Confetti at the Cornish Café: The perfect summer romance for 2018 . Phillipa Ashley

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СКАЧАТЬ her knuckles into the sticky mass, ‘I wish it was Mawgan Cade. I can’t believe she knows Ben Trevone. And to dare come here to muscle in when she knew they were paying a visit. I wish we could ban her from the wedding.’

      ‘Handfasting …’

      ‘Handfasting then. Whatever, I don’t want Mawgan sticking her six-inch leopard-skin boots into it.’

      ‘I can’t dictate to our guests who they can invite – unless that person is a psychopathic nutcase, of course … which Mawgan does qualify as.’

      ‘Yes.’ Bash. ‘She.’ Thump. ‘Does.’ Whack.

      Wow, she really is giving that dough a working over. It reminds me of my mum. She used to use bread making as therapy when my dad had upset her. Yet at the same time, watching Demi knock seven bells out of that dough is strangely soothing. I never stopped being amazed at how Mum turned a bag of flour, some water and a bit of yeast into light and fluffy loaves. The smell of bread baking makes my mouth water even now. We’d toast it and slather it in butter and homemade raspberry jam from her kitchen garden, or we’d eat blackberry crumble made with berries I’d pick from the hedgerows all around Kilhallon. Me, Luke, Isla … it was a happy, simpler time.

      We once studied a book at school where someone said the past is another country, or something like it. It feels so true, especially when I think about what happened in Syria with Soraya and Esme. I wonder where she is, or if she still exists at all in this realm. I shake away my thoughts, returning to the present before I turn maudlin.

      ‘Maybe you can arrange for the owl to be a huge eagle that will swoop down and carry off Mawgan again instead of the ring …’ I say, trying to lighten the mood for myself as much as Demi.

      ‘Don’t mention the bloody owl. Where am I going to get an owl from?’ she asks, pummelling the dough even harder.

      ‘An owl centre?’

      She glances up and blows a strand of hair that’s escaped her ponytail out of her eyes. ‘Ha ha! Then again, it’s an idea … hmm. There is a birds of prey centre outside St Ives. I could ask them. Why did you have to mention it? I’ve enough trouble trying to create this “totally natural and thrown-together-at-the-last-minute” wedding arch and flower decoration. The truth is that Lily only wants it to look natural and what she really wants is a fashion shoot recreation of her fantasies! Mind you …’ Her voice takes on a mischievous edge. ‘Since it was your idea to have an owl and you’re the one with the DIY skills, I think you should take charge of caring for the wildlife and the arch construction.’

      ‘Thanks a lot.’

      ‘You’re welcome.’ With a smirk, she goes back to kneading with renewed vigour and complaining about Mawgan and owls. If she glanced up from the tabletop, she’d catch me smiling at her. I love the way she tackles any task with a fierce enthusiasm that’s almost comical and yet touching too. I love the way her breasts push together in that old long-sleeved T-shirt. God, I’m shallow but I’m also a man and I’d love to interrupt her bread making now and drag her upstairs to bed.

      With that thought, I turn back to my laptop, intending to close the browser, but my eye is drawn to a recent email in my inbox. There among the messages about liability insurance, gas safety checks (yawn) for the cottages and a rogue item asking me if I’d like a much larger erection (I don’t think I could improve on the one I have now, but …) is one that leaps out at me. Its subject line is written in capitals and stops me in my tracks.

       PLEASE DON’T GET YOUR HOPES UP …

      It comes from someone I rarely hear from nowadays; a good friend who knows that any email from her risks stirring up memories I should have left behind by now. A kind, brave friend who would never send me an email with the word ‘hope’ in it unless that hope was also preceded by a ‘no’.

      So to receive an email with the subject line ‘Please Don’t Get Your Hopes Up’ makes my heart rate speed up, my mouth go dry and my hopes soar higher than a gull above the Kilhallon cliffs.

      The slap of the dough and the thuds of it being beaten into submission recede when I open the email and read the words from Carolyn, my former boss and a senior manager of the overseas aid charity for whom I used to work.

       Hi Cal,

       How are you? Still wrestling with rebuilding Kilhallon or is it all up and running now? I hope so. I thought you looked well on it when we saw you in London last autumn, if that’s not too patronising. OK. I guess, by now, the title of this email has you gnashing your teeth and scrolling down for the thing you’re hoping to hear.

       But, Cal, I’m going to preface this nugget of news with the same warning as in the subject line, because I know you too well.

       So: *PLEASE* don’t get your hopes up.

       Promise me?

      No, I mouth silently. No, I can’t promise anything where Esme is concerned.

       OK. Now that I’ve got the warning over with, even though I know it’s useless to expect you to heed it, I’ll get to the nitty gritty. This is only a glimmer and it may be nothing but as you may have heard, we’ve been able to move back closer to the town where Soraya was killed and Esme was last seen. The refugee camp is as big as ever with new influxes of people daily from other areas but also some of the people who were here when we pulled out. One of my new colleagues was treating a young guy for shrapnel injuries, and called me to give a second opinion. I thought I recognised the guy and when I spoke to him, I realised it was one of Soraya’s extended family, Jaz. You might remember him, because he had a long scar down the side of his face from a shrapnel wound.

       He was very grateful and he mentioned you and asked after you. I know you blame yourself for what happened to Soraya but apparently that’s not how her extended family see it. Jaz said they’d been grateful to you for trying to help them. To them Soraya will be considered a martyr and a heroine, which, I know, may not be any comfort to you but …

      My stomach turns over. Soraya was a friend of mine, a Syrian nurse who helped me and my colleagues in our work in a refugee camp near the front line. Then I got her involved in smuggling medical supplies and arms to local rebels. As a result of my actions, she ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time and lost her life. I ended up in the hands of insurgents and Soraya’s little girl, Esme, vanished in the chaos of the falling town. Sweat breaks out on my back now and I have to clasp my hands together under the table to stop them from shaking. At Christmas, I finally trusted Demi with the story of what happened to me but since then I’ve tried hard to move on and focus on my life at Kilhallon. I think we both know that I can never move on completely, not until I know what happened to Esme.

      I return to Carolyn’s email, feeling sick to my stomach with a mixture of guilt, hope and fear.

       I took the opportunity to ask if he had seen Esme, and Jaz said no. He also said that her grandparents hadn’t seen her since that day and that everyone in the immediate family thought she might have died. But then Jaz said that he had heard from friends of his parents who knew the family, and he also said that Esme *might* have been taken in by some of their neighbours and they were headed for Turkey and hoping to reach Greece.

       I’m sure you’ve been scouring social media and online tracing services for her. I’ve had a quick look but I’m so busy and I СКАЧАТЬ