‘He’s been off travelling for some time. Australia, at the moment, been getting jobs all over, stays a while somewhere then moves on. He’s found it hard to settle since Luke …’ Angela let the words drift.

‘Yes.’

It had hit him so hard, his older brother dying like that. It had hit them all hard.

‘I know it’s a little while away yet,’ Angela explained the reason behind her call, ‘but we’ve booked a holiday cottage up in your area for a long weekend before Christmas and we wondered if you’d like to join us for lunch one day or something?’

‘Yes, that would be really lovely.’

‘It’s over near Kielder Water. We’ll be doing some hiking, that kind of thing. Well, lovely to chat, darling. I’m sure you’ll be busy. I’ll call again nearer the time to sort out the details. Take care, Emma.’

‘Thanks. You take care too. Love to you all.’

Emma felt so much for them, losing their son. How on earth would they feel if they knew she’d been seeing someone else? She’d been on cloud nine these past few days, enjoying the excitement of this passionate new relationship with Max and now it suddenly felt all wrong. Disloyal.

39

It was bloody freezing. Her finger joints were aching with the cold. At least she’d thought to put a thermal vest on and several layers of clothing under her puffy coat, but her legs were chilled through her jeans. She’d have to invest in long johns if she took on any more winter markets, and she hadn’t brought gloves other than the thin latex ones she used for hygiene reasons. Mistake. She could now hardly move her fingers, so it was really hard to handle the chocolates. She rubbed her hands together in a feeble attempt to bring them back to life, sighing out a puff of white, lukewarm mist.

Emma was at her first-ever Christmas market as a stallholder in the historic town of Alnwick, a twenty-minute drive from Warkton-by-the-Sea. A host of white, tarpaulin-covered stalls were set out on the stone cobbles of the market square, and after spending a half-hour shipping goods to and from her car she felt proud of her very festive-looking Christmas Chocolate Shop, set out carefully with shelves of chocolate reindeer, snowmen, Santas, boxes and bags galore of fudge, truffles, and chocolate bars, all prettily wrapped in golds and silvers with green, gold and red bows and coloured ribbons. She’d strung up a set of twinkling fairy lights behind her and brought some festive decorations too, including a small tinsel Christmas tree which she had strung with chocolate stars and edible baubles.