The Perfect Hero: The perfect summer read for Austen addicts!. Victoria Connelly

the Cobb now where several vans were already in position. It was too early yet for tourists to get in the way but Kay could see that the area had been roped off.

      She looked around her bedroom. Now, where had she put them? She started hunting through her wardrobe and the drawers of her bedside table. They were here somewhere, she was quite sure of it. Ah, there they were! Tucked away at the back of the second drawer, behind a notebook featuring the face of Mr Darcy, was a pair of miniature binoculars. Kay pulled them out, grabbed a drawing pad and pencil and ran downstairs, pulling on a pair of boots and heading along Marine Parade in the direction of the Cobb. She didn’t want to make a nuisance of herself and so found a quiet stretch of wall along the beach and sat down.

      ‘That’s better,’ she said to herself as she brought the binoculars into focus and settled on the little crowd of people who had joined her guests on the Cobb. There was a lot of pointing going on and everyone looked out to sea where a heap of bruised clouds was looming over the horizon. Teresa was nodding her head and Les was looking as miserable as ever. And Oli was looking handsome. He had such a great profile. Just the sort of profile a heroine would sketch as a silhouette. Kay smiled. What a great idea that would be! She could get him to sit for her one evening and make one of those fabulous Austenesque silhouettes – just like the one Marianne had made of Willoughby in the film adaptation of Sense and Sensibility.

      In the meantime, the artist in her got the better of her and she opened her pad and began sketching. That beautiful slope of his forehead, that perfect nose and strong jaw, the sensual curve of his smile and the buttery floppiness of his hair. Kay quickly sketched – her eyes focusing through the binoculars and then down on her pad, capturing the magic of the man as quickly as she could. She was just putting the finishing touches to it when she looked through the binoculars again. Oli had turned around and he was waving. Kay moved the bin oculars to the right, trying to see who he was waving to and then something odd happened: Oli pointed towards her, a big grin on his face.

      Kay gasped. He was waving at her. She bit her lip and quickly got up to leave but it was too late, of course. She’d been well and truly rumbled. She closed her eyes for a moment and allowed herself a good old cringe. What on earth would Oli think of her now? He’d think she was some ogling star-struck fan. It was awful! She’d just have to try and explain what she was doing.

      You were ogling him, a little voice inside her said as she quickly headed back home.

      ‘No I wasn’t. I was sketching him as part of my work. He is playing Captain Wentworth, after all.’

       You were ogling him! You know you were!

      Kay groaned. She had better things to do than stand around arguing with herself. There was the dishwater to load for a start.

      She was just piling in the dishes and thanking her lucky stars that she’d had the foresight to buy one when there was a knock at the door. For a moment, her heart raced. Maybe it was Oli. He’d raced back to the B & B after seeing her ogling him – watching him. It had suddenly dawned on him that she was the girl for him. How hadn’t he seen it sooner? He should have realised it when she’d been serving him breakfast. Oh, all the time they’d wasted!

      Kay opened the door. It was a man all right but it wasn’t Oli.

      ‘Hello,’ he said.

      ‘Hello,’ Kay said, her heartbeat returning to something approaching normality again.

      ‘I’m Adam. Adam Craig.’

      ‘I’m afraid we’re full at the moment. If you’re looking for a room,’ Kay said.

      ‘Oh, I’m not,’ he said. ‘I’m looking for Teresa. I believe she’s staying here.’

      ‘She’s down at the Cobb,’ Kay said. ‘They left about ten minutes ago. You can’t miss them – they’ve practically taken over the whole of that part of town.’

      Adam turned to look in the direction of the Cobb. ‘Ah, yes. I should have thought to go there first.’

      ‘You’re with the film people?’ Kay asked.

      He nodded. ‘I’m the screenwriter and producer.’

      ‘Oh,’ Kay said.

      ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘Nobody ever knows what a producer does and nobody ever cares what a writer does.’

      ‘I didn’t mean—’

      ‘It’s okay.’

      ‘Would you like to come in?’ Kay asked, not quite sure what she was going to do with a screenwriter/producer but feeling it was the polite thing to ask.

      ‘This place was empty for a while, wasn’t it?’ Adam said, stepping inside and looking around. ‘It’s good to see you’re breathing new life into it,’ he said with a smile.

      ‘I’ve just had all the bedrooms redecorated, and the dining room. The rest will have to wait, I’m afraid,’ she said, leading him into the living room.

      ‘Ah, yes. I see what you mean.’

      Kay nodded as Adam took in the nicotine-coloured wall-paper and swirly patterned carpet.

      ‘An acquired taste, perhaps,’ Kay said. ‘And one I have no intention of acquiring. Oh,’ she suddenly added, ‘I’m Kay.’

      Adam smiled and stretched out a hand to shake hers and then his eye caught the book she’d left open over the arm of a chair.

      ‘You’re reading Persuasion?’ he said.

      ‘It’s one of the reasons I’m here in Lyme now. I was reading it when Teresa arrived and told me she was filming it right here in Lyme.’ Then something occurred to Kay. ‘You must be staying somewhere else?’

      ‘In a way. I’ve got a little place a few miles away.’

      ‘Oh, you’re local?’

      ‘Born and bred,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a few acres of land in the Marshwood Vale.’

      ‘What do you use the land for?’ Kay asked.

      ‘To walk on, mostly,’ he said with a smile. ‘Although I’ve been thinking of getting a horse. What do you think?’

      Kay’s eyebrows rose. She wasn’t used to strange men asking her advice about equestrian matters.

      ‘I used to ride but I got out of the habit when I had to work for a living.’

      ‘Well, I’ve got nothing against horses,’ Kay said. ‘All the best heroes have them.’

      ‘Heroes?’

      ‘In books.’

      ‘I see,’ he said with a nod of recognition. ‘I suppose horses were the status symbols of their day.’

      ‘But where would you park a horse in Lyme?’ Kay asked.

      ‘That’s a very good question,’ Adam said. ‘Still, imagine the fun of turning up to work on a horse with your briefcase in your hand.’

      Kay laughed. She’d only known Adam for about five minutes but she already liked him.

      It was then that the front door opened and closed.

      ‘Kay?’ a voice called. It was Gemma. ‘Oh, Adam!’ she said as she came into the room and Kay couldn’t help noticing how Adam’s face suddenly lit up and – in true Emma Woodhouse style – she had them matched and married off in a blink of an eye. After all, Adam wasn’t bad-looking now that she came to think of it. He had dark brown hair that was a little bit tousled as if he’d been cycling down a windswept hill, and his eyes were an intense grey behind his glasses and his smile was very cute too.

      ‘Everything all right?’ Kay asked.

      ‘Teresa wants to know if we can borrow your copy of Persuasion. She wants to check something and nobody has a copy.