The Little Clock House on the Green

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First published in Great Britain by HarperImpulse 2017

Copyright © Eve Devon 2017

Cover design by Holly Macdonald © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017

Cover images © Shutterstock.com

Eve Devon asserts the moral right

to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is

available from the British Library

This novel is entirely a work of fiction.

The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are

the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to

actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is

entirely coincidental.

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and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.

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ISBN: 9780008211042

Ebook Edition © March 2017

Version 2020-01-23

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

Chapter 1: Accidental Selfie Hell

Chapter 2: Logos and Gossip

Chapter 3: Within the Sound of Silence

Chapter 4: Boys and Their Toys

Chapter 5: Back – From Outer Space

Chapter 6 : Voice of the Beehive

Chapter 7: Then I Saw Her Face, Now I’m A Belieber!

Chapter 8: The Whirling Dervish in the Wild Wellies

Chapter 9: Letting the Cat Out of the Bag

Chapter 10: And the Cats Just Keep on Coming…

Chapter 11: Birdsong, Baskets and Business Plans

Chapter 12: It’s All in the Timing, Mr Wolf

Chapter 13: The Clock House Challenge

Chapter 14: Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner

Chapter 15: Let the Right One In

Chapter 16: A Lot Like Losing a Locket and Finding a Pebble

Chapter 17: Support Groups

Chapter 18: Breaking Bread

Chapter 19: A ‘Fete’ Accompli

Chapter 20: Let Them Eat Cake

Chapter 21: Sun Tzu and the Offside Rule

Chapter 22: Juliet and Oscar Standing by a Tree, A-R-G-U-I-N-G

Chapter 23: Is That a Presentation in Your Pocket?

Chapter 24: All the World’s a Stage and Now I Get Stage-Fright?

Chapter 25: Queensberry Rules

Chapter 26: Parallel Universes

Chapter 27: Conversation Starters For One

Chapter 28: Past Tense, Present Tense, Totes Tense

Chapter 29: The Girl Next Door

Chapter 30: Life Isn’t Like in the Movies

Chapter 31: By The Light of the Silvery Moon

Chapter 32: Nocturnal Habits

Chapter 33: Money, Money, Money – It’s So Funny…

Chapter 34: You’ve Got To Be In It To Win It

Chapter 35: The Curious Incident of the Plan in the Night-time

Chapter 36: Thanks For Nothing, Mr Tumnus

Chapter 37: Going Once, Going Twice… Sold

Chapter 38: How to Lose a Guy in Zero Dates

Chapter 39: Out of the Barbecue, Into the Fire

Chapter 40: Gonna Swing From the Chandelier

Chapter 41: Red Sky at Night

Chapter 42: Sign of the Times

Chapter 43: All For One and One For All

Chapter 44: The Writing on The Clock House Wall

Chapter 45: On That Fete-ful Day

Chapter 46: Fete-fully Yours

Chapter 47: Clocking Off

Acknowledgements

Dear Reader

Keep Reading …

About the Author

About HarperImpulse

About the Publisher

For anyone who ever brought a dream back up to the surface,

dusted it off and made it come true

‘Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul,

And sings the tune without the words,

And never stops at all.’

Emily Dickinson

Chapter 1
Accidental Selfie Hell
Kate

Jiminy Cricket! It was hotter than Hades in the shade. Kate didn’t think Tobago was ever supposed to get this hot. Arching her neck, she held the water bottle she’d been eking out for the last quarter of a mile to her skin and rolled it back and forth in the hope of teasing out the last condensation-filled cooling properties.

Honestly, how couples even – you know – coupled in this heat she had no idea. Not that she was here for coupling, which was probably why she was attracting attention and almost certainly what was making her job reviewing the luxury resort’s facilities so difficult.

Was there anywhere on earth more guaranteed to make you stick out like a sore thumb than at a couples-only resort when you weren’t part of a couple?

If she’d still been seeing Marco, she could have invited him along. But she wasn’t. And besides, Marco would have hated it. He was more Rough Guide than Forbes list. Weirdly, all the time she was with him she would have sworn she was the same, enjoying reporting on some of the more out-of-the-way and definitely cheaper destinations for the holidaying masses. But now, despite the fact that she was a singleton in couple-land, she couldn’t help remembering how she’d used to subscribe to the notion that a little luxury in everyday life was no bad thing.

‘Are we nearly there, yet?’ her body whined at her brain as she walked back from the local markets. She’d had it in mind to write an article for a travel blog she freelanced for, but as the sun had beat down all she’d been able to think about was that thing about frogs being slowly boiled alive.

When the road became familiar landscaped gardens and she realised main reception and more bottles of water, together with blissful air-conditioning wasn’t far away, she celebrated by opening the bottle she was carrying, peeling the neckline of her t-shirt away from her hot skin and chucking a generous amount of the liquid down inside her top.

The water splashed down her front and had a cooling effect for about a nano-second. With her free hand she slipped her phone from her shorts pocket. At 2pm there was a cocktail-making lesson with her name on it. Squinting against the glare from the sun dancing merrily across the screen, Kate held the phone aloft, twisting and turning, trying to find the right angle to read the display, pouting with impatience when she couldn’t and splashing more water in the direction of her now transparent t-shirt.

‘Oh my goodness, Richard, look – I think that’s that Kardashian selfie-woman.’

At the not-so-sotto-voce comment, Kate looked up, eager to catch a glimpse of her. Instead she found a couple in their sixties walking towards her, the man with a friendly grin on his face, the woman with the kind of disapproving frown that suggested she was the Kardashian in this little scenario.

Kate followed the woman’s pointed stare at her chest. Oops! She lowered her phone back to her side at the realisation that she was doing a good impression of a selfie-obsessed wet t-shirt entry in a club 18–30 holiday instead of a guest at a seven-star complex. Timing never had been – probably never would be – her strong suit.

Still. Kate felt herself bristle.

Did the woman really have to look at her like she’d been put on this path to corrupt all men?

She offered up a smile, yet more heat blooming across her décolletage, creeping blotchily up her neck and landing prominently on her cheeks when the woman didn’t appear interested in accepting it. Fabulous, Kate thought, feeling foolish under the disapproving regard.

#SneeringWoman’s inability to give her the benefit of the doubt had Kate wanting to lean towards the man, drench the both of them with the rest of the water, and go all Pretty Woman on them with a, ‘Fifty bucks, Grandpa – for seventy-five, the wife can watch.’

But by the power of Greyskull, she managed to rein herself in.

Just.

Because while she might have an impulsive streak running a mile wide through her, adding grist to the mill was almost certainly going to land her in even more hot water, and right now she was hot enough, thank you very much.

Lifting the heavy swathe of mahogany hair off her shoulders, Kate twisted it up into a knot on top of her head, slightly worried someone from staff was going to pop out from behind a palm tree and accuse her of trying to make a mini-porn phone video. In public. On their premises.

She stepped off the path in order to let the couple pass and when the woman protectively manoeuvred herself between them, Kate glanced down to double-check that her clothes hadn’t somehow magically melted away. Nope. Her cleavage might be rocking the Flashdance drenched look, but she was still wearing ninety per cent more than anyone on the beach… and had she mentioned how hot it was?

As if those last words had formed on her lips instead of inside her head, the couple glanced back and Kate couldn’t help herself – she lowered her oversize shades, gave an exaggerated wink, and, yes, finished off with a bit of a shoulder-chest shimmie. The look she received from both of them as they left her – presumably on the highway to hell – was priceless and went a little way to restoring her sense of humour.

She headed along the curving trail through the tropical gardens. Even the geckos were trying to avoid the direct heat of the sun, their little splayed feet barely seeming to touch the concrete as they scurried off the path, through the bougainvilleas, and straight for the shade of the palm trees.

Kate squinted down at her phone. The time said that she was due at the largest of the resort’s five poolside bars in thirty minutes, which left her plenty of time to check for messages at reception, and then nip back to her room for a quick shower and a change into her bikini.

The thought of alcohol in this heat had her fingers tightening around the now empty water bottle. She’d ask to make mocktails instead.

It occurred to her she couldn’t remember the last time she’d held a mug of tea in her hands or felt the comforting sting of a strong, sweet brew against her tongue and palate.

A strange little pang hit beneath her breastbone, surprising her. Who in their right mind would swap sherbet coloured drinks, in happy bulbous shaped glasses, complete with cute little umbrellas rammed in at jaunty angles, for mugs of builder’s tea?

At the main building she walked into reception, the piercing bright sunshine of the day immediately giving way to the darker, cooler tones of the interior.

The blast of air-conditioning had her shivering in delight; the man-made chill wrapping itself around her and freezing that unsettling pang for home in its tracks.

Shoving her sunglasses high into her hair, Kate made her way across the huge expanse of marble flooring to reception and smiled. ‘Hi, any messages for 103?’

The receptionist glanced briefly at the transparency of Kate’s top before adopting a neutral expression and turned to check a wall of numbered pigeon-holes. Kate wished she had the same kind of game-face that the staff at the resort had, but unfortunately emotion tended to use her face like it was under spotlights and centre stage in a one-woman show. With a mortified look down at her top, she pulled the material so that it wasn’t plastered to her curves and rested her forearms against the polished surface of the desk. Her fingers tapped out a silent tune. Her left foot came out of her flip-flop to rub against her calf. She chewed the inside of her cheek.

She was fidgety.

Restless.

Which was disconcerting because since when did the prospect of checking out a hotel’s facilities make her fidgety? Granted, she didn’t usually get offered the honeymoon destinations, but after four years’ reviewing all kinds of venues, she was up to the challenge. Plenty of people would love to have her job. If she hadn’t found it quite so fulfilling lately, well, she was almost certain she could avoid dwelling on that this evening, with the aid of a Planter’s Punch and a good book.

Popping her foot back into its flip-flop she forced her hands to still on the countertop. Beside her was a stack of glossy white leaflets advertising the hotel spa services. She had a handful of them already tucked in a folder back in her room. She even knew which treatments she was scheduled to have the next day. But concentrating on reading the leaflet would stop her fidgeting. Maybe halt the whisper of anxiety accompanying the restlessness – the loneliness. Definitely stop that pang for home from darting unexpectedly through her again.

‘Here you go, Ms Somersby,’ the receptionist said with a broad grin as he held out the hotel’s blush-pink letterhead paper containing a reminder that the fire-alarms would be tested at 11am the following day, together with a postcard.

A postcard? Wasn’t the sending of postcards supposed to be the other way around?

Kate smiled her thanks and looked down at the picture of quintessential rolling English countryside. With shaking hands she turned the card over.

Kate’s sunglasses slipped back down her head as she stared at her cousin’s handwriting.

Old Man Isaac was selling…?

A horrible tilting sensation had her reaching out to grab a hold of the edge of the reception desk.

Wow.

Okay.

And Juliet thought she needed to know because…?

Before memories could swirl into focus and the charming old brick building could fully form in her mind, Kate shoved the postcard into the darkest, deepest recess of her bag and headed off in the direction of her room, one clear thought making its way to the top of the jumble in her head: she was absolutely, positively, going to ask the bartender how to make the most alcoholic cocktail on the bar’s menu. And then she was going to drink it. Stat.

Chapter 2
Logos and Gossip
Kate

In the cramped window seat of the plane, Kate was oblivious to the fact that if she looked out of the window, past the thin layer of cloud, she’d be able to make out the Atlantic Ocean below. Instead, she was completely focused on her laptop screen. Using the tracker-pad, she dropped the image of the little friendly looking bee over the letter ‘e’ in the word ‘Beauty’.

Hmmm.

It didn’t look quite right.

Maybe she should change the word ‘at’ for the ‘at’ sign?

Making the change, she tipped her head to the side and re-read: Beauty @ The Clock House.

That looked much better. Simple and contemporary. Although… maybe she should work on a tagline to explain the bees?

‘Clever,’ declared the passenger in the seat beside her. ‘Do you design logos for a living, then?’

Dragged from her state of intense concentration, Kate turned towards the woman sitting next to her. ‘I’m sorry?’

The woman nodded her head towards Kate’s laptop screen and turning a little red, said, ‘It’s me who should be sorry. I shouldn’t have been looking.’

Kate swung her gaze back to her laptop screen.

Caught red-handed.

Darn it!

She was supposed to be working. On coming up with the last three points of her ‘Travel Hacks’ article for The World’s Your Oyster travel blog. She certainly wasn’t supposed to be designing logos for a pipe dream she’d thought she’d successfully buried four years before.

It was all Juliet’s fault.

Six weeks after receiving the first postcard, she’d received another.

Two postcards in and Kate had an inkling these things were going to find her wherever she was. Honest to goodness, it was like being on the Dursley end of receiving owl post.

After the first one, she’d emailed Juliet and explained she wasn’t interested in hearing about the clock house, but clearly her words had been lost in translation. Admittedly they’d been shoved into the middle paragraphs about how beautiful Tobago was and all about the stunning humming-birds and the tranquillity of the rainforest areas and this gorgeous callaloo soup she’d tried because obviously she didn’t want to appear too weirded-out about The Clock House being up for sale.

But maybe she was going to have to stop sending Juliet postcards, e-cards or any other kind of card that kept her in touch with where she was and how she was, if this was the sort of payback she was going to receive.

Her cousin was the only person from Whispers Wood who Kate kept in loose contact with and the thought of not checking in with her every now and then… the thought of severing that connection with the place she used to call home, made that stupid pang that had been hitting her at the oddest of times of late, press into her breastbone again.

‘I could claim to be politely interested,’ Kate’s new travel companion stated, ‘instead of appearing downright nosy, but to be perfectly honest with you, I fall very comfortably into the nosy camp. Plus, I hate flying and I thought this book,’ she held up her paperback for Kate’s attention, ‘would hold my interest, but alas… not.’

Kate stared at the front cover of the proffered paperback. It depicted a woman in sky-scraper heels holding a whip and standing over a man lying on a bed. Kate grinned. Who didn’t love gawping at what other people were reading? ‘Too much whipping action?’ she sympathised.

‘Not enough,’ the woman said, making Kate’s smile grow wider. ‘So much for the “What to read after 50 Shades” list, but don’t mind me. If you’re not in the mood to talk… or if what you’re working on is confidential…’

‘No, it’s all right,’ Kate reassured, glad of the interruption, because what if, after she’d finished designing logos for a business she didn’t have, in premises she has absolutely no intention of owning, she’d actually moved on to designing the packaging too? ‘What you saw,’ she gently closed her laptop, ‘well, that wasn’t work. I was just–’ Getting carried away? Testing myself? ‘Doodling,’ she finished lamely.

‘I see,’ said the woman, with a look that clearly said she didn’t and as Kate hardly understood it either, she couldn’t really blame her.

For the thousandth time Kate told herself that just because Old Man Isaac was finally selling The Clock House, didn’t mean she should be the one to buy it…

Yes, she might, technically, have the funds sitting in a bank, largely untouched for four years, and, yes, she might have the idea.

But, and as buts go, this one was a doozy… the person she was supposed to implement the idea with, wasn’t here any more.

Her hand moved unconsciously to rub at her sternum and encountered the filigree-silver locket watch she never took off.

There were some wounds that time couldn’t heal, so to be even contemplating going home to Whispers Wood and buying The Clock House was madness.

Determined to shake off the melancholy, Kate turned more fully to her new-found friend and asked, ‘Have you been to La Rochelle, before, then?’

Her companion shook her head. ‘My son-in-law is French, and he and my daughter moved back two years ago now. We Skype and all that business, but I haven’t been to see them because I hate flying so much. But–’ The woman pulled out her phone. ‘I decided the arrival of one’s first granddaughter merits a change in attitude and so here I am. Prepare yourself, this is where I now bore you with photos.’

Kate stared dutifully down at the slide show on the woman’s phone, right into the eyes of a cherubic newborn swaddled in baby-pink waffle-textured blanket. ‘She’s so sweet. And tiny! Looks as if Granny’s in for a lovely visit.’

‘Doesn’t it? When my daughter first told me they were moving I was determined to be happy for them. It was a bit of a shock. We’d only lost my husband two years before.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that.’ Kate watched the grief flash in the woman’s eyes before acceptance remembered to make its appearance and, without even thinking about it, Kate reached out to squeeze her hand.

The woman stared into Kate’s eyes and after a moment squeezed back and heaved in a breath. ‘Anyway, it was hard, but I had work and my friends and I knew I’d be okay. And then, oh, I don’t know, you go about your daily routine, being okay and you think that okay is fine. Okay is good. And then, out of the blue, you get some news and suddenly you’re realising things can be better than okay. And such joy floods in,’ the woman shot Kate a look. ‘Do you know what I mean?’

‘Oh, completely,’ replied Kate, lying through her teeth, because compared with before, her life being ‘okay’ was already more. Except… maybe when she’d received that first postcard from Juliet… Mixed in with that gravity-shifting experience – before she’d tamped it down so forcefully – had been a feeling of joy. Joy at the possibility of a second chance. Joy at the possibility of more.

‘So what about you?’ the woman asked, stroking a finger over the photo on the screen before sliding the phone back into her bag. ‘Meeting someone the other end?’ The woman glanced down at her book and grinned. ‘Ooh, tell me you’re jetting over oceans to meet your lover?’

Kate grinned back. ‘Where I will naturally whip him into shape?’

‘Naturally,’ the woman laughed.

‘Sadly,’ Kate answered, ‘I’m just going to be working.’

She wasn’t sure why she’d accepted the job, really. Possibly to prove something to herself? She would really rather not have realised that every flight she took of late seemed to bring her closer to England. And this was the first trip back to La Rochelle where she wouldn’t grab a taxi and whiz through the port’s busy harbour streets to meet Marco. There would be no falling into bed with him. No late-night stroll down the Rue Saint Pierre afterwards, holding hands and chatting about their latest work assignments before stopping in at his favourite bar and, after a drink or four, going back to his tiny apartment to fall back into bed again.

She tested a breath and found that it wasn’t lodged too deeply in her throat after all. The last few months had eased the ego-crushing aftershock of her last visit, when Marco had sat her down and gently told her that he’d met someone. Someone who wanted to be with him. Wanted to live with him.

Wanted to commit to him.

She’d been stunned. He’d never once intimated he’d wanted more and hot on the heels of the shock had been an automatic need to tell him she was sure she could commit to him too – especially now that she knew that was what he was looking for.

Big mistake.

Huge.

The realisation that the gravel-laced reverence in his voice when he talked about Clara was definitely not, and indeed, had never been, present in his voice when he’d talked to her, coupled with the excruciatingly gentle manner he’d used to explain why it was never going to be her, had had her salvaging her pride and high-tailing it out of there.

She’d gone down the tried-and-tested route when she’d left on that jet plane, completely certain she wouldn’t be back again. Throwing herself into work she’d crossed so many time zones she hadn’t even bothered unpacking. Not that she usually unpacked. That was her ultimate life-hack, but Kate knew that didn’t look great, so she kept it to herself.

‘Work?’ said the woman disappointedly. ‘So the doodling…?’

‘Was for someone else.’ Another her. A different her. A lifetime ago. ‘My job involves travelling and reviewing for airlines, tourist boards, resort owners, etc. It’s a tough job…’

‘But somebody has to do it,’ her new friend replied, with a generous smile. ‘You get to travel. Experience new things. Share them with others. I like it.’

‘Exactly.’

‘You’re probably too young to settle down anyway.’

Exactly.

‘So where is home for you?’ the woman asked.

Kate’s heart missed a beat. ‘Oh, you won’t have heard of it. It’s a small village in West Sussex.’ Determinedly she reached out in front of her, opened up her laptop and, with only a moment’s hesitation, hit the delete key on the logos she’d been tinkering with.

Home was where the other her had lived. The different her. A lifetime ago.

Opening up the blog article, she took a deep breath and glad to have this lovely person sitting next to her, a person more than capable of distracting her from pipedreams, Kate put her fingers on the keyboard and asked, ‘Hey, what’s your top tip for travelling?’