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“Well, you’re adding to my anxiety now,” Ellie returned, trying not to sound annoyed. How did he think she was going to react, to having this kind of uncertainty sprung on her? And what did he mean exactly, a job opportunity? He worked for the inn, for their family business.
“Sorry, sweetheart.” At least he looked genuinely repentant. “I put my foot in it, clearly. I shouldn’t have said anything to you yet.”
“Or you should have saideverything,” Ellie retorted, exasperated. “Matt, what am I supposed to do with this—”
“We’ll talk soon,” he promised. “I mean it. This evening, even. But, right now, we’ve got to put on a tea and then a supper and games tonight—”
Ellie knew he was right, even though she didn’t particularly appreciate that fact at this moment. “All right,” she agreed reluctantly. “But we aredefinitelytalking tonight.”
Inside the house, everyone was springing into action. Ben and Josh were getting games out. Jess was setting up crafts in the corner of the games room, and guests were wandering about, some heading upstairs to refresh themselves before tea and others relaxing in the sitting room. A few of the younger children were racing around excitedly, and Ellie had to dodge out of the way as she headed into the kitchen. Gwen was slicing scones and dolloping clotted cream into little crystal bowls.
“Can I help?” she asked, already reaching for a jar of Gwen’s homemade strawberry jam and decanting it into bowls.
Gwen gave her a quick, harried smile. “Sorry, I got back late. I should have sorted all this out before.”
“It’s all right, they’re only just getting back now, and no one seems in a rush for their tea. Where were you, anyway?” Ellie kept her voice casual, although, in truth, she was rather curious.
“I met up with John,” Gwen admitted, her head bent so Ellie couldn’t see the expression on her face—or whether she was blushing. “We walked up Sugarloaf Mountain.”
“Oh, lovely.” Ellie kept her tone warm and easy, even though part of her was reeling. Had that been an actualdate? Or was she reading too much into it, thanks to Sarah’s remarks the other day? This was something else she and Matthew hadn’t talked about; he’d seemed a bit out of sorts about John’s presence in the garden, carving the nativity scene, and Ellie hadn’t wanted to go into it. Maybe it was something else they needed to discuss tonight, she thought with a sigh.
She loaded up a tray with scones, clotted cream and jam, and brought it into the sitting room before checking on the children in the games room. What had once been a library nook was now a cheerful space, with shelves of board games and puzzles, a craft table, and a cupboard full of art supplies. Josh and Ben were setting up Monopoly, while Jess was laying out glue sticks for a leaf printing craft, Ava doing her best to help.
“How’s it all going?” she asked brightly, and Jess shrugged.
“Okay, I guess.”
“Just okay?” Ellie asked lightly. Jess was usually cheerful about doing the crafts. “Where’s Mairi?”
“She said she had to study today.”
Ellie recalled Sarah saying how stressed Mairi was about her exams. “I guess GCSEs can be a real killer,” she remarked.
Jess gave another shrug, her head bent. “Yeah, although I’ve been doing okay,” she pointed out, to which Ellie could only agree. Jess had been pretty much a straight A student since she’d started at school; she really hadn’t had to worry too much about her schoolwork.
“What about Sophie?” she asked. “Could she help out this week?”
“She’s busy with her music,” Jess replied.
“How busy?” she asked. Ellie knew Jess’s best friend had joined the school band earlier this year, and it had taken up a lot of her time, but she hadn’t realized quite how much it seemed to have affected her daughter.
Jess kept her head bent as she replied in a muffled voice, “Pretty busy. She’s got all her band friends now.”
Had Jess and Sophie fallen out? Ellie wondered with alarm. Sophie had been her daughter’s first friend at school; they’d proudly performed in the talent show together, and had been practically joined at the hip all through their first year here. Admittedly, she’d seen a little less of Sophie now that Jess was in year eleven, but she hadn’t remarked on it too much, because her daughter seemed happy to hang out more with Mairi. But if Mairi wasn’t available…
There was always something going on, Ellie acknowledged ruefully, and meanwhile she still didn’t know what on earth Matthew had been talking about earlier. She just hoped she found out tonight.
CHAPTER11
SARAH
It was the day of the photo shoot, and Sarah had taken the day off work to help Ellie with everything. She’d been at the inn all day Saturday and Sunday, as well, helping with the decorations, cobbling together crafts to show the photographer, wrapping empty boxes with lavish paper and ribbon to put under the Christmas tree that Matthew would take out once the shoot was over. It all felt like a lot of effort, Sarah reflected, not unkindly, and she wasn’t sure what for yet, since they still didn’t have any bookings for this much-feted Christmas week. It was starting to feel rather desperate. Not that she was going to say as much to Ellie. Like her sister-in-law, she really hoped this plan worked.
Yesterday Ellie had been practically manic in her determination to get everything done, and yet also strangely distracted. More than once, Sarah had asked her a question only to have Ellie startle and blink, asking her to repeat what she’d just said. Everyone had been too busy, bustling around, for Sarah to get to the bottom of what was going on, and in any case, she had her own worries. Mairi was more stressed than ever, and had backed out of doing the crafts with Jess, as well as taking care of Mabel. Sarah had been seeing to the horse every day, wanting to give her daughter a little breathing room, but also knowing they needed to have another talk about responsibility and consequences.
When she’d tried to broach the topic with Nathan, he’d seemed more or less unbothered by the development.
“If Mairi isn’t interested in her horse anymore, then I suppose we could sell it,” he’d remarked as he’d yanked off his tie. He’d come home from work on time for once, not that it had made much difference, since he’d spent the evening closeted in his study.
