomi seemed to find the joke funny.
“A whole summer of him?” her dad grumbled. “That’s all we need.”
“He’s not a teenager any more,” Seren said, feeling a rush of defensiveness for Cadan. “He’s twenty-eight and he outgrew his rebellious streak a long time ago.”
“Maybe so,” her dad conceded. “I reckon he retained his idiotic streak, though.”
Even with the stern set of his features, it was hard to take her dad seriously. Seren and Naomi laughed in unison before changing the subject to Naomi’s job at the flower farm.
The evening passed amiably. When Seren arrived back at her one-bedroom flat above a quaint little craft shop at the edge of Hugh Town, she vaguely contemplated packing for the weekend before deciding to leave the job until the morning. Instead, she flopped in front of the TV, flicking through the Netflix menu without finding anything that caught her interest.
Taking herself off to bed for an early night turned out to be an almighty waste of time. Her brain wouldn’t switch off, and the thoughts of Kit that swirled in her mind were entirely inappropriate.
Somehow, she was going to need to put her feelings aside for the weekend in London.
She just wasn’t sure how.
CHAPTERSIX
The noise of the plane’s engines made it difficult for Seren and Kit to chat. At least, it made it difficult to chat without having their heads practically pressed together, which wasn’t helping Seren in her mission to only see Kit as a friend. The smell of his aftershave and the feel of his shoulder pressed against hers was playing havoc with her hormones. Discreetly, she leaned away from him, peering down at the rugged Cornish coastline and taking slow breaths to settle her heart into a steadier rhythm.
Kit nudged her leg to get her attention again and she turned back to him.