The Secret Life of Lucy Lovecake: A laugh-out-loud romantic baking comedy

by Pippa James

  “We discuss everything very openly,” I said. “There’s our work, then there’s our private life. We don’t mix them up.”

  Even as I said this, I knew it wasn’t true. All aspects of our life were constantly straddling boundaries.

  “I just want to protect you. You are not obliged contractually to involve him in every aspect of your publishing life. It’s not a problem if you do, but you might find it hard to get out of some of your arrangements, if the day comes when there’s a cooling off on the personal side,” Branwell counselled.

  “I appreciate your words, but I think I’ve got that under control. Don’t worry.”

  “I won’t then. And I will not mention it again unless you do. Now, let’s get stuck into this chocolate pudding!”

  I insisted on paying for lunch, which was a lovely feeling.

  As I was leaving, Branwell reached into his pocket. “Oh! Nearly forgot! There’s just one other thing,” he said, handing me a folded slip of paper.

  “What’s this?” I asked.

  “Not sure really. We had a phone call from a lady asking to speak to you, found our number on the internet in connection with you. She wouldn’t give her name and didn’t want her details on e-mail, but asks that you call her on this number. It’s up to you, of course. Might be a lunatic – that’ll be the next thing, the crazies who want to get close to you! Don’t arrange to meet anyone, okay?”

  “Right, okay. What next?!” I sighed.

  “I know. You need a nice quiet time now to get on with book two. How’s that coming along?”

  “No progress of late, but I’m all refreshed and raring to go. Don’t worry!” I assured him.

  “Good show. Breaks are lovely, darling, but you don’t want to take too much time away from the voice. It’s always a bugger to get it going again!”

  “Yes, I’m sure.”

  As I went back to Paddington in the cab, I looked at the number on the slip of paper, then tucked it into my purse.

  82

  The Phone Call

  I got home about 7pm, and Dominic was curious to hear all about the lunch.

  “So, who was the special guest?” he asked.

  I had decided what to say. “Erm, it was a new author Branwell is taking on. He wanted me to give some guidance about social media. Ha! Comical or what?” I lied.

  May God forgive you, Daisy Delaney. You are a serial fibber when it comes to men. What will become of you?

  * * *

  While Dominic went to read to Minty at bedtime, I decided to try the number on the slip of paper.

  I bet it’s one of those horrid ladies who spoke to me in the car park at Hay after my event that day. Barbara and Martha.

  I keyed in the number, a mobile phone number. I couldn’t help shaking as it started to ring.

  “Hello,” said a lady.

  “Erm, hello. This is Daisy Delaney. Did you call the Branwell Thornton agency asking to speak to me?”

  “I did.”

  “Right. Can I help you?”

  “Daisy. This is Mrs Burton speaking, from the Swan Hotel in Hay.”

  I froze. Mrs Burton who told the Daily Mail that Dominic and I had shared a “compact” double room. I said nothing, my brain whirring.

  She went on. “Don’t hang up. There’s something I need to tell you.”

  Again, I said nothing.

  She carried on. “It wasn’t me who spoke to the Mail. They tried to get me to speak, but I didn’t say a word. I swear it. I liked you, and I love your book. I’m not a big mouth. Somebody else must’ve told them and used my name.”

  Should I believe this?

  I did believe her. I had thought it strange at the time when Kitty told me about the betrayal. Mrs Burton didn’t seem the sort to double cross.

  “Mrs Burton, can you remember the name of the journalist you spoke to?” I asked.

  “No, but I have his card somewhere . . . let me see. Asked me to call him back, but I never did. Wait a minute. Ah, here it is. Michael Swanston.”

  “Mrs Burton, thank you for telling me this,” I said. “I really appreciate it.”

  “I’ve been up to the ninety-nines about it. You must have been thinking the worst of me, and that bothered me. I hope we’ll see you again next year?” she said.

  “Well, I don’t think my new book will be out by then, but maybe the year after that,” I told her. “But do stay in touch.”

  “Right you are. Oh, I feel so much better. I really do! Well, all the best in the meantime.”

  “And to you, Mrs Burton. Bye for now.”

  I Googled Michael Swanston. A freelancer, mostly working for the Mail.

  I slept badly that night. The American man loomed in my mind. The faked sincerity. Am I up for that level of attention? I was so upset about one tiny leak, how would I manage a whole flood?

  “Everything okay?” said Dominic, rolling round to embrace me.

  “Yeah,” I responded. “Just London stressed. It jangles me these days.”

  “I know. Country living is so peaceful. You get used to it.”

  “Exactly,” I agreed.

  “Maybe you should get used to it permanently. Have you thought about giving up your flat?” he suggested.

  “Yes, it’s a waste of money when I’m living out here, isn’t it?”

  He rolled on top of me, looking right into my eyes, the rising sun lending some light to the room.

  “Daisy, why don’t we—”

  “Ssshhh,” I said, kissing him.

  83

  Pavlova

  The researchers on the Hannah morning show had contacted Dominic to ask if I’d appear at short notice to discuss following dreams, adapting to change and feminine feminism. They had a gap; someone had let them down.

  Seen sense, more like.

  “What do you think?” asked Dominic over the kitchen table.

  “Sounds like a good opportunity?” I mulled.

  “Yes, I asked for the figures. It regularly reaches 1.4 million viewers, mostly in our demographic. They did a feature on The Hen Weekend and that trebled sales instantly.”

  “So, you will have one finger poised over the ‘reprint’ button?”

  “Yes, but that’s happening anyway, Daisy. It’s a phenomenon.”

  * * *

  The day before the TV appearance, I went up to Primrose Hill to clear out the flat. A truck was due to take all my belongings down to Bluebells. Kitty had decided to stay on – she could afford the rent alone with her modelling jobs. Pippa was living with James in New York and the Hamptons, so it didn’t seem likely she’d be living at Rosehip Lane again.

  “How’s it going with Dominic?” asked Kitty as we sat having tea, me on the Lloyd Loom chair, she on the sofa.

  I tried to work out if she was concerned for me or a little sad that I was moving into another stage of life before her. Maybe it’s a bit of both.

  “Don’t change, Daisy,” she said.

  “I’m not changing, Kitty. I promise. You think I am?”

  “No, but don’t. Because what makes people love you is the real you.”

  Kitty went out for supplies and I stood at the oven, picturing Michel looking in the window, his face alight with excitement when he saw me in the lingerie that Friday afternoon. I sat on the loom chair and sobbed. I didn’t want to go back to that day, but with hindsight, it had been the sweetest, funniest, most pivotal moment of my life. I knew the house in Elsworthy Road was empty. It felt to me as though Primrose Hill was empty because Michel had gone. In fact, that London was empty.

  If I had only known how short-lived those fun times would be.

  I kept thinking of a Shakespeare quote my English teacher, Mrs Murphy, used to say when we were all moaning about our boyfriends. From a Midsummer Night’s Dream, “So quick bright things come to confusion!”

  I boxed up my make-up, books, trinkets and some clothes. I ditched all the letters from Tom Percy. There wasn’t an awful lot to call my own.


  After one of our nostalgic tapas suppers, Kitty helped me pick out what to wear for the Hannah programme.

  “A bit sexy, a bit girl-next-door,” she decided. We opted for a pale green dress with sweetheart neckline and puff sleeves, with hair up and minimal jewellery.

  “I look like a nurse, circa 1978,” I said.

  “Exactly. Nurses are sexy girls next door,” said Kitty.

  We flumped out together in the sitting room with a bottle of prosecco.

  “I’m going to miss you, Daisy,” she said.

  “Don’t. I’m only just holding myself together. Life has got so weird lately. You know how Mrs Burton told the Mail that I had slept with Dominic at her hotel?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, she didn’t. She contacted me through Branwell, really upset. Claims she said nothing. It was some journalist guy called Michael Swanston who approached her. She thinks someone else spoke to him, and her name was used as a smokescreen.”

  “That’s awful. Michael Swanston? I think he contacted me as well. Maybe it was on Twitter. I didn’t say a word either,” said Kitty.

  “What did he say to you?”

  “Asked to talk about you. Did I know the status of your relationship with either Michel Amiel or Dominic McGann?” she revealed.

  “And?”

  “I said I knew nothing about either and that if I did, I still wouldn’t speak, at any price. I hate how they cause suspicion with their hacky ways,” said Kitty. “You know how careful I am.”

  “I do, of course.”

  “We should get to the bottom of this,” said Kitty.

  “I agree.”

  Kitty sent a private Twitter message to Michael Swanston.

  Kitty: Who really told you that Daisy and Dominic were a couple?

  Michael: Can I call you?

  Kitty: Yes. She typed her mobile number.

  The call came through straight away.

  “This is Kitty Chang,” she said.

  She asked Michael if he could expand on his story. I watched her nod, gasp, then wind up the call.

  Kitty came off the phone looking ashen.

  “Well? Who told him?” I asked.

  Kitty looked awkward. “Are you sure you want to know?”

  “Of course I do!” I exclaimed, heart racing.

  “He claims it was Dominic,” said Kitty. “I’m sorry.”

  I gasped, catching my breath in my throat, coughing, struggling to comprehend.

  “I’m so sorry, Daisy!”

  “Was Michael Swanston quite sure?” I pressed.

  “Yes, he said it was a direct call with Dominic, no middle people,” Kitty explained.

  “But, why?” I asked.

  “Maybe just to get rid of Michel once and for all – to help you get over him,” Kitty said, being charitable to Dominic. “Perhaps he could see at Hay that you weren’t over him. That you two might rekindle things. And maybe you would have done were it not for that ‘leak’ about the double bed.”

  I could hardly take it in. I knew that Dominic was a strategist, but this was another level. I went to bed feeling that my new world might be paved with gold, but it was also laced with poison.

  Early the next morning, a car came to collect me for the TV show.

  So much for the minimal make-up – I was taken for a complete masking, and they had another idea for what I might wear. Black trousers and a silky pink blouse, high heels. TV code for successful woman.

  Such progress have I made in my life that I no longer get to dress myself. Nice.

  Hannah was lovely, very gentle in her questioning, zooming right in on how hard it must be to adapt to such rapid life changes rather than glorifying the success.

  “Yes, it has been a shock,” I admitted. “And I suppose I now need to create some time to reflect on what has been good and what’s been not so good and decide on the way I want to live from now.”

  “Yes,” she agreed. “I’ve spoken to lots of people who’ve had really sudden changes in fortune, whether it’s a lottery win, winning a medal for sporting achievement or being elected into high office unexpectedly. Whatever the case, there are challenges associated with it, and a sense of surreality . . . People don’t want to hear that it’s not all upsides, but it’s hard work being successful, isn’t it?”

  I nodded. “I’ve got some regrets, but when things happen at great speed, that’s inevitable, I guess.”

  Hannah was getting braver. “Look, everyone’s going to want me to ask about Michel Amiel. They say that love and hate are very close. Is it a case of that?”

  I was taken aback. I had been briefed on the questions, but this hadn’t appeared in the briefing.

  I cleared my throat. “Michel Amiel has been very important in my story. He has inspired me in many ways, and I learned a lot of my baking skills at his cookery school,” I said.

  “But the spats on Twitter – sounds like something went wrong a bit. Would that be fair to say?”

  I took a deep breath.

  “Well, yeah. It was decided that French Fancy would come out under the Lucy Lovecake pseudonym,” I said. “Largely my own idea.”

  “Right . . .”

  “And part of making sure that would work as a teaser was that absolutely no one outside the central team should know about it. My identity had to be kept secret until well after launch. The problem was that this made me secretive and even a little treacherous towards people in my life who were not in on the secret.”

  “I understand. And Michel Amiel was one of those people you had to ‘betray’, as you put it?”

  “Yes,” I said, stifling a pathetic sob.

  I regained composure.

  “I can see that must have been hard,” said Hannah. “You know you have a potentially life-changing book, you don’t want to jeopardise the success of it in any way. Hard situation for you.”

  “Yes, and it was the most awful conflict imaginable because he became a more special friend as I was writing the book, and what’s more, I was sent to his cookery school in that period. I wanted to be honest with him, and I regret that I was not.”

  “Well,” Hannah continued, “we’re going to a break, but when we come back, Daisy Delaney is going to be telling us her secrets of success. How she persevered to get a literary agent and turned around her fortunes – join us for that!”

  I checked my phone during the commercial break. Dominic had sent a few messages on a theme. “Move on from Amiel, ffs.”

  After the show, I took out my phone to send a message to Dominic. Branwell’s advice about the risks of mixing love and business was ringing in my ears. I didn’t want to ruin my career, but I couldn’t live with a man I didn’t trust:

  Dominic, I’m going to spend some time at the flat. Things are moving too fast for me. I’d like to take some time on my own to write the next book. I’m sorry. Maybe I just haven’t got Michel Amiel out of my system after all. Thank you for everything, Daisy X

  A lot of messages and calls came through from him after I sent that, but I didn’t respond to them. Until, finally, I wrote: Michael Swinton. Nothing more after that.

  84

  Reflections

  Before I went back to the flat, I stopped at a supermarket to buy some baking things. The best therapy – making French fancies. I went into the little kitchen and got to work, lost in the processes, producing a plate of dainty iced fancies. After that I walked around the streets of Prim Hill, taking in the sights that had been so familiar for so long. I went into the cookery school to see Catherine.

  “Daisy!” she cried. “Fantastic to see you. Well done! I’m seeing you everywhere. That cake you did at Hay was to die for!”

  “Thanks, Catherine. My course here enabled me to try things like that. I don’t know how to say thank you.”

  “There’s no need. Plenty of people learn to bake here. Not everyone has turned that knowledge into a bestselling book.”

  “Ach, let’s not talk about all that. What’s going
on with the cookery school?” I asked.

  “We’re not sure, is the simple answer,” she said.

  “Michel never comes now?”

  “Never.”

  “Is he okay?”

  “We’ve heard he’s really depressed. Last we saw of him, he looked rough,” she confided.

  “Yes, I agree. He wasn’t well at Hay.”

  “He’s living in Paris, and this place is ticking along okay for now. I think Brasserie Rose is in need of his touch, but the manager does his best. We’re all trying to hold things together while he sorts himself out. But we’re not at all sure that he is doing that,” Catherine revealed.

  “Sad.” I sighed, deep and long.

  Catherine leaned forward. “Let me give you his new address.”

  I said nothing but did not object. She went into her desk drawer and produced a small card with Michel’s details.

  As I walked back to the flat, I felt somehow comforted by the card, but I knew I would be too afraid to get in touch. Too afraid that nothing came back.

  I let myself in, forlorn.

  “Kitty! I’m back!”

  No reply. Kitty wasn’t there. However, a familiar scent was.

  Sitting in the loom chair was Michel Amiel.

  “Kitty told me you’d be here,” he said.

  “Michel!” I gasped. He looked fit and well; dressed immaculately. I saw from his tagged bag that he’d just arrived from the airport.

  “You came especially to see me?” I asked.

  “I did.”

  “How have you been?” I wanted to know.

  “For a while I was lovesick. But then I thought, no, don’t give in to this. I’ve been running every day, swimming, writing a new book, eating well, staying off the booze, learning some new skills, getting myself ready,” he said.

  “Ready for what?”

  “For now,” he said, stepping towards me.

  “Do you forgive me?” I whispered.

  “Of course I do,” he replied, pulling me towards him.

  I said nothing as we embraced.