by Maya Rodale, Caroline Linden, Miranda Neville, Katharine Ashe
“But I’m going to need access to a high quality market,” Natalie had reminded her. “I’m writing a cookbook.” Supposed to be, at any rate. Privately, she wasn’t sure anyone would want a cookbook by her, but she had needed a face-saving reason for her sudden and abrupt absence from her family’s restaurant. She could hardly tell her parents that she might kill her brother, or he might kill her, if she stayed; writing a cookbook had seemed like a brilliant excuse. Her mother, a chef, was delighted. Her father, a restaurateur recovering from a stroke, approved. And her brother Paul would just be happy she was out of his way so he could continue trying to ruin everything that made her parents’ pride and joy special—or, as he called it, expanding their brand.
“There’s a local market right in town,” Pippa promised. “Just walk down and get as many organic eggs and as much fresh bacon as you need.”
“Will it be filled with tourists?” Not that she had anything against tourists, but she was feeling a little antisocial and wanted peace. “Are there going to be people snapping pictures of the house from the road?”
Phillipa snorted. “No one ever finds that cottage. Melbury is perfectly ordinary, and it’s not close to anything especially historical or scenic. Honestly, I thought I would die of boredom when I crashed with Amaryllis for a few weeks. It’s the house that time forgot.”
“Whoa. I need a real kitchen, Pip.” Natalie had wondered if Pippa even knew what a real kitchen looked like. She’d certainly never needed to know; Pippa’s father had made a fortune in banking before driving his Ferrari into a brick wall. In college, Pippa was infamous for almost burning down their apartment building by microwaving soup that was still in the can. Natalie would have bet good money she had never cooked anything in her life.
“Of course it’s got a kitchen. Amaryllis thinks she can cook, so she put in everything state-of-the-art.” There was a pause. “I’m sure it all works.”
In fairness, Natalie had to admit Pippa had been right about the kitchen. Everything was absolutely up to date—although she was still puzzling out the idiosyncrasies of the massive AGA cooker—and it all worked splendidly. The icing on the cake was the walk-in wine cooler, which was mostly empty of wine at the moment and therefore a perfect giant refrigerator. Judging solely on the merits of the kitchen, Primrose Cottage was ideal.
But the second lie: no one would bother her.
“It’s honestly in the middle of nowhere,” Pippa had assured her. “There aren’t even neighbors. The only house within two miles is an old manor house, and I think it’s been condemned. No one lives there, the owners have moved to Bali. You can cook eighteen hours a day and never see a soul unless you go into town.”
That had tipped her over the brink. Natalie was not by nature a remote or shy person, but the last year had left some serious scars on her psyche. A year ago, everything had been great. Her parents had still been in charge of the family restaurant, Cuisine du Jude, her mother in the kitchen and her father in the front of the house. Natalie loved Cuisine du Jude, or just the Jude, as they called it. She’d grown up there, folding napkins when she was a kid, manning the soda fountain and busing tables when she was a teenager, then helping out in the kitchen during college under her mother’s expert instruction.
Judith Corcoran had been born to cook. There was no other explanation for her deft touch with flavors and textures, her eye for a beautifully arranged plate, her attention to the smallest influence on her diner’s happiness. Tom, Natalie’s dad, said he was the only struggling student who gained weight while putting himself through college on a shoestring budget, because his wife could make a four-star dinner out of a buck and a half’s worth of ingredients. A few years after he finished his degree in business, he’d borrowed money from every family member with a hundred dollars to spare and opened a tiny, hole-in-the-wall restaurant. Judy cooked, Tom bused and managed. Soon they moved to a bigger spot, then to a nicer one with a patio on the river, and there they’d stayed, successful but more a local gem than anything, until three years ago when a renowned restaurant critic, in town for her son’s college graduation, ate at the Jude. A month later her raving review appeared in the New York Times, calling the Jude “the most perfect date night restaurant in the world.” The national morning TV shows called. Oprah visited. Judy Corcoran was invited on cooking shows left and right. And every table in the restaurant was booked up for eight months in advance.
Then it all went to pieces.
Tom had a stroke—thankfully not a debilitating one, but bad enough to shake everything up. The doctors decreed he should not work for at least six months; Judy declared she was taking a sabbatical to care for him and oversee his rehab. Natalie, who had been cooking alongside her mother since she was six, would take over the kitchen, and Paul, who had followed their father into the business side, would run the front of the house. That was fine with Natalie. The Jude had been her life, and she wanted to stay there forever, keeping up her parents’ tradition. If only Paul hadn’t gotten stars in his eyes from all the national press fawning over the Jude. All on his own, he decided that one location was not enough; they needed two or three or eight. And he’d gone and hired an architect to start planning these new locations.
The fight, when Natalie found out, was epic. Worse than when they were kids. Only this one hadn’t ended with a spanking or being grounded. Their mother had intervened, white-faced and furious. “Stop it,” she told them both. “You are too old for this. You owe your father better. Paul, there will be no expansion without your father’s approval, and he’s too weak to give it. If you ask him about it, I will disinherit you now,” she said as he’d opened his mouth to argue. “Natalie, things cannot stay the same forever and ever.” She’d looked between the two of them in the deeply disappointed way only a mother could manage. “You’re not to speak to each other for two weeks. Cool down and act like rational adults.”
“What about the Jude?” Natalie had protested. “We can’t run the restaurant without speaking.”
“Mick can mediate,” said her mother, naming the Jude’s sous chef.
Natalie tried, but within a week realized it wouldn’t work. It turned out she and her brother were totally capable of communicating without speaking a word, and most of their exchanged glances could be translated as you are such an idiot. The day Paul had the nerve to have his architect out to the restaurant for lunch, Natalie lost it and dumped a bowl of soup on her brother. Paul called her crazy. Natalie called him a lying snake. Mick called their mother.
Writing a cookbook had been the only straw Natalie could grasp to save face. Banished from the Jude, she had to get away, as far away as possible, from her brother’s subtle gloating. He wasn’t getting his way just yet, but she’d blown her cred as the sane, sensible child and they both knew it. Thank God for Pippa, who had volunteered this cottage—a cooking paradise far enough removed from Massachusetts that she wouldn’t be able to embarrass herself again. Even if Pippa had warned her it was next to a construction zone, she would have gone, but she’d gotten used to the relative quiet. The last week or so had made her feel like she was living in the middle of a highway.
Her phone buzzed. “Bloody hell,” cried Pippa. Dance music throbbed behind her voice. “What the hell is going on?”
“Beats me, but it’s big.” She checked the clock. “Are you at a club at three in the afternoon?”
“But no one lives there! We used to traipse over the hill to have smokes when we were kids because it was deserted.” A high-pitched laugh shrilled in the background. “Hang on, let me see if Amaryllis knows.” The line went dead.
Natalie stayed where she was. After extensive trial and error and a great deal of cursing, she had mapped the irregular spots of cell coverage on the property. This spot right inside the kitchen door offered up to three bars, which was excellent by local standards. Near the window in the front bedroom upstairs one could usually get two bars, and the back bath sometimes got two. Pippa had warned her that she’d hav
e to walk up the hill to get a steady three bars, or even four if the gods were feeling kind, but that was too much trouble. Natalie just left her phone in one of the more likely locations with the ringer turned up. Not that she wanted people to call her, as she was supposed to be a hermit these two months, but her mother would freak out if she didn’t answer.
A few minutes later the phone went off again. “Oh my God. I swear I had no idea—Amaryllis says the Melburys decided to renovate the house and turn it into a hotel or some such.” Pippa sounded mournful. “I am so sorry.”
“Is it open?”
“I have no idea! Amaryllis said they have a website now. Hang on a mo.”
Something butted Natalie’s elbow. Oliver, the resident cat, pushed his round head under her arm, demanding a good pet. She scratched his ears, careful not to step out of the tiny bubble of cell reception.
“Sorry,” said Pippa breathlessly. The noise behind her waned a bit. “Just ran into the coatroom. The house is called Brampton House. Google it, maybe you can find out what’s going on. Although honestly, the last time I saw that house it looked like the roof would fall in, so I can’t imagine how much work it needs.”
That would explain the many vans and trucks struggling up the road. Natalie let her head fall back and stuck out her tongue at the ceiling. Just her luck. Oliver meowed again and jumped down. He padded to the door and began circling expectantly, so she went to let him out. She wasn’t entirely sure Oliver belonged to Primrose Cottage, but there was a bag of cat food in the pantry. Because Paul was allergic, the Corcorans had never had a pet growing up, and Natalie found she rather liked it. Oliver was the perfect male: soft and furry, easy to feed, and he purred like a vibrator when someone scratched under his chin.
“So much for peace and quiet,” she said to Pippa. “Well. The hotel is a good mile away or more. If it needs that much work, it can’t be open yet, so I only have to suffer the traffic…” She threw open the door and Oliver bounded out, only to draw up short and hiss. Natalie stared in furious disbelief. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“What?” Pippa demanded. “What did you say?”
“Just tell me where the hose is,” Natalie replied grimly. “There are two people—probably guests at the so-called hotel—having sex on your stepmother’s patio.”
Chapter Three
It was a fifteen-minute walk to the gazebo, which did command a magnificent view as Mr. Delancey had promised. Unfortunately, the manager must have sent every other guest up the hill as well; three other people were already there when Archer reached it. A tall young man in a yellow hoodie was pacing in circles around the gazebo, talking computer code into his phone. A dark-haired girl was sprawled on one of the cushioned benches in the gazebo with her phone pressed to one ear, while an older woman was giving orders for dress alterations between hungry draws on a cigarette.
Archer walked upwind and pulled out his phone. To his relief it found signal and began downloading e-mail, though at a snail’s pace. The programmer circled him—“You’re killing the CPU by doing it that way…”—and the older woman lit a new cigarette—“I don’t want it down to my ruddy ankles, I’m not some crusty old dowager!”—while the girl began filing her nails—“I can’t believe we have this whole place for a week! It’s, like, really old and shit…”
He hit two-dozen messages and walked a few steps away, trying not to overhear. Ten more messages, when there were probably two hundred waiting to download. He scrolled through, deleting most of the e-mail as banal or unimportant, but they were all from the previous night. One by one, ten more appeared on the screen. The programmer came around again, this time agitated and waving one hand—“I don’t want it to call the server that often, it will crash the whole app!”—the older woman had moved on from the length of her dress to worse—“I want some beading. What do you think? Would beading around the neckline make me look jowly?”—and the younger woman fished out a beer from a cooler beneath her bench—“Check it out! I think I can see Windsor Castle from here! Do you want me to send you a picture?”
Archer eyed the signal indicator. Three bars, flickering up to four from time to time. He drifted a little farther down the far side of the hill. If Brampton House was in a valley, shielded from cell service by that hill, then there ought to be cell service many places on the other side of the hill, not just at the top. The signal held and he walked on, watching the messages slowly accumulate. The ground flattened out into a broad gentle slope of lawn. He was almost at the bottom of the hill, but he could still hear the older woman going on about her dress: “It has to match the shoes! Don’t do the damn beading if it won’t match the shoes!” He kept walking.
There was a line of trees, with a thin trail leading through and beyond it. Still scrolling through messages, Archer absently followed it. A muffled noise caught his attention, and then another. He looked up, and did a double take. Just behind the trees, a guy was lying on his back in the grass, with a girl grinding on top of him. She was clothed—barely—but her skirt hid any proof of actual intercourse. Whatever was going on under her skirt, both of them were obviously enjoying themselves a great deal. Archer averted his eyes and went the other way.
It was blessedly quiet out here and the air was crisp and fresh. For the first time he started to see why Jane Sparks had liked the place enough to drag her friends and family across an ocean. It was remote, sure, but that also meant privacy. Just last week Duke and Jane had struck a deal with a major magazine for exclusive wedding photos in exchange for a generous donation to Jane’s favorite charity, and having it in the middle of nowhere would make it harder for the paparazzi to find them. Archer made a mental note to keep an eye out for anyone suspicious; it would certainly be easy for someone to sneak through the woods and angle a telephoto lens on Brampton House.
And then, out of nowhere, an alert popped onto his screen, asking if he wanted to join a Wi-Fi network. Archer stopped in his tracks. He tapped an app on his phone, and realized the Wi-Fi signal was nice and strong. It was also, unfortunately, password protected.
He deliberated. It was probably unneighborly to steal someone’s Wi-Fi, but he had no idea where the neighbor actually was. It wasn’t even his neighbor. He tried a few common passwords, none of which worked. Well, if he couldn’t stealthily join the network, maybe he could talk his way in.
The track curved and wound through a meadow, where the grass was taller. A tall hedge ran along the side, and he realized it screened the road to Brampton House. So this was what lay on the other side of all those trees. Now that he wasn’t risking life and limb along the twisting road, Archer could acknowledge that it was picturesque. Still very remote and primitive for a techie wedding, but beautiful.
Around a bend in the path he found the source of the Wi-Fi signal. A house of gray stone sat in the middle of a garden, with a small patio facing him. And—he actually stopped walking and took a deep breath—the most heavenly smell drifted from the open windows.
Led by his nose, he walked right up to the edge of the patio. It smelled of chocolate and coffee, and made him realize he hadn’t eaten lunch, nor anything else today other than a wholly inadequate roll from an airport kiosk, washed down with a bottle of warm water. Oh God, what he wouldn’t give for a good cup of coffee right now, and if it came with a slice of chocolate cake—
The door opened with a bang, and a woman stalked out toward him. A very attractive woman, with light brown curls bouncing around her head and a mesmerizing sway to her hips. Archer started to smile, but it fell off his face as she drew near. “Whoa!”
“This is private property,” she said acidly in an unmistakably American accent.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know.” He took a step backward and kept his eyes on the large meat cleaver she was pointing at him. “There’s no sign marking the boundary of the hotel grounds.”
She seemed to bristle. “You’re staying at the hotel?”
“Yes,” he said warily. Her tone indicated that w
as not a mark in his favor.
“What the hell is going on up there?” She waved her free hand at the road. “A dozen trucks a day go up and down that road.”
“Just a wedding.” He kept his voice calm and unthreatening. She was holding the cleaver like she knew how to use it.
“A wedding. It’s not even supposed to be open!” She shook her head, and curls spilled over her face. She swiped them back, and shaded her eyes to peer up the hill. Unthinkingly Archer gave her another quick once-over. A long white apron hid most of her, but her fitted shirt showed off a nice pair of breasts. On her feet she wore clogs, but her legs to the knee were bare. Cleaver aside, she was damn fine.
“Could you please tell everyone else at the hotel that this house, and this garden, are not part of the hotel grounds? If I find one more jackass out here—”
“I don’t recommend you cleaver them, even if they trespass,” he said when she pursed her lips in disgruntlement.
“What?” She stared up at him. He’d thought her eyes were brown, but now he saw they were more hazel, with gold and green sparks and only brown around the edges.
“The…” He motioned with one hand, still upraised in the universal gesture of surrender. “The meat cleaver. I don’t think English law would pardon the use of a cleaver even on a very rude trespasser.”
“Oh.” She looked at it, and her face eased. All the hard lines of fury disappeared, and the look she gave him was almost sheepish. “Sorry about that. I was chopping up a chicken for pot pie when I saw you.”
“And here I thought I smelled chocolate and coffee,” he said. “It must be the English countryside.”
She laughed—just for a moment, but enough to make his breath catch. When she smiled, she was gorgeous. “No, it’s coffee and chocolate now. Chicken later, if Oliver doesn’t eat it.” Her eyes grew round. “Oh my God, if that cat eats my chicken—”
