Nuala, hurriedly brushing the last splinters of china into the dustpan, mumbled something unintelligible.

‘Ah, but she doesn’t just work for me,’ the landlord declared with satisfaction. ‘She’s my girlfriend. We live together. Didn’t you know?’ He raised his dark eyebrows in mock surprise.

‘We’re love’s young dream.’

‘You’ve been ages. We were about to send in a search party.’ Will Gifford patted the space on the bench beside him. ‘What was all the crashing and shouting about in there? Is that your way of getting reacquainted with the locals?’

Kate wondered if his scruffy, bumbling Hugh Grant act was meant to be endearing. ‘I’m fine. The landlord’s a dickhead, that’s all.’

With a shout of laughter, Will said, ‘Oh good grief, you mean it was you?’

Emptying the lukewarm dregs of her champagne into an oak barrel overflowing with geraniums, Kate held out her glass for a refill from the bottle in the ice bucket.

‘Your daughter doesn’t suffer fools gladly,’ Will told Oliver, and Kate shot him a meaningful, take-note look.

‘That’s Kate for you.’ Oliver nodded with pride. ‘She’s always known her own mind.’

Nuala appeared, carrying a fresh bowl of water for Norris. As she placed it on the ground next to their table she glanced awkwardly across at Kate.

‘Look, thanks for sticking up for me in there. I heard what you said to Dexter.’ Despite feeling she needed to express gratitude, she clearly wasn’t comfortable saying it.

Kate shrugged. ‘I meant what I said. He’s a bully.’

‘He isn’t really. A lot of it’s just for show,’ Nuala insisted.

Duh?

‘Fine.’ Kate picked up her drink. ‘If that’s what you think, good luck to you. You’ll need it.’

‘Honestly,’ complained Will, ‘this is so unfair, I miss all the fun.’ His eyes bright, he looked at Nuala. ‘So what happens now? Is she banned from the pub?’

‘ Banned?’ It was Dexter, emerging with their lunches. ‘You must be bloody joking. Had the guts to stand up to me, didn’t she? I’ve always respected a girl with a bit of spirit.’ Deftly, he laid down the plates, straightened the cutlery and refilled their glasses with the remainder of the Laurent Perrier. ‘Besides,’ he went on, acknowledging Oliver with a nod, ‘what landlord in his right mind would ban the daughter of a man who spends two hundred quid on a pub lunch?’

‘Anyway,’ Nuala murmured when Dexter had whisked open their napkins with a flourish and disappeared back inside the pub, ‘I just wanted to ... um, apologise for the other night, although I didn’t say what you thought I said.’

‘Fine,’ Kate replied stiffly, aware of Will bristling with curiosity beside her. ‘Let’s just forget it, shall we? In future, you don’t make fun of my face and I won’t make fun of your fat.’

‘There you go.’ Will Gifford gave her a comforting nudge when Nuala had left them. ‘Sounds to me like you’re settling back in a treat.’

Chapter 13

‘Right,’ Oliver announced with a flourish of platinum Amex, ‘how about that guided tour now?’

Norris, nudged awake by Kate’s foot, spotted a small, sandy-haired terrier some distance away and lumbered to his feet, snuffling with interest.

‘No,’ Kate warned, but Norris ignored her. Like a new graduate from an assertiveness training course, he raced across the dusty road dragging her along in his wake. The terrier, eyeing him in return, let out a volley of high-pitched barks and rushed up to greet him like a besotted groupie.

This had to be the famous Bean, Kate realised as Jake Harvey emerged from his workshop and whistled to attract the little dog’s attention. Bean glanced back, then promptly ignored him, far more interested in discovering what a hulking great bulldog looked like close up.

And smelled like close up, Kate discovered, as the two animals investigated each other thoroughly, indulging in that dreadful bottom-sniffing thing dogs loved to do in order to embarrass their owners.

Mortified, she tugged at Norris’s lead and prayed they wouldn’t attempt anything more gymnastic.

Laughing, Jake sauntered over. ‘Bean, you’re under age. Plus, he’d squash you flat. How was lunch?’ He grinned broadly at Kate.

‘Pretty good." Actually, it had been excellent. ‘But I don’t think much of the landlord.’

‘Dexter? Oh, he’s in a league of his own. Actually, we’re fairly sure he’s the secret love child of Simon Cowell and Rosa Klebb. Saw you talking to Nuala,’ he went on innocently.

‘That girl shouldn’t let him speak to her like that. What is she, some kind of doormat?’

‘Nuala? Her motto is better the devil you know than no devil at all. Anyway, how about you?’

He nodded over at Will Gifford, currently shrugging his way back into his shabby jacket. ‘Who’s the mystery man? Boyfriend of yours?’

Oh God, was this the conclusion everyone was going to jump to? Now that she was ugly, would they automatically assume that someone like Will was the best she could hope for?

‘Please,’ Kate shuddered, ‘I’m not that desperate.’ In fact, if anyone physically resembled a battered old doormat, it was scruffy, tufty-haired Will; should you need to wipe your feet on something, he’d be perfect.

‘You’re looking a bit happier today,’ said Jake.

Was she? Really? Well, maybe she wasn’t feeling quite so suicidal. Then again, this could be due to picturing herself trampling all over Will Gifford in spike-heeled boots.

‘Either your heart’s beating very fast indeed,’ Kate observed, ‘or someone wants to speak to you.’

The pocket of Jake’s white cotton shirt was vibrating like a humming-bird.

‘I was enjoying the buzz.’ With a wink, he took out his mobile and answered it. Much to Kate’s relief, Norris and Bean had stopped investigating each other’s bottoms, evidently having decided to keep their relationship platonic. Norris was now lying on his side on the dusty ground while Bean, rather sweetly, attempted to clamber all over him.

‘Hello, you,’ Jake murmured smiling into the phone and raking tanned fingers through his blond hair. ‘I know, me too.’ He paused to listen, then laughed. ‘Now there’s an offer I can’t refuse. No, definitely free tonight.’ Another pause, then he broke into a grin. ‘You’re a bad, bad girl. OK, eight o’clock, I’d better go now. See you there.’

Kate had never been more glad of her dark glasses. Was every conversation with Jake Harvey destined to lift her spirits, then bring her crashing back to earth with a bump?

‘Sorry about that. Sophie’s headmistress,’ said Jake.

‘ Really? Oh.’ Too late, she realised he was joking.

Entertained, he said, ‘You haven’t seen Sophie’s headmistress. Anne Robinson on a broomstick.’

‘Well, I’d better be going too.’ Kate gave Norris’s lead another tug, before Jake could start telling her all about the stunning girl he’d arranged to meet tonight. Across the road she saw that Oliver had finished settling up; if he and Will made their way over now, Will would be bound to say something excruciating.

‘So who is he?’ Clearly curious, Jake nodded over at Will. ‘He makes documentaries. He’s doing one on my dad. He’ll be filming around here too,’ said Kate.

‘Filming?’ Jake let out a low whistle. ‘Anyone with something to hide had better watch out then.’

‘Does that include you?’ Kate couldn’t resist the dig. ‘Not me.’ He flashed her a wicked grin.

‘Luckily, I’m not the secretive type.’

‘Who’s he?’ said Will.

Honestly, and women were supposed to be the nosy ones. ‘Local coffin-maker. Thinks he’s it. I’m taking Norris home,’ said Kate, because Norris was casting lovelorn looks over his burly shoulder at Bean and she didn’t trust him not to drag her back across the road.

‘We won’t be long,’ said Oliver. ‘Just a quick tour of the town then we’ll be back.’

Sophie and Tiff were playing with a cardboard box on the pavement outside the Peach Tree.

‘Takes me back a bit,’ Oliver said jovially as he and Will approached the delicatessen.

‘Playing with cardboard boxes because we couldn’t afford proper toys.’ He liked to exaggerate the circumstances of his childhood, play up the poverty aspect. ‘Hello there, you two, having fun? This is Sophie, by the way, our housekeeper’s granddaughter. And Tiff is the son of Juliet, who owns the deli.’

‘Hi,’ said Will, eyeing the box with its letterbox-sized slit in the top. ‘Playing postmen?’

Sophie shot him a pitying look. ‘It’s a toll booth.’

‘It costs fifty pence to get into the shop,’ said Tiff.

‘No it doesn’t,’ an exasperated female voice called out from inside the delicatessen. ‘Tiff, let them in.’

Tiff and Sophie gazed up at Oliver.

‘Outrageous opportunism,’ Oliver tut-tutted, pulling a handful of coins from his trouser pocket and slipping them into the box. Sophie and Tiff exchanged smug glances — Oliver Taylor-Trent was always a soft touch. Then their eyes swivelled in unison to fix upon his younger, scruffier companion.

‘Don’t look at me,’ Will protested. ‘I’m like the Queen, I never carry cash.’

‘Appalling children,’ sighed Juliet, appearing in the doorway and ushering in her potential customers. ‘You shouldn’t give them any money.’

‘Nonsense,’ Oliver said briskly. ‘Couple of young entrepreneurs in the making. Reminds me of myself when I was young.’

‘More like a couple of highway robbers.’ Juliet smiled apologetically at Will. ‘What must you think of us?’