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in.
    Dale had no idea what to expect, but it was an awful shock to see Lotte lying on the couch looking terribly battered and crushed. Not just the hideous black eye, the swollen lip and the stiff movements which spoke of other hidden injuries; it was as if all the joy in her had been snatched away, leaving a frightened, pale wraith in her place.
    ‘Just ten minutes, honey,’ Fern commanded.
    Fern Ramsden was the kind of woman it would be impossible to overlook. She was around five foot eight, with a voluptuous figure and very good legs. That day she wore a jade-green low-necked sweater dress with a gold chain belt and gold sandals. The colour of the dress enhanced her red hair and her golden tan. While she was probably well over forty, she could easily pass for thirty. But Dale felt irritated by the older woman looking so stunningly attractive when poor Lotte looked so bad; that seemed cruel.
    ‘Oh my God, Lotte, what a terrible thing to happen to you! I can hardly believe it,’ Dale blurted out. ‘But how are you feeling now? Did you sleep OK? Are you in pain anywhere?’
    ‘She doesn’t want questions thrown at her,’ Fern interrupted. ‘If you want to stay, just sit quietly with her.’
    Until then Dale was prepared to believe this woman was a saint because she’d rescued her friend. But now she was being treated like an irritating child, Dale’s gratitude to Fern and her husband faded, and she began to resent her.
    She needed to tell Lotte how she felt about the terrible thing that had happened to her, but she couldn’t articulate it when the woman was standing close by, timing her visit. All she could do was hold her friend and sob out that she wished she hadn’t let her go ashore alone and that she wanted to take care of her.
    ‘That sure is impossible,’ Fern chimed in, and now her drawling American accent had a touch of steel to it. ‘You gotta work, Dale honey, and Lotte needs rest and quiet if she’s to recover.’
    ‘I’ll be fine in a day or two,’ Lotte said bravely, smoothing back Dale’s hair from her face, as if she were the victim who needed comforting. ‘I’m on the mend already. Now, don’t you worry about me, and give all the girls in the salon my love and apologize for letting all the clients down.’
    ‘But tell me how he did it,’ Dale begged her. ‘I mean, where were you and how did he get hold of you?’
    ‘That’s enough now,’ Fern butted in, catching hold of Dale’s arm none too gently. ‘Lotte doesn’t want to relive the whole thing again. Time you went.’
    Maybe Fern was right, but by the agonized look in Lotte’s eyes as Dale was ushered out, she was sure her friend would rather have talked it through.
    Dale felt as if she was awake all night reliving the events of that day in Ushuaia, but she must have dropped off to sleep eventually because the ringing of her alarm clock woke her with a start at seven the next morning. She got up immediately, aware that she would need to look bright-eyed and bushy-tailed as many of the wedding party guests were booked in for manicures this morning before the service, and Marisa would be watching her closely.
    But she didn’t feel like it. Those dreadfully upsetting images of Lotte through the night had left an ache inside her. She was silently praying this girl on the beach wasn’t her friend, she’d been through too much already, yet a sixth sense told her it was.
    By quarter to eight Dale was in the spa getting her nail trolley set up for the first client, due at eight, when Scott came in dressed in his shorts and singlet for the gym.
    They had managed only the briefest of conversations when he got back from Brighton the previous day, and that was about Marisa discovering that Dale had gone out without permission.
    ‘I hope the police contact us today,’ he said, rubbing his eyes. ‘I can’t stand just waiting for news. If that girl on the beach is Lotte, where’s she been all this time? Why didn’t she ever ring