Laurel put on a smile along with a blue sparkly dress and embarked on Christmas Day at The Nookery. No way would she risk spoiling her family’s Christmas by telling them she’d soon be moving away. She’d spent half a sleepless night browsing properties she could rent, solo, no longer feeling like being part of an artists’ community. A cottage by the sea would be good. Or maybe a lighthouse. At the top. Alone. Without Grady. Without Grady forever, now. He’d offered his heart on a plate but it was too difficult, too complicated, too compromising for her to take it.

She was leaving Middledip and him behind. For the second time.

But first there was Christmas to get through, and it hurt to realise she’d messed up having the planned Christmas Eve and Christmas morning with Grady, the only chance she’d ever have to celebrate the festive season with him.

Nobody at The Nookery commented on Laurel’s presence at breakfast when they’d expected her to be at Mistletoe Cottage. Rea just gave her a cranberry croissant and coffee to accompany the gift opening. Daisy, who’d earned almost five hundred pounds making Christmas wreaths, had splashed her cash. There was a new helmet and breeches for Rea and a green numnah for Daybreak because she thought it would look better than the blue one. For Aunt Terri there was a silver bookmark, and for Laurel a sumptuous book depicting the works of Édouard Manet and a print of Manet’s grave at Passy, in the snow.

‘You shouldn’t have spent so much!’ Laurel gasped, turning the glossy pages. ‘But, oh, this is so beautiful, Daisy. Thank you.’ She fell into contemplation of Chez le Père Lathuille and the way the man gazed into the face of the woman. It took a polite cough from Daisy for her to realise she hadn’t handed out her own presents.

For Rea she’d bought the beautiful gourd lamp from Grady. Rea looked dazed. ‘That’s just gorgeous,’ she breathed. For Terri there was a 3D puzzle of a cottage – to celebrate her choosing a cottage in Middledip – and a bottle of craft gin. Daisy received fleece pyjamas bearing the legend ‘You got this’, chocolate and marshmallow bombs and a Nike top. ‘I didn’t think of Daybreak,’ she apologised to Rea. ‘I’ll give her an extra parsnip later.’

From Rea she received a pair of green suede ankle boots and from Terri a multi-faceted crystal hanging in an ornate silver ring. ‘It’s a home star,’ Terri explained. ‘You hang it in your window. When you’re lost, it’ll bring you home.’

Laurel gave her a wordless hug at the idea of Middledip being ‘home’ because her heart felt so ice-like it wanted to slide from her chest and shatter on the ground.