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‘Of course.’ His mouth lifted in one corner. ‘So I suppose you were planning to sell the house.’
‘No, definitely not.’
Did he think she was worried about the money? Maybe the whole village saw her as an opportunistic gold-digger who’d come back purely to claim her inheritance. Rosie swallowed. ‘I could never sell Driftwood House. I haven’t had time to consider things properly. Everything’s such a muddle, but I suppose I’d have rented the house out.’
‘Why, when you’re hardly ever here?’
So he did blame her, just as Belinda did, for not being around enough. Rosie’s cheeks grew hot and her stomach churned with guilt and irritation. Why were people around here so swift to judge? All she’d wanted was an adventure – a chance to see a world outside Heaven’s Cove. A world that people like Belinda and Liam hardly knew existed.
‘Living somewhere other than Heaven’s Cove isn’t a crime,’ she told him.
‘I never said it was. But why keep the house on when you’re in Spain?’
That was a fair enough question, but Rosie hadn’t quite got her head around the answer. It didn’t make sense but, instinctively, she recoiled at the thought of losing Driftwood House. This dilapidated place, battered by sea winds and fierce winter storms, was her safety net. A place where she was always wanted and loved, however much she screwed up.
‘My mum loved Driftwood House,’ said Rosie, her voice shaky. ‘It’s full of memories and I thought it would always be here for me to come back to one day. If I wanted to. That’s all.’
When Liam stood up and took a step towards her, she thought for one alarming moment that he was going to hug her. But of course he wasn’t. People like Liam Satterley didn’t hug unglamorous women with eye bags and bed hair.
He set down the documents on the oak kitchen table.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said, stiffly.
‘Perhaps Mr Epping will change his mind if I write to him and say I’d like to take over the house and make sure the rent is covered.’
‘You could try that. Or you could just go back to Spain.’ He frowned as a gust of wind slammed more rain against the window and Billy’s whining reached a new high. ‘I’d better be going because I’m busy tonight. Will you be all right here on your own?’
‘Yeah,’ said Rosie, her voice sounding strangely flat, as though it didn’t belong to her at all. ‘Thank you for bringing the letter and the food.’
‘That’s all right. And I’m sure things will look up.’
Things will look up–such an anodyne phrase that meant exactly nothing. Rosie merely nodded as he opened the back door and disappeared into the grey, wet afternoon.
She already regretted telling golden boy Liam Satterley her business. He’d be sinking pints in The Smugglers Haunt this evening and telling everyone that Driftwood House belonged to the Eppings.
I’m sure things will look up.Had Liam really said that to a woman who’d just lost her mother and now faced the loss of her family home?
He groaned as he slid his way down the sodden track, with Billy by his side. He used to be a smooth talker, someone who said exactly the right thing at the right time, even when he didn’t mean a word of it. But there was something about Rosie Merchant – there always had been – that unsettled him.
And seeing her so upset had thrown him even more. He winced, remembering how fragile and lost she’d seemed when speaking of her memories at Driftwood House. He’d never been a touchy-feely person but he’d almost hugged her then. Though thank goodness he’d seen sense and backed off, because she was virtually a stranger.
They’d been aware of each other at school of course but unlike him she’d never been a part of the alpha crowd. Rosie had been a loner, out of step with his group of friends, and determined more than anything to get away from Heaven’s Cove. That had never been an option for him.
Liam trudged on through the relentless rain, wondering if Rosie would really go to the effort of writing to Charles Epping. Whatever she did, it wouldn’t make the slightest difference. Charles Epping owned half the village, including some of his farm, and was the kind of absentee landlord who didn’t give a damn. He’d just upped the rent on the fields at Meadowsweet Farm and was bleeding the business dry.
The same shiver of anxiety that kept Liam awake at night rippled through him, and he stopped to catch his breath. Keeping the farm afloat, for his parents as much as for himself, weighed heavily on him these days.
‘Hold on, boy. Let’s rest a minute.’
Billy stopped immediately and flopped down by his master’s feet. Liam bent and scratched behind the dog’s ears. ‘Typical! Why weren’t you so obedient in Rosie’s kitchen, rather than splattering the place with mud? She can addhopeless with dogsto her poor opinion of me now.’
Oh, well. What did it matter what strange Rosie Merchant thought of him when she’d be back in Spain for good before long? He straightened up, noticing that Heaven’s Cove far below him was starting to close down early. The rain had chased away the tourists and lights were shining in cottage windows even though it wasn’t yet five o’clock.
‘Let’s get home, Billy, and have our tea,’ he said, picking up his pace when he reached the gentler lower slopes of the cliff.
His thoughts turned again briefly to Rosie, as he pictured her cooking the potatoes and chicken he’d brought. Though, having seen the state of her, he doubted that she’d bother. Just as he hadn’t bothered with cooking or looking after himself after his life had imploded last year. She’d probably sit in the kitchen, lost in memories as the sky turned black, before dragging herself to bed.
Maybe, pondered Liam, Charles Epping was doing Rosie a favour by severing her ties with Heaven’s Cove completely. It meant she could escape back to Spain after her mother’s funeral and leave the village behind forever, if that was what she wanted.
‘Devon in the rain, or wall-to-wall sunshine in southern Spain. It’s a hard choice, Billy,’ said Liam, feeling water dribble from his collar down his neck. But Billy was gambolling ahead and no longer listening.
