My dander rises and, you know, I’m not even sure where my dander is. ‘Absolutely.’

‘I don’t know what’s got into you. Or who.’ He glances in the direction where Blake Chadwick has recently exited. ‘You’re completely mad, woman.’ And it’s not said in a fun, teasy way. My husband really does think that I’m mad.

‘I’d be mad to give up my dream,’ I tell him stubbornly. And, at this moment, if I have to hop all the bloody way, then I damn well will.

Chapter 78

Chapter 78

Greg took the bottle that Ray was offering. They both sipped on chilled beer from the cooler that his friend had installed in the boot of his car.

‘This is the life,’ Ray said, smacking his lips.

Greg’s rod twitched, his float bobbed and he could feel a little pull on the reel. Not much – maybe a perch – light, a pound, nothing more. Then, as he reeled it in, he saw the menacing wide head and tooth-filled jaw of a pike come up and snatch the fish from his hook with deadly efficiency. The ultimate predator had struck.

‘Bloody pike,’ Ray muttered in sympathy. ‘They’d eat their own granny if they could. No morals.’

The pike wasn’t a fish Greg would normally seek out. He usually only encountered them when they were snatching his own fish from beneath his nose while he was powerless to do anything about it. They looked like trouble and they were trouble.

They were a prehistoric fish, old as time itself, and their behaviour and appearance hadn’t changed much in all that time. If you hooked one they’d fight like fury to defeat you. The pike was the most fearsome and fearless of all the freshwater fish.

Its camouflage was perfect, allowing it to move unseen alongside an unsuspecting fish before striking. It was enough to send shivers down the spine of any angler. The pike had a frightening turn of speed and explosive power. Underestimate him at your peril.

Greg turned to his friend. ‘I think there is another man,’ he said. ‘I can’t be sure.’

‘No smoke without fire,’ Ray warned.

‘Annie fell over. Broke her foot.’ Greg decided not to mention the pineapple costume. The Bunny Girl, he thought, had been a step too far. Now this. ‘There was a bloke at the hospital. A bit too close for comfort.’

He couldn’t believe it. His Annie. How could she do this? The old Annie would never have dreamed of cheating on him. But this newfangled, unrecognisable Annie? This strange, unfamiliar woman seemed to be capable of anything.

Chapter 79

Chapter 79