Chapter 9

Gabbie had shown yet more initiative and had hung the Do Not Disturb sign on the door handle, so the house keepers skipped their room and they slept right through until 11am when the sirens from a fire engine passing below eventually woke Steve. He got up and padded quietly into the lounge to make coffee, letting the girls sleep a little longer.

As the first cup of coffee took effect he picked up his phone to see what they’d planned for the day.

“Oh shit,” he said and ran into the bedroom.

“Hey, hey, get up, we’re supposed to be going to meet your brother today, we’ve got like 90 minutes to get to Edinburgh.”

“Shit, shit, shit,” Gabbie cried as she jumped out of bed.

“I’ll turn the shower on,” Steve said, “we can all jump in for a quick wake-up hose down.”

15 minutes later they were all washed and pulling on jeans and jumpers, “grab your make-up and stuff, you can make yourselves more beautiful in the car.”

A minute later they were waiting for the lift, “how’re you feeling today?” Steve asked Lucy as the doors opened.

“I’m still really sore, I don’t think I’ll be able to run anywhere for a while, and my tummy feels really weird. Gabbie said my first poo will be a killer, so I’m really not looking forward to going to the toilet today. How are you though, Gabbie said she had to hurt you.”

“I’ll live, I’m a bit sore, and it’ll probably hurt if I get an erection in the next few days, but no real harm done, and you did exactly the right thing Gabbie. I wouldn’t have been able to withdraw without hurting Lucy more otherwise.”

As soon as the lift reached the car park they sprinted across to the Aston.

“Can we make it to Edinburgh in time?” Gabbie asked as they bundled themselves into the car and fastened their seatbelts, “I’d hate to let Jordan down.”

“My phone is saying it’s a 70 minute drive, we’re due to meet him in 70 minutes, so I guess I’ll have to put my foot down on the M8 and pray there’s not much traffic on the way.”

After some weaving through city traffic Steve hit the M8 and glory be it was mostly clear all the way to Edinburgh, so with his foot to the carpet they were speeding towards the capital at speeds usually reserved for the Avanti Pendolino trains.

25 minutes later they reached the end of the motorway and the Aston’s uprated carbon brakes brought them to a complete stop as they hit the exit ramp and spent the next 30 minutes crawling across Edinburgh. The time they made up on the motorway was lost in busier than usual traffic due to an accident on Princes Street.

Gabbie was biting her nails worrying about being late, but Lucy saved the day when she found a shortcut on her phone and directed Steve around the worst of the traffic and they pulled into Fette’s visitor car park at two minutes to one.

As soon as Steve turned off the engine Gabbie shot out of the car and ran to her brother, who jumped up as soon as he heard his name called. Gabbie took him in her arms and hugged him tightly.

Steve and Lucy stood by the car, watching Gabbie’s obvious delight at seeing her brother. Jordan tried to look cool, but he couldn’t hide the joy at seeing his sister.

“Come see my friends,” Gabbie said, and she took Jordan’s hand and led him over, “this is Steve and Lucy, my best friends in all the world.”

“Hey, cool car man.”

“Thanks, it’s my dad’s,” Steve replied.

“Oh wow, and he lets you drive it?”

“This is the first, and probably last time if I’ve got a ticket driving to get here in time, we overslept a bit this morning.”

“Our dad just has a shitty Land Rover,” Jordan said, frowning at the injustice of it all.

“So, what are we going to do?” Gabbie asked him brightly.

“Well, I thought we could go up the Scott monument, it’s a nice clear day so we’ll be able to see for miles, then go up to the castle.”

“Traffic across town is a nightmare right now,” Gabbie said.

“That’s ok, it’s not far to walk, about 20 minutes from here to the monument, then another 10 to the castle. I’d love a ride in the car before you go back though.”

“No problem,” Steve said, “we’ll do the monument and castle, then when we get back we’ll go for a drive to get something to eat.”

“Amazing!”

It was a cold, clear day and so they walked quickly from the college to the monument in Princes Street Gardens, where Steve handed over the cash for four student admissions.

The attendant took the money and waved them through, “There’s a few people up top at the moment,” she said, “and the last lot of steps are really tight, so shout ahead to check no-one’s coming down”

“Thanks, we’ll be careful,” Gabbie said as she skipped up the first of the 287 steps needed to get to the top of the tower 200 feet above their heads.

“We close in an hour kids, not a lot of point being up there once it gets dark. The view from the top will be great today while it’s still light, you should be able to see over to the Forth Bridge.”

They set off up the narrow winding steps, on each landing they listened carefully for anyone coming down.

On the second landing was a small museum to Sir Walter Scott, as they were in the museum the party who were at the top when they arrived came down, the way ahead was now clear, so they set off to the top.

The last set of steps were super narrow and the doorway to the top viewing platform was pretty low, Steve and Jordan had to duck down to climb through.

As expected, the view was spectacular, but so was the wind. It was worth the climb to see the view across the city. Edinburgh really did look great from above, the people below looked like little ants scurrying around with their toy cars, buses and trams.

They waited as long as they could and were rewarded for braving the freezing wind when the sun started to set in the west, Gabbie and Lucy took many photos for their social media as the sun started to slide behind St Andrew’s House on Calton Hill.

There wasn’t a great deal of light inside the tower, so they descended slowly and carefully, Lucy using the torch on her phone to light the way.

“That tower in Provincetown was a bit easier to climb than this one,” Lucy called back to Steve.

“Yeah, but it didn’t have Edinburgh spread out below, so I’m calling it a draw.”

“I’ve been here over a year now and this is the first time I’ve been up the tower,” Jordan said, “I’ve got to come back, bring some friends, it was awesome up there. Thanks for coming round Gabbie and letting me be a tourist.”

“No worries bro.” Gabbie replied, she looked at her watch, “will the castle still be open, it’s after 4?”

“Yeah, but it’s too late to go in, we can walk up and have a look at the outside, it looks great lit up at night. There’s some proper touristy shops on the way, you could buy a tartan scarf or something.”

Lucy took loads of photos of St Giles Cathedral on the Royal Mile, along with the Heart of Midlothian on the pavement outside, and they spent a good while looking at the castle from the car park, and once it was full dark they took photos of it all lit up and the lights across the city below.

They visited a few of the tourist shops on the way back down the Royal Mile, Lucy and Gabbie both bought tartan scarves, Steve was tempted by a kilt until he saw just how much a proper kilt costs, so he bought a very warm looking jumper instead.

They walked back to the college and stashed their shopping in the boot. Lucy let Jordan sit up front, she slid in the back with Gabbie, then as Steve told Jordan about the car and showed him the crystal key she checked her phone for a restaurant for dinner, eventually settling on a country hotel and restaurant about 15 miles outside Edinburgh. She plugged the postcode into her maps app and found a route and sent it to the sat nav.

Steve dropped the windows and started the engine, the big V12 engine barking into life, the noise bouncing off the walls as Steve rolled the car out of the college and onto the highway. The route Lucy found included a couple of road tunnels, it was a real treat hearing the engine wail as they drove through them.

The hotel was reached via a long tree lined driveway with a carriage circle at the top, a parking attendant greeted them by the grand entrance, he gave Steve a ticket and took the car to park it around the back of the hotel.

“I’m not sure I’m happy with him taking the car,” Steve said.

“Relax,” Lucy replied, “I bet that’s one of the cheaper cars in the car park, have you seen this place, it’s got a Michelin star, it’s run by some famous chef off the telly apparently, although I can’t say I’ve ever heard of him.”

The hotel lobby was very impressive, a polished wood floor with Chinese rugs, leather club chairs around dark wood tables, lots of polished brass, a split staircase rose either side of the long reception counter.

Gabbie spotted a sign for the restaurant, so she led them out of the lobby and along a corridor lined with paintings and tapestries, it was more like an art gallery or museum than a hotel.

They were met just inside the restaurant by a maître d’, “can I help you?” he asked sniffily.

“Ahh yes,” Lucy answered, unphased by the maître d’s hostility, “I just made a booking online, table for 4 in the name of Temple.”

“Mmm yes, I have a booking in that name, do you have an ID?”

“Why would I need ID for a restaurant booking? I just made the booking, I gave you the name the booking was made in, why do I need to show ID.”

“Well, you could have overheard the person who made the booking for instance.”

“Fine, here’s my ID.”

Now officially Jerry had withdrawn Lucy’s Amex card, but he’d secretly let her keep it, strictly for emergencies, and Lucy decided this was one such emergency.