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CHAPTER ONE
Chloé Jenkins pulled her black woolen coat tightly around her as the wind whipped around the open grave. Her uncle’s body was slowly lowered into the gaping hole and she threw a flower onto the rosewood coffin. She was glad that Uncle John had planned his own funeral – she wouldn’t have known where to start.
She felt a cold tear slide down her cheek – but was more alarmed to feel something else. A warm arm came around shoulder. It could only belong to one person – the one person she didn’t want to see. She shrugged it away angrily without turning around.
“Hey, come on, it’s only me.” His voice was deeper than she remembered, and had a sexy growl to it. Damn!
“I know full well who it is.” She hissed the words back at him, still staring at the grave, which was now being slowly filled with soil.
As the small crowd began to disperse she looked up angrily. His gorgeous dark brown eyes gazed down at her and her stomach flipped at his beauty. He had just the right amount of sexy stubble on his chin, and that chiseled jaw she’d always found so alluring. Turning from the grave he put on his hat. He wore a heavy work coat over black trousers, and his pointed boots shone in the early afternoon light.
Chloé took a deep breath, trying to disguise her gasp as she stared at the guy she had left almost a year ago without saying goodbye.
To say he was gorgeous would have been a gross understatement but she didn’t want to admit it, even to herself. She steeled herself, jutting out her chin defiantly.
“Food and drink are being supplied for the guests at The Wakefield Inn, if you’re interested,” she told him.
He grinned. His perfect teeth and those sumptuous lips glistened back at her, and his eyes shone with mirth.
“I know. I helped organize it,” he said. “Your uncle said he’d spent enough time in the place it was only fitting for everyone to celebrate his life there once it was over.”
Chloé fumed. It was bad enough she had had to find out that her own uncle had passed away through the police, without discovering that Tyler Brannagh had helped organize the funeral and wake.
Her first instinct had been to boycott the whole thing, but she was Uncle John’s only remaining family and it would be churlish and unfair for her to miss his funeral because of a grudge – even if the grudge was, in her opinion, wholly justified.
“Thank you. It was good of you to help,” she said dismissively.
She was irritated to hear his chuckle as she picked her way over the hard mud and compacted snow, following the small crowd down the cleared path from the churchyard.
“Chloé – I thought it was you!” Maisie Turner grabbed Chloé’s arm as she joined the rest of the throng. “How are you? We all thought you’d dropped off the face of the earth. Where have you been? Are you back to stay? We really need to catch up, sweetie.”
Chloé smiled. Maisie had always been a good friend to her and she felt guilty for taking off like that without a word to anyone. She supposed she was lucky Maisie was still speaking to her after that. But she couldn’t have stuck around after that dumbass stood her up – it was all too humiliating.
Everyone who had attended her graduation knew that Tyler Brannagh had finally asked her out to dinner after all these years, and they were bound to all be talking about it the next day. How was she supposed to explain to her friends that the bastard hadn’t shown up? What would everyone think? She should have known that it was too good to be true.
She had liked Tyler for years and had longed for him to ask her out. He had become a close friend of her Uncle John after being promoted to foreman on her family’s ranch, and had been up at the house all the time. She had loved having his strong, male presence around the place. Tyler even made up for her uncle’s quick temper which seemed to get worse after Aunt Brenda passed away.
The couple of years before Chloé had left town had been really difficult. Uncle John snapped at her for the slightest thing, and she felt like she was treading on eggshells all the time. Luckily, Tyler had a way with her uncle, though. He would make him laugh and then Uncle would seem like a totally different person – more like the man she had grown up with.
“Are you okay sweetie?” Maisie had stopped her chattering and was now looking at Chloé face-on.
“I’m fine. Sorry, I was just thinking.” Chloé managed a smile to reassure her friend as they walked together through the snow.
They arrived at The Wakefield Inn to find the place full of people singing an old Irish song, one which Uncle John used to love.
“Let’s get a drink, then you can fill me in properly,” Maisie insisted, heading for the bar. Chloé took a minute to look around. The familiar smell of wood and beer welcomed her into the old building, which had exposed beams in the ceiling and mismatched furniture on a hardwood floor. The curtains were shabby and the place was very rundown but Chloé couldn’t stop smiling at it. It felt homey. Especially as it was decked out for Christmas with a large pine tree by the fire and sprigs of holly and mistletoe decorating the pictures and mirrors that lined the cracked walls.
The place brought back long-lost memories of her youth. She used to come here with her friends after college and drink apple cider while they all discussed the lectures they had just attended, and made fun of their tutors. She remembered the chairs in the corner where Uncle John and Aunt Brenda used to sit when they came in for their usual night-cap – sometimes she would still be there with her friends and she would walk home with her elderly relatives, catching up on the day’s news.
“Here you go. There’s a couple of seats over by the fire.” Maisie placed a large glass of white wine in her shivering hand and led the way.
“There isn’t that much to tell,” Chloé explained as they sat opposite each other. “I got that job in the city I was telling you about so I went to find myself somewhere to live over there. I’ve been working for Jarvis-Brockman for nearly a year now. They even put me on one of their accountancy courses so I got more qualified while I worked.”
“You always were good at math,” Maisie replied, a little wistfully. “I wish I’d been good at something. I’ve got a job in the super mart, though you’d hardly call it super. So much for my degree!”
