A MIDNIGHT KISS ON EVER AFTER STREET

JAIMIE ADMANS

For everyone who has joined me on this journey over the last six years. Thank you for reading.

1

‘Absolutely no one shall go to the ball!’

I look down at the gold-edged ticket in my hand and try not to let the wave of disappointment show on my face. I’d known what my aunt’s reaction would be, but ever the optimist, I still thought it was worth asking when that fancy embossed card came through our door. It’s all I’ve thought about since we heard that they were going to open up the castle one last time for a masquerade ball. It felt like my heart turned grey when the announcement about it going up for sale was posted, and it didn’t start glowing red again until we received notice that the seller was going to hold a fairy-tale ball to showcase the castle to potential buyers and, as a gesture of goodwill towards the locals, everyone would be invited.

‘No one on Ever After Street is going to the ball,’ Aunt Ebony continues. ‘It’s the principle of the thing. Soulless, heartless millionaire businessmen thinking they can swan in here with their gimmicks and buy our castle. We’re all boycotting it. That includes you, Sadie!’

Rumours are swirling that an offer has been made on the castle by a business conglomerate who want to knock it down and build a supermarket in its place, which would be catastrophic for Ever After Street and all those who live and work here, like us. I’m a seamstress at The Cinderella Shop, one of many fairy-tale-themed shops on this street. We’re a dress shop with a unique guarantee – you’ll find love while wearing one of our dresses or get your money back.

‘We don’t know who’s buying it yet. The seller must be hoping this ball will attract more offers. And it isn’t our castle. It’s… well, no one knows who owns it or where they are, but—’

‘That’s not the point. The castle is a huge part of Ever After Street. There should’ve been some legislation in place that prevented it from being sold to whoever wanted it. This ball is solely to paper over the cracks where they’ll cut planning permission corners, you mark my words. This will be the end of Ever After Street itself. A fairy-tale-themed shopping centre in the foothills of an Aldi doesn’t have quite the same ring to it.’

‘It might be a Waitrose,’ my cousin Scarlett suggests. ‘We don’t know which supermarket has made the offer yet. It might be something posh that appeals to a different type of visitor.’

‘At which point, they will have spent all their money up there.’ Aunt Ebony waves a hand in the direction of the castle nestled in the green hills at the end of the street. ‘And will have none left to spend down here in our shops. And no one’s mentioned access roads yet! They’ll tear up half the trees and plonk their pollution-filled road right through the middle of the Full Moon Forest. A supermarket will be the end of everything that’s good about Ever After Street. We’ll be lucky if they don’t bulldoze the lot of us and turn us into a supermarket car park! None of us are going to play nicey-nicey with them at their silly ball. We’re not going to give them the satisfaction. We’re going to show them that no matter who owns that castle, they can’t throw a fancy ball and then sell it to someone who will serve us all with eviction notices the next day. These shops are people’s livelihoods. A supermarket is not welcome here.’

Judging by how many dresses I’ve made over the last few weeks, a lot of people are going to the ball. I stand by the shop door and stare longingly down the road, towards the greenery of the forest and the castle hiding in the trees. I love that castle. It’s been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. My mum filled my childhood with stories of how she’d met my dad there many years before when she was delivering handmade dresses to the viscountess, and he was an accountant to the viscount who’d owned the castle back then. It’s been empty since I was a child, gradually falling into disrepair and being swallowed up by the trees that surround it on the hillside.

‘It will put us all out of business. This place is a quiet, countryside haven. Children can roam free because of the safety of the pedestrianised street. People can wander, meander around the shops and then head into the woods for a picnic or a paddle in the river, or hike up to the castle…’ Ebony is still ranting.

‘But it’s just a ball. It’s a nice gesture. A nod towards the origins of the castle and the importance of keeping the fairy-tale aspect of Ever After Street intact.’ I read that bit from the gold text printed on the card in my hand. ‘As far as we know, the sale hasn’t gone through yet. The supermarket moguls who are sniffing around and sizing up the area might go to the ball, realise their supermarket doesn’t fit here, and that will be the end of it.’ I sound far too hopeful for my own good. The castle is still up for sale. Any potential buyer could have a damning effect on Ever After Street and the lives of the people who own shops here.

‘Honestly, Sadie, you’re so naïve,’ my aunt snaps. ‘Life is not a fairy tale. This is not some magical ball where a pumpkin is going to turn into a glittering carriage and rodents are bibbidi-bobbidi-booed into becoming the four horsemen of the apocalypse. You’re not going to meet Prince Charming and live happily ever after. This ball is a con that serves no purpose except trying to curry favour when it comes to the local council deciding which shops will be demolished first when the supermarket needs wider access roads or extra parking space!’

‘I don’t want to meet Prince Charming. Cinderella would’ve been better off living a happy life with her animal friends than marrying a prince who only recognised her by her shoe size.’ I run my fingers over the thick white card. ‘I just want to see the castle. It could be my last chance. No one’s seen inside it for decades and no one ever will again if they knock it down.’

‘Sadie could go as a spy,’ Scarlett says. ‘Go undercover on behalf of the shopkeepers of Ever After Street so she can report back on what they’re up to. Maybe she could go as a saboteur. Chat to any businessy-looking types and covertly drop into conversations how quiet the area is, you know, terrible for business. Or lament loudly about a flood risk due to proximity to the river, ask everyone if they remember what they were doing on the day the sewers backed-up and the drains overflowed…’ Scarlett really is dedicated to the cause.

‘Absolutely not. I forbid it.’ Aunt Ebony stamps her foot for good measure. ‘All the shopkeepers on this street are standing against them as a whole. We will be noticeable through our absence.’

‘It’s a masked ball! No one will know who stands against them or doesn’t because no one will recognise anyone!’ Scarlett snaps.

‘I don’t care. We must all stand together.’ She’s one step away from ribbiting along to Paul McCartney and The Frog Chorus.

‘Loads of people are going,’ I say. Admittedly none of them work on Ever After Street though. ‘The unknown seller has invited everyone on this side of the Wye Valley. Everyone’s talking about it.’

‘Then there’ll be plenty of photos for you to look at online afterwards, won’t there? You can live vicariously through those.’

I seem to do nothing but live vicariously these days. For once I’d like to do something just for me, something that wasn’t dictated by someone else. ‘It’s not the same. I want to experience it – to see the magic that my mum once saw.’

Aunt Ebony’s face softens at the mention of her late sister, and then quickly hardens again. ‘You’re too old to be like your mother was, Sadie. Always with her head in the clouds, sewing “love” into whimsical dresses and daydreaming of handsome princes and enchanted castles.’

‘The love she sewed into her dresses is our entire business model. You don’t usually complain. You made it into a guarantee – you’ll find love in one of our dresses or get your money back.’

‘Exactly. It’s the kind of whimsy nonsense that paying customers lap up, but it’s whimsy nonsense with a price tag, and you know me, I can get behind anything with a price tag. Now, come on, girls. No more daydreaming of armoured knights and fair maidens. That castle is nothing more than a tumbledown load of old stone. It’s been abandoned for so long that the ball attendees will be lucky if the whole thing doesn’t fall down on top of them. It’ll be mouldy and musty, undoubtedly haunted, and probably full of bats too. You’d be more likely to find Dracula lurking inside than Prince Charming. You don’t want to go there, Sadie.’

I look longingly through the door towards the hills again. For the first time in my life, this week the castle has been a hive of activity. Teams of workmen are up there preparing for the ball. The tallest trees have been cut back, the windows have been opened and cleaned, and the stone walkway jet-washed until it glitters in the late-April sunlight. Any lurking bats would surely have been chased out. I do want to go there. Even if Dracula is the most interesting thing I find. I can’t imagine the castle being demolished without me ever having seen inside. Disillusionment is creeping into everything I do lately, and the promise of a ball is the first thing that’s made life feel magical again, as though the fairy tales I used to believe in could come true after all, and I can’t give up on it that easily.

I’m so lost in daydreaming that I don’t notice my aunt has stalked across the shop until she whisks the invitation out of my hand with such force that it causes a papercut across my index finger.

‘I have an important business trip to prepare for. I don’t want to hear another word about this.’ She tries to screw the invite up but the cardboard is too thick so she shoves it angrily onto a shelf underneath the counter instead. There’s a ceremonial burning of ball invitations by the shopkeepers on Ever After Street scheduled for next week.

And I get it, I do. The castle being demolished and a supermarket built in its place will be disastrous for Ever After Street. We’re the Disneyland of the retail industry. A cobbled traffic-less street filled with fairy-tale-themed shops; a perfect mix of entertainment for children and retail therapy for tired parents. Everyone who works here runs a shop inspired by a different story, like the Tale As Old As Time bookshop or the Colours of the Wind museum. There’s an area at one end with a carousel, face painting, craft stalls, and a magician to entertain visitors, but the biggest draw to our little open-air shopping retreat is the castle in the hills.

Steeped in mystery, turrets and spires visible for miles, like Disney’s Sleeping Beauty castle on your doorstep in the Wye Valley, complete with ghost stories and myths and eternal gossip about what happened to the viscount and viscountess who disappeared so many years ago. Until this week, there’s been no access to the castle, but the forestry that surrounds it is full of fairy doors and has a feel of tingling, twinkling magic, and twisting maze-like paths that lead through the woods and to a gently flowing river, and green fields of farmland on the other side. The perfect place to come for a day out. The demolition of the castle and the building of a supermarket will destroy the quiet little hideaway that is Ever After Street for good.

I shouldn’t want to go to this ball so badly, but oh, how I do. For years, I’ve looked up at the castle from the window of my shoebox-sized flat and imagined what it would be like to live in such a place. The glamour and the opulence – a world away from being hunched over my sewing machine into the early hours with a mannequin’s arm digging into my back because there isn’t room for it anywhere else.

‘Sadie!’ Aunt Ebony snaps her fingers as if she’s been trying to get my attention, and I blink to see Scarlett hiding a smirk at the faraway look on my face. ‘I said, have you got those samples I asked for? My flight is first thing tomorrow morning, there’s no time for dithering.’

‘Tell us again why you’re going all the way to Finland?’ Scarlett asks her mum as I go and collect an armful of garment bags from the back room that doubles as my sewing workshop.

‘There’s a Finnish reality TV star who might be interested in having some custom-made pieces for her wardrobe. I’d never heard of her, but apparently she’s very big in Finland. It’ll be great exposure for us.’

‘Judging by the lack of material in these outfits, exposure of a different kind might be on the cards for her too.’ I look at the zipped-up bags in distaste: Ebony’s designs based on outfits she’s seen this reality TV star wearing. Hours of pointless work when it would’ve been no less effective to show sketches, but my aunt is big on exclusivity and going the extra mile. Unfortunately the ‘extra mile’ is usually by first-class plane ticket via the business expenses account which could do with an injection of cash to boost it up as much as the bulbous ruffles in these garish garments. Every day, I question how my life ended up like this – sewing dresses I hate for people who don’t appreciate them, desperately wishing things were better, but without a clue how to make them so.

‘And that’s going to take a week, is it?’ Scarlett has the confidence to question, whereas I don’t. ‘Hand-delivering samples of our work is hardly necessary. You could’ve emailed her our brochure like any other dressmaker would have, and not forced Sadie into making those stupid samples which has put her behind on all her paid work.’

‘It’s fine.’ I wave a hand while trying to keep hold of the garment bags. I appreciate Scarlett sticking up for me, but the last thing I want to do is anger my aunt. This shop will be mine one day and I can run it however I want to, but until then, it’s best to stay on Ebony’s good side. I’m not one for rocking any boats.

‘You just got back from Dubai where you were trying to sell our dresses to some sheikha, last month it was New York, in January you had to go to Turkey, December it was—’

‘I’m trying to grow our brand and take us global. She’s a very big star in Finland, and being seen in one of our dresses could bring us international acclaim.’

Unless she takes one look at these creations and recoils in horror. They look like the luminous orange and lime green love children of something that’s escaped from Lady Gaga’s wardrobe and mated with a clown. I used to love this job, but it’s been so long since I made a dress that I even liked. I’m not proud of my work any more. And with the threat of the supermarket coming and how much The Cinderella Shop is struggling to stay afloat as it is… Ever After Street is all about making our customers believe in fairy-tale magic, but it’s starting to feel like nothing magical will ever happen for me.

Scarlett goes to say something else, but Ebony cuts her off. ‘My sister tasked me with looking after the shop she started. It’s my responsibility to put my all into doing that. We deserve to be a household name. She deserves it as her legacy.’

My mum does deserve a legacy, but her sister swanning around every country under the sun on expenses, trying to persuade celebrities to endorse The Cinderella Shop, would never have been what she had in mind. Mum was happy here, making dresses for those who could afford it or doing alterations for those who already had dresses they loved but needed a better fit. She didn’t want global fame or to see her designs in the pages of OK Magazine – she just wanted the people she made clothes for to be happy.

‘And you.’ Ebony taps her hand on the counter and then starts wrangling the garment bags out of my arms and into her own. ‘No more of this nonsense. Get your head out of that castle and into your work or you’ll never get caught up with our paying customers.’

‘Yes, Ebony.’ I sound like a well-trained parrot. If parrots could use sewing machines, maybe that’s what I’d be.

I go and hold the door open for her; the garment bags are so puffy that she has to renegotiate the doorway a few times before she finally gets through it.

When she’s gone, I close the door and meet Scarlett’s eyes, and we both let out a sigh of relief. I love my aunt, but we’ve been at nothing but loggerheads lately, and no one can deny that life is a lot easier in The Cinderella Shop when she’s away.

I’m majorly behind on work, so I leave Scarlett in charge of the shop and return to the sewing machine out the back to carry on stitching butterfly embellishments onto a floor-length navy-to-cream ombre dress made of silk-chiffon, a last-minute order for the ball next week. Yet another thing that keeps pulling my mind back to that golden card underneath the counter.

That night in my flat, I turn out the main light and sit on my window ledge with a book and a cup of tea. If I rest my head against the windowpane, I can see the castle in the hills. It’s a sight that’s always comforted me, even in the hardest of times. No matter how hard life seems some days, I can look at the castle and still believe that a fairy tale will find us all, someday. It’s a sentinel, looking over the street, protecting us. Solid and strong and never-changing, unlike so many other things in my life.

For the first time ever, the castle is glowing back at me, and I have to blink a few times before I realise what I’m seeing. There’s a light on. There’s never been a light on before. Someone must be staying there.

It’s strange, but comforting in a way.

Only a handful of the other shopkeepers live above their shops, and I always feel alone here at nights, but that glowing light from the castle makes me feel less lonely, and instead of reading, I rest my head against the window and look out, because there will come a day, really, really soon, when that glowing light is the fluorescent neon of a twenty-four-hour supermarket, and that’s just unthinkable. People say you get three great loves in a lifetime, and that castle is one of mine. The Cinderella Shop is another one. I haven’t found the third… yet.

2

‘You’re going to that ball.’

I lift my forehead from the front window and wipe at the smear it’s left on the glass as I look over my shoulder at Scarlett. ‘I can’t. You know that.’

It’s Sunday afternoon, and I’m hiding between the ruffles of the lurid dresses in the front window display and leaning so close to the glass that there’s a genuine possibility I’ll have fused with it by the end of the day. It’s been a week since the invitation arrived and Ever After Street has been buzzing with people going back and forth to the castle: teams of workmen and cleaners and decorators, caterers and wait staff preparing for the ball.

The big event is tonight, and I can’t stop thinking about it. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it all week, and I’m glad Ebony isn’t here to see how many mistakes I’ve made, how many stitches I’ve run off in the wrong direction and had to unpick and re-sew. The invitation is still under the counter, calling to me like the goldleaf itself is glowing, like Sleeping Beauty’s spinning wheel on her sixteenth birthday. Judging by the items we’ve seen being heave-ho-ed towards the castle, light-up acrylic pillars, crystal mountain ranges, and what appear to be life-size palm trees made of faux ostrich feathers, it’s going to be such an impressive party that it would put any Disney movie to shame. I make wedding dresses and prom dresses and special occasion dresses for a living, and yet I’ve never had a special occasion to wear one. I’ve never been to a ball before. Even if it wasn’t at the castle, it would still sound like a magical night. The kind of ball that every girl who grew up watching Disney’s Cinderella dreamed of attending.

‘Ebony’s due back tonight. At eight o’clock – exactly the time the ball starts. She’s going to expect me to be here.’

‘I’ll cover for you. I’ll tell her you’ve gone to bed early, or you’ve gone to visit your parents’ grave, or we could say you’ve got food poisoning and are “otherwise engaged” in the bathroom.’

‘She’s going to expect proof of that. If I’m not here when she gets back, she’s going to know where I’ve gone.’

‘Then we’ll arrange a tin of pea soup nicely in a bucket and leave it outside the bathroom door, she won’t be able to argue with that.’

I laugh at the mental image, but Scarlett and I both know that nothing will fool Ebony. ‘She’s going to hand the shop over to me this year. I can’t do anything to jeopardise that now. She’s right on the brink of signing it over, she has to be.’

Scarlett scoffs. ‘Oh, please. How long has she been dangling that particular carrot? She’s not going to hand this shop over to you while there’s a business expenses account to wallow in. I love my mother dearly, but you have to stop trying to please her.’

‘Says the woman who won’t even tell her you want to leave this shop and go full-time at hairdressing.’

Scarlett only works part time at The Cinderella Shop, covering the shop floor and running the business side of things, and she spends the rest of her time working at Rapunzel’s hair salon down the street, except in this case, ‘Rapunzel’ is a long-haired man called Jackson who also happens to be Scarlett’s boyfriend. She’s been taking on more and more private clients and spends most mornings doing special occasion hair dos for wedding parties.

‘That’s different. She might disown me if she finds out I studied business management for years only to throw it all away to do “superficial hairdressing nonsense Jackson has talked me into”. Sadie, you’re incredibly talented. Your dresses are as beautiful as your mum’s were, but look at the hideous crap we’ve got on display.’ She indicates towards the front window, which has got three mannequins on one side, all wearing dresses Ebony has insisted I make. Flashy ruffles in clashing shades of neon pink, neon orange and banana yellow, with enough flounce to look like a hot air balloon has deflated on top of each mannequin. ‘People call us The Ugly Sister shop, not The Cinderella Shop. You can’t keep doing everything she tells you to in the hopes she’ll finally sign the shop over to you.’

‘I’m thirty-five, and she’s turning sixty-five in a couple of months. She must be wanting to slow down by now.’ I have to cling onto the hope that Ebony will give me the shop one day. I haven’t worked this hard, for this long, doing everything she asks of me, only for The Cinderella Shop to never be mine.

‘You’ve said the same thing at each of your big birthdays. Twenty. Twenty-five. Thirty. Even thirty-two because she mentioned wanting to take up golf and you thought it was code for retiring rather than just an excuse to do less work. It’s hard to imagine my mum doing less work than she currently does, but one thing we can be sure of is that she’ll find a way.’

‘But if I don’t do what she says, she’ll never sign the shop over to me. I need her to trust me. Every time I alter the window display, she puts it back to how it was. She yells at me for trying to put my tasteful dresses at the front of the shop. We’re barely doing any trade. People don’t come in because there’s nothing even vaguely appealing to entice them. Her insistence on celebrity endorsements is what’s going to pull this place under. The creations that might appeal to slightly mad celebrities don’t belong on display here. They’ve been known to make small children cry. Even pantomime dames have looked in and recoiled in horror at the brightness. We’re losing customers because of her way of trying to gain customers, and she just can’t see it.’ I sigh in frustration. It’s heart-breaking to see my beloved shop floundering and the one person who can do something about it simply won’t hear it.

‘Say that to her. And quickly. We’re going under, Sade. Our outgoings are higher than our incomings for the tenth month in a row. There’s very little left in the coffers to keep us afloat. We need something to change, drastically.’

‘I know.’ I didn’t expect Scarlett to approach the subject head on. We’ve been dancing around it for months, but it’s true. We’re running at a loss. Treading water. I’ve already had to buy cheaper fabrics and cut other corners. How much worse is it going to get? ‘Ebony doesn’t listen, you know that. But she has to let me take over before it comes to that. The only thing keeping us afloat is the occasional injection of cash from the commissions she does get. This can’t go on much longer. I need her to trust me enough to run The Cinderella Shop as it used to be run, and going against her, and all the other Ever After Street shopkeepers by going to that ball is not the way to build her trust in me.’

‘And then what?’

‘And then my life can begin. I can change things and turn this shop back into the sewing heaven it was when my mum and dad ran it. I can display the elegant dresses that I want to make and sell them for prices that normal people can afford. Get rid of this stupid guarantee that’s wiping us out financially, and—’

‘And the castle will be gone. If this sale goes ahead, you will never get to see that castle again, but you’ve got the rest of your life to win my mother back around. And that’s only if you get found out.’

‘How am I not going to get found out? I’m the worst liar in the world. And I haven’t been invited. That ticket is addressed to the owner of each shop. I am not the owner.’

‘It says you can bring a plus one.’

‘I don’t think you can go as a plus one if you haven’t got the “one” to begin with.’

Scarlett screws her face up in thought, and I can’t help but smile at her determination. She’s always been like a sister to me. I might’ve had the Cinderella-esque start of losing my parents and being taken in by my aunt, but I never got the clichéd ugly stepsister part. Scarlett has been my best friend, cousin, and makeshift sister for as long as I can remember.

I’ve never gone against my aunt’s wishes before, but this ball… it feels like there’s magic in the air every time I think about it, and when I let my mind drift, just for a second, I close my eyes and picture a magical night of dancing and pumpkin carriages and glass slippers, and then…

The shrill ring of my phone in my pocket shocks me out of my reverie and I pull it out to see ‘Ebony’ flashing on the screen. It’s as if she could telepathically tell what I was thinking and chose such stellar timing as a reminder that the ball isn’t meant for me.

‘Hello, Aunt Ebony?’ Why is she phoning my mobile on a Sunday afternoon? I quickly pull the phone away from my ear as the shrieking from the other end threatens to spontaneously burst an eardrum.

‘Would you believe my flight’s been delayed?’ she barks down the line, along with a few choice expletives.

‘Delayed?’ I put her on speakerphone so Scarlett can hear too.

‘They won’t even say why! Something about birds in the engine. Birds, for goodness’ sake! I was supposed to land at seven, but now my flight isn’t even taking off until eight! I’m stuck in this hellhole for hours.’ She swears at someone on the other end, presumably a member of the Finnish airport staff trying their best to appease her wrath.

‘I’m sorry, Aunt Ebony,’ I say, but my eyes are on Scarlett’s face which has got a mischievous look creeping across it. ‘What time do you expect to be back?’

‘I don’t suppose we’ll see you tonight, will we? It will be too late.’ Scarlett jumps in before she can answer, waggling her eyebrows at me.

‘Yes, you flaming well will! I’ve got a commission from that reality star! An all-in-one catsuit. It’s a little… risqué. Not your usual style, Sadie, but she wants to wear it for a red-carpet event on Satur—’

‘This Saturday? I don’t have time to make a catsuit and ship it to Finland before Saturday!’

Ebony laughs. ‘You will when you see how little material is involved. And that’s exactly why I’ll be over tonight. My flight should land at eleven, so I’ll be there by twelve. You need to get started on this right away!’

‘Midnight?’ I groan. Catsuits at midnight. Is this what my life has come to? Instead of the glamorous ballgowns my mum sewed or the Disney princess-style wedding dresses that I used to design, I’m reduced to making lascivious jumpsuits during the witching hour?

‘There’s no time to waste. She’s paying top dollar. Well, top euro or whatever they have in Finland.’

We’re interrupted by another member of staff asking Ebony if she needs anything, who probably wasn’t expecting the answer to be a screamed, ‘What I want is my flight to take off on time!’

Scarlett rolls her eyes.

‘I’ll be over with the measurements and design sketches on my way home from the airport. Make sure you’ve got the coffee on, Sadie, it’s going to be a long night.’

She ends the call before I can protest again. I let out another groan and my head drops forward until my forehead bangs against the front window, my eyes on an ice sculpture of the Eiffel Tower as a team of decorators wheel it past.

‘Isn’t the universe a wonderful thing?’

‘What?’ I ask Scarlett without lifting my head.

‘Sadie! Tell me that’s not a sign! Her flight’s delayed! You have until midnight! It doesn’t get much more Cinderella-like than that. And you know what Cinderella did at midnight?’

‘Ended up face down in a puddle when her pumpkin exploded, with nothing but a shoe full of mice to show for her troubles?’

‘Well, yes, but not before going to a magical ball and falling in love with a handsome prince. And you, Sadie Winters, are going to that ball.’

‘I can’t,’ I say, even though my heart rate has sped up at the thought. ‘It’s not even about Ebony. What about the others? I’ve worked with most of these shopkeepers for years – they’re my friends. I can’t let the side down.’

‘Oh yes, you can.’ Scarlett sounds so much like a pantomime character that I ready myself for a chorus of ‘it’s behind you’, and when I push away from the window and turn to look at her, she’s got a mask dangling from her fingers. ‘Because absolutely no one is going to know it’s you. They call it a masquerade ball for a reason. You’ll be anonymous. Now, I have a hairdressing client this evening, so get over here and let me work my magic on you because you are going to that ball. We’re going to make you into the most Cinderellery Cinderella who ever Cinderellered. Just call me your fairy godmother. Well, cousin. Fairy godcousin. Minus a magic wand and any unusual fascination with pumpkins.’

‘What have you done to me?’ It’s the first time in over two hours that Scarlett’s let me look into a mirror, and I look like a totally different person. Gone is my mass of blonde messy curls, and it’s been replaced by straightened hair which looks so much longer than it is. Usually my curls are a springy mass around my shoulders, but having straightened them, my hair is long and sleek and reaches halfway down my back. Scarlett’s added some brighter blonde clip-in hair extensions to liven up my natural dark blonde colour and they blend in perfectly with my now-straight hair. My plain, unmemorable face is glowing with make-up. Every little acne scar, every line, and every pore has been concealed, smoothed over, and perfected. I never wear make-up, it’s too much hassle, but Scarlett’s been dabbing and patting at my face for ages, and she’s used highlighters and blusher that make me look like I have actual cheekbones, and a mix of eyeshadow shades from brown to grey that surround my eyes and make them pop with perfectly flicked dark lines of liquid eyeliner.

While Scarlett stands behind me, adding the last few sparkly pins to my half-up do, I pick up the mask and hold it to my face. It covers from my forehead down to just under my nose, with holes for the eyes and nostrils. It’s made of a beautiful light blue leather with navy blue swirls, silver accents, and the dramatic shape of raven wings form the edges. We do the kind of occasion wear that might require a matching mask sometimes, so we always have a few samples lying around the shop, but I never imagined that I would have occasion to wear one.

No one will recognise me, that’s for certain. Even without the mask, I’m a distant relation to my usual drab self. I wear nothing but oversized shirts and trousers with lots of pockets at work, and rarely manage to get my hair under control.

Guilt nibbles at my ankles about ignoring Ebony’s strict orders though, and about Ever After Street itself. This is the furthest thing from a united front. ‘What about the other shopkeepers? Your mum’s right. We have to protest against the sale of the castle.’

‘It’s just a ball. Going doesn’t mean you agree with a supermarket buying it. Like when you were a child and someone’s mum made them invite everyone in the class to their birthday party. You didn’t have to like the kid – but you liked birthday cake, and that was as good a reason as any to go.’

‘I don’t think there’s going to be birthday cake there.’

She huffs so hard that it blows her pink-tipped fringe up from her forehead. ‘You know what I mean, Sade. You’ve loved that castle since we were little.’

‘It’s been nice to see a light on in there this week. It’s like the castle is alive again, like it’s been sitting there, forgotten, and now someone’s remembered it. And instead of bringing it back to life, they’re going to kill it,’ I add when I think about the real reason behind the glitz of the ball.

‘I think we need a quick word about the sentience of old buildings. It isn’t alive. The light is probably to deter burglars now they’ve taken down the blockades. Ooh, unless it’s a prince!’

I laugh. ‘I don’t think it’s a prince, Scar.’

‘Well, you never know, do you? It’s the kind of fairy-tale castle that should have a prince. Maybe you’ll meet him tonight. A literal Prince Charming.’

‘Pretty sure Prince Charming neither exists nor hangs out at fairy-tale masquerade balls in the lower Wye Valley. That would be far too cliché. Besides, our only princes are Wills and Harry and neither of them do anything for me.’ I shudder at the thought. ‘If anyone is staying there, it’s more likely to be the ghost of some long-dead viscount returned from the grave to show his displeasure at the castle being sold.’

‘Whoever it is, he’s going to see you naked if we don’t get a move on.’ She checks the time on her phone. ‘Oh, heck, I’m going to be late for my client. Can you get dressed by yourself?’

I nod. ‘Of course, go.’

‘You know which dress you’re going to wear?’

I haven’t stopped thinking about it since the moment I saw that invitation. Hidden in my flat upstairs are many dresses, ones that I sew in my spare time. Dresses that I dream of filling The Cinderella Shop with one day. Fairy-tale dresses that would make any woman feel like a princess. The opposite of what I have to make under Ebony’s instructions. A hidden collection that my aunt must never know about.

‘Good.’ Scarlett steps back and we both stare at the mirror. I look nothing like myself. I’ve never looked this good in my life before. I wouldn’t be out of place if I really was Cinderella going to the prince’s ball and a fairy godmother really had given me a magical makeover.

‘You look so much like your mum, it’s unreal,’ Scarlett murmurs. ‘This is just how I remember her. Effortlessly glamorous, like she belonged in a fairy tale.’

‘You’ve been working on me for hours. I’m not sure that counts as effortless glamour.’ We both laugh, but neither of our eyes leave the mirror. How much I look like my mum and how much trouble Scarlett has gone to so I can go tonight are making tears threaten to rise up, but I can’t cry and ruin this make-up. ‘One thing my mum never had was a fairy godcousin though.’ I turn around and hug Scarlett. ‘Thank you.’

‘Something magical is going to happen tonight.’ She squeezes me back. ‘I can feel it in my bones.’

‘The only magical thing is going to be somehow getting away with this.’

‘There’s nothing to get away with. All you’ve got to do is be back by midnight.’

‘Not a problem. You know me, I’m the furthest thing from a “fancy ball” type of person. I’ll probably be bored stiff in twenty minutes and come home immediately.’ Even though I’m trying to play it down in front of Scarlett and not let on that my heart hasn’t stopped pitter-pattering since she held up that mask, I also have no idea how true this is. Am I a fancy ball type of person? I’ve never been to one to find out, and I can’t quite hide the excitement that tonight, I will.

‘Not if you meet a handsome prince.’

‘At least that’s one thing we can be sure definitely won’t happen tonight!’

‘And I thought you believed in fairy tales.’

‘I do… I mean, I did. I used to, once… But everyone does when they’re younger, and then you grow up and find yourself stuck in an endless unmerry-go-round of disenchanting dresses, a poky flat, and trying to make life what you thought it would be and never quite succeeding.’ Fairy tales are a nice thought, but they don’t happen in real life, no matter how much you want them to. ‘Never mind all that, you’re going to be late for work and I’ve got a dress to get into without knocking a hair out of place or smudging this make-up.’

‘You look beautiful, Sade. Have a wonderful night.’

‘I will. I promise.’

When Scarlett leaves with her bag of hairdressing gear over her shoulder, I slip outside and go around the corner to the stairs up to my flat. It’s bursting with dresses so the choices are endless, but my mind is set on just one.

About three months ago, I couldn’t sleep, so I sat down at my mum’s old Singer sewing machine in the flat with no plan in mind. The clock on the wall said it was 9 p.m., so I had plenty of time before I’d be too tired to keep my eyes open. I used my own measurements, and before I knew it, I’d made this beautiful dress. When I’d looked out of the window, the sun was coming up, but the clock still said it was 9 p.m. Unbeknown to me, it had stopped, and it made the night feel endless and I barely remembered time passing. It was like waking up in the morning and finding elves had nipped in and sewn the dress overnight. My mum always used to say it was like that for her, and for the first time that night, it felt right. Sewing that dress felt like what I was supposed to be doing, like something else was driving my fingers, where everything went perfectly and there wasn’t a single mistake or broken needle or snag or bunched-up bobbin thread. I always feel close to my mum when I’m sewing, but that night, it was as if she was right there beside me. I could almost see her sitting there, like when she’d sat beside me and shown me how to sew when I was little, and this dress felt extra special because of that.

I gave it the finishing touches over the next few nights, and I should have put it on the shop floor as a display piece, but the thought of Ebony ridiculing it and shoving it to the back where no one could see it was unbearable, so I put it in my wardrobe and tried not to think about how good it felt to make, and how that is the way I want to spend my life, not sewing barely-there catsuits for celebrities that even the Z-list hasn’t heard of.

I take the ballgown from the wardrobe and run my fingers over the blue silk. I thought of the sky while I was making it, a mix of day and night. A simple off-the-shoulder bodice, sewn with light blue and navy blue satin that seamlessly blend together, stiff boning in the corset and hook-and-eye fastenings, but the full skirt is what makes it spectacular.

The bottom hem skims the ground, and layers of ivory tulle and pale blue chiffon make up the first petticoat. The second petticoat is made of organza in every shade of blue from light to dark, then there are layers of iridescent organza that’s so delicate it’s almost transparent. There’s a third skirt which is made of a heavier silk in the colour of a pastel rainbow, and the outer skirt is navy silk organza and covered in Swarovski crystals so it sparkles with every movement.

I slip it on and it’s by far the most beautiful thing I’ve ever worn. I instantly feel like a princess. This is how my mum’s clients must have felt all those years ago, and how I wish clients of The Cinderella Shop would feel now. A dress like this suspends all worries – while I’m wearing something like this, there is nothing but me and the night ahead. There can’t be anything wrong in the life of a girl who owns a dress like this. It makes a swishing sound with every movement as I spritz on my mum’s favourite perfume, a little way of taking her with me everywhere I go, and make my way back down the stairs and into the shop.

Not even Cinderella herself could walk in glass slippers, so I borrow a pair of shoes from the shop shelves. The Cinderella Shop gets custom shoes made by a Dutch shoemaker to match our dresses, but we’ve always got a few pairs in stock for display and to give clients an idea of the options, and a few of them happen to be in my size. I choose a pair of midnight-blue satin slip-ons with a lace overlay, diamante accents, and a two-inch wedge heel, and slide my feet into them, and then I use one of the brightly lit changing room mirrors and hold the mask up to my face and tie the ribbons into a bow at the back of my head to keep it in place.

The woman staring back at me from the mirror could have stepped out of a Hollywood remake of any Cinderella movie. My masked face doesn’t look like mine, my sparkly half-up hair do could rival Belle’s in the ballroom dance scene, and my dress looks like it came straight from the wand of a fairy godmother. Blending in is usually my speciality, but tonight, for once, maybe it would be nice to stand out. This is the most magical thing I’ve ever done. I should probably feel guilty, but for the first time in years, I’m putting myself first and the one place I want to be tonight is at that ball.

3

What was I thinking? I don’t fit in at a fancy event like this. I make dresses for people who go to balls like this, but I am not one of those people. I’m awkward and out of place. The castle is as majestic as I’d always hoped it was – round towers, blue conical roofs, regal turrets and shining spires, an imposing clocktower looking down on us, but I barely had a moment to take it all in as, along with every other ball attendee, once we’d shuffled along the walled stone walkway and handed our invitations to the guard at the gatehouse, we were funnelled into a grand entrance hall and then sent to one of the two ballrooms that have been opened up for the night.

The portcullis gate was raised, and I’d wanted to stand there and appreciate the very spot where my mum and dad met, but there were too many people, both guests and staff hired for the night, herding us through like sheep, and now everyone’s split off into cliques, and I’m standing at the edge of a ginormous ballroom on my own with a glass of flat champagne that’s unappealing in every way.

How does everyone know each other? Have they all come together? Doesn’t that defeat the object of a masked, anonymous ball? The make-up, the dress, and the mask make me look like I belong here, but inside, I’m swirling with that familiar ‘last to be picked for school sports teams’ feeling all over again, and I wish for the confidence to simply walk over, insert myself into a group and join in with their laughs and conversations.

Everyone else looks so natural, as though it’s a regular occurrence to be quaffing champagne in a castle, but unless they’re secretly royalty, surely they’re people just like me, who have never done this before and aren’t quite sure how to do it now?

The only good part of the night so far has been seeing my dresses in action. That’s something you don’t ever get to see as a dressmaker. You make beautiful gowns for special events in other people’s lives, but you’re never a part of the event itself. You take measurements, you sew until your fingers are blistered, you adjust and fit the dress to each person’s exact measurements, and you wave goodbye at the shop doorway. In the case of The Cinderella Shop and my aunt’s return policy, sometimes you get the dress back afterwards because the wearer hasn’t found love and you have to refund it and then it goes to live on the rails out the back because no one knows what to do with the returned dresses. But tonight, I’ve already brushed past a few of the dresses I’ve made in recent weeks, and each time, it reminds me of how lucky I am to get to make dream dresses for a living, and how devastating it will be if the castle is sold to a supermarket. Supermarkets have their own clothing ranges these days, and if they’re selling ready-made dresses for twenty quid, no one is going to come down the road and commission a custom-made one for hundreds of pounds. The Cinderella Shop will lose even more trade than it’s already losing. We won’t be able to carry on. What will I do? That shop is part of my DNA. I have no identity without it. I’ve never worked anywhere else, and I don’t know how to imagine a future where it is gone.

I take a breath and force myself to focus on the present moment rather than worrying about what’s to come. The ballroom is like a football pitch but bigger, and you can’t help but wonder how many chandeliers one room needs. There’s a thirteen-foot one hanging from the centre of the ceiling and smaller chandeliers forming a circle around it, and I pity the cleaner who had to get those free of cobwebs this week. Everything is the sumptuous deep colours of maroon or plum, and all the furniture and fittings are made of velvet and tinged with gold, and there are even stained-glass windows in the domed ceiling. There’s a live orchestra playing classical music in this room and couples are dancing together, twirling around the dancefloor, further pushing home my loneliness. I wish Scarlett hadn’t had to work tonight so I’d have someone to talk to. Who did I think I was going to meet here? Prince Charming? A handsome stranger to dance the night away with? If only real life worked like that. Handsome strangers have been scarce for me. In fact, most ‘handsome strangers’ have turned out to be frogs in disguise, and I’ve long since given up on the idea of Prince Charming actually existing.

The other half of the party guests were siphoned into a second ballroom on the opposite side of the main entrance hall, and I back out into the grand hall, intending to go in search of more single, awkward people like me, but I can’t help stopping to look around in awe. I didn’t fully appreciate it on the way in, but now it’s empty apart from a steady stream of waiters coming from a staff kitchen, the door to which is hidden under the grand double staircase leading to the higher levels of the castle. The ceiling is neck-straining to look up at, and painted with a cherubs-in-the-sky mural, and the imposing hall is lined by suits of armour that almost definitely come to life at night. If I spoke, there would be an echo. The wall to the left is covered with once luxurious but now faded wallpaper with peeling edges, and there are rectangles of grime around empty spaces of unfaded wallpaper, as though it once held portraits that have since been taken down.

The grand stairway is roped off, but it seems so much more interesting than another ballroom, and the rope isn’t much of a barrier… so before I know it, I’ve hiked my dress up and stepped over it.

I’m not doing any harm, I tell myself as I make sure no one’s seen me and hurry upwards. It’s not as if anyone’s going to be up here. I just want a little look around before the castle is gone for good.

At the top of the stairs, there’s a balustrade balcony circling the lower floor from above, closed doorways to multiple rooms, and hallways that lead further into the castle with rich wood-panelled walls and old-fashioned but luxurious carpets. Everything smells of polish and cleaning products, and Ebony would be disappointed to know there isn’t a bat in sight, not even in the furthest crevices of the high ceilings.

I don’t know which way to go and suspect I’ll be wishing for a trail of breadcrumbs to find my way back, but I follow one of the hallways and come to another set of dark wood stairs that twists around and seemingly goes back on itself, and I follow that upwards too, telling myself that I best not go much further. No one specifically said the rest of the castle was out of bounds, but one might deduce that from the rope barrier.

One. Maybe I do belong here after all.

No one ever told us where the toilets are so, if anyone catches me, I could say I was looking for them and lost my way.

Getting lost in this place is definitely a reasonable excuse.

Even the staircases feel luxurious, covered with carpet that’s been freshly cleaned, but no amount of cleaning can hide the moth-eaten holes and frayed edges from the years of being left to rot here. It’s so long ago that Mum told me about it. The memories are like childhood stories, long forgotten but coming back in fragmented parts, like a favourite old book that you read again as an adult. I remember her saying the viscount and viscountess had separate quarters in the castle. I remember thinking how posh it was to have an entire suite of rooms all to yourself, so many rooms that you could go an entire day without seeing your husband despite the fact he lived in the same building, but apparently they always reconnected by taking supper together and sharing a bedroom, from which all talk of work was banned. When I was young, I thought it was romantic, but now it seems like it must’ve been a lonely way to live. Surely the point of a relationship is to have someone to face the world with, not someone you only have a brief catch-up with once a day?

At the top of this staircase is a heavy-looking door with gothic-style silver hinges. Unlike every other door I’ve passed, it’s ajar, and I can’t resist pushing it open and peeking inside. It’s a library. Well, a study, maybe. It’s too small to be a library, but the walls are shelves of books from floor to ceiling, and there’s a shiny mahogany desk and a well-worn leather armchair with a reading lamp beside it in one corner. The threadbare carpet looks as though it’s been traipsed across many times, and there’s even a fireplace with a mantelpiece above it that holds a bust of William Shakespeare and a candelabra that I’m almost certain is Lumiere from Beauty and the Beast. Something tingles at the back of my neck. There’s something about this room that feels as magical as the Beast’s castle. It’s still got the glamour of downstairs – not many people have bookshelves edged with goldleaf or a ceiling you’d need a crane to reach – but there’s a warm and cosy feel to it too. It smells of the papery scent of old books, and I can imagine an elderly viscount sitting in the armchair, his slippered feet up on the footstall in front of the crackling fire, an old book open on his lap as he dozes in a favoured armchair, like everyone’s favourite grandfather.

It’s a room that feels tucked away, as if there should be more to it and it’s cut off somehow. It makes me wonder if it’s the quintessential castle cliché and one of these books is a decoy and pulling the right one will reveal a hidden room. I trace my fingers along the recently cleaned spines, trying to work out which one could lead to a false wall and a secret room. I pull a few out at random, old tomes of research, poetry, and novels from times gone by, but all of them turn out to be exactly what they look like – books. I thought ‘castle’ might be a keyword, so I’m just putting back a copy of I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith when there’s a noise of surprise, and I spin around to see a man standing in the doorway.

‘What the hell are you doing in here?’ He sounds angry, but his voice is unsteady, like it’s debatable which one of us gave the other the biggest shock.

‘I’m not doing any harm. I was looking for the toilets and…’ I trail off, the excuse sounding pathetic even to my own ears. He’s a guest, like me. He’s dressed in a sharp charcoal-coloured suit with a burgundy tie that matches his china mask. Burgundy on one side, white on the other, with intricate silver swirls where the colours meet in a diagonal line, and silver edging around the eyes and sides of the mask. It covers his face from the forehead to under his nose, and he’s holding a glass of champagne, like the one I’ve just put down on the desk.

His mouth is set in a disapproving thin line and his eyes take me in for a moment. ‘Let me guess, you’re looking for the way to the west wing to see if there’s a prince who’s been turned into a beast?’

‘No, but now you’ve suggested it…’ I meet his eyes across the room, so serious that they’re almost glowing with annoyance, and I think the best thing to do is make a joke and then a quick exit. ‘Have you seen that candlestick? There’s no way it’s not going to come to life at some point. I wouldn’t be even vaguely surprised if a clock waddled up and started talking.’

One of the first things I notice about him is that he’s so tall that his suit doesn’t fit properly. Dressmakers notice these things. He’s got huge hands and quite possibly the longest arms I’ve ever seen. The sleeves of his suit end just above his wrists, making his arms look even more elongated. He’s in the doorway, twisting the stem of his champagne glass, and I don’t intend to make conversation, but he referenced Beauty and the Beast. Any man who references Disney films without being prompted is worth making conversation with. ‘Are you trying to hide out too? I don’t go to parties like this. I was trying to be brave by coming tonight, but I’ll always prefer books to humans.’

‘Brave.’ He repeats the word, sounding surprised that I’ve spoken to him. ‘Yes, that. I don’t go to parties like this either. I don’t like people.’

Oh good, he’s a cheery, welcoming sort. And he isn’t stepping out of that doorway so I can make a run for it.

‘It’s disconcerting, isn’t it? So many people in one place.’ I do a comedy shudder, still trying to lighten the mood.

‘Er, yes.’ From what little I can see of his face, he looks taken aback by the fact I’ve continued the conversation, and we look at each other in silence for a few awkward moments, and then he surprises me by speaking again.

‘I thought the mask might make it easier to be brave. I’m not good at talking to people. It’s easier when no one knows who you are.’

‘But you still feel awkward and like an outsider, right? I’ve been trying to work out how so many people know each other. It’s meant to be anonymous. Talk about defeating the object.’

‘Very true.’ He smiles for the first time, the corners of his lips turning upwards just slightly. ‘And I don’t even like champagne.’

‘Me neither! And that makes you feel even more like an outcast because who doesn’t like champagne, right?’ The last thing I expected to find up here was a fellow awkward, non-champagne-loving outsider and there’s something about his little smile that makes me want to keep talking.

‘Cheers to that.’ He lifts his glass in a toast across the room, but instead of taking a sip, he puts it down on the corner table inside the door.

‘How about those fancy hors d’oeuvres?’ I continue. ‘All those fish canapés and fiddly little things. Who could be arsed to spend that long manipulating a piece of salmon that’s so small you can barely taste it? Give me a cup of PG Tips and a packet of custard creams any day.’

‘Yorkshire Tea Bedtime Brew and chocolate digestives. A biscuit tin would improve this soiree no end.’

‘I completely agree.’ I’m smiling at him across the room. Despite the icy first impression, he seems so… normal. On a night that’s been utterly absurd so far, he’s like a glowing flame of normality, reminding me that I’m not the only awkward one who feels like I don’t fit in. ‘So you came to explore the castle too?’

‘Came to seek solace in books. I was looking for some peace and quiet, but you’ve inadvertently found my favourite room in the house.’

Has he been here before? How can a guest have a favourite room? ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t expect anyone to notice me.’

His eyes run down my dress appreciatively, but he makes a great effort to keep his gaze only on respectful places. ‘You are unnoticeable. No, wait…’ He rubs at the back of his neck restlessly. ‘That came out wrong. You are un-unnoticeable. And now you should…’ He gestures behind him as though he’s telling me to leave.

But there’s something about him that makes me want this encounter not to be over yet. He’s the strangest man. He seems annoyed at finding me here, but also nervous and uneasy. He’s unusually tall, six-three or six-four, but awkward with it, like a teenager who hasn’t quite grown into his body yet, despite the fact he’s clearly an adult in his late-thirties or early forties. His dark hair has got one splash of grey near his right temple which I suspect makes him look older than he is, and I wish I could see his face. But then he would see mine too, and that would lead to all sorts of problems.

‘I was looking for a decoy book,’ I blurt out, trying to extend the conversation. ‘It seems like the kind of place where there’d be a book that’s secretly a switch to a hidden room or something. Wouldn’t that be cool?’

‘You don’t think this place has enough rooms without needing to find an extra one?’ He speaks slowly, as if he’s considering every word, but there’s a tone of disdain in his voice that suggests he thinks I’m a total loser. A Disney-loving overgrown child who really thinks she’s stepped into an animated movie.

‘No, I think it would be magical. I’ve always wanted to live somewhere with a bookcase that hides a secret room.’ I pull out a few more books, hoping I might come across the right one and prove I’m not out of my mind. When I risk a glance over my shoulder, he’s watching me with an intense look in his eyes, and maybe it’s a good thing I can’t see his face or it might be too intense.

‘There is.’

I wait an abnormally long time for him to elaborate, but he doesn’t. ‘Are you going to show me?’

‘Wasn’t planning on it.’

‘Seriously?’ I put my hands on my hips and give him the sternest look possible with half my face obscured by the mask. ‘You can’t say something like that and not show me.’

‘Maybe you should tell me why you’re poking around looking for a secret room.’

‘I wasn’t poking around.’ I slip the book I’m holding back onto its shelf to make completely sure that it doesn’t look like I was poking around, and then sigh because I was clearly poking around and he caught me red-handed. ‘Because the castle’s being sold and this might be my last chance. It’s like something from a fairy tale and I just wanted to know what it was like before it’s gone for good.’

‘Do you know what secret rooms around here hide? Ghosts, monsters, and spiders, and the only fairy-tale-ish thing likely to be here are the villains.’

‘I’d still like to see.’ I fold my arms. Surely no one can be so bad-mannered that they’d tell of a secret room but then refuse to show it?

His blue eyes run over me again for a minute and he shakes his head as though he thinks I’ve got a screw loose, and I’m certain he’s going to ask me to leave again.

‘May I?’ He holds a hand out towards the room, as if he’s asking my permission to come in, and I nod. Maybe he is a gentleman after all.

He steps down from the doorway and bumps into one of the tables and sets the lamp on it wobbling. ‘Sorry.’ He turns around to steady it, and I’m unsure if he’s apologising to me or to the lamp. Preferably the latter because I do that all the time, and apologising to inanimate objects makes him seem endearing and less standoffish than he has up until now.

‘Let’s see if I can remember where it was…’ he mumbles to himself as he goes to one of the bookcases on the opposite side of the room and runs exceptionally long fingers across the spines. ‘It was red. Purple? Brown? No, definitely red, up here somewhere…’

I love people who talk to themselves because it’s another thing I do all the time too.

He seems uneasy as he examines the shelves and then beckons me over. ‘For future reference, when looking for decoy books, the designers are often concerned they’ll forget which book is the decoy and leave certain clues for themselves…’ His finger rests on a red-spined leathery looking book, with gold printing for the title and author name.

‘Decoy by I. M. NotABook,’ I read aloud and then burst out laughing. ‘Oh my God, that’s brilliant. The previous owners must’ve had a cracking sense of humour.’

‘There’s a trick to this. Pull down and then to the left…’ He sounds as if he’s trying to remember it as he pulls the book forwards and down by the top of the spine, and then jolts it to the left. There’s a creaking noise and the unmistakable click of a lock opening, and the bookcase to my right shifts backwards slightly.

This castle is incredible. It really does have secret rooms! Talk about everything I dreamed it would be and more. If I didn’t love it already, I’d have fallen in love with it just for that. I go over and push on the shelf and it swings open to reveal a staircase that passes a window and curves upwards, like it’s some sort of tower.

And hasn’t been opened for many, many years.

I jump backwards as dust fills the air and a musty smell seeps in from the open doorway, and a spider scurries out of sight. I wave away cobwebs and peer upwards, but it’s dark outside and the window doesn’t let in enough light to see around the curve of the stairs.

My new friend stands next to me, keeping a respectable distance between us. ‘Well, the cleaners this week certainly didn’t find it. There you go, now you’ve seen it.’

‘Are you kidding? You’ve opened a bookcase to a secret room and you want to walk away?’ I raise an eyebrow and only then realise it’s ineffective with the mask on. ‘I’m going up. I’m not afraid of a few cobwebs.’

‘Your beautiful dress might be.’

I blush for no real reason. ‘Better cobwebs than the stuffy atmosphere downstairs.’

He lets out a laugh and then looks surprised that it managed to escape. He shakes his head and ducks through the doorway, taking the steps three at a time in long strides until he reaches the window, does something fiddly with the lock, and opens it, letting in the cool night air. He looks upwards and swipes a hand across the stairway, dragging down cobwebs heavy with dust.

He hasn’t invited me, but I follow him up the stairs. The walls are stone, the wooden boards of the staircase are a graveyard for dead woodlice, and his shoes leave footprints in the unidentifiable grime that’s settled in a layer over the floor. The stairs spiral around like we really are ascending a tower, and at the top, he fumbles until he finds a switch and a bare bulb flickers into life. Floorboards creak under our feet and I stand at the top of the stairs and look around as he crosses the room and throws open another window.

It’s a bedroom. A round bedroom at the top of a tower, like something out of a fairy tale. There’s a four-poster bed, a comfy-looking sofa that looks as if it was custom-made to fit the curve of the wall, bookshelves full of dusty books, and shelves of knick-knacks, stacked up board games and Lego sets from decades gone by. The air is thick with disturbed dust and I can feel it making my chest tight, so I go and stand next to him at the window and take a few gulps of fresh air.

There’s a moth-eaten item of clothing that may have once been a T-shirt on a chair nearby. He shakes it out and I stand back while he dusts the window ledge with it, and then leans on his elbows and looks out, pulling his suit sleeves up further and exposing more of his arms.

Even his wrists are gorgeous. What am I saying? The dust in this room must be scrambling my brain. I’ve never thought someone’s wrists are sexy before in my life.

I put my hands on the window ledge and push myself up until I can see as far out as possible, and I’m looking down into the courtyard, past the gabled roofs of the lower parts of the castle. Wow. We’re in the first tower, the one that overlooks Ever After Street, and even though it feels high from up here, it’s one of the shortest towers at the front of the castle.

Just being here makes me want to spin around in a circle and sing ‘When Will My Life Begin?’ from Tangled. ‘It’s just like Rapunzel’s tower.’

He looks over at me. ‘Wasn’t Rapunzel’s tower a prison?’

‘Well, yeah, but in a good way. A good version of Rapunzel’s tower. Maybe it is Rapunzel’s tower and we’ll find a cute chameleon living up here in a minute.’

He doesn’t seem like the kind of person who’d have seen Tangled so the reference probably goes over his head; his focus is on the view beyond the window and he seems miles away.

Ever After Street is glittering in the dark. Being a fairy-tale-themed shopping street means there are fairy lights everywhere. Strung across the road along with multicoloured bunting, and hanging in ropes between every lamppost, and wrapped around the posts themselves from bottom to top. The carousel is dark at this time of night, but there’s a glowing star on top of the tent covering it and lights run along every seam.

‘It’s beautiful up here.’ It feels like I’m standing side by side with someone I know, not someone I met fifteen minutes ago. ‘Thank you for showing me this.’

He looks across until his eyes meet mine. ‘You’re welcome.’

He talks in a kind of stilted way, as though he chooses as few words as possible, although the words he does use are soft and gentle, and spoken with a posh voice. Not stuck-up posh, but trustworthy, like a gentleman. How you’d imagine a prince in a fairy tale would speak. If the animated Prince Charming ever came to life, he’d sound like this mystery man.

‘This is a real hideaway. You could escape the world up here. Stay here and watch life go by out there, and no one would ever know you were here.’ I look out longingly. An escape from the world sounds like heaven some days. ‘It’d be like Quasimodo living in the bell towers of Notre Dame.’

‘Quasimodo’s tower was a prison too, wasn’t it?’

‘Well, yeah, but… It’s only a prison if you want to get out. Who would ever want to leave a place like this?’ I do a twirl of excitement again, and I can feel his eyes focusing on the skirt of my dress spinning out around me.

He shakes his head, looking back out at the view. ‘Ever After Street. I can’t believe they built up a whole street based around this castle. It never used to be like this, did it? That was where the servant cottages used to be…’

‘Yes?’ I say, surprised by his knowledge. Not many people would know that about Ever After Street, and yet he seems unsure and as though he’s asking me for confirmation. ‘It was more in tribute to the castle. People around here love this place. It’s like Disneyland but without the people in giant mouse costumes.’

‘Good, because they creep me out.’ His reluctant-sounding laugh makes me smile.

‘After the castle was abandoned, it became a bit of a tourist attraction, and someone saw the benefit of setting up a tearoom because there were tourists visiting and nowhere for them to go. It started off organically, just people who loved this area trying to make it better…’ I trail off because I don’t want to reveal too much or say anything that might give away who I really am.

‘A tourist attraction? Really? I thought it would just be left to ruin. Why would anyone be interested in this place?’

‘Well, the ghost stories, obviously. The viscount and viscountess disappeared and left the castle abandoned. They say something truly macabre happened here, but no one knows what, and you know how things like that go in small villages – if people don’t know, they make something up. It became the stuff of local legend. The entrance was sealed off so no one could do anything besides stare from a distance and invent what might’ve happened here, and then one by one, the servant cottages were sold off, turned into shops or demolished and built over…’

‘And as with everything else that's nice, someone came along and realised money could be made from it and turned it into a soulless commercial venture,’ he finishes for me.

‘No! Absolutely not. Ever After Street is nothing like that. It’s heartfelt and good and welcoming. It’s a real little community.’ He has no right to be so dismissive of my home. Just when I thought he wasn’t quite as prickly as he seemed at first, he throws out something like that.

I ignore the uncomfortable feeling that seeps through me, because in that one simple sentence, he’s hit the nail on the head about what Aunt Ebony has done to my mum and dad’s business. Something that was once done for love is now done for profit. That isn’t what The Cinderella Shop should be about, and yet, that’s what it’s become. And this complete stranger has unintentionally forced me into admitting it to myself, but I can’t let him know that.

‘The people on Ever After Street are genuine. Their shops mean the world to them. We—’ I cringe and correct myself. ‘They work incredibly hard to make the place as magical as it can be for children and adults alike. Children already believe in magic, it’s the adults who need some persuasion.’

‘Mmm. A nice sentiment.’

‘Don’t you believe in magic?’

‘Does any adult?’ He turns his head to look at me.

This close, his eyes are a light blue and I feel like I’m looking directly into his soul. A blush sweeps across my whole body from tiptoes to cheeks that are reddening behind my mask. I usually try to keep the whimsical side of me in check when meeting new people, but I don’t feel I have to hide anything from him. Maybe it’s the mask. I can be anyone I want tonight with no judgement because no one knows who I am. It doesn’t matter if I ask a grown man if he believes in magic. No one can laugh at my silly questions when they don’t know I’m me. ‘I do.’

He blinks slowly, holding my gaze for such a long time that it should get uncomfortable, but it doesn’t. I’m not very good at talking to people either. I tend to get flustered and only make eye contact when I remind myself to, but nothing seems to be awkward with him. My mouth tips into an involuntary smile, getting even wider when he starts to smile too, until he shakes his head and looks away.

‘Are you local?’ he asks and then hesitates. ‘Sorry, that was too much of a personal question when we’re meant to be anonymous.’

‘It’s fine. And I am. You?’

‘No. Just visiting. For work.’

‘This is a pretty splendid thing to be a part of your work trip.’

‘What, the castle?’ He makes a noise of indifference. ‘If you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all.’

‘Castles? I’ve never seen one before. Do you go to a lot of castles?’

‘I go to a lot of old buildings that used to matter to people and now don’t. They’re all the same after a while. There is no magic in the walls. No spells to be broken or cheerful fairy godmothers or enchantresses in disguise. They’re just hollow old shells that look impressive from the outside, but hide a myriad of sadness on the inside. People who live in castles are rarely happy, did you know that?’

I try to appear unaffected, but it makes me abnormally sad because it’s the sense I’ve felt from the castle tonight too. Instead of fairy dust and magic, there seems to be sorrow at every turn. ‘Most people hide behind a façade. A mask. I don’t think owning a castle makes much difference to that.’

‘The truest thing I’ve ever heard.’ His eyes linger on mine for too long again, and I get the feeling there’s more to be said, but it doesn’t seem like the time. I don’t know who he is or how he knew about the secret room, but I get the feeling he’s regretting coming up here, and not just because of the spiders.

And I get what he’s saying. Towers are rarely good places in fairy tales, from Sleeping Beauty’s slumber chamber to Cinderella’s attic room to the Beast’s spell-ridden fortress… ‘This is a special castle though. Like a sentinel up in the hills, a guardian, watching over Ever After Street. All those shops down there wouldn’t exist without it. It feels like a mutually respectful relationship. They look after the castle and it looks after them. It will be devastating to see a supermarket here.’

‘Change is good, so people tell me,’ he says with a shrug.

Talk of the supermarket is enough to ruin any evening, so I change the topic. ‘Have you been here before?’

‘No.’

‘Then how did you…’ I trail off before I finish the question. I’m desperate to ask, but this is supposed to be an anonymous ball, and he doesn’t exactly seem open and easy-going. If I make him answer too many questions, he’s going to expect the same from me, and I can’t let anyone know I’m here, not even him.

He must sense what I want to ask because he pushes himself up off his elbows and pulls his suit sleeves down, which does nothing to make them long enough for his arms. He strides across the room in the dull light and traces a finger along the stone wall until he comes to a cord and pulls it with both hands as though he’s lifting a blind, making his sleeves rise even further up his arms. There’s a creaking above him, and a part of the ceiling moves, taking cobwebs and their disgruntled inhabitants with it, and revealing a wide skylight right above the sofa.

‘Wow,’ I murmur, wondering how many times I’ve said that so far tonight. In years gone by, when the sofa was clean enough to sit on, it must’ve felt like you were looking up at the whole sky. ‘We’re so far up that I feel like I could reach out and touch the stars.’

‘I always—’ He goes to speak and then stops himself. ‘It’s a clear night. Let me turn the light off.’

He crosses the room to the switch he found earlier, and my eyes adjust to the darkness. There’s a clonk as he walks back across the room, and he murmurs an apology to the trunk he walked into. Apologising to inanimate objects again. It makes me feel even more of an affinity for him.

He comes to stand near me, intentionally keeping a distance. He seems to know that his height could be intimidating, and I like that self-awareness. He is kind of intimidating, but he’s intriguing too.

The skylight is perfect. Just big enough to fill your vision and block out everything else around it, making it feel like you’re in the middle of the sky. ‘How can anyone look at the night sky and not believe there’s magic in the universe?’

He doesn’t reply, but we stand there, side by side, looking up. The stars twinkle back at us and a tingle runs down my spine. This is the last thing I expected tonight. And it feels like that ‘something magical’ Scarlett predicted is happening right now.

Eventually the band downstairs strikes up with ‘A Whole New World’, the sound filtering through the open window, and we shake ourselves out of our reverie. He clutches the back of his neck as though it’s cricked from looking upwards and I twist my head around, trying to stop the ache.

‘The bolts holding my neck on are about to pop out,’ I say, and warmth spreads through me when he lets out a completely unguarded, big laugh, the kind of laugh that would make even the coldest winter day feel like summer.

I make my way to the stairs as he closes the skylight and shuts the window.

‘Thank you.’

I turn around and look back at him. ‘What for?’

He goes to speak and then shakes his head. ‘Something I can’t explain.’

His eyes linger on mine, and another little tingle travels down my back, and I tell myself to ignore it.

I hold up my dress and make my way down the narrow stairs rather than pushing him for an explanation. There are a lot of things neither of us can explain tonight, and that makes it better somehow. I’m not afraid to be myself. I’m not constantly on edge about doing something embarrassing. It doesn’t matter tonight. I’m never going to see him again. Actually, I’m never going to see him at all, am I? Our masks aren’t coming off, no matter what.

I blink as we emerge into the full light of the study. It feels like hours have passed, but it’s only been about twenty minutes. He clicks the door to the secret stairway closed, and then leans against the bookshelf to brush his suit down, and I do the same, sitting against the desk and leaning over to brush the bottom of my dress clear of the dust it picked up along the way. ‘That was amazing. Thank you.’

‘What for?’

I think about it for moment. ‘Something I can’t explain.’

He laughs as I deliberately repeat his words, but it peters out until we’re just looking at each other, and there’s that tingle again, stronger this time, harder to ignore.

It’s time to go. There’s no feasible way of dragging this out any longer. One of us is going to have to make a move towards the door, and then what? Maybe I could be brave enough to ask if he’d like to dance when we get back downstairs, and at least if he says no, my embarrassment will be hidden behind the mask. Could I ask him if he knows of any more secret passages we could explore? Whoever he is, he knows more about this castle than most of the other guests, but I don’t want it to seem like I’m being nosy and obtrusive when he wasn’t exactly forthcoming about showing me that one at first.

‘We should…’ He inclines his head towards the door, but makes no move to push himself off the bookshelf.

‘Yeah. Wouldn’t want anyone to come looking for us.’

‘Exactly.’ He sounds as reluctant as I feel, and it sends another fizzle down my spine that maybe he doesn’t want this to end yet either.

Still, we stare alternately at each other and the damask rug covering the floor, as though each of us is willing the other to say something, suggest something, anything to make this not be over yet.

‘Ladies first.’

‘Yes. Er. Right.’ I take baby steps towards the door. Come on, Sadie. Say something. Ask him something that will require a long answer, and maybe by that time you’ll have plucked up the courage to ask him to dance.

I’ve turned into my uneasy, bumbling self again, something that’s been missing since he walked in, and has only made a reappearance at the thought of saying goodbye.

I’ve reached the door and he’s not far behind me. I glance back at him. His hand comes up, and for a second, I think he’s going to reach for me, but he holds the door open instead, and I scold myself for the sting of disappointment as I step out onto the small landing area.

I glance back again and meet his eyes. There’s nowhere else to go from here. We’ll both have to go down the stairs, and by the time we’ve reached the bottom, I’ll have plucked up the courage to—

‘Do you want a cup of tea?’ The words burst forth as though he’s been building up to them, a garbled mess spilling out of his mouth.

‘Yes!’ I choke back a laugh of relief, and his shoulders sag and the smile that crosses his face is as relieved as mine.

It makes my heart sing. He must want this night to not-end yet too. ‘The way to any British girl’s heart. You know where we can get a cup of tea around here?’

‘The kitchen?’ He sounds confused, as though he thinks I might not know where cups of tea generally originate.

‘I think the kitchen’s been taken over by caterers. Have you seen how many waiting staff are in and out down there?’

‘Not the staff kitchen, the private kitchen.’

Surprise, again. He knows where the private kitchen is? He has access to the private kitchen? ‘Are we allowed?’

‘Anything’s allowed if we don’t get caught.’ He sounds like he’d be waggling his eyebrows if he didn’t have the mask on.

Once again, he doesn’t know how fitting that wording is for tonight.

He gestures towards the stairs. ‘Lead the way.’

‘I don’t know the way.’

‘Oh, yes, right. Sorry. May I?’ He squeezes past me in the doorway. Our bodies brush together and it sends heat racing through me. The organza of my dress tries to cling to the wool-and-silk blend of his designer suit and I’m glad the mask hides my burning cheeks.

When he’s on the small landing area, he turns back and holds his hand out to me – an open invitation.

I can’t remember the last time a man offered me his hand, but it makes me feel like a lady dating the most dashing gentleman, and I slip my fingers over his. His long digits close around them, and he stares at our joined hands for a moment, and his lower lip distorts as he bites the inside of it.

His hand is warm, his skin soft, and I’ve never held a hand that was a more perfect fit before, and the tingle that goes down my spine is more like a wave this time, followed by a shiver of goosebumps running up my arm.

His fingers involuntarily twitch, inadvertently squeezing mine. ‘This way.’

As I follow him down the stairs, I feel like a schoolgirl cutting class – giggly, excited, doing something naughty and forbidden, and when he looks over his shoulder with a smile, I know without a shadow of a doubt that it’s worth any bollocking I might get from the teachers.

4

We’re taking the scenic route. He dropped my hand instantly at the bottom of the stairs, and now we’re walking through elaborately decorated hallways with strapwork ceilings, stained-glass windows hung with red velvet curtains, polished wood panelling and chequerboard marble flooring, and stone statues set back in custom-made alcoves in the walls. Everything is the height of old-fashioned luxury, and even though the place has obviously had a thorough cleaning this week, it feels hollow and silent. We’re on the third floor now, even the noise from downstairs is dim from this far away, and you can hear the castle itself. Creaking, clanging, as though it’s whispering as we meander past. I’m almost positive that somewhere just out of sight, there’s sentient homeware gossiping among themselves.

The private kitchen is at the bottom of another tower, and as soon as we step into it, I’m drawn to the window. ‘Oh wow, that view.’

He turns the light out so I can see without reflections. It faces the opposite direction to Ever After Street, and we’re so high up that you can see for miles. Even though it’s dark outside, we’ve got a panoramic view right across Herefordshire and the neighbouring Gloucestershire. Over the trees in the woods below to the clearing where the river runs behind the castle, and beyond that, rolling green hills and trees, trees, trees for miles, bursting into leaf as they wake up for spring.

I glance at him, but he’s just waiting patiently in the doorway, and I love that feeling of being with someone who’s got all the time in the world for me. Most of my encounters with people are rushed. Clients are usually busy with a million other things to do in preparations for weddings or other important events. Scarlett always has to rush off to another hairdressing client. Ebony’s impatience edges into every conversation she has with me, but this nameless man has just taken me on a long walk around the castle, and everything feels the total opposite of the rush that my life usually is.

‘Can you imagine living here? Doing your cooking while looking at that?’

‘I’ve never really thought about it.’

‘Although I suppose the owners of somewhere like this would have servants to do the cooking for them, right?’

‘You’d be surprised. Most people who own places like this are struggling financially. A big old building of this level is a money sinkhole. It requires more maintenance and repair work than most people can afford. They buy castles for the prestige, but then the practical side kicks in and they’re forced to sell up. A castle is not just the initial investment, it’s everything that comes after it.’ He tilts his head, silently asking if it’s okay to put the light back on, and when I nod, he flicks the switch and steps into the kitchen. ‘Sorry, I’m spoiling all the fun of a fairy-tale ball and a “magical” castle.’ The intonation he puts on that one word leaves me with no doubt about his scepticism towards all things enchanted. ‘I’m too sensible for my own good.’

Sensible, like me. ‘Of course, we’re forgetting that anyone living here wouldn’t need servants because the cutlery comes to life and entertains you while you eat a dinner prepared for you by the household appliances.’

He gives me a tight smile, clearly not appreciating my affinity for Disney films or magical castles.

The private kitchen has stood still in time. It must be exactly as it was when the castle was abandoned in the early nineties, and the kettle he’s filled is boiling with a juddering burr that sounds not unlike a train speeding through the building. There’s a fridge freezer that’s got more rust on it than the white it once was, a microwave that would probably need a specialist harmful rays team if anyone dared to turn it on, an oven that definitely deserves some sort of listed status, and even though it’s been cleaned like everywhere else, the room pervades an aura of not being lived in for many, many years.

Despite that, it seems to be stocked with essentials, because he gets milk from the fridge and makes two cups of tea and carries them round to the unit in front of the window. He pulls two stools out from underneath it and I sit down gratefully, suddenly aware of how long I’ve been on my feet in unfamiliar shoes tonight.

‘Embarrassingly, there aren’t any biscuits in…’ He starts clattering around in the cupboards, opening and closing doors as though he’s looking for something. ‘So it’s either going downstairs and commandeering a plate of oyster and caviar tartlets or… birthday cake.’ He pulls a box from the cupboard and carries it across to the unit.

It’s a fondant-covered birthday cake with iced balloons on the top. I can’t stop a laugh bursting out.

‘What’s funny about that?’ He sounds mortally offended.

‘Nothing. It’s just my cous— a joke was made about birthday cake earlier. Is it someone’s birthday?’

‘No. Would you like to know a secret?’ He beckons me closer as though he’s going to reveal a previously unknown mystery of the universe. ‘One of the greatest pleasures of adulthood is the ability to buy a birthday cake even on the occasions when it’s not your birthday, and guess what? Nobody knows. You can go to any shop and buy a cake, and no alarm goes off if it isn’t imminently your birthday. No one questions you. Checkout staff and fellow customers simply assume that you have a friend or family member with an upcoming birthday, and no one is any the wiser.’

‘You are a genius, you know that? Birthday cake is one of my favourite things in the world, and it has never before crossed my mind that I could buy one for non-birthday-related reasons.’

‘Glad to be of service.’ He’s laughing as he gets the cake out and locates a knife and a cake server. He’s got a lovely laugh that’s as big as his smile, and I get the impression he doesn’t use either as often as he should. And he buys birthday cake just because he likes birthday cake. I’ve never thought that could be a top attribute for potential partners before, but from now on, I intend to judge every future boyfriend on their feelings towards birthday cake.

He crosses the kitchen to get two plates and comes back to cut the cake, and I can’t help watching the way he squints at it.

He must sense me watching. ‘Sorry, I usually wear glasses but I couldn’t get them on with the mask, and contact lenses…’ His mouth distorts as he pulls a face and shudders. ‘A big nope to putting things into my eyes, so everything’s a tad fuzzy tonight. That’s my excuse for the massive slices. I have no restraint when it comes to cake.’

He serves up two huge slices of cake, returns the box to the cupboard and comes back with two forks, and then sits down on the stool beside me.

He picks up his mug and holds it out. ‘Cheers to… um…’

‘Cheers to… random meetings. With fellow people who are graceless in the face of cake.’

We clink mugs and take a sip of tea at the same moment, and both let out a coordinated sigh of pleasure.

‘I don’t know why they bothered with all that fancy champagne and shredded lobster stuff downstairs. Tea and birthday cake is a million times better.’ I lean towards him. ‘To let you in on a secret, I was never in it for the fanciness of the ball. I only came tonight because I wanted to see the castle before…’ I stop myself mentioning the upcoming sale and dragging the mood down.

‘I thought I’d be the only person hiding away up here tonight. I’m… surprisingly glad that I’m not.’ His eyes catch mine and there’s a tiny emphasis on that ‘glad’ that makes my knees feel weak.

‘Me too,’ I murmur, trying to ignore the fluttering in my stomach. Butterflies? Over a guy I’ve just met? A guy whose name I don’t know and whose face I haven’t seen?

‘You can go back to the party whenever you want, you know. You don’t have to stay and hang out with the guy in the ill-fitting suit.’

Without thinking, I reach over and give his arm a squeeze. ‘There’s no place I’d rather be.’

He looks down at the spot where my fingers curl over his arm, blinking slowly, and I pull my hand back sharply. I don’t know why I did that. I force myself to look away and take another forkful of cake because I can’t keep staring at him, but it feels like something is sparkling is the air all around us, like Tinkerbell’s nipped in and sprinkled some fairy dust. Every time I look away, something pulls my gaze back to his. Every time I look at him, he’s got this tiny little smile on his face and I know mine mirrors it because there’s something about him that just makes me smile.

An easy silence falls as we finish off our cake and drink our tea. It would be easy to fill it with rambling or impersonal small talk about the weather, but there’s something very zen about him that makes me want to just be. To appreciate the silence with someone who doesn’t make me feel like I need to fill it.

Eventually he gets up and takes our empty plates and cups over to the sink, and then turns back to me. He goes to speak, but then stops and paces back and forth across the kitchen a couple of times, as though he’s reconsidering it, and then his eyes meet mine, and his lips move like they won’t work properly, and eventually a question spills out in a jumble of words that roll into one. ‘Would you like to see something else?’

‘I’d love to.’ I’m intrigued by how nervous he sounds again, but at my yes, a smile breaks across his face that’s the widest one he’s given so far tonight, the corners of his lips curving up so much that they’re hidden by the edges of his masquerade mask.

He holds his hand out to pull me up from my stool, and I slip my fingers over his gratefully, loving the way his close around mine with a little squeeze.

It sends another flutter through me because I was hoping for a way for this not to end yet, and maybe he was too.

5

The castle is a maze but he navigates it with ease, through wide echoey hallways and down grand staircases, the music from below gradually getting louder as we get closer to the ground floor again, and then we’re at the top of the stairs I came up, looking down at the main entrance hall. The two ballrooms on either side are still bubbling with people who sound a lot merrier than they were when I left. He stops at the edge of the stairway and puts a finger to his lips, and then peers around the banister as though he doesn’t want us to be spotted, and when the coast is clear, we hurry down the stairs. Instead of going back to the ballrooms, he tugs me alongside the staircase and past the staff kitchen door, and at that exact second, it opens.

‘Run!’ His hand tightens around mine and we take off through an open doorway and down a darkened hallway, leaving the light of the entrance hall behind us, hopefully along with whichever staff member was about to catch us. He opens another door and there’s an actual theatre inside, complete with a stage and rows of seating, and we weave around the edge of it and back into another hallway. His eyes are twinkling when he stumbles to a stop against the wall and I crash into him and fall against his solid chest.

He’s not upright, and his lips are right there and everything outside of them feels very far away and an adrenaline rush floods my body. His eyes burn into mine, his tongue wets his lips and his head lowers, and my hand automatically uses his chest to push myself up until my lips are level with his, and for just a second, I imagine us kissing. I imagine throwing caution to the wind and pulling his mouth to mine, but then my sensible side kicks in and I stumble backwards.

He pushes himself upright and goes to shove a hand through his hair, but realises at the last minute that the mask is in the way and accidentally clonks himself in the forehead instead. ‘Adrenaline rush.’

‘Adrenaline, yeah.’ I shake my head at myself. I got carried away. I never would have actually kissed him, but for just a moment there, I wanted to. I could have. The possibility that I am someone who would kiss a stranger hangs in the air, and I like it. It makes me feel unrestrained and carefree, the opposite of my usual self.

He walks back to the end of the hallway to double-check we weren’t followed, and then we go across another room, a stately living room-type area with bookcases, a sofa and armchairs. Probably original oil paintings in lavish gold frames line the walls, and a grandfather clock is ticking in the corner, and then we’re in another hallway, this one with honey-coloured brick walls and glass panels in the roof so it’s lit by the moon above, and lined on one side by wall-planters with the dead strings of some once-living plant still spilling from each one, and that feeling of standing still in time prickles again, like if someone only came along and watered them, they’d come back to life, just as they were when they were abandoned.

He seems to be counting as he moves slowly along the corridor, but I’m not sure what – until he stops, presses the flat of his hand against a brick, and sure enough, a part of the wall shifts backwards and he slides it aside on silent runners.

‘Another secret door!’ I say in shock. To the untrained eye, there is absolutely no difference between that part of the wall and every other part, and yet, he knew exactly what he was doing. ‘Where does it lead to?’

‘Secret.’

I raise an eyebrow and then remember again that he can’t see me doing it. I peer in but it doesn’t give anything away. It’s a narrow walkway that looks dark and foreboding.

Should I be honoured? Scared? Slightly wary that he might be a lunatic and is leading me into some kind of hidden dungeon for definitely not Prince Charming-type purposes?

‘Sorry, I don’t have my phone on me for a torch.’

‘Me neither.’ Phones seemed like the sort of thing best left at home tonight.

He’s smiling again, his lips pressed tightly together and tipping upwards like he’s trying to hold back a laugh. ‘Do you trust me?’

I don’t know. Do I? It’s that moment from Aladdin, right before Jasmine steps onto the magic carpet. In my head, I know the horror stories. The instinct every woman has about going into dark places with strange men when no one knows where you are, but I think I’m generally a good judge of character, and I feel safe with him.

‘It’s not going to be a dungeon, is it?’

‘Nothing so macabre.’ He’s stepped inside the doorway and he holds his arm out, inviting me to slip my hand through the crook of his elbow, and it’s such a nice, chivalrous gesture that I do it. Because even though he’s a bit aloof and cynical, he also seems every inch the gentleman – suave, dapper and polite, and it’s been a long time since anyone treated me like a lady. He’s either a real gent or the world’s most sophisticated serial killer.

He pushes the wall shut behind us and stands for a minute to let our eyes adjust to the darkness. ‘So how does the false wall rate on the list of castle clichés?’

I can’t help laughing. ‘Well, between that and the decoy book, it’s ticking all the boxes. The only disappointing thing so far is that my teacup didn’t blow bubbles when I drank. Secretly hoping we might be on the way to find a torn portrait of a prince-turned-beast though.’

He laughs too. It feels like we’re both a bit nervous, a bit out of our comfort zones and doing something we wouldn’t usually do, but in the best way possible. My hand is curled around his elbow, the back of it held against the smooth material of his suit jacket, and I can sense his eyes on me when he keeps glancing down, and I keep glancing up at him, and every so often we catch each other’s eyes and look away quickly.

Our footsteps echo along the corridor until he stops, takes a jangle of keys from his pocket and unlocks a door, letting in a rush of cool night air.

‘It’s a secret garden!’ I’m surprised as we step outside onto a patio. There’s a wall surrounding half the garden and a waist-high neatly cut hedge fencing us in on the other side, a paving stone patio area with decorative planters all the way around it, each one housing a rose bush with different colour flowers, so perfect that it could be like the Queen of Hearts’ garden in Alice in Wonderland and someone’s been out here painting them. ‘A secret rose garden. Wow.’ I seem to be incapable of saying any other words to express my delight. ‘How is this still here?’

‘There’s a castle gardener. He’s kept up maintenance of the grounds over the years. The castle’s been locked up but there’s a path down to the lower gardens on the other side of that wall.’

We’re not on ground level; it’s like a private garden to one of the towers, and on the opposite side of the wall he’s pointing to are the upper windows of a ballroom and the music from below is filtering up. There’s a stone fountain burbling in one corner with a single penny in the basin. A wish. Whose? His? The gardener’s? I look over at him, but his mask gives nothing away. I trace my fingers across one of the many roses; this one has pink petals splashed with white and a sweet floral scent. ‘This is the most romantic place I’ve ever seen in my life.’

‘I thought your beautiful dress deserved better than filthy towers and retro kitchens. If there’s any magic in this old castle, I think it would be found here.’ His voice is a whisper that makes me want to whisper in response. It doesn’t feel like the kind of place for talking at normal volume. There’s something so lovely about the way he speaks – slowly and deliberately, as though he’s thinking about every word before it comes out. The kind of princely voice that makes me want to close my eyes and just listen.

‘Your dress is…’ He stutters as if he can’t complete the sentence. His lips move but no words come out, and eventually he shakes his head. ‘It’s rendered me speechless. It’s… a phenomenon.’

Words that could sweep me off my feet. ‘Thank you.’ I can’t tell him why that means so much, but the amount of time it took him to settle on that word makes it feel incredibly meaningful.

He reaches out slowly and lifts a fold of rainbow silk and sky-blue organza from my skirt and rubs his thumb over it, looking down as though it’s something revered, and using such a careful touch that it’s like he’s scared of tearing it with his huge fingers. ‘The whole sky in a dress.’

Eventually he lets go and murmurs an apology, even though he has nothing to apologise for. Being under his gaze feels special somehow.

He goes over to a white rose bush and goes to pluck one, looks at me, and then reconsiders and sidesteps to cut off a red one instead. As he comes over, he’s brushing every thorn from the stem, and he holds the rose out.

My fingers touch his as I take it and hold it to my nose to inhale the scent, letting my eyes close at the romance of the gesture. No one has ever given me a rose before.

‘May I?’

I nod, and he takes the rose carefully from my hand and tucks it behind my ear, letting his fingers trail through my hair as he steps away.

I open my eyes and meet his and he starts laughing. ‘Was that the cheesiest thing anyone’s ever done? I swear there’s a spell on this castle tonight. I lose my mind every time I look at you.’

I laugh too. ‘It was nice. Cheesy, but nice. Rom—’ I go to say ‘romantic’ but I don’t want to make it awkward.

I smile at him and he smiles at me and it’s like there’s a warmth in the air between us. It’s not cold tonight and it’s not too warm, it’s the most perfect night anyone could’ve dreamt of.

‘Would you do me the honour of dancing with me?’ He holds his hand out again, another perfect Prince Charming pose, and if I didn’t know better, I’d think there was a genuine chance that he really is royalty. Surely non-aristocrats don’t behave like this?

I slip my hand into his and he pulls me gently closer, still keeping a respectful distance between our bodies.

‘It’s not going to be “Tale As Old As Time” is it?’

I break the intensity by making him laugh, and he holds up a finger. ‘I have an idea. Hold that thought.’

He goes to the wall in the far corner, swings his legs over it and drops down onto the other side. There are a few noises: the rattle of keys again, the sound of a window opening, and the music from downstairs filters up, louder now. He must’ve opened a window to the ballroom below. He jumps back over the wall with ease on such ridiculously long legs.

‘All the fun of the party with none of the crowds.’ He brushes his hands off and reassumes the position, and I slip my fingers over his again.

The singer below is having a break and the orchestra are playing Tchaikovsky’s ‘Waltz of the Flowers’ from The Nutcracker Suite and the classical tune filters up from below, loud enough to hear but quiet enough not to be a disturbance.

His right hand closes around my ribs, and his left hand extends to hold onto mine, and we start a waltz. Usually I’d be overthinking it, but everything feels different with him. It’s a night of romantic firsts. Just as no one’s ever given me a rose before, no one’s ever danced with me in the moonlight before, and I’m not sure things have ever felt so natural with someone.

I remember doing this with my father when I was little, standing on his shoes and practising a ‘Cinderella’ dance that I’d do at my future wedding. Doesn’t every little girl dream of one day wearing a ballgown and dancing with a man she loves more than anything else in the world? Dreams like that were quickly wiped out as I grew up, but tonight, I feel like that little girl again. As if anything is possible. As though fairy-tale castles and Prince Charming can exist in real life, and you can really go to balls and meet a prince. A figurative prince. I’m fairly sure he’s not actual royalty.

‘I haven’t done this for a long while. My father taught me to dance when I was young. He mistakenly believed I’d have a lot of use for twirling fair maidens around a ballroom.’

‘My father taught me too. I grew up under the illusion that there were many more Prince Charmings in the world than there actually are, and the movies make you believe that you’ll attend a lot more fairy-tale balls than you actually do.’

He’s strong and firm, holding me steady, and although it’s been years since I danced, each move is instinctive. I mean, we’d probably get a one out of Craig Revel Horwood on Strictly Come Dancing, but it feels right tonight.

He spins and twirls me and lifts me with ease, and with every twirl, the skirt of my dress crashes against him like a wave, the soft rustle of the many layers of fine fabric adding to the atmosphere of the night.

The castle encloses us, as though we’re right in the heart of it. Behind us are brick walls, and in front are the trees that surround the castle and the hills. The almost round moon glowing down will be full later this week, and there are no lights out here to take away the view of a million twinkling stars. His aftershave has taken over every other sense. He smells of the darkest chocolate and the driest wood, something inky and bewitching, and I’m not sure I’ve ever smelt anything sexier.

‘Your dress moves like the ocean.’ His voice is a deep whisper and he has to swallow a few times before he can get any words out. ‘I’ve never seen anything like it before. It’s like dancing with a cloud.’

‘Thank you,’ I say again, my mouth suddenly dry from the closeness of his body. ‘It feels like wearing a dream. I don’t wear clothes like this in real life.’

‘That was made for you.’

Oh, if only he knew how true that was. ‘Look a bit daft walking round Tesco though, wouldn’t it?’

He bursts out laughing so hard that he missteps and nearly overbalances us both. ‘Ah, the illusion of being dashing and debonair can only last for so long. Sorry.’

Everything about him makes me feel normal. There’s an ease between us, a feeling that neither of us needs to hide our true selves. He looks every inch the Prince Charming, but beneath the expensive suit and shiny shoes, he’s like me. Awkward and used to not fitting in. He seems shy, kind of clumsy, and he’s someone who chooses tea over champagne and who buys birthday cake for the sake of it, and that is what makes him so charming.

As the song reaches a crescendo, his hands close around my waist and he lifts me up for a final spin, and I feel like a firework spinning in the sky as he lowers me slowly, my hands on his shoulders as he sets me down and steps back, and with one hand behind his back and one over his heart, he bows.

I’ve never curtseyed before in my life, but it feels right, like Ella and Kit ending their dance in the live-action Cinderella film. He is every inch the gallant prince and every woman deserves a night like this in their lives. It’s so perfect that I’m convinced I’m going to wake up at any moment, because it must be a dream.

We’re standing, staring at each other. My eyes haven’t left his since the beginning of the song. The way he’s looking at me is breath-taking, and it makes me feel like my whole body is vibrating with anticipation of the next touch.

He reaches out and runs his fingers through my long, straight hair, a million miles away from my usual curls. His hand lingers, touching it like the Beast touches Belle’s hair when he gives her the magic mirror – as if he’s trying to commit the moment to memory forever. It makes me feel like the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen.

In my real life, I am someone who people look straight through. A seamstress on the edges of their awareness. I listen to instructions, make suggestions, take measurements over and over again, but at the end of the day, what people see are the dresses I make. I’m a side effect of that. Not someone who deserves the level of reverence that he’s bestowing upon me.

His tongue wets his lips and he swallows. ‘Ask me again if I believe in magic.’

The words make my knees go weak. It’s such a simple, beautiful question, and the answer is shown so unflinchingly in his blue eyes. ‘I don’t need to ask.’

That smile again. His eyes and mouth are so expressive that I’ve forgotten so much of his face is obscured. His smile could turn water into something better than wine, like hot chocolate with marshmallows. The kind of smile you can see once and then never, ever forget. Even when you’re ninety, you’ll still be able to picture it every time you close your eyes.

The singer has come back and the next song that reaches us from the window below is ‘Once Upon a Dream’ from Sleeping Beauty, fitting considering I’m convinced this is a dream.

‘I love this song,’ I whisper, and he steps closer, puts his hand on my waist and pulls me tight against his body. It starts off as a waltz again, but I’m enjoying the closeness so much that I relax in the solid cage of his arms, my fingers brushing his shoulder and running down his arm. ‘Got to appreciate Disney teaching a caveat to the traditional lesson of not talking to strangers you meet in the woods… unless they’re good-looking.’

It makes him laugh again. ‘You’re dancing with a stranger tonight.’

‘Doesn’t feel like it though, does it?’ My mouth is almost too dry to speak.

He swallows hard enough to hear, which is all the answer I need.

It feels like the stars from the sky have fallen down and are sparkling between us and I move in a way I never thought possible. I float rather than step. I’m dainty and elegant rather than clumsy and tomboyish. Time loses all meaning. Nothing outside of his bright eyes and his smile is important now.

I lean back in his arms as he spins us around, my arms extended, elegant like a swan, the dress moving with me, creating a momentum that makes it feel as though we’re gliding.

I’m dizzy in the best way possible when we slow down, giddy with the sheer joy of how good it feels and intoxicated by his smile as we unsteadily wobble back into a normal waltz.

‘What you said earlier about wearing a mask,’ he murmurs. ‘Do you wear a mask?’

‘More than you could ever know.’ It’s the first time I’ve admitted that out loud and it makes me realise how true it is. Life is nothing like I expected it to have turned out, and a night like this makes me realise that something has got to change.

‘Me too.’

‘You?’ I look up at him. Tall, gallant and good-looking. ‘You don’t seem like the kind of person who’d need to pretend to be something you’re not.’

‘I think… pretending not to be something I am… is a better fit.’

I feel those words in my soul.

‘And yet, I feel like I’m not wearing one tonight. Ironic, really.’ He gestures to the mask on his face.

‘Me too.’ If ever there was a night for unflinching honesty, this is it. And there’s something about him. I get the feeling he’ll know if I pretend otherwise, and for once, I don’t want to be anyone other than myself. Even though I’m as dressed up as I’ve ever been, I feel as exposed as if he could see inside me. ‘In real life, I’m invisible. I exist on the side-lines and blend into the background, watching life go by without me.’

‘That can’t be right.’ He smiles down at me. ‘You’re the most memorable thing I’ve ever seen.’

He’s trying to be nice, but he’s unintentionally reinforced what I was saying. My dress is the most memorable thing he’s ever seen. But me? He hasn’t seen me.

‘But I get it,’ he adds. ‘In my real life, I’m a middleman between people and… a thing.’ He clearly can’t elaborate without giving too much away. ‘People only see the thing. The middleman is overlooked. Forgotten. I fade into the background like I was never there.’

‘I get that more than you know. I’m a middleman too. Well, middle-woman. I create… a thing, and people only see the thing, not the person behind it. And that’s always been okay with me, I’m not a “front-and-centre” type of person, but I wish… There are certain people in my life who I wish would listen to me and take my ideas seriously. I’m not very good at putting things into words and asking for what I want.’

His answering smile is full of understanding. ‘Words are my problem too. In my head, sophisticated and articulate. In my mouth…’ He makes a noise of a splutter crossed with stepping in a sludgy puddle and pulls a face that makes me laugh. ‘Can I just say that you are… spectacular, and anyone who doesn’t value you… well, that’s a reflection on them, not you.’

How can you go from laughing to the verge of tears in three quarters of a second? ‘Thank you.’ I say the words so quietly that he has to lip read.

We’ve drifted closer, and we’re not doing any kind of proper dance now. His hands are on my hips and mine are around his neck, just swaying to the music as the song reaches its final note, and there’s a lull while the singer downstairs starts the next request.

I could look into his eyes for the rest of my life. I could feel safe in these arms forever. The respectable distance between us has gone and my body is pressed against his as closely as possible. His fingertips are so warm through my dress that it feels as though they’re leaving permanent brands on my skin. There’s a deep cleft in his chin and I let my thumb rest in it as my fingers skim his jawline, brushing against the edge of his mask.

His eyes close and that sense of peace settles over me again, like nothing I’ve ever felt before. It would be so easy to curl my fingers around his mask and gently pull it away and remove mine as well. Would he complain if I did? It doesn’t seem like he would, but this night, this ball… Maybe the magic is in the anonymity. I can say anything to him, I can be honest, because neither of us know who we’re dancing with. Will that be ruined if we take off our masks?

I like being the glamorous and mysterious partygoer. The elegant mystery woman with the sleek and styled hair and the dress that looks like the sky. What if I take off my mask and he’s disappointed? What if we make plans to see each other again, and next time, the frazzled woman who turns up will be wearing combat trousers, a tape measure around her neck, and have hair that looks like it’s been styled via the medium of sticking fingers into a plug socket?

I am not the person I look like tonight. This night is perfect. I don’t want to ruin that by revealing my true self.

The music from below continues and my fingers can’t stay still. They trace up and down the back of his neck, into his dark hair and across the thick elastic that holds his mask on, and back down again. His hands skim up and down my back, his arms around me, holding me steady with every shiver that runs through me each time he reaches the top of my dress and his fingers brush the bare skin of my back. It feels more intimate than anything has ever felt before.

‘Can I ask you something?’

‘Mhmm,’ I mumble in response, unsure if I’m capable of actual words.

‘Am I imagining this?’ The words don’t come out right and he swallows and clears his throat. ‘I feel like I’ve met someone I was meant to meet. I feel at ease around you, and I’m not the type of person who feels at ease around anyone. There’s something in the air tonight. Do you feel it too?’

I pull back and look up into his eyes. ‘I was hoping you were going to say that. I thought maybe I was the one imagining it.’

‘Can I…’ We’ve stopped moving and his fingers come up to trace my jaw, and his eyes focus entirely on my lips, leaving no doubt about what he’s asking. His arm that’s around me has loosened, allowing me to step away if I want to, and he makes no move to get any closer without permission. Little gentlemanly things that make all the difference.

I nod.

He tightens his hold on me and his other hand tilts my head gently as he bends and his head lowers, tilted in the opposite direction to avoid our masks clashing.

It’s like electricity when his lips touch mine. A buzz that blocks out everything else in the world. Every hair on my body stands on end and every pore turns into a goosebump. I let out a moan at how good it feels. I’ve never felt this special before. My fingers slide along his jaw and curl into the short hair at the back of his neck to pull him closer, and he moans into it too, and it makes it feel even more intense that kissing me is having an effect on him too.

It’s the most perfect kiss I’ve ever experienced. The kind of kiss they write fairy tales about. A kiss that I’ll tell my grandkids about someday and they’ll think it’s a thing of myth because kisses like that don’t actually happen in real life.

I’ve never kissed someone I don’t know before. I’m far too sensible for that sort of thing, but it doesn’t feel like I don’t know him – it feels like I was meant to meet him too, and the universe did what the universe does to ensure we were in each other’s path tonight.

Everything outside of his lips and his body has faded into nothing and the only things I can focus on are his mouth and his dark and alluring aftershave and the feelings tingling through me, a wave of happiness that’s making me emotional at how right this feels.

And then… a banging filters through the haze of kissing him. Something distant and faraway and not as important as the kiss. No, it’s not a banging. More of a clonking. A dong, like a chiming.

Chimes! Midnight! I scream and push him away. ‘I have to go!’

He pulls back in surprise. ‘What?’

I stare at him in horror. This has to end now. ‘I’m sorry, I have to go. I wasn’t meant to be here, and…’

He looks like I’ve punched him in the face. His eyes behind the mask don’t hide any of the shock and disappointment, and his lips move as though he’s struggling for something to say. ‘No, don’t. Please.’

God, this guy. Every fibre of my being is screaming at me to stay. Like an anchor pulling me backwards, and my mind is racing. What’s the worst that can happen if I’m not there when Ebony gets back?

She’ll never agree to hand The Cinderella Shop over to me if she knows I’ve broken her trust like this.

This guy is something special. I know that. I’ve never felt like I do tonight. I want to stay. I want to take my mask off and tell him everything about me and I want to know everything about him. But I’m always annoyingly sensible. I don’t take chances. I don’t rock boats. I don’t want to upset people, and if my aunt knows I went to the ball, everyone else on Ever After Street is going to know too. They’re going to know I let them down. That I didn’t stand up to the threat of a supermarket like they did. That I came to the ball thrown only to support the selling of the castle.

‘Thank you for an incredible night. This isn’t you, it’s me. I should never have come here.’

His fingers hold onto mine for as long as possible as I back away, until just the tips are touching. He’s leaning forward to prolong the contact and it feels as if they drop in slow motion. I look around for an exit. Back through the castle will take too long. That corridor, having to get him to find the keys or the secret brick or whatever, prolonging the agony of saying goodbye, it’ll be impossible. My eyes fall on the low wall he vaulted over earlier, and I lift up my dress and make a run for it.

‘Wait, don’t go. Tell me your name! Your number! Where to find you! This can’t be over!’

It has to be over. I was never meant to be here, and I can’t explain that to him, not in a way that makes sense. ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I don’t want to go – I have to go. I’m too sensible for my own good too. And I’m late. I’m so late.’

I throw my legs over the wall and my body follows, dropping down onto a grassy verge, and then down steep concrete steps into the castle gardens, rectangles of lawn surrounded by smooth paths, statues and fountains and pretty white benches. There are well-maintained flowerbeds bursting with spring flowers and freshly trimmed topiary shapes everywhere, and I dodge around them and run.

It’s midnight. If my aunt’s flight was on time, she’s already at the shop. And if I’m not, she’s going to know exactly where I’ve gone.

The gate isn’t far. Through the hedge that hides the gardens from sight and I’m back at the entrance, doormen still on the door where I handed my ticket in hours ago.

There are footsteps behind me. He’s following.

I race down the stone walkway, walled on either side, and his footsteps are getting closer. Mine echo up from the ground below, leaving no secret of where I’m going.

His legs are a hell of a lot longer than mine and he can cover ground much faster than I can. And it’s not that I don’t want him to – it’s that he can’t catch up. Ebony is probably already at the shop. If I have any chance of saving myself, I cannot go barrelling in wearing a ballgown with a handsome prince on my heels. She’s not going to believe that I picked him up on a late-night wander round Lidl, is she?

My wedge heels are a hindrance on the cobblestones and the dress is so floofy that it’s a hazard, even though I’m trying to keep it gathered up. I can sense his moonlit silhouette behind me, gaining on me, and I do the only thing I can think of. I reach down and yank my shoes off. I’m not used to heels and I’m slipping and sliding every which way. I usually walk around in socks at work and only shove flat shoes on when I see a client. I’m better barefoot.

I try to bundle them together in the same hand so I’ve still got one free to steady myself, but it’s just too much and I drop the pair of them. I grab one, but one has rolled behind me, and I turn to go back for it, but he’s right there, already halfway down the walled walkway. A few strides and he’ll catch me.

‘Wait!’ he calls. ‘Please wait!’

I meet his eyes across the distance, one final time, and then I force myself to turn and run, leaving the shoe. A pair of shoes is a small price to pay for any hope of getting back to the shop before Ebony.

If I stay on the main path to Ever After Street, he’ll catch up in seconds. Instead of following it, I jump the wall at the end of the stone road to the castle, scramble down the bank, and disappear into the depths of the Full Moon Forest.

It’s not a very Cinderella-esque exit, far from hordes of palace guards thundering after me on horseback, but at least it’s not the original Grimm Brothers’ Cinderella with the tar on the stairs. That would’ve been seriously messy.

I can hear him calling ‘Come back!’ but it’s distant now. I dash through wild raspberry bushes, jump over roots and slip between tree trunks. These are my woods. I know them better than the back of my hand, and tonight they are my saviour. They provide a shortcut back to Ever After Street. Years of wandering through them, daydreaming of the fairies that are said to live here, escaping from school bullies and my aunt’s unreasonable demands, it all feels like it led to this moment, because when I need them the most, the forest gives me the cover I need to disappear, and I’m at the back door of the shop in minutes.

It’s mercifully silent. She isn’t here yet.

I fall into the back room and nearly impale myself on a coat hanger as I unhook the fastenings of my dress and clamber out of it. I yank my mask off and with it comes the rose he tucked behind my ear.

There’s the rev of a car engine from out the front. Ebony. I shove the dress onto a rail of returned dresses to hide it and bury my one remaining shoe under a pile of fabric on my workbench. I grab a spare piece of satin and rub it over my face to get rid of the make-up, yank on a long T-shirt, and—

‘Sadie!’ Her key turns in the lock and a breeze rushes in as she opens the door.

‘I’m up! I’m up!’ I shout, shoving a hand through my hair to pull out the half-up do and dragging out a handful of sparkly pins that skitter across the floor. I kick them aside and rush out the front, stumbling to a dishevelled halt centimetres away from barrelling into Ebony’s composed form.

‘What on earth happened to your hair?’

‘Scarlett! Scarlett was practising; I must’ve fallen asleep while she was doing it.’

‘If that’s how she makes her clients look, she needs to reconsider her job,’ she says with a sneer. ‘And for goodness’ sake, learn to remove your make-up properly before you go to bed, it’s terrible for your skin and you have enough problems in that department.’

‘Yes, Aunt Ebony.’ I touch my nose defensively. I know my oily T-zone never really grew out of the adolescent years, but someone pointing it out does nothing to make me less self-conscious of it.

I fake a yawn to further demonstrate the ‘just fallen out of bed’ act.

‘Oh, do stop that, Sadie. If anyone has a right to be tired, it’s me. I’ve been travelling for hours, and coming here is another delay I didn’t need tonight. I want to go home for a hot shower to wash the airplane off me and to sleep in my own bed, so stop dawdling.’

I trot after her obediently as she goes over to the counter and throws papers down on it. I rifle through them, trying to make head or tail of them, and then look up helplessly, waiting for her to explain.

She clicks her tongue, annoyed that I can’t magically divine what the sketches are. She turns the drawing around so it’s the right way up. ‘This is what that Finnish reality star has ordered from us.’

‘That? What is that? Why does it have… tentacles?’ It looks as if you’d need to be a spider to get it on and I debate turning the sketch around again – it looked better upside down. ‘That’s not clothing, that’s lingerie. It belongs in the bedroom on a saucy weekend away with an eight-armed spouse, by the looks of it. There are plenty of lingerie shops that can provide your Finnish friend with that – I’m not making it. It’s two nipple covers and a gusset.’

‘Joined by plenty of see-through black fishnet, which we have in the store room.’

‘The store room is my flat.’

‘Which is exactly why I don’t charge you much rent on it.’ She pats my cheek. ‘By Wednesday, please, I need to get it shipped to Finland by Saturday.’

‘Wednesday! Ebony, I can’t, I’ve got three bridesmaid dresses and a mother-of-the-bride outfit to match a wedding dress and they’re coming in for the fitting on Tues—’

‘Well, you’d better get on with it rather than making such a fuss, hadn’t you?’

‘But this is… trashy. No one normal would wear this in a million years. It isn’t appealing, and it has no business being associated with a shop on Ever After Street. We’re a shop that makes wedding dresses and kits out teenagers for proms. Small children used to stand and stare at princess dresses in our window. If it gets out that we’re making things like this, we’ll probably be banned for being non-child-friendly. This is a walking wardrobe malfunction.’

‘It’s a walking wardrobe malfunction that’s paying good money. I don’t see you out there dragging in new clients and we need all the new clients we can get. We’re going under, Sadie, you know it as well as I do. Gone are the days when we could lackadaisically sew anything we fancied and put pretty floaty dresses in the window and people flocked from miles around to see our perfect creations. We make anything we get paid to make – your opinion of it is irrelevant.’

I go to protest but she pats my other cheek, somehow managing to out-do herself on the patronising front. ‘One day this will all be yours and you can run it however you want. Until then, you listen to the experienced businesswoman who works her fingers to the bone to bring in prestigious new clients and knows the ins and outs of profit and loss.’

I glance at her fingers – freshly manicured in Finland, by the looks of it. ‘You sew it then.’

‘You’re the seamstress, not me. We’ve always agreed to work to our strengths, haven’t we? Sewing is yours, dealing with clients on the shop floor is Scarlett’s, and I thrive in the world of business and celebrity. Let’s not deviate from our particular lanes, hmm?’

This is all wrong. It’s all gone so wrong. My mum and dad would be mortified if they saw the kind of clothing we make now. I glance down at the sketch again. While lingerie has its place, The Cinderella Shop isn’t it. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to look sexy for a partner, but we make dresses for people to wear on days of their dreams, not tentacle-laden catsuits that barely cover the wearer’s modesty.

Half an hour ago, I was a princess, dancing with an incredible man and feeling like the world was at my feet. Now, I feel lower than a rat crawling around the gutter. Useless and ineffectual, like I have no say over my own life and what happens in it. And something has to change.

Meeting him has buoyed my confidence. Some chances are worth taking. If I hadn't been brave enough to go tonight, I would never have met him. Magic still exists in the world if you have the courage to look for it.

He's made me feel like anything is possible.

Maybe he's not the only good thing that can happen tonight. ‘Ebony, I've been thinking…’

She sighs, as though me thinking always ends badly.

‘I don’t want to do this any more. We’re going under because of clothing like this.’ I tap the paper on the counter. ‘We’ve lost who we are. People don’t come in because the clothes in the window are off-putting. They don’t appeal to your average person. And they’re too expensive. We don’t need exclusive clients who’ll pay hundreds of pounds for a dress – we need normal people who’ll pay what they can afford for a special occasion. The cost of living is going up and people can’t afford—’

‘Which is exactly why I target the rich and famous who can afford your beautiful dresses.’

‘No. This is the opposite of what my mum wanted when she started the shop. She wanted to make people happy, she—’

‘—was in huge debt when I took over, you know that. That’s what happens to people whose business model is “making people happy”. Happiness doesn’t pay the bills.’

‘Neither does clothing like this.’ I wave the sketch about in front of her, trying not to let the frustration turn into an emotional outburst. My mum’s legacy is being trampled all over and it’s her own sister who’s doing the trampling and she refuses to listen. ‘People laugh at us. Instead of Cinderella, our clothing is better suited to the Ugly Sisters. It’s time to change. I’m old enough now. More than old enough.’ I think of his eyes. The strength in his voice when he said that about valuing me and it gives me the courage to continue. ‘I want to take over The Cinderella Shop. Now. Not in some unknown number of years’ time when you “deem me ready”. Now. Today.’

She laughs. ‘I’ve had a long day, Sadie. I’m tired. I don’t want to talk about it.’

‘Well, I do. There will never be a time that you don’t find inconvenient to talk about what’s happening here. This stupid guarantee of finding love or getting your money back needs to go. I’m spending hundreds on fabric and hours of my time to make dresses that people can wear for one night and then return for a full refund, which then sit out the back on rails and do nothing. No wonder we’re operating at a loss. Something needs to cha—’

‘What’s got into you tonight?’

His eyes. His smile. The strength in his words. The way I felt, spinning around with his huge hands on my body, the feeling of being safe and protected from all bad things… I don’t need to be protected by some handsome definitely-not-prince, but it made me realise there are not-good things in my life and I’m the only one with the power to change them. ‘I can save this shop. I know I can, but not if you don’t let me.’

‘Oh, you are dramatic, Sadie. We’ve been over this. You’re a seamstress, like your mother, and while your talent is appreciated, you don’t know the slightest thing about running a business. There’s far more to this job than sewing. You’ll be out of your depth within a week. The moment you show me that you can do something spectacular on a marketing and business management level, the shop will be yours. In the meantime, we don’t let clients down, and this client has ordered this outfit, so chop chop, hmm? Don’t expect me in tomorrow; I need a couple of days off to recover from the arduous travelling. Goodnight!’

‘Ebony!’ I call after her but the reply is the rev of the engine as she starts her car and whizzes away, clearly thinking that the ‘no cars’ rule applies to everyone other than her.

I sigh. I really thought tonight would be the night she’d listen to me. Her ideas on how this shop should be run are the exact thing that’s pulling us down, and if she’d just swallow enough pride to listen… Tears threaten again and I force them down. I don’t want to end this night by crying. Maybe it was the wrong time to broach the subject. Maybe I went in too hard. Maybe I had too much courage. Or maybe she’s right. I don’t know the first thing about running a shop from the business side of things. If she did sign this place over to me, I would be out of my depth.

And yet, I want it more than anything. Apart from Scarlett, there are people I could get to help me – accountants and other business types who do know stuff about running businesses. Ebony insists on chasing high-profile celebrity clients, but I just want to make dresses that ordinary people can wear for special occasions. Dresses that make people feel like I felt tonight. It’s magic to put on a dress that makes you feel like a princess – that makes someone you love look at you as though you’re the only person to have ever existed. I want to do that for normal people. Not make lingerie for Z-list celebs whose only claim to fame is an inability to wear clothes that don’t flash their bits.

I gather up Ebony’s sketches and pick up my mask, the shoe, and the rose from the back room and trudge up to the flat. I should start work on the catsuit, but I don’t want to sully my mum’s gorgeous vintage Singer sewing machine with it; I only sew special dresses on that, so I’ll do it downstairs when Scarlett’s covering the shop tomorrow.

I put the mask and my one remaining shoe into a drawer beside my bed, and fill a slim vase with water for the rose and place it on the bedroom window ledge and sit down beside it. I lean my head against the window and look towards the castle again. It’s illuminated tonight, like a glowing haven within the mountain, and when I open the window just a little, faint snatches of music filter down from the hillside.

My mind drifts to Prince Charming again. Is he still there? Did my speedy exit ruin his night too? I sit with the window open and let tonight replay in my mind. The most magical moment of my life, cut short by sensible, boring reality.

I trace my fingers over the red petals of the rose he gave me. You never know, maybe it’ll turn out to be enchanted after all and I’ll find him again before the last petal falls.

6

‘Mum was well wound-up when she came home last night, and not about the delayed flight.’ Scarlett’s rearranging shoes on the display stands in the shop. ‘What on earth did you say to her?’

‘I didn’t say anything – she didn’t let me. I tried to make it clear that I want to take over The Cinderella Shop, but as usual, she wouldn’t hear it. I was trying to take the proverbial bull by its perfectly coiffed and manicured-to-perfection horns.’ I give Scarlett a quick rundown of what happened with Ebony last night.

‘You actually confronted her? Outright?’ Scarlett shakes her head when I nod. ‘How much “Dutch courage” had you indulged in at that ball?’

‘It’s not that unusual for me to stand up for myself, is it?’ To be fair, it probably is. Confrontation isn’t my strong suit. I’d rather keep the peace and tiptoe around without upsetting anyone. I didn’t want to upset my aunt last night. I just wanted her to see me the way Prince Charming saw me without even seeing me. Last night made me feel brave, like I deserve better than this and I didn’t need a mask to go out and get it, but this morning… all I can think of is that Ebony is right. What do I know about running a business? What do I know about marketing schemes and getting clients? I could learn, I suppose. Get myself on a business management course or something, but The Cinderella Shop is dying so fast that it’s probably too late. And would showing Ebony some certificate at the end of a run of evening classes really prove anything?

‘Sadie!’ Scarlett snaps her fingers in front of me. ‘I said, I didn’t come in early this morning to hear about your row with my mum. The only thing I want to hear about is the ball last night. Was it the most magical night of your life?’

‘Something like that,’ I mutter. The confrontation has overshadowed it all somehow. While lying in bed and reliving the magic of the evening, I tried to keep my mind on the nice parts of last night, like Prince Charming and who he is in real life and what might happen if I see him again, but every time I got too lost in the daydream, it was disrupted by thoughts of Ebony’s sharp words that left me wondering how I can ever prove myself to her.

‘Sadie Winters, if you don’t give me something right this instant…’ Scarlett gives me such a threatening look that I laugh.

‘Okay, okay. It was actually a bit rubbish at first, so I went exploring the castle and I ran into this guy…’

I don’t realise I’m smiling until Scarlett gasps. ‘Oh my God, I knew Prince Charming was going to be there.’

‘No, no, nothing like that.’ I try to rearrange my face into a frown, but the thought of the mystery man puts a smile there without my permission. ‘He was a bit frosty at first, but we…’

‘Oooooh!’ She’s waggling her eyebrows and waiting for more, but I don’t want to tell her about the kiss. It felt private, not a moment to be gossiped over the next day. Besides, if she knew, she’d never understand why I left at midnight. Before I can think of a way to finish the sentence, much like last night, I’m cut off by the clocktower at the castle chiming for 9 a.m., except this time, I’m grateful for its interruption.

‘It was a great night.’ I go across the shop floor to unlock the door. ‘I’m glad I went.’

‘If you think you’re going to get away with such a vague description, you can think again. You’d only say something so indifferent if you were hiding something outstanding. I want deeeeeetails!’

Scarlett knows me too well. She’s never going to let me hear the end of this if I don’t share something… I turn the key in the door and pull it open, and at exactly the same moment, a man appears outside and raises his hand to knock and his fist nearly collides with my face. I shriek in surprise and the man makes a noise of shock and takes a quick step backwards, and I’m unsure which one of us got the biggest fright.

‘I’m so sorry,’ he stutters, a look of horror crossing his face.

My heart is hammering from the unexpected encounter and it takes a few moments to get my breathing back under control as the adrenaline dissipates. ‘Morning, can I help you?’

The man opens his mouth to speak but no words come out. Instead of whatever he was going to say, he shakes his head. ‘No. I’m wasting your time.’

He turns and walks away, but before he gets very far, he turns again and goes to come back, but then he abandons that move too and turns to walk away again, and he ends up sort of pacing back and forth a little way up the street. There’s something about his stance that seems oddly familiar. He’s wearing glasses and there’s a leather satchel hanging from his shoulder that bangs against his hip with every movement.

Scarlett meets my eyes with a raised eyebrow. ‘Is there anything more frustrating than someone going to say something and then stopping and not telling you what it was?’

We both shuffle nearer the door so we can see the man. The hairs on the back of my neck have stood up and there’s something about him that makes me want to keep watching.

‘What’s he doing?’ Scarlett asks.

‘Having a conversation with himself, I think.’ The man is still pacing back and forth, his face moving as though he’s trying to talk himself into something.

‘Well, we’re used to that. You do that all the time.’

I do talk to myself a lot. When there’s no one else to talk to, you have no choice but to make a decent conversation partner for yourself, right?

The man must reach a decision because he turns once more and comes back towards the shop with renewed purpose, and Scarlett dives behind the counter so it doesn’t look obvious we were watching him.

I pull the door open again as he approaches. ‘Good morning.’

‘Hello.’ He stops at the step and holds a hand out to shake mine.

Not many customers greet a shopkeeper this way. I lift my hand and long fingers curl loosely around mine, and that feeling tingles at the back of my neck again. I’ve held this hand before.

‘I have an unusual problem.’

‘Unusual problems are our speciality.’ I sound smoother than I feel as I stand aside to let him through.

There really is something unnervingly familiar about him. I try to study him from behind as he goes to the counter, but it was dark last night, and I didn’t spend much time looking at the back of Prince Charming’s head…

But the height’s right. And there’s a streak of grey at the temple of his otherwise dark hair. He said he wore glasses and this man is wearing glasses. He also has unusually long arms. And his voice… His voice sounds odd this morning. Shaky and laboured, as though he’s nervous, but there’s the same deep timbre that sounds like the voice I’ve been replaying in my head since last night.

It couldn’t be… could it?

‘Hello, what can we do for you?’ Scarlett says in her usual bubbly way.

He ums and ahs for a minute, and glances towards the door as though he’s considering making a run for it. ‘Were either of you at the ball last night?’

‘No!’ I yelp so abruptly that I’m fairly sure a slate tile just fell off the roof in fright, and rush around him to get behind the counter before Scarlett says something she shouldn’t.

‘Ah, right. Well, I was, and there was this girl… A remarkable girl. We had the most perfect night.’ He’s obviously flustered. He keeps wiping his palms on his trousers like they might be sweating, he’s barely lifted his gaze from the floor, and I’m hardly paying attention to what he’s saying because I’m trying to scrutinise his face for signs I remember.

I’d remember his eyes, if he looked up. I’d remember his smile, if he smiled. I’d remember his voice, but he sounds as though he’s fighting to get every word out and nothing like the relaxed ease of last night. I focus on his hands. His hands and his height are two things that stood out, and… they’re both a perfect match.

‘And then she ran away.’

What does it feel like to hyperventilate? How can he have found me already? Did he somehow manage to follow me through the forest after all?

‘I didn’t do anything wrong,’ he says quickly, and then reconsiders. ‘At least, I don’t think I did. At the stroke of midnight, she said she had to go.’

‘Was her carriage about to turn back into a pumpkin?’ Scarlett laughs, not taking this seriously.

‘As she was running away, she lost her shoe.’ His hand plunges into his satchel and returns with a midnight-blue satin and lace wedge heel.

My shoe. My other shoe, the partner of the one I hid in my bedside drawer last night. It never occurred to me that he would pick it up. I have got to be the world’s biggest idiot. Of course he picked it up. That’s what princes do with glass slippers left on palace stairs – they always pick them up!

He’s here! This incredible guy has somehow garnered enough info from my shoe to track me down. Maybe he has a pet Bloodhound he didn’t mention. Sniffer dogs on standby? The fear of Ebony finding out about my lie last night is obliterated by the sheer joy that he’s found me. That he cared enough to come looking. It really was as special to him as it was to me.

Excitement is fluttering in my belly as I wait for him to turn to me. Hand over the shoe. Ask why I left so hastily.

He doesn’t.

‘It comes from your shop.’ He points out the ‘Cinderella Shop’ label sewn inside. ‘That’s why I’m here.’

‘Do you want to try it on the foot of every fair maiden in all the land?’ Scarlett’s mocking him.

‘No, I hoped you might remember who you sold it to.’

‘Sold it to?’ I splutter, and he looks at me blankly. Wait… what?

He hasn’t tracked me down. He isn’t here because he’s found me. And he hasn’t realised that I am me.

‘I don’t know how else to find her.’ He’s looking directly at me and I’m looking directly at him, except I know and he… doesn’t. ‘This shoe is the only clue I’ve got. She never told me her name or anything about her.’

Scarlett, who’s been stifling giggles all along, suddenly sobers up. ‘Oh, are you actually for real? Seriously?’

‘Yes. I thought this was the ideal place to come with this Cinderella-esque situation.’ His light eyes focus on Scarlett, who is bouncy and confident and always sparks up conversations with ease, whereas I’m more of a background person, but for once, I wish I wasn’t invisible to him.

There isn’t even a flicker of recognition. Absolutely nothing. Something seemed familiar about him from the moment I shook his hand, but I’m clearly not that memorable, am I?

‘I don’t know what you expect us to be able to tell from a shoe,’ I say coldly, but instead of backing me up, Scarlett holds her hand out for it, and he hands it over and adjusts his glasses.

I should say something. I obviously didn’t mean that much to him if he doesn’t even recognise me this morning, glasses or no glasses. All right, he said everything was fuzzy without them, and my hair was straightened and much longer than it looks now, and the blonde clip-in hair pieces made my colour look much brighter than usual, but is that all he can recognise me by? I’m wearing combat trousers and a black T-shirt with a cream holey-knit crochet tunic over the top, which is about the furthest thing you can get from a ballgown, but I have eyes, a voice, a general presence… don’t I?

Of all the ways I imagined what it would be like when I met him again, him not recognising me was not one of the options I considered. There were visions of our eyes meeting across a crowded street. Of him somehow finding out who I was and riding up to the shop door on a white stallion and whisking me away. Of some heroic gesture in which I fell into his arms and our eyes widened amid cries of ‘It’s you! You’re the one I’ve been looking for!’ Our eyes meeting across the width of the counter and him not even realising… Yeah, that didn’t play out in my fantasies.

‘I’m Witt, by the way.’

‘Wit?’ Scarlett asks uninterestedly, not looking up from the shoe.

‘Hewitt Kingscote, but I go by Witt. Two T’s. Less pretentious – Hewitt makes me sound like a great-great-grandfather from the 1700s. Or a packet of chewy sweets that were popular in the nineties.’

I had no intention of cracking my face at anything he’s got to say but a laugh bursts out and catches me by surprise. It’s the self-deprecating kind of thing he said last night. The laugh makes him look up at me and I look away quickly.

Witt. I spent a not-small proportion of last night imagining what his name might be, and I can honestly say that wasn’t one of the options I came up with. But I like it, somehow. He’s the kind of man who should have a name you don’t hear every day.

‘I’m staying at the castle. I work for the estate agency managing the sale. I’m here to do house clearance and oversee the final handover.’

An estate agent. Not a long-lost prince from a far-off land then. For God’s sake, Sadie, of course he’s not. That explains so much. How he knew where everything was. How it seemed as though he was remembering but he’d never been there before – he’d obviously studied the blueprints or other estate-agenty paperwork and was remembering from that. It all makes so much sense now.

Even being a middleman in his job. What is an estate agent if not a middleman between a person and a property? Someone who fades into the background, forgotten once the desired property is purchased. Everything makes sense now.

Apart from the fact he’s looking right at me and he doesn’t recognise me. Am I wrong for expecting better than that? Do I really look that different without my hair and make-up done?

‘Well, it’s a shoe.’ Scarlett concludes her in-depth examination and puts the shoe down on the counter.

‘Can you remember who bought it? And her dress… She wore a stunning dress. It must’ve come from here too.’ He gestures around to the clothing rails and mannequins displayed throughout the store. ‘It was one of a kind. Totally unique. I thought you might remember the buyer.’

‘Sadie’s the seamstress, talk to her.’

‘It was magnificent.’ He turns to me, his voice slow and stiff, as if he’s choosing every word carefully. ‘Like a mix of day and night. Like the sky had fallen down and settled itself on her dress. A huge skirt, but lightweight and soft. A real princess dress. There can only be one like it in the world.’

‘Maybe it didn’t come from here. People can buy dresses and shoes in different places.’ I sound unintentionally snappy, but I’m struggling to hide my annoyance. My charming prince seemed so different to all other men, but in the cold light of day, he doesn’t even remember me.

‘Sade, we only sell shoes to clients, you know that.’ Scarlett sounds confused and then turns back to him. ‘Our shoes are all custom orders. We get them made by a shoemaker in the Netherlands to match our dresses.’

The mystery man’s face lights up. ‘So it must have come from here then? You must remember it.’

‘I make dresses every day and sell them to hundreds of people.’ All right, bit of an exaggeration there. ‘I can’t remember every single one of them.’

‘It was blue. No, not just blue. It was every blue. No one could ever forget it.’

Funny, that. The dress is unforgettable, but the person inside it clearly didn’t make that much of an impact.

He’s wearing dark grey trousers and a white shirt that’s got a stiff collar and looks too smart to wear without a tie. His shirt sleeves are rolled up and buttoned at his elbows, and he fiddles with one of the cuffs. ‘Maybe you have till receipts or order forms?’

‘We don’t keep information like that on file, and even if we did, it would be confidential.’

‘Hold that thought!’ Scarlett rushes out the back, and I know exactly what she’s going to return with.

‘Scarlett!’ I hiss.

He looks at me. Witt. Witt, I tell myself. He has a name now.

‘You think badly of me. You think I did something wrong that made her leave?’ That stuttery uncertainty is back in his voice. He seems to be questioning himself again, and guilt creeps up on me for running away last night. In that moment, I was only thinking about myself, about getting back here before Ebony. I never even considered that it would affect him too. It must’ve made him feel unwanted and left him wondering what he’d done wrong. Maybe he thought it hadn’t mattered as much to me as it had to him. I hadn’t even considered that my actions would leave him in a tailspin too.

‘There was a kiss, but it was mutual,’ he continues. ‘I’m not the kind of person to push myself on someone. But maybe I shouldn’t have kissed her. Maybe that was why she ran away.’

‘Or maybe you shouldn’t be so self-absorbed and realise that not everything’s about you and maybe she had other things to deal with.’ I hate myself, especially when he takes a step back in surprise at my outburst. Why can’t I just be nice to him? Even civil would do at this point. My own guilt over running away is coupled with my annoyance that even face to face, he doesn’t know me, but he doesn’t deserve that. ‘Sorry, I—’

Scarlett comes back clutching our orders folder to her chest. She heaves it onto the counter and opens it. ‘This is where we keep a record of every dress made. Sadie’s sketches, measurements, client information, prices, and occasions. Why don’t you look through it and see if you recognise the dress?’

His long fingers start turning the pages of the huge file with care.

‘You can’t show him that. It’s private.’

‘Oh, nonsense,’ Scarlett says. ‘Who’s going to know? We can’t stand in the way of true love.’

‘Love?’ Witt makes a scoffing noise without looking up from the pages he’s looking at. ‘It’s nothing to do with love. She knew things about the castle. Things that I don’t know. I’d like to find her again to hear more about it.’

That’s it? That’s why he’s come looking for me? Nothing to do with the magical evening we spent together or the best kiss of my life? He just wants info about the castle? Oh, this day just gets better.

‘I tried to follow her but she disappeared into the woods. She knew her way and I didn’t.’

‘Not from around here?’ Scarlett asks as he continues leafing through the pages.

‘No, I’m from Scotland. Just here for a couple of weeks to clear the castle of anything valuable before the sale.’

Scotland? He did say he was only here on business, but by heck, Scotland may as well be the fourth moon of Jupiter. He doesn’t have the accent though. He sounds exactly like he did last night: English and well-spoken, a deep voice that’s slow and considered, but gets stuttery when he’s nervous.

Scarlett sighs wistfully. ‘That ball must’ve been magical. Sadie was just telling me about— ow!’ She glares at me when I stamp on her foot.

‘You don’t recognise any of these, I’m sure,’ I say when he looks up at Scarlett’s noise of pain. I am, obviously, sure that he doesn’t.

He shakes his head forlornly, and Scarlett takes pity on him. She explains our guarantee about finding love in one of our dresses and that buyers can return a dress if they don’t find that special someone while wearing it. ‘We have rails of returned dresses out the back – that might be worth a look.’

The returned dresses! Oh, the holiest of hecks, I never took my dress back upstairs last night. It’s still there, on the rail where I shoved it before Ebony arrived. I’d intended to take it back up to my flat when the coast was clear, but I never thought of it again. Oh God, he cannot see that collection of returns. I jump in quickly. ‘It was only last night. I don’t think she’d have returned it yet. There’s no point in looking.’

‘There’s always a point when it comes to love.’ Scarlett beckons him through to the back room. ‘Come on, this way.’

‘Not love,’ he reiterates. ‘I don’t believe in any such thing.’

‘No, don’t. I…’ I blank on any other possible excuse, and it’s too late. He’s already ducking through the door behind Scarlett.

I clonk my head down onto the counter. Just tell him. It’ll be awkward and embarrassing, but he’ll soon realise that I am not the fairy-tale princess I was last night, and we’ll laugh and put it down to the headiness of the evening, and he’ll politely backpedal on everything he’s just said and go back to Scotland as if none of it ever happened. Maybe they won’t even find the dress. He’s clearly not the best at recognising things, and without his glasses on last night, maybe the dress looked fuzzy enough to be unrec—

‘Sade! Where did this dress come from?’ Scarlett calls from the back room.

Monkey bollocks. They’ve found it.

‘It was, er, outside when I came in this morning,’ I call back. ‘Another return, no doubt.’

Witt emerges from the back room cradling my dress in his arms like the person in it has died. He looks devastated. ‘That’s it then, isn’t it? If she’s returned the dress, last night couldn’t have meant anything to her.’

‘Didn’t mean much to you either, eh?’ I mutter under my breath.

‘Or, as per my mum’s ridiculous guarantee, she could just have been trying to swindle a free dress for the evening. You’d be surprised at how many people treat us as a rental service.’ Scarlett follows him out into the shop, but he looks genuinely distraught, and I wonder if maybe it did mean something to him after all, and no matter how annoyed I am by his lack of recognition this morning, he seemed like a genuinely lovely guy last night, and I don’t want him to think he did anything wrong. This has already gone too far.

‘Look, there’s something I need to tell you. It was me…’ I take a deep breath and look up into his eyes, and it’s as though he’s looking straight through me. There’s still no recognition whatsoever. It hasn’t even crossed his mind that someone so scruffy and tomboyish could be the Cinderella princess from last night. I’m just a worker, a middleman – someone who people look at but never really see. Last night, it was easy to believe in fairy tales and forget the truth that every adult knows – they don’t happen in real life, and it would be better to spare us both the embarrassment and move on. Let last night be exactly what it was – a fantasy. A magical night that’s best becoming nothing more than a lovely memory. This will get even more messy if he knows who he really danced with. ‘…who made the dress,’ I finish quickly. ‘And I can’t say I remember who it was for. Sorry.’

‘It doesn’t matter now. For her to return it… It can’t mean anything good.’

‘Maybe she doesn’t want to be found,’ I suggest.

‘Maybe she doesn’t. But she framed the castle in a way that I hadn’t thought of – a way that potential buyers would appreciate. She—’

I must let out a growl because he cuts off the sentence and looks over at me. I can’t believe what I’m hearing. ‘So you want us to tell you who this woman is so she can help you sell the castle and, what, get a few brownie points from your boss? Get a higher offer from the supermarket?’

‘Well, not just that. I’d like to go for a coffee or something. I’d like to talk to her again. I liked talking to her, and believe me, I don’t like talking to many people.’

‘No bloody wonder,’ I mutter. ‘Newsflash, Witt, no one on Ever After Street wants the castle sold, so you’ve come to the wrong place, mate. There’s the exit.’ I throw my hand out towards the door, narrowly avoiding hitting Scarlett, who’s staring at me with her mouth agape.

Witt has the decency to look taken aback. ‘I’m sorry, that came out way too harsh. It wasn’t just that. I’d like to see her again. There was something about her. Her soul, her spirit, or something. I don’t know. I wasn’t attracted to her physically.’

Oh, thanks. I roll my eyes.

‘That came out wrong. I mean, I was, very much so, but it was so much more than that. She made me see things in a way I hadn’t before. I felt different when I was with her and I liked being different for a while.’

Now, that I understand. That vulnerability he had towards the end of the evening has crept back into his demeanour. He was reserved at first last night, he didn’t loosen up immediately, and I can see hints of that deeper layer again today, and I’m overjoyed that whatever it was I felt yesterday, he really did feel something too, but none of it changes the fact that he doesn’t know me today. ‘You haven’t got a clue what she looked like. All you remember about her is a thing.’ I wave towards the dress in his arms. ‘You wouldn’t recognise her if she was standing right in front of you.’

He looks down at the dress and then up at me. ‘Of course I would. We may have been wearing masks, but every moment of last night is imprinted in my mind. Believe me, I would know her the second I saw her.’

I almost laugh. It’s too absurd to be real. Him saying such lovely things is negated by the fact he is literally standing right in front of me.

Scarlett’s still quizzing him for more details about last night to see if there are any clues to the mystery woman’s identity, but an idea has started forming in my head. A horrible, terrible, brilliant idea.

He’s the estate agent in charge of the sale, and he wants to use me for… the spin I could put on the castle or whatever he just implied. He’s the one man who might have some power over who buys the castle. He might be able to stop it being a supermarket. He might be able to find a better buyer, someone who’d keep it as it is, or even better, restore it to its former glory. And he wants to use me to help with that. Well, why shouldn’t I use him too? Why shouldn’t we use him… to prove to Ebony that my dresses can bring in customers?

‘Put the dress in the window,’ I blurt out.

Scarlett stops talking and both of them turn to look at me, but the idea is snowballing in my head. I thought last night was the start of a great romance, but clearly not so great that he remembers me the next morning. And he doesn’t even live in England or believe in love. What kind of relationship could I ever have with a guy like that? If last night meant so little to him, maybe we can both get something out of it without either of us ever having to confront each other. ‘Think about it – you’re the Cinderella Prince searching for Princess Charming – it’s like the roles have reversed. And we could find her for you.’

He raises an eyebrow.

‘This is a real-life fairy tale happening on a fairy-tale street,’ I carry on as the idea grows. ‘A real Cinderella story happening in The Cinderella Shop. It’s like fate. It cannot be ignored. We have to get the word out – let her know that you’re looking for her.’

‘Okay?’ He sounds hesitant and unsure.

‘We’ll put that dress in the window and display the shoe, and put up signs saying we’re looking for the woman who has the other shoe. We’ll post about it online and tell everyone we know. If she’s local, word will soon reach her that you’re searching for her. We’ll share this story far and wide. It’s a modern-day love story. People need to believe in this sort of thing. Proof that fairy tales still exist in this miserable world. It’s a story to bring hope to all ages. Everyone will get behind this – someone is bound to know who the missing Cinderella is.’

‘I really didn’t want to get everyone involved.’

‘Oh my God, Sadie, that’s genius!’ Scarlett ignores him. ‘It’s the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard. People will love it.’

Witt looks out of his depth, as though he’s being swept along by an unseen current, but this is the perfect idea. I’ve always wanted the dresses I make in my spare time to have a place in the window display, but Ebony would never allow it, yet with this literal Cinderella story behind it, she can’t refuse. It will get people talking. People will want to know who the mystery Cinderella is. Ebony told me to do something spectacular on the marketing front. To do something that draws attention to our shop and brings in customers. What better way to prove that I can manage this business on my own than by creating a fairy-tale buzz around all things Cinderella?

And my dress, my special dress that was made on one special endless night and worn for one special midnight kiss will be front and centre of it all. Customers will finally get to see one of my dresses, the dresses I’d make if I had any say in how The Cinderella Shop was run, and my aunt won’t be able to do anything but accept it. ‘We were – literally – made for this job. Where better to look for a missing Cinderella than The Cinderella Shop?’

‘And that stunning dress will be in our window.’ Scarlett picks up on my bubbling excitement and seems to realise how important this could be for us. ‘Permission to use everything you’ve just told us?’

‘Um…’

‘Can we have a photo?’

‘Um…’

‘Here, hold this.’ She shoves the shoe at him and before he’s even taken it, she’s got her phone out and snapped a few pictures of him while he stands there, looking bewildered. ‘Oh my God, there’s so far we can go with this. We can do a website. We can print out some posters. Flyers! Flyers, everywhere!’

‘This really wasn’t what I intended.’ He sounds like he’s struggling to get a sentence out. ‘I’m not much of a front-and-centre person and she said she wasn’t either.’

‘Well, it’s a good job you came here then because we are the front-and-centre people you both need.’ Scarlett has zero time for his hesitation. ‘Do you actually want to find her?’

‘Yes, of course, but—’

‘Brilliant. Come back tomorrow and we’ll have everything set up.’ She takes the dress out of his arms and lays it on the counter. ‘I’ll get my boyfriend to do a website, and we’ll get a contact form thingy sorted so potential Cinders can send in their info, and we’ll have this displayed in the window and get the word spread around Ever After Street.’

Websites? Contact forms? Potential Cinders-es? Alarm bells start ringing. I didn’t mean we’d actually look for anyone, just that it would be a great bit of publicity for us and an excuse to display a dress that might attract some customers, unlike Ebony’s usual creations.

He looks over at me again, but Scarlett is a force of nature when she’s got a bee in her bonnet about something, and she’s herding him out the door as though she can’t wait to get started on this.

‘Thank you for all your help,’ he calls politely through the door she’s just closed behind him, and it makes me smile again. Those manners. That charm. He might not really be a prince, but he certainly acts like one. Sometimes. Not when he’s failing to recognise me and the only ‘something in the air’ he felt last night was what my words about the castle could do for him.

‘Oh my goodness, if that isn’t the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard.’ Scarlett turns back to me, but my eyes are on him, watching through the window as he walks away. ‘I’m going to write up everything he just said for the website. Even the most jaded of cynics can’t deny the romance of that.’

‘Didn’t sound like it had much to do with romance to me. Just business. Just another guy with an ulterior motive. And what about the girl? What if she doesn’t want to be found?’

‘Did you see him? He’s a Prince Charming from head to toe. Tall, dark and handsome. The posh accent. And that name! Hewitt Kingscote sounds like it should have ‘sir’ or ‘lord’ in front of it. And he’s staying in an actual castle. Who wouldn’t want to be found by a guy like that?’

‘It might not be that simple. What if she ran away for a reason?’ I rub my fingers over the blue bodice of the dress. I knew it was a special dress, but I never thought it would lead to anything like this.

‘No one would run away from him for any reason. This is the best idea you’ve ever had. My mum challenged you to do something fantastic on a business and marketing front, and the very next day, an actual Cinderella story falls into your lap. That incredible dress will be in the window for all the world to see – and this is the kind of feel-good story that social media loves, so all the world will see it. We can do so much with this. We’ll get everyone on Ever After Street involved. It’ll be the biggest publicity hit The Cinderella Shop has ever had, and no one’s had to fly to Finland or make tentacle-laden catsuits to achieve it. The only thing we have to hope for is that the missing Cinderella doesn’t come forward for a while otherwise it’ll be over too soon.’

‘Hah.’ I snort at the irony. ‘Not much chance of that happening.’

‘What’s got into you today, Sade? This is a brilliant opportunity to get everyone talking about us. It’s probably our only chance to save The Cinderella Shop. It could bring in so many new customers, and yet, you couldn’t have been any ruder to our princely friend if you’d tried.’

‘He’s just not who I thought he was.’ I’m distracted, looking through the window at the empty street, half-wishing he’d reappear and half-wishing he’d never come again. ‘I thought last night meant something, but he just wants, what, someone local to write appealing copy to attract potential buyers? He probably gets a cash bonus if he offloads the castle quickly.’

‘All right, what am I missing here? Have you met him before or…’ Her face shifts as she starts putting two and two together.

I wasn’t going to tell her, but I’ve already said too much and if I don’t say something now, she’s going to have figured it out for herself in about thirty seconds. I take a deep breath. ‘There’s absolutely no chance of the missing Cinderella coming forward… because she’s standing right in front of you.’

‘What? What? And may I respectfully add a “the hell” onto the end of that what?’ Scarlett is pacing the floor so hard that I’m surprised she hasn’t worn a hole through the wood flooring. ‘The guy you “ran into” at the ball, the one you were just about to start telling me all about… was that guy? And the woman who ran away from him… was you?’

‘Yes.’ I cringe.

‘Why would you— oh God, did he do something to make you run away?’ She stops pacing and looks worried.

‘No! Heck, no, he was the most perfect gentleman in the universe. There couldn’t be a more considerate and respectful—’

‘Then why the flipping heck would you run away from him?’

‘It was midnight!’

‘A time that means nothing when you’ve met Prince Charming! Unless you’re literally Cinderella and your carriage is about to turn back into a pumpkin! Were there lizards? Mice?’

‘I wasn’t supposed to go to that ball. I was just going to have a look around the castle and be home ages before your mum got here, but then I met him. Time ceased to exist. And then the clock struck midnight and time came thundering back into existence with blinding breath-taking reality.’

‘Who cares about my mum when that is on offer?’

‘I do! I need her to trust me to take over The Cinderella Shop! If she knows I went to the ball, she’ll never forgive me. She’ll never deem me ready to take over. I’ve worked here for most of my life. I wasn’t about to throw all that away for some guy I’d just met. I didn’t have time to think it through, I just had to get back.’

‘So much so that you couldn’t have yelled a quick “I’m Sadie from The Cinderella Shop, come find me” instead of dropping your shoe?’

‘I didn’t plan to drop the shoe. I didn’t want him to find me. I mean, I did, but not in this way. I thought I’d run into him again when the time was right. Not this sodding morning.’

She pushes a hand through her choppy blonde hair. ‘Why didn’t you say something just now?’

‘Seriously?’ I raise an eyebrow. ‘He didn’t even recognise me.’

‘Oh, come on, Sade, cut the man some slack. Even I wouldn’t have recognised you last night. The whole point of the fairy godcousin makeover was so no one would recognise you. You can’t blame him for that. All right, you’re a bit hurt, but you have to tell him… Oh, wait. No, for God’s sake, don’t tell him! We need the publicity from this. The last thing you should do is tell him. Our shop needs a missing Cinderella to find!’

‘I don’t want to tell him. I’m not the person he met last night. She was a perfect version of me that doesn’t exist. A pretty, well made-up, flawlessly styled, nicely dressed, elegant fairy-tale princess. That isn’t me. It’s 9 a.m. and I’ve already got bits of cotton in my frizzy hair. And he didn’t have his glasses on at the ball. He said everything was fuzzy. He’ll see me as I am and recoil in horror. I’m never going to live up to his idea of the “missing Cinderella”. It’s better to stay as one magical night that will never be anything else.’

‘Sade…’ She’s going to tell me off for being self-deprecating, but she knows I won’t listen so she lets out a huff and rolls her eyes instead. ‘How karmic that you going to a ball that was thrown solely to accomplish the sale of the castle could be the one thing that gives us a leg to stand on. If anyone could have any influence over who buys the castle, it’s the estate agent managing the sale – Prince Charming himself.’

‘He wasn’t that charming. He was, last night, but it seems like he turned back into a pumpkin at midnight too.’

‘Sadie, he’s so charming! All right, he seemed a bit shy and nervous, a bit difficult to talk to. I don’t think even he knew what he wanted to say, but he can’t have been that bad last night because you kissed him! You kissed a man on a first date!’

‘It wasn’t a—’

‘You dated that Danny for three months and never got as far as kissing him!’

‘That Danny had a tongue like a lizard! He’d stick it out and wriggle it around occasionally, like he was hoping some random girl might fall and spear herself on it. And I didn’t date him – I went out to lunch with him a few times because your mum wanted to be part of his mum’s “elite social circle” and it took me a while to stand up for myself and tell her we had nothing in common and I was sick of him always “forgetting” his wallet so I had to pay.’

She shakes her head. ‘To get a kiss from you on the first date, Prince Charming has to be some sort of phenomenon previously unstudied by humankind and—’

‘And like with all other men I’ve dated, they want something from me,’ I cut her off. ‘I thought he’d be different, but no. He doesn’t even believe in love. Why did he come down here looking for me? Not because he felt anything or because last night meant something to him, but because he liked what I said about the castle and thought I might help it sell. Just business, nothing more.’

‘Well, he can unwittingly help us out too. He wants something from you – your stories about the castle, and we want something from him – his missing Cinderella story. Look at this dress.’ Her fingers brush over the crystals covering the skirt. ‘This is a shining example of what The Cinderella Shop is meant to be. You made it because you know people can find love while wearing one of our dresses – exactly like your mum did, once upon a time. And maybe, just maybe, you’ve found something special while wearing one of our dresses too.’

‘What felt special last night feels like a special kick in the teeth this morning.’

‘Oh come on, that was about way more than how you spoke about the castle, even if he hasn’t admitted it to himself yet. No one would bother hunting down the owner of a shoe just for that. He felt something, Sade, just like you did, even if you’re trying not to admit it. Now come on, we’ve got a lot of setting up to do and a window display to clear. As my mum would say – this is going to be a turning point for us!’

I’ve heard that phrase many times before and it usually gives me an ominous feeling, but this time, something’s sparkling in the air and hope stirs in me for the first time in months. Maybe this is why I was meant to meet Witt last night – because it really, really could turn things around for us.

7

‘I’m off, have fun!’

I look up from the overlocker machine where I’m finishing the seams of the Finnish catsuit with spidery tentacles hanging from the sides. ‘What do you mean, off?’

It’s quarter past nine and Scarlett’s got her bag of hairdressing gear over her shoulder as she heads towards the door, and I realise what she means. ‘Scarlett, don’t you dare! You told Witt to come back today. You can’t leave me to deal with him!’

‘Of course I can.’ She gives me an evil grin. ‘Now you’ve got a chance to get to know him without a mask on. Jog his memory a little, but not too much, because our Cinderella needs to stay missing for as long as possible. I have work with Jackson. Hairdressing clients back to back all day. Byeeee!’

‘Scarlett!’ I rush out onto the shop floor after her, but she’s already halfway down the street towards Rapunzel’s hair salon, and I groan out loud. It’s hard enough to sew in the back room while listening out for customers to come in, but the added stress of Witt returning makes the day seem overwhelming.

I was intending to keep my distance and let Scarlett deal with him. I want to see him again, but it’s all got so messy and I don’t know what to do. I thought I could hide out the back and let Scarlett show him the website she’s set up, as pointless as it is. Who on earth does she expect is going to get in touch?

My stomach is in knots for the rest of the day, and I struggle to focus on anything except the sound of the bell tinkling whenever the door opens. And it does nothing for my nerves when it’s a surprisingly busy day.

The Cinderella dress in the window catches people’s attention. Customers come in to browse, but end up leaving quickly as there’s not a lot to browse. Ebony insists on minimalism so we don’t have many dresses on display because she thinks they make the shop look cluttered. We only have a small selection of dresses on mannequins and hung on rails. They can be tried on and then altered to be a perfect fit, as well as the option to order the custom bespoke dresses that are our speciality, even though orders have been fewer and farther between in recent months. Not many people these days are looking for custom-made dresses that cost hundreds of pounds, and Ebony insists on a minimum pricing strategy that outprices anyone on a normal salary. Special occasion dresses that are a once-in-a-lifetime purchase are one thing, but we have customers who want affordable dresses for regular occasions, especially at this time of year when the wedding season is nearly upon us and people want outfits they can wear more than once.

It’s the busiest day we’ve had for a long time, and I get the catsuit finished with a lot of stopping and starting, which is at least something off my never-ending don’t-want-to-do list, and through it all… he doesn’t come.

I’m on edge all day, half-dreading seeing him again, and half-excited, but as the clock ticks closer to closing time, there’s no sign of him, and endless possibilities flood my mind. What if he’s realised we’re using his story for publicity and wants no part of it? What if he somehow did realise it was me, and he’s so disappointed that he’s never coming back?

Despondency has settled over me like a cloud by the time I step outside and lock up for the night. That must be it. He must have realised the fairy-tale princess from Sunday night is a scruffy seamstress and was just too polite to say anyth—

‘Wait, wait, wait!’

I look up from turning the key in the lock to see Witt running down Ever After Street towards me, from the entrance on the main road, not from the direction of the castle.

He barrels to a halt, gasping for breath. ‘Sorry I’m late. I got caught up in what I was doing at the castle and lost track of time.’ He puts his hands on his knees and bends over, panting. ‘Please excuse me while I showcase how incredibly unfit I am. I took the long way round because I thought I’d get lost in the forest and never be seen again. And then I saw all the posters you and your sister have put up and stopped to stare at them in horror.’ His chest is still heaving when he stands upright. ‘Hello.’

I can’t help smiling. There’s a huge part of me that’s glad to see him. ‘Hello.’

He smiles at me too, and I feel it again, that connection. The ease is instant, just as it was at the ball the other night. ‘Yeah, um, Scarlett kind of took over on the poster front. I haven’t had a chance to get outside today; I haven’t seen them yet.’

‘Every shop, every noticeboard, every lamppost, everywhere you turn. You can’t get away from them. It’s awful.’

Scarlett designed the posters yesterday, but gave me only the quickest flash of them before running to the nearest print shop. It’s a picture of the dress, side by side with the photo of Witt she took in the shop yesterday, and an explanation below.

Did you attend the ball at the Ever After Street castle on Sunday night? Were you the mystery woman wearing this dress? Did you spend a magical evening dancing with this Prince Charming? Did you make a hasty exit as the clock struck midnight and lose a shoe on the way? If so, we want to hear from you.

It’s a real-life Cinderella story! A real fairy tale happening on this fairy-tale street! Our handsome prince is desperately searching for his lost love! We need to find the woman who still has the other shoe. Did you see the woman wearing this dress? Do you know who she is? Come and talk to us in The Cinderella Shop or get in touch on – searchforprincesscharming.co.uk.

There are even tear-off strips with the website address on the bottom. I feel a bit guilty because he’s obviously not happy about it, but I’m trying to tell myself that this is business. We have to do what’s best for the shop. It doesn’t matter whether he approves or not. ‘I don’t know how you expect to find her if we don’t get the word out. Scarlett’s good at social media and stuff. She’s only trying to help.’

‘Yeah, I know, I just… I don’t like photos of myself. I don’t want to be on show to anyone. And I don’t think the missing girl did either. Seeing these makes me want the ground to swallow me whole. I spend my life hiding away in musty old buildings, so to suddenly see my face plastered in every shop window…’ He shudders. ‘I just wanted to bring in the shoe and ask if you could identify it. It wasn’t meant to be bigger than that.’

‘People on Ever After Street support each other and get behind a common cause. I’ve had a few people in today to see if we’ve found her yet and asking to be kept updated. People are invested already. I’m sure Cinderella herself will turn up before long.’

He looks much more casual today. He’s got on smart trousers, but a white T-shirt with an open checked shirt over it, the sleeves rolled up and buttoned at his elbows again. He really does have ridiculously long arms, because there doesn’t seem to be a shirt in existence with sleeves that are the right length, but it only adds to how endearing he is.

Witt wanders over to where the Cinderella dress is on display. We’ve dedicated one of our two windows to it, and it’s set up on a mannequin with the shoe displayed on a clear Perspex table that’s draped with fairy lights, and Scarlett has hand-chalked signs that say similar things to the posters. ‘You really made it?’

I nod when he looks at me.

‘It’s truly majestic.’ He glances at me again. ‘I know you think I only remember this thing about her, but I don’t. I was trying to describe the dress because I thought you might remember it more than whoever bought it.’

‘You don’t have to explain yourself to me.’

‘Maybe I want to.’

I quickly get off the subject. ‘So, this website Scarlett’s set up. Apparently there’s a contact form for any potential Cinderellas to send their stories to, and I’m sure she can grant you access so you can check it from your own phone.’ I get the key out of my pocket and go to unlock the door. ‘Come in, I’ll show you.’

He stops me. ‘No, no, you’ve finished for the day, and it’s my fault for being late. No one has a decent work/life balance as it is, and it would be unfair of me to impose when you’re on the way home. I’ll come back tomorrow.’

‘I’m sure you’re busy,’ I say, because even though I appreciate how polite and considerate he is, another day of watching the door and waiting for him to show up doesn’t sound appealing. Better to get it over with tonight.

‘I am, but if there’s any hope of finding her then it’s worth all the time in the world.’

Aww. That’s so sweet that I can feel my heart softening towards him. ‘Scarlett’s got her boyfriend to set up the website. She’s started a blog about it, and… you know what, you may as well come in.’

‘May I walk you home? I mean to save time. You could tell me on the way and I won’t have taken up any more of your evening.’

‘I don’t think it’s the best idea…’

‘No, of course not. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to cross any lines.’ He stutters a response as though he’s done something terrible. ‘I wasn’t trying to be overbearing or anything, I just…’

‘It’s not that.’ I beckon for him to follow me and we walk the three steps round the corner of The Cinderella Shop and arrive at the side door to the flat. ‘Congratulations, you just walked me home.’

He looks up at the window on the second floor and then starts laughing as he realises what I mean. ‘You live here.’

‘It’s my aunt’s, but she lets me stay in exchange for always being on hand to open and close the shop and never being far away from the sewing machine to put in plenty of overtime.’

‘I’m disappointed. I was looking forward to a walk with you.’ As soon as the words are out, he looks as if he wishes he hadn’t added the last two. ‘Er, I mean, I’ve been stuck inside all day as well. It would’ve been nice to get out for a bit.’

‘You can still enjoy a walk. There are some lovely trails through the Full Moon Forest that go right around behind the castle and out to the river.’

He glances cautiously towards the trees at the end of Ever After Street and then back at me. ‘Would you do me the honour of accompanying me?’

Accompanying me. That prince-like charm again. No one has ever asked me to ‘accompany’ them before, and I wonder if we’ve accidentally taken a wrong turn and wandered into a Jane Austen novel. On the one hand, this is clearly a terrible idea, but on the other hand, his smile has set off butterflies in my stomach, and the thought of spending time with him is absolutely irresistible.

‘If it's not weird to walk in the woods with a strange man,’ he continues before I’ve answered. ‘Not that I am strange. Well, everyone's a little bit strange, aren't they? I just meant in terms of being a stranger and a man. A stranger man. A man stranger?’

I'm laughing so hard that I no longer care if he's a stranger. ‘I’d love to.’

His answering smile takes my breath away. It seems as though nothing has ever made him happier and I feel as I did at the ball – like we’re the only two people in the world. He holds his arm out and I hook my hand through the crook of his elbow just like I did the other night, and he glances down at it, and for just a second, I’m certain he knows, and I wait for the inevitable confrontation, but it doesn’t come.

I don’t know if I’m disappointed or relieved. Maybe both? I wanted him to have paid enough attention the other night to realise who I am, but at the same time, the plan of finding the missing Cinderella and any chance of bringing our shop back to life would have been over if he did, so it’s probably for the best.

Ever After Street is shaped like a wishbone; the narrow end is the entrance from the main road, and then it gradually widens until it splits in two, and in the middle is an area with flowerbeds, benches and picnic tables. The fork of the road to the left leads to a craft area for children and a carousel to ride, and then onwards to the Full Moon Forest and the castle, and the fork to the right leads to more fairy-tale-themed shops and meanders further towards Christmas Ever After, the section of the street where it’s Christmas all year round.

We wander towards the castle end of Ever After Street in gentle silence. There’s a noticeboard by the carousel, and he stops to frown at one of Scarlett’s flyers and the photo of himself. ‘When I was looking at the posters just now, I couldn’t help noticing all the anti-supermarket stuff that’s up too. Selling the castle is not a popular decision around here, I take it?’

‘No. Particularly not to a supermarket, who we’ve heard is the most likely buyer?’ I ask pointedly, hoping he might chime in with some insider information, but he stays frustratingly quiet, so I continue on. ‘There have been a lot of protests, there’s an anti-supermarket campaign on social media and every shop is running its own petition, which are collated on a weekly basis.’ I explain about the impact a supermarket would have on Ever After Street and he listens intently. ‘But we’re helpless, really. The castle belongs to whoever it belongs to and we can’t stop it being sold. I just wish it was to someone who would keep it as it is, not demolish it and turn it into a supermarket. The world doesn’t need more supermarkets – it does need more fairy-tale castles.’

‘At least supermarkets are useful. What good is a decrepit old castle to the world? Just another thing that some poor sod has got to keep pouring money into for maintenance. Better to knock it down and be done with it. Still, maybe you’ll get your wish – the ball was intended to attract more interest and higher offers. That’s how I was forced into letting it go ahead.’

‘That was you?’

‘I’m in charge of the castle on behalf of the owner while the sale goes through. I’m not one for parties and I hated the idea. I’m trying to empty the castle and I’ve had to work around teams of decorators bringing more stuff in, and cleaners, and they had to get the electrics checked after so long, then there were plumbers, and…’ He makes a noise of frustration. ‘It’s been a whirlwind. I was supposed to be in and out, but it’s put me so far behind. The estate agency thought it would be worthwhile, but it doesn’t seem to have earned my potential buyers any goodwill from the locals.’ He points to a picture on the noticeboard of a supermarket that someone’s printed out and painted a big red X over.

‘Ever After Street boycotted it en masse.’

‘Oh.’ He glances down at me. ‘Did they?’

I nod.

‘I’m intrigued by this place. I didn’t know Ever After Street existed until I arrived. It’s…’ He twists around to look behind us without letting my hand drop from his arm. ‘It’s really unusual. Children must love it.’

‘It’s magical. You should see the looks on kids’ faces when they come here. Getting their hair done at Rapunzel’s salon or wandering around the Mermaid’s Treasure Trove. Eating at the 1001 Nights restaurant. Getting ice creams at the Frozen ice cream parlour. The Colours of the Wind museum is really fantastic too. It’s full of fairy-tale artefacts that kids can actually play with. There’s a collection of dressing-up princess ballgowns they can put on, they can wear Cinderella’s glass slippers, rub Aladdin’s lamp, spin silk on Sleeping Beauty’s spinning wheel, and…’ I stop myself, realising I’m rambling. ‘Sorry, I’m sure you don’t want to hear every detail.’

‘On the contrary, the one thing I enjoy hearing about is what people love. Tell me more, please. I’m fascinated.’

I tell him about the shops as we pass them, from Marnie’s Tale As Old As Time bookshop to Sleeping Beauty’s Once Upon A Dream, which is dedicated to bedtime delights like luxury bedding, sleepover kits, blankets, and bath bombs.

At the edge of the forest, instead of taking the main path up the hill to the castle, I pull us to the left, along one of the fairy trails through the trees.

‘Full Moon Forest.’ He reaches up to touch the wooden sign that hangs between two trunks.

‘It used to be called the Blood Forest. It’s said that if you cut the trees, they bleed red because the viscount went mad and took his own life in the castle courtyard and there was so much blood that it ran down the hill and watered the ground.’

‘Pretty sure that didn’t happen.’

‘No, of course not, but you know what people are like. If they don't know what happened, they make up stories about it. For a long time, no one ever came into these woods. It was said to be haunted; children would dare each other to walk through on Halloween nights, and a few years ago, the people of Ever After Street decided to take it back and bring joy back into it. Rather than blood and gore, we went back to the Victorian-era rumours that fairies live in these woods and embraced that by allowing children to put fairy doors on trees, and we added giant wooden mushrooms, glowing solar flowers, and fairy lights hidden in the boughs.’

Witt looks around like he can’t take it all in as we walk beneath the canopy of branches.

‘There’s a craft stall by the carousel. Kids can buy their blank fairy doors, paint them, and then come through the woods to stick them on. Like leaving behind a little piece of each person who comes here. People make them in memory of children they’ve lost. There are certain trees where carving is allowed and people carve in the names of departed loved ones, as a way of asking the fairies to protect them on the other side.’

He seems genuinely moved when he looks down at me. ‘None of this will survive if the supermarket deal goes through, will it?’

I shake my head. ‘They need access roads for construction vehicles. They can’t come down Ever After Street itself, so the only option is to tear the forest out and build their own roads straight through it.’

‘That’s…’ He looks around, seeming lost for words. ‘That’s more unthinkable than I thought it would be.’

‘We’re a self-sufficient little retail park full of independent shops that mean the world to their owners. Supermarkets only care about the untapped potential for themselves, not about the impact on the rest of us.’

The paths are narrow and we have to squeeze together to get along some of them. Dappled evening sunlight is shining through the trees, providing the perfect mix of sun and shade as we wander along.

Sculptures of wooden butterflies and dragonflies are placed on trees, and he’s tall enough to reach out and touch everything, his eyes shining with delight at every new thing the forest unveils, as though he’s never seen anything like it before.

‘Are you really staying at the castle?’

He makes an affirmative noise as he stops to look at a fairy picnic area – a red and white wooden mushroom with a miniature tea set arranged on it, and smaller mushrooms in a circle around it, like a table and chairs.

‘You must be the light.’

‘The what?’

I laugh at my own awkwardness before clarifying. ‘I spend a lot of time looking out at the castle. For days now, there’s been a light on when it’s always been dark before. I thought it was just workers preparing for the ball. I didn’t realise someone was actually staying. That makes it seem really homely somehow. It’s nice to see after so many decades of it being empty. What’s it like to live there?’

‘Same as any old building. Draughty. Empty. Hollow. Damp from the roof leaking. In need of repair.’ His voice sounds flat, as though he really loathes the castle.

‘I didn’t realise estate agents did house clearances.’

‘It’s a service provided to high-value estates where the owner doesn’t want to be involved. They send someone to act in lieu and manage every aspect, especially if there are things of value in the building, or if there’s likely to be local resistance that could stop things running smoothly. I work with a lot of old estates, castles, and stately homes. I’m a historical buildings surveyor, but I also do things like tracing the history of old buildings and tracking down possible heirs, exhausting options before a property is sold, and putting old ghost stories to rest.’

‘Do you know anything about the history of the castle?’

He gives a laugh that’s tinged with something. Bitterness, maybe? ‘I think the history of this particular one is better left in the dark. People romanticise castles but most of them have unhappy histories. Buildings like this don’t end up abandoned unless something horrible happened inside them.’

I look up at him, but he remains poker faced. ‘No one can over-romanticise this castle. My parents actually met there, many moons ago.’

He pulls back to look at me in surprise. ‘Really?’

‘It’s why I love the castle so much. My mum was a dressmaker to the viscountess and my dad was an accountant to the viscount. He was leaving after a meeting and she was just arriving, and they ran headfirst into each other at the gate. She had her arms full of dresses, they both fell over, his briefcase split open and his papers flew everywhere. He trod on a hem in the tangle and tore the bottom of a dress she was taking to the viscountess, who luckily saw the funny side. Instead of leaving, my dad sat on the wall and waited until Mum came back out so he could apologise properly, and then he asked her out to dinner.’

Witt’s looking down at me in awe by the time I’ve finished. ‘I didn’t realise you had a personal connection to the castle.’

‘It meant a lot to my family. I’ve never known a world where it wasn’t watching over me from the hillside. I can’t imagine this place without it.’ I can’t help myself once I get started on talking about the castle, but I’m inadvertently doing exactly what he wanted. He wanted to hear more about it, and here I am, sharing a personal part of my family history with this stranger whose job is to make sure the castle sells.

‘Being here feels like being in a different world.’ He reaches out to trace a carving in the trunk of a tree, and then takes a couple of breaths, as though he’s building himself up to saying something. ‘Sadie, can I tell you something about me?’

I nod and my hand tightens on his arm automatically because tension has shot through him that makes it feel important.

‘I don’t usually tell people, but something about you makes me want to be open.’ He goes to carry on but can’t get the words out.

I hold his arm tighter. I’m way too close to this man. I feel too at ease with him. He must know I’m the girl from the other night or he’s going to think I’m the most overly familiar stranger he’s ever encountered.

‘I have a speech impediment. I stammer.’

‘Really?’ This clearly isn’t something he’s said very often and my heart is melting at how insecure he looks.

‘I’m fairly sure you can tell.’ He gives me a soft smile. ‘Generally I can control it if I speak slowly and focus on each word, but sometimes it gets the better of me, particularly if I’m nervous. I wanted to explain if I came across badly yesterday when I brought the shoe in. I was embarrassed and flustered and fighting to get words out and maybe I came on too strong or unnerved you in some way. It’s why I come across as harsh sometimes. Abrupt. Monosyllabic. I choose the shortest sentences possible and the words in my head are rarely the same ones that come out of my mouth.’

So much makes sense now. Even at the ball, the way he seemed to struggle to find the right words or abandoned sentences that didn’t seem like they were going to go the right way. I’ve noticed his stilted way of speaking and how he sometimes gives up on words and says something else instead. Words are my problem too is what he said at the ball the other night, but I never knew it hid something like this.

My fingers fiddle with the cuff of his shirt sleeve where it’s turned up around his elbow. ‘Thank you for telling me.’

‘I wanted you to know in case you wonder why I’m a bit weird sometimes.’

‘I don’t think you’re weird.’

He smiles an involuntary smile. ‘I don’t think you’re weird either.’

It makes me laugh out loud. ‘Oh, Witt, the compliment every girl dreams of. I don’t think anyone’s ever said anything so nice to me before.’

He laughs at my sarcasm, but a feeling of loveliness settles over me as we walk. Everything feels so lovely with him. The whole world is nicer than it was before, and I’m enjoying his company so much. I can’t think of any better way to spend an evening.

‘Bringing the shoe into the shop got out of hand yesterday. I’m not used to dealing with people. The stutter makes me avoid them as much as possible. I spend my life hiding away in old buildings because it’s easier than trying to speak to fellow humans. I was caught up in trying not to make a fool of myself, and you and your sister’s enthusiasm took me by surprise. I didn’t mean for this campaign to find Cinderella to take on such a life of its own.’

‘She’s actually my cousin.’ I didn’t correct him last time, but now it feels wrong not to. ‘My parents died when I was ten and my aunt took me in. I went to live with her and Scarlett.’

He’s listening so intently that he accidentally walks into a tree trunk and stops to look at me in surprise. ‘I lost my parents when I was ten too. Well, my father. My mother had passed a few years before that.’ He shakes his head in disbelief. ‘What a weird thing to have in common.’

I never expected that kind of connection with him. Losing both parents at an early age is a grief that not many people understand, and I can’t quite believe that this man who felt so special the other night would know the impact that it has too.

I manoeuvre us around the tree and we carry on walking. ‘Did you have to move in with family?’

‘Bundled up to Scotland to live with a grandma who I didn’t know existed until that point.’

‘That must’ve been tough.’ There I go squeezing his arm again. I’m trying to tell myself to untangle our arms and walk side by side, keep a bit of distance between us, but I can’t do it, not when he’s talking about something so personal.

‘My grandma was elderly and crotchety and didn’t want a kid around. She hadn’t had contact with my family for over thirty years and made it crystal clear that I was only there because there was no one else. Every day I’d get in from school and she’d be asleep in her chair and I’d have to poke her to make sure she was still alive. She lived in this tiny little crofter’s cottage with doorways that are about four foot high.’ His hand comes up to mid-chest to indicate how far he had to duck. ‘She acted like it was still the 1900s. She’d get me new shoes and couldn’t comprehend that within a few months, I’d have grown out of them. Same with clothes. I mean, you can see how tall I am, I grew fast at that age.’ He moves his hands apart to indicate going upwards. ‘Every item of clothing fitted me for a very short window of time before it was too short or too tight. You can imagine how well that helped me fit in.’

‘It was bad?’

‘In the middle of a Scottish school, I was a tall English kid with a posh English accent, bad clothes, and a new and uncontrollable stammer. I stood out like a bullfinch in the snow. My grandma would mend things time and time again rather than buy new, long after the lifetime of which anything could reasonably be mended. She didn’t have a TV so I could never join in with those conversations, no music or any kind of player, we were lucky to have electricity, and even that was considered a “new fandangled thing not to be trusted”.’ He puts on an elderly voice that makes me laugh. ‘It’s not that I wasn’t grateful, because I don’t know where I’d have ended up without her, but it was like going back in time.’

‘It sounds grim.’

‘I guess it gave me my appreciation for old buildings and the history of places; maybe I’d never have got into my line of work without living in literal history. Bright side and all that.’

My fingertips can’t stop themselves from running over the inside of his forearm.

‘She died when I was sixteen. I still live in the same cottage now. How about you?’

‘I was lucky compared to you. I didn’t have to go far. My aunt lived about thirty miles away from where we lived. It was outside the catchment area for my school, so I had to switch schools. Aunt Ebony went for the sympathy card so every teacher in every lesson introduced me as, “This is Sadie, she’s just lost both her parents in a tragic car accident, so be nice to her, won’t you?”’

He screws his face up. ‘I can imagine how well that went down.’

‘They used to shout “Miss Hannigan!” at me, or sing “It’s the Hard Knock Life” or “Tomorrow” from the musical Annie whenever they saw me.’

‘Ouch. Kids can be so cruel.’ He winces in sympathy and draws his elbow in until the back of my hand rests against his ribs. ‘Sorry, that isn’t something I’d usually share with someone I barely know, but you caught me off guard. I didn’t expect to have something like that in common.’

‘Maybe we were meant to meet.’

‘Maybe we were.’ He catches my eyes again with so much intensity, the urge to reach up and stroke his jaw again, to rest my thumb in the dip of his chin is almost impossible to ignore.

I should tell him. Just blurt it out. It isn’t fair to carry on pretending we’ve never met before. But what if Scarlett’s right? People are already asking about the missing Cinderella. There have been website hits. Retweets. If the story grows, more people will be asking, and more people will be talking about The Cinderella Shop. I love that shop more than anything. If this is the only way to give it a fighting chance, I can’t let a little twinge of guilt change that.

The almondy scent of Hawthorne blossom is heavy in the air as we carry on walking, past little fairy paths between patches of bluebells, giant wooden sunflowers, and a tree stump with models of Thumbelina and Prince Cornelius dancing on a pumpkin.

‘The other night, when I met the mystery Cinderella… I thought we’d get more time. I thought by the end of the night, we’d take our masks off and introduce ourselves. If I’d known it was going to end like that, I’d have been more forward. It’s one of the reasons I wanted to find her – I don’t want her to think that it didn’t matter to me.’

‘I thought you only wanted her for her whimsical storytelling ability.’ I don’t mean to sound quite so spiky, but I was so sure he felt something on Sunday night, and hearing that yesterday morning put my hackles right up and made me question everything I thought I’d felt at that ball.

‘Yeah. Um…’ He shakes his head. ‘Another example of words coming out in a way I don’t intend them to. I do, but it wasn’t meant to sound as callous as that. She made me feel something about the castle, and if she can get to my cold, lifeless heart, then potential buyers would lap it up.’

I go to do a gasp of indignation, but he interrupts it with a noise of frustration at himself and takes a few slow breaths. ‘Sorry, this is where I fail at making myself understood. What I mean is that she made me see a good side of the castle, and it’s been a long time since I saw the good side of anything… I’d like to know what else she can tell me about it.’

Guilt twinges again. I can see how much he’s struggling to make his words sound right, and I can definitely see how his clipped sentences come off as harsher than he means them to. At the ball, he was sharp at first, but he became more at ease as we spent time together, and now he seems like that quiet, peaceful gentleman again.

‘Would you want to be found?’ He blurts the words out too fast and I watch the way he takes a couple of breaths and focuses himself. ‘If you’d run away from a guy like me at a ball?’

It’s probably the most loaded question anyone’s ever asked me. I don’t know if it’s pointed, if he suspects and he’s trying to wheedle an admission out of me, or if he’s totally earnest and doesn’t know who else to ask.

‘I think it would be complicated.’ I try to sound as neutral as possible because I don’t want him to think he did anything wrong that night, and even though it would be nice to think I’m not so unmemorable after all, having to call off the search for Cinderella would be a death knell for our shop. ‘Maybe there are other factors at play. There might be other things going on in her life that don’t make it as simple as it sounds. The world can’t revolve around a guy she’s just met.’

‘Yeah, I understand that.’ He nudges his arm against mine. ‘And it’s not all about me, right?’

‘I didn’t mean to be quite so unkind when I said that yesterday, but in the nicest way possible, yes. Whatever the reason she ran away, it must have been important to her.’

I keep looking up and appreciating his face. A wide nose and cheekbones that were hidden by his mask the other night. Blue eyes that are enlarged by his glasses, and the dip in his chin that’s disguised by a five o’clock shadow tonight. He’s exactly like I thought he was. Kind, gentle, endearing, unsure on the surface but with an underlying strength of character and a sense of fun behind his twinkly eyes.

We’ve meandered around the path through the woods and ended up coming out at a different entrance to where we went in, and Witt looks behind him in surprise. ‘That place really is like a maze.’

‘You just need to have spent as much time there as I have. I used to go there to feel closer to my parents. The Cinderella Shop was their life’s work, they loved Ever After Street so much.’

‘This place is really important to you, isn’t it?’

‘I’ve never wanted to work anywhere else. My parents believed everyone deserves a fairy tale in real life, and they were so proud of being a part of making that happen. My mum made herself a dress for her first date with my dad because she knew it was special. She sewed all her hopes into it, and they fell in love that night. That’s where the “you’ll find love wearing one of our dresses” thing comes from. She believed that wearing beautiful clothes that were made to fit gave people confidence and made them feel good, and if you’re feeling good, you’re more likely to be open to whatever possibilities the universe throws your way. It was Ebony who turned it into a literal guarantee – a silly gimmick.’

‘Look at the dresses you make though. You make magic happen too.’

‘Doesn’t feel like it sometimes,’ I mutter, and then stop myself before I say any more.

We’ve reached the door to my flat, and I’m already wishing I’d taken us on a longer route just to extend our time together, even though we’ve been out for over an hour.

‘Thank you for making sure I didn’t get lost. You wouldn’t want to do it again sometime, would you? I’d love to hear more about things around here, and you’re the tour guide of my dreams.’

‘I’d love to.’ It makes me laugh. And blush, a little bit.

He holds his hand out and as soon as I touch him, his fingers fold around mine and he lifts my hand to his mouth until he can press a kiss to the back of it, and then tips an imaginary hat in my direction.

He might not be a literal prince, but he definitely was in some previous lifetime. Modern-day men just don’t act like this.

I can’t help the disappointment as his fingers let mine go. There’s something about him that makes everything feel right with the world when my hand is in his.

‘Thank you for a lovely evening. I don’t know anyone around here so it’s nice to have a… friend?’ He says it questioningly, as though he’s double-checking it’s all right to call me that.

I nod, and that’s it, really, isn’t it? We’re friends, nothing more. I am so far removed from the woman he met on Sunday night that he can’t even comprehend we might be the same person, and I’m both annoyed and fully aware of how disappointed he’ll be if he finds out. I don’t want him to find out. He doesn’t even live here. He’s going back to the opposite end of the country within a matter of weeks. The rejection when he finds out isn’t worth it. It’s better for him to leave with the memory of one wonderful night and for me to keep the memory of meeting a real-life Prince Charming at a real-life castle, and not to mess it all up with boring very unmagical reality.

8

‘What’s happened to my window?’ Ebony wails when she arrives the next morning. ‘What on earth is that? Who gave you permission to make that?’

I’m instantly defensive. ‘Since when do I need permis—’

Scarlett jumps in before either of us says something we regret, and explains everything about Prince Charming and the missing Cinderella.

‘Oh, not more fairy tales. How many times do I have to tell you both to get your heads out of the clouds? This nonsense has no place in our shop. If you want fairy stories, go to the bookshop across the street. Losing a shoe at midnight is the behaviour of a drunkard, not a princess.’ Ebony turns to me. ‘This is that childish idealism again, just like your mother, always humming lullabies and dreaming of far-off castles and dashing knights. Life is not a fairy tale. In reality, you work hard all your life, your husband leaves you, then your sister dies and you end up as a single mother looking after her child as well as your own, not that I ever begrudged that, Sadie, but I wouldn’t have minded some handsome prince riding up to rescue me from the doldrums, but things like that don’t happen in real life. It really is beyond time for you to grow up. Now, take that out of the window and let’s get something high-brow back on display.’

‘No.’

‘No?’ She raises a plucked-to-perfection eyebrow.

‘No.’ I didn’t think that one little word could ever feel so good to say. It’s something I’ve almost never said to Ebony before, but I really believe in this. There’s no way I’m telling her it’s part of a plan to prove myself to her, but someone has to step in before she runs my beloved shop completely into the ground, and it’s about time that person was me. ‘We’re helping Witt to find his mystery princess. And that dress deserves to be on display. It’s already attracting more customers. We had loads more people in yesterday.’ I don’t add the fact that none of them bought anything because there’s nothing for the ordinary, everyday person to buy. Assuming ordinary people aren’t after tentacle-themed catsuits that leave nothing to the imagination, anyway.

‘People are already engaging with this story.’ Scarlett gets her phone out and shows it to Ebony. ‘Over two thousand people have looked at the website, and the dress photo has been “pinned” seventy-five times. I made a short video that’s been watched a few hundred times between all platforms. And it all only started less than forty-eight hours ago.’

Ebony nods approvingly. ‘Oh, well, in that case, let’s hope the missing woman stays missing for quite some time, we could do with numbers like that seeing our work.’ She goes and gets another dress from a rail – a skin-coloured latex thing that’s dripping in beads to make it look like the wearer is wearing only beads. ‘Could we not say the missing woman was wearing this one instead?’

‘No!’ Scarlett and I say in unison.

‘We need to mix things up,’ Scarlett continues. ‘Displaying dresses like this will appeal to more people. Normal people like Sadie, who want to believe they’ll still get to be a Disney princess one day.’

‘We don’t want women like you.’ Ebony frowns at me. ‘We want people who can afford to pay top dollar and tell their extremely important and rich friends about us. No offence, of course.’

I almost laugh. I don’t think Ebony’s ever uttered a sentence that hasn’t caused offence. ‘This is exactly our problem. You want to attract celebrities, but the people we don’t attract are the ones walking past every day. People look, but they see our price tags, or enquire about custom-made dresses and faint at the estimated costs.’

‘We’ve been through this. It’s about the exposure and the prestige of—’

The doorbell tinkling interrupts her and Ebony makes a noise of frustration. ‘Oh, what now?’

Witt pops his head in. ‘Is this a bad time?’

‘Who’re you?’ she barks at him and I can see he’s taken aback as I introduce them.

‘Oh, so you’re our prince, are you?’ She walks in a circle around him, as though she’s examining him, and then turns to me. ‘Do something about that grey streak and he might be okay.’

‘Ebony!’ I say in horror.

‘How old are you?’ she demands.

‘Thirty-nine.’ Poor Witt definitely wasn’t expecting this today.

She gives his arm a patronising pat. ‘Spot of hair dye and you won’t look a day over forty. It’ll be our little secret.’

‘I’m so sorry,’ I mouth to him.

‘Tentacle costume?’ Ebony clicks her fingers to get my attention because I’ve yet to stop smiling at him, and I rush out the back and return with the dreaded thing, wrapped neatly in tissue paper inside a white cardboard box tied with a gold ribbon.

‘I’ll get this shipped on my way to London. I’ve arranged a meeting with a clothing boutique in Regent Street. They might be willing to display a few of our pieces.’

‘Regent Street!’

‘I know, can you believe it?’ She makes it sound as though it’s a good thing.

‘I can’t make dresses for Regent Street as well. Some boutique in London is not where we should be focusing on.’

She opens the till and takes a few notes out to cover her petrol costs. ‘Do you know how many rich and famous people shop there? It would be such an accomplishment. I’d better go, I’ve got an appointment booked at a “hairdresser to the stars” right before the meeting so I look my best. We want to impress them, don’t we?’

‘No we don’t!’ I call as she swishes across the shop. ‘Ebony!’

The door slamming on her way out is my answer.

I clonk my head down on my arms with a groan. ‘She cannot be for real.’

‘Shall I come back later?’ Witt looks perplexed.

‘No, you’re fine,’ I mutter without looking up. At this point, seeing him is the only thing likely to improve my day.

‘Do you mind if I ask a question?’

Or, maybe not. Witt and questions probably aren’t going to lead anywhere good.

‘What exactly is a tentacle costume?’

I burst out laughing and look up at him. ‘It was this… You know what, as a gentleman, I think you’d rather not know.’

‘Finnish reality stars famous for falling out of clothes as opposed to wearing them,’ Scarlett clarifies with a handwave. ‘Lingerie with spider’s legs.’

He laughs at the mental image, and Scarlett claps her hands together. ‘Ah ha, you’re here to see if the mystery Cinderella has got in touch.’

‘I think he’s just here for the password so he can access it from his own phone,’ I say.

‘Oh, no no, that would be too easy. Sorry, Witt, you’ll have to check them from here.’ She pats the chair next to where I’m standing. ‘Right here.’

‘But…’ I start to protest as he walks over. Our computer is a big, clunky old thing built into shelves behind the counter, so I can easily check fabric stocks and swivel the monitor around to show customers potential options.

She winks at me without him seeing. ‘The account has been set up on our server. Jackson couldn’t grant just anyone access. It has to be done from here.’

Admittedly I don’t understand the tech stuff that Scarlett’s boyfriend does, but I’m certain there’s only one reason that Witt has to check it from here, and that’s because I’m here.

Scarlett pulls out the comfy computer chair with wheels and a back that reclines when you lean against it, and Witt sits down, so close that his arm brushes against my thigh, and his aftershave fills my nose. It’s not the same one he wore to the ball. This one is dark lavender and spice and smells warm and homely.

‘Right, there we go, Sadie will show you the rest.’ Instead of doing anything on the computer, Scarlett dashes out the back and returns with her hairdressing toolkit over her shoulder. ‘Must dash. Hair clients. Byeee!’

‘Wait, I don’t know—’

The door slams behind her. Why do people keep doing that?

‘—how it works either.’ I clonk my head down again in frustration.

‘I’m sure we can figure it out between us.’ Witt’s arm presses against my thigh in a comforting gesture.

Everything about him is reassuring. I should probably move away, but I like being with him. Everything feels better when he’s near.

He leans back to allow me access to the computer and I crouch next to him and try to figure it out. ‘Scarlett’s posting on The Cinderella’s Shop’s own social media accounts seeing as we already have a few followers, and this is the blog she’s set up to keep readers updated on the progress, and this must be the contact form where people can get in touch…’

He lets out a sigh as though he’s fed up of it already. Pictures of him that Scarlett took are all over the website with a sad-face emoji stamped on them, and Scarlett’s posted an update this morning saying some ‘potential princesses’ have already been in touch and we’re eagerly awaiting the results to find out whether they’re ‘the one’ or not.

I click onto our email account where Jackson has labelled a new inbox for incoming mail via the contact form. ‘Look, there are thirty-four messages already.’

‘That’s ridiculous.’ He leans forward so he’s pressed right against my side, and his closeness and aftershave make it difficult to concentrate on anything. ‘Thirty-four people who say they were at the ball with me on Sunday night?’

I step aside and he reaches out for the mouse and scrolls through the emails.

‘One of them is from Australia.’ His face gradually contorts in horror as he reads on. ‘One of them is eighty-nine! One is from a pair of identical twins saying they kept swapping throughout the night and are now offering me a threesome.’ He makes a frustrated noise and sits back, pushing a hand through his hair. ‘I thought it might work, you know? She said she wasn’t good at putting things into words, and I understand that all too well, and I thought getting in touch like this – quietly, privately, via email – would be less intimidating and give her time to think about what to say, but this is… a circus. Who are these people? Why say they’re her when they’re not? How can you ever trust anyone?’

I bend to take hold of the mouse and scroll through the slew of messages. There are endless emails from women, and men, claiming to be the one he’s looking for, including but not limited to a drag queen, a sixty-year-old who says she ran away because she didn’t want her husband to find out about her illicit affair with a prince, a chimpanzee trainer who had to get back to her chimps, and one who claims she was actually the real Cinderella and her footmen were already turning back into lizards and her fairy godmother was waiting at home.

I didn’t expect this. I know the internet is a hotbed of madness, but I thought Scarlett’s contact form was just a token. I didn’t think we’d actually get people pretending to be the mystery woman. ‘Everyone wants to believe the world is better than it is. Maybe people are just looking for a fairy tale.’

‘That’s a lovely attitude.’ He holds his hand out and when I’ve slipped mine into it, he tugs me closer to his side, making my breath catch and heat tingle inside me. ‘I wish I could see the world like that.’

‘This story has ignited a sense of childhood nostalgia in people. Everyone grows up hoping life will turn out like it does for Disney heroines one day, and somewhere out there, a real Cinderella story is unfolding in front of their eyes, and if it can happen to someone else, there’s still a chance for them too. I don’t think they mean any harm. I just think they’d like it to be them, even though it isn’t.’

He lets out a breath and leans his head to the side so it’s resting against my upper arm, and for just a second, I wonder if he’s as comfortable with me as I am with him.

‘I’m sorry about Ebony earlier, she doesn’t realise how offensive she can be.’ I look down at the top of his head. He’s sitting and I’m standing, and it’s the first time I’ve seen him from this angle.

His hair is dark and long enough that it’s starting to curl, in a way that suggests it would be a mass of curls if he grew it any longer, and I love that he’s got curly hair too. At the ball, he had product in it that kept it spiky, and before I realise what I’m doing, my fingers brush through the splash of grey at his right temple. ‘I like the grey streak, you know. Very distinguished.’

Oh my God, what is wrong with me? I freeze in horror. I need handcuffs on when I’m near him. I’ve just touched this man’s hair. Touched a total stranger’s hair without even thinking about it, like he is somehow mine to touch. I am a socially awkward monster who should never be allowed to engage with other humans.

I expect him to pull away, but he tilts his head back and smiles when he meets my eyes. ‘Thank you. It’s never bothered me. I’ll be forty next year, and it hasn’t been an easy life. A few greys are fair game at this point.’

It makes me want to slide my arms around his neck and hug him tightly, and with his head tilted up like that, he’s at the perfect height for taking his heart-shaped face in my hands and lowering my lips to his.

He squeezes my hand, and it forces out words that I had no intention of saying. ‘Everything about you is exactly as it should be.’

Instead of cringing in embarrassment, his cheeks take on a pink tinge and he smiles as though he couldn’t stop himself if he tried. ‘That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.’

It would be so easy to tell him everything, and that thought is enough to make me pull myself together and move away. ‘Sorry, I must get on. I’ve got a fitting for a rainbow chiffon prom dress this morning and I haven’t finished hemming it yet.’

‘Am I okay to stay?’

‘Yeah, sure, take as long as you need. How else are you going to pick her out amongst all the lonely soldiers and distant Nigerian relatives who’ve left you a fortune?’

‘Believe me, I’ll know the moment I see her again.’

It makes that annoyance prickle again. ‘Oh, you will, will you?’

‘I will,’ he says with a laugh. ‘I think we both know that the girl I’m looking for is not going to be found in this parade.’

I go to walk away and then turn back because I can’t stop myself prodding. Whatever I felt for him at the ball was something… magical, something I don’t think you find every day, and I’m fighting a need to know if he felt it too. ‘You’re going to a lot of trouble just to see a good side of the castle. Either you really need those extra brownie points at work or maybe it’s really about something more. Was there something special between you that night?’

‘Like what?’ There’s a challenge in his eyes. He’s pushing me to say it.

‘Well, you did kiss her. A person could be forgiven for reading something into that. It sounds like things got a little… romantic. Maybe you felt something. Something like love.’

‘Love?’ he scoffs. ‘There’s no such thing as love. I don't believe anything is given freely without an ulterior motive. People only love someone else if there's something in it for themselves. The concept of love exists only to be used as a manipulation tactic.’ The stutter is coming out as his voice speeds up.

I bite my lip in an attempt to stop the pervading sadness showing on my face. ‘How can anyone go through life not believing in love?’

‘If only we all believed a fairy godmother was about to pop out from around the next corner, eh?’ He doesn’t sound as though he thinks it’s a bad thing. In fact, he sounds like he quite wishes he believed it, and I can’t help wondering what someone has to go through to get that cynical worldview, and what it would take to change it.

9

Witt finished going through the emails yesterday, but he’s come back today to have a look at the next lot that have landed in the inbox overnight. I’ve finished the prom dress and sent a happy customer and her mum on the way, cut pattern pieces of purple velvet for a Regency-style dress someone’s ordered for a Jane Austen weekend, and he’s gone out to get sustenance from the teashop down the street.

The bell above the door tinkles as Witt comes back in, holding two takeaway coffees with a bag of pastries balanced on top of them. ‘I feel like my childhood never ended when I walk around out there. I want to ride the carousel and get tiger stripes painted on my face.’

‘Why don’t you?’

He puts a coffee cup down on the counter for me. ‘I’m six foot three and weigh, well, more than enough to break those poor wooden horses.’

‘You know, the point of Ever After Street is to prove you’re never too old for anything. Unbridled joy is not an emotion limited to childhood. Fun has no age limit.’

He makes a noise in his throat and looks at me like he wishes he believed that, and then changes the subject. ‘Do you know how many people are taking selfies outside with the dress?’

There are three middle-aged ladies out there now, posing with the dress in the window behind them, and they’re not the first people I’ve seen stop for a selfie today. ‘It would be even nicer if they’d come in and buy something.’

As if on cue, the door opens and the three ladies traipse in.

‘Oh, heaven’s me, that dress!’ one of them exclaims when she sees us standing at the counter. ‘You couldn’t make one of those for a post-menopausal overweight donkey like me, could you?’

‘I can make anything for anyone,’ I say, struggling to muster much enthusiasm because these enquiries always go the same way. They start excitedly talking about what they want, and then ask about how much it will cost, and that’s the end of the conversation. ‘What did you have in mind?’

She starts talking about a flared gown like the dress in the window but maybe in purple and then gets to the kicker. ‘What kind of price are we talking?’

I stumble and stutter, and eventually settle on a figure of £500. There is a lot of material in that dress and it took a lot of hours to make, and Ebony insists on pricing high.

The woman visibly pales. ‘Oh, er, I’ll have to think about it. Maybe not this week…’

She makes eye contact with her friend, and they go to the door to wait for the third lady. She’s found a beadwork halter-neck dress in a pink to purple ombre colour and is running her fingers down the multi-layered skirt. She looks enamoured with it, until she picks up the sign on the display plinth that shows the price. She slams it down in shock and backs away until she bumps into her two waiting friends and they make such a hasty exit that you’d think a monster had emerged from the depths of the organza.

‘Come back,’ I say to the empty shop, watching through the window as they make their way over to the teashop, undoubtedly needing a cuppa to settle their nerves after seeing such high prices. ‘We can make other dresses. Nice dresses. For affordable prices. We just… urgh.’ I trail off in frustration and drop my head into my hands. No wonder we’re sinking. What ordinary person has a spare 500 quid for a dress?

I can feel Witt’s eyes on me. ‘Do you mind me asking what I’m seeing here?’

‘You don’t want to know,’ I say, the words muffled through my hands.

‘I genuinely do.’ He’s standing on the other side of the counter and he picks up my dressmaker’s tape, unrolls it, rolls it back up again, and uses his finger to make a steeple out of it. ‘When I came in yesterday and your aunt was here, I could’ve popped the tension with a pin. A colour-blind orangutan in the depths of the Bornean jungle could tell there’s something going on here. You and Ebony have… differing visions for the shop?’

When I look up, his eyes are kind and he gives me a soft, encouraging smile.

‘The Cinderella Shop should be mine. It was the love of my mum and dad’s life. She sewed the dresses and he ran the admin side of the business. Every dress she made was special because she loved each one. She took her time, she got to know each client, and she sold her dresses for reasonable prices. She filled this shop with beautiful, demure clothing, from ballgowns to everyday summer tea dresses that people could afford. She made clothes that were both special and wearable for any occasion, and slipping one on felt like wearing magic. People were reduced to tears in the changing rooms because she just got them. I’ve loved sewing since I was old enough not to puncture my fingers with the sewing machine needle, and I never wanted to do anything other than follow in my mum’s footsteps. But I was too young when they died, so it was left to Ebony on the condition that she would pass it on to me when she deemed me ready.’

‘Let me guess, the call of the business expenses account is so loud that she hasn’t deemed you ready yet.’ God, his eyes. There is so much kindness and understanding in them. He’s the kind of person you could tell anything and know he’d never judge you for it.

Another passer-by outside takes a photo of the dress in the window and I tell him about the differing visions Ebony and I have, the frustration at her high prices, insistence on making dresses that no one but a flamboyant clown would wear, and the constant swallowing of funds to chase minor celebrities across the globe. ‘She’s convinced exclusivity is the way to go. She keeps saying that all it will take is one celebrity wearing one of our dresses to a red-carpet event, and we’ll be designing for the stars and rolling in money, but I can’t agree, and we keep clashing. She wants social media influencers and reality TV stars with millions of followers and bags of disposable cash, but I just want to make people happy, like my mum did. But she’s the boss. I just work here, and she never listens to what I have to say and sees no value in my ideas. And her gimmicky guarantee is wiping us out. I spend hours making a dress, someone wears it for an evening, and returns it saying they haven’t found love and gets their money back, and then it sits unworn in the back room with all the others, forevermore. Ebony thinks it makes us memorable – and it does, when someone wants a dress for a one-off event without paying for it.’

All the while, Witt listens intently. He doesn’t drop eye contact, he doesn’t interrupt, and I realise I’ve never told anyone this before. I’ve got no one else close enough to share stuff like this with except Scarlett and she knows it anyway. ‘I just want her to realise that I know what I’m talking about. I have the experience, I know the people who shop on Ever After Street, and I have ideas for how we could take this place back to the glory days, but she never listens.’

‘More fool her.’

I smile at the kind sentiment, but it doesn’t help, not really. ‘I think my parents didn’t want me to be tied down or to feel obligated to take over their business if I wanted to do something else with my life.’

‘Surely you can challenge that legally?’

‘Firstly, that costs money, and secondly, I don’t want any bad blood with my aunt. I don’t want to drag her through the courts. I just want her to value me.’

‘You’ve been working here for a very long time…’

I see what he’s hinting at in his typically kind way. What Scarlett is always telling me in her typically blunt way. If Ebony hasn’t deemed me ready by now, it’s unlikely that she ever will. My only hope is making a success of this missing Cinderella campaign. But to do that, I’m using him, and the better I get to know him, the worse it feels. ‘Everything will work out in the end. I believe that. If you keep working hard, keep your head down, keep being a good person, eventually hard work will be recognised and rewarded.’

He makes that all-too-familiar noise of cynicism again. ‘That’s the opposite of what is true. You have to go out and take what you want.’

‘Taking what you want is generally known as robbery and comes with a prison sentence.’

He laughs, but he’s serious. ‘I wish I could see the world the way you do. I wish I could believe that. In my experience, if you keep working hard and being nice to people who don’t deserve it, you will always be trodden on and walked over and taken advantage of. People see kindness as a weakness to exploit.’

I gulp. Is that how he’ll see me if he finds out? That I’m exploiting him by using his Cinderella story to gain customers? ‘Don’t you believe there’s any good in the world?’

‘I didn’t until I met you. Now I wish I did.’

‘That’s so sad. What does a person have to go through to come to that conclusion?’

He looks surprised by how forward that question was, and I try to backpedal. ‘I meant hypothetically. I wasn’t trying to pry or—’

‘It’s okay. My father was like you. Kind, trusting, took people at face value and always saw the good in them, and he died because of it. I try to protect myself by seeing the world as it is, not as it should be.’

I bite my lip. He said his father died when he was ten… that’s a long time to have spent thinking the worst of people.

‘Okay, answer me something. I know you haven’t had it easy either. How does someone go through hard times and come out still believing in fairy tales?’

‘I don’t believe in fairy tales, but I believe in love. I think falling in love is the closest thing we get to a fairy tale in real life. And I believe people are generally good. I believe in Ever After Street. I love this place. I love that castle. Children come here and leave thinking Disney movies are real. Cynical adults leave with a light in their eyes. And The Cinderella Shop in particular… Every little girl grows up dreaming of being a Disney princess one day, and I’m a part of making people feel like that. It’s the best job in the world.’

Both our hands are on the counter and his fingers brush against mine. ‘What about you? Does anyone ever make you feel like that?’

‘It’s not about me.’ I’m blushing because the only time anyone has ever made me feel like a princess, was the other night, with him.

‘Have you ever been in love?’ he asks instead of pushing me for a better answer.

I shake my head.

‘Never?’ He raises a dark eyebrow.

‘What do I know about love? I’m thirty-five and my recent dating history is nothing more than a few dates set up by my aunt with men so unsuitable that E.T. would genuinely have been a better candidate. My only relationships have been few and far between. Work has always been more important. I love The Cinderella Shop. I don’t want to waste time loving someone who doesn’t make me feel anything. I want what my mum and dad had. I want magic. Maybe I do spend too much time daydreaming, but everyone has to believe that one day someone will come along who makes it all worthwhile. Isn’t that why we all go through life – to get to something better? Someone who makes the world seem better than it did before?’

He makes that noise in his throat again, the one that meets halfway between scorn and longing.

‘If you don’t believe in love, why are you going to all this trouble to find the girl from the ball? Why are you really putting in this much effort?’

‘To return a shoe, obviously. They probably cost a lot of money and one is not much good without the other.’

‘You keep telling yourself that.’ I go to pat his hand, but he turns it over so my fingers land in his palm and he gives it a squeeze while holding eye contact, and I wish I could kiss him hard enough to make him believe in fairy-tale endings. I’ve always said I do, but since I met him, I really do.

10

‘Save the fairies!’

‘Fairies before food!’ Imogen from Sleeping Beauty’s Once Upon a Dream shop waves around a reversible placard while shouting out her slogan.

It’s been a week since the ball and the shopkeepers of Ever After Street are gathered around an incinerator drum, doing a ceremonial burning of the ball tickets that were delivered to every shop.

‘No to a supermarket!’ Marnie from the Tale As Old As Time bookshop shouts as she throws her ticket into the inferno, and Ali, the owner and head chef at the 1001 Nights restaurant and leader of the proceedings today, cheers.

Lissa from The Colours of the Wind museum is filming the whole thing for social media in the hopes of gathering more support for the cause.

‘Magic not market!’ Mickey, who runs the Mermaid’s Treasure Trove, throws her ticket in and Ali hits the side of the incinerator drum with a stick, sending sparks up into the sky.

Ebony’s standing on the opposite side of the crowd, and it’s her turn next, but she pats her pockets and gives Ali an empty-handed gesture. Unsurprisingly, she hasn’t been able to find her ticket.

‘Keep the fairy tale alive!’ Lissa shouts, approaching the incinerator with her ticket in hand. She lights the corner and watches it burn in front of the camera before dropping it in.

I’m near the front, but I blend into a crowd easily and no one seems to have noticed me. There’s plenty of people all around, from shop owners and workers to regular visitors who have come to lend their voices to the anti-supermarket cry, even on a Sunday morning.

I look around to see Witt making his way down the street, and even with so many people between us, his eyes catch mine and a smile brightens his face. He excuses himself politely through the crowd until he’s standing right behind me.

‘Where’s Gaston when you need him? Surely they’re about to lead a braying mob up to the castle?’

It really is like the moment Gaston waves around a flaming torch and rallies the villagers to storm the Beast’s castle, and I turn around and look up at him. ‘I don’t think you want to be here for this. The shop’s unlocked; go in and make yourself at home. You aren’t going to like what we’re saying about the person you’re working for.’

‘On the contrary, I’m fascinated.’ Instead of slinking away like I thought he might, he shuffles closer, folds his arms, and leans them on my upper back, trying to make himself shorter so he doesn’t block the view of anyone behind.

I crane my neck until I can meet his eyes. ‘You comfy up there?’

He grins back and leans further into me. ‘Extraordinarily so.’

I smile to myself as I go back to watching the festivities. He’s the perfect height and I love that he’s comfortable enough to lean on me. His body is pressed tight against mine, and I still want to reach back and pull him even closer.

My hair is such a mass of curls that it makes me look taller than I am, and I can feel his chin brushing against it every time he moves.

‘What’s the total for petition signatures now?’ Imogen calls.

Lilith, who is well on the way to her hundredth birthday, is sitting down outside the teashop she runs and jabbing at a calculator on the table in front of her. ‘Twenty-two thousand four hundred and twenty-two. An increase of 3,000 from last week. That Cinderella dress has upped awareness.’

Every eye in the street spins to look at me. So much for being invisible.

‘It’s increased footfall no end,’ shouts one of the girls from Christmas Ever After, the year-round festive end of the street.

‘The website’s servers overloaded one afternoon. People who haven’t heard of Ever After Street before are looking it up and making plans to come here,’ Jackson, Scarlett’s boyfriend, says. ‘Bookings at Rapunzel’s salon are increasing daily.’

Even the eyelinered magician who works the carousel is staring with intense dark eyes. ‘More people are bringing their kids. The carousel hasn’t stopped turning since that dress went up, and it’s only going to get busier with half term in a couple of weeks.’

‘Glad to have helped,’ I say meekly, because everyone’s looking at me eagerly. Even with Scarlett’s enthusiasm, I didn’t expect it to make this much of a difference, and so quickly. And I never thought it would have such a far-ranging reach that it might help improve things for the other shopkeepers too. It should be a cause for celebration, but with Witt standing so close, the guilt is clamouring a little bit louder than the positive things. All of this is only happening because I’m letting him believe we’re looking for the missing Cinderella when he’s literally leaning on her.

‘Well, let’s keep it going,’ Lilith says. ‘The more coverage we get of this Cinderella story, the better it will be for all of us. More visitors equals more signatures and more anger for the supermarket to come up against.’

‘We’re all feeling so helpless, and that dress makes us feel powerful again,’ Imogen says. ‘The amount of interest it’s getting might give us a chance.’

‘It’s bringing attention to Ever After Street at the time when we most need it.’

There’s suddenly a murmur through the crowd and I hear whispers. ‘Is that him?’

Witt’s hands move to my shoulders and he ducks down, hiding his face behind my hair. So many pairs of eyes looking at him is clearly making him uncomfortable.

The meeting draws to a close, and as people start to disperse, everyone comes over to us.

‘A fabulous idea to create a real-life fairy tale.’ The woman from the Christmas end of the street shakes both our hands.

‘Thanks for your help, handsome,’ Imogen says to Witt.

‘Thought I’d seen you around these past few days.’ Lilith hobbles over and raises an arm to pat his cheek, and he ducks to let her when he realises she’s on tiptoes and still struggling to reach. ‘Tea and coffee on the house for you, pet. Come in any time.’

Witt stutters out responses, blushing red, and clearly surprised by the attention.

‘Hope you find her.’ Ali owns the 1001 Nights restaurant, famous for their unique promise that if you eat there 1001 times, you get the next 1001 meals for free. No one knows whether Ali is his real name or just a nod to Aladdin. ‘You’re investigating the castle, right? Have you found out what happened to the missing viscount and viscountess?’

Witt shakes his head.

‘I heard his wife killed him and ran off with all his money,’ Ali says.

‘I heard she cheated on him and he drowned himself in the river because he couldn’t cope with the betrayal,’ Imogen says.

‘No, no,’ Lilith corrects them both. ‘It was murder-suicide. He killed his whole family and then himself.’

They walk off chatting about other gruesome rumours of how the viscount might’ve met his demise.

‘God, that dress, Sade.’ Mickey from the Mermaid’s Treasure Trove comes over. ‘I stop and stare in awe every day. The way it catches the light…’

‘Makes me feel like a little girl again,’ Lissa says. ‘If the missing Cinderella doesn’t want it, I’d be happy to display it in the Colours of the Wind museum – a part of our own fairy-tale story.’

‘Everyone deserves to wear a dress like that once in their lives,’ Marnie says without making eye contact with anyone and then scurries back to the bookshop across the street.

‘Thanks for letting us be part of your fairy tale,’ the girl from Christmas Ever After says as she leaves.

Witt stumbles inside the shop as though he can’t get in quick enough while I wish everyone a good week and then close the door behind me. The Cinderella Shop is shut on a Sunday, and although some shopkeepers on Ever After Street choose to stay open, I use the day to catch up on sewing.

‘There’s something about Ever After Street. People here are nicer than people I’ve met before,’ Witt says.

‘We’re all lucky to work here. We love our jobs. No one owns a shop here just to make money – they do it because they love seeing kids come along like they’ve found Disneyland on their own doorstep. Job satisfac—’

‘God, I hate this place!’ The door clatters as Ebony storms in. ‘Everything I put down, it goes flaming walkabouts. I looked like a fool out there. They’ll be saying I support the supermarket at this rate. Where is that wretched ticket?’

She starts rifling through the piles of papers on the shelves below the counter, mostly made up of half-hearted order outlines that customers never went through with and my absent-minded dress sketches that I do while I’m manning the counter sometimes.

‘The burning video has got 300 views already and Lissa’s only just uploaded it. I should’ve been part of that, not standing there patting myself down like a numpty.’ She mutters to herself as she hurls papers around. ‘I put that damn thing right here, I know I did.’

‘I threw it out,’ I lie because she’s making such a mess and I know with utmost certainty that she won’t be the one tidying it up.

‘Threw it out?’ She screeches so loudly that I’m almost positive one of the papers screws itself up in terror. ‘Why would you do that? You knew we were going to burn them.’

I shrivel under the incredulous look she throws at me. ‘I was tidying up.’

‘Tidying up.’ She tuts, indicating the mass of papers on the under-counter shelving. It looks like it was last tidied up in 1983. ‘You made me look like a fool out there.’

‘Sorry.’ I should’ve kept my mouth shut and denied all knowledge, let her think fairies had spirited it away during the night.

I’m still standing next to Witt and his elbow presses against my upper arm in silent, gentle support, but I daren’t glance up at him to see if he read anything into the missing ticket.

‘Tidy up this mess.’ She slaps the counter, sending the papers she’s strewn scattering even further. ‘I don’t have time for this nonsense today.’

‘You’re not going somewhere again, are you?’

‘I’m going on a cruise with a social media influencer. I’ve got to be in Southampton tonight; we leave tomorrow morning.’

‘A cruise… with an influencer…’ I repeat, but no matter how many times I try to make sense of that sentence, it doesn’t compute in my brain. ‘How is that going to help?’

‘She asked me to tag along so she can see some of our designs in motion.’ She sounds defensive. ‘I’m taking my entire wardrobe with me. She’s got 1.38 million followers, you know. If she wears our clothing on her socials, it will turn everything around for us.’

‘Ebony, you can’t keep…’

She fixes me with a glare that’s hard enough to cut me off. ‘You sew, and you leave finding clients to me. You know nothing about the world of business and how you have to act with these snooty little madams. We have to play the game. We need to be seen as a brand they’d like to be associated with, and what kind of an impression does it give if we’re suggesting we can’t afford to go on a cruise?’

‘Maybe the impression that we can’t afford it?’ I’m so exasperated that I’m struggling not to shout. All right, I don’t know what important influencers want or expect, but I do know we’re failing with the normal people who walk past every day. Why can’t I just pluck up the courage to say it in a way that would make her understand rather than shut me down? ‘How long will you be gone?’

‘Two we—’

‘Two weeks! How much is a two-week cruise with an influencer going to cost?’

‘Nowhere near as much as the revenue it will bring in when she wears our dresses on her feed. 1.38 million followers, Sadie.’

‘But even if she agrees, you have no way of knowing how many, if any, of those followers will be even vaguely interested or how many of them are likely to be able to afford—’ I stop myself because I’m failing at keeping my voice steady. I want to go over and shake her to make her realise this isn’t the way.

‘Our shop’s motto is exclusivity. We want our clothing to have a certain prestige among our clients, which is exactly why we need influencers on board. On board – hah!’ She laughs at her own joke and then rolls her eyes when I don’t. ‘Lots of celebrities follow her. Harrison Ford follows her, you know.’

‘I don’t think Harrison Ford’s going to be very interested in satin dresses from Herefordshire,’ I say as she takes money from the till and walks towards the door.

Witt laughs. ‘We have no idea about Harrison Ford’s life choices.’

Ebony stops as if it’s the first time she’s realised he’s there. ‘Who are you? What are you doing in my shop?’

‘This is Witt, Ebony. The Cinderella Prince? You met him a few days ago?’

‘Well, get out of the way.’

He sidesteps obediently, despite the fact he wasn’t in the way. ‘The dress is helping, right? It’s pulling more customers into the shop? It’s been busy lately.’

She peers at him. ‘If only Sadie was better at talking people into parting with their money, then it might actually do some good.’

‘People can’t afford our pri—’

‘Anyone can afford anything they want – that’s what credit cards are for!’ She turns back to me. ‘Don’t burn the place to the ground while I’m gone. And don’t recycle any more of my private mail.’

‘It wasn’t private, it was to—’

The door slams and she waves without looking back.

‘—all of us,’ I finish uselessly.

I want to cry. She makes me feel about two centimetres tall. Every time I try to stick up for myself, I lapse back into being that shy ten-year-old who’s grateful for being taken in and supported through the hardest time of my life, feeling like I owe her something, and battling the constant fear that everything could be taken away from me if I step out of line.

Witt reaches out to touch my arm, and he’s so nice that it’s going to make me burst into tears, so I hurry behind the counter to put the computer on for him and start putting the sketches back into piles.

Dreams of dresses I’ll never have time to make. Dresses that would make their wearers feel like a queen, although, for the amount of fabric and hours they’d take, on top of Ebony’s minimum pricing strategy, you’d have to be an actual queen to be able to afford them, which kind of defeats the object. There’s a compromise to be had – simpler dresses that take less fabric and less time to make and therefore could be sold for lower prices, but Ebony won’t hear of it.

Witt instinctively knows not to push, and he stays quiet. The computer makes its start-up jingle and he comes over to sit down behind the counter and leans forward to start reading through today’s Cinderella applicants while I carry on tidying.

‘Over a hundred today,’ he mutters. ‘Haven’t people got anything better to do?’

He’s getting disheartened by it all. After days of trawling through emails, he’s given up hope of finding her, and I feel like I’m hurting him by letting this farce continue, but how can I tell him now? Over a hundred people have taken the time to email him today – that can only be a small percentage of the number of views on our website. Our social media followers have risen on every channel. There’s a #FindCinderella hashtag on Twitter. The shop is getting more attention than it ever has. If I tell him, it all stops. And all our new followers will probably find out it was a con. The Cinderella Shop is back to square one, but with an additional tarnishing. I can’t let that happen. This was my idea and I have to see it through to the bitter end, no matter what.

‘Maybe today’s the day, eh?’ I force a shard of cheerfulness. Now he knows about the missing ticket, I can’t risk him putting two and two together.

‘Maybe.’ He looks up from his chair at the same moment I’m looking down at him, and gives me the softest smile, and… ‘Oh, for God’s sake, this woman is in prison! She’s offering to be my Cinderella in five years, seven months, and seventeen days’ time. But not to worry, she’s reassured me that her crime wasn’t anything violent, and not to read into the fact she’s already served fourteen years. Because I expect a lot of people get twenty-odd year jail sentences for non-violent crimes, don’t you?’

I fight the urge to slip my arms around his shoulders and hug him protectively.

‘And this one appears to be from a dog. Offering me wet nose kisses and sloppy dog biscuits in exchange for walkies and tummy rubs, which is not disturbing at all.’ He thinks about it. ‘Presuming the dog didn’t write it itself anyway, in which case, it’s either a really disturbed human or a really clever dog.’

Laughter takes over and eases the frustration I was feeling with everything. I carry on stacking the pages into a pile to take upstairs with one eye on him as he goes through messages with a constant litany of nopes and hitting the delete button hard.

‘Oh my God. Unsee! Unsee!’ He throws his arm across his eyes, knocking his glasses sideways, and shoves the chair back with such force that both he and his chair roll through the counter access gap and halfway across the shop. ‘What is wrong with people? I don’t want to see some random woman’s… pelvic region! That’s awful!’

Oh, bless him. He’s either really inexperienced with the internet or he really is too nice for his own good. I lean over and delete the waist-down full-frontal picture in the inbox. ‘It’s safe; you can come back now.’

He groans and scoots the chair back across so he’s next to me again, but instead of going back to the computer, he takes his glasses off, squeezes the bridge of his nose and screws his eyes tight before putting them on again and spinning the chair to face me. ‘This is ridiculous. Why am I doing this?’

‘Because somewhere in the depths of your hardened heart, you have hope?’

‘Yeah, okay, but not in the people on here.’ He gives me that pointed look again, the one that would make it so easy to crouch down, clasp his hands in mine and confess everything… but then I imagine the look on his face when he realises I’ve used him.

He makes a noise of irritation and spins a full circle in the computer chair. ‘She said she wasn’t meant to be there, so maybe she’d be in trouble if anyone found out, and that’s why she’s not coming forward? And we’ve made it all worse by turning it into a publicity campaign. What if we stopped all this and just let it be? No publicity, no find-Princess-Charming campaign, and no contact form which seems to be a magnet for weirdos.’

‘It’s too late now. People are invested in this. You saw that reaction this morning – people really care. We can’t just take it offline and expect everyone to forget about it.’

He sighs and spins the chair again, his fingers rolling and unrolling my dressmaker’s tape. ‘What if I promised not to say anything? If she wasn’t supposed to be there, if she thought she’d be in trouble or if she has something to protect, her secret would be safe with me, always.’

Maybe if I told him the truth… explained about the way this fell into my lap on the morning after Ebony told me I had to prove I knew something about marketing. Maybe he’d understand that I never realised it would turn into something this big. I never intended there to be contact forms and TikTok videos. I was just angry and annoyed – at Ebony, and at him for not recognising me, and I said the thing about putting the dress in the window, and then it all spiralled out of control…

‘What if it’s not that simple?’ I trust him, but no matter how much you trust someone, the road to secrets getting out is always paved with good intentions. I can’t risk it, not when Ebony’s trust in me and The Cinderella Shop is at stake.

‘Maybe it’s because I kissed her. I didn’t mean to kiss her, it just… happened. It felt right that night, like kissing someone I’d known my whole life, someone who was already mine to kiss. I got swept away, lost in the magic of the night…’

‘I’m sure it’s not that.’ I meet his eyes. ‘Maybe she just had to go home.’

‘Then why not tell me that?’ It’s a gentle but pleading question, as though he’s desperate for someone, anyone, to answer it.

‘Maybe she didn’t want you to know. Maybe she was playing a part and she didn’t want to break the illusion. She was beautiful and glamorous and she didn’t want Prince Charming to know she was really a scullery maid.’

‘A literal Cinderella?’ He considers it for a moment. ‘But I’m not Prince Charming. I’m a clumsy oaf who’s too big for my own skin and can barely string a sentence together most days. I want to see her again because of her words, because of how she made me feel when she was talking about the castle. Maybe she could help me understand what happened there.’

I cling onto the ‘how she made me feel’ comment. We both felt something that night, something magical, something that shouldn’t exist outside of fairy tales, and now I’ve ruined it, haven’t I? I’ve spent too much time with him. I’ve got to know who he really is under the standoffish exterior, and I like him too much to take the rejection when he finds out. Or when he goes back to Scotland. I’ve already got too close to him, and it won’t be worth the heartbreak when he leaves.

At least Prince Charming and Cinderella lived in the same kingdom.

He’s watching me, as though he’s waiting, and now is the perfect moment to spit it out, and…

I can’t do it.

‘Don’t give up on her,’ I say instead, disappointed in myself for not being braver. ‘Maybe one day she’ll find the strength she needs to take that risk.’

He nods slowly. ‘I can wait.’

I don’t know if he gets the hidden meaning or not, and I wish I was fearless enough to throw it all out there, but I’m not. The fact is, that no matter how well I get on with him, this is not a fairy tale. He doesn’t live here. One day very soon, he’s going to finish his work at the castle and he’ll be gone, and so will the castle and The Cinderella Shop, and I can’t let that happen without doing everything I can to save it.

Instead of going back to the computer, his body brushes against mine as he gets up and starts wandering around the shop, his fingers trailing over the silky ivory satin of a wedding dress on a mannequin and the glittery teal tulle of a fit-and-flare prom dress on the rails.

‘Why don’t you sign your sketches?’ Witt’s looking at the sketches of memorable Disney dresses that hang around the walls in elegant silver frames.

‘How do you know they’re mine?’

‘I recognise your work from the order book the other day.’

I find that hard to believe. My work is unmemorable and there’s no way he could really recognise it that easily. He’s just taking a punt, thinking I’ll laugh and correct him.

I should deny all knowledge, but he makes it too easy to tell him things I had no intention of telling him. ‘Ebony wouldn’t display them if she knew they were mine. I made Scarlett tell her she’d commissioned them from an in-demand artist on Etsy, and she was happy with that.’

‘Sade, these are so beautiful. Creative. Clever. Special. Ebony should be proud to have these. You could sell these as a side-line to sewing. Any Disney-loving child or adult would love something like this on their bedroom walls.’

‘Don’t be daft, they’re just… doodling. They fit the Ever After Street theme. I’m a seamstress, not an artist.’

‘Have you seen that dress in the window? If that isn’t art, I don’t know what is. So are those that you’re trying to hide over there.’ He nods towards the pile of papers I’ve left on the edge of the counter to take upstairs when I next go up to the flat.

‘They’re just dreams, Witt. Dresses I’d make if I had the time, material, and ability to sell them at a price that even non-millionaires could afford.’ I look at him across the shop. He’s got a unique ability in his beautiful eyes to see underneath my words. I felt it at the ball too – straight away. From the moment I met him, I didn’t want to be anything but honest.

‘It hasn’t always been like this with Ebony.’ I don’t realise I’m going to speak until I do. ‘She hasn’t had it easy. Her husband walked out on her when Scarlett was ten, and less than three months after that, my parents died, leaving her a single mother of two children. She never once complained. Never once made me feel like I wasn’t her own daughter. Ebony ran this place as it should be run once. She had never threaded a needle before, but because of how much this place meant to my mum and dad, she learned to sew from scratch so she could take over and do it justice. And she did, she really did. She hired another seamstress and there were shop staff here when Scarlett and I were still too young. A few years ago, we hit a rough patch. Dresses weren’t selling and customers weren’t coming in. The staff and the other seamstress had to go. It was a tough time and everything had to be cut back – until it was just us, back to basics. And then some movie star’s wife wore one of our dresses to a film premiere, and it really did turn things around. We had orders again, the elite and their friends travelling down for fittings, endless enquiries and celebrity assistants sending measurements over the phone, and that little burst of attention got the finances back into the black and the shop thriving again, but as with all things celebrity, it’s a fickle business and the orders soon dried up. And ever since, Ebony’s been chasing that again, convinced that we just need one big star to name-drop us or one influencer to influence people our way. She’s certain that we need to operate like a big London fashion house – with almost nothing on display and prices so high they make people think we must be super exclusive haute couture, to reflect the kind of clientele we want appeal to…’

He’s stopped wandering and is listening as though I’m the only person in the universe. I’ve never known anyone who listens like Witt does. Someone’s undivided attention would usually make me nervous, but with him, it makes me feel empowered – like I’m worth listening to.

‘You can’t undervalue your work though. It must take you days, even weeks, to create a dress like that.’ He lifts a hand towards the Cinderella dress in the window. ‘People can’t expect to buy something like that for a few quid.’

‘It’s not about that. There has to be a happy medium between charging something that regular people can afford and not feeling like I’m working for nothing. I don’t want to dress celebrities, Witt. I want to make normal people feel special when they put my dresses on. My mum did this because she loved making people happy. I used to love doing this. Now, I sew dresses I love when I can’t sleep at night, and I spend my days making hideous creations that a gaudy axolotl wouldn’t be seen dead in. Our actual sewing space in the back is full to bursting with returned dresses that no one knows what to do with.’ I’m short of breath by the time I stop myself talking. I hadn’t intended to spill out quite that much.

‘All those old dresses in there… returned because people didn’t “find love” while wearing them…’ He points to the open doorway to the back room although his tone says exactly how he feels about the concept of love. ‘It’s ridiculous that they’re just sitting there… Besides, second-hand items and buying sustainable is cool these days…’

He’s not wrong there. It’s not the first time I’ve thought about it. People can find love twice in a lifetime. Don’t those dresses deserve a second chance at finding love too? They could at least find new owners who love them… ‘You’re suggesting I sell them?’

‘Why not?’

‘Why not?’ I repeat. ‘Oh, let me count the ways. I don’t have permission to do that and Ebony would never agree. It’s not our policy. Each dress was handmade for each individual buyer. Exclusively. They can’t just be passed on to someone else.’

‘If they’ve returned it, I really don’t think they care what happens to it now.’

‘Well, no, but…’ Something’s sparked inside me and my mind is fizzing with possibilities. I could turn this shop around. Steam clean all those dresses and fill the shop with them. Sell them for reasonable prices. Prices that people who visit Ever After Street can actually afford. There could be rails full of dresses for people to look through, try on, spin around in front of a mirror, like there used to be when I was a child, sitting on my dad’s knee behind this very counter, listening to the whirr of Mum’s sewing machine, watching customers hold dresses up in front of themselves in the mirror, close their eyes and pretend to waltz with an imaginary partner, dreaming of the magical evening they could have with a dress like that on.

‘I could make alterations, adjust them so they fit each buyer’s measurements… It doesn’t take long to unpick seams or add panels here or darts there…’ My voice is speeding up and I can’t keep the excitement out of it, and I force myself to stop because I’m getting carried away and forgetting myself. This is not my shop and I will never be allowed to do that, no matter how incredible it would be.

‘Do it.’

His simple, calm words make it sound so easy, but as with most things in life, it never is. ‘I can’t just “do it”, Witt. Ebony would kill me.’

‘Ebony’s not here.’ He approaches the counter without dropping eye contact. ‘Ebony’s not going to be here for another two weeks.’

I almost laugh at what he’s suggesting. ‘Not at the moment, but do you think she’s not going to find out and then kill me? I’m trying to make her realise that I’m a responsible adult who can be trusted. When she hands the shop over to me, I can run it the way I choose. Then I can give those dresses a second chance, not now.’

He leans on his elbows on the counter, ducking down until he’s at my height and looking me directly in the eyes. Without a word, he holds his hand out, and like an autopilot response, I slip mine into it. ‘May I speak frankly?’

I nod, biting my lip because I already know what he’s going to say, and maybe I need to hear it.

He takes a breath and it makes me realise that speaking isn’t always straightforward for him. He hides his stammer a lot, and I squeeze his fingers, because he’s trying to help me, and it’s easy to forget how far out of his comfort zone this is.

‘It’s never going to happen. You’re working your backside off and you have been for years, and she’s stringing you along, dangling a carrot, but she is never, ever going to admit she’s wrong and give up this shop.’

At first I’m stung and my instinctive reaction is to snap that I’ve only known him for a week, and he has no right to push his – admittedly gorgeous – nose into our business, but his words connect with my own thoughts that I keep trying to stamp down. ‘You don’t know that.’

‘You’re absolutely right. I don’t know that.’ His hand squeezes mine. ‘But I think you do.’

How can someone I met a week ago know me this well? I swallow hard and he continues kindly. ‘Sade, what you do is extraordinary and I think you’ve forgotten how extraordinary it is. Whatever’s happened here in the past few years has knocked your confidence so much that you no longer believe in the thing you love. You say you believe in fairy tales, but it’s been a long time since you really did, and even longer since you believed in yourself. You have everything you need to save The Cinderella Shop, but it’s not Ebony’s permission you need – it’s your own.’

I don’t realise how deeply his words have affected me until his face blurs in front of my eyes and spontaneous tears spill over.

‘Oh God, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to speak that frankly.’ He lets go of my hand, pushes himself up onto the counter and swings his legs over until he’s back on my side, and then I’m in his arms, surrounded by his dusky lavender and saffron aftershave as he holds me against his chest. I’m enclosed by his solid body, and it’s the most safe and secure I can ever remember being, and I focus on the feeling of his stubble catching in my hair as I wipe my eyes and try to get myself under control. I did not expect such an emotional reaction to words that are truer than I’ve ever admitted to myself before.

He’s wearing a quarter-zip khaki top with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows to disguise how short it is on his arms and I put my hand on his chest, intending to step away from him, but it ends up staying there because whenever I touch him, it’s impossible to stop. His hand covers mine and he holds it over his heart and his chin presses closer to the top of my head, even though he’s probably being suffocated by curls up there, I let myself lean against him for a few moments, and I think I could be happy for the rest of my life in these arms.

And then, as always seems to be the case when I’m with Witt, reality slaps me round the face like a wet haddock and I force myself to step away. ‘Are you serious?’

His eyes search out mine before he answers. ‘Yes.’

That simplicity again. His easy way of making anything seem possible, and inside me, there’s a sense of a weight being lifted, like he’s hit the nail completely on its uncomfortable but honest head, and it’s coupled with a fluttering, buzzing excitement, and I feel as though he sees it all when I look into his eyes.

‘You have two weeks of freedom. Not to prove to Ebony that you can be trusted, but to show Ebony that your ideas are worth listening to. To make yourself believe in you as much as I believe in you.’

I know he notices the way my face distorts as I bite the inside of my cheek to stop the tears welling up again, and I have to grip the counter to stop myself jumping on him and acting on the overwhelming rush of love. How did I get so lucky to meet a man like this? Prince Charming has got absolutely nothing on Witt Kingscote.

‘I’ll help. I can move stuff, shift shop fittings, put rails together.’ He flexes a bicep which was supposed to be a joke, but it makes my mouth go dry and simultaneously feel like I might be drooling. ‘I can even be taught how to use the steam cleaner.’

It makes me laugh out loud. ‘Do you have time for that?’

‘For you? Always.’ His eyes are shining as he looks at me, and I finally give in to the excitement that fizzes through my veins. I feel like a fading, flickering candle and something has lit me up and given me permission to be alight again.

Witt and I are making two mannequins waltz across the shop together when Scarlett comes in that afternoon. She immediately backs out of the doorway and looks up at the sign to make sure she’s entered the right shop.

I’ve stripped the windows of everything apart from the Cinderella dress, and all of Ebony’s peacockish designs are on their way to the back room. There are naked mannequins in the window, and so many plastic legs and arms and torsos all over the place that it looks like a doll murder scene, and we’ve got half-full rails, empty rails, and dresses everywhere.

‘In this parallel universe I’ve accidentally walked into, what are you doing?’

‘Giving love another chance.’ I explain everything while Witt carries on de-robing a mannequin of one of Ebony’s designs – a neon yellow and purple dress with a plumage-like chiffon skirt and oversized sleeves made of feathers that make it look as if the wearer is trying, and failing, to sprout wings from their shoulders.

I wait for Scarlett to tell me I can’t do that, to start putting things back as they were, to phone her mum and tell her everything, but her face slowly breaks into a grin as I stumble over my explanations. ‘It’s about time. How long have I been saying this, hmm?’

I’m welling up again because it feels so right and she comes over to hug me.

‘Sometimes the right people say things in the right way for you to hear it with your heart rather than your ears.’ She nods towards Witt. ‘Well done, that man.’

‘Nothing to do with me.’ He carefully unlaces the mannequin’s corset. ‘Just so you know, I feel like a total pervert doing this, even though the woman’s made of plastic.’

‘Just shows how much of a gentleman you are,’ Scarlett tells him.

I don’t add that he did actually ask the mannequin for permission to undress her and reluctantly started even though she, unsurprisingly, did not give her plasticky consent.

‘Jackson has just been showing me the website. You might want to have a look at this.’ She holds her phone out to show us, and Witt comes over and bends beside me, his chin millimetres away from resting on my shoulder, and that little flutter races through me again at his closeness.

And even more so when I realise what Scarlett’s showing us. ‘Seventeen thousand likes on Instagram?’

‘Six thousand “pins”, and look at all these comments. They’re all saying the dress is magnificent, and how much it reminds them of the Disney dresses of their childhood dreams.’ She flicks the screen up and shows us more social media sites.

‘Nearly a half a million views on TikTok,’ I say in astonishment. ‘This is…’

‘Good for Ever After Street, right?’ Witt finishes for me.

‘Yeah.’ I look at him. ‘It’s exactly what we need. These are numbers that could save us. If this amount of engagement translates into customers… The Cinderella Shop could soar again. The other shopkeepers are noticing it too. Everyone’s mentioning that they’re busier than usual. It could give Ever After Street a leg to stand on against the supermarket buying the castle. With figures like this, we are not just a little retail outlet that they can evict and turn into car parking spaces. We have value of our own. People will support us. If this number of followers see us posting about how special the Full Moon Forest is, there will be uproar about anyone who wants to tear it out and put in access roads. There will be protests. Threats to boycott the supermarket. All of this will be for nothing if the sale to the supermarket goes ahead, but if we could use this as a platform to save Ever After Street itself, then maybe…’ I stop myself before I get excited about the prospect of the castle being saved, but I can’t help thinking it. This kind of online presence could impact everything.

Witt drops my gaze and looks uneasy. I shouldn’t have said any of that in front of him. I’ve let my imagination run away with me, while conveniently forgetting that it’s his job to sell the castle to the highest bidder, even if it is a supermarket.

‘Mum’s going to go ballistic,’ Scarlett says with a laugh. ‘You’ve gone viral with a dress that she would have refused to display.’

‘It’s not the dress, it’s the story. People want to believe that fairy tales can happen in real life.’

‘Trust me, Sade, it’s the dress and the story. And… you two.’ She waves an arm towards us. ‘Good things happen when you’re together.’

‘I agree,’ Witt murmurs, turning his face to my ear and burying the words in my hair.

My hand is hanging limply next to his, and my fingers find his and brush against them and he lets out a tiny little sigh that might be the best noise I’ve ever heard. I get that little shiver down my spine again, the one that’s full of both joy at finding someone who makes me feel like this, and dread at how he’s going to react when he finds out who the missing Cinderella really is.

‘Now we just have to make sure the story and the dress gets a happy ending.’ Scarlett claps her hands together. ‘Right, let me help, there’s a lot to do before opening time tomorrow!’

By nightfall, the three of us have transformed The Cinderella Shop into a wonderful, exciting jumble of colours and fabrics. There are four mannequins in one window, each wearing a demure Disney-inspired gown from the returned rails. Everything’s price tagged at £50 to £100 depending on the amount of fabric and man hours involved, and while each dress is easily worth a lot more, even second hand, it isn’t about the money. It’s about taking a stand and proving to Ebony that my ideas are worth listening to, and it will be a pleasure to see the dresses being enjoyed again.

For the first time in many, many years, I can’t wait for Monday morning to come around. And it’s not very often you get to say that.

11

By 9 a.m. on Monday morning, there’s a queue outside.

We haven’t posted on social media or the Ever After Street website in case Ebony is keeping tabs from her cruise, but we’ve asked our fellow shopkeepers to spread the word locally, put up a sign on the notice board and in our windows, and Scarlett’s put a chalkboard outside advertising our ‘second chance’ dress sale, and it seems that a chance to own a Cinderella Shop dress for a fraction of the price is enough of an incentive in itself.

Marnie, who barely leaves the bookshop, is first in the queue and she waves excitedly at me as I go to open the door, and leave it hooked open, inviting people in, something Ebony never lets us do in case it invites the ‘wrong’ type of people in.

After Marnie, there’s Lissa, Mickey, and Imogen, and even Lilith has tottered up on her Zimmer frame, along with customers I recognise from previous visits – people who have been put off by the extortionate prices. Faces I’ve seen through the window, looking in longingly, but never venturing past the door. Within minutes, the shop is alive with chatter, chaos, and a chorus of oohs and ahhs.

And it is joyous.

It’s amazing to see customers rifling through rails and holding dresses up to the mirror. When a dress is priced at a few hundred pounds, people are scared to look at it, never mind touch it, but now they’re stroking fabric and matching up shoes. People are recommending things for their friends, shouting at them to come and see, snapping photos and sending text messages telling friends they’d better get down here fast, and rushing towards the changing rooms with armfuls of dresses that I never thought would see the light of day again.

Within a couple of hours, Scarlett’s had to cancel a shift at Rapunzel’s because we’re so busy. I have a rail full of alterations to do, and we’re restocking constantly, and even with both of us, it’s impossible to keep up.

By late afternoon, the initial rush has calmed down, and Scarlett and I are both exhausted but in a good way. I’m in the window, replacing yet another dress that’s been sold and covering a naked mannequin’s modesty for the fourth time today when I see Witt coming down the street, or rather, staggering towards the shop under the weight of something heavy, and I quickly do up the one-shoulder blue tulle dress and clamber down from the display as he comes in. ‘Hello!’

He’s struggling under the weight of an armful of old books, but he stops in the doorway to look around in surprise. ‘This place looks like an actual clothing shop. Even on the way down, I heard people buzzing about it. There are people carrying your branded paper bags everywhere. I’m so happy for you.’

‘Me too,’ Scarlett calls from the back of the shop, where she’s making the most of the lull between customers to tidy a rail for the umpteenth time.

He looks at me and inclines his head towards the counter. ‘Have you got time to look at something?’

He heaves the books onto the counter with a heavy thud and I follow him across the shop.

‘Sorry I’m late.’ His hand brushes mine. ‘I got so caught up in what I was doing at the castle. I thought you might like these?’

‘What are they?’ My fingers trace over the edges of the stack of old books.

‘Old fashion books. They must’ve belonged to the viscountess. She had her own private library and I found them in it.’

I pull the top one down and the spine creaks with age as I open it. The pages are yellowed and there’s age damage to the covers, but they’re beautiful coffee-table books that would’ve been hideously expensive in their time. There are catalogues of designer collections from decades past, along with book after book on the history of fashion, from the twentieth century and as far back as Georgian times.

Scarlett’s gone behind the counter and traces a finger over the designs on the pages, iconic dresses that probably weren’t iconic back when these were drawn. It’s like we’ve stepped back in time and are seeing the future before it happens. I can’t help inhaling because they smell papery and delicious. ‘Someone loved these, once.’

He makes that noise in his throat again. ‘I know you draw on fashions of the past for some of your designs and I thought they might be useful to you.’

‘Oh, Witt, these are beautiful. Thank you.’ I close one and take another from the stack and leaf through it carefully. I’m standing next to him so I nudge his arm and make him meet my eyes again.

I’m stupidly touched. I love books and I love the fashions of days gone by, and even in such a short time, he already knows me better than most people who have been in my life for years. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Yep. I’ve got strict instructions to get rid of everything. Charity, landfill, or somewhere in between.’ He indicates me and it makes me laugh.

‘There you go with the compliments again.’ I’m grinning and he’s grinning, and neither of us can take our eyes off each other.

‘That’s really sad.’ Scarlett has to slam a book shut to get our attention back on the task at hand, presumably meaning the castle clearance and not the way I’m looking at him. ‘It must be full of stuff that meant so much to someone once.’

‘Once,’ he says pointedly and turns to me. ‘Speaking of stuff, can I ask you something?’

I nod, hoping he can’t see me swallow. This question puts me on edge every time he asks it.

‘When you said your mum was a dresser for the viscountess… did you mean the first viscountess?’

I look at him in confusion. ‘There was more than one?’

‘So the stories go.’ He shrugs. ‘The viscount and the first viscountess were married for decades of blissful happiness, until she died. A few years later, he remarried an evil gold digger who gold-dug him into an early grave, so they say.’

‘I never knew that.’ I look at Scarlett and she shakes her head too.

‘I was trying to sort the dates out in my head. When would your mum and dad have worked there?’

‘It was one of my mum’s first jobs. The viscountess happened upon one of her designs and employed her straight away, even though she lacked experience. My mum was nineteen when she started, so it would’ve been the… early seventies?’

‘So it was the first viscountess. The good one. The viscount didn’t remarry until the end of the eighties.’ His face breaks into a smile. ‘I’m going through her things and there are a load of dresses, and there’s something about them that reminds me of you. I’m wondering if they might be your mum’s work?’

Oh my God. It had never crossed my mind that things like that could still be there. Frozen in time, like the rest of the castle. My emotions are instantly on edge. I’ve never known anything about the viscount or apparent viscountesses, and I’d never given a second thought to the things inside the castle, and the thought of dresses my mum made all those years ago still being in existence is a little bit mind-blowing.

I feel like Witt can see every emotion surging through my head because he’s chewing his lip as he watches me. ‘Do you want to come and see?’

‘More than anything, but I’m worki—’

‘Go!’ Scarlett insists. ‘I’m here and it’s not far off closing time anyway.’

I exchange a look with her, double-checking with my eyes that she’s really okay with being left alone, and she nods. Ever After Street is quiet now and it doesn’t look like we’ll be inundated with the same rush of customers as earlier. ‘Text if it gets busy again. Take measurements, pin darts, and add dresses to the alterations rail if any are needed; I’ll start on them when I get back.’

She makes a shooing motion and I’m fairly sure she’s going to get a broom out and sweep us out of the door soon.

‘Just let me take these upst—’ I go to pick up the books, but Witt’s huge hands clamp on the tower of spines.

‘I’ll take these upstairs; they’re heavy.’

‘Aww, and he insists he’s not Prince Charming,’ Scarlett says to me as I reluctantly let Witt take them and lead the way out the door.

I unlock the side door, hold it open for him, and then rush up the narrow stairway to let us into my cramped flat. There’s what was once a kitchen table covered in fabric, which I sweep aside to give him a space to put the books down when he ducks into the room behind me.

If I’d known a gorgeous guy was coming into my flat, I’d have made an effort to clean up.

He stretches his back out, grunting as he stands up to full height and looks around. ‘This is… cosy.’

He has such a nice way of putting things. Instead of heading straight back out the door, he invites himself into the living room, where my mum’s old Singer machine lives, along with many half-finished dresses and reams of fabric, both my own and the shop’s excess stock, and rails of dresses in garment bags, finished but without a home.

‘Okay, you’ve seen enough now, off we go.’ I try to keep it light-hearted, but it’s cramped and stuffed, and he’s staying in a castle that’s got huge rooms and valuable antiques and luxury at every turn, and I’m embarrassed by my living quarters.

The kitchen and living room are open plan, which is a nice way of saying one merges into the other with no distinction, and it’s jam-packed enough to make even the bravest of people feel claustrophobic, and the hallway towards the bathroom is lined by rails of returned dresses that have spilled over from downstairs.

‘Is this a flat or a store room?’

Honestly, I’m not sure sometimes either. ‘It’s a flat, but downstairs is full so things have gradually migrated up here. I guess it’s a store room but Ebony lets me live here. It’s convenient for work, and I have everything I need on hand.’

‘Or, on head.’ As he stands up, he clonks his head on one of the racks of fabric rolls that are attached to the living room wall, a throwback to the times when it actually was a store room.

It really is a tight squeeze. There’s fabric everywhere, dress forms in various states of undress, boxes of unused accessories from the shop, and a couple of carts with trays of sewing supplies in them.

He bends over the table to have a look at the old Singer machine that works with a hand crank rather than electricity. ‘This is an antique.’

‘I know. Don’t laugh.’

‘I wasn’t going to laugh. It’s beautiful. I’m a property historian, Sade, I appreciate things the way they used to be, not as they are now.’

‘It was my mum’s. It’s not big and flashy enough to be used professionally – the one downstairs has got all the bells and whistles – but this is… I don’t know. Everything my mum ever made, she sewed on this old thing. It was a present from her parents and she used it until the day she died.’

‘It’s where the magic happens?’

I nod, even though he sounds genuine and not as if he’s humouring me.

He walks between mannequins and traces long fingers across rails, unzipping one of many garment bags to peer inside. The dresses I make up here are much more demure than the ones downstairs. Less floofy and princessy, and more elegant and suitable for normal occasions rather than fairy-tale balls.

‘This is what you do,’ he says simply. ‘These are the kind of dresses you’d sell if it wasn’t for Ebony’s input?’

‘She doesn’t know any of this is here. She doesn’t know I make things that aren’t for the shop, at least not now.’

‘Who are they for?’ He zips up the garment bag and unzips another.

‘I don’t know. No one. Anyone. Stock for when I take over one day…’ I trail off because it seems increasingly unlikely, especially given that I’m now solely responsible for breaking one of Ebony’s cardinal rules. No matter how much of a success it is, when she gets back, she is not going to fall at my feet and praise my inventiveness in selling off the second chance dresses, and it’s going to be nigh-on impossible to convince her otherwise.

‘You know how beautiful these are, don’t you?’

I shake my head. ‘It’s just playing. Using up offcuts of fabric. Filling my time when I can’t sleep and it’s more productive than counting sheep.’

He stops and looks through to the bedroom for a moment, which is a little sanctuary in the crazy flat, and nods.

‘I’d have tidied up if I’d known you were coming.’

‘I wouldn’t have wanted you to. I like it here. It’s very you.’

Ebony says things like that, but they’re disparaging commentaries on my clothing or appearance. When Witt says it, it sounds like a true compliment. ‘Not quite a castle with a thousand rooms.’

‘Only ninety-three actually.’

‘Oh, that must make it so much easier not to get lost.’

He laughs, his eyes on the view through the bedroom window as clouds cover the early-evening sun, and then he pulls a dress form around in a waltz to get across the hazardous living room and holds his hand out to me. ‘Shall we?’

I laugh and push him towards the door.

At the bottom of the narrow stairs down to Ever After Street, he holds the door open for me and looks back up at the flat window as I lock up.

‘This is where you made the Cinderella dress, isn’t it?’

‘You don’t know that.’

‘Yes, I do. It’s a dress made with love, and it’s been a long time since you made anything you loved for work.’ He holds his arm out. ‘Hasn’t it?’

‘I’m not going to dignify that with a response.’

‘Okay.’ His voice is soft and his arm is right there, and I slip my hand through the crook of his elbow, always surprised by his simple acceptance.

It’s been many years since I invited a man into my flat, back in the days when it was tidier and I still made dresses I loved as a day job and my nights were devoted to actually sleeping. Those were the good ol’ days.

Even at this time in the late afternoon, we’re dodging people as we head towards the woods at the end of Ever After Street. The carousel is turning, filled with laughing children and grandparents clutching screaming toddlers. In recent months, the carousel has turned maybe once or twice a day, but so many more people have visited this week that it’s otherworldly organ music to the tune of ‘When You Wish Upon A Star’ has been an almost constant soundtrack.

A fizzle of excitement builds when we’re swallowed up by the woods as we head up the wide, steep path and get closer to the castle. From this part of the forest, the main building is obscured by trees and you can only see the tallest blue roofs and spires.

‘How are you getting on at the castle?’

‘There’s something about the place. So many memories that aren’t mine, does that make sense? I feel like I’m trying to untangle someone else’s life. Like, um…’ He stutters on the last bit of the sentence and frustration crosses his face. ‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t apologise. I love the way you speak. You sound like a prince.’

‘Yeah, a frog prince.’

‘No, Witt.’ My hand spreads out across his inner forearm and I let my fingertips rub his skin softly. He’s got a gorgeously deep and silky voice and I hate the undercurrent of self-loathing I can suddenly sense in him. ‘Will you tell me about it?’

He sighs and I squeeze his arm gently, trying not to push him but desperately wanting to have a better understanding.

‘It’s taken me years to learn how to control it, to speak slowly and focus on every syllable, visualise each word as a physical thing between my lips, but it still catches me off guard sometimes. It really comes out when I’m nervous, or tired, or stressed, or if I’m ill or if I’ve had one too many, so basically if I’m on anything other than top form, I’m a stammering wreck.’ His voice is starting to waver and he shakes out the hand that's not holding mine as though he's trying to loosen himself up and pushes a long breath out through pursed lips. ‘Sorry. I’m not even used to talking this much.’

I hug his arm closer to my side and give him all the time he needs.

‘I get so angry at myself because the words are there but they won’t come out, and that frustration makes it worse. And the self-consciousness. I can feel people looking at me, getting annoyed at how long it’s taking, the “helpful” claps on the shoulder and “just spit it out, lad,” like it can be solved by encouragement. The humiliation that I can’t do something that everyone else does without a second thought. I dread phone conversations with every fibre of my being and my greatest fear is public speaking.’

I’m holding his arm so tightly that he’s going to have five crescent-shaped fingernail marks in his skin when I eventually release him.

‘It’s why I went to the ball. Usually I don’t talk to people or mix with people, and I never go to parties or gatherings, but the mask made me feel brave. At least if I embarrassed myself, I could slink away unseen and even if people laughed at me, they wouldn’t know who I was.’

‘I get that. It’s a shame we can’t wear masks every day in real life.’

He unwinds his arm from mine, drops it around my shoulders instead, and squeezes me into his side. ‘Or meet people who make you feel like you don’t need one.’

When I look up at him, his eyes hold mine intently and my breath is suddenly coming in sharp pants. ‘You’ll never need a mask with me.’

‘You’ll never need a mask with me either, Sade.’

I force myself to drop eye contact and look away. The path up to the castle is wide and steep, but I’ve barely noticed the incline that always leaves me out of breath. It’s usually for lack-of-fitness related reasons, but today the blame lies solely at Witt’s feet.

‘Have you always had it?’ I ask, thinking back to something he said the last time we walked through this forest, something about it being new.

‘No. It was a post-traumatic thing when I was younger. Something happened and it developed as a response to that.’ He sighs as though he didn’t intend to say that much, but I can feel his eyes on me as he thinks it over and decides he trusts me enough to tell me the rest. ‘I saw my dad die.’

‘Oh God, Witt, I’m so sorry.’ I’m both surprised by his honesty and stunned by the fact he’s chosen to be this honest with me, and the need to throw my arms around his neck and hug him to bits is uncontrollable. His arm is still slung around my shoulders and I cover his hand with mine, but it’s not enough. I lift his arm back over my head until I can get both my hands around his and press my lips to his knuckles. ‘I had no idea.’ I whisper the words against his skin. ‘I can’t imagine what that must do to a child.’

We’ve reached the walled walkway to the castle, the point where I left him the other night, where I dropped the stupid shoe, and I’m filled with regret. I knew he was special, I knew I should have stayed, but I prioritised Ebony and my job over him that night, and I’ve been doing the same thing ever since. Using him to prove a point to Ebony and save the shop, and now I don’t know how we’re ever going to overcome this thing between us – this truth I haven’t told.

It’s like when Ariel gets her legs and goes to Eric’s castle, and even though he’s looking for her, he doesn’t believe she’s the one because she can’t tell him who she is.

He squeezes my hand and doesn’t let go as our entwined arms drop between us. ‘Makes ’em turn out like me, I guess.’

I tug his hand until he meets my eyes again. ‘That’s not a bad thing.’

My heart melts at the involuntary smile that blazes across his face, and my grip gets impossibly tighter. ‘Do you want to talk about it?’

‘That was me talking about it. I’ve never told anyone that before, but you… this place…’ He shakes his head as though there isn’t a way to end that sentence. Maybe it’s a sentence that doesn’t need an ending?

He lifts an arm towards the portcullis gate as we head towards the gatehouse. ‘This is where they met, your mum and dad?’

It must’ve been right here. This very spot. Somehow my hand has dropped out of his and he stands aside and lets me look.

It’s like standing in a storybook that I’ve read a hundred times. ‘It was such a huge moment in both their lives. That one accidental meeting changed the course of their lives forever. The Cinderella Shop, me, maybe Ever After Street itself… None of it would exist if it wasn’t for that one moment in this castle.’

‘How come?’ He sits on the wall and stretches his legs out.

I turn back towards Ever After Street. ‘The Cinderella Shop building was a wedding gift to my parents from the viscount and viscountess. You were right, they were servant cottages once, but times had moved on from the servant days, and they’d been empty for a while. For a young couple to be given a place like that was unreal. It was their home at first; my dad was a freelance accountant and my mum started seeing her dress clients there, and the business was doing well enough that they could afford somewhere bigger when Mum found out she was pregnant with me. So they got a bigger place and turned the house they’d been given into The Cinderella Shop. Lilith already had her tearoom, but The Cinderella Shop was the first retail shop on the street, the others followed from there.’

He’s still sitting on the wall and his head is cocked to one side as though he’s considering the great mysteries of the universe.

‘What?’

‘Nothing.’ He shakes his head. ‘Like I said, I just didn’t realise how important this place was to the area, that’s all. That’s a pretty special history.’

‘This is a special place.’

I appreciate the way he lets me take my time and just look. This is what I wanted to do the other night when ball guests were herded through so quickly by the party staff that there wasn’t time, but Witt makes me feel like we’ve got all the time in the world.

It’s not dark yet but the mid-May sky is cloudy enough to suggest it soon will be, and I force myself to stop picturing the moment exactly as it happened and go over to where he’s sitting. I hold my hand out to pull him up, and neither of us let go as he unlocks the main door and lets us in. It has been a long time since anything felt as nice as my hand feels when it’s in his.

The castle feels even more special than it did the other night. Then it was all glitz and glamour and music and lights, but now it’s dark and so quiet that you can almost hear old ghosts shuffling about their business. Witt flicks a light on, like anyone else coming home to a darkened house, and it makes it seem welcoming and homely. The chandelier in the entrance hall lights up, and so does the one with about a thousand crystal bulbs hanging above the main double stairway. Well, maybe not that homely – most people aren’t greeted by two massive chandeliers, although life would probably be better if they were.

He doesn’t let go of my hand as he leads the way up the same set of stairs we came down together the other night, and I can’t help looking at the wall with the missing frames again. ‘Do you know what was up there?’

He glances up uninterestedly. ‘Pictures, at a guess.’

‘Portraits?’ I look at the three rectangular gaps where paintings have obviously been removed. Two large and one small. ‘Do you think the smaller one was the second viscountess? Added as an afterthought in a small frame? Bet she loved that.’

He laughs. ‘It was probably a point of contention.’

We carry on up the stairs, but instead of any of the paths we took the other night, he leads me down a long wide hallway, the way lit by golden Cupid uplighters along the wood-panelled walls, hung with heavy velvet drapes, and so many fine paintings that this would be an art lover’s dream. There are marble columns and statues that probably belong in a garden, but the interior is so huge that they don’t look out of place inside. Mosaic flooring turns to plush carpeting that still smells of the products the cleaning team used before the ball.

Witt’s quiet as we go through an opulent drawing room, and a music room with the grandest of grand pianos and a harp standing in one corner, and I get the impression he’s taking the scenic route and giving me a tour of the castle. We must have crossed to the opposite side of the building by the time we enter yet another bedroom, this one even more luxurious than the other rooms we’ve passed through, but with that air of sadness and standing still in time again. There are a lot of boxes in this one, labelled in neat writing that must be his work. He opens a door on the opposite side of the huge room and we ascend another tower.

‘This was the viscountess’s private dressing room.’ He unlocks the door at the top of the winding stairs, and a crystal pendant light flickers into life.

I go straight over to the window and look down at the array of conical roofs and turrets below, the green gardens that look like a maze for ants from this far up. I feel like we can see the whole of England from up here. I thought we were high up the other night, but this truly is the highest point of the castle, and you can see for miles.

‘It was kept as a time capsule after she died,’ Witt says. ‘Left exactly as it was and no one was permitted entry. Everything was covered, but I don’t know what state the fabric will be in after so many years.’

In my mind, it’s like no years have passed at all. I approach a dress form wearing a ballgown with a lace overlay and a wide tiered skirt and take the grape-coloured velvet between my thumb and forefinger. It’s a dress I’ve seen photos of, old pictures taken by my dad of my mum at her sewing machine, making it. This very dress.

‘Are they…?’

I nod, knowing I’m going to cry if I attempt to answer him.

He knows it too because he comes over and slides his arm around my shoulder and gives me a squeeze of moral support.

‘See here?’ I part the fabric of the skirt to reveal a tiny glass slipper charm. ‘This was my mum’s signature. Nowadays we sew “Cinderella Shop” labels inside, but back then, she didn’t have anything like that, so she sewed a miniature glass slipper into the skirt. I still have a box of these. I sew them into the dresses I make on my own. Not into Ebony’s designs.’

‘Rebellious sewing. Anarchy via the medium of itty-bitty charms. I like it.’ He winks at me, and I appreciate the attempt to lighten the atmosphere, because it’s like walking into a room full of ghosts… invisible ghosts wearing these decades-old dresses.

His arm drops as I go across to another one, an off-shoulder gown in heavy cream satin with a statement red poppy print. There are boxes of old photos at Ebony’s house, and I’m pretty sure that all of these dresses are in them. There are so many more. What must have been the viscountess’s favourites are displayed on dress forms, covers around their feet where Witt’s removed them, and there are baroque wardrobes that run wall to wall around the whole room, and in each gap between them are floor-to-ceiling mirrors. There’s a dressing table, the kind of oversized thing you can imagine only the rich and famous use, still covered in pots of half-used face powder, dried-up nail polishes, and perfumes in atomisers discoloured with age. It really is like a time capsule, left exactly as it was at the moment the viscountess died.

‘He used to come here to talk to her,’ Witt murmurs. ‘I think leaving it like it was convinced him she was still alive. It was all just waiting for her to come back.’

‘How do you know that?’ I turn to look at him, and he meets my eyes and then looks away.

‘Police reports from the time. Local gossip. And I have experience with old buildings – you can deduce a lot about their tragic pasts from the way things are left. Part of my job is to figure out what happened to a building.’

I look at him again, but he’s gone to look out of a window. ‘Do you know when the first viscountess died?’

He goes to answer and then stops and shakes his head. ‘Mid-eighties or thereabouts.’

‘I was born then. Throughout my childhood, my mum told me so many stories about her time at the castle, but she never once mentioned that the viscountess had passed away.’

‘Maybe she wanted you to believe in fairy tales. They’re supposed to have happy endings, not death and mourning and a viscount sent mad by grief. And I’m not sure if anyone knew. I’ve been trying to piece together a story from what I’ve heard locally, but no one seems to have a clue about who lived here or what happened to them.’

‘Maybe it’s better that way.’ I look up at the intricate plasterwork of the high domed ceiling and turn in a circle; it feels impossible to take it all in. ‘Maybe old ghosts should be left in peace. It’s no business of ours, is it?’

‘I feel like I’ve met part of her through you.’ He looks surprised when the words spill out of his mouth and a bit like he wishes he could put them back in. ‘Through your mum and your connection to the castle. It’s like we’ve brought the past back to life for a little while.’

‘These are not just dresses. They define a moment in time. The viscountess loved fashion, my mum used to say they would talk for hours about what was hot and what was not and they collaborated on all the designs that Mum made for her. Dresses like these are memories. They’re timestamps of a life. My childhood is interspersed with memories of family weddings, funerals, Christmases, or other gatherings, not because of the events themselves, but because I always remember what my mum was wearing, like Polaroid photos in my mind. Do you know what I mean?’

‘I wish I did,’ he mumbles. ‘I don’t remember much of my childhood. Not the good parts, anyway.’

‘Witt… thank you.’ I’m not entirely sure what I’m thanking him for, but it’s a combination of remembering what I’d said about my mum, recognising her work, and inviting me here.

He smiles at me in a way that says he understands everything I’m trying to convey and maybe that’s the thing with Witt – he understands that sometimes it isn’t easy to put things into words.

‘Thank you.’

‘What for?’

He considers it before speaking. ‘Something I can’t explain.’

It sends a shiver through me because it’s exactly what he said on the night of the ball – what we both said.

He must sense it too because he shakes himself and drops my gaze. ‘These are all yours if you want them.’

‘Of course I do,’ I say excitedly and then grimace. ‘Not sure I’ve got anywhere to put them right at this moment, but…’

‘I’ll keep them safe for you.’

‘In the castle that’s going to be demolished and turned into a supermarket?’

‘Not for a while yet. Maybe by that time, you’ll have sold loads more second-chance dresses and have room in your flat again.’

I remember what Lissa said the other day. ‘Maybe Lissa would display them in the museum. They are a part of Ever After Street’s history, after all…’

‘That would be a nice way for both your mum and the viscountess to live on.’ He looks at dresses with a muted smile and eyes that are distant. ‘I’d like that.’

‘Speaking of Ever After Street and history… did any other offers come through after the ball? Is there any chance that it might not be a supermarket?’ I try not to sound too optimistic, but I’m hoping that he trusts me enough to let me in on what’s happening with the sale.

‘Is insider information all you want from me?’ He looks at me and a flash of something unreadable crosses his face before he looks away again. ‘I can’t share info like that, Sadie, so if it is, you’re wasting your time.’

He says it jokingly, but there’s a sharpness to his voice, a tone of resignation, as if it’s what he expected, and I wish I’d kept my mouth shut. I like him for so many reasons, and then I go and say something like that and it sounds like the only reason. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean…’

He brushes off my apology before I’ve even figured out the right words to say, but the atmosphere has become strained and I know I’ve put him on edge.

The tower makes me realise why he doesn’t like towers, and as much as I love seeing Mum’s old dresses, it’s a relief to leave it behind and get back into the main part of the castle.

As we retrace our steps back to the ground floor, I tell him some of the stories I can remember from my childhood, like the time the viscountess wanted a special dress for an anniversary and was determined to keep it hidden from the viscount – as determined as he was to see it. The ugly shirt she commissioned for him as a joke, but he wore to bed every night until it literally fell apart. The times they invited my parents over for tea and made it a running joke to serve the poshest and most eye-wateringly expensive food to be found, which was always followed up by my mum and dad’s humbler favourite – cheese on toast. How every time my mum made a dress for the viscountess, she also made a matching tie and pocket square for the viscount because they liked to colour coordinate when they went out together.

Witt goes to make us a cuppa while I wander around one of the ballrooms, which is so much better when it’s not full of people.

‘Do you think they threw so many balls that they really needed two ballrooms?’ I ask when he comes back in, carrying a tray with two cups of tea and a packet of biscuits. His footsteps echo on the hardwood floor as he crosses the room and puts it down on the closed lid of the grand piano.

‘It’s a nice thought. Kind of what you expect a castle to be used for.’

‘You’re so lucky to be staying here. To get the full castle experience before it’s gone for good.’

‘What, to be trapped in an ancient building, rattling around alone with a load of old ghosts?’

I didn’t think it was possible for anyone to look that sad while dunking a chocolate HobNob into a mug of tea. ‘Literally?’

‘No.’ He sounds as if he’s humouring me. ‘I just meant there’s a lot of sadness in these walls.’

I turn around, looking up at the chandelier glittering above us, the carved ivy leaves running down the ornate columns at the edges of the room, the wooden floor with strips of gold that catch and reflect every sparkle of light, the huge arched windows that look out onto the forest. ‘There’s a lot of happiness too, I wouldn’t wonder.’

‘Happiness?’ He sounds as though he’s never heard the word before.

‘They must’ve been so happy once. The viscount and viscountess. And not just them, but the generations who lived here before in the centuries since it was built. Families from years gone by. How many people must have lived and loved here? How many children have grown up here with the castle as their playground? How many people have danced with the love of their lives on this very floor? How many people have met someone they wouldn’t otherwise have met because of this castle?’ I go over to a window, the shadows of trees visible in the darkening dusk outside. ‘How many people have looked out of these windows and watched winter become spring or summer become autumn? Can you imagine that one day, many years ago, someone looked out of this window and those trees were saplings? This castle has stood here for so long and the world has changed around it, but it’s still exactly as it was over four hundred years ago. The only thing that changes about a building like this is the people who love it.’

‘It hasn’t had much love in recent years.’ His voice sounds thick and stilted.

‘No, but they’re all still here, aren’t they? The people who once loved it. Not in ghost form or anything…’ Hopefully… ‘I think people stay a part of the places they live. For whatever reason they can’t love it any more, it doesn’t mean it didn’t matter to them once. They’d still love it if they could, and now it’s up to us to love it for them. I don’t think anyone ever owns a place like this. It belongs to everyone who’s ever lived here and everyone who ever will live here. Everyone is just preserving it for the next generation. Saving it as a monument to the past. It’s living history – it should be valued for that, not sold on for profit.’

He doesn’t respond and when I turn around, he’s frozen in the middle of the dancefloor, and his eyes are glistening with unshed tears.

It’s like a punch to the gut. I had no idea I was upsetting him and the guilt needles at me. Here I am, going on and on about the castle without thinking about how he feels. He must think I hold him personally responsible for the sale. He must think I blame him because of his job. ‘Witt… sorry, I get carried away sometimes. Ignore me.’

He shakes his head, and I can’t ignore him. I stride across the ballroom floor, slide one arm up around the back of his neck and pull his head down to my shoulder, one hand in his hair to hold him there, while the other one slips around his back and I hug him to me.

He’s stiff at first – he clearly didn’t expect to be hugged – but as I loosen my grip on his hair and stroke my fingers through it, he starts to relax.

His hands touch my sides and slide behind my back, crossing over and pulling me closer and he lets out a long sigh. ‘Sorry. You have a way with words. Your perspective is refreshing. I’ve worked with old buildings for years and I've never looked at one the way you do before.’

‘This castle is so special.’

His only response is a non-committal grunt.

He’s much taller than me and I release him after a few minutes when it seems like his back is protesting the bent angle, but instead of moving away, he straightens up and his hands find their way to my waist and he starts swaying us gently.

It takes me a few moments to realise I’m dancing with Witt again, but as myself this time, and I’m waiting for him to look down at me and realise I’m the same person. He must have figured it out. He can’t be that oblivious. Is he really dancing with me again without realising who I am? It doesn’t seem like he can be for real, but when I tilt my head back to look at him, his eyes are closed and his chin is in my hair again.

I let myself relax into it because there’s something about Witt. Just being with him is calming and makes me feel as though he was made for me and simultaneously as though my life has been empty until now. He’s filled a hole that I didn’t realise was there. In the past few years, I’ve focused only on work, and thoughts of romance have been the last thing on my mind. More than anything, he makes me wish I’d stayed the other night. Whatever this could have been, I threw it away before it had even begun.

‘I’ve got an idea I want to run by you,’ he says eventually. ‘And you’re going to think I’m nuts, but will you hear me out?’

I nod against his chest, and feel the breaths he takes to centre himself and my fingers brush over the back of his neck. ‘Got all the time in the world.’

‘What if we gave your second-chance dresses a second-chance ball to attend?’

‘On their own? Might be a bit difficult without involving the wearers too.’

The laugh that bursts out of him is unexpected and drains so much tension from his body that he nearly topples us both over. ‘Why don’t we throw another ball? Nothing to do with the seller or any potential buyers this time – just me. A celebration of Ever After Street and a way of saying thank you for making my cynical old soul see a different side to this place. I didn’t want to take this job, and now I’m very glad I did. You wouldn’t have to boycott it then. You could come with no repercussions. So could everyone else on Ever After Street who has been so kind to me since I got here. And all those extra customers need somewhere to wear their new dresses, don’t they? What do you think?’

‘I think you’re nuts.’ Without taking my hands off him, I pull back until I can look into his blue eyes. ‘In that lovely, thoughtful, slightly crazed, let’s-do-it way. Are you sure?’

‘Yeah. You’re right, this castle should be celebrated. So should Ever After Street. Most of the decorations are still here from the other night, and I could get the caterers in again, but we don’t need anything too fancy. I’d prefer a ball with tea and biscuits. And no masks this time. No one needs to pretend to be something they’re not. Seeing your dresses get second chances has got me thinking. A second chance for anyone who didn’t get to come last time, a second chance for your dresses, and a second chance for… me. And her. I want to invite her, personally. For whatever reason she wasn’t supposed to be there last time, maybe it will be different this time. If she wouldn’t be in trouble for going, maybe she could tell me who she is.’

So much for him starting to realise. Maybe it’s me who’s imagining how special that night was. Despite what he’s saying, it can’t have meant that much to him when he’s literally dancing with the same person and he doesn’t know it.

‘How are you going to invite her?’

‘Online. On the website, or social media or whatever.’

‘You’ll have half of England turning up. Look how many oddbods showed up in the inbox. Do you really want to meet those people in person, Witt? Oh, you might even get lucky and that one in prison will be able to secure a day release.’

He can’t stop himself from smiling. ‘It’ll be a personal invitation, just to her.’

‘Like when Prince Charming invites all the maidens in the land to try on the glass slipper, and in the original Grimm’s stories, they start cutting off their toes to make it fit? Doesn’t sound like the best idea to me.’

‘I’ll invite her to meet me in the place we kissed. She’s the only person who would know the way – I’ve never taken anyone there before. No one will ever find it – except the person I showed the way.’

‘What if she doesn’t have a great sense of direction and gets lost?’ In my mind, I’m instantly trying to map out the route through the castle we took that night. There were too many hallways, too many twists and turns and rooms we cut through. ‘What if she’s forgotten?’

‘Am I that unforgettable? Er, wait, no, I mean forgettable, not unforgettable. I always get that muddled up.’

He did at the ball too. Is it a hint? Is he seeing if I remember? ‘I think you were right the first time, Witt. You are unforgettable.’

His cheeks flare red but he can’t stop himself smiling. ‘I know it’s mad, but I just want to know if I imagined how wonderful that night was. I can’t get her out of my head. I feel like I’ll never get her out of my head. I have to go soon, and I can’t leave this place without seeing her again.’

I realise what he’s really saying. This is it. Do or die. One last chance. I have to decide whether I’m brave enough to reveal the truth or say goodbye to him forever. ‘What if she’s scared you won’t like her as she is? Without the make-up and the princess dress? What if she feels stupid for not coming forward before? What if something’s happened between then and now that would make things different?’

‘I’m sure she had her reasons.’

He really is that perfect. He’s kind and understanding, but will he still be when he realises the runaway Cinderella he’s been looking for has been beside him all along, using his story to gain followers and prove I’d know a marketing opportunity when it hit me in the face? Will he forgive me? Or will the fact I haven’t told him erode every inch of his trust in me and put an instant end to our friendship, never mind anything more?

One of his hands touches my elbow and slides down my arm until he can take my hand and pull away to spin me around and then back against his chest. His chin rubs against my hair and his voice is a tiny whisper. ‘Do you think she’ll give me a second chance?’

I lean back in his arms until I can reach up and hold the side of his face and brush my thumb over his cheek, loving the first prickle of stubble and the way he turns into my hand.

‘She’d be the biggest fool in the world not to,’ I say, because I would, wouldn’t I? There’s nothing in the universe that would make it worth letting this man go.

12

The two weeks since Ebony left have been mad. Scarlett’s had to get Jackson to cover for some of her hairdressing clients, and Witt’s come down to the shop to help out when we’ve been particularly busy. Second-chance dresses are flying off the shelves like proverbial hot cakes, although the queues to get into The Cinderella Shop have been arguably longer than the queues for Lilith’s tearoom, so maybe we’re even outselling actual hot cakes.

Witt’s idea of giving the second-chance dresses somewhere to go has erupted like a non-deadly volcano and the lava flowing out is satin, organza, and reams of tulle. The second-chance ball is now two weeks away, and rails in the back room are empty and boxes full of returned dresses are being aired out and given a second shot at finding someone who loves them. Takings are up massively, followers on all our social media accounts are skyrocketing, and people who had never heard of Ever After Street before are making day trips here, bringing kids on weekends, and it’s half term this week so it’s likely to be even busier. The whole street has come alive with delighted shouts, sing-alongs to Disney songs, and shoppers carrying bags full of goodies, and everyone is talking about the second-chance ball. Everyone is going to be there. All of my fellow shopkeepers love Witt and have set their boycotting tendencies aside and admitted they were all disappointed to miss the first ball and can’t wait for a second chance.

After a late evening of doing alterations to make sure every second-chance dress fits perfectly, I’m lying in bed, reading Witt’s invitation to the missing Cinderella for approximately the seven hundred and fifty-seven thousandth time.

To the girl I danced with at the ball. The girl I kissed. The girl who ran away at midnight. Everything deserves a second chance.

Maybe you think I only noticed your beautiful dress, but I didn’t. I noticed your eyes, your smile, your kindness, your humour and sense of fun, and most importantly, the way everything changed when I met you.

I am no Prince Charming. I’m clumsy and awkward and I work too much. I’ve never met an inanimate object that I didn’t try to make conversation with. I’ve also never met anyone who understood me like you did.

I don’t think you wanted to leave – I think you had to, and I can understand the lengths that we have to go to sometimes to please people who don’t see how special we are.

Will you give me a second chance? At the second chance ball, to be held on Sunday, June 11th, I will be waiting in the place where we kissed. Please be brave. Please let me see you as you are – because I think we had something special. Something worth exploring in all its inconvenient, unexpected joy.

It’s written on a proper invitation card, a digital replica of the one we received the first time around. His gentle way of assuaging my fears. It’s the first time he’s really hinted that he felt something special that night too, and his voice is inside my head, speaking each word into my ear, like he’s written it only for me.

Apart from the fact it’s been shared 300,000 times and the comments range from sentimental to lewd at best.

I ignore all that. Witt’s right, no one will ever find that secret garden except for me and him, and I’m staring at the invitation on my phone and daydreaming about how it will go. From his words, I want to believe he’ll understand, that he’ll realise why I didn’t immediately tell him who I was, and why I’m still annoyed at him for not recognising me. He knows about Ebony and how much The Cinderella Shop means to me – he has to understand why I had to make the most of an opportunity to save it when it was going under. Maybe we’ll dance again. Maybe we’ll say, ‘I wanted it to be you all along,’ and run into each other’s arms, and the kiss will go on forev—

I’m blasted out of the daydream by a car horn and the rev of an engine right under my window, and I roll over to the other side of the bed and push myself up to peer out. The rose Witt gave me that night is still in a vase on the bay window ledge; a few sad petals have fallen to the shelf around it, but it stands as though it’s got a glass cloche over it, marking the passage of time before the spell is broken.

I groan when I recognise the car that’s pulled up, but even the groan is cut off by a sharp hammering on the downstairs door.

I knew Ebony’s cruise ship was docking in Southampton tonight, but I didn’t realise she’d come straight here.

I glance at the clock. Ten minutes past midnight. She’s got a thing about this time of night. There’s nothing but a bedside lamp glowing inside, so she must realise I’m asleep or trying to make it so, but if anything it just makes the hammering louder.

It’s not particularly cold tonight, but I heave myself out of bed and shrug my dressing gown on, flicking on the stairway light to alert her to my presence and make her stop the hammering before she wakes the neighbouring counties and starts rousing people across the border in Wales.

I knew this confrontation was coming, but I expected it in the morning when Scarlett would be here to back me up. Ebony’s been mercifully quiet on her cruise, and apart from a few curt texts, we’ve heard nothing and as of yet have no idea if she’s discovered what we’ve been doing in her absence.

Judging by the hammering, she most definitely has. And I’m alone to face her wrath.

‘What do you think you’re playing at?’ Ebony screeches when she hears my key in the other side of the lock. ‘I go away for two tiny little weeks and trust you not to wreck the place, and you go behind my back and start selling things that are not for sale, and—’

‘Good evening to you too, Aunt Ebony.’ I squeeze out of the door in the smallest gap possible and shut it quickly, lest she get any ideas about going up to the flat and finding the dresses that she’s never meant to find.

‘No, it is not a good evening! Christ in a wheelbarrow, you’ve got some explaining to do. What were you thinking? How did you think you were going to get away with this? Did you think I wouldn’t notice? Did you think I wouldn’t wonder what was going on at the sudden increase in followers, the number of people tagging us on social media, all the photos shared, customers talking and tagging and sharing photos of other people’s dresses?’

‘They’re not other people’s dresses. Other people returned them, therefore they’re now ours to do what we want with. And increases in followers and pictures of our dresses are generally a good thing. For the first time in ages, people are talking about The Cinderella Shop—’

‘In embarrassment! They’re laughing at us for making a mockery of our unique guarantee! As if that monstrosity in the window wasn’t bad enough with this stupid Cinderella thing, and now there’s another bleeding ball, and…’ She’s so indignant that she runs out of breath and has to stop.

I look up the hill towards the castle. There’s a light on in one of the towers. Witt’s still up. Just the thought of him brings a smile to my face. The way he supports me. The way he believes in me more than I’ve ever believed in myself. How much time he’s spent in the shop lately, helping out because Scarlett and I haven’t been able to keep up with the increase in customers. Tidying up, packing dresses into boxes or garment bags, convincing customers how much they need a dress and personally inviting them to the second-chance ball. Doing everything he can to help, for nothing in return.

Seeing the light in the castle makes me feel stronger than I usually would when faced with confrontation. Ebony isn’t always right. If I had done what my aunt said, I would never have met him. She was wrong about going to the ball, and she’s wrong about how to run The Cinderella Shop.

‘Have you finished?’

‘Finished?’ she bellows. ‘I haven’t started.’

‘Keep it down, will you? You’ll wake the entire street.’

‘Good! Someone should know about what you’ve been doing behind my back. How did you rope Scarlett into this?’

I decide to take the blame entirely. Scarlett might have backed me up, but it was me who started this; she doesn’t deserve any of Ebony’s fury. ‘I didn’t give her a choice. I did it while she was hairdressing; it was too late by the time she got back.’

Ebony taps her foot on the pavement. ‘I knew you’d both been suspiciously quiet. I was trying to have a relaxing break, but I thought I’d better check the socials to see if everything was all right, and thank God I did! What’s got into you, Sadie? I’ve never seen such insolence before. What on earth do you think you’ve been doing?’

‘Saving The Cinderella Shop.’

‘Saving it?’ she screams, like a particularly shrieky parrot. ‘You’re going against everything we stand for. Exclusivity is our business model and—’

‘And look how well it’s been going so far.’ I jump headfirst into the middle of her rant. ‘The shop is on its last legs because of your reliance on celebrity endorsements which count for nothing in this day and age. No one has got the kind of money celebrities have got. The returned dresses are just sitting there, waiting for the moths to get at them.’ I quietly explain about the second-chance dresses and the second-chance ball, but my calmness makes Ebony go even more nuclear.

‘How dare you? I trusted you, Sadie. I can’t believe you’d be so underhanded. If you want to change the way things are run, you talk to me about it.’

‘I’ve tried! Multiple times. You brush me off and never listen.’

‘You must’ve been itching for me to get out the door. I bet you were watching at the window for my car to disappear from view so you could put your greedy little plan into action.’

‘Nothing like that. It wasn’t planned. It was spur of the moment and my mind ran away with the possibilities.’ My hands are shaking and I can’t get my head around how she thinks the worst of me. Is she really so blind to the state the shop is in and why it’s in that position?

‘Something ran away all right – your sanity would be my guess. I’m beyond disappointed. Never thought I’d see the day.’ She continues muttering to herself, as if I can’t hear every derogatory comment. ‘First thing tomorrow morning, we’ll put it all back right. I want you on the shop floor by six o’clock to undo all the damage you’ve done before opening time. I will not lose another minute of custom to your “big ideas”.’ She does the inverted commas with her fingers, just in case her tone wasn’t enough to convey what she thinks of my ‘big ideas’.

‘No.’ I fold my arms, probably made less threatening by the panda-print fluffy dressing gown, but still. Maybe it’s good that Scarlett’s not here. This has been coming for a long time. Usually Scarlett diffuses arguments, but when it’s just the two of us, we have to hear each other, don’t we?

‘No?’ she repeats, mere seconds away from an explosion.

‘We’re not going back. We’re going to carry on as we have been for the past couple of weeks. This was my parents’ shop and I get a say in how we do things. I’ve proved that my ideas have merit.’

‘You’ve proved that you have no respect for our customers. Our guarantee makes us stand out from the crowd and attract more high-end buyers – it does not make us pass on their exclusive dresses to the next bidder, like some real-life version of eBay!’

‘Our guarantee makes us numpties. Naïve numpties. It makes no difference to the original buyers if a dress is rotting in our storeroom or making someone else’s life better. If they cared that much, they wouldn’t have returned it, would they?’ Witt said something similar to me two weeks ago, and using his words makes me feel like he’s beside me.

I look up at the light glowing from the castle again. Silent strength on the hill above us, a constant in my life. All the years I’ve watched it, never knowing that my mum’s dresses were still inside, waiting to be discovered again. And then there’s Witt.

Clinging onto his belief in me makes me realise how much I desperately want that from Ebony. I want her to like the dresses I make. I want her to believe that customers might like them, but she never does. I’ve always thought that one day, I would do something good enough to earn her respect. I’d make such a beautiful dress that she’d realise I’m not a child waiting to be ‘deemed ready’, but an adult who knows what she’s doing and is capable of running a business on my own. And it’s started to feel like she never will, and I’m starting to wonder how much more of my life I can spend here, waiting for something that is never going to happen.

‘The second-chance ball is in two weeks and our dresses are flying off the shelves. We’re going to keep the shop as it is until then. You have to give it a fair shot.’

‘You’re going to tell me what to do, are you?’

‘You haven’t been here. You’re off sunning yourself here, there, and everywhere. Hair appointments, nail appointments, cruises, foreign trips to chase after some uninterested celebrity or another. You have no clue how this place needs to be run because you’re never here. I see the day-to-day customers and what they want. For once, you are going to listen to me. If we carry on for a couple more weeks, we might even earn enough to cover the expense of the cruise you’ve fraudulently charged to our business account.’

Just when I thought she couldn’t get any shriekier, she screeches, ‘Fraud!’

‘Last time I checked, reasonable business expenses did not stretch to luxury cruises. And how did you get on with the elusive social media influencer? Is she going to showcase our products on her channels?’

‘Ah. Well, about that…’ She sputters to a halt. ‘She’s considering it. She’s asked us to make seven dresses, one for every day of the week, and then she’ll decide.’

‘You’re kidding.’

‘She has to test our products properly first. She has integrity – she won’t put her name behind just any brand, she has to love it. Her fans appreciate that.’

‘So, let me get this straight, you’re expecting me to make seven dresses for absolutely no payment in the vague hopes that she might deign herself to give us a quick mention on her socials?’

‘It could be a turning point for us.’

I’m so fed up of hearing that sentence. Does Ebony even know how often she says it? Every single whim of hers is the next ‘turning point’. Since she’s been away, we’ve made our own turning point, and I’m proud of that, even if it means upsetting her. ‘No. No, it won’t, because it never is. We don’t need to be loved by someone with millions of Instagram followers – we need to be loved by the people who come to Ever After Street and want to go home with a dress that makes them feel special. And for the first time, that’s what’s happening. So no to your social media influencer. No, no, and seven times no.’

She blinks as though she can’t comprehend the word.

‘In two weeks, we’ve taken almost as much as we took in six months last year. I’ve done that, with help from people who believe in me. I deserve a chance to see how this pans out, and I’m not going back to the way things were. We’re making people happy. You say happiness doesn’t pay the bills, but we’re proving that it can. If you don’t believe me, check the accounts, and you’ll see. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going back to bed. You have no right to come here ranting and raving at this time of night. Goodnight.’

‘Sadie!’ she screams as I close the door on her and lock it. She hammers again but I ignore her.

My hands are still shaking as I trudge back up the stairs. I’ve certainly just thrown away any chance I had of taking over The Cinderella Shop, and probably tossed my relationship with my aunt in the wheelie bin right along with it, but it feels empowering to flick the light off while she’s still banging on the door.

That needed to be said, even if it’s changed my life forever. And she’s no less likely to give me the shop now, because she was never likely to give it to me in the first place, and if this is it, if she sacks me and throws me out, then I’ll find somewhere else. There’s a market for the dresses I make – the last few weeks have taught me that. If I have to start anew, then I will, just like my mum did all those years ago.

I hear the shop door opening below, and I have a brief fear that she’s going to put things back as they were by herself, using her anger to fuel her, but she leaves again within a few minutes, presumably with the till rolls and the accounts file.

As her car pulls away, I stand at my bedroom window and look up at the castle, a single glow on the mountainside.

‘Thank you,’ I whisper to it. It or him, or both. None of this would be happening without either of them, and that’s a good thing.

13

I feel sick the next morning. I’ve never had a row like that with Ebony before. I’ve never spoken to Ebony like that before. I’ve never spoken to anyone like that before. Although I went to sleep after she left, I woke up at four and I’ve been tossing and turning since then, wondering what the heck possessed me to be so antagonistic, and by the time nine o’clock rolls around, I’m too jittery to eat breakfast, and I’m convinced that Ebony’s going to be waiting downstairs with my P45 and an eviction notice, but there’s just Witt, waiting outside the door with a tray of three coffees from Lilith’s because he’s even got the charm to make Lilith let him in early, and Lilith doesn’t let anyone in early.

‘Good morn—’ He takes one look at my face. ‘What’s wrong?’

‘Ebony knows. She came over at midnight and we had a row. Always in the middle of the night; I don’t know why she’s got such a thing about that time.’

He raises a thoughtful eyebrow. ‘Secretly a vampire? A well-dressed bat in disguise?’

In the middle of the stress, fear, and frustration since last night, it makes me laugh loud enough that I forget everything for a blissful moment.

‘Are you okay?’ He reaches out and takes my hand. ‘I’m so sorry, I was intending to be here for moral support.’

‘That’s why you’re early.’ I realise why he’s standing outside the shop before opening time with coffee. He knew we were expecting Ebony back today. He was genuinely coming to back me up and make sure I wasn’t alone when she arrived.

After the fraught night, it’s my undoing. Everything this man does makes me emotional, and my cheeks flare red and my nose burns as tears well up, and within seconds, he’s put the coffees down and wrapped me up in his arms.

‘I’m sorry.’ His lips move against my forehead and he winds his fingers in my hair to hold me against his chest. His comforting aftershave – lavender mixed with spice and dark wood – takes over my senses and blocks out the anxious thoughts.

His kindness makes even more emotions rise up. He’s unlike anyone who’s ever been in my life before. The Cinderella dress glitters in the window behind us, and that familiar feeling that he deserves better than someone who can’t be honest with him bubbles up. The thought makes me step out of his embrace, rub my eyes, and steel myself for the day ahead as I open the shop door and let us in.

When I check behind the counter, the till receipts are gone and the most recent print-outs of the accounts are missing from the desk in the back too, and they will show Ebony that letting our second-chance dresses go on to find new owners is a worthwhile endeavour.

‘I don’t know why you don’t go on strike,’ Witt says when I’ve given him a rundown of everything that happened last night. ‘You are The Cinderella Shop. It doesn’t exist without you. Show Ebony that and she’ll soon start valuing you.’

‘Ha ha,’ I say purposefully, but the idea worms its way into my brain. Let’s face it, it’s not like things could get much worse, is it?

It’s a matter of minutes after opening time when there’s the click-clack of heels on the pavement outside. Scarlett still lives with Ebony and they come in together. She winks at me as her mum bustles in, stopping in the doorway to tut at the doorstop holding it open.

Witt’s trying to get to grips with corset laces as he dresses a mannequin on the other side of the shop, and I’m not sure Ebony even notices him as she does a sweep of the shop with her eyes.

‘It looks like a jumble sale in here. Have we turned into a charity shop overnight? We’re giving off “Primark after a gang of teenage girls have ransacked it” vibes.’

‘No, we’re not.’ I sound much calmer than I feel. ‘Customers are loving it.’

Witt finishes the corset with a victorious smile and steps down off the plinth he was standing on.

‘Now, look, maybe I was a tad hasty last night; I was tired and hurt by your deviousness, and it had been a long day, but I’ve had the chance to sleep on it… Scarlett also spent most of the night trying to talk me round and shoulder half the blame for your actions.’

‘It was both of us,’ Scarlett says, sounding as though she’s had a very long night. She picks up her coffee gratefully and goes to take refuge in the back room.

‘And I am not so pig-headed that I can’t admit it’s nice to see the incoming transactions higher than the outgoing expenses for a change, but you are making a mockery of your own work. I’ve been through these till rolls, Sadie. There are worrying things in these receipts. People will never buy our dresses for full price again if they learn that they can get them on sale in a few months. This one, for example.’ A till receipt roll is clutched in her fist as she waves her arm around and describes a metallic satin Bardot dress. ‘That dress was priced at £400, and you sold it for £40!’

‘It was all the woman could afford.’

‘It was all the woman told you she could afford. Bargain-hunters are unscrupulous, you know.’

‘I believed her. Better it go for £40 than not at all. And she was so happy with it.’

‘Happy?’ Ebony scoffs. ‘Always with this damn happiness thing. How many times do I have to repeat myself? Happiness does not pay the bills.’

‘If I may?’ Witt takes a tentative step over, sticking his head out as if he’s peering around the doorway of this conversation and asking if he can come in. ‘I was here and the customer was absolutely overjoyed. Happy customers tell their friends and post on social media. It’s a good business tactic.’

I appreciate him stepping in and trying to stick up for me. No one’s ever done that before. And the fact he’s putting his own insecurities aside makes it even more meaningful. It isn’t always easy for Witt to speak, but he does it anyway, for me, even though he’d probably prefer to stay quiet. ‘Sadie was right to do that. Word of mouth is the most important thing for any shop.’

‘And you’re an experienced business owner, are you?’ She turns around and narrows her eyes at him.

‘No, I…’ He’s taken aback and the stutter prevents him from finishing the sentence.

‘Then go away.’ She peers at him with her nose turned up. ‘Who are you anyway?’

I roll my eyes, wondering how many times I’ve introduced him now. ‘This is Witt, Ebony. He’s the Cinderella Prince looking for Princess Charming.’

‘But it’s nice to know I’m so memorable,’ he says, his cheeky smile belying a sense of edginess, while I wonder how on earth someone can see tall, gorgeous Witt and not remember him.

‘A man in a dress shop is off-putting. Women might see you here and think it’s creepy. Why is a man hanging around a dress shop if not to perv on the customers?’

‘I’m not perving on the customers, I’m perving on Sadie.’ He holds up a hand and closes his eyes in embarrassment. ‘That came out very, very wrong. I did not mean I’m perving on you, I meant I only have eyes for you. No. Wait. I mean, I’m only looking at you. No, that sounds even worse. Oh hell. Do you have a dark room I can go and lie down in?’

In the middle of what was a serious conversation, I’m trying valiantly not to laugh but I can’t do it. It gets the better of me and I burst into giggles so hard that I knock my water bottle over and he hides his face in his hands with such force that he knocks his glasses askew and sinks down into one of the chairs usually reserved for waiting husbands or friends minding shopping bags, shaking his head at himself.

I can’t deny the swell of affection for him again. My heart thumps extra hard and warmth fills me. It’s nice to hear that, and even nicer that he spoke up for me. When it’s just us and he’s relaxed and unpressured, it’s easy to forget how much the stammer affects him, but with other people here, watching him, waiting for his words to come out right, he gets flustered and self-conscious. ‘Witt’s a friend here to talk to another friend. He’s not doing any harm. Some customers have actually asked for his opinion and been glad to have it, and he’s such a gentleman that even if they ask him, he gets their permission before looking. He won’t even undress a mannequin without protecting her plastic modesty.’

Ebony scowls at him and then me. ‘I don’t like him here.’

‘Well, he’s my guest and he’s welcome here,’ I snap. ‘In two weeks, he’s done more to help The Cinderella Shop than you have in months.’

‘It’s my shop. I’m the boss and I’m getting heartily fed up of no one listening to me!’

‘Okay, fine. Be the boss instead of flitting around on holidays all the time. See what it’s like to actually work here. Take note of what our customers want. Because I haven’t had a day off in many, many years, and I’m going on strike.’

‘What?’

‘What?’ Witt looks up, but his half-joking words earlier put the thought into my head. Something has got to change, and if that starts with Ebony actually having to do a day’s work, then it may as well start right now.

I hold my hand out and Witt lets me pull him to his feet and instead of letting go, his fingers close tighter around mine.

‘You can’t do that,’ Ebony barks. ‘You’re going to leave Scarlett on her own all day?’

‘Can’t stop! Hairdressing clients!’ Scarlett reappears from the back room with her hairdressing toolkit over her shoulder and hurries out the door, Witt and I swiftly following behind.

‘Scarlett! Sadie! You, tall man! Come back! You can’t just leave me here!’

We don’t stop running until we reach the benches in the middle of the street, out of Ebony’s sightline.

Scarlett turns around and gives us a thumbs-up as she rushes to take refuge in the hair salon with Jackson, ignoring the distant sound of wailing from behind us.

Witt’s hand is still in mine, his chest heaving from the unexpected run, and his eyes shining with that sense of fun that makes everything seem better when he’s around. ‘I’m so proud I could kiss you!’ He suddenly looks horrified and his cheeks redden. ‘Er, except I won’t, because that would be weird and unwarranted. Sorry, things keep spilling out of my mouth this morning. I didn’t mean that comment in there either. You know how much I stumble over my words when I’m nervous. I just meant I’m here to see you, not your customers. Nothing else.’

‘I know. Wait, I thought you were here to find your missing Cinderella.’ To be fair, it has been many days since he even looked at the emails.

‘I think we both know that’s not going to happen, but I can’t tear myself away, no matter what your aunt says. Let’s face it, she’ll have forgotten me by the next time she comes in anyway.’

‘Believe me, no one could ever forget you.’

That fizzle passes between us again. My breath comes in short bursts and I can’t look away from him, as though a magnet is pulling us closer. Somehow my other hand has found his other hand and we’re just standing in the middle of the street, holding hands, and smiling at each other for no reason.

I’ve had a thing for his hands since the moment he held one out to me as we left the study on the night of the ball, and if anything it’s only got stronger as I’ve got to know him. Everything seems right with the world when his fingers are entangled with mine, and the thought of how easy it would be to kiss him flits around like a really devilish hummingbird. What he said the other day, about how kissing me at the ball felt like I was already his to kiss is how I feel too, and it would be so easy. His tongue wets his lips and his head dips slightly, like an invite, and if I just pushed myself onto my tiptoes…

Luckily, a gust of wind whips up and smothers my face with my hair, turning me into some curly version of Cousin Itt and swiftly wiping out any prospect of sexual attraction.

I push a hand through my hair to get my curls off my face. ‘So what are we going to do with this unexpected day off stretching out before us?’ I look up the hill and the spires catch the early sunlight and glint back at me. ‘You need help at the castle?’

‘Nah, I’m on strike today too.’ He thinks about it. ‘What about we grab lunch to-go at the tearoom and then… will you walk with me?’

‘I’d love to.’

He’s been spending so much time at the shop lately that I half-expected him to be glad of an excuse to get away from me, and I can’t stop the massive grin because he wants to spend a day off with me as much as I want to spend it with him.

After getting a takeaway picnic from Lilith’s, Witt wants to see more of Ever After Street, so we visit the Mermaid’s Treasure Trove, buy sweets in the Neverland Sweet Shop, wander round the Beast’s Enchanted Rose flower shop, which is conveniently next door to the Tale As Old As Time bookshop, and walk around Lissa’s Colours of the Wind museum. We ride the carousel three times and get our faces painted. He goes for tiger stripes and I go for butterfly wings on my cheeks, and then we wander through the Full Moon Forest hand in hand, surprisingly unselfconscious despite the fact we both look like overgrown children, and neither of us can stop giggling, whether from the exhilaration of shirking adult responsibilities or from the sugar rush of the candyfloss he’s bought to share as we walk along. Even though I work here every day, it’s been a long time since I enjoyed Ever After Street for the playground it is, but Witt brings out the fun in everything.

On the other side of the Full Moon Forest, there are wildflower meadows where we stop for a picnic before we reach the river. The water is a calm trickle over shallow rocks between almost-still deeper pools that glint in the sunlight and show the reflection of puffy clouds and blue sky in their surfaces, and like a real adult, Witt instantly takes off his shoes and socks, rolls his trousers up, and splashes straight in to paddle.

‘Come in, it’s lov— well, it’s absolutely frigging freezing, but I’m a firm believer that no one should see a river and not paddle in it.’

I’ve already sat against a boulder to pull my shoes off, because you can’t see someone else enjoying themselves so much and not join in.

I yelp as my bare feet touch freezing water and slippery stones, and his arm circles my waist and holds me up as we paddle out a bit deeper. Both my hands are wrapped around his forearm, although he doesn’t seem any steadier than I am, even with his big feet, and I can’t see this little adventure ending without one or both of us landing on our bums in the water, yet somehow, it doesn’t matter at all.

His smile is radiant. For the first time since I met him, his face is free of the worry lines that often wrinkle his forehead, and he looks like a man without a care in the world, and just being with him is enough to make me forget everything about Ebony and the shop and all the things that aren’t right in my life and just enjoy the moment.

Even though I’ve found my footing, his arm is still around me and his fingers curl into my side, giving me a squeeze and waiting for me to look up at him.

‘Thank you for making me feel like a big kid. I missed out on a lot of childhood and I never realised how much until I saw this place again. I see the magic in the world when I’m with you. That’s something that evaporated a very long time ago for me, but everything feels different here.’

‘Me too,’ I say, but my mouth has gone dry from the intensity in his eyes and the words come out as a hoarse whisper. ‘On all counts.’

I have never wanted to kiss someone this badly before, and it would be so easy to act on it, but I force myself to take a step away from his arm, and look down at the water to avoid his eyes. How can I kiss him when there’s so much unsaid between us? Hidden by a mask and feeling like a different person at the ball was one thing, but I know him now, and I know how hurt he’ll be when he realises the truth about the missing Cinderella.

We’re far away from the castle here, the back side of it looming behind us in the distance, mostly hidden by the trees, apart from the tallest tower tops and spires, and when I turn back to him, he’s looking up at the hillside as though it’s the first time he’s ever seen it. ‘You okay?’

In one swift move, as if he’s not giving himself a chance to overthink it, he leans down to press his lips to my cheek. It lasts for less than a second, but it feels significant somehow. He hasn’t shaved this morning and the scratch of his dark stubble is at tantalisingly perfect odds with the softness of his lips. ‘Better than I’ve ever been.’

He sounds so happy that it’s enough to make my knees weak and my hand tightens on his arm because standing in the middle of a river is not the ideal place for knee unsteadiness.

I can feel his skin heat up with the embarrassment, and he hovers, as though he’s unsure whether to pull away or not, and then he tucks my hair aside and shifts until he can whisper in my ear. ‘See those rocks down there?’

I nod, unsure of where he’s going with the thought, but appreciating that he’s trying to cover the awkwardness and save either of us having to address it. He points to a weir downstream, where a line of flat boulders cross the river with water flowing between them.

‘I challenge you to reach them without falling over. Race ya!’ And with that he takes off, sploshing through the river, yelping as an unexpectedly deep pool soaks him to the calves.

There’s a lot of screaming and shrieking as we slip and slide over water-smoothed stones in the freezing river, probably scaring fish and terrifying any nearby frogs. He wins the race because his legs are so long you could climb them to the moon, but not without banging his knee up on a rock with a few choice swearwords. He stands in the water to wait for me, but I stop to kick water up and splash him, which turns into a splash fight, until we’re both out of breath from laughing so much and liberally soaked with river water.

‘Okay, okay, I give up.’ He shakes himself like a dog getting out of a bath and steps onto one of the huge flat rocks, and then holds his hand out to pull me up too, until we’re standing side by side, panting for breath and laughing like children.

‘Your tiger stripes are running.’

‘Your butterfly wings are smudged.’

‘You’ve got pink butterfly wings on your mouth.’

He ducks his head to let me rub it away with my thumb, and I’m holding his face again, just like I did that night at the ball, and every nerve ending is on fire. His eyes are closed and he turns almost imperceptibly into the touch and lets out a shuddery breath that has nothing to do with the exertion and everything to do with the closeness and the kiss that put my face paint on his lips in the first place.

The urge to use my grip to pull his mouth to mine is almost unfightable, and I’m holding back so hard that my hand starts shaking and I force myself to step away, and he blinks and stands upright again, turning around to look at the river in front of us instead of the way we’ve just come.

There’s a large stony beach on the opposite side, backing onto more wildflower meadows and grassy fields where a few sheep from a distant farm are milling about, and the river stretches on until it reaches a bend that we can’t see around. He hasn’t let go of my hand yet, and he sits down on the flat rock, wordlessly urging me to sit with him.

When I do, he pulls his hand out of mine so he can take his glasses off and dry them on the bottom of his grey T-shirt. He reaches out for my hand again the instant they’re back on his face, and it sends a little flutter through me. The fact that he wants to sit here with me, he wants to hold my hand… it has to mean something. It has to mean he likes me as I am, not just as I was the other night, doesn’t it?

I stretch my legs out so my feet dangle in the burbling river, and he does the same, leaning back on one hand and letting his feet hang in the water, but within a few minutes, his banged-up knee protests at the angle and he pulls one leg up again.

‘Aww, poor baby.’ I untangle my fingers from his and reach over to slip my hand around his bruised knee, and he reaches over to hold my left hand instead and drops his head to the side, until it rests on my shoulder.

His trousers are rolled up above his knees, and my fingers stroke gently where they touch his skin, avoiding the graze from the rock, and he sighs a happy sigh and nestles against my shoulder, our joined hands resting on my lap, and it takes every ounce of willpower I’ve ever possessed not to press a kiss into his hair.

That sense of ease settles over me again. Everything is so easy with him. Ease is not something I’ve ever felt in relationships before. No one’s ever felt special enough to truly let my guard down around them, to let them in and see me as I am, rather than as the front I put on to the world. But everything feels different with Witt, and it has since the first moment I set eyes on him in that study.

‘If I fall asleep, please take it as a compliment.’ His voice is slurred with relaxation, and I turn so I can rub my chin against his thick hair and hold his hand tighter because there’s something unspoken in how nice this feels, and honestly, if we don’t move for the rest of the day, I’d be okay with that.

‘Do you really not believe in love?’ I ask eventually, hoping he might be relaxed enough to answer me.

He makes a noise as though the question wasn’t unexpected. ‘Sitting here, I believe in anything. Peter Pan’s probably flying about up there somewhere, and a fairy godmother is twizzling about a magic wand. It’s all there, just as long as you never move your hand.’

I wasn’t expecting that and it makes me laugh out loud and feel simultaneously fluttery that he seems to be suggesting that I make him believe in magic.

‘But no. Love is just a way of furthering one’s own gains. What better way to get what you want from someone than to convince them they’re in love with you? It’s something exploited by people who want to con their way into your wallet or whatever else they can get out of you.’ He sighs and lifts his head, looking out at the river in front of us, but it’s the furthest thing from a happy sigh this time. ‘My father ended up in a loveless marriage with a woman who used all his fears and insecurities against him, and after he died and I was sent to Scotland, my grandma was bitter and angry at my grandfather, who’d died many years before and I was never quite sure she hadn’t murdered him. The man was dead and she still found a way to blame him for everything that went wrong in her life. You know how they say true love transcends death? Well, in her case, so did bone-deep seething hatred.’

I laugh. ‘A pleasant and cheery thought.’

‘And you wonder why I don’t believe in love.’

‘You must’ve been in relationships.’ I squeeze his knee gently, hoping he doesn’t realise how much I’m trying to pry because I want to know everything about his life.

‘Not real ones. Not meaningful ones. I mean, I’ve dated, I’ve been out with people, but in terms of trusting someone enough to share my life with them… I’ve never been able to do it. I’ve never been able to let my walls down. I’ve been on my own for a very long time – I can’t see that ever changing.’

‘Not even if…’ I was going to ask about the missing Cinderella, but I stop myself. I know Witt felt something that night. I’m sure trying to find her is about more than he’s letting on, but when he does find her… What have I done except prove him right? When he realises we’ve staged this elaborate search for someone who was never missing, he’s never going to believe there’s anything real here. He’s going to think the only thing I ever wanted was to further my own gains and exploit him – exactly what he thinks love is all about.

I swallow hard. ‘That’s so sad.’

‘Why, because it’s not your choice?’

‘No, just… lives are meant to be shared.’

‘Lives are meant to be whatever you want them to be.’

‘Okay, picture this – you’ve had a long day at the office. You had a crappy night’s sleep, just about everything that can possibly go wrong has gone wrong over the course of the day, you’ve spilt your coffee, the photocopier’s jammed, the Wi-Fi’s gone down, you’ve pissed off a client, there was a traffic jam on the way home… And when you get home, don’t you think it would be nice if you could collapse on the sofa, and someone who loves you puts a cup of tea in your hands and rubs your shoulders and listens to you tell her all about your day and you can feel the tension draining away with every touch?’

He’s lost in thought for a moment, and then he blinks himself back to reality. ‘I can do all that myself.’

‘You can’t rub your own shoulders unless you’re some kind of contortionist.’

He laughs. ‘Well, no, but… I can deal with my own bad days. I don’t need anyone else.’

‘Need, no, but want?’

‘Sometimes, I admit, it would be nice, but that level of trust, being able to share that much of yourself with someone else, to be vulnerable in front of someone, to let someone look after you when you’re ill, to fall asleep in someone’s arms and trust them not to stab you in the back… I don’t work when I’m not a hundred per cent.’ He points to his mouth. ‘To let someone see that, see me at my most vulnerable, most embarrassing, and trust them not to make fun of me…’

‘Why would someone who loves you make fun of you, Witt?’

‘That’s what people do.’

It suddenly seems overwhelmingly impossible. I’ve always believed the clichéd ‘love will conquer all’ thing, but I don’t think anything will ever change his feelings on the topic. I want someone who loves me and I’m not sure Witt will ever let himself go that much. He’s been building those walls for decades. I’ll never get past the fact he doesn’t believe anything good can ever come from loving someone. Maybe the missing Cinderella could have, that night at the ball, if I’d stayed as that person and he’d stayed as the person he was behind his mask, but now it’s all got so tangled. His walls are so high because he’s been hurt in the past. People have laughed at him, and what have I done except make a farce out of a night that meant so much to me and him? I don’t think we’ll ever be able to get past this. ‘Someone who loved you would love that part of you. They’d love everything about you, every little part that makes you you.’

‘Even if I left wet towels on the bathroom floor?’

‘And they’d love the way you use humour to change a subject if you don’t want to talk about something that might reveal some carefully concealed part of yourself.’

This time he laughs but doesn’t deny it, and in my head, his comment about falling asleep is buzzing around. He doesn’t let his guard down and I don’t let mine down, and yet, sitting here with him feels like the most open either of us have ever been.

And then I do it. I let my hand leave his knee to pull his head back down onto my shoulder, and then I press a big ‘mwah’ into his hair and let my fingers stroke through his would-be curls, and he relaxes again and stretches his leg out so both feet hang in the water.

‘We’re going to be covered in each other’s face paint, you know that, don’t you?’ His voice has got that relaxed softness to it again that makes me do an internal happy dance.

‘Wouldn’t have it any other way.’

Long, long minutes pass, tens of minutes, and we sit there, watching tiny fish swimming and an orange and blue kingfisher flitting from one side of the bank to the other, diving for fish.

‘No one’s ever been this comfy sitting on a rock before.’ His voice sounds drunk with relaxation and it makes something inside me melt. To have that effect on this huge, protected man who doesn’t let people see his vulnerable side… It means something. He’s just told me that he doesn’t do exactly what he’s doing.

‘Can we stay here forever? No balls, no castle, no Cinderella Shop, just me and you? We’ll drink filtered river water and survive on foraged berries and probably-not-poisonous mushrooms?’

I can’t hold back the laugh or the kiss to the top of his head again. ‘I wish.’

‘When we get back, you’ll be up sewing half the night, won’t you?’

Scarlett has already texted from Rapunzel’s salon with intel that The Cinderella Shop is still open, so Ebony must have stayed, and judging by every other day lately, there will be another pile of alterations to do to the second-chance dresses later.

‘Of course I will. I’ve got all those alterations to do. They don’t take long, but I haven’t done any today.’ I sigh. ‘I need to… I don’t know, Witt. Maybe it’s time to think about moving on. The castle being knocked down will change everything on Ever After Street. It’s a huge part of my life, and I know it sounds daft because it’s just a building that has nothing to do with me, but I’m not sure I can watch it become a supermarket without my heart breaking. And you’re right, and Scarlett’s right: Ebony is never going to give me the shop. I don’t want to drag her through the courts and fight for it, so maybe it’s time to think about finding somewhere else to live and work.’

He lifts his head in surprise. ‘That’s not what you want.’

‘No, it isn’t. I want to run The Cinderella Shop as my parents would’ve run it. I want the castle to stay exactly as it is for another few centuries, but neither of those things are going to happen. I’ve worked on Ever After Street forever – literally. It’s my comfort zone, and maybe I need to see what happens when I step outside it.’

He drops his head into the hand that’s not still holding mine. ‘This is my fault.’

‘No, it’s not. You’ve inspired me. It’s not a bad thing to want more from life. You’ve shown me that fairy tales can happen in real life if you’re brave enough to take a chance. And I’m in awe of you. You’re an inspiration. I can’t imagine what it’s like to open your mouth and not know whether the words are going to come out or not, but you deal with it admirably, and you don’t let anything hold you back.’

Even under the smudged tiger stripes, I can see his cheeks reddening. ‘No, no, no. You do that to me. I’m a different person around you. I feel respected and cared for. The stutter doesn’t come out as much because I’m so at ease with you. Before I came here, I shut myself away from the world. I do a job where I barely need to interact with people and most conversations can be achieved over email. I stop myself doing everything in case something brings up a need to speak. Shop assistants and acquaintances must think I’m the rudest person ever because it’s better to stay silent than to risk the embarrassment that inevitably comes with speaking. But with you… I forgot myself from the moment I met you, and since then, you make me feel accepted and unjudged.’

‘Are you happy in your job?’

He makes a non-committal noise. ‘It suits me. I spend a lot of time by myself in old buildings, and I often have to travel to places and stay for weeks at a time, which gets me out of my grandma’s little cottage that’s seemed more and more oppressive lately. But happy?’ He shakes his head. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever been happy, Sade. Maybe when I was a kid, but it’s easy to be happy when you’re a kid because your parents protect you from the worst parts of the world.’

‘And then something happens to them, and the worst parts of the world come rushing at you all at once?’

‘Exactly. And for a really long time, I’ve only seen the bad parts, and since coming here, I see the good in it again, and I don’t want to lose that.’ He’s quiet for a while. ‘I just told you a lie. I’ve been happy once lately – that night at the ball. When I was dancing with the mystery Cinderella. I felt something, and I think it was pure, unadulterated happiness, and that’s why I can’t give up on her. Because I think she felt it too, and…’ The stutter comes out and he shakes his head instead of finishing the sentence.

It’s the first time he’s said it, actually said it out loud, to me. The first time I’ve really known that he did feel something that night, and it feels like a big step for him to admit that. The hand that was around his knee is now on his thigh and I give it a squeeze. ‘Of course she did. Things like that are never one-sided…’ I have to force the words out past the lump in my throat, which gets tighter when he meets my eyes, giving me the perfect opportunity to tell him. I could say it. Just blurt it out. Three little words. It was me. Followed by five more words. And you didn’t recognise me. I could say it out here, in the quiet of the countryside, where everything is peaceful and maybe he’s relaxed enough to hear me out while I try to explain why I’ve let this go on for as long as I have.

But those words coming out will hurt him. They’ll ruin whatever this could be between us, and they stick in my throat before I can say them.

The one thing he understands is words not coming out when you want them to, and he squeezes the hand he’s still holding in my lap, and then lifts his arm across my head so it encircles my shoulders, and he pulls me into his side in a one-armed hug.

‘I’m not unhappy right now.’ He whispers the words into my hair.

‘I’m not unhappy right now either.’ I lean my head against his chest and we stay, being not unhappy with each other for an abnormally long time.

14

It’s a couple of days later and I haven’t seen Ebony since the moment I walked out on her. Scarlett tells me she was asleep on the sofa by 7 p.m. that night while soaking her blistered feet in a footbath, and she needed a few days to recover.

Second-chance dresses are still flying off the shelves, and I’m thinking about ways to move forward. A step away from princess ball gowns and into something more practical and suitable for everyday wear, even if that means a step away from The Cinderella Shop too.

I’m standing at the counter, drawing up a design for a dress with a non-corseted bodice and deep V-neck, a swishy, swingy skirt with elements of Baby’s peachy-pink Dirty Dancing dress and Marilyn Monroe’s infamous subway-grate dress from The Seven Year Itch. Something that’s suitable for date nights and summer weddings rather than fairy-tale balls. I love making the princess dresses, and while people still want them for really special occasions, like bridal gowns, I’ve realised that the second-chance dresses appeal so much because they’re affordable. Even £50 for a dress is a lot of money if you’re only going to wear it once, whereas if a customer can see several potential upcoming occasions where it would work, then £50 is a reasonable investment and people are happy to pay it.

‘Is this the future of The Cinderella Shop or you?’ Witt’s leaning over the counter from the other side, his fingers fiddling with the flower-shaped pin cushion that’s around the wrist of my free hand as he watches my pencil moving across my sketchbook as I draw smooth outlines, with no ruffles and not a crinoline in sight, the kind of elegant dress that Kate Middleton would wear without the need for her budget.

‘I don’t know.’ I look up and see the understanding in his eyes. ‘Just feeling inspired, I guess. It’s been ages since I could design the dresses I want to make and have a chance of actually making them. I’ll talk to Ebony, tell her what I’m thinking – that we change how things are done around here or I move on.’ I’m heartbroken at the thought of leaving The Cinderella Shop, but the other shopkeepers are right – without the castle, I’m not sure how much of a future Ever After Street itself will have, but I also feel empowered. Things have been going this way for far too long, Ebony and me at an impasse, and one of us has to do something about it. Witt makes me want to sort my life out, to address the not-good things head on, even if that means leaving my comfort zone and the shop that’s always been a part of me. ‘I always thought that would be terrifying, but it feels invigorating now. Like I have a choice. Like I have some agency over what I do. Everything feels different since I met you. You are—’

‘Prince Charming!’ The door bursts open and a woman with red hair barrels through it. ‘It’s me! I’m the one you’ve been looking for!’

Witt pushes himself upright and looks at me before looking at her. ‘I really don’t think so.’

‘No, I’m really her. I was just out for a walk and saw my dress in the window. My dress. And my shoe. I’ve been looking for that! Can I have it back?’

‘No.’ I give her a stern look. What is this woman playing at? ‘Not unless you can produce your original receipt, anyway.’

‘Oh, I threw that away ages ago.’ She waves a nonchalant hand.

What a surprise. ‘Then you’re out of luck, I’m afraid.’

‘Why has it taken you so long to come forward?’ Witt sounds disbelieving, but he’s well-mannered enough to give her the benefit of the doubt, whereas I know she’s making it up.

‘I didn’t know you were looking for me, did I?’ She sounds snappy and impatient. ‘I’ve only just seen the dress and the posters. But now we’ve found each other again. Yay!’

‘Yay.’ Witt mutters the most un-yay-like mutter in world history and looks at me again. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t think you’re the person I’m looking for.’

‘Yes, I am. I can prove it. I have the other shoe.’

He raises an eyebrow at me before looking back at her. ‘You have the other shoe?’

‘Yes!’

‘You don’t have the other shoe.’ I’m trying to stay calm while secretly racing through thoughts of whether she’s lying or whether she really could somehow have the other shoe. Well, not the other shoe, but there may be more than one pair. They weren’t custom-made for any particular dress, they were just display pieces. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that she could’ve bought a similar pair. What if she does somehow have an other shoe?

Who is this woman and what does she expect to gain out of pretending to be, well, me? Witt can’t be stupid enough to fall for this, can he?

He adjusts his glasses as he looks at her, as though he’s thinking it through.

‘You, Mr Prince!’ She jabs a finger at him so hard that, even from the other side of the shop, he flinches as if she’s actually poked him. ‘You take me out for dinner tonight and I’ll bring it with me.’

‘I don’t think that’s a very good ide—’

‘Don’t you want me to prove who I am?’

‘Well, yes, but I don’t think…’ He looks at me again.

‘Witt,’ I mouth. Come on. He is not so daft that he’d even consider this to be true. Is he?

He thinks about it for a moment, clearly suspicious of her claim. ‘That night at the ball – what was I wearing?’

The nameless redhead thinks long and hard. ‘A suit.’

He glances at me. ‘Well, I was.’

‘As opposed to what? A yellow tutu? Björk’s swan dress?’ I hiss. ‘What else would a guy wear to a ball?’

He looks befuddled. ‘It’s just that the girl I met had blonde hair.’

‘Have you never heard of hair dye, Mr Prince?’ She whirls round and barks at him so sharply that he takes a step backwards. She doesn’t even know his name or seem particularly interested in finding out.

‘Well, yes, I… um… Good point well…’ His lips stay closed but move as though he can’t get the next word out, and I can see his panic set in. I can see the tips of his ears reddening, the heat that’s rushed to his cheeks, the way he tries to take a breath and centre himself, but the woman is glaring at him and making it worse. His hand is on the counter and I reach out to give it a squeeze and curl my fingers around his.

‘Made,’ he finishes with a rush of air as though he’s been holding his breath. His fingers tighten around mine.

The redhead has got her hands on her hips and is giving him an annoyed look. ‘Don’t you want to get to know me after that amaaaazing night?’

His hand is shaking and I can tell how much he doesn’t want to speak again. ‘Then I suppose I do owe you dinner.’ His voice comes out painstakingly slowly, his eyes trained on our joined hands on the counter. ‘May I take you out tonight? You’ll bring the shoe?’

Oh Witt, what are you doing? I roll my eyes skywards as if any listening deities might be able to shed light on the matter. He’s only offering out of embarrassment. I can feel his pulse hammering in his fingertips and see how desperately he wants her to leave so he can get his breath back and stop his chest heaving the staccato beat it’s currently fighting.

‘Of course, Mr Prince! The 1001 Nights restaurant! 7 p.m. Don’t be late!’

‘What’s your name?’ He calls after her, but she’s already gone.

‘Witt, you can’t really think…’

She’s somehow managed to dislodge the doorstop so the door clatters shut in her wake, and he breathes a sigh of relief. ‘No, I…’

Is that it? Is that all you have to do to get a date these days? Walk in and demand one and the guy just… agrees? Without any evidence, almost without a second thought? I never expected Witt to agree to go on a date with anyone and it’s upset me more than it has any right to. Someone who is so anti-love is willing to go out with a total stranger, and he can’t even tell that, whoever that woman is, she is not the Cinderella he’s looking for?

He looks down at our hands on the counter again and I pull my fingers back quickly. ‘She made you nervous. Why would you want to go out with someone who makes you nervous?’

‘Humans make me nervous, Sade. Know where I can go that I won’t have to interact with them?’

‘Pluto’s supposed to be nice at this time of year. Cheaper since losing planetary status too.’

He laughs but it turns into a groan. ‘Why would anyone come in and say it was them if it wasn’t?’ He meets my eyes. ‘It would be almost as absurd as someone saying it wasn’t them when it was.’

‘People are strange.’ I feel instantly sick and busy myself by going over to hook the door open again. I stop to look at the dress, still glittering in the window. ‘She was much shorter than that dress.’

‘Heels?’

‘Spice Girl-style Buffalo Boots and that dress would still be too long. It wasn’t her, Witt. You know that.’

‘I know. I panicked. This is what I do, Sade. I can’t get words out and then other words come out to cover up the mess before I’ve had a chance to think them through.’ He groans again, and when I get back to the counter, he starts fiddling with the pin cushion on my left wrist again, his fingertips grazing my skin as he mindlessly pulls pins out and pushes them back in, and I kind of love that he’s using me as a distraction technique.

‘I don’t think you should go. It could be a trap. She could be a serial killer.’

‘I can take care of myself. Besides, it’s a public place and that restaurant is always busy; I’m not going to be alone with her.’ He must clock the worried look on my face because he laughs. ‘I’ll be careful, okay? Thank you for worrying about me.’

‘She might try to poison you or slip something in your drink. Keep your credit card out of her reach, this could be some kind of elaborate fraud thing.’

‘I don’t want to go, Sade.’ He looks up from the pin cushion and meets my eyes again. ‘Say something to stop me.’

Because it’s me. The words are right there on the tip of my tongue, but every time I envision saying them, I also envision his reaction. The way he’d stand up straight and narrow his eyes. Refuse to believe me because the girl he met that night would never lie to him like I have. He’d probably let out that disbelieving half-laugh thing he does. The incredulous Alicia Silverstone from Clueless impression. As if. As if it’s been you all along. As if we’ve done all of this to find someone who’s been right here from the start. As if we’ve spent all this time together and you haven’t told me. As if we’ve opened up to each other about everything, apart from this one important thing. I can even envision the clatter of the door as it slams behind him.

‘I can’t.’ I say it so quietly that my lips move but no audible sound comes out.

He looks crestfallen and drops my gaze with a resigned nod. ‘Okay. Then I have to see where it leads, don’t I? She’s offering proof that she’s the mystery woman, so maybe she is. I can’t prove that she isn’t.’

I can. I just don’t know how to tell him.

15

The 1001 Nights restaurant is annoyingly just out of sight from both the shop and the upstairs window of my flat, which doesn’t stop me watching the rest of Ever After Street all evening for any glimpse of Witt and the deceitful redhead, but there’s no sign of either of them.

I eat dinner on the window ledge, and hand-sew a couple of alterations so I can sit in the darkened window and not take my eyes off the street in the direction of the restaurant, which leads to a few needle-in-finger incidents and me racing to the kitchen for a plaster more times than I can count.

By eight o’clock, they must’ve had their date. He must’ve seen that she’s not who she says she is, and I keep waiting for a text from him or something, anything, just to let me know he’s okay and hasn’t fallen for her lies, but nothing comes.

As it gets later, I watch the castle too, waiting for the light to go on when he gets home, but it never does. I keep going to bed, but I can’t sleep so I get up and look out the window again, but tonight is the only night in recent weeks that the castle doesn’t illuminate. Witt isn’t there. And my mind goes to all the worst places it can possibly go, and more than anything, I wish I’d told him the truth. What if this is it? What if I’ve missed my chance once and for all?

‘Sadie, will you stop it!’

By the next morning, Scarlett’s already fed up with my worrying. ‘I’m tidying the dress.’

‘No, you’re not, you’re pressing your nose against the window in the hopes you might see him an extra millimetre before he comes into view anyway. You’ve been looking out for him for the past half an hour and now we’ve got nose prints all over the glass!’

I sulkily wipe the window with the sleeve of the check shirt I’m wearing. ‘He could be dead. She could have poisoned him. She could have drugged him and stolen his wallet and phone. It could have been part of some organised crime gang and really he was meeting a group of thugs who have beaten him up and left him for dead in a ditch.’

‘He’s a giant, Sade. He’s more than capable of taking care of himself. And you said he was wary so he’d have been careful. Stop worrying. And stop watching TV because I think you’re recounting plotlines from EastEnders.’

I sigh. ‘Even worse then – what if he’s fallen for her? What if he really thinks she’s the one?’

She fixes me with a look that could turn a mannequin to stone. ‘There is no doubt in my mind that he knows exactly who “the one” is, and it’s not her.’

‘He doesn’t know, Scar.’

‘Have you seen the way he looks at you? Every time he comes in here, he doesn’t have a face – he’s just a yellow blob with heart-shaped eyes like a walking emoji. Even if he doesn’t realise you’re who he met at the ball, he’s as topsy-turvy for you as you are for him. And he’s certainly not stupid enough to fall for that crock of codswallop from someone he knows full well he hasn’t met before.’ She sighs when I don’t agree. ‘Maybe she stood him up?’

‘Better than any of the other things she could’ve done to him.’ I give up and clamber out of the window display, knocking over the singular shoe on my way. A bad omen, perhaps? ‘Then why didn’t he go home last night?’

She doesn’t justify my worrying with an answer.

The morning rolls on forever. I watch every tick of the second hand on the clock. Endless minutes pass as though each one lasts for an hour… Well, it feels that way, but in reality, it’s ten past nine when Witt finally comes through the door.

I inhale a gasp of relief and force myself not to vault over the counter and wrap him in a relieved hug.

Which is probably just as well, when he throws his arms out wide and spins in circles. ‘I’m in love! I’m in love and I want to shout it from the rooftops!’

So this is what it feels like when your heart breaks. I can’t breathe. My throat is too tight and my internal organs feel too big for my body. Everything’s pulsating and my entire body is shaking. My vision blurs so much that I might be about to pass out. Tears have sprung to my eyes. That’s it. I’ve lost him and I’ve let him fall for that falsifying ferret. Our ‘once upon a dream’ is ove—

‘Seriously?’ Scarlett raises an unimpressed eyebrow.

‘No, of course not.’ He laughs. ‘Are you kidding? She was barmy. Think she wanted to boil my bunnies. She gave me a minute-by-minute itinerary of how we’d spent the night at the ball – none of which happened. You know, we’d walked round the maze, and gone to the dungeons and had raunchy dungeon sex, when neither mazes, dungeons, or the possibility of me having sex with someone I don’t know are things that exist. Then she produced the shoe. It was green and about this big.’ He holds up a thumb and forefinger about an inch apart. ‘She’d made it herself out of Play-Doh and when I said that wasn’t quite what I’d had in mind, she threw another table’s jug of water over me and screamed that I’d led her on because I’d said I was looking for the other shoe and hadn’t specified which shoe, and then she stormed out, but not before getting a stamp on her 1001 Nights card. Ali said he’s seen her in there hundreds of times with different people. Gotta admire her dedication to getting those 1001 free nights.’

I burst into a, quite frankly, terrifying mix of relieved tears and unhinged laughter and make a noise that can only be likened to an angle grinder on the blink.

He looks taken aback when his eyes fall on me and he approaches the counter. ‘Sorry, I was just joking. Winding you up for being so worried abo—’

I push myself upwards until I can grab him and yank him into a hug across the wide wooden desk. I get my arms around his shoulders and pull him into the awkwardest hug that’s ever awkwarded, sort of squeezing his head and burying my face in his neck.

In keeping with the awkward theme, his arms slide around me awkwardly, and he rubs my back, moving his chin as though he’s got a mouthful of my hair. The counter digs into my stomach at a sharp angle, but I didn’t know how else to let out the rush of relief that he’s okay and not in love with her.

‘That’s not funny, Witt!’ I eventually release him and give him a smack that comes out harder than intended and stings both my hand and his arm, and then I feel guilty and hold his wrist in my palm while I use the other hand to rub over the sting. ‘Sorry.’

‘Sadie thought you’d been murdered,’ Scarlett adds helpfully.

‘You should have called or something. You could have at least texted me proof of life. Why didn’t you go home last night?’ Who knew blushing was an extreme sport? I wasn’t intending to let him know quite how much of the evening I spent spying on him. ‘I’ve got used to seeing the castle lived in again. I happened to notice your light wasn’t on…’

‘Sadie watched from her window for 99 per cent of last night. She watched from the shop for the other 1 per cent.’ Scarlett’s not letting me get away with glossing over it.

‘That’s an exaggeration,’ I protest. And it really is. It was a fair 2 per cent from the shop and no more than 98 per cent from the bedroom window.

He laughs, a little bit nervously, as though he’s slightly concerned about my stalkerish tendencies. ‘I went to sit by the river and lost track of time. It was about 3 a.m. when I got back to the castle; I didn’t want to wake you with a text. The light wasn’t on because I went for a shower and straight to bed to try to blot it out. I’m sorry, I didn’t think you’d be that bothered.’

‘Of course I’m that bothered! I lov—’ The half-word hangs in the air, and I don’t know how to save it. I can’t love him. I can’t even be bloody honest with him. ‘I was worried about you.’

It’s the lamest ‘save’ ever. He knows it, Scarlett knows it, and I know it. Somewhere, there’s a random pigeon on a distant roof who knows it. What I felt last night wasn’t just worry. The unadulterated and instant heartbreak when he made that joke just now wasn’t because I thought he’d fallen for a liar – it was because I thought he’d fallen for someone who isn’t me.

His face has brightened and his mischievous smile suggests he knows exactly what that cut-off word was meant to be, but he doesn’t press it. ‘I wanted to be on my own. Think things through. I was just so fed up and disillusioned by it all. Plus, wet. I didn’t want to come here and drag you down too. Incidents like that are exactly why I avoid people.’

My hand is still on his arm and he twists his fingers until he can grip my hand and lift it to his mouth to press a kiss there. ‘I’m sorry, Sade. I didn’t mean to worry you.’

I’m still trying to get my breathing under control and my fingers press into his, trying to get across how much he means to me and how sorry I am for dragging him through this. All of this is my doing. At first, I thought it was worth it – whatever it took to save The Cinderella Shop. None of it would matter, as long as we did. And now… it’s gone too far. It does matter. I’m hurting him and further reinforcing his lack of faith in love.

He looks around the shop. ‘Can we forget this now? The Cinderella dress, the stupid website, the calls for people to come forward. I don’t want any more nights like that. If she hasn’t told me yet, maybe she can’t, or she doesn’t want to, or she will when she’s ready.’

‘Not on your life, my friend.’ Scarlett crosses her arms. ‘Do you know how much publicity it’s bringing us? People are still taking selfies with that dress. I can’t walk down the street without someone asking me if we’ve found the mystery Cinderella yet. My clients in Rapunzel’s are always gossiping about who it might be. Someone came up with Carol Vorderman in disguise the other day. The favourite theory is that she was really a princess from a foreign country and she wouldn’t be allowed to tell you because you’re a commoner.’

My hand is still in his. Why is my hand still in his? Why haven’t I pulled my fingers away yet and why hasn’t he let go yet?

‘I think we can rule out Carol Vorderman.’ He tries to make light of it, but Scarlett continues glaring at him.

‘Just because you haven’t read the emails for weeks doesn’t mean they’re not still piling up. We’re not taking that dress down. It’s the best thing that’s happened to The Cinderella Shop in years.’

He looks over at the dress doubtfully. ‘Well, I want to help you.’ He looks back at me, and then quickly corrects himself. ‘Both. I want to help you both, the shop as a whole, but so long as you know that’s all this is about. I’m not going to find her this way, but if it’s doing some good for The Cinderella Shop… For you, Sade, in whatever you do next…’

I can see Scarlett’s ears prick up. I haven’t told her about my idea of giving Ebony an ultimatum yet, and she doesn’t know I’ve been casually googling property prices in the area and trying to figure out if I could afford to rent somewhere new to sell my dresses from. Trying to figure out if I could be brave enough to go it alone. It’s easy to think about it with Witt’s support, but he’s going to be gone soon, and I really will be alone.

In the way that people who have been almost-sisters and best friends since they were ten years old often do, Scarlett understands without a word being spoken. She makes the connection between the look in my eyes, the sketches half-hidden under the counter, and how unhappy and discouraged I’ve been lately. How we’ve both been lately.

‘You know I want to go full-time as a hairdresser,’ she says casually. ‘If you’re going to do anything rash… count me in. This place is dying before our eyes and that dress, and the Cinderella story, is the only thing that’s giving us a chance to fight it at the moment.’

Witt glances at me again. ‘Who am I to argue with that?’

As Scarlett’s here to cover the shop, I’ve got a custom order for a butterfly wing dress where each layer of the skirt is patterned to look like a Monarch butterfly’s wing, so I’ve got bolts of duchesse satin laid out on my cutting mat on the floor of the back room as I slice around my pattern pieces with a rotary cutter, and Witt hovers in the doorway between the shop floor and the back room, watching me work.

‘You going to be in trouble for all the work you haven’t done lately?’ Scarlett asks him. ‘You’ve been spending more time with us than you have at the castle valuing antiques or whatever you’re supposed to be doing.’

‘Just sorting the place out. Making sure everything important is included in the final valuation and the owner is suitably compensated.’

‘Because the rich racoon clearly needs more money,’ she mutters. ‘Leaving it to fall into disrepair, decades of neglect, letting Ever After Street do the dirty work and then sweeping the rug out from under our feet at the first sniff of cash, selling to a supermarket motivated only by greed, because Ever After Street – the only people who have given that castle a second thought in years – can’t match what a multi-million multi-national powerhouse can offer, even though it belongs as a castle, not a supermarket.’

Witt stays quiet. He paces in the doorway for a while, knotting his fingers together and making it impossible for me to concentrate on what I’m cutting out.

‘Can I ask you both something?’ he says eventually. ‘What would you do with the castle?’

‘Do with it?’ Scarlett asks from the shop.

‘Yeah. It doesn’t do anything. It just stands there.’

‘What do you want it to do? The foxtrot? A nice Charleston?’ I look up at him.

He laughs. ‘Sorry, I’m rubbish at making myself understood. I just mean… it doesn’t bring anything to Ever After Street other than its presence. Old buildings like that are a financial sinkhole. It’s probably been left to fall into disrepair because the owner can’t afford to – or doesn’t want to – upkeep it. If this was to end in any way other than being sold to a supermarket, I just wondered… in the eyes of two idealistic young dreamers who work in the shadow of it and still believe in the goodness of the universe, what would you want it to become in an ideal world?’

‘Been a long time since I was idealistic or young.’ Scarlett scoffs. ‘Why? Do you think you can get a message to the owner? Try to talk him out of it?’

‘No. Strictly forbidden. I work on behalf of an agency who have contact only from “his people”. There are no direct lines of communication, and it wouldn’t be my place, even if there were.’ He sighs. ‘No, I was just thinking. Daydreaming. Wondering what I’d do if it was mine. Trying to imagine the world being a better place than it is.’

‘I’d open it up to the public.’ I sit back on my knees. ‘The place is incredible. You know those famous castles in Germany? Neuschwanstein, Lichtenstein, Eltz… Those places get thousands of visitors every year. They’re a tourist attraction in their own right.’

‘But places like that have rich and interesting histories. This one was built by some dodgy Tudor who got a false honour in Henry the Eighth’s court and conned his way into a meaningless title that’s been passed down for generations through some not-very-stable family lines and everything it once meant has been lost under decades of ghost stories.’

‘You really have been doing your homework.’ Scarlett sounds impressed. ‘Do you know what happened there? I’d love to know what really became of the viscount and viscountess. They say he murdered her and then locked himself in a dungeon and starved to death under the weight of his own guilt.’

‘There are no dungeons. Why are people so obsessed with dungeons in castles?’

‘But that in itself is interesting,’ I say. ‘I never knew anything about who built it. To share some real history of the castle and to let people see why it’s so special would be amazing. You saw how many people were at the ball – I’m sure a vast majority of them were there out of curiosity about the castle rather than from any desire to attend a fancy ball. I made a few dresses after the invites went out – customers were abuzz with a chance to finally see inside. If it was open to the public, people would buy tickets and day passes and come here on family outings. It could host other events too, like weddings. You’d be surprised by how many brides-to-be I get asking if it can be booked for weddings.’

‘Really?’ He looks down at me with a surprised gaze, and I scramble up off the floor because I’m getting overexcited by so many possibilities. ‘Why would anyone want to get married at a scene of horror and despair?’

‘Because it’s roman—’

‘Trust me, whatever happened there is not romantic.’

‘Not the actual events. The castle as a whole. Who wouldn’t want to get married in such a beautiful, Disney-ish place, but couldn’t afford the cost of getting married overseas and hiring an actual Disneyland castle as a wedding venue?’

‘You’re underestimating how much people love this castle,’ Scarlett adds. ‘There are so many ways it could be used for something better than a money-grabbing supermarket.’

He looks at me for a long moment. ‘When I got chatting to Ali last night, he was saying that he’d love to hire the castle out as a restaurant. He said things get so cramped at 1001 Nights, there’s no room for expansion, and he’d like to be able to offer something really special for special occasions and it got me thinking about what could go on there, that’s all.’

‘It could host other events too. It just takes a bit of thinking outside the box.’

‘A film set, for example,’ Scarlett says. ‘Look at Highclere Castle and Downton Abbey. There must be loads of film and TV companies who would love to film at a place like this.’

‘And events like corporate retreats. Festivals. Honeymoons. Shows. It has its own theatre – what company wouldn’t want to put on a Shakespeare play in a Tudor castle?’

‘Hair shows,’ Scarlett suggests. ‘A dramatic setting for some dramatic ’dos.’

Witt and I have both migrated onto the shop floor again, my pattern pieces abandoned as I go over to the door and look out, trying to think of ways the castle could help everyone on Ever After Street.

‘Book festivals,’ I suggest, looking at Marnie’s A Tale As Old As Time bookshop across the street.

‘Fashion shows.’ Scarlett holds her hand out towards me. ‘Cinderella dress displays in an actual Cinderella castle. They have dress displays at the V&A; they must be popular.’

‘Food festivals.’ I look towards Lilith’s tearoom and then point at the Beast’s Enchanted Rose flower shop. ‘The gardens and grounds could host flower shows. Picnic areas for visitors. Live music events.’

‘Outdoor cinema screenings,’ Scarlett suggests.

‘School trips. Historical re-enactments. Craft fairs. Workshops.’

‘Holiday accommodation.’

‘Ghost tours. Halloween night sleepovers.’

‘A Christmas wonderland! Pantomimes!’

‘Escape rooms. Those murder-mystery weekend things.’

Scarlett and I go back and forth until Witt’s doubled over with laughter and holds a hand up to stop us. ‘I apologise, I truly did underestimate how much some people love the castle.’

His laughter is contagious. The joy on his face lights up the entire room, and he looks less weighed-down than he did earlier, and when his eyes catch mine, it’s impossible not to laugh with him.

‘I get carried away with possibilities, sorry.’

‘Don’t be.’ He comes over and takes my hand. ‘Thank you for making me believe anything’s possible. Do you think people would support events like these? I mean, the turnout for the ball was amazing, but no one had to pay for tickets. It might be different if there was an entrance fee.’

‘People on Ever After Street realise how important the castle is to our businesses. We’d all get behind anything and everything that went on there and hopefully persuade our customers to as well.’

‘Anything that wasn’t a supermarket, right?’

‘Don’t even mention those ruthless beasts in this shop. This is hallowed ground for all things supermarket.’

Even though I am serious, he laughs. ‘Speaking of work, I should go. Scarlett’s right, I haven’t been getting enough done. The second-chance ball is only a week away and I’m putting the decorations up myself this time, and that’s without having to do my actual work.’

There’s a shot of disappointment that I need to have a word with myself about. I like him being here too much. It’s too easy to spend time with him. He isn’t from here. As soon as the castle’s done, he’s leaving. I cannot be disappointed about not spending extra time with him, because pretty soon I’m going to be spending no time with him.

‘You are coming to the ball, right?’ His dark blue eyes bore into mine.

‘Wouldn’t miss it.’ I paste on a smile that covers a deluge of terror. We need to get things out in the open, but at the same time, I’m terrified of him never forgiving me, and there’s that constant feeling of time running out. I cannot let him go back to Scotland without telling him.

‘Good.’ Somehow, he’s holding my hand again, and he seems reluctant to let go. ‘Will you save a dance for me?’

My breath catches at the intensity in his eyes, and I nod, suddenly incapable of words.

‘Good,’ he says again, giving my hand one final squeeze before letting it go. That man and his hands. A wave of butterflies swishes through me. No matter the consequences, he has to know who his missing Cinderella is. Whether that ball gives us a second chance with each other, or if it’s the end of our… whatever this is… for good.

16

The following day is a Monday, six days before the second-chance ball, and when I get downstairs that morning and walk round the corner to open the shop, Witt’s waiting outside and I jump in surprise. ‘Good morning. What are you doing here?’

After the hint yesterday that he hasn’t been getting enough work done, I didn’t expect to see much of him for a while.

He goes to speak, but stops himself and gives me a helpless nod instead.

Something’s wrong. He’s pacing and rubbing his hands together as though he’s cold, even though it’s early June and the morning sun is catching the light of Ever After Street’s roof tiles and making them sparkle, and his frustration is already building at the struggle to get words out.

‘Are you okay? You look like you’ve been awake half the night.’

‘That’s good then, because I’ve been awake all the night.’

‘Oh, Witt. Why?’

‘I need to tell you somet—’ His voice cuts off and he does that head shake thing he does when there’s no option but to give up on a sentence.

‘Do you want to come in?’ I push the door open and step aside for him to duck in too before letting it close again. Maybe getting inside and away from any neighbours who might be watching will help.

I flick the lights on and go behind the counter. ‘Want a cuppa?’

He shakes his head as he comes over to the counter. ‘I need to talk to you.’

This doesn’t sound good. Has he finally figured out who I am? Why is he nervous? I would’ve expected him to be angry, but not nervous.

‘Sorry, Sade.’ He makes a few attempts at speaking again, but stops every time. ‘I’m het-up and overtired; the stammer is getting the better of me.’

He shakes his hands out with a noise of frustration, and I reach over and catch one of them and keep hold of it while I walk round to his side of the counter. ‘Whatever’s wrong, take your time. It’s just you and me, there’s no rush.’

I meet his eyes and up close, I can see the lack of sleep making itself a physical presence. There are dark circles under them and the lines around them look particularly pinched.

He pushes his hand through his hair and picks up my water bottle and takes a sip.

‘C’mere.’ I reach up and pull him into a hug. I tug his head down to my shoulder and rub my hands over the arch of his back where he’s having to bend to reach me. ‘Close your eyes. Relax. Breathe. We’ve got all the time in the world.’

His arms tighten around me and pull me closer, and his lips drop a kiss on my shoulder, and I feel him letting out long breaths and trying to force himself into calming down, and I’m starting to get really worried now. It’s the first time I’ve seen him this agitated, and I can’t work out what it’s about.

‘I can’t do it, Sade,’ he eventually mumbles into my shoulder.

At first I think he means he can’t say whatever he’s trying to say, but then his hand leaves my hip, and without breaking the hug, he reaches for something in his pocket, something that jangles, and then feels around blindly until he can get hold of my hand and tug it down to press something cold and metal into my palm. My fingers close around… a key? Some kind of big, ornamental key. I raise my hand until I can squint at it over his head. It looks like the key he used to unlock the castle gate when we were there the other day.

He must be able to feel my face screw up in confusion. ‘I can’t go through with it. I can’t sell the castle. You love it so much, and I lo—’

The sentence breaks and I let out a disbelieving laugh. He hasn’t lifted his head from my shoulder, but I pull his hair back like it will somehow let me see his face. ‘It’s a wonderful thought, but you can’t do that. You don’t have that kind of permission, do you? And you can’t lose your job because of me. If it’s not you, they’ll just get someone else…’

‘You’ve made me love it again. You’ve made me see the good in it, and… Sadie, I’m not—’

‘Oh my God, this is genius!’ No one has ever had such bad timing as my aunt, who chooses that moment to burst through the shop door with the understated volume of a jumbo jet thundering in to land.

Witt and I dive apart as though we’ve been caught doing something unthinkable.

She’s waving around the shoe. My eyes flick to the window. The shoe is still on the display plinth. Oh, hell’s bells. She’s waving around the other shoe. My shoe. From my bedside drawer.

‘Sadie! I’m so impressed! Why didn’t you tell me this was all part of a grand plan?’ She holds it aloft, shaking it at the ceiling like it’s some great victory.

Witt looks at her in confusion. ‘Where did you get that?’

‘Oh, I think you know full well, Mr Prince Charming indeed!’

His eyes flick between the shoe in her hand and the one in the window too. ‘No offence, Ebony, but I know you weren’t the woman I danced with at the ball.’

Oh, hell’s bloody bells. This can’t go on any longer. I have to be honest with him, and I have to be honest with him now. ‘Witt…’

Now it’s me who feels like I can’t get a sentence out without choking on it. This is not how I wanted him to find out. It was supposed to be quiet, private, just the two of us, not with my aunt watching on. Ebony is enough to make a stone nervous, and I don’t know how to get the words out, but I do know I have to do it before she blunders in with something sharp, cutting, or untrue.

I take a deep breath. I don’t think I’ve ever felt worse than I do in this moment. I feel sick, but in a way, relieved too. We can’t avoid it any longer. I never knew how I was going to find the courage to confront this, and Ebony has catapulted us headfirst into it in her typically abrasive way. He deserves to know the truth, and I’ve been hiding it for too long.

‘It was me, Witt.’ I look up at him and then look away because I don’t want to see the hatred creep into his eyes. ‘It’s been me all along. I’m the mystery Cinderella you met at the ball.’ I keep my eyes on the floor, following the lines of the wooden planks. The world has stopped moving. I think all three of us have stopped breathing, frozen like statues, waiting for the inevitable explosion when he realises what I’m saying, and it feels like forever before someone takes a breath again.

‘Sadie.’ Witt takes the hand that’s still got his key in it and holds it between both of his. ‘Do you honestly think I don’t know that?’

‘What?’ My mouth falls open and I inhale in surprise and then choke on the air I’ve taken in. ‘You know?’

‘Of course I know. The mask might’ve hidden your face, but it didn’t hide your eyes. Your voice. The feel of your hand in mine. I knew from the moment you opened the door on that first morning.’

‘No you bloody well didn’t! You didn’t recognise me! You looked straight through me.’

He grunts and lifts a hand to pull awkwardly at the back of his neck. ‘All right, maybe not that exact second, but not because of you – because of me. When I’m trying not to stutter, I’m inside my own head. I don’t see anything except the words I’m focusing on. I can look at people without seeing them because all I’m concentrating on is my next word, and that morning, I was so caught up in trying not to make a fool of myself that it took me a while to get outside my own head. When you snapped that it wasn’t all about me, it made me look at you, really look at you, and something sparked and I thought it was you then and there.’

I feel like something’s hit me in the chest. ‘Why didn’t you say anything?’

‘Because you didn’t say anything. Because I didn’t think you knew it was me. And then I realised you must have known because who else would have the shoe, and then the dress was there, returned, and you didn’t say anything, and I thought maybe I was mistaken, or you weren’t interested in seeing me again and were too polite to tell me, and then I said the wrong thing about only wanting to find you for your spin on the castle, which was horrible and I couldn’t blame you for not saying who you were, and then you suggested putting the dress in the window and trying to find her, and I went along with it because I convinced myself it wasn’t you, but I couldn’t tear myself away. Going through those emails was just a way to spend time with you – to prove to myself that I wasn’t imagining it.’

‘I was angry at you for not recognising me. I recognised you the moment I opened the door. The cleft in your chin, the dip above your upper lip, the size of your hands, the length of your arms, your smile. God, your smile.’ I meet his eyes and his lips tip into a half-smile. ‘And I couldn’t tell you. I wasn’t supposed to be at that ball.’

I’m well aware of Ebony listening in. If she hadn’t worked out that I went to the ball by now, this is the final nail in the coffin.

‘You could’ve trusted me. I would never have told anyone.’

‘Secrets like that have a habit of getting loose. It wasn’t about trusting you, Witt. If anyone on Ever After Street found out, they’d hate me. If Ebony found out, I would’ve kissed goodbye to any hope of taking over The Cinderella Shop. I know I’ve said it before, but it couldn’t be all about you. I couldn’t throw away everything I’ve worked for because of a guy I’d spent a couple of hours with. It wasn’t a reflection on you – it’s just common sense.’

‘I know. You told me that. I accepted that.’

‘When have I told you that?’

‘On that very first morning in the shop, for a start. And many times since then. And I’m not stupid, I’ve understood the subtext. I’ve known when you were speaking to me, letting me know without really letting me know. And how many times have I said that I could wait or that she’d tell me when she was ready? I’ve tried to let you know that I understood without letting you know too.’

Ebony is strangely silent throughout this. She hasn’t left to give us privacy like anyone else might have, and I suspect that if I try to take Witt out the back, she’ll follow anyway.

And at the same time, nothing matters as much as him. Him knowing. Him understanding. Him being the best human I’ve ever met.

‘Since then, it’s been like a little puzzle to put together. I don’t think you realise how often you’ve slipped up. How often you’ve let me know without intending to. The things you’ve said – about the mass boycott of the ball and about Ebony having a thing for midnight visits. The missing ticket. The rose I gave you that night is in a vase on your bedroom window ledge – I saw it when I carried those books upstairs. The other day, you told me I was right about this street being where the servant cottages once stood – only I never said that to you. You’ve mentioned the theatre in the castle – the one I never showed to you. That night at the ball, you wore your regular cherry-scented perfume. Every time I’ve got close to you, I’ve smelt the same scent I smelt that night.’

And I thought I was so good at keeping secrets. I can’t believe I didn’t think of this. That day he took the books upstairs and looked through to the bedroom window. It never crossed my mind that the rose was sitting there in plain sight. And he’s right, I always wear the same perfume, the one my mother wore. A bottle of it is Ebony’s Christmas gift to me each year. I spray it on before I walk out of the door every day – and that night.

‘I doubted myself at first. Convinced myself it couldn’t be you, maybe I was misremembering, I hadn’t had my glasses on, and then I thought you must be repulsed by the weird stuttering fool, and—’

I point a threatening finger at him. ‘Don’t you dare say that. I wouldn’t allow anyone else to talk about you like that, I’m certainly not going to let you. Your height, your stutter, and your abnormally long gorgeous arms are all part of what makes you you.’

He smiles, folds my finger down and lifts my hand to his mouth. ‘Do you honestly not see why I haven’t been able to tear myself away? You make space for me in your life. I’m awkward and cumbersome. I never fit anywhere, and then I met you, and for the first time, I fitted with you. I felt like I was exactly the way I was supposed to be. Like there’s someone out there who is everyone’s perfect match, no matter how weird and awkward they are, and somehow I’d got lucky enough to stumble across mine. I’ve never connected with someone like I connect with you. The unexpected stuff we have in common, an understanding that’s hard to come by with many people. From the very first second I saw you, it felt like we were meant to meet, and that didn’t change whether you had a pretty dress on or the cargo pants and crochet jumpers you have on otherwise.’ He tugs my holey-knit tunic affectionately. ‘It doesn’t change whether your hair is straightened or the beautiful mass of curls that I can barely stop myself twirling around my fingers. I didn’t come looking for you because of how you looked – I came looking for you because I wanted to find out if I’d imagined the connection I thought we had.’

‘I convinced myself that you wouldn’t like me in the cold light of day. That you didn’t have your glasses on and if you saw the real me, you’d recoil in horror. And all the…’ I search for the right word. He might know it’s me, but he hasn’t realised the implications yet. ‘…online stuff. It went too far. It was never meant to—’

‘Don’t you realise I stopped looking? I was never interested in those emails because I knew it was you. From the moment I walked into your shop, I felt a sense of ease around you, exactly the way I did at the party. That doesn’t strike twice in one place. And the night we walked through the Full Moon Forest. Your hand through my arm, like it was at the ball. Then, I knew.’

‘Why did you go on that date with that woman on Saturday night?’

He laughs. ‘Half curiosity about what she was going to come up with, and half because I wondered if it would push you into saying something. I didn’t mean to worry you as much as I did.’

‘I’m so sorry, Witt. I didn’t mean to lie to you, it just…’ There isn’t even a decent way to finish that sentence.

‘It’s all right. You told me in not-as-many words, and you know me, I’m always better with fewer words.’

I’m fighting back tears at how lovely he is. ‘Don’t you hate me for this?’

He’s still got my hand in his and he pulls me closer. His fingers stroke my hair like he did that night and overwhelming love for him surges up so strongly that I might burst.

‘Why would I hate you?’ His tongue wets his lips and his head dips towards mine and that flutter of excitement at finally getting to kiss him again sends sparkles dancing through my veins. The key clatters onto the counter as my hand goes to stroke through his hair and pull him the rest of the way down…

I don’t realise those are famous last words until Ebony interrupts nanoseconds before our lips touch.

‘Wait, he didn’t know?’ She sounds confused. ‘Are you not in it together? You’re telling me that you did all of this on your own? Even Prince Charming himself wasn’t part of creating this Cinderella story?’

‘It wasn’t… No one created it – it just kind of happened.’

‘Publicity juggernauts like this don’t just happen. I could have hired the best advertising agency in the world and they wouldn’t have come up with something so inspired and tailor-made to our shop and Ever After Street. Brilliant, Sadie, absolutely top-notch.’

It’s the first time in recent years that I can remember Ebony paying me a compliment – I just wish it wasn’t in relation to this.

‘Heaven’s me, I didn’t know you had it in you. If I’d known what you were planning to use the ball for, I’d have given you that ticket happily. I’ve been so angry at you for going against my instructions, but all along, you’ve been doing exactly what I told you to.’

It makes me uncomfortable and the hairs at the back of my neck prickle in a bad way. This has taken on a typical Ebony cynicism and she’s made it sound so much more calculated than it was.

‘What?’ Witt was still leaning in, with a softness of that about-to-be-kissed haze, and he instantly stands upright.

‘On the night of the ball, I told you to, didn’t I? I said this shop would be yours the moment you showed me you could do something spectacular on the marketing front, and my God, you’ve succeeded. That’s why you kept it from me. You’ve been trying to prove a point all along.’

‘Well, yes, but…’ I trail off, unable to find the words to defend myself. She’s made it seem cold and callous when it was never meant to be that way.

Witt’s stiffened and taken a large step away from me, and I suddenly realise how bad this sounds. ‘Witt, this is not what you think. I told her I wanted the shop that night, at midnight, when I got home. She gave nothing but vague brush-offs, excuses, something about being out of my depth and not knowing how to handle the marketing and publicity side of the business…’ I trail off because the dismayed look on his face suggests I’m digging myself in deeper.

‘That’s why you went to the ball! Did you just get lucky and stumble across him or did you pick out an awkward loner beforehand?’ Ebony glances at him. ‘No offence.’

‘Oh, none taken. I assure you, it takes more than that to offend me.’ His eyes are stone cold when he looks at me. ‘Being used, for example, is something that offends me.’

‘Witt, no. She’s made it sound premeditated and it was never like that. That morning, I was still upset about arguing with her the night before, and then you were there with the shoe. And I was angry at you for not recognising me, and then for downplaying the night we’d spent together – for making it all about business. You wanted to find me because my “whimsical storytelling” would con potential buyers into upping their offers. Every relationship I’ve ever been in has ended because it was all about what the other person wanted from me – and I didn’t want the Prince Charming from the night before to be the same. I was upset at myself for being so forgettable, so unimportant to anyone that the only appealing thing about me was what I knew of the castle. The idea of putting the dress in the window was just an excuse to put something beautiful on show that Ebony wouldn’t be able to argue about. Every time I put a dress I’m proud of on display, she changes it, but this time, she couldn’t. And then Scarlett got involved with the website and the contact forms and the emails, and it all spun out of control. It was never meant to go as far as it has.’

‘But she’s right, isn’t she? From the moment you opened the door that morning, you knew who I was. You knew who you were. You knew the posters and the website stuff made me uncomfortable, and you could have stopped it at any time. I want to believe everything you’ve just said about why you didn’t tell me, but this… This makes a heck of a lot more sense. The main, and only, reason you couldn’t tell me who you were… is because that dress in the window has bought a lot of attention to The Cinderella Shop.’

‘And Ever After Street,’ Ebony says cheerfully, not realising the gravitas of this situation. I can feel panic rising at the look in his eyes and the hard set of his jaw. I knew he’d be hurt by this, but I underestimated how hurt.

‘It was all for the publicity, wasn’t it? For the tweets and shares and likes and pins and views. You’ve even told me that without telling me. You told me the shop was in trouble. You’ve told me about the need to get customers back. You’ve told me about your opposition to Ebony’s way of doing things and how you wanted to prove that your ideas had merit. Scarlett even said, literally yesterday, that the dress was staying in the window because of how many customers it was bringing in, and I never realised. I knew it was good for your business, but I’d separated the two. I thought the advantage for the shop was just a side effect of us getting to know each other, a secondary benefit of exploring whatever we felt that night at the ball. I’m so stupid.’ He smacks his forehead. ‘I thought you were the one person who was different. I never realised that it was all about the business. The sole reason for dragging this out is because if we had “found” you, the website visitors and retweets would have dried up.’ The anger is making him stumble over his words and he keeps having to repeat himself. ‘I was just a means to an end, wasn’t I?’

I don’t know what to say. What to do. It started off being about the publicity, but it quickly became so much more. When he puts it like that, it sounds indefensible. ‘No. God no, of course not. I know how it looks, and yes, at first it was just an opportunity to help the shop, but as soon as I got to know you, Witt, as soon as we started spending time together… the publicity didn’t matter any more. It wasn’t about that.’

‘Did this story fall into your lap at exactly the right moment? Or did you actually set out to orchestrate your own Cinderella story that night? Was the whole thing perfectly planned? From meeting me in the study to our magical evening under the stars to running off at the stroke of midnight? Because it suddenly makes so much sense that that’s exactly what it was. A carefully coordinated storybook moment. All you needed was a stupid, silent Prince Charming.’

I don’t know how to defend myself. I know how it sounds. How it looks, and I know what he thinks about love and how this must look to someone who is so fiercely guarded and never lets people get close because people only want to get close if they can use you, and that’s exactly what I’ve done. I didn’t tell him who I was because not telling him ultimately benefited me, and I don’t know how to make him believe that even though it started off as a marketing idea, it didn’t end up as one.

I reach out for his hand and he yanks it back and moves out of my reach so fast that his hip hits the counter, hard enough to jangle the key that’s still lying there. I feel a splash on my chest and realise it’s because tears are dripping off my chin, and for one second, his face softens.

‘I was just going to put the dress in the window. Scarlett came up with the posters and the website before she knew—’

‘Oh.’ He lets out a sarcastic bitter laugh. ‘So she did know then? You could trust her with this supposedly unsharable secret that you couldn’t bring yourself to tell me. The two of you must’ve cooked this whole thing up together.’

‘No! I hadn’t intended to tell anyone, but she put two and two together because of my reaction when you came in with the—’

‘Don’t tell me, she even helped you get ready for the ball?’

‘Well, yes, but not in that way.’ Oh, God. This is getting worse and I’m digging a bigger hole and I don’t know how to stop it. ‘It wasn’t like that.’

‘She’d seen you in the dress? From the moment she showed me the returned dresses, you both set this whole thing up.’

‘No, of course not. She’d never seen it. She’d had a client in the afternoon and left before I—’

‘Oh, spare me the excuses, Sadie.’

He hardly ever calls me by my full name. I can hear his voice breaking, the stutter coming out even more as his distress grows, and I desperately want to go back to earlier and hold him in my arms again and do something to prevent this.

I feel so guilty. I should have put a stop to this from the moment I realised who he was, and I didn’t. Ebony’s words have played straight into his insecurities and made everything that’s happened between us seem twisted and underhanded. Yes, the publicity has been great, but once I got to know him, the only reasons for not telling him were my own lack of confidence, and the fact I’ve fallen head over heels in love with him and was too scared of losing him to be honest.

‘Tell me one thing.’ Instead of their usual warm twinkle, his eyes are icy when he looks at me. ‘Did you know? Is that why you’ve got close to me? All the leading questions you’ve asked me… the inside information you’ve tried to wheedle from me. You’ve known who I am all along? This was all part of some grand plan to stop the castle being sold?’

‘No. How could I possibly have known you were the estate agent overseeing the sale?’

‘The estate agent?’ He scoffs so hard that it makes him choke. ‘I’m not— you know what, never mind. Thank you for proving what I’ve always known – that love is a con, and nothing is ever given freely without an ulterior motive. People only love someone else if there’s something in it for themselves.’ His voice is broken and his hands are shaking as he takes the key off the counter, rams it back into his pocket, and storms out.

I stare at the rattling door in a daze.

‘What’s going on?’ Moments later, Scarlett comes in the door that’s still juddering in its frame. ‘Why does Witt look so angry? I’ve never seen him look angry before; he’s like the least angry person in the universe.’

‘Ask her,’ I snap in Ebony’s direction.

‘Oh. Oh. Ohhh,’ Scarlett says in three different tones as she spots the ‘glass slipper’ in her mum’s hand.

‘I have to go after him. Don’t go anywhere,’ I tell Ebony. ‘You’ve got some explaining to do, but he is way more important right now.’

When I get outside, he’s gone. Of course he has. His legs are the height of a double-decker bus, and he can cover ground at a similar speed. I shout his name, but it does nothing but earn dirty looks from nearby shoppers.

He’s tall enough to be easily spottable in a crowd, but there’s no sign of him anywhere. Where would he have gone? The castle is the obvious answer, and as I run along the wide path through the woods, the spring sunshine that’s dappled through the trees disappears behind a cloud that’s so heavy, it turns the sky navy, and the heavens open.

Behind me, there are the shouts of shoppers making a dash for the shelter of shops, but a bit of rain isn’t as important as losing Witt.

The downpour is so heavy that it gathers in the grooves of the brick walkway as I run towards the castle, splashing high up my legs and drenching every part of me.

There’s no sign that he’s at home. No lights on. No way of telling if he even came back here. Probably not, considering he undoubtedly knew it would be the first place I’d look. But there are no other options.

I huddle under the narrow gate arch. The portcullis gate is still raised, but the heavy wooden gates on the other side of it are shut tight. I knock loudly. ‘Witt, let me in, please!’

Nothing.

‘We need to talk. Please let me explain.’

Still nothing. I’m huddling in the gateway where my mum and dad met, yelling at a man who either isn’t there, or can’t hear me, or is ignoring me if he is there. But I have to do something, even if it’s just shouting at an empty castle.

‘Scarlett never saw the dress. She never knew it was mine until it was too late. It wasn’t meant to be there – I’d shoved it onto that rail to hide it when my aunt arrived, and then I forgot about it. You were never meant to find it.’ I sigh and look upwards, and regret it when a big raindrop drips from the brickwork and plops straight into my eye. ‘But I’m glad you did, because it brought you into my life. As you, not as some Prince Charming in a mask. Getting to know you has been the best thing that’s happened to me in years. When I’m ninety and looking back on my life, these past few weeks will be one of the highlights. When I’m decrepitly passing on my wisdom to the younger generation, I’m going to tell my grandkids to find a partner who makes them feel even a fraction of how you make me feel.’

I bang on the door again, but I know Witt well enough to know he’d want to be alone, need to be alone, and I’m probably not helping matters here.

‘Witt, if you do nothing else, please listen.’ I’m shouting louder to be heard over the pounding of the rain. ‘The only thing I thought about that morning was putting the dress in the window. I didn’t expect all the publicity that would come from it or how invested people would get, and once it started, I didn’t know how to stop it without standing up and announcing that I’d gone against the wishes of everyone I’ve worked with for years, and now I really, really wish I’d been brave enough to do that, because it would’ve been better than hurting you. If I could go back in time, I’d ignore the chime of midnight and stay in your arms. I’d remove both our masks and kiss you properly. You deserve better than someone who can’t be honest with you, but please, please know that, although this started off as trying to save the shop, it became so much more than that, and the only reason I didn’t tell you was my own lack of courage and fear of having this conversation without losing you.’

I’m drenched. The rain has gone straight through the loose-knit holes in my crochet tunic and plastered the white vest underneath to my skin, and my hair has taken on the appearance of a mop, but it feels wrong to just give up. I look around. I got out of this castle all those weeks ago – maybe I could follow the same route through the grounds, and up over that wall into the secret garden and get back in? I’m not sure I’d ever find the way again, but it might be worth a try… and the breaking and entering conviction that would surely follow. If he’s there, he’s not going to be happy about me inviting myself in when he’s clearly shut me out, and if he’s not there… well, the police probably wouldn’t be too happy about it either.

The rain has eased to a drizzle, and the sun has the nerve to peek out over the distant hills, and I go back to the door and knock on it again. ‘Just so you know, I was thinking of breaking and entering, but I won’t. I don’t want to walk away, Witt, but I think I could stand here until a week next Friday and it still wouldn’t make you come out, so I’ll go. But please listen. The one and only reason I didn’t tell you immediately was because I didn’t think you’d like me as myself, and I wish more than anything that I’d been brave enough to take that risk because you’re the only person who’s made me feel worthwhile in a long time, and I should’ve extended you the same courtesy. And this is the worst timing but I refuse to walk away without saying it. I’ve fallen in love with you. You’re the best human I’ve ever met, and I’m sorry that I put the business before you because The Cinderella Shop is just a shop, and I’d rather lose it than you.’

I step back and look up at the castle. It stares hollowly back at me.

‘Pass on the message, will you?’ I pat its brick wall as I go to leave. Witt talks to inanimate objects, he’d understand. Or I just poured my heart out to a castle and told it I loved it. Which I guess I do, just not in quite the same way that I’ve fallen in love with him.

I traipse back with an overwhelming feeling that life as we know it on Ever After Street is over.

17

Scarlett and Ebony are having a row when I drip my way back to the shop as the sun reappears, making damp cobblestones glint as the air fills with the smell of wet concrete after a rainstorm.

‘Did you find him?’ Scarlett asks.

‘No, he’s gone. Probably for good. And what else do I deserve? We did take advantage of him, didn’t we? We exploited what he felt that night and we set up this thing of looking for someone he wasn’t going to find. He deserves better than that. He deserves someone who would’ve opened that door the next morning and said, “Oh, it’s you.” And I didn’t do that.’

‘Neither did he. If he knew the truth all along, he could have stopped it at any time, and he didn’t. I know it’s been great for the shop, but it hasn’t been about that since you started getting to know him – and he was never looking for anyone, it was only about getting to know you. He knows that, he just needs a minute.’

‘You didn’t see him. My heart broke when he joked about being in love the other day, and I’ve just seen the same thing happen to him, except I couldn’t turn around and tell him it was all a big joke. A “minute” to cool off won’t change that.’

‘Scarlett tells me I may not have helped matters…’ Ebony’s voice is much quieter than her usual booming tone.

I go to shout at her but stop myself before any words come out. Instead, I squelch over and snatch the shoe from her hand. ‘Where did you get this? Because I know exactly where it was and I want to know what you’ve been doing in my flat, and specifically, in my bedside drawer.’

‘It’s not your flat. It belongs to me. I have every right to be there.’

‘It’s my private space. You might let me stay there, but never with a stipulation that you can poke your nose in anytime you fancy!’

‘I was looking for something.’ She juts her chin out.

‘In my bedside drawer?’

‘I’m a landlord, I have a right to inspect my property. I’ve noticed some of these dresses are not the second-chance returned ones. You’ve obviously been moonlighting, and I wanted to know what you’d been hiding up there. The last thing I expected to find was the other shoe.’

‘You had no right,’ I splutter, feeling so overwhelmingly bleak that I’m even struggling to muster up my earlier anger. I’m the one who hid the shoe. I’m the one who should have been honest with Witt from the start. It was going to come out in one way or another. No matter how Ebony found it, I can’t blame her for this.

As though she can tell what I’m thinking, she shifts awkwardly from foot to foot before speaking again. ‘I’m sorry about the tall man. I genuinely thought you were in on it together. If it wasn’t only for the publicity, I don’t understand why you didn’t tell him straight away and save all this palaver?’ She waves a hand between the Cinderella dress in the window and the computer on the counter.

‘Because look at me,’ I say without thinking. ‘Because I’m plain and unnoticeable and I fade into the background of every situation. I’m the complete opposite of the woman he met in that dress. I didn’t think he’d like me as I am. Him not recognising me only heightened that.’

‘Maybe it’s a good thing in the long run, Sadie. You don’t want to get involved with someone who lives so far away. It would never have worked out, would it?’ There’s a sympathetic tone in her voice that makes me think she’s being nice, even though a flame of defensiveness starts in my stomach too. Maybe it would have worked out. It felt like it would, somehow, no matter how much distance was between us. It felt like it was worth fighting for.

‘Anyway, enough moping.’ She claps her hands together sharply. ‘We’ll get this silly second-chance ball out of the way and then get things back to normal. You can be proud of yourself for clearing some much-needed space in the storage room, but this has gone on for long enough now. What we all need is a return to normality and to forget all about the past few weeks.’

‘Normality?’ It’s enough to stoke that defensive flame in my belly into a full-blown fire. ‘Because normality was going so well for all of us, wasn’t it? The past few weeks have been the best of my life. The last thing I want to do is forget them. I went to the ball because I wanted to go, and I met this incredible man there. And my biggest regret is leaving him that night, because over the past few weeks, I’ve been able to see a future with him…’ Something else comes into sharp focus and I sink down into a seat as I realise how true it is. ‘And I no longer see a future here.’

‘What?’

‘I’m done, Ebony. I can’t do this any more.’

‘Because of him?’

‘No, because of me. Witt’s made me realise what it’s like when someone truly believes in me, and he’s shown me that it’s not a bad thing to expect that from the people I work with and the only family I have. I can’t keep working here, sewing dresses that I don’t believe in and rarely even like. We’ve lost what The Cinderella Shop set out to be. All my mum wanted to do was spread joy through her love of sewing, and it’s become bitter and unrecognisable, like a castle surrounded by twisted thorns, and I can’t keep working for someone who doesn’t believe in me. This shop could be so much more than it is. In the past few weeks, we’ve shown you how much good we can do, I’ve proved that we can turn things around, and even now, you still don’t believe in me. You can see how many dresses we’ve sold and how many customers we’ve got, how much people are talking about us online, and you’re still on about going back to the way things were before. You’re so set in your own approach that you won’t even consider that my opinion might be worth listening to and my ideas might be valid.’ I’m still holding the shoe in my hand and I fiddle with it as I speak. ‘I want so much for this place, and I will never, ever be allowed to do it with you in charge. I’ve always thought my mum and dad would be disappointed in me for leaving, but now, I think they’d be proud. They’d understand that we can’t carry on like this. You and me at loggerheads and Scarlett stuck in the middle. We were a team once. The three of us wanted the same thing – to make my parents proud, but everything has got lost along the way, including our relationship as aunt and niece, and I don’t want to lose that by continuing to fight. You were supposed to give me this shop when you considered me ready, and you will never, ever come to that conclusion, and I can’t carry on watching you run it into the ground while waiting for a day that will never come. It’s time for me to go.’

‘Sade, no,’ Scarlett says.

‘I’ll finish my outstanding orders, but I won’t take on any new ones. You’re going to have to find someone else or let The Cinderella Shop die with the castle. Because that’s what it’s doing. And I don’t want to see that happen and feel like I could’ve done something about it. I’m going to look for somewhere nearby, a little shop on a high street somewhere, with enough space to sew, have fittings, and display the dresses I want to make. Spread a little Cinderella magic somewhere else.’

‘This is why you’ve been making dresses and hiding them in your flat? Preparing for months to usurp me and steal our customers?’

‘No! But thank you for confirming you really do think the worst of me. I sew at nights in my flat because it’s the only chance I have to make anything that I like. That I believe in. That I want customers to wear. There’s a market for dresses like the ones I make in my free time. Ones that everyday people can wear. Dresses that make people feel special and that they can afford. That’s what my mother wanted when she started, and that’s what I’ve always wanted too, and I can’t keep pretending it isn’t.’

‘It sounds like we want to run two different businesses.’

‘We have for a long while now, and it’s time to admit that. You’re my aunt and the only mother I’ve had since I was ten years old. That is more important than a brick-and-mortar shop, and I don’t want to lose that because of our constant clashes over work.’

She looks as if she’s about to cry.

‘Sade, this isn’t what you want,’ Scarlett says.

‘I want to go to work every day and feel like I’ve felt for the past few weeks. That is never going to happen here, no matter how much I love Ever After Street. And the castle… I don’t think I can watch every day as it’s torn down brick by brick. I can’t watch lorries trundling through the Full Moon Forest and destroying every inch of it. I’m protecting myself by getting out now.’

Scarlett shakes her head as though she doesn’t believe me.

‘Well, if you’re sure.’ Ebony’s voice is wobbling.

‘I’m sure.’ My own voice shakes. I’m the furthest thing from sure, but this feels like a moment that’s been coming for months, if not years, and there’s a catharsis in finally confronting it. Ebony and I are never going to agree, and one of us has to be brave enough to accept that.

She comes over and holds a hand out to tug me to my feet and pulls me into a hug. I can’t remember the last time I hugged her. We used to have Sunday dinners at her house every week, and now, I don’t know when I last saw her outside of the shop. I don’t know anything about her life in recent months, and she doesn’t know anything about mine. We’ve become strangers who do nothing but bicker over work, and in that moment, no matter what has come between us, I’d rather have an aunt than continue trying to save The Cinderella Shop.

She holds a hand out to Scarlett too, and hauls all three of us into a group hug. It’s something we used to do all the time, when Scarlett and I were still young and Ebony was still finding her way in the world of shopkeeping, a morale boosting thing that made us feel like the team we were. Us against the world, united by the unexpected twists life had thrown at us.

‘You can stay in the flat for as long as you need. Here, I’ll even give you the key so you’ll know I can’t walk in.’ When we eventually release each other, Ebony swipes at her eyes with the back of her hand as she twists a key from her keyring and holds it out to me.

‘Why do people keep giving me keys this morning?’ I laugh through my own tears.

‘Who else has given you keys?’ Scarlett’s voice sounds thick and emotional.

‘Witt, earlier. It was something to do with the castle, but we never got as far as what.’

‘As much as I don’t want that old place to be sold, I’ve never understood why you’re so obsessed with it when there are so many nasty stories about it,’ Ebony mutters. ‘Nothing good has ever happened there.’

‘Yes it has. My parents met there. I met Witt there.’

‘And everyone conveniently forgets the mad viscount who killed himself in front of his son.’

My blood turns to ice and every hair on my body stands on end. ‘What?’

‘The viscount shot himself in front of his young son and the boy disappeared, never to be seen again.’ She shivers and continues muttering about hauntings and evil spirits, but I don’t hear another word.

I feel like a Rubik’s Cube when the coloured squares all click into the right places. A dot-to-dot puzzle when the dots finally connect in jagged, painful understanding. More tears fill my eyes and my hands cover my mouth to hide the gasp of anguish. ‘It’s Witt.’

‘What’s Witt?’ Scarlett asks.

‘Who’s Witt?’ Ebony says jokingly until Scarlett gives her a death glare.

I can’t make sense of what I suddenly understand. ‘In all the stories we’ve heard about that place, I’ve never, ever heard that the viscount had a son, have you?’

Scarlett shakes her head, looking confused. ‘How do you know that’s not just another story?’

I turn to Ebony. ‘Because you would’ve heard it from the one person who knew. My mum. Their family friend.’

She gives me a sad smile and nods.

‘That’s what he was trying to tell me this morning. He’s not an estate agent come to do house clearance. He’s the boy from the castle. He’s told me so many times without telling me. He saw his dad die when he was ten. He was sent away. From that very first night, I said it was like he was remembering and I told myself it was from his estate agent paperwork, but it wasn’t. He really was remembering. The other day when we were in the river, he said something about seeing this place again. I thought it was just a word slip at the time, but it was real. He’s been seeing this whole place again. He teared up when I was going on about the people who used to live at the castle. Why would an estate agent tear up at that? But if those old ghosts had been his family… Oh God, the portraits on the wall! I’m such an idiot. There are three portrait spaces on the wall. One is smaller. I joked that it was the viscount’s second wife, but it wasn’t, was it? It was his son. When he showed me the dresses my mum made for the first viscountess, there was such a fondness about him, as though he remembered them. An estate agent wouldn’t feel like that. He felt like that because she was his mother, and she died when he was four or five. His father ended up in a loveless marriage – with the second viscountess, a gold-digger, a story we’ve heard many times before.’

‘Your mum said the viscount was never the same after his wife died,’ Ebony says. ‘He lost touch with friends and locked himself away in the castle and was hardly ever seen. People forgot about them.’

Like the Beast’s castle after it was cursed. It was always there, but no one knew who was inside. It became a relic while it was still occupied. A grieving viscount and his young son, shrouded from the world, metaphorically imprisoned in the towers of the castle. He said that on the night of the ball. He showed me his prison, and I never realised.

‘So, you’re saying Witt is the owner?’ Scarlett says. ‘He’s the one selling it to a supermarket?’

‘No. Yes. I don’t— oh God.’ The realisation of what he meant by that last question before he left hits me like a truck. He wasn’t asking me if I knew he was the estate agent. He was asking me if I knew he was the owner. ‘He thinks I knew. He thinks I targeted him at the ball. This is…’ It goes so much deeper than I ever imagined. He has so much misery connected to that castle, and I’ve made it so much worse. ‘He must’ve come here to, what, lay old ghosts to rest for one final time, and instead he meets me, and all I do is wax lyrical about how wonderful the castle is, run away after a midnight kiss, and then use that midnight kiss to try to save Ever After Street. No wonder he thinks I used him.’

‘Oh come on, you had no idea. No one had any idea,’ Scarlett says and Ebony nods in agreement. ‘But this means the castle is saved, right?’ Scarlett’s one second away from a happy dance.

‘That was before, Scar. Before all this. Before he found out. If anything, what I’ve done will have pushed him into selling it immediately. After how much I’ve hurt him, he won’t want it now, will he? That’s what he was trying to say this morning – that he was thinking of keeping it. That’s what that was all about yesterday when he asked us what we’d do with the castle. The way he left so abruptly – he went off to think it through. He said he hadn’t slept this morning – I think he’d been up all night going over it, and he’d finally decided, and then…’ I look down at the shoe where I’ve left it on the seat. ‘I’ve made him hate everything. I’ve proved his theory that people only love you if they can get something out of you. He’s never going to see it any other way. The only thing he’s going to do now is go straight back to Scotland and erase every memory of this place – from the past and the present, and it’s my fault.’

I’ve broken my own heart and the heart of the only person who could save the castle, and I wish I had a magic clock that could turn back time, because I’d do anything to undo this curse and bring back the light that has lit up the castle in recent weeks.

18

‘I am not going to that ball!’

Scarlett’s in the window, taking the Cinderella dress off the mannequin. ‘Sadie, you’re going. If I have to use a crowbar to get you into this dress, you’re going. If I have to march up to the castle with the dress in one hand while I drag you by the ear with the other, you’re going. If I have to hit you over the head with a shovel, push you up there in a wheelbarrow, and deliver you to the second-chance ball in an unconscious heap with the dress thrown on top of you, you’re going. Don’t think I won’t!’

‘Planned violence – always fun.’

She gives me a scathing look. ‘You’ve spent the past few days expecting the second-chance ball to be cancelled – he hasn’t cancelled it. And because he hasn’t cancelled the ball, he’ll be expecting guests to turn up, and he’ll expect one of those guests to be you. And, by hook or by crook, he will be right. Don’t make me get out my hook or my crook.’

‘Your violent tendencies have been well hidden up until now.’

‘This is my fault too. I had to jump in with #FindCinderella and contact forms and tear-off-strip posters rather than just leaving it to you, and I’m not being responsible for Prince Charming and Cinderella’s story having an unhappy ending. Therefore, you’re going.’

‘I’m not going, Scar.’

‘Yes, you are.’ She detaches the mannequin’s arm and waves it at me threateningly. ‘The one thing you are going to do for that man is show up.’

‘He hates me. He thinks I used him. I did use him.’ I get annoyed at myself for sounding so sulky, but this is pointless. Witt hates parties. He definitely won’t be in the mood for a ball. I didn’t expect him to let it go ahead, but he has – probably for the sake of Ever After Street and the other shopkeepers who didn’t get to go last time – but there’s no way he’s actually going to be there himself, or that he’s going to talk to me, even if he is.

‘And not turning up will do nothing but prove that.’ She huffs. ‘He said he’ll be waiting in the place where you kissed. You are the only person who knows where that is. You’re not going to leave him in the lurch again.’

‘He wrote that weeks ago – before all this came out. He’s not still going to wait there.’

She shrugs. ‘Okay, but you will. Because whether he is or isn’t, you ran away from him last time and you’re not going to do the same this time.’

I mutter something about bossy cousins, and she brings the dress over to the counter and pushes it at me. ‘He suggested this ball to give your dresses a second chance. When he wrote that invitation to the missing Cinderella, he already knew who he was inviting. The whole idea of this was to give you a second chance – and now you are going to give him one.’

Which is how we end up at the ball that Sunday evening, five weeks to the day of the first one. The sun has been out all day, warming the night air, and a gentle breeze has sprung from the trees – the kind that blows tendrils of hair around delicately, as opposed to the kind that plasters your hair across your face and makes it look like an attractive home for mice.

A team of catering staff arrived this morning and we watched as they made their way up to the castle, but there hasn’t been any of the hullabaloo of the first ball. I expect there to be security men on the door who ask for my ID and immediately throw me out, but there’s no one, no tickets at all this time, a free-for-all. Scarlett and I simply slip in with the other guests.

There’s music, a singer from one ballroom and a classical band from the other, their music clashing as it filters out into the grand entrance hallway. The stairs are blocked off again with a better barrier this time… Witt knows all too well how easy the last one was to climb over.

There are people wearing my dresses, giving them their second chances, and it warms my cold, dispirited heart, and simultaneously makes me want to cry again because of Witt’s thoughtfulness. He did this to give my dresses a second chance to find happiness, and more than anything, I wish he was here to see so many of the dresses I’ve made, dresses he’s helped me steam clean, adjust, and sell, and how much good his idea has done for The Cinderella Shop and for the people who look so happy here tonight.

It’s magical to see people walking around in them, enjoying themselves, dancing while looking lovingly into a partner’s eyes, some new matches doing the awkward first dance of accidentally stepping on each other’s toes, dances that might lead to so much more, just like my dance at a ball like this did a few short weeks ago.

There are murmurs as we thread our way through the guests. The skirt is so flouncy that people have to move aside for me to pass, and they recognise the dress after it being front and centre of our window display for five weeks, and without masks tonight, people recognise me in it. Do they think I’ve put it on because we never found the missing Cinderella? Or do they realise it was me all along?

We pass the portrait wall, still showing the unfaded rectangles of the missing frames. A clue right from the moment I walked through the door five weeks ago. Paintings of a family that have hung there for decades. Paintings that were removed recently, not years ago like I’d imagined, but by Witt, to make sure there wasn’t a scrap of evidence that he’d ever existed. I saw how unfaded those missing rectangular shapes in the wallpaper were, and I still didn’t see why.

Scarlett gives the suits of armour a wide berth as we go past the stairs and slip by the staff kitchen door without being seen. I lead us along a corridor, and have to open a few doors before I find the theatre I remember cutting through with Witt the first time. Another hallway, and then the palatial living room with a ticking grandfather clock and an oil painting depicting a river scene, and I stop at the edge of the room. I’m sure it’s the way that leads to the corridor where the secret door was, and I don’t feel like I have a right to take Scarlett any further.

‘He’s not going to be there.’ I turn to her. ‘He’s going to be hiding out in the castle somewhere, away from the party.’

‘And you’ll know where. The tower or the kitchen or the other places he showed you. But try the place you kissed first, because he invited you, Sade. That has to mean something.’

Her words give me a little flutter of hope, but I stamp it down. I desperately want it to be true. I want him to be waiting for me more than anything, but he won’t be. Things have changed since he wrote that invitation.

I force a cheery smile and wave her goodbye and slip into the corridor we were in before. Hopefully, anyway. There are many corridors in a castle like this. The rooflights seem familiar, and the wall-planters have been tidied up now, but I can’t be sure I’ve got the right one.

The problem is that I have no idea how Witt opened the wall that night. I was focused on him, not what he was doing. There was no visible latch. The door was roughly in the middle of the hallway, and I trail my fingers along the honey-coloured bricks, feeling for something, anything, that might give it away.

I walk slowly, stopping to push at certain spots, trying to feel a change in the resistance that suggests it’s not like other parts of the wall, but there’s nothing. I scan the bricks, but every single one looks the same. That night, I admired how concealed it was and marvelled at how he’d literally opened the wall, but now, it doesn’t seem like such a good thing.

And then I remember how tall Witt is. He didn’t bend or stretch and I shimmy along the wall on my tiptoes, stretching up, pressing my hand into every brick I can reach, and even some I have to jump for.

We could be here all night.

I squeak in surprise when a brick moves under my fingertips, and there’s a click as a door-sized part of the wall shifts back, and I can get my fingers in and slide it aside on hidden runners, like he did that night.

I can’t believe I actually found it again. The flutter of excitement returns as I step into the narrow walkway, and I tell myself to stop being so silly. Me remembering where the secret garden is doesn’t make it any more likely that he will ever speak to me again.

He’s not going to be here. That’s the litany in my head as my sensible flat shoes click down the darkened corridor, and I use my phone light to illuminate the way. I’ll get over the barrier on the staircase and try the study next, where I first met him, then the decoy book and the tower, and if that fails, then the private kitchen, and Scarlett’s promised to apprehend him and text me if she sees him, even though I know the one thing Witt would be doing at a ball is avoiding it.

The door at the end of the corridor is unlocked. Witt had to stop and unlock it the first time, and for a moment, hope flares in my chest. I push down the handle and step out onto the paved area.

The rose bushes show the cut stems from being pruned and the promise of new buds to bloom for the summer, and the fountain is also lit up and has red rose petals floating on the water in the basin, and the hedge surrounding the patio area is threaded with glowing fairy lights that weren’t there before, but as I thought, the secret garden is empty.

It’s the most magical place I’ve ever been… but Witt is what made it so special the first time, and without him, it feels dull and unalive.

‘You came.’

I let out a yelp of surprise and spin around to see him sitting on a wall at the left side of the garden in the shadow of the tower, his long legs stretched out in front of him.

So many emotions rush through me, and they mainly involve jumping on him and hugging him, or kissing him for the rest of forever, so I end up twiddling my phone around in my hands, unsure of what to do or say. ‘You’re here.’

‘I didn’t think you’d come.’

‘I didn’t think you’d be here.’

‘I wasn’t going to be.’ His voice sounds thick and like he’s fighting his emotions as much as I am. ‘But here we are.’

He must have been waiting for me. I know he’s hiding out from the party, but he wouldn’t have chosen to hide out in the very place he invited me to, would he?

‘You look beautiful. That dress will never not take my breath away, but it looks even better with you in it.’

‘Thank you.’ I blush and slip the phone into the concealed pocket of the dress and twist my fingers together instead, building myself up to saying what needs to be said. ‘Witt, I’m so sorry. That morning, I was angry. I was angry at Ebony and I was angry at you, I felt out of control of my own life, and putting this dress in the window was a tiny way of clawing back some authority. The Cinderella Shop was slipping away from me and I thought there was nothing more important than saving it. Nothing else mattered. I didn’t realise it was going to get as big as it got, and then it was too big to tell you the truth without hurting you. And by that time, I really cared about not hurting you. But you have to understand that although this dress gained us a few followers, what really turned things around was the second-chance dresses, and that had nothing to do with the Cinderella attention. That was just me and you, your belief in me being strong enough to make me believe in myself. We created a little magic on our own that day and over the past few weeks and…’ There’s a lump in my throat and I’m running out of air, stumbling over an explanation that I probably should have practised, but every time I thought about it, I didn’t think I had a chance of finding him tonight and I didn’t know what I’d say anyway.

‘Well, we’ve got a bit of a problem, Sade.’ He looks at me thoughtfully, but his face remains stony, except for one corner of his mouth where he’s chewing his inner lip. At first I thought he was chewing it in distress, but the longer he looks at me, the more it looks like he’s trying to stop a little smile that wants to break out. ‘In all my life, I have never believed in love, but a few weeks ago, I met this incredible woman right here in this castle, and I appear to have… fallen in love with you too.’

And there they are, the tears I was trying to hold back. Too. He must’ve heard what I said at the castle gateway the other day. ‘You heard that?’

‘Every word. You’re fast when you’re chasing me. I’d barely got inside the door when you were there. I didn’t intend to listen, but it was like my feet rooted me to the spot. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t do anything but listen. And yes, I felt awful for making you stand in the rain. I wanted to open the gate and let you in, but I…’ He shakes his head. ‘That was very ungentlemanly of me. I’m sorry.’

A thick laugh escapes as I try to swipe tears away before they melt the minimal make-up I’ve got on. My hair is its usual mass of curls too. I didn’t want to be anyone I’m not tonight.

‘I shouldn’t have gone off like that. I was so worked up already, I hadn’t slept, and I think if it had just been you and me, we could’ve talked it out, but with your aunt there, watching and waiting for me to mess up, I was self-conscious and couldn’t get my words out, I couldn’t make myself understood, the wrong words kept coming out, and it was getting worse and worse, and I felt like my head was going to explode if I didn’t get some fresh air and space. Hearing that, my mind spiralled on me, like going down a rabbit hole, a barrage of things all at once, and I couldn’t process it then and there.’

‘I know it seems like I only wanted one thing, Witt, but it wasn’t—’

He holds up a polite hand to stop me. ‘I know. God, I know. I knew the other day too, but there was too much speaking and too much pressure to be able to speak eloquently, and I can’t, and it was all too much. But I know, Sade. I know it wasn’t about the publicity. It swept us both along, but I let it too. I knew who you were and I could have stopped it at any time, but I didn’t want to because I wanted to be near you, to get to know you, and it was a way of spending time with you.’ His voice is measured, slow, the concentration clear on his face. ‘I never let people in. I push them away and hold everyone at arm’s length because I’ve been laughed at my entire life, and the way I’ve been feeling with you has felt too good to be true. From the moment we met, something’s felt different, I’ve wanted to get close to you, I’ve let my guard down, I’ve started believing in things I’ve always thought were fairy tales. I’ve spent my life avoiding people, speaking as little as possible, dodging conversations…’ His voice is speeding up and he stops himself before the stutter gets any stronger, and takes a few deep breaths. ‘I’ve always thought that good things don’t happen in this castle. I was waiting for the inevitable unhappy ending, and when your aunt said that, my walls snapped up instantly. It’s only with a bit of space that I’ve realised I overreacted and heard what I was expecting to hear rather than what you were really saying. I’m sorry I couldn’t listen the other day.’

‘I’m sorry I couldn’t find the words to say.’

‘That’s something I understand all too well.’

I smile at him and he smiles at me, and I want to wrap my arms around him and pull him into the tightest hug, but I force myself to stay still. He’s still focused on his breathing, clearly needing to say more.

‘I’m not sure I deserve you showing up for me tonight. There’s something I need to tell you too—’

It’s my turn to hold a hand out to stop him. ‘I already know, Witt. I know who you are.’

His face screws up and his body instantly stiffens and he sits up straighter. ‘Now or before? Please don’t tell me I’ve got this wrong and you really did target me all along?’

‘Now. Because I finally heard the words you hadn’t been saying. You told me without telling me too.’ I give him a quick rundown of the realisation after Ebony’s mention of the viscount’s son the other day.

‘You don’t hate me for it? I haven’t been honest with you either.’

‘Well, neither of us are doing great on that front, are we?’

He lets out a breathy laugh and holds his hand out, and as always, I’m unable to resist anything to do with his hands. My ballet flats tap across the paving slabs and everything feels right with the world when his fingers close around mine.

I go to sit on the wall beside him, but he stops me. ‘You can’t sit on a wall in that beautiful dress. The bricks will snag the organza.’

‘Look at you, learning stuff from spending the past few weeks in a dress shop.’

He pulls his knees up so his thighs form a flat surface and pats his leg.

‘I can’t sit on your lap.’ I let out a semi-hysterical laugh.

‘’Course you can. I mean, if you want to. I know things aren’t right between us; I owe you an explanation, so maybe you don’t want—’

I cut him off by perching on his lap. I loop my arms around his neck and he turns his head to kiss my inner elbow, his arms sliding loosely around me, holding me tight.

There’s so much fabric to the dress that it’s everywhere. I pat it down and try to tuck it around our legs, and I feel him relax. That sense of peace settles over me when I’m with him too and soothes all the sharp edges and tattered nerves of the last few days, and I lean in to kiss his cheek and he lets out a long, shuddery breath.

‘When I was ten, my father shot himself in the courtyard. I woke up in the middle of the night with an overwhelming sense of dread. A fear I couldn’t see. I knew something was wrong. I ran through the castle, desperately looking for him, searching for reassurance that I was just having a nightmare. I saw him from the window. The glint of his hunting rifle catching the moonlight. I screamed. I pounded on the glass, but he didn’t hear me. I was too far away and the building was too big. By the time I got out there, he’d pulled the trigger. He took his final breath in my arms. I blamed the castle itself. If it had just been smaller, a normal-sized house, I would have got there in time. I would have called his name and he’d have turned around and seen me and realised he was about to make a huge mistake. He’d have put the shotgun down and we would have gone inside and warmed up with hot chocolate, and he’d still be alive. In my mind, it was the castle’s fault that he wasn’t, and I’ve hated the place for so many years.’

One hand rubs his shoulder and I let the other stroke through his hair when his voice breaks, and his hands tighten on my thigh.

‘Maybe it was the castle that woke you up that night too. At least he wasn’t alone. All death is horrible, but the least you can hope for is that the person is with someone they love when it happens. And he was. The last thing he felt was your love.’

He looks up at me with his head tilted and tears in his eyes. ‘And that is why I fell in love with you. You see this castle in a way that no one else does. You see the world through different eyes. I’ve never thought of it like that before.’

I blush and continue running my fingers through his hair, trying to hug him one-handed without suffocating him in the dress. ‘I should apologise for all the “mad viscount” stories you’ve heard. No one meant any harm. None of us had any clue he was your father.’

‘It’s okay. He was broken after my mother’s death, but I had no idea how broken. A father wouldn’t talk to his young son about mental health, and half the labels we’d put on it these days hadn’t been invented then. We stayed in the castle, locked away. There were staff back then but they were fired because he became convinced they were plotting to kill us. I was taken out of school because he thought my teachers were part of the plot, and what young boy wouldn’t be overjoyed at that? He taught me everything he knew. Taught me how to be a gentleman, how to treat people right, how to act, how to speak… and then the weirder stuff like how to stop the “powers that be” from reading your thoughts, and where to hide from “them” who might be watching. Obviously, looking back as an adult, I see he was suffering from psychosis, delusions, hallucinations, but back then, I thought he was just being daft old Dad, making up stories like the ones I read in books.’

I kiss his forehead, giving him time to talk.

‘Things only got worse when his second wife came along. She fed into his delusions rather than recognising that he needed help. She targeted him from the very beginning. She saw a vulnerable man who had a lot of money and set out to part him from it. She never cared about him, never loved him, but he thought she was the answer to his prayers, sent by some higher power to rescue us from whatever he thought we needed rescuing from. She used his love against him. Used it as a manipulation tactic, a way of getting him to do whatever she wanted. I was too young to remember the love my mum and dad had, so that was my only experience of what love means. For years, I’ve protected myself against love because I’ve thought that’s what it would be like. You’ve shown me otherwise. The stories you’ve recounted to me about my mum and dad have reminded me of what real love is and what they shared, before it all went wrong.’ He rests his chin on my bare shoulder, the shadow of his stubble making my skin tingle.

‘Why did you come back now?’

He manages to shrug his shoulders without dislodging any of the places we’re touching. ‘I’ve had loads of offers on the castle over the years, but I’ve always hung onto it. I couldn’t face seeing it again, but I didn’t want to get rid of it because it was the last place my father was happy. The last place I was happy. But this time… I don’t know. Something felt different, I guess. I’m going to be forty next year. Thirty years will have passed since that night. The supermarket’s offer was no better than any of the others I’ve received, but I convinced myself it was time to let go, but I couldn’t let go without coming back one last time. One final chance to bury the bad memories associated with this place. And then I met you.’

I can’t help smiling at the abrupt way he ends the sentence. ‘It feels like a lot of sentences ended that night.’

His chin moves against my shoulder as his face shifts into a smile.

‘Are you really an estate agent?’

‘I am,’ he says with a guilty laugh. ‘Everything I’ve told you about my job is true. The only thing that I wasn’t quite honest about is that this isn’t a project for work – I’m using my annual leave to be here. I had no idea that Ever After Street had sprung up around the castle in the decades since I was last here, and when I realised the level of feeling in the area and how unpopular selling the castle was, I didn’t want anyone to know it was me who’d made the decision to sell it, and the more I’ve found out about Ever After Street, the worse I’ve felt. I’m sorry for the stress I’ve put you and the other shopkeepers through.’

‘Not me, not any more… I quit my job.’

‘You’ve… what?’ His hand shifts from my thigh to curl around my waist and he pulls back until he can catch my eyes.

‘After you left the other day. It was all too much for me too. It made me realise some home truths.’ I repeat some of the things I said to Ebony in the shop.

‘What are you going to do?’

‘I don’t know. I could actually do with an estate agent’s help. I want to find a little shop somewhere, on a high street, small enough to afford but big enough to display some dresses in the windows, sew, and do fittings. What my mum did all those years ago, but on my terms. It won’t be the same, it won’t be The Cinderella Shop, but…’ I trail off because every time I think about the reality of leaving the shop, I want to cry. It isn’t what I want, but it feels like the only way it can be.

His fingers brush up and down my thigh, rucking up the sparkly organza and smoothing it back down again. ‘How about here?’

‘Here?’

He looks up at me with shining eyes. ‘Here. Either a couple of rooms in the castle or somewhere in the grounds, somewhere with shelter, space, big windows… I know it’s not Ever After Street itself, but if we’re going to hire the castle out as a wedding venue, it would be kind of cool for brides to come for fittings here too…’

‘And go into direct competition against Ebony and Scarlett?’

He grimaces as though he hadn’t thought of that. ‘Well, maybe it could be more of a co-op, like another branch of The Cinderella Shop, maybe you could work with each other instead of against each other. You are family, after all, and I can’t imagine Ever After Street without you, Sade. And I want it to be here for many years to come.’

Tears fill my eyes as I realise what he means. He really must be intending to stay. ‘Oh, good lord… Wait, that was meant to be a figure of speech, but you’re not actually a lord, are you?’

He laughs so hard that we’re probably lucky we don’t both have a Humpty Dumpty moment and fall off the wall. ‘No. I’m not anything. I’m entitled to use “The Honourable” in front of my name, but I don’t, because it’s so pretentious and I don’t want any part in that kind of lifestyle. I’m just Witt. I don’t want to pretend to be something I’m not.’

I kiss him.

It’s just a brief press of lips, but the need to kiss him is too overwhelming to ignore, and he makes a noise of surprise before kissing me back, his fingers pressing into my body, making me feel more cherished than I’ve ever been. It’s not a long enough kiss and we both let out a shaky breath when we pull back.

‘Are you really going to stay?’ I let my fingers brush through the grey streak at his temple and grin down at him.

‘Move in with me. Oh hell.’ He pushes his glasses up and pinches the bridge of his nose. ‘That wasn’t meant to be as forward as it sounded. I’m not trying to push our relationship too fast. You can have your own room, your own living quarters, hell, you can have your own wing of the castle if you want. I just meant… You’ve barely got space to breathe in your flat, and the castle deserves to be surrounded by people who love it for a change, and no one loves it more than you. And I can’t imagine doing this without you by my side, and I just—’

I kiss him again. I always want to give Witt time to speak without interrupting, but sometimes there’s no option but to cut him off with a kiss, because I love the way he’s surprised for a moment before he kisses me back, and how so much can be conveyed through that noise he makes, the kind of muted growl that suggests he wants to rip my clothes off, but he’s too much of a gentleman to spoil such a nice dress, and we’re grinning against each other’s mouths, and it takes a lot of willpower to pull away.

‘Can I just say, I really like it when you do that?’ He speaks without opening his eyes and his voice sounds breathy and dazed.

I laugh and kiss him again for good measure, and he makes a noise of disappointment when I pull back, and it takes a good few seconds for him to blink himself back to reality.

‘What do you think? Can you put up with a stuttering fool whose sleeves will never be long enough and who’s guaranteed to talk to inanimate objects at every turn, and will always buy birthday cake even when it’s no one’s birthday?’

‘All things that make you the best human I’ve ever met.’

He’s laughing as I press my lips to his again. ‘I don’t have money. I don’t have a title. I don’t have any idea what I’m doing, but I want to make this castle the best it can be. I’m going to sell my grandma’s cottage in Scotland and the money from that will pay for essential repairs and whatever structural work it needs to make it safe to open to the public. There’s a branch of the estate agency I work for nearby, I’ll put in for a transfer and request to reduce my hours, so I’ve got more time to focus on the castle.’

‘You’ve thought this through.’

‘I’ve been doing nothing but thinking it through since I met you. Something so horrible happened in this castle that I’d blanked out the good memories that came before it, and you somehow unlocked those. You reminded me of the times before. That night at the ball… it was the first time I’d felt something good towards this castle in decades, and I wanted to hear more. You made me feel good. I’d been het-up and angry since I got here and you made me feel at peace. I’d forgotten how much I loved this place once, and now, I don’t want to be anywhere else. All those things you said the other day, all the suggestions, I want us to figure it out together, to give this castle the life it deserves… together.’

‘It sounds perfect. That last word in particular. I like the sound of that.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah.’ I cup his face and rest my forehead against his, nodding so he can feel it, until he surges up to kiss me. One hand twists in my curls while the fingertips of his other hand skim the bare skin of my upper back, and mine clutch his suit jacket as we melt against each other. Goosebumps wash over me from the ends of my hair to the tips of my toes. The first time I kissed him, there was a buzz, but this time, it’s like static electricity has been humming around me for weeks, and kissing him is like finally touching something metal and discharging it. It’s the most perfect kiss, just like it was in this garden before. It’s the kind of kiss that you can’t imagine happening outside of film sets, and it leaves me feeling like all is right in the world and like a part of me that I never knew was missing has slotted back in.

The same aftershave he was wearing last time at the ball, dry wood and black chocolate, fills my senses, making me dizzy and lightheaded. He twitches his nose against mine when they rub together, making me giggle into the kiss and hold him tighter for being so adorable, and the kiss ends with us both dissolving into laughter at how good it feels to finally kiss each other with no pretences between us.

He lets out a happy sigh as we pull back and leans his head to the side to rest on my arm.

‘Before my brain is scrambled completely, can I ask you something very important?’ He holds his hand up, his palm open and inviting. ‘Would you do me the honour of dancing with me?’

‘It seems like you’ve asked me that before sometime…’

‘Once upon a dream.’ God, his smile. It’s so wide that it makes me feel fizzy inside and butterflies flitter all over me.

His hands hold onto my hips to steady me as I lever myself and the dress up off his lap, and he stands up too. As I walk over to the patio where we danced before, he jumps over the low wall and goes to the window above the ballroom as he did last time.

There’s a lull between songs at the moment, and he knocks on the glass before he opens it. ‘Could you do me a favour and make it “Waltz of the Flowers” next?’

The first piece of music we danced to all those weeks ago. He slips back over the wall as the first notes start filtering up. One hand folds over mine, and his other hand goes to my hip. Mine slides up to his shoulder and time loses all meaning as we waltz together.

When the singer downstairs joins the orchestra, the song fittingly changes to ‘So This is Love’ from Cinderella, and more songs follow. His eyes never leave mine, and if I hadn’t already fallen in love with him, I would have in this moment.

He makes me feel like a princess. The way he lifts me, twirls me, and spins us around. The way he bows at the end of every song. The way he looks at me, like he’s still expecting to wake up at any moment, until the dancing has faded into just swaying together, holding onto each other, our bodies pressed against each other, sneaking in a kiss here and there, dancing like we did before, except tonight there’s no midnight, and the fairy tale won’t end when the clock strikes. It feels like it won’t ever end this time.

19

It’s only the clock chiming that makes us realise we’ve been outside for a couple of hours, and I gear myself up for facing everyone.

‘Oh, there you are!’ When we emerge from the secret garden, Scarlett pulls me into a hug and waves an arm towards Witt. ‘I told you he’d be there!’

She and Ebony are hanging around the entrance hall with a few other Ever After Street regulars, and I’m surprised Ebony has come.

She’s wearing a dress I made her ages ago, a floor-length gown with a Queen Anne neckline in grey silk with a black rose pattern embroidered in the sheer outer layer, the kind of thing we used to sell but haven’t for years now, and it’s a nice reminder of the past. ‘I didn’t know you still had that.’

‘Of course I have it. Do you think I’d ever throw out something you’d made me? I’ve still got picture frames made of pasta that you made for me in infant school when I was still just your aunt.’ She takes a step towards me. ‘Sadie, can we talk?’

I tighten my grip on Witt’s hand, letting him know not to go anywhere, and making sure Ebony realises she can say whatever she wants to in front of him, and he inclines his head, leading the four of us into a hallway and closing a door for some privacy.

She takes a deep breath and looks at Scarlett, who gives her a nod of reassurance. What is going on here?

‘The Cinderella Shop is yours. I hand it over with immediate effect. Expect a call from my solicitor to go in and sign the paperwork, but I’ve already instructed them to begin the process of changing ownership.’

She blurts the sentence out in such a rush that it takes a minute for me to untangle the words, and I go to speak a few times before anything will come out. ‘But… why?’

‘Because you were right in what you said. We’re trying to run two different businesses, and neither of us are succeeding. When I realised you believed in our shop as it used to be – so much so that you’d walk away because of me, I swallowed my pride and really looked at what you’ve been doing over the last five weeks. It was eye-opening to see how well you’ve done – without me. The Cinderella Shop is thriving for the first time in years, and why? Because I’ve been away. It made me think about what you could do if you weren’t waiting for me to come back, worrying about what I’d say, keeping things quiet so I don’t find out.’

‘It was never meant to be like that. I just had to do something, and…’

‘It’s okay, I understand. When you left me in the shop the other day, I realised why I go away so much. I don’t want to work in a shop any more. I loved that shop when I first took over. You were ten years old and you had to teach me how to sew, and they were a wonderful few years. Full of grief, of course, but full of joy too. A feeling that I was doing right by my sister, that between us three, we’d make your parents proud, and that’s got lost along the way. We’ve all got lost along the way. I’m floundering around, trying to save a sinking business, and feeling like I will somehow have failed my sister if I don’t do it by myself, when the reality is that I should have talked to you and Scarlett long ago and listened to your opinions. I thought we just needed one big thing to bail us out, and then I would have fulfilled the promise I’d made to your mum and dad. And instead, I bury my head in the sand and take holidays under the guise of working, in the hopes that some time away will give me the space to come up with some brilliant plan, and it never happens, so off I go again, telling myself it’ll be better next time, and it never is. And all along, I’ve ignored our best asset – you. The dresses you make, and your intimate knowledge of Ever After Street, and your experience of what the people here want. What you’ve been telling me all along.’

I blush and Witt nudges his arm against mine. I can’t take all this in. Ebony saying things that I’ve desperately wanted to hear her say for so long.

‘I’ll pay back my travel costs into the business account, and then I’ll back out. I’ll always be your aunt, Sadie. Always on hand if you want advice, but it’s time for me to step back from everything else. What you said about us losing our relationship really hit home. I’m pushing you away as my niece, my daughter in all senses of the word, in my misguided attempt to do what’s best for the business, and you’re more important to me than that.’

Just when I thought I couldn’t possibly cry any more today, tears have filled my eyes again. ‘Ebony, I don’t know what to say. Are you sure?’

‘The surest I’ve ever been. I’ve rarely had confidence in anything to do with The Cinderella Shop. I feel like I’ve never outgrown that heartbroken, blundering young woman who walked into that shop after their will was read, and thought, “How can I do this?”’

‘I didn’t know that.’

‘I’m good at projecting confidence. You have to be. It isn’t easy to be taken seriously in the business world, and you have to make people think you know what you’re doing, even if you don’t. But now, for the first time, I know this is the right move, for all three of us. And those dresses you have hidden upstairs. They’re so beautiful, Sadie. They should be on show, on display, on sale where they’ll attract customers, not hidden behind the things I think might catch some rich celebrity’s eye. You can do that now. Make The Cinderella Shop exactly what you want it to be.’

‘I will.’ My mind is already filled with ideas of the window displays I want to create, the dresses I can make now, the people who will be able to buy them.

‘I should have handed the shop over to you many years ago. I’ve never wanted to give in to that stipulation and “consider you ready” because I never wanted you to grow up. My sister can’t be gone if her little girl is still a little girl – if I’m somehow still taking care of you until she comes back. But once you were old enough, I should have given you a choice, so I’m a little late, but I’m ready now. What about you?’

‘I’ve been ready for years. This is all I wanted. My aunt back and the chance to return the shop to how it was when my mum and dad ran it, with a modern twist and a greater emphasis on more casual dresses that still feel like they could’ve slipped out of a fairy tale.’

‘That sounds perfect. How it should be.’ She comes over and gives me a hug and we hold onto each other for so long that it’s like we’re making up for lost time.

‘This is Witt, by the way.’ I’ve somehow managed to hug her without letting go of his hand. ‘Please learn his name, you’ll be seeing a lot more of him.’

She unexpectedly pulls him into a hug too.

‘What will you do now?’ I ask when she releases my unnerved-looking Prince Charming.

‘Honestly, I’m not sure. How long it took me to recover from standing on my feet all day when you went on strike made me wonder if it really is time to think about retirement…’

Scarlett and I glance at each other doubtfully. The one thing I cannot imagine Ebony doing is retiring.

‘No?’ Ebony looks between us until we both burst out laughing. ‘I don’t know, but something part time, I think. I enjoy working with boutiques; maybe I could offer my expertise on a consultancy basis.’

‘They’ll be lucky to have you.’ I really mean it. Just because what Ebony does doesn’t fit The Cinderella Shop, doesn’t mean it won’t be wonderful for other shops with different goals and different customers.

‘What about you?’ I turn to Scarlett. ‘You want to be a full-time hairdresser, not stay on to help me out.’

‘We’ll manage. I love The Cinderella Shop too. I’m happy splitting my time, at least until we’re doing well enough to hire full-time shop assistants so you can sew and not have to watch the shop all day too.’

‘I think Sade might be sewing from here from now on,’ Witt says.

‘Yeah, I’m kind of going to move into the castle. I think we’re going to do something about hosting weddings here.’ I look up at him for confirmation and he nods. ‘So maybe we could display wedding dresses here, bridal princess dresses, bridesmaids’ dresses, mother-of-the-bride ensembles, while the shop itself shifts focus to more everyday accessible outfits at reasonable prices. The best of both worlds.’

‘Display them on those creepy suits of armour. Anything to suffocate them,’ Scarlett mutters. ‘Talk about the way to give people nightmares.’

‘Yeah, they keep creaking in the nights too.’ Witt grins. ‘And sometimes, when I get up in the mornings, they’re definitely not where I left them.’

She realises he’s joking and pokes her tongue out at him, making us all laugh, and absolutely everything feels right with the world again. There is definitely more than a little magic in these castle walls.

When we leave the hallway, Ebony spots a friend and goes to chat and Jackson has arrived and is waiting for Scarlett with a corsage made of roses, and Witt and I stay on the side-lines, taking it all in.

‘Look how happy everyone looks,’ Witt whispers to me. ‘You dressed the majority of people at this ball. How many do you reckon have found love tonight?’

I push myself up on tiptoes until I can press a kiss to his jaw. ‘I know one couple who definitely did.’

‘Nah, I fell in love with you weeks ago. It’s just taken the magic of a ball to make us admit it.’ He gathers my hair and pulls it aside until he can kiss my bare shoulder. ‘We should do this more often, you know. Make it a regular event. Make sure your dresses have always got somewhere to go.’

‘Dresses are, of course, renowned for having full calendars and a busy social season.’

‘You know what I mean.’ He laughs against my skin. ‘I want to be a part of this “sewing love into the seams” legacy. We should host regular events like this – a chance for people to find love if they’re looking.’ He nods towards a giggly young couple who are so engaged in chatting to each other that they walk straight into a suit of armour, and then his gaze shifts towards Lilith and her husband who are dancing with the aid of a Zimmer frame. ‘Or give long-established happy couples a chance to enjoy a night out together and feel the magic of the castle for themselves.’

‘I’d love that.’ I look around. Everyone has got a smile on their faces, and the castle itself feels lighter somehow, like the Beast’s castle when the curse was lifted. ‘I think everyone else would like that idea too. Maybe a seasonal ball, four times a year to celebrate every season.’

‘Yes!’ He sounds so happy, but as we stand there and look around, I can sense his unease growing and he starts fiddling with the collar of his shirt as though it’s too tight.

‘You okay?’ I find his hand and give it a squeeze.

‘Sade, will you… I need to do something, and I…’ He swallows. He’s gone pale, and his hand is suddenly clammy in mine. ‘Just hold my hand and don’t let go?’

I realise what he’s going to do as he starts leading us towards the stairs and goes up a few before the barrier blocks the way, so we’re standing above the crowd. I lift our joined hands until I can press a kiss to the side of his wrist. Someone whose greatest fear is public speaking is about to speak in public.

‘Hello, everyone.’ Witt clears his throat and has to say it twice before it comes out loud enough for anyone to hear. ‘Firstly, I want to say thank you for your support in helping me find my missing Cinderella. She has now been found.’ He lifts our hands and meets my eyes. ‘And along the way, I’ve found a lot of other things too. Long-lost childhood wonder, fun, friendship, and someone who makes me believe in magic again – Sadie, and actually all of you and what you do on Ever After Street.’

A few people clap, but no one can see how hard this is for Witt. No matter how tight I’m holding his hand, it doesn’t stop it from shaking, and I can feel every tremor that runs through him, and see the panic in his eyes with every sentence.

‘The night of the first ball, Sadie and I talked about pretending to be something we’re not, and I said I’ve spent a long time pretending not to be something I am, and being here, seeing this place again, and meeting all of you has made me realise how true that is.’

He stutters, of course he does. He’s fighting to focus on each word with so many eyes on him, but he keeps going. The guests are respectful enough to stay silent, and I grip his shaking hand, holding it tightly between both of mine, giving him something to fixate on instead of so many people hanging on his slow words. I don’t think I’ve ever been so proud of someone.

‘For decades, I’ve pretended not to have a stammer. I’ve pretended not to be the son of a viscount. I’ve pretended not to be the owner of this castle, but being here again has made me want to admit who I am. My name is Hewitt Kingscote. I have a stammer, as I’m sure you’ve all noticed and been too polite to point out. I am the son of a viscount. Yes, that viscount. The man who owned this castle. I am the current owner. I am the person who was intending to sell—’

As a wave of shock buzzes through the gathered people, he lifts a trembling hand to stop it. ‘The castle is no longer for sale. I’m going to stay here and we’re going to make this castle a true part of Ever After Street, if you’ll have us.’

That pride flares up again. Each sentence is a struggle to get out, he’s blushing furiously, but he doesn’t stop. His grip on my hand is as tight as my grip on his, and I’m sure that neither of us have got any circulation below the elbow.

Most of the guests tonight are either people who work here or regular visitors, and as his words sink in, a cheer goes through them that builds and builds until it’s so colossal that it could blow the castle roof off.

Witt looks bewildered, as though he’s waiting for the punchline. He really expected people to hate him for this, and not just to be overjoyed that our beloved castle isn’t going anywhere.

Their acceptance lights him up. His electric smile creates so much brightness that it could be sold back to the National Grid, and he looks at me like he can’t quite believe it.

While everyone’s attention is on discussing the possibilities with each other, Witt can’t get away quick enough, and I can tell his legs are like jelly as we step down the few stairs and onto solid ground again.

‘If no one’s told you how amazing you are yet today, you’re amazing. That was incredible, Witt.’

‘Still recovering. I’ve never spoken to that many people before. No one laughed. No one made fun.’

‘No one who matters ever would. And if they did, they’d have me to deal with. And I know all the most painful places to insert a sewing needle.’

His laugh is one of relief and my arm slides around his back and I pull him into a hug for a few moments before we get swept up in the excited chatter of the crowd.

Ali pulls Witt aside to talk about hiring out rooms for special occasion dining and themed dinner nights, and I leave the two men to it when I spot Mickey, Lissa, and Marnie together in the crowd.

‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to let you down.’ I go over to them. ‘I know I shouldn’t have gone—’

‘I wish you’d have said; you could have come with us,’ Lissa says.

‘You went?’ I say in surprise.

‘Of course we went,’ Mickey says. ‘Just because we objected to the castle being sold doesn’t mean we aren’t nosy little caterpillars. You can’t work in the shadow of a place like this for years and not be curious about what it’s like inside. We thought it was going to be our last chance so we both donned our masks and pretended we hadn’t been there.’

‘I wish I’d have known, I’d have gone too,’ Marnie says. ‘I’ve always dreamed of a Beauty and the Beast moment in a ballroom in a castle.’

‘I don’t think this will be the last ball we throw here. You’ll get your chance. And next time, everyone will be welcome, including any lurking Beasts who haven’t been turned back into princes yet.’

Marnie looks excited at the prospect.

‘Don’t know what you were so worried about, Sade.’ Lissa pats my arm. ‘No one can resist the call of a fairy tale. We’d never hold that against you.’

‘Love you guys. Team Ever After Street.’ We all do a fist-bump and Witt catches my eyes from across the room, looking as though he needs rescuing from Lilith and her husband, and I edge my way towards them.

While a well-timed waiter distracts Lilith with a champagne refill, he manages to slink away and pull me into the ballroom. His revelation has caused such a stir that most people have migrated into the main entrance hallway to chat, and it’s quiet in here.

‘There’s a certain irony to escaping into a ballroom, considering we wouldn’t have met if we hadn’t been escaping from a ballroom,’ he murmurs.

‘I guess we’ve got the castle to thank for that.’

‘Got the castle to thank for a lot of things. Reminding me of the good when I’ve spent so many years thinking only of the bad. Bringing you into my life. Your mum’s stories and the love that was once shared here, and will be again.’

Every word makes me melt, and it’s a good job his arms are around me, holding me steady. The singer is still singing at the other end of the room, and we’re doing something that’s a cross between a hug and a dance, and as she finishes one song and starts the next, it just happens to be ‘Once Upon a Dream’.

‘And I didn’t even ask for that,’ Witt whispers.

‘Maybe the castle is letting us know it appreciates being part of a fairy tale for the first time in years too.’

‘It feels like it’s come to life over the past few weeks. Not literally.’ He looks around like he’s expecting Mrs Potts to roll up with a cup of tea at any given moment.

‘Thank you for being the best Prince Charming I could’ve dreamt of meeting. The prince I’ve spent my life waiting for without realising it. The dream that everyone hopes will fall into their life one day.’

‘Thank you for making me feel like Snow White.’

I choke on a laugh at the unexpected mental image while I wait for him to explain.

‘It’s like you’ve woken me up from years of slumber with true love’s kiss. The castle was like a poisoned apple…’

I narrow my eyes at him. ‘The fairy-tale analogies are getting too much now. Next you’ll be telling me there are seven small chaps mining in the grounds somewhere.’

‘You never know.’

He cuts off my laugh with a kiss that’s straight out of a fairy tale. His hands close around my waist and he lifts me up while twirling us around and gently lowering me until my lips reach his, and we don’t break the kiss until my feet touch solid ground again. He spins me around so my skirt flies out in a perfect circle and then pulls me close. His hand curls into my hair, holding me up as he dips me low, using his leg to support my body in the swiftest of moves, and he presses his lips to mine from above, clutching me so strongly that I’ve never felt more secure, or more loved.

When we pull back, he asks the singer to do ‘Once Upon a Dream’ again. His arm slides around my waist and pulls me to him as mine slips around his shoulders and my fingers thread into the hair at the nape of his neck, and we’re just swaying with each other, enjoying the closeness, humming along to a song that’s summed up our relationship since that first night, and I’m still not entirely certain this isn’t a dream.

He’s got my whole heart and has had since the moment he walked into the study, apologised to a lamp, and made me feel like a princess. I never thought we’d be able to save the castle and rescue The Cinderella Shop, but wonderful things can happen if you believe in love, fairy tales, and just a little bit of magic.

MORE FROM JAIMIE ADMANS

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Chapter One

‘“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”’ I quote Anne of Green Gables to Mrs Potts as I throw open the bookshop curtains, ready for another day on Ever After Street.

She looks up at me uninterestedly from the floor, waits for me to straighten out her bed in the window, and then jumps into the display and settles down with her back to me. Sometimes it feels like I’ll never win over my grumpy old lady of a cat.

It’s not personal, I tell myself. Mrs Potts doesn’t like anything except Dreamies and leaving mouse intestines by the front door.

As I open up the shop, Mickey, who runs The Mermaid’s Treasure Trove, is walking past and she pokes her head round the door. ‘You okay, Marnie?’

‘Fine, thanks.’ I pretend to be rearranging the other window display and concentrate intently on it so I don’t have to make eye contact. I know she means well, the other shopkeepers who work on this street always do when they pop in to check on me, but every time they do, it’s a sharp reminder of how alone I am now.

‘Well, you know where we all are if you need anything. Have a good day.’

I give her a wave as she disappears down the street towards her own shop, but it’s too late for her to see it. It’s not that I don’t appreciate them checking on me, but I just keep hoping they’ll stop coming, and maybe things will start to feel normal again.

Things haven’t been normal in A Tale As Old As Time for a while now, not since Mum died, taking with her my enthusiasm for running the bookshop we owned together.

In the window, there’s a vase holding bare tree branches hung with laminated miniature book covers, a liberal scattering of fabric autumn leaves around my book picks for this week, and brown and yellow leaf bunting that’s draped from one side of the display to the other. I adjust that and rearrange my favourite book that has a permanent spot in one of the two bookshop windows – Once Upon Another Time by U.N.Known – an anonymous author who happens to have written the best book ever. It’s my go-to recommendation for anyone looking for a book. It appeals to all ages, from disinterested teenagers to cynical adults who need to see the good in the world again. It’s the ultimate comfort book. Escapism that reminds you of what’s important in life and inspires you to follow your dreams. I stroke my fingers over the embossed cover and tilt it on the stand so the shiny lettering catches the morning sunlight and draws in passersby. Hopefully, anyway.

A Tale As Old As Time is a little bookshop on Ever After Street, a fairy-tale-themed shopping street in the foothills of a castle in the Wye Valley. I stock mainly fairy tales and their retellings and other books that have a hint of magic, myth, legend, or enchantment about them. And romance, because falling in love is like experiencing a fairy tale in real life. So I’m told, anyway. My experience of love so far is the exact opposite of a happy ending.

It’s not nine o’clock yet so I run upstairs to make a cup of tea. The elderly gent who used to rent this shop before we took it on lived here, but my mum left her bungalow to me when she died, so I live in a little row of cottages on the other side of the forest, and the upstairs here is just storage with a dingy kitchen and a kitty litter tray for Mrs Potts, who only deigns herself to go outside when the bloodthirsty need to murder a mouse arises. Most of the time – perfectly normal contented cat. Couple of nights a month – bloodthirsty harbinger of death to every rodent within the Herefordshire land borders.

I pop a lemon shortbread biscuit into my mouth for good measure and go back downstairs and head to the counter with my cuppa. The counter is probably the best thing in the shop. It’s hexagonal and made from dark wood, with shelves for displaying books on each of its sides. The sixth side at the back is a door that lets me into the middle of it, where the till and computer is, and there’s loads of under-counter shelving to stash my current read and any errant cups of tea.

I tidy the displays of bookmarks, postcards and notebooks, a few of the other bookish gifts on sale here, and wait for the first customers to come in.

And wait…

And wait…

All right, customers are few and far between at the moment, but it’ll pick up. It’s autumn now – the perfect time of year for snuggling under blankets with a good book and a hot chocolate, preferably in front of a crackling fire.

And it’s Monday. It’s always quieter early in the week. It’ll be better at the weekend. And there’s the after-school club this afternoon. Maybe one of them will buy a book for a change, and not just find a book they like and watch as one of their parents gets their phone out and orders it from Amazon.

It’s times like this that I miss Mum more than anything. She was my co-owner and running this shop was our dream, together. Once upon a time, the place was filled with customers and full of the constant chatter of book recommendations and the ding of the till as people couldn’t queue up fast enough. We had a shop assistant back then, we were so busy that it was more than two people could handle, and it was nice that there was always someone to talk to, although given what happened with Shannon, my ex-shop assistant and Rick, my ex-boyfriend, maybe there’s something to be said for working alone.

Thankfully, it’s picked up a bit by the afternoon. There are a few people browsing, and a mum reading a Heidi Swain book while her toddler runs riot in the kids’ section play area, scribbling with crayons on the table itself as opposed to on the blank paper set nicely in front of him. I want to say something because that’ll take me a lot of scrubbing later to clean up, but I’m not very good at saying things to people, and I’m hoping the mum will actually buy that Heidi Swain, given how much she’s creasing the spine.

‘Anything new by U.N.Known yet?’ one of my regular customers asks as she comes up to the counter with a pile of fantasy books.

‘Nothing, disappointingly.’

She comes in every week and we have the same conversation. I talked her into buying Once Upon Another Time months ago. She loved it, and now she’s as desperate to read something else by its unknown author as I am, but unfortunately he hasn’t written anything else, and in the seven years since it was published, he seems to have disappeared from the face of the earth. No website, no social media, no other mentions anywhere online. It was initially advertised as the first book in a trilogy, but over the years, all mention of that has been removed from existence, so much so that I’m half-convinced I imagined it. Even a movie that was being made of the book has now been canned with no explanation.

‘One day,’ she says hopefully as I put her books into a brown paper bag with a print of the Beast’s enchanted rose on it. ‘What I wouldn’t give to meet that man. The things he can do with words. I’d ask him to marry me on the spot.’

No one knows for sure that U.N.Known is a man, but that’s the general consensus. It’s hard to believe that someone who can write a story like that can suddenly stop and never write anything again, and I – along with a lot of other fans – live in continual hope that he will. There’s a forum on the internet dedicated to Once Upon Another Time and its mysterious author, with people determined to find out something about the unknown man.

I wave goodbye to my regular customer and turn back to serve the next one.

‘Think we’d better take this.’ The mum has put the Heidi Swain back on the shelf, put her toddler in reins, and reluctantly come to buy the book he’s scribbled all over while I wasn’t looking. ‘A sneaky idea to put crayons in the children’s section, bet you get a lot of sales this way.’

I’m not sure if she’s joking or not, but I do an awkward laugh like it’s the funniest thing I’ve heard all day, which to be fair, as she’s only the second person who’s spoken to me today, it actually is the funniest thing I’ve heard all day. Most people scurry out without purchasing anything and don’t want to make conversation with the person they haven’t purchased anything from. I want to tell her that the only reason she has to buy it has nothing to do with my placement of crayons and everything to do with her not bothering to watch what her precious moppet was up to, but I’m not brave enough to say it. I don’t have enough customers to risk offending the ones I do have.

At least she had the decency to buy it because most people who damage books just slip them back on the shelves and hope I won’t notice.

I put it in the bag and the toddler scrunches his hands for it, so I hand it over, and his mum gives me a glare when he immediately tries to eat it.

‘Thanks for your purchase,’ I call after them. ‘Have an enchanted day!’ Our go-to farewell sounded quirky at first, but with customers like that, I fear it’s taken on a patronising tone.

There’s a display of pumpkins in a stack by the door, and the toddler smacks it as his mum drags him outside, sending it clattering to the ground and mini plastic pumpkins rolling across the shop. Charming.

I apologise to Mrs Potts, who has woken up with a start, and go over to set the display right.

I’m still gathering up pumpkins when a group of three women come out of The Beast’s Enchanted Rose Garden, the flower shop next door, and come straight in through my door, one of them carrying a miniature rose bush in a pot under her arm. Each pristine white flower has a delicate lemon centre and the shop is instantly filled with a subtle floral scent.

‘That place is so weird,’ she says as I scramble out of the way with my armful of pumpkins. ‘The guy who owns it isn’t really a beast, is he?’

As a bookseller, you’d think the questions I get asked the most are in some way related to books, but in reality, the one and only thing most people want to know about is my Scary Neighbour. ‘I don’t know, I haven’t seen him.’

‘Aren’t you two, you know…’ She lowers her voice and waggles her eyebrows. ‘…together?’

‘Just a coincidence, I promise.’ I give her my brightest smile. It’s a misconception that I have to correct several times a week. The Beast’s Enchanted Rose Garden being right next door to the Tale As Old As Time bookshop really is just a coincidence. When I was a little girl, I told my mum that I wanted a bookshop named A Tale As Old As Time one day, after watching Beauty and the Beast for the thousandth time in my young life. The Beast’s Enchanted Rose Garden was already here when we arrived on Ever After Street, but that just made it even more of a perfect fit for this fairy-tale-themed street.

The only thing I know about my neighbour is that he exists. The Beast’s Enchanted Rose Garden is run by a man who is hardly ever seen, and on the rare occasions that he is seen, he’s always wearing some kind of disguise that keeps him hidden. He’s also the gardener up at the castle in the hills at the end of Ever After Street, the one who kept it neat and tidy while it was abandoned, before Witt and Sadie from The Cinderella Shop across the street moved back in earlier this year.

Maybe I should be grateful. Given the kinds of problems that people can have with their neighbours, I never hear a peep out of mine. I may as well be living next door to a ghost. People say he lives in the flat above his shop, but the only time I know he’s there at all is if I’m upstairs and he happens to be upstairs at the same time – the walls are thin enough to give away the sound of movement on the other side: footsteps or the creak of opening and closing doors.

When we first opened our shop a few years ago, I went next door to say hello and although I could see him moving around in the back of his shop, he didn’t respond or acknowledge me in any way, and he’s never tried to introduce himself since, so it’s probably safe to assume he’s not one for neighbourly goodwill. He’s obviously some kind of rose specialist though, because everything in his shop revolves around them. He’s got bouquets of cut roses in a rainbow of colours; growing roses in decorative pots, from huge established bushes to tiny windowsill plants; bare-rooted stems for people to take home and plant themselves, and an array of seasonal wreaths and garlands that all feature roses in some way. His window displays make you stop and stare at them, open-mouthed, as you wonder how anyone can do so much with a simple flower. His shop is beautiful, but he is terrifying. In fact, he seems determined to drive customers away. Every time I’ve looked in, there’s no one manning the till, just a cash box where he expects people to put the correct money for anything they want to buy, and anyone who has made the mistake of seeking him out for flower-related advice has found themselves growled at or shouted at, and apparently chased away with a broom once. Which seems like an odd way to run a business to me, and surely the broom is overkill.

There are security cameras everywhere in there, so I can only assume he monitors everything via video and relies on his scary reputation to deter customers from attempting anything dodgy.

The postman is next to arrive at the bookshop, depositing a pile of letters on my counter with a cheery smile as I ask the women about the last books they read. I can’t resist chatting about books at any given opportunity, and I’m always happy to hear book recommendations despite the fact my to-read pile is so big that it’s liable to topple over and crush me one day.

I leaf through the letters distractedly, dreading the thought of more bills or problems to deal with. There’s an official-looking letter with my landlord’s return address on the back and a stone settles in the pit of my stomach. My lease renewal is coming up… Maybe it will be something nice about that, like saying my rent has gone down perhaps? Unlikely, but a girl can dream.

The three women are chattering between themselves so I open the letter and scan it quickly, not expecting anything too bad, but my eyes pick out words like ‘complaint’, ‘prosecuted’, and ‘evict’. What?

Panic rises, but I don’t have time to read it properly as a man comes up to the counter with a stack of romance books and tells me he’s buying them to cheer his wife up. It warms my cold heart to think there are still some good men out there, but all I can think about is the letter I’ve just shoved onto the shelf beneath the counter with such force that it’s still billowing around, like one of those fortune-telling fish you get in Christmas crackers, warning me it’s something far from good.

It takes forever for the women to leave, without buying anything, of course. My stomach is rolling and my hands are shaking as I get the letter out and try to make sense of it.

Dear Miss Platt,

I’m writing to inform you that I’ve received a complaint about the state of the garden area at the back of my property. I’ve received documentation suggesting a vast amount of neglect on your behalf. The garden behind the bookshop is as much a part of the property as the bookshop itself, and you signed a lease agreeing to look after the property.

You have failed to do this. The garden has been left to dereliction, and as such, it is now devaluing my building. This is unacceptable behaviour from any tenant. I have been more than lenient, given your personal circumstances, but this cannot be ignored for a moment longer.

A patch of Japanese knotweed has been brought to my attention. While it is not illegal to have it on the property, it is illegal not to declare it, and you, Miss Platt, have not declared it. As it is close to the property boundary, we are at risk of it spreading onto public land, for which we could both be prosecuted.

I take the letter and go to look out the window. I don’t even know what Japanese knotweed is, never mind that I was supposed to declare it. And ‘illegal’ sounds all sorts of terrifying. I picture myself in court, a scary judge bearing down on me as I wibble about not being able to declare something I can’t even recognise. The garden is a mass of greenery. There could be anything lurking out there.

Therefore, if work is not undertaken to rectify this immediately, you will be liable for the charges to put things back as they were when you signed the tenancy agreement, and I will not be renewing your lease for another term.

I work in accordance with the local council and the complaint has prompted them to look again at the popularity of A Tale As Old As Time, and quite frankly, the council and I agree that your bookshop is simply not attracting the attention that it once did, and therefore, if things do not improve within six weeks, I will be evicting you when your lease expires. I will be in the area at that time and I will be coming to inspect the property, and I politely suggest you have a very good case to put forward as to why Ever After Street needs a bookshop at all. The novelty of a Beauty and the Beast-themed bookshop has clearly worn off and the council are keen to fill the street with shops that attract customers, bring in revenue, and get people talking about the area. Your shop, Miss Platt, is doing none of those things.

Regards,

Mr Rowbotham

The garden? The garden has caused all this? Pure dread is flooding my veins and I can’t get enough air into my lungs. I lean a hip against the counter to steady myself because my legs are shaking. Mum loved gardening. The garden was always her department. She kept it looking lovely and spent many sunny afternoons sitting out there when she needed to take the weight off her feet. Since she died, I haven’t been able to face the garden at all. I’ve tried not to think about it, tried to ignore how overgrown it was getting in the hopes that… I don’t know. Maybe fairies would come along and sort it out for me?

I can’t cry, there are customers in. Someone’s telling me about a book she bought for her son last week and how much he enjoyed it. I can see her lips moving but I can’t hear her words coming out.

What am I going to do? A Tale As Old As Time has been my sanctuary for the past eighteen months. It’s given me something to focus on. It’s the only thing that’s kept me going, and now it’s going to be taken away?

I know I’ve been avoiding the garden, but I didn’t think anyone else had noticed. I’m not much of an outdoorsy person, and the garden at the back of the bookshop is… well, all right, it’s a bit on the unkempt side, but there’s a little path because Mrs Potts and I cut through the back way to get into work every day. Who the hell has complained about it? And why? What has my garden got to do with anyone else? Who can even see it? The window to the back is in the children’s section, but I painted it with blue sky, sun, and green hills, so no one can see out. No one walks down the back lane apart from the other shopkeepers who work on this side of the street. Was it one of them? Or some miserable customer intent on sticking their nose in where it doesn’t belong? The garden doesn’t harm anyone. It’s just a tad overgrown. I glance towards the back window, where the branches of an overhanging bush are scraping along the glass outside, clamouring to get in. All right, maybe more than a tad overgrown.

And okay, trade has been quiet lately but since Mum died, so has my enthusiasm for doing anything other than losing myself in books. I read so I don’t have to think about real life. The bookshop isn’t pulling its weight with reaching new people. Earlier this year, The Cinderella Shop staged their own real-life Cinderella story that went viral and pulled in tonnes of visitors for all the shops on Ever After Street, but now a few months have passed and things are quiet again. Schools have gone back after the summer holidays, parents are spent-out on uniform and every other expense that comes with a new school year, but things always pick up as we move towards Christmas. They have to. Because I can’t lose this place.

The thought makes my nose burn and a lump forms in my throat. I glance up at the clock: 3.30 p.m. The after-school club will arrive in half an hour – I can’t let myself cry. Children notice and are quick to point out things like red blotchy faces. I’m reading Beatrix Potter tonight; I can’t be a sniffling mess when they come in.

I won’t think about it, not now, not in the middle of a working day. Professionalism and all that. I distract myself by scrubbing the crayon off the table and tidying up again. I talk a constant litany of nonsense to Mrs Potts because if I stop for even a second, my mind goes to the letter under the counter. It feels like it’s watching me as I work, biding its time until it can leap out and clamp my leg between its metaphorical teeth.

The after-school club was inspired by Meg Ryan reading to children in her bookshop in You’ve Got Mail, but tonight’s session is like torture, not because of the kids or The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck, but because of me. I mess up words and I can’t hide the distress in my voice, even on the cheeriest parts, where I overcompensate and become high-pitched and squeaky. A small child bursts into tears. An accompanying grandma takes her hearing aid out and replaces the battery in case it’s on the blink.

I’m a wreck by the time they leave, not a sale between them, and even though it’s only half past four, I shut the door and flip the sign over to ‘closed’. Being open for another half an hour is not the magic wand I need to save this shop. Unless it’s the difference between a billionaire stopping by and buying 13,692 books, anyway.

Mrs Potts has had some cat biscuits and is sleeping on a chair upstairs now, where she swiftly takes herself at the appearance of any significant number of small children who tend to scream ‘kitty!’ and usually want to do one of two things – smoosh her to their little chests or pull her tail, and in her grouchy old age, Mrs Potts no longer has the patience for smooshing or tail pulling.

I get the letter out again with shaking hands. Maybe it will make more sense with a re-read, like really clever paragraphs of really clever books, except clever paragraphs excite me, there’s a joy in learning new words or seeing what someone has done with text, but there is nothing good about this letter.

This letter is the end of the only good thing in my life.

We hope you enjoyed this exclusive extract. An Enchanted Moment on Ever After Street is available to buy now by clicking on the image below:

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thank you, Mum. Always my first and most important reader! I’m eternally grateful for your constant patience, support, encouragement, and belief in me. Thank you for always being there for me – I don't know what I'd do without you. Love you lots!

Thank you Bill, Toby, Cathie, and Bev for your continued love, enthusiasm, and support. Thank you to Jayne Lloyd and Charlotte McFall for being such wonderful friends.

Thank you to my best friend, Marie Landry, for being a constant light in the darkness and brightening up every day. I love you to bits. Thank you for being the best best friend I could ever have hoped to find!

A big shoutout to some Facebook groups who support me tirelessly and are an absolute pleasure to be part of. If you’re looking for book-loving groups filled with lovely readers who will be good for your soul (but terrible for your to-read list!) then I highly recommend joining The Friendly Book Community, Heidi Swain and Friends, Chick Lit and Prosecco, The Socially Distanced Book Club, and Bookswap Central. Thank you so much to all members and admins of these wonderful groups who put in so much effort to make little communities that are a joy to belong to!

Thank you to all the team at Boldwood for welcoming me with open arms! Thank you to my amazing editor, Emily Ruston, along with the rest of the team and my fellow authors who have been so warm, friendly and enthusiastic! I’m looking forward to being part of such a fantastic crew!

Thank you to my wonderful agent, Amanda Preston, for all the advice and support over the last few months – it’s been incredible to have you on my side!

And finally, thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed Sadie and Witt’s story and will join me again for the next book – there are many more happily ever afters to come!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jaimie Admans  is the bestselling author of several romantic comedies. She lives in South Wales.

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ALSO BY JAIMIE ADMANS

The Gingerbread House in Mistletoe Gardens

The Ever After Street Series

A Midnight Kiss on Ever After Street

An Enchanted Moment on Ever After Street

First published in Great Britain in 2023 by Boldwood Books Ltd.

Copyright © Jaimie Admans, 2023

Cover Design by Alice Moore Design

Cover photography: Shutterstock and iStock

The moral right of Jaimie Admans to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

This book is a work of fiction and, except in the case of historical fact, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Every effort has been made to obtain the necessary permissions with reference to copyright material, both illustrative and quoted. We apologise for any omissions in this respect and will be pleased to make the appropriate acknowledgements in any future edition.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Paperback ISBN 978-1-80483-856-3

Large Print ISBN 978-1-80483-852-5

Hardback ISBN 978-1-80483-851-8

Ebook ISBN 978-1-80483-849-5

Kindle ISBN 978-1-80483-850-1

Audio CD ISBN 978-1-80483-857-0

MP3 CD ISBN 978-1-80483-854-9

Digital audio download ISBN 978-1-80483-848-8

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