“My ears went red?”
“Not really. I made that up but it proves you weren’t being honest,” said Tess.
Symon stared at her for a moment, then started to laugh. “Well, I’m truly caught out, Miss Hamilton. No wonder the kids in this village don’t get away with anything and my brother only lasted five minutes!”
Tess rolled her eyes. “The less we say about Nick the better. He’s fun and cute but I think that’s where we’d better leave it. I’m sorry though for upsetting you. I was just trying to make conversation.” She paused and her brown eyes grew serious. “Look, Symon, don’t take this the wrong way or anything, and I’m sure you’re a really nice guy, but this isn’t going to work between us. I don’t want to hurt your feelings, and I know you were hoping otherwise, but I don’t think we’re ever going to be a couple. I just don’t feel the same way as you.”
“What?”
“It’s OK, Symon, I know how you feel about me.” Tess lowered her voice at this point and, unable to quite believe what he was hearing, Symon had to lean forwards to catch her words. “Mo’s told me everything.”
“Oh, has she?” Symon was starting to guess what was going on here. “And what exactly did my sister tell you?”
Poor Tess was suddenly fascinated by the beer mats. “That you’d wanted to ask me out for a while but were too shy? I only came tonight just because she keeps on telling me all this and I thought it would be best to speak to you myself. Blind dates aren’t really my thing. You’re a nice man, Symon, but there has to be a spark and I just…”
Her voice petered away and Symon wasn’t sure whether he should laugh, feel insulted or go and strangle Morwenna. Probably all three.
“You just don’t fancy me? Is it because I’m ginger?” he deadpanned.
“Oh God! No! Your hair is lovely and it’s red not ginger and I…” Tess began and then groaned. “You’re winding me up, aren’t you?”
“Sorry, I couldn’t resist.” Symon reached for the Pinot and topped up their glasses. “You probably won’t be surprised to hear that Mo said something very similar about you.”
“And you came along tonight because you felt bad? You were trying to think how to let me down gently?” She shook her head. “I am going to kill your sister.”
“Get in the queue,” Symon answered.
Tess sighed. “She means well. I think she’s worried about you working so hard.”
“I’m aiming for my second Michelin star! I have to work hard. Besides, that’s the nature of restaurant work. I love what I do and I haven’t got time for a relationship even if I wanted one, which I don’t.”
“That’s just how I feel about teaching,” Tess said. She raised her glass at him. “To our careers and to being single!”
They clinked glasses.
“Now that’s dealt with, I think my appetite’s coming back.” Symon passed Tess a menu. “Shall we order?”
“You still want to eat?”
“Sure. Why ruin a night off? Besides, it makes a good change to let somebody else cook for me,” Symon said. “If you want to, of course. I’ll totally understand if you’d rather go home and get on with your marking.”
“Tempting thought, but I’ll have some steak pie first,” Tess grinned.
Their pub meals were every bit as hearty as Symon had hoped, and he and Tess tucked in with gusto. They’d just finished and were discussing whether they had room for pudding when the pub door flew open and a man stumbled into the bar. Tall, wide-shouldered and with a thick bronzed mane tossed back from a flushed face, he was hard enough to ignore anyway, even without the ripples of interest that spread through the place when people realised who he was.
“I’ll have a bottle of champagne,” he was hollering. “No! Bugger it! I’ll have two. Teddy will be here in a minute and he’ll drink mine if I let him, the bugger!”
“Hey! Isn’t that Charlie Barton?” Tess asked, craning her neck.
Symon groaned. It certainly was and Charlie Barton wasn’t a character he had a great deal of time for. He was a gifted chef, no doubt about it, but he was also volatile and erratic – and Teddy St Milton, who was joining him now, wasn’t any better.
Charlie’s restaurant based at the Polwenna Bay Hotel was probably the closest thing The Plump Seagull had to local competition, and Symon was all for some healthy rivalry. What he hadn’t expected were the nasty rumours concerning his own establishment, as well as several thinly veiled insults that had been made by Charlie on his local television show. Symon couldn’t prove where the rumours originated, or disprove this either, but he had his suspicions.
“I was going to ask him if he’d open the school’s Spring Fair,” Tess was saying, all thoughts of sticky toffee pudding vanishing as she watched Charlie clap Teddy on the shoulder and almost knock the smaller man over. “Do you think he would?”
It was on the tip of Symon’s tongue to say that if there was a camera present Charlie would turn up to see a packet of crisps being opened, but the sparkle in Tess’s eyes suggested that she wouldn’t listen anyway. Celebrity chefs obviously appealed to her more than the nonentity kind.
“I guess you could ask him,” was all he said and Tess nodded, already out of her seat.
“It’s for the kids so I’m sure he’ll say yes,” she said.
What must it be like to have so much faith in people, thought Symon wistfully.
Leaving Tess to it, he picked up his jacket and headed outside into the night, where snatches of chatter and music lived and died on the wind and the full moon rose high above the sea. Pale and aloof, its out-of-reach beauty reminded him of Claudette. A scarf of grief wrapped itself around his heart. As he stared up at the moon, his head swam and for a horrible moment he felt so alone and so insubstantial that he thought he might float away.
Thank goodness for his restaurant, thought Symon as he walked away from The Ship and back to The Plump Seagull. It really was all that kept him anchored and he couldn’t imagine what he’d do if he lost it.
He could only hope he’d never have to find out.
Chapter 6
Hitch-hiking in the UK was hard work, decided Emerald Meyers as yet another car swished past while she stood at the side of the road with her thumb held out in a hopeful fashion. Either she now had amazing powers of invisibility (unlikely) or folks in merry old England were just plain mean-spirited and rude. Having spent most of her life hitching her way around California, Emerald was drawing some conclusions that were starting to make her wonder whether coming here was such a good idea after all.
Take the weather, for example. As she shouldered her heavy rucksack and resigned herself to trudging along the garbage-strewn grass verge, Emerald realised that she hadn’t seen proper sunshine or even felt warm since her plane had taken off from LAX. Having grown up taking bright blue skies, endless sunshine and splashes of citrus colours for granted, the leaden skies of Heathrow had come as something of a shock. Everything was just so goddamn grey here! The people, the sidewalks, the cafés – all were stained around the edges with the same murkiness. It was as though somebody had turned the colours down, the same mean entity that had also chosen to sprinkle the world with icy drizzle and whip up a spiteful wind. Just walking along the road was a battle as she bowed her head against the rain and tried to ignore the cold water trickling down her neck. Used to warmth, Emerald was ill-prepared for the English weather and her thin Californian clothes were as much use at keeping out the cold as they were at repelling the rain.
This wasn’t quite what she’d expected. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.
Where were the thatched cottages? The castles? (Emerald couldn’t wait to see a real live castle.) The morris dancers? At least she’d seen red buses and call boxes and been on a tube train. That tube ride was cool and so was the detour she’d made to see Oxford Street and Buckingham Palace. Emerald had grabbed a Starbucks (some things were the same the world over!) and then she’d posted several pictures to her Instagram a
ccount, which all her friends back in Sausalito had been way excited about. Within minutes, comments like OMG! You’re there! Sooo jealous! Say hi to Prince Harry! had been pinging up on her Instafeed, and Emerald had felt excitement rise in her like a hot-air balloon.
Emerald was half English, something her girlfriends found very exotic, and she had dreamed for years about actually seeing the country for herself. She wasn’t daft enough to imagine that she’d bump into Prince Harry (although he did like American girls, or so she’d heard, and with her long blonde hair and blue eyes Emerald had secretly wondered whether she did stand a chance), but she was excited about seeing her dad again and meeting the rest of her family. She had brothers and sisters that she’d never met! Older than her, of course – because her dad had only met Mom when he was travelling later on in life – but nonetheless she had an entire new family waiting for her! That was way, way cool and Emerald could hardly wait to meet them all at last. Ever since Mom had told her the truth (and to be fair Emerald had long suspected that the stork hadn’t delivered her and that Jim Morrison couldn’t possibly be her dad), she’d been dreaming about this moment and planning it too. She’d had to wait until she was eighteen in order to get her own passport, but the minute her birthday had arrived Emerald had completed the forms and been on the phone to arrange her trip – and now here she was! In England and, according to Google Maps, only twenty-five miles away from Polwenna Bay.
Her mom wasn’t convinced this trip was a good idea, but Leaf would no more have dreamed of stopping her daughter than she would of cutting her own long blonde hair or settling down in one place for more than five minutes. A perpetual flower child, Leaf Meyers was more concerned with campaigning against oil pipelines or being a birthing partner for the various women she met at the Outreach Centre than she was about what Emerald was up to.
“You have to be free to follow your own path,” she’d always said, which Emerald’s friends all thought was fantastic. They were wildly jealous of Emerald’s freedom and of her pretty Mom with her flowing skirts, all jangling bells and shedding sequins. They loved the fact that Emerald was allowed to stay up as late as she wanted. If Emerald had envied them their mommies dressed in jeans and sneakers, their neat backyards and their cars that weren’t held together with love beads and hope, then she’d kept this to herself. Now that she was older she could see that Mom had done her best. Besides, Leaf had only been young herself – not much older than Emerald was now, really – when she’d had her daughter.
Emerald’s dad had been a mystery. All Emerald had known was that Mom had met him in San Francisco at a party and that he was English and quite a bit older than her. They’d had a great time and travelled together for a while, and then he’d gone home again before Emerald was born. Apart from him being fun and kind and very handsome, Emerald hadn’t been told much more. Over the years he’d become a distant fantasy figure, a sort of mixture of Hugh Grant, Dick Van Dyke and Mr Darcy. Life was full and busy, Leaf was a fun mommy and since lots of the other kids Emerald grew up with didn’t have fathers on the scene either, she never felt his lack.
A bit like having a father in her life, school too was optional in Leaf’s view; because they moved about so much, Emerald had wound up being taught at home. Not that she and Leaf had actually gotten much done in terms of traditional academia, but there had been lots of nature walks, poetry and listening to Hendrix. Later, when Mom had hooked up with an ex English teacher (a gentle bearded soul with faded blue eyes and a huge collection of books), Emerald, a voracious reader, had been in heaven.
Mike. That was his name. As she trudged along the side of the A38, lorries rumbling past like monsters and with her glittery sandals rubbing her heels, Emerald recalled him with fondness. There’d been quite a few father figures drifting in and out of her young life – some better than others, it had to be said. Chuck with the motor bike had been fun and cowboy Mac, who’d taught her to ride on a barrel-racing pony, had been a big favourite too. Emerald had broken her heart when Mom had moved on from him, although admittedly this had been more about leaving Pepper the pony behind than worrying about Mac, who chewed tobacco and smelled funny.
Mike had definitely been one of the good guys. He’d walked away after a year or so, which always tended to happen, but while he had been around he’d chatted about books and writing and taught her so much about literature that the Brontës and Jane Austen and Lord Byron now felt like best friends.
Emerald was rarely without her nose in a book and she loved writing too. Her most cherished dream was to be a writer. Now that she was in England, the place that had inspired her literary heroes, Emerald was determined to make this dream come true. She’d already started a blog and filled several pages of her new diary too, although with these failed hitch-hiking attempts and being thrown off the coach in Saltash because her ticket was only supposed to take her to Plymouth, she was feeling more Jack Kerouac than Brontë. Her feet were sore, she was cold and (although she hated to admit it) she was also feeling a little homesick. Still, writers had to suffer, right? And experience new stuff too. And take risks.
Coming to England to see her father and meet her family was all of these things…
It was only when she was in her teens that Emerald had started to ask questions. Leaf had done her best to avoid them for a long while; she hated confrontation and tended to skim over the surface of life’s trickier issues like a pond skater. Nevertheless, Emerald’s determination had eventually worn her mom down, until Emerald had a name and some sketchy details to be working on. It hadn’t taken much more than a few clicks on Google and a scoot around Facebook to trace her father and a whole bunch of siblings she’d never known about. Suddenly Emerald’s identity had been transformed. She was no longer an only child with a rootless mother who’d floated the two of them all around California. Instead, she was a member of a huge family who’d lived in Cornwall like forever, and in a clifftop house that looked as though it belonged in a du Maurier novel.
Rebecca had to be Emerald’s all-time favourite book and now she knew why! Her family came from the very place the novel had been written! Cornwall was in her blood and she’d never had any idea. All the time she’d read about Maxim de Winter, imagined the overgrown garden at Manderley and pictured the beach with wild waves tearing up the silvery sand, that place had really existed and her family lived there. It was just like something out of a story and Emerald had been so excited. This was awesome!
Her father had been shocked when she’d contacted him via Facebook – which was fair enough, Emerald had thought. It couldn’t have been easy for him to have found out that he had a teenage daughter when he was innocently flicking through his social media messages. He’d come out to visit a couple of times now and she liked him a lot and could see why he and Leaf had hooked up. They were two peas in an easy-going, carefree and (back then, she imagined) stoned pod. Having spent time with her newly discovered father, Emerald was keen to come to the UK and meet the brothers and sisters he’d told her all about. Her father had promised her that they were equally keen to meet her and that soon, very soon, he’d arrange a trip. He called her regularly and they Skyped a lot, but whenever she asked him again about her visit or raised the possibility of speaking to the rest of the family, the subject was swiftly changed. It was one of her mom’s classic avoidance tricks too and Emerald was instantly on her guard.
Another lorry trundled by, the driver pointedly ignoring her outstretched thumb. Jeez, these British truckers were miserable! Emerald hoisted her rucksack onto her other shoulder and plodded on. She was always hitching in California and never failed to get a ride. Granted, out there the sun was usually out and she looked pretty good – all tanned body, white vest and swishy ponytail – whereas here she resembled a drowned rat. That probably had a lot to do with it. No wonder England had so many amazing authors. If it rained this much everyone was inside writing!
If she was honest, Emerald was starting to feel a little underprepared for her
big adventure. During her bus journey to Saltash all she’d seen of England were acres of freeway, and raindrops trickling down the steamed-up bus window. It couldn’t be that far to walk to Polwenna Bay, surely? England was tiny, right? She gritted her teeth and trudged on. Emerald wasn’t a quitter. She clearly didn’t get this side of her personality from her dad or her mom, both of whom struck her as lovely but total dreamers, so it must be a throwback gene to someone else. Maybe someone she was only hours away from meeting? A sister? A brother or maybe even a granny? Emerald knew she had a grandmother in Cornwall and she could hardly wait to meet her. She’d always wanted a grandmother.
It had been worth spending all her savings on a plane ticket, Emerald told herself firmly. Even if she was cold and wet and feeling a bit lost, this was still the right thing to do. She could hardly wait to see her father’s face when he saw her. He was going to be so surprised. Her fingers were itching to message him, but so far she’d been able to resist. It was tempting to call his cell and ask him to come and pick her up, but she’d been dreaming about this moment for so long – the knock on the front door and the cries of delight when her family saw her there at last – that she wasn’t going to let a bit of silly old rain spoil things now. No way, siree!
The sun was coming out now anyhow, edging the pewter clouds with gold and drying up the drizzle. As though in direct response to the brightening day, Emerald felt her spirits rise too. Everything was going to be perfect. She just knew it! Just moments later a car pulled up alongside and the window hissed down.
“You look drenched, love!” A middle-aged woman with a couple of children squashed in the back seat and plugged into earbuds was peering out at her, looking concerned. “Can I give you a lift somewhere?”
Talk about the Law of Attraction! Her mom would say this was the Universe delivering up what she wanted in response to her positive thinking. Leaf loved stuff like this and right at this moment so did Emerald. Go the Universe!
Recipe for Love: A gorgeous Cornish romance (Polwenna Bay Book 5) Page 6
