Then Callie was jumping out of the car, ready to take the driver’s seat again, and Mimi couldn’t help but feel like she was still losing her.

*

Darren

He and Claudia had been drinking together now for a couple of hours and there was still no sign of her colleague, Jane, but it seemed Claudia wasn’t concerned. He wondered if she might have surreptitiously texted her and told her not to come.

If so, that meant it had turned out to be true. Dogs were great wing-men when it came to picking up women. Or wing-canines, he figured it should be. He just hadn’t expected it to be the dog’s actual groomer that he’d be picking up. He also hadn’t expected to be drinking this much on a Monday. He’d initially assumed that Claudia was only here on her break and that she’d be headed back to work at some point. But she’d explained that it was the end of her shift and she had nowhere she had to be. She’d given him one of those looks when she’d said it.

She wasn’t coming on quite as strong and straightforward as Sage had the night he’d met her, but it was still clear that she was interested in taking things further. What was going on with him lately? He’d had zero luck meeting women since Charlotte, and now, two women in the space of a week had hit on him.

The question was, did he want to take Claudia home? Especially when a part of his mind was still drifting off every now and then towards Sage.

This was ridiculous. Sage had been clear about what she wanted, or more specifically, what she didn’t want. Which meant he needed to put her out of his mind.

He looked at Claudia. ‘Do you want to get out of here?’ he asked.

‘Love to.’

CHRISTMAS EVE

Darren turned back to Jill. Had she taken such a hard knock that she’d lost her memory? Why had she told the other guy that Frank had been in the car with her? Maybe it was the initial shock and her mind would clear in a minute. She lifted her chin and Darren reached in to steady her. ‘Take it easy, Mum. Everything’s going to be okay.’

‘My fault,’ she mumbled.

‘Don’t worry about that right now. It doesn’t matter whose fault the accident was.’

‘No . . . not the accident . . . the email . . .’

Jesus, she really was confused, he had no idea what she was on about. He could still hear the man on the phone behind him, he was describing Jill’s injuries.

‘An older woman, she definitely hit her head. No, she’s awake.’ Then Darren heard him say, ‘I don’t know about anyone else, I haven’t even made it over to any of the other cars yet.’