Nessie shifted uncomfortably. ‘It’s been a lot of hard work.’
‘But it’s paying off big time,’ Patrick persisted. He threw an admiring glance her way. ‘You’re amazing, Ness.’
‘It’s not just me,’ Nessie said, looking flustered.
‘It’s your name above the door,’ he said, shrugging. ‘So I reckon you can bask in the glory. I’d forgotten how smart you are. How smart you both are.’
Sam frowned. Patrick had never been one for wild flattery before – he really was pulling out all the stops. And although she’d be the first to agree that her sister was resourceful and clever, she hoped Nessie was wise enough to see through Patrick’s charm offensive. ‘We’ve had a lot of local support,’ she said in a meaningful tone. ‘From our friends in the village.’
She gazed pointedly at Nessie as she added the last few words, hoping her sister would get the hint. Patrick was starting to attract interest from a few of the regulars dotted around the pub – once they worked out who he was, his presence would be the talk of Little Monkham. Two pink spots appeared on Nessie’s cheeks: she understood exactly what Sam was getting at.
‘It’s really only meant to be pub employees behind the bar, Patrick,’ she said, sounding awkward. ‘Health and Safety, you know how it is.’
Patrick smiled. ‘No problem,’ he said, walking around to the customers’ side. ‘What drink does the landlady recommend?’
Sam bit back a sarcastic response and let Nessie pour him a pint of Thirsty Bishop. But she didn’t return upstairs; she balanced her laptop on the end of the bar and kept a watchful eye on her brother-in-law. If Nessie didn’t make it clear Patrick wasn’t welcome at the Star and Sixpence later, she would.
It was unusually quiet for a Saturday night. Rain had set in during the afternoon, along with blustering winds that whistled around the Star and Sixpence and across the village green, the tail end of a hurricane from the States that everyone had hoped would blow itself out across the Atlantic. Patrick and Nessie had headed to nearby Purdon for their meal.
‘Rather you than me,’ Sam had called with a shiver as they’d vanished into the gloomy twilight, and she’d meant more than just the weather. She couldn’t think of much she’d like to do less than sit opposite Patrick making small talk.
She’d built a roaring fire in the huge fireplace at the heart of the pub and lit as many candles as she could find to create a cosy atmosphere, although she doubted many villagers would brave the wind and the rain to join her and Tilly the barmaid. On nights like this, when the wind sighed around the old coaching inn and the beams creaked as they settled, Sam could almost feel the shadows of the people who’d lived there before. The pub was said to be haunted by the ghost of a highwayman, a story Sam played on with some of their more credulous overnight guests. It had also given her the idea for the Halloween Masked Ball; Sam was nothing if not practical and although she didn’t believe in ghosts herself, she wasn’t above exploiting the idea of them. Even so, on a night like this she could easily believe that the creaks and moans were not all caused by the old building settling down for the night . . .
There was one regular Sam could always rely on to stop by: Ruby Cabernet, her late father’s girlfriend. When she and Nessie had first heard they’d inherited a pub from their estranged alcoholic father, they hadn’t known what to expect. But they certainly hadn’t expected to find that a woman like Ruby had been part of his life. Ruby was glamorous and vivacious, the embodiment of a faded acting star who had retired to the country after a glittering career on the stage. At first Sam hadn’t known what to make of her but she’d soon come to like and admire Ruby. What she didn’t like so much – what no one in the village really liked – was the amount Ruby drank.
‘Awful night,’ Ruby said as she pushed the pub door shut and shook the raindrops from her fur-trimmed hood. ‘There’s a tempest worthy of Prospero himself blowing out there.’
She unhooked her heavy-looking cape and draped it across one of the chairs facing the fire to dry. Typical Ruby, Sam thought, eyeing the older woman’s forest green wiggle dress and kitten heels; anyone else would be in boots and a waterproof coat but Ruby maintained she had standards and never looked anything other than extraordinary. Her red hair was always perfectly set, her make-up immaculate. She was Little Monkham’s style icon and the PR girl in Sam was itching to find out more about her. One day, she told herself.
Ruby glanced around the bar with wide eyes. ‘Don’t tell me I’m the only one brave enough to battle the elements?’
Sam managed a rueful smile. ‘It looks that way. I could have George Clooney here tonight and we’d still be on our own.’
‘Then I’d better have a double G&T, if I’m your only patron,’ Ruby said, arching a delicately drawn eyebrow. ‘And perhaps one for George, too.’
Tilly set to work pouring Ruby’s drink while Sam joined her at a table by the fire. The older woman took a long sip of gin then smacked her lips together in appreciation. ‘The first one always hits the spot.’
Sam dredged up a smile, doubting very much that this was Ruby’s first drink of the day. ‘We aim to please.’
Ruby leaned back into her seat. ‘No Nessie tonight?’
Sam hesitated. Had word got around about Patrick already? But she only saw friendly interest in Ruby’s eyes; if she was on a fact-finding mission she was hiding it well. ‘She’s out for dinner with an old friend.’
‘Old friends,’ Ruby sighed. ‘The best kind. Of course, when you get to my age most of your old friends have gone to that great green room in the sky.’
‘Ruby!’ Sam exclaimed. ‘You’re not old.’
The other woman shook her head, her eyes twinkling. ‘To quote darling Harrison Ford, it’s not the years, honey, it’s the mileage.’
Sam laughed. ‘I’m sure every mile has been worth it.’
The door swung open again. This time it was Owen. He stood for a moment, rain glistening in his black curls. Ruby’s scarlet lips curved into a smile as she winked at Sam. ‘Who needs George Clooney when you’ve got Owen Rhys?’
‘Pint of Thirsty Bishop, Owen?’ Tilly called, reaching for a glass.
He nodded as he shrugged off his coat. ‘It’d be rude not to, especially since I hear it’s award-winning.’ He glanced around. ‘Quiet in here.’
‘The important people are present,’ Ruby said briskly. ‘The stalwarts.’
‘The hard core,’ Owen replied as he crossed to the bar. He fired a swift smile at Sam.
‘Although if you’re looking for Nessie, you’re going to be disappointed,’ Ruby said. ‘Sam says she’s out on the town.’
‘Oh?’ Owen said easily. ‘I’m sorry to have missed her.’
Sam didn’t think Nessie would mind – the last thing she’d want was to run into Owen before she’d given Patrick his marching orders. Maybe Sam wouldn’t mention Owen had stopped by. Unless of course Nessie hadn’t told Patrick the news . . . then Sam might use it to remind her sister where her future lay. And that Patrick wasn’t part of it.
Owen carried his pint over to where Ruby and Sam sat beside the fire. The conversation touched on Sam’s plans for Oktoberfest and the range of beers Connor planned to offer. Briefly, Sam wondered how different things might have been if Joss was still around but she didn’t let her thoughts dwell on him; thanks to Connor, they were doing very well without Joss’s help. Ruby had launched into a scandalous tale from eighties Soho when the door opened again and Nessie walked in. She stopped dead when she saw Owen.
‘Nessie,’ he said, getting to his feet with a smile. ‘I thought you were out for the evening.’
Nessie’s panic-filled gaze flew to Sam. ‘There’s a fallen tree blocking the Purdon road so we turned back.’
Ruby patted an empty chair next to her. ‘Then Purdon’s loss is our gain.’
Sam saw Nessie half-glance over her shoulder and knew Patrick must be on his way into the bar. Her brain flew into damage limitation mode. ‘Did the two of you manage to ha
mmer out the details?’
‘What?’ Nessie said, still distracted. ‘Oh . . . no, not really.’
Ruby pounced like a tiger. ‘Details? Are you and your friend planning a school reunion?’
Sam took a deep breath. ‘Not exactly. I know I said Nessie was out with an old friend. In actual fact she was out with her ex-husband.’
Patrick appeared in the doorway. ‘Not quite, Sam.’ He strode forwards, holding out a hand to Owen. ‘Hi, I’m Patrick. Nessie’s husband.’
Owen blinked at the emphasis on the final word. He took Patrick’s outstretched hand almost automatically and his eyes strayed to Nessie’s. ‘Owen Rhys. I’m—’ He paused for a heartbeat and an unspoken communication seemed to pass between them. ‘I’m her next-door neighbour.’
Chapter Three
Nessie woke up with her alarm at six o’clock and lay for a moment staring at the cracked ceiling above her bed. This time yesterday, everything had been fine. Not perfect, but moving in the right direction. Then Patrick had arrived and shaken everything up like leaves in a gale, and she wasn’t at all sure life would settle back down exactly the way it had been before.
Her thoughts flew back to last night and she covered her gritty eyes with a groan. She’d thought her heart would stop when she’d walked into the bar and found Owen sitting there. Sam had done her best to rescue the situation, but Nessie had known the moment Patrick introduced himself that the damage had been done: Owen had drained his pint and made his excuses not long after. Nessie had watched him go, her heart heavy with anxiety, and longed to follow him to explain, but she couldn’t. Not with Patrick watching. So she’d spent a restless night worrying, listening to the howling wind with Sam’s whispered goodnight warning bouncing around her brain: Tell Patrick tomorrow or I will.
With a broken sigh, Nessie pushed back the covers and pulled on her dressing gown. Patrick was asleep in the living room; she could hear his snores through the door. With a bit of luck the amount of Thirsty Bishop he’d drunk would mean he’d sleep through her breakfast preparations for the guests upstairs. But he wouldn’t sleep forever; she’d have to face him sometime and set things straight between them. She needed to speak to Owen too, and explain that it wasn’t what it looked like, that Patrick wasn’t back in her life the way he’d insinuated he was.
But before any of that, she thought as she padded along the landing to the kitchen, she needed to bake some bread.
She knocked on the door of Snowdrop Cottage just after eight-thirty. The wind and rain had died down, leaving the air smelling clean and fresh but Nessie thought she detected a smoky hint of autumn as she crossed the yard in front of the forge. It took a moment for the door to open and when it did, it wasn’t Owen peering out at her but his sister, Kathryn. Her dark curls, so like Owen’s, were uncharacteristically messy, suggesting she’d just got up.
‘Morning, Nessie,’ she said, her Welsh lilt lifting into a half-covered yawn. ‘You’re up and about early for a Sunday. Do you need to borrow something?’
Nessie shook her head. ‘I came to see Owen. Is he around?’
‘No, he’s taken Luke to football,’ Kathryn said, with a sympathetic grimace. ‘Won’t be back for about an hour.’
Nessie felt her shoulders sag. She should have known Owen would have taken his son to football – he did it every Sunday morning. But her mind had been so full of jumbled thoughts that she’d forgotten. She gnawed at her lip; she didn’t want to go back to the pub, not when there was every chance Patrick would be awake. She wanted to see Owen first, to give her the strength to tell Patrick it was over. But it didn’t seem as though luck was on her side.
‘Why don’t you come in and wait,’ Kathryn said, as though reading her mind. ‘We can have a cuppa and a gossip.’
Nessie frowned. ‘But you’ve just got up.’
‘It’s no bother,’ Kathryn replied. She pulled the door back further. ‘I’ve got some of Martha’s triple chocolate chip cookies.’
Nessie smiled. ‘You know me too well.’
It wasn’t until she was sitting in Kathryn’s cosy kitchen, sipping a cup of steaming hot tea, that it occurred to Nessie to wonder whether Owen had told his sister about last night. She didn’t think so – Kathryn was famous for her bluntness. She would have brought the subject up the moment Nessie was through the front door if she’d known.
‘How are things with you?’ she asked.
Kathryn cupped her hands around her tea and sighed. ‘Okay, I suppose. Band rehearsals are the usual mess of egos and artistic disagreements, but what can you expect with a bunch of musicians?’ She pulled her mouth into a wry smile. ‘I sometimes think I’m the only sane one among them.’
Nessie smiled too; Kathryn’s band, Sonic Folk, covered an eclectic mix of music and they didn’t always see eye to eye on which tunes suited their style. She’d seen them play a number of times and they’d never failed to impress her, but she knew from Kathryn that there was a lot of tension beneath the energetic, polished performances. ‘Oh?’
‘Bookings are up, which is great,’ Kathryn said. ‘Or it would be if they weren’t scattered all over the country. Some of us have responsibilities. We can’t just set off to Edinburgh at a moment’s notice.’
Nessie shifted uneasily. There was a faint whisper of resentment behind Kathryn’s words, something she’d never heard before. She knew Kathryn had sacrificed a lot to help her brother care for Luke after Eliza’s death. Could it be that she was starting to feel tied down by Owen and Luke? She was only in her early thirties, after all; could she perhaps be wondering when she might get to lead her own life?
‘Have you spoken to Owen about this?’ she asked.
Kathryn shrugged. ‘You know my brother. He’d tell me to go and then forget to pick Luke up from school at the end of the day.’
Nessie laughed. ‘I think he’s got more sense than that.’
‘You’re probably right,’ Kathryn admitted. ‘But he’d still struggle if I wasn’t around to help. I’m not sure they’d eat, for a start.’
Nessie thought back to when Alyssa Di Campo, the chef, had visited the Star and Sixpence back in February, to cook for their pop-up romantic restaurant. It had gone better than either Sam or Nessie had dared to hope but Nessie remembered Owen had been pretty handy in the kitchen. She doubted he and Luke would starve if Kathryn spent some time away. And if it turned out they couldn’t cope there’d be no shortage of volunteers to help out: Owen was considered a hot property by many of the village women and Nessie knew several who would leap at the chance to offer some TLC.
‘They’d be fine,’ she said to Kathryn. ‘Honestly, take a bit of time for yourself. You’ve earned it.’
Kathryn looked unconvinced. ‘I dunno . . .’
‘At least talk to him about it,’ Nessie urged. She smiled. ‘You never know, he might be as keen to fly solo as you are.’
‘But what if I decided to make it . . . a more permanent arrangement?’
Nessie stared at her. ‘You mean move out?’
Kathryn’s gaze slid away. ‘Perhaps. I don’t know.’ She sighed. ‘Maybe I just need a bit of space. Or maybe I’m just in an odd mood – autumn does that to me sometimes. The change of the season, all the trees losing their leaves, it makes me a bit restless.’
Nessie nodded. The change from summer to autumn was probably the most dramatic of the seasonal shifts – as well as the visual signs, the air seemed different too, rich and smouldering with the scent of delicately spiced wood smoke even when there was no fire for miles. Unlike Kathryn, it didn’t make Nessie feel restless. It made her want to reach for warm woollen jumpers and snuggle beside the fire with a good book and a never-ending mug of hot chocolate. ‘Talk to Owen,’ she said again gently. ‘He’ll understand.’
The other woman nodded, then pushed the plate of cookies towards Nessie. ‘We’d better eat these before Luke gets back. You know he can detect chocolate from two villages away.’
The conversation moved on
to the latest village gossip: confirmed spinster Franny Forster was rumoured to be thinking about moving in with Henry Fitzsimmons, something Nessie would never have predicted when she’d first met her. As well as running the village Post Office with an iron fist, Franny was the chairwoman of the Little Monkham Preservation Society, a role she took very seriously – any potential stain on the reputation of the village was treated as a personal insult. Sam had once observed that Franny was as upright as the church steeple and about as flexible, although she’d definitely mellowed recently and it was widely agreed that the change was down to Henry. His gentlemanly courtship had allowed Franny’s softer side to come to the fore; she’d even confided her scandalous secret past to Sam in the summer, when the Will Pargeter business had been at its worst. Even so, no one had expected her to move in with Henry. Tongues were definitely wagging.
‘Good on her, I say,’ Kathryn said. ‘It just goes to show that it’s never too late.’
There was a rumble outside as Owen’s battered old Land Rover swept into the yard. Nessie heard Luke chattering at the back door, then he tumbled inside, his freckled face rosy beneath his mop of untidy blond hair. ‘I scored three goals,’ he announced proudly. ‘It would have been four except Robbie Henderson fouled me just as I was about to shoot. Dad said he’s a filthy little—’
‘Never mind what I said,’ Owen cut in, laughing. His dark eyes came to rest on Nessie. ‘Good morning.’
All of Nessie’s mortification about the night before came rushing back. She did her best to smile but it was a weak effort. ‘Good morning. Kathryn and I were just having a gossip.’
Luke’s eyes lit up when he saw the crumb-covered plate. ‘You’ve had triple chocolate chip cookies! Did you save one for me?’
Kathryn mock-frowned. ‘Maybe.’ She eyed his mud-caked knees and grubby football kit. ‘But you’re not getting anything until you’ve had a shower.’
She chivvied him towards the kitchen door. ‘Thanks for the advice, Nessie,’ she called over one shoulder as Luke thundered up the stairs. ‘Much appreciated.’
Autumn at the Star and Sixpence Page 2