Her name is Lexie Smith.
I’ll be honest, I was kind of expecting something more exciting. Something like Lexie Aurorabelle van de Maur. Or at least a more interesting surname than Smith.
Men don’t leave their fiancées for women named Smith, do they?
Maybe there really is an explanation for all this. Something where Drew isn’t the bad guy and we still get our happy ending wedding day at an upmarket London hotel.
But it would have to be something bloody good to explain why he hasn’t bothered to call me, or even respond to the hundreds of calls and messages I’ve left him.
And then there’s the matter of Lexie’s villa here in Barcelona.
Amy’s plan to get information out of Joaquin actually worked and she somehow found out that Lexie Smith is a well-known woman in the area who owns a posh villa and has lived in Spain for years.
The only thing that convinced me she’s the right person is when Joaquin mentioned her new boyfriend. Apparently his name’s Drew and he’s a floppy-haired English man who still wears a suit in the blistering heat.
Amy managed to keep her cool, casual demeanour all the way through phase two and pretend like she was interested in buying a holiday villa so that she could extract the specifics from him.
This is why Amy, Lou and I are standing outside the most amazing house I have ever seen.
Well, it’s not a house. It’s perfection in a sloping-white-walls-and-private-pool package.
I can’t believe that anybody lives here, never mind her. The woman who stole my fiancé.
“Joaquin said that she owns this place?” I ask in awe.
Amy shrugs. “Yeah, she’s from a rich family or something.”
“So how does Drew know her?” Lou frowns as we reach the curved brick wall running around the outside of the villa.
I run my hand along the brickwork. “I haven’t got a clue. Sharon doesn’t know who she is and Felicity’s never heard of her.”
Amy fiddles with a tall iron gate, with no luck. “Does he work away a lot?”
“Not really. Obviously he goes off to conferences at hotels and stuff in London.” I freeze, my hand covering my mouth. “Oh my God. That’s how he knows her, isn’t it? She’s probably one of the boring rich businesswomen he told me about.”
Amy gawps at me. “He told you about her?”
“Not her specifically,” I clarify. “But her type. Women who work in the leisure industry and own exotic villas are the typical guests at the hotel conferences he goes to.”
“That bastard!” Amy pumps one fist in the air.
“What do we do now?” Lou peers through the gaps in the iron bars. “I think there’s an intercom system. We could buzz in and say—”
“Say what?” Amy challenges. “We can hardly say ‘Hi, this is Drew’s fiancée come to steal him back in time for the wedding’”
“Well, no, something more intelligent than that.” Lou sighs and looks at me. “What do you think, Kirst?”
“Do you think anybody’s in there?” I nod towards the extended grounds behind the wall in front of us.
“Hard to tell.” Amy cranes her neck above the wall.
“They’ve got to come back at some point though, haven’t they?” Lou says.
“And if they’re in, surely they’ll need to come out,” I agree.
“So what do we do?” Amy leans against the wall. “Just wait for that to happen?”
I shrug. “Got any better ideas?”
“This isn’t too high.” She pats the bricks. “I could climb over?”
“And do what?” Lou snorts. “Get arrested when you set the fancy burglar alarm off?”
“I’m prepared to go through that for my best friend.” Amy winks at me.
“Crazy,” Lou mutters.
I close my eyes. “Let’s just stay here.”
“All day?” Amy stares at me.
“If it takes that long.”
“But what about shopping and going to the beach?” Amy pouts. “What about cocktails?”
This is my problem, isn’t it? I’m the one who dragged Amy and Lou here. And neither of them have got a fiancé who’s run away to Barcelona with some villa-owning businesswoman named Lexie Smith.
I can’t stop them from having fun. It wouldn’t be fair.
“You two go.” I wave my hands at them. “I’ll stay here.”
“You can’t stay by yourself,” Lou insists. “I’ll stay with you, and Amy can go to the beach if that’s what she wants to do.”
“Oh, because you don’t?” Amy laughs. “How about we take it in turns?”
“Like shifts?” Well, that sounds like a reasonable idea.
“Okay, why don’t I take first shift?” Lou suggests.
I shake my head. “I’ll do it.”
“But what if they don’t come back? Or what if they’re in there and they never come out because they’ve got their love nest all set up and—” Amy stops talking as soon as she catches my eye, realising what she’s said. “Sorry,” she mumbles.
I look across at the villa again, the gates locked and the grounds empty. “How long do shifts last?”
Amy shrugs and glances at Lou. “How long were you planning on waiting here?”
I grip my water bottle. “As long as it takes.”
“Then I suppose we divide the rest of the day into three blocks and take one each.” Lou looks at her watch. “If we say the stakeout ends when it gets dark, we’ve got about six hours.”
“I’ll take the first two hours.” Amy leans back against the wall. “If it stops you two arguing about it.”
I stare at her. “Are you sure?”
“Go enjoy yourself.”
I wish I could.
*
It’s just after three in the afternoon when I approach the villa again, ready to start my shift. With no news from Amy, I assume there’ve been no sightings of Drew.
Unless she’s captured him and left him handcuffed to a palm tree somewhere, wearing only the expensive watch I bought him for Christmas.
Oh no, why did I leave Amy here alone? And why did I think waiting at a villa that might belong to the woman who’s run away with my fiancé was a good idea?
I don’t know this woman. None of us do. And she doesn’t know us.
So what’s the first thing she’s going to do if she sees a stranger hanging around outside?
I pick up my pace, practically running towards the gate. Still locked. And no sign of Amy.
Oh God, what if she’s been arrested? What do I do?
Amy could be locked away in some foreign prison cell while Louise works on her tan and I can’t do anything but panic.
I peer through the gap in the metal gate, watching the pool glistening in the late afternoon sun. The villa itself still appears dark. They could have been and gone by now.
I grab my phone and pull up Amy’s number, bringing it to my ear.
Please say there’s a good explanation for her absence. One that doesn’t involve police or handcuffs or anything worse.
“Kirsty?” Amy answers on the fourth ring.
I let out a breath. “Amy! Where the hell are you?”
“I’m…erm…” Music plays in the background over voices and laughter and clinking glasses.
“Are you in a bar?”
“No. Well, yes. But it’s not like that. I was following someone.”
“You were following someone?” I pace the street outside the villa. “Who?”
“I saw a man come out of the villa.”
“What man? Drew?”
“No, it was somebody else. I don’t know who he is.”
“But he came out of the villa?”
“Yeah.”
I sigh. “Where are you?”
Ten minutes later, I cross over the road to the bar Amy directed me to. She’s sitting at a high table outside, her feet in flip-flops resting against an empty stool.
“So.” I reach the table. “What exactly is going on?”
“Some guy.” Amy shrugs. “I saw him leave the villa so I followed him here.”
“And is he here?” I lift my head, trying to look through the tall windows behind her. “Have you seen him?”
“Well, not exactly.” She stares down at the table.
I follow her gaze, noticing two beer bottles in front of her.
“Not exactly.” I frown. “So who were you drinking with?”
She looks up at me. “What?”
“Don’t tell me you’ve drunk two of those while you’ve been here.” I nod at the bottles.
“Oh. That…that’s not mine.” Amy pushes them both away and slides off the stool. “Must have been here when I sat down.”
I narrow my eyes at her, trying to figure out what’s going on.
“We should go back to the villa.” She grabs my arm. “Maybe whoever it was will come back.”
I shake my head. “Whoever it was, it wasn’t Drew. Or Lexie.”
“So what should we do?”
“Let’s just go back to the hotel.”
Amy nods and steers me across the road as a man with tanned skin and bright blue eyes emerges from the bar and watches us leave.
“Who’s that?” I take in his toned arms and cropped brown hair.
“No idea.” Amy barely turns her head.
I keep his gaze until we turn the corner, quickly putting the hot stranger out of my mind.
I’ve got more important things to think about like a new plan to find Drew.