My Perfect Stranger: A hilarious love story by the bestselling author of One Day in December

‘Maybe he’s a vampire.’ Nell closed the dishwasher and spun around with a startled look in her eyes. ‘God, you don’t think he’d been trying to …’

Honey shook her head. ‘There were no cuts on his wrists, if that’s what you mean. I checked. It was his actual hands, but both of them. That’s weird, isn’t it? I think he’d tried to clear up my glass jug, but then why would he have been so clumsy? And then not finished the job!’

‘Prison’s such an odd thing to call your home,’ Nell said.

Honey glanced around the warm, welcoming kitchen. Nell’s tidy, gorgeous home embraced everyone who entered through the door in a big warm hug. Just being there was balm for her tattered nerves.

‘He was angry, Nell. Proper angry.’

Nell frowned. ‘I don’t like the thought of you living alone next to him, Honey.’

‘That’s another odd thing.’ Honey reached for her coffee mug. ‘I’m not scared of him, not in that way. If anything, I felt sorry for him.’

Nell leaned back against the kitchen surface with her steaming mug cupped in her hands. ‘I’m not sure I do. He’s been nothing but rude to you from the day he moved in.’

‘Well, I won’t be nominating him for neighbour of the year, that’s for sure.’ Honey stroked the sleeping baby’s fragile fingers, struck by how vulnerable and innocent she was. She couldn’t imagine the man she now shared a house with ever being like this. She had no clue who he was, but something had happened to him. Something awful, and it had made him just about the most angry, jaded person she’d ever met.

‘Tash texted me this morning from Dubai,’ Nell said, changing the subject.

Honey glanced out at the rain through the window, her train of thought broken.

‘Lucky cow. She moans about that job, but at least she gets to see the sun every now and then.’

‘She’s found you a pianist.’

Honey looked up sharply. ‘Jeez, Nell. It was a joke. She isn’t serious?’

Nell shrugged with a half-suppressed smile. ‘I think she is. She’s going to call you when she gets home tomorrow.’

‘Nell. I’m about to lose my job and Freddy Krueger has just moved in next door to me. Do you think I need any more hassle in my life right now?’

Ava stirred, her sleep disturbed by Honey’s agitation.

‘Probably not,’ Nell conceded. ‘But then what if he looks like Michael Bublé?’

Honey grinned. ‘Then I’d let him buy me dinner.’

Nell eased the half-awake baby out of Honey’s arms and into her own, where Ava slipped straight back into contented sleep.

‘Just wait and see then, okay?’ Nell winked as she headed upstairs to lay the baby down. Honey sighed. The relentless gloom outside was a fitting reflection of her mood, and the idea of having to endure a blind date with some random stranger to satisfy Tash and Nell’s ridiculous quest wasn’t a welcome addition to her burden.

Honey walked past the chemist on the way home, and then backtracked and went inside. A few minutes later, she emerged with a carrier. When she let herself into the house she approached her neighbour’s door rather than her own.

‘Umm, hello?’ she called out without knocking, as he must have heard her come in. She could make out the strains of music, something heavy metal by the sounds of it. Maybe he hadn’t heard her after all. She rapped on the door, loud enough to be heard, but hopefully not loud enough to be annoying. She waited, and then knocked again when he didn’t answer.

‘I have something for you,’ she called out. In answer, he turned the music up full blast, loud enough to drown out any further attempt at conversation. Honey shook her head and growled with frustration. He really was a nightmare neighbour. She bent and left the carrier leaning against his door, and after a few uncertain seconds she turned away and left him to stew in his misery.

Hal sat in the hard, unforgiving armchair with his forearms clamped against the sides of his head to drown out the noise of MTV and Strawberry Girl’s knocking. Only when he was sure he couldn’t take it any longer without putting his foot through the TV did he turn it off. The sudden silence was almost as deafening as the music. Was she still out there, waiting for him? He sat stock still and listened for a while until he was sure she’d gone, then sat there some more with his head in his sore hands, for some considerable time. He wanted a drink. He needed whisky, but the empty bottle was on his bedside table after he’d tipped the last of it into his mouth last night. He ran through his options in his head. Go without. Not an option. He could call someone, but who?

His close friends would no doubt feel duty bound to let his worried family know where he was, and anyone who didn’t care very much about him would value the gossip above his friendship. Poor old Hal, living in a grotty flat with just a whisky bottle to talk to. Such a shame.

No, calling someone he knew was out of the question. Maybe he could just go out in the street and hope that some kindly passer-by took pity on him enough to take his twenty-pound note and fetch his whisky? He thumped the arm of the chair in temper. How low did he have to go with this fucking thing? It scared him that as low as he was, there were still further depths to which he could plummet. There was only one option available to him; he’d known it even as his mind had cast around for alternatives. Strawberry Girl. He scrubbed his hands over his face and pulled his dark glasses over his eyes, then heaved himself out of the chair and along the hallway which had fast become familiar territory.

Hal paused as his fingers found the catch on the door. He hadn’t stepped foot outside since he’d knocked her flowers over. Apprehension encroached on his psyche, but he shoved it aside. He wasn’t going to become that man.

He swung the door open and stepped out, then lost his footing over something and slammed hard onto the floor.

Honey heard the almighty crash as she wandered out of the steamed-up bathroom in her dressing gown with a towel wrapped around her hair, still hot from the shower. She dashed for the front door without thinking, and opened it to find her neighbour sprawled face down across the floor, surrounded by the antiseptic cream and bandages she’d left for him.

‘Go back inside and shut your fucking door right now!’ he roared at her without looking up as his hands scrabbled around on the floor for something.

‘What? No, let me help …’ Honey’s hands flew to her cheeks in panic. It went against her every instinct to leave him there, but she was under no illusion – he meant exactly what he’d said. She stepped forward, and her toes touched against something unexpected. When she looked down, she found his dark glasses about to disappear beneath her foot. She bent and picked them up, relieved to find they were still intact.

‘Here.’ She held them out to him, and at the sound of her voice he went from groping around on the floor to absolutely bone still.

‘My glasses?’

Honey nodded, then after a beat she let out the softest of gasps at the significance of him needing to ask the question. ‘Oh.’

He reached out towards her without looking up. ‘Give them to me.’

She stepped out of her doorway and placed them in his fingers. He grabbed them and shoved them onto his face, then rolled over and scooted back against the wall, his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands.

Honey moved quietly around him, collecting up the chemist supplies back into the bag and putting them on the hall table. Shit. Why couldn’t she have just left them there in the first place?

‘I brought you bandages. And antiseptic. It was for your hands,’ she murmured, knowing it was insignificant. ‘I’m sorry.’

He made a guttural sound and scruffed up his hair with his fingers.

‘I was wrong when I called you a girl guide. You’re way beyond that. You’re a regular Mother fucking Teresa.’

Honey hesitated, unsure whether to stay or go. ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘Not setting up any more obstacle courses in the bloody hallway would be a good start.’

‘Deal.’ Honey realised in that tiny moment of thaw that she didn’t even know his name. ‘I’m Honey, by the way.’

‘Well, that’s ridiculous. What’s your real name?’

‘Honey is my real name. Well, it’s Honeysuckle, actually.’

‘Fuck me. That’s even more ridiculous.’

Honey was well used to her name being cause for comment, yet still his blatant derision riled her. ‘Just another thing about me to annoy you then, rock star.’

‘“Rock star”?’

‘Yeah. That’s your name in my head. Mostly because you’re an arrogant twat who swears all the time and drinks whisky for breakfast.’