Finally, Chloe nodded decisively. “You’re right, let’s just go with the May Ladies.”

Lucy let out her breath, her mouth stretching to its widest girth. “Great,” said Jules, glad they’d settled on a name. “We’re the May Ladies. Now, can we please go to the beach?”

Chapter 1

Lucy

London

“Good lord, what is that smell?” Lucy bundled through the front door of her flat, dropped the keys in the catchall by the door, and dumped her handbag and laptop bag on the floor. She stepped out of her heels and, feeling the relief at once, scrunched her toes into the fluffy runner that led down the hallway to the main room, a combined kitchen-dining-lounge.

She followed the smell to discover her flatmate, Val, elbows-deep in a giant bowl. “Hiya,” chirruped Val.

“Hiya,” replied Lucy, far less enthusiastically. “What are you making?” She wasn’t sure she wanted to know, but whatever it was, the flat would undoubtedly smell like rancid feet for days to come.

“Cheese.”

Well that explained it—somewhat. Weren’t there a thousand different kinds of cheese?

“Right, well, I’ve had quite the day and I’m opening some wine. Would you like a glass?” she offered.

“Always,” grinned Val.

“Hmm.” Val was always up for drinking a glass of wine, just never actually purchasing said wine. Lucy pulled a bottle of chenin blanc from the mini fridge under the counter and retrieved two glasses from the shelf above the sink. She poured two equal, but generous glasses and took hers to the sofa, while Val bustled about the kitchen.

The smell seemed less intense now than when Lucy first got home. She sighed involuntarily as she sank into the seat and propped her feet up on the pouffe. She sipped her wine, starting to feel the tension release from her shoulder muscles, and surveyed the flat. Every now and then, she liked to take stock of her lovely home and after a day like today, it was a calming ritual—a bit like the wine.

The garden flat was south facing with high ceilings and lots of windows, and it was filled with natural light on days when the sun dared to show its face. The main room was spacious enough for a modular sofa, a square coffee table—thank you, Mum and Dad, for the flat-warming gift—and a long, low TV cabinet along the wall. A four-chair dining suite sat in the corner near the glass-paned door to the small conservatory.

The kitchen was compact but most of the fixtures were new, including the hob, the oven, and the backsplash of white subway tiles. Lucy had sprung for an updated kitchen and bathroom when she’d bought the flat, unwilling to put up with the Victorian plumbing, which had been patched up so many times over the years, it had been on its last leg. In Lucy’s mind, a decent bath and shower were not luxuries, contrary to how she’d been raised.

That said, the updates had cost a bit and though she was exceptionally good with money, she’d stretched herself as thin financially as she was willing to go—which was far more comfortable than most people—and had got herself a flatmate to offset the mortgage.