Summer at the Cornish Cafe

by Phillipa Ashley

  Mitch sits beside me, looking like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth. Eva puts Betty down and Mitch touches her snub nose.

  ‘I love your idea for selling organic doggy treats. It’s something I’d like to try in the new cafe I’m opening in Brighton. Your canine ice lollies sound amazing.’

  ‘I’ve got a couple in the freezer if Betty would like to try one?’

  Eva claps her hands together in delight. She might be in her fifties and a multi-millionaire but she’s like a little girl where dogs are concerned. ‘Do you mind posing with Mitch and Betty for a picture for my blog? I might be able to use the photos in my next magazine column too.’

  Resisting the urge to jump and up down like a kid, I try to stay business-like. ‘I’d love to. Shall we go outside and do the photos? I can show you where the new cafe’s going to be and we could have the sea in the background. Then I can find Betty one of the lollies.’

  ‘Super idea. I’d love to see what you have planned here. I already want to pack up and move. I bet you could never leave such gorgeous surroundings.’

  I glance over at Cal, who is smiling and charming the Rt Hon Yvette. He looks back at me and winks.

  ‘No you never get tired of it.’ My face is heating up rapidly. ‘Shall I take you down to the site of the cafe? The coast path literally runs past the door, if we get it up and running. I mean when we get it up and running.’

  Ignoring my shaking hands, I collect two lollies from the freezer and lead Eva down to the partly restored stone building that will become the cafe. When we reach the site, Mitch makes short work of his lolly while Betty licks hers with delicate little strokes.

  ‘They have good things in like organic fruit and veg. Mitch likes the peanut butter ones but you need to let them thaw for a while so the dogs don’t get freezer burn on their tongues.’

  Eva squeals in delight. Cal, busy showing a yurt to two London travel bloggers on the other side of the field, glances up at us. ‘Oh, it’s all simply delightful. I’m soooo impressed with what you have planned here. I can see you have a true passion for Kilhallon and what you’re trying to do, especially the food. Would you be happy for me to include some recipes on my website? They’d be credited to you, of course.’

  ‘My recipes? Oh wow, I’d love you to.’

  ‘And, forgive me if this is intrusive, but would you mind if I wrote a feature about you? I’d mention Kilhallon of course and include some photos, but Cal told me that you’ve had a rough start in life and were homeless before you got the job here.’

  ‘Did he?’

  ‘Yes. I hope that was OK. You can say no, of course, but I think what you’ve achieved is remarkable. I hear that Cal has been helping refugees too. It’s an amazing story; homeless girl and ex-aid worker start eco business.’

  ‘I hadn’t thought of us as a story. Really, I’m one of the lucky ones.’

  ‘Oh gosh, no. Cal told me he was lucky to have you.’

  ‘He did?’

  She smiles. ‘Does that surprise you?’

  ‘I suppose so. He doesn’t gush about people.’

  ‘Well, my love, he thinks a lot of you. I also know what he’s been through. It’s a great story and I’d love to tell it but Cal doesn’t want any of the credit. He wants you to have the limelight and it would raise Kilhallon’s profile.’

  ‘Limelight? Well, if Cal doesn’t mind and it would help the business, then I’ll do it.’

  She hugs me enthusiastically.

  ‘Righty-oh. I’ll get my people to contact your people and we’ll set it up.’

  ‘I don’t have any people, apart from Mitch.’

  She laughs. ‘Then we’ll let Betty and Mitch sort it all out.’

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  It was after midnight when we waved goodbye to Robyn and Andi and their mates from the folk band. The yurt party was a huge success, with so many people raving over the setting and the mocked-up interior of the ‘show yurt’. Sheila turned up after the Beach Hut closed and gave me a beautiful bunch of flowers, and Tamsin arrived with a congrats card and a bottle of champagne. I’ve never been given my own flowers or champagne and I almost lost it in front of Cal and the guests. Even the Cornish weather smiled on us, delivering a sunset to die for and a clear night with milky white stars.

  The one person who didn’t come was Isla, who had to go up to London unexpectedly for a production meeting. She’d left us a card and an even bigger bottle of champagne for Cal ‘and the team’. Sheila told me it was a magnum of Krug and would have cost hundreds of pounds. If he was disappointed Isla didn’t come herself, he didn’t show it. Is it wrong of me to be glad she couldn’t make it?

  Cal locks the gate at the end of the drive and walks back down the drive towards me. At this time of year it never really goes dark but I can still see the stars winking in the inky sky. The cloudy swirl high up is the Milky Way, according to Robyn. She has an app on her phone that shows the stars wherever you are, even when you can’t actually see them. Tonight, though, they’re swarming over the sky like fireflies.

  ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ Cal stands next to me.

  ‘Hmm. It reminds me of a dress my mum had. It was dark blue velvet. Do you think she can see us?’

  ‘I don’t know. Anything is possible.’ His voice is gentle but I know he’s only being kind to me because the day has gone well.

  ‘I know it’s mad, but tonight, it does feel like anything is possible.’ I turn to him. In the starlit twilight he seems more darkly sexy than ever.

  ‘Are you tired?’

  ‘It’s funny, I’ve been up since five but I feel as if I could go on and on forever. I wish tonight would never end.’

  ‘That’s adrenaline. You’ll be knackered tomorrow.’

  Ah, Cal, always practical. I follow his cue as we walk down the drive towards the farmyard. ‘I was worried about the logos for the cafe. When I showed you them, you didn’t seem very pleased.’

  ‘How was I supposed to look? Turn cartwheels, let off fireworks.’

  ‘Show a bit more enthusiasm. I thought you were only going along with it to keep me happy.’

  I try to make out his expression in the twilight but can’t quite.

  ‘Believe me, I’d have told you straight if I didn’t like them,’ he says. I dread the moment when we reach the farmhouse, knowing we’ll have to part and today will be over. Well, I won’t sleep. I’ll stay up all night pretending today can go on forever.

  ‘Yes, yes, I suppose you would.’

  ‘It was just you talking about marketing collateral, and business branding.’

  ‘Why is that funny?’

  ‘Six months ago you wouldn’t have believed it. I always knew you’d be a doer and you deserved a chance but I don’t think even I expected the future businesswoman of the year.’

  ‘Some people will say I only got where I am because I slept with the boss.’

  He stops me with a hand on my arm just as we reach the yard. The lights glow from the windows but he makes no attempt to leave.

  ‘You haven’t slept with the boss …’ he leaves the sentence hanging, then smiles. ‘I don’t know about you but I can’t possibly go to sleep yet. Shall we go and celebrate? I think we deserve it.’

  The moon shimmers on the sea as we sit on the beach at Kilhallon Cove by a fire Cal made from driftwood in a ring of stones. We carried a bottle of leftover champagne down to the beach and on this fine August night the whole world seems alight and alive with possibility. We talk about the party, and our plans, and gradually, slowly, the wine and the warmth of the fire makes my limbs relax, grow liquid. The surf breaks softly on the shore, the pebbles make a sloughing sound that soothes me.

  It’s just me and Cal, alone. He hands me the bottle of champagne. ‘Last drop? You’ve earned it.’

  I tip up the bottle and swallow the final mouthful of fizz, the bubble popping on my tongue, going up my nose. I giggle and Cal sticks the empty bottle in the sand. Lacy waves caress the shore a
nd the usual roar is a whisper.

  ‘Cal?’

  ‘Mmm.’

  ‘There’s something I have to ask you.’

  ‘Sounds serious,’ he says but he doesn’t look serious. He’s trying not to smile and I’m trying not to be put off by that sexy half-smile.

  ‘I was in St Trenyan the other day, buying some last-minute stuff for the launch and I saw you and Isla at the Harbour Cafe. She seemed upset, only you didn’t mention it and I wondered.’

  He heaves a sigh. ‘Wondered what?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. Nothing. I was worried that something really bad had happened.’ I scrabble frantically for a reason why I’m interrogating him, anything other than the truth. ‘That the Cades had caused more trouble.’

  ‘For Isla and Luke? Why would Isla have anything to do with them? I’d had to go into the solicitor’s to sort out the probate on my dad’s estate and Isla walked out of the office as I went in. She’d been to collect some documents for her parents. They’re selling their house in Penzance.’

  ‘I didn’t realise, but you had your arm around her and I thought …’ Saying the words out loud feels a bit pathetic yet my feelings are anything but.

  ‘Isla’s parents are splitting up – which is why her father decided not to come back from Dubai for the engagement party – and she was upset so I took her for a drink to calm her down.’

  ‘Oh, I see. I’m sorry.’

  ‘Yes, it’s rough on her. She loves them both and she’s gutted they’re splitting up but maybe it’s for the best.’ He smiles. ‘Nothing we can do about it, though.’ He scrambles to his feet, holds out his hand. ‘Now, do you fancy a swim?’ he asks.

  ‘After the last time?’

  ‘It’s different tonight. It’s calm and I’m not drunk.‘

  ‘It will still be cold.’

  ‘True, but we have the fire to warm us up.’ He pulls me to my feet. My limbs feel liquid. It could be the champagne but I think it’s relief at hearing his explanation for meeting Isla. I’m paranoid. Of course he cares for her but there’s nothing more going on. She still loves Luke.

  ‘I haven’t brought my bikini. Come to think of it, I haven’t brought my bra …’

  ‘I haven’t brought my bra, either, and if you think I’m going home in soggy boxers, you can forget it.’

  He strips off his T-shirt while I unbutton my skirt. He pulls his jeans over his legs, almost overbalancing and we both laugh. In seconds, he’s naked, standing with his hands on his hips, impatient for me to do the same but I can barely take off my clothes because my hands are shaking so much.

  A lump settles in my throat. I’ve seen him naked before, in his bedroom and later, after the party, but I was too angry and hurt that time to really look at him. This is different. Moonlight silvers his body, casting him in a new light. He’s slim, still, but has filled out in the past few months. I see the man Isla and half of Cornwall fell in love with and I know he can never be mine. Not forever, but for tonight. The smart and sensible thing would be to walk away but I’m feeling neither of those things.

  ‘Come on, I’m getting cold,’ he says.

  That dark trail of hair leads downwards. Wow. ‘You could have fooled me …’

  He glances down with a wicked smile that shoots fire through my body, warming me instantly. ‘Oh, this is nothing. What are you waiting for?’

  I can forgive him the male pride, and forgive myself for setting all my worries about Isla aside. The desire that’s building deep inside me is too much. I want him. So I pull my T-shirt over my head and drop it on top of his jeans, followed by my knickers.

  I shriek as his palm connects, hard, with my bum.

  But he’s yards ahead, running for the waves, whooping. ‘Last one in clears up in the morning!’

  I run after him, the sand cold under my soles, the wind tugging at my hair, shrieking over sharp stones and shells and slippery jade seaweed. Into the foam and deeper, knowing I’m already lost.

  ‘Oh my God!’

  Water laps Cal’s chest. ‘Wuss!’

  I wade in, tensing every muscle, trying not to squeak. It’s a low form of torture but Cal dives forward, and under, popping up a few feet away, gulping in air. The water laps at my waist.

  ‘It’s a lot easier if you get it over with,’ he says, yards away, scattering water from his hair, like Mitch does.

  ‘I’d rather do this in my own time.’

  He dives again while I step forward, wincing.

  Cal pops up next to me, grabs my legs and ducks me into the water. I barely have time to close my mouth and eyes. I strike out, swimming away from him, anything to get the blood pumping and distract me from the cold sea. I thrash around, heading for the moon which hangs suspended over the horizon like a yellow Chinese lantern. I paddle back towards Cal, my heart pounding. Gradually, the water stops being torture and becomes a cool, sensual pleasure, soothing away the last remaining tensions of the day.

  ‘Told you it was better to plunge right in,’ he says, treading water alongside me.

  ‘I had no choice!’

  He laughs. ‘Come on, I’ll race you to back to the beach.’

  ‘What if I don’t want to race?’

  ‘It’ll keep you warm.’

  We run up the wet sand to the jumble of weed and debris at the tide line and beyond. At the top of the beach, powdery sand sucks my feet down, slowing me. My lungs almost burst and I collapse onto the sand by the embers of the fire.

  ‘Why did I ever let you persuade me to do that?’

  Cal kneels by the fire, raking it into life again. ‘Because you’re as mad as I am.’

  ‘Not possible.’

  I look at him, naked and lit by the glow of the fire pit. ‘You have sand on your bum.’

  Laughing, he glances back and dusts the grains off his bottom though some still cling to his skin. There’s a glow in me as fierce and hot as the fire. His eyes reflect the flames, flickering back at me. I shiver, but not with the cold. Cal holds out his hand and lowers me onto the sand, pulling me back against his chest.

  He breathes in my hair. ‘You smell good,’ he murmurs.

  ‘What? Of seaweed?’ Nerves force a joke from me.

  ‘Of sex,’ he whispers in my ear. ‘It’s beautiful.’

  ‘You can’t say that.’ Trembling now, I rest my hands on his thighs. They tense and the hair is softly rough. My whole body quivers like the flames of the fire.

  ‘Can you feel me?’

  ‘Cal, we can’t do this.’

  ‘Shhh. Just go with it.’

  He grazes my shoulder with his teeth, and the brief pain is replaced by a pleasure that melts my bones. Thank God Mitch is safely snoring in the cottage. This is a moment when I don’t want him to protect me from Cal, though I probably need him more now than ever before.

  Cal pulls me onto my knees and we’re a breath apart, my knees sinking in the sand. The surf sucks at a shingle bar, the tide is coming in and I can’t hold back from Cal or myself a moment longer. It’s me who kisses him, tangling my fingers in his hair, urging my tongue into his mouth. This isn’t our first kiss but it’s the first one when I’ve been fully aware of how hot and sweet and wonderful his lips and mouth are. He pulls me tight against him, and his need for me is urgent, nudging my stomach. He feathers tiny kisses on my neck, my shoulders.

  Every part of me feels molten hot and his fingers close gently over my breast and his voice is a hot whisper on my bare skin. ‘Demi. I want this but …’

  ‘I want it too.’

  His face blots out the moon as he lowers me down onto the sand.

  The sun streams through the open window and the breeze brings the tang of sea and salt into the bedroom. I pull the sheets over me, realising with a blush that I’m naked. Cal’s side of the bed is cool and empty. We came up to the farmhouse from the beach and had sex again – and again – until it was light. I thought I’d never fall asleep but after the excitement of the day and night, I must have drifted
off. It would have been nice to wake up with him but I don’t believe in perfect endings.

  Going to sleep with him is enough for now; and what happened between us was so amazing, it must herald a new start for us. After last night, I have new hope that he is over Isla. Hugging the pillow to my face, I smile and blush at the memories of the past night.

  I wonder where Cal is. Perhaps he’s gone for an early ride or he’s started clearing up from yesterday. Maybe, like me, he couldn’t sleep. I think I’ll go downstairs and find him, make breakfast or take coffees and toast into the yard. He’ll be hungry after his ride. I know I could eat a horse myself.

  I dozed off again and dreamt that Cal had come back into the room but thought I was asleep. I knew he thought that from the way the boards creaked softly as he moved carefully around the room and the soft jangle of his car keys as he collected them from the dresser.

  In my dream, I knew he didn’t want to wake me up. My eyes and body ache with the tension of pretending to be asleep. I heard him lift the latch and close the door softly behind him, and the stairs creaking as he went downstairs.

  The spluttering of the Land Rover trying to start outside the window wakes me up. Properly wakes me.

  So I hadn’t dreamt the part about Cal going out.

  The engine coughs into life, the gears grind and it rumbles out of the yard. It labours up the track to the farm gate, and dies away until there’s quiet again in Cal’s bedroom. My eyes focus on the freshly painted ceiling, and the new window frame. Claws clatter on the stairs, a tail thumps the panels. Cal didn’t shut the bedroom door properly.

  A cold wet nose nudges my leg under the sheet.

  I pull it back over my head and mumble. ‘Morning, Mitch.’

  Kilhallon seems unnaturally quiet when I walk out of the farmhouse munching on a crust of buttered toast. The tables are still set up in the barn but one end of the bunting dangles loose and the bins overflow with paper plates and empty plastic cups. The clearing-up will have to wait because there’s no sign of Polly, who’s having a lie-in after yesterday’s efforts.