The Once in a Blue Moon Guesthouse: The perfect feelgood romance. Cressida McLaughlin

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      ‘Does Darcy have dry or wet food?’

      He looked slightly surprised. ‘Dry. But I’ve fed her already, upstairs. I didn’t realize you actually catered for dogs, I thought you just agreed to have her because I didn’t give you a choice.’

      ‘I could easily have said no to both of you.’ Robin said it with a smile, and Will narrowed his eyes as she disappeared inside.

      ‘Coffee coming right up!’

      She cooked her last breakfast for the day: scrambled eggs, Cumberland sausages, grilled tomatoes, local smoked bacon and homemade hash browns, and took a photo of it for the guesthouse Instagram feed before she gave it to Will. She left him to eat and cleaned and wiped down the kitchen, then went outside to offer him more coffee. His plate was clean and he was intent on his phone, Darcy lying a few feet away in a wide patch of sun, her head resting on her paws. Robin noticed with amusement that Eclipse was sitting beyond the French doors looking out at the dog, and that Darcy’s large brown eyes were trained on the kitten, her tail wagging gently.

      ‘More coffee would be great.’ Will put his iPhone in his pocket. ‘I’ve got a long day ahead of me.’

      ‘What are you doing down here? If you don’t mind me asking,’ Robin added hastily.

      ‘I’ve come to clear out Tabitha’s house,’ he said with a sigh, glancing up at the building next door and squinting slightly. His hair had dried in the suntrap of Honeysuckle and Robin saw she had been right; it was a toffee-brown colour with a few natural blond highlights.

      ‘You’ve got to clear out the whole place on your own?’ She took a step closer to the table.

      He shrugged and turned to look at her. ‘There’s nobody else to do it.’

      ‘What will you do with it once you’re done?’

      ‘Sell it, I suppose. I haven’t thought that far ahead.’

      Robin’s stomach clenched as she thought of Mrs Harris’s scorn at the prospect of a modern development on Goldcrest Road. Even if her assumptions of a shopping centre were way off, this was likely to be the easiest negotiation Tim had ever done.

      ‘You’ll sell it?’ She hadn’t meant to sound so stunned, but Will looked at her closely.

      ‘I’m going into this blind,’ he said. ‘I know nothing about Campion Bay, about what’s in my aunt’s house and really, I have no clue what I’m going to do. I only know it falls to me, and the longer I leave it the worse things will get. Hence the impressive leak.’

      ‘I’ll get your coffee,’ Robin said quickly. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked. It’s none of my business.’

      ‘Hey’ – he reached his hand out towards her, palm up – ‘why not make enough coffee for both of us? You can give me a crash course in Campion Bay – if you’ve got time.’

      Robin smiled, relieved that he hadn’t taken offence at her intrusiveness. ‘Give me five minutes.’

      When she sat down, Robin’s knees, clad in orange skinny jeans, briefly pressed against his before he moved them.

      ‘You don’t seem too happy that I might sell the house,’ he said, after Robin had added milk to both mugs.

      Robin kept her eyes focused on the table. ‘It’s not up to me,’ she said. ‘It surprised me, that’s all. Tabitha has owned the house as far back as I can remember, and then, after she died, it stayed empty.’ She glanced at him but his gaze was steady, no flicker of emotion at the mention of his aunt’s death. ‘I hadn’t thought about what happens next,’ she added, pushing her coffee shop discussion with Tim from her mind.

      ‘You and me both.’ Will rested his elbows on the table. ‘I’ve known about the house – that it would fall to me – ever since her will was read, but this is the first chance I’ve had to come down here and take a look at it.’

      ‘What do you do, if you don’t mind me asking?’

      He pressed his lips together, seeming to weigh something up before he answered. ‘I work – worked – at a historic house, in Kent.’

      ‘Doing what? It – you don’t own it, do you?’

      Will shook his head, giving her a rueful smile. ‘No, nothing like that. I do a bit of everything – help to manage the estate, odd jobs, pitching in as a tour guide. It’s not a large house, not English Heritage or National Trust, but it’s open to the public so there’s always work to keep on top of.’

      Robin tried to imagine him wearing a Barbour jacket and Hunter wellies, striding across a manicured lawn with a lurcher at his feet. She couldn’t do it, and not least because when she tried to picture it, the lurcher was immediately replaced with Darcy, scurrying to try and keep up with Will’s long strides, unprepared to let him out of her sight. ‘But you said worked. You’ve quit?’

      Will sighed, his chin dropping to his chest. ‘It’s obviously not something I can do freelance. I’ve known for a while that I’d need to come and sort out Tabitha’s house and it – it was suddenly the right time.’

      ‘Did you enjoy it?’

      ‘I did. No two days were the same, always a new challenge, always meeting new people. Being a guide is fun, as long as the guests are vaguely interested. You can measure your success by how many of them are still maintaining eye-contact at the end of the tour.’

      ‘Did you make things up?’ Robin took a sip of her coffee but it was too hot, and she spluttered, spilling some over her hand. She put her mug on the table and sucked at the scald.

      ‘Here,’ Will said, pressing a paper napkin into her free hand. ‘Are you OK?’

      Robin nodded, stopped sucking the injury like a small child and wiped at it with the napkin.

      ‘Make things up?’ he asked. ‘You mean on the tours?’

      ‘You know, embellish the stories, add a few more juicy details.’

      Will shook his head slowly. ‘I can’t believe you’d even ask that. Of course not. People come to find out about the history of the house, not hear some sensation-filled fabrication.’

      Robin felt a flush of shame, but she could see that he was amused by the suggestion. She took another, tentative sip of her coffee. ‘At least your love of old buildings will help you today,’ she said softly.

      Will winced, lines forming at the edges of his eyes. ‘Clearing out an empty house isn’t quite the same thing.’

      ‘So do you know how long you’ll be down here? Will you have to find another job, or can you focus on next door?’ Robin knew that she was firing too many questions at him, that it was none of her business, but she had such a strong desire to know. Now he was sitting at her table, he could give her more insight into Tabitha and into her house, which suddenly seemed the object of so many people’s attention.

      Will leaned down to stroke the top of Darcy’s head. ‘I have no idea how long it’ll take, but if it stretches into months, if I’m making slow progress, then I’ll СКАЧАТЬ