‘Your landlord who rescued you from the side of the road, invited you to move in and also happens to be both single, a really nice person and have a devastatingly sexy scar?’ She shrugged. ‘Just wondering how you were getting on. The two of you. All those cosy nights in together.’

‘Sounds like you should be the one cosying up with him if you think he’s that great,’ I retorted back, in a vain attempt to pretend I didn’t agree.

She flapped one hand in dismissal. ‘Nah. He’s not my type.’

I resisted the urge to ask if pie and pint loving tradesmen were her type.

‘So, how about you? Any sparks flying over the breakfast table? Are you like, spending your evenings hanging out together or what?’

‘Wow. This really is a no-holds-barred, right from the get-go friendship, isn’t it?’

Becky grinned. ‘Don’t worry, I’ve no one to gossip to. Well, apart from Mum, and I’m not about to feed that beast.’

I coughed. Straightened my mug on its coaster and cleared my throat again. ‘Daniel is clearly a really nice guy. And yes, while we have spent some time together in between him working and looking after Hope, it would be far too complicated for me to entertain any notions of a spark. I love it here, and want to make a go of Charlie’s dream. Developing feelings for her brother, who is, as you said, my live-in-landlord, would be a catastrophic move. So, in answer to your question, we’re friends.’ I smiled. ‘Although I haven’t officially asked him.’

‘Okay, so to clarify, you fancy the pants off him but don’t know if he feels the same way and don’t want to make a fool of yourself?’

Before I could clarify her clarification by fudging something about how yes, of course I fancied him but I was hiding a horrible, shameful secret identity so couldn’t do anything about it even if he hadn’t been Charlie’s brother, my landlord and possible future business partner, another clang rang out.

‘What the hell?’ Becky made as if about to duck under the table.

‘It’s the doorbell.’

‘Wow. Sounds more like an intruder alarm.’

Which, it turned out, it might as well have been. Damson Farm was about to be invaded.

14

This time, Daniel got to the door before me. Due to my innate journalistic nosiness, I lurked a few feet behind him in the hallway to see who it was.

‘Ah, hello there!’ A man’s voice boomed. ‘Are we all right to leave our bags here?’

Then, as Daniel stood there looking a mixture of bewildered and incensed, the man wangled his way past him into the house, immediately followed by two women.

‘This is so not what we were expecting!’ One of them, dressed in what I knew to be a £2,000 coat, because I’d been given the exact same one in a different shade, muttered at the other, who scanned the hallway and stairs while unwinding a giant scarf from around her neck.