A Slippery Slope Read Online Free Page A

be quite
as perfect, or as angelic as he looks.’
    She
stretched her aching limbs, got to her feet and was about to clamber out of the
minibus when Etienne appeared in front of her: fair haired, muscular bodied,
deeply tanned, hunk of gorgeousness that he was.
    He
held out his arms and lifted her down as if she weighed no more than a
snowflake, and although it was evening and the sky was dark, she wished she’d
kept her sunglasses on. She was almost blinded by the radiance of his smile.
    ‘If
you ever tire of being a ski guide-come-instructor-come-minibus driver,
Etienne, you could earn a fortune working for a toothpaste company.’
    He
winked at her. ‘Merci bien, Vérité,’ he replied in a perfect French accent,
although he’d already disclosed that he was raised in Kent by his English
mother after his French father had taken a dislike to married life. He’d spent
long holidays with his dad though, he’d said, who’d taught him how to ski and
had encouraged him to move back to Meribel, several years later.
     ‘I’ll
make sure you two are settled in,’ Etienne continued, reverting to English as
he lifted Lucy down from the minibus with equal ease, ‘then I’ll get the rest
of this bunch to their various haunts.’
    Verity
and Lucy weren’t the only seasonaires Etienne had met at Chambery airport.
There were eight others, all of whom were regular employees of the
conspicuously absent, Joshua Calder. They would be working at various resorts
in the Three Valleys in one of several, Calder Chalets . Verity had
discovered this much before she had succumbed to her much needed sleep. She and
Lucy were the only ‘virgin seasonaires’ this year.
    ‘Did
I hear you say that Mr Calder is out of the country at present?’ Verity asked,
hoping she hadn’t imagined it.
    Despite
Joanna’s assurances that her uncle was very grateful when Verity stepped in to
take her place, Verity was feeling apprehensive. She wondered how her new
employer really felt about having her foisted on him at such short notice.
    Throughout
her early teens, she’d dreamt of becoming a chalet girl and living in the Alps.
But life had other plans for her – and she met Tony. Now that she was actually
here, she wondered if it would be a disappointment. Or worse – if she would be a disappointment. Her cooking was more bleurgh than cordon
bleu, as Tony had told her. Repeatedly.  
    ‘Yeah,’
Etienne said. ‘He’s spent Thanksgiving in the States with friends, as always,
and he probably won’t be back for another day or two. We don’t usually open
’til mid-December. We’re opening a week early because there’s been so much snow
this November and a group of his regular guests asked him to. He’s done it
before when conditions have been as good as they are now. I often help him out
so it’s no big deal and he’ll be back before the first guests arrive next weekend.
That you can count on.’
    Verity
almost sighed with relief. She had a few days’ grace to improve her cooking,
she thought. That should be okay. After all, how hard could it be to make crème
brûlée?
    Etienne
grabbed the luggage from the snow-covered forecourt where he’d deposited it a
few minutes earlier.
    ‘Back
in five,’ he told the rest of the seasonaires seated in the minibus.
    ‘Goodbye
and good luck,’ Verity wished them.
    But
as she linked arms with Lucy and walked across the crisp, white snow towards
the front door of the chalet which would be their home for the next five
months, she had a strong feeling that she was the one who would need the luck.
    The
chalet was ‘picture-postcard perfect’. Made of wood and stone, with
heart-shaped cut-outs breaking up the balustrades of the wrap-around wooden
balconies, it was the epitome of most people’s dream chalet.
    There
were shutters at the windows, which matched the deep, warm oak of the balcony
balustrades and the imposing double front door. The roof and every exposed
metre of balcony, windowsill, window