But already, she was starting to doubt her memory of the employee handbooks. She knew she’d memorized them, but she also knew she had a tendency to mess things up at vital moments, and therefore her memories of memorizing were not to be trusted, and—

Oh Christ, the man was talking. “—sunny-side up, and the stewed tomatoes, ta.”

Eve scribbled dutifully and hoped like hell she’d just caught the tail end of a request for a Full English. Because that’s what the poor bastard was getting. “Right. If you’d like to take a seat, I’ll bring it right out.”

“Cheers, my darling,” he said, but he did not take a seat. Why didn’t he take a seat? “This hatch wasn’t open yesterday,” he went on conversationally.

Eve froze in the act of reaching for some eggs. “It wasn’t?” But it was supposed to be open, wasn’t it? Or had she misread, misunderstood, mis—

“Nor the day before, when I arrived. Nice to see what’s going on behind the scenes, though. Say, where’s Jacob this morning?”

Oh dear. This particular question was the one Eve had been dreading. She’d hoped no one would miss the man’s icy presence and she therefore wouldn’t be asked about him, but apparently, no such luck. “Jacob is, erm, indisposed.”

“Indisposed, is it?” The man chuckled. “If it were anyone else, I’d think that was code for a hangover.”

Eve laughed nervously. “Right. But not Jacob!”

“Lord, no, not him. So what’s up with him?”

“Erm . . .”

“I hope he’s not poorly. He’s a lovely lad, he is.”

Eve blinked. “Erm . . .”

“This here’s the only place that guarantees us a ground-floor room every time. My Sharon’s got dicky joints, bless her. Puts us on a special list, he does.”

Eve’s sister Chloe required similar accommodations, so Eve knew some people were horribly unreasonable about that sort of thing. But apparently, not Jacob. Typical. She’d feel much better about her rather shocking sins toward him if he could be a little bit evil. The bastard.

“Barry?” A voice trilled from the dining room doorway, out of sight. The man in the window turned toward it, his smile growing impossibly wider.

“There y’are, Shaz! Sleepyhead. I’ve ordered my breakfast, babe, didn’t know what you wanted.”

A woman appeared in the hatch, as smiley and pink faced as the man. “Hiya, darling,” she beamed at Eve. “I’ll have what he’s having.”

Of course she would. “Right,” Eve stammered. “Which, er, which is . . . I mean, rather, would you like your eggs—”

“Sunny-side up, thank you!”

“Fabulous.” Eve stared at the couple with a rictus grin she hoped they might find encouraging. Any further instructions? No? Fine. “Can I get you anything to drink? Tea? Juice? We have a selection of both this morning.”

IT’S NOT JUST BED AND BREAKFAST: Chapter Two, Section F: There’s no such thing as too much.

“I’ll have a coffee,” the woman said. “He’ll take a green tea.”