A Winter Flame Read Free Page A

chance of a lifetime. It is the greatest challenge of your career. Can you tell
the court that you could honestly turn your back on that magic word “challenge”, Miss D?’
    That damned barrister knew that the word ‘challenge’ was like a red rag to a bull to Eve. That barrister sounded a lot like Aunt Evelyn as well. He was even accompanied by a scent of
yellow French Fancies.
    Eve abandoned her goose-down quilt, slid her feet into her slippers and headed for the kettle to make some strong coffee. She knew there was no way she would get a wink of sleep until she had
taken those files apart and read every word. So she did. Then she checked out the competition on the internet. Then she made a note to ring her friend in the morning and borrow her secret weapon
– Phoebe May Tinker.
    ‘I didn’t get you up, did I?’ asked Eve, with the hint of a yawn. After all, she’d only had four hours’ sleep.
    ‘Are you joking?’ returned a jolly voice. ‘I’m up sorting out her ladyship’s Crunchy Nut Cornflakes. You’re ringing early. Are you okay?’
    ‘Sort of,’ said Eve.
    ‘You don’t sound so sure.’
    ‘Alison. Aunt Evelyn left me her locket.’ Eve thought she’d build up to this one slowly. Alison was six months pregnant and she didn’t want to shock her too much.
    ‘Aw, bless.’
    ‘And a theme park.’
    Alison laughed. ‘Alton Towers or Pleasure Island?’
    ‘Neither – Winterworld. And I’m not kidding.’
    Now there was a shocked silence on the other end of the phone.
    ‘Winterworld is a one-hundred-and-fifty-acre plot just outside Higher Hoppleton. Aunt Evelyn bought the land in the sixties as an investment and then last year went mad and starting
building log cabins on it, apparently.’
    ‘Dear God, you aren’t joking,’ said Alison, half laughing, half breathless with amazement.
    ‘Nope. That is as much as I know for now. I’ll fill you in with more when I’ve got my brain around it all. Anyway, why I’m ringing you is because I want to borrow Phoebe
to come with me to Birmingham on Saturday. There’s a place called “White Christmas” that I want to check out. I thought she could help me spy.’
    ‘I’m sure she’d be delighted,’ said Alison.
    ‘Wonderful. I’ll pick her up at nine.’
    ‘She’ll be ready,’ said Alison. ‘Blimey, Eve. You really do know how to start my day off with a bang. I’ll have to ring Rupert and tell him. It’s not every
day your oldest friend has news like that.’
    Eve put down the phone and wished her life was more like Alison’s. A smooth ride instead of a roller coaster of white-knuckle dips and rises. Especially as there had been more dips in the
past five years than she cared to think about.

Chapter 3
    ‘Auntie Eve, why is that elf smoking?’ Phoebe pulled down on her honorary aunt’s sleeve as she asked the question at 43,000 decibels. The said elf gave the
small red-haired child a resentful sideways sneer that would have put Elvis to shame, before placing the cigarette to her lips once last time, then dropping it on the floor and twisting the ball of
her foot on it. Eve was itching to respond to the seven-year-old with the same volume.
    ‘I don’t know, sweetheart. I think Santa should kick that elf’s backside because she’s not exactly doing a great PR job for him.’ But the elf looked very big, very
butch and that short cropped hairdo said ‘New Hall prison’ more than ‘North Pole’.
    ‘Santa will be back in a minute,’ said the elf grumpily when the little boy at the front of the queue asked where he was. Eve half expected the elf to go on to explain that he had
gone for a piss. She wouldn’t be surprised at anything after what she had seen so far. It was all so fantastically, brilliantly awful and super-tacky.
    ‘Let’s go for a look around and come back later,’ said Eve, taking Phoebe’s hand. ‘And let Father Christmas get on with his jacking up,’ she added under her
breath.
    The ‘White