The Village Green Bookshop: A Feel-Good Escape for All Book Lovers from the Bestselling Author of The Telephone Box Library

by Rachael Lucas

  ‘Well, that’s good to know . . . and now that you’ve saved my eggs, I better get off.’ Who on earth was this person speaking words in her voice through her mouth, but actually sounding – was she actually being flirty?

  ‘Any time.’ He tapped lightly on the roof of her car and then stepped back, still looking at her with the same slightly amused expression.

  It wasn’t until they’d driven down to the bottom of the village and out past the sign thanking people for driving carefully in Little Maudley that Ben exploded.

  ‘Oh my God Mum, I can’t believe you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Eggs. He handed you eggs.’

  She turned to him, one hand on the wheel. ‘And?’

  ‘You don’t know who that was?’

  ‘He looked familiar. Does he read the news or something?’

  Ben dropped his head into his hands and groaned in disbelief.

  ‘It’s Jake Lovatt. You know, the England player who broke his leg in the Championship?’

  A vague recollection of news articles, horrible clickbait videos on Facebook and front-page photos spun through her mind. She wasn’t a football fan by any means, but living with Ben meant that it was ever-present on TV, on the radio, being talked about with his friends. Phil had never taken an interest, claiming he wasn’t a football person – so it had always been Hannah who’d spent Saturday mornings standing in the pouring rain watching Ben play, learning the offside rule (well, mostly – she was still a bit hazy on it) and cheering him on. It felt like the least she could do, given his father’s lack of interest. And now here she was presented with one of the biggest players in the country and all she could do was – oh God, she’d flirted with him. He probably got that all the time. She cringed.

  ‘I remember now.’ God, she was actually blushing at the thought of it.

  ‘And you acted like that.’

  ‘Like what?’

  Ben groaned. ‘You acted like a mum.’

  Hannah rolled her eyes.

  She drove home, not even minding the hideous traffic on the motorway, thinking about how excited she was to be moving to Little Maudley and daydreaming about the possibility of her very own tiny little bookshop. And she definitely didn’t think at all about the green-eyed, egg-rescuing ex-footballer. She smiled secretly to herself as she pulled into Beulah Avenue and saw Phil’s car parked outside. A tiny little flirt once in a while was probably good for the soul. It wasn’t as if it was going to go anywhere.

  Chapter Nine

  It was a grey and slightly damp Saturday morning – August seemed to have forgotten it was summer and the weather had changed, bringing leaden skies and an abrupt end to summer – when Jake walked the dogs down to the park. Meg and Mabel, both yellow labradors, were delighted to have an extra-long walk and trotted along by his side, tongues lolling.

  Despite it only being half nine in the morning, the park between Little Maudley and Much Maudley, its neighbouring (and even more upmarket) village, was already busy. The newly built tennis courts were full, as they always were for a couple of months after Wimbledon time when everyone fancied themselves as the new Serena Williams or Andy Murray.

  Over on the far side of the park, shaded by horse chestnut trees, he could see a group of lads messing about with a ball and a man in a tracksuit laying out some colourful flat plastic cones. There was a moment, as he picked up the ball and threw it for the dogs, when he found himself hesitating, and then he headed towards them.

  He was standing on the sidelines, feeling awkward, half waiting to be noticed and half wondering what he was supposed to do. Despite everything, it felt like a massive ego trip to actually just turn up and say – what?

  And then the problem was solved.

  ‘Oh my God,’ said one of the boys, nudging another. They both shot him a sneaky glance.

  He was used to it – the first time it happened when he’d signed for Southampton at the age of seventeen, he’d gone to the shop with Aunty Jane and been surprised when the man behind the counter had pulled off a piece of receipt paper and asked for his autograph. He’d never even thought about what his signature should look like, so he’d just scribbled a vague doodle on the paper and given a shy smile before leaving, face scarlet with embarrassment. But as the years had passed and he’d adjusted to it, he’d learned to make himself invisible – despite what the papers would have you think, it wasn’t that difficult. A baseball cap, travelling early in the morning or late at night – just keeping your head down was the secret.

  ‘All right?’ The man in the tracksuit came over. ‘Heard you’ve been doing some training with the lads over at Ridgeway. How’s it going?’

  ‘Good, thanks,’ Jake said, picking up the ball that had been dropped at his feet and throwing it as far as he could. They both watched as the two dogs hurtled off in hot pursuit. He hadn’t actually done anything more with them – having pretty much decided straight off that they didn’t need him – but he couldn’t face an inquisition, so he just let it drop.

  ‘Have you come to check us out? We’re all a bit knackered – end of summer, everyone’s boiling hot, and half of them haven’t done any exercise all holidays.’

  ‘I dunno, you’ve got a few decent players. That lad at the back communicates well. That’s always a good start.’

  The man beamed. ‘I’m Gary, by the way.’

  ‘I guessed.’ Jake shook his hand. ‘Beth in the village shop mentioned you guys were looking for some help with coaching?’

  Gary took a step back and started to laugh, which turned into a fit of coughing. ‘And you’re offering your services?’ He chuckled to himself.

  Jake nodded. ‘If you’re still looking for someone.’

  ‘You’re offering to train this lot?’ The boys, who had gathered and were hovering close by, weren’t saying anything. ‘This is the quietest I’ve seen them in – well, forever,’ Gary added.

  ‘I don’t need them quiet,’ Jake said, turning to catch their eyes. ‘If I do take this on, I’ll need as much communication as I can get, and I’ll need you all focused on what the rest of the team is doing at all times.’

  Not one of them said a word. They looked shell-shocked, and more than a little bit like rabbits in headlights.

  ‘Well, this is a first,’ said Gary. ‘Nobody got anything to say?’

  They shook their heads, still mute.

  Jake looked at him. ‘I understand you’ve had some trouble with your heart?’

  ‘Yeah, I just can’t spend as much time on my feet as I could. And you can’t coach while you’re sitting on the sidelines.’

  ‘True.’ Jake tapped the ball, which had rolled to his feet, back towards one of the taller boys in the team. ‘Come on then, let’s see what you lot are made of. Shall we do some tackling drills?’

  The boys played surprisingly well. Gary was a good coach – encouraging those who were quieter, nipping the occasional bit of teenage attitude in the bud and redirecting the mouthy ones. Jake was surprised by how much he enjoyed being back at grassroots level, where there was nothing to focus on but the love of the game.

  ‘You certain you want to give up your Saturday mornings to do this?’ Gary sat on a folding travel chair, clearly worn out from his exertions. The boys were dismantling the net, stacking up the cones and messing about with the ball. In the distance, several cars lined up by the road, waiting for them to finish.

  ‘Yes, I am.’ Jake nodded. ‘It’s not like I have anything else to do, to be honest.’

  ‘I’d have thought you’d be busy doing lots of . . .’ He tailed off. ‘I dunno. What do retired footballers do on a weekend?’

  ‘Not a lot.’ Jake shrugged, smiling. ‘I’m single, no kids, nothing like that.’

  ‘Sounds bloody peaceful to me,’ Gary laughed.

  They shook hands, swapped mobile numbers and agreed to meet up to discuss the practicalities later in the week. It was the most normal thing Jake had done in a long time, and he liked it. If
he could keep it out of the papers and they didn’t come sniffing around, he could actually have a stab at a normal life. But it depended on people not mouthing off to the press.

  The last thing he needed was anyone getting wind of what was going on at home. The newspapers would have a field day – he could just imagine the headlines. Despite everything, he felt a fierce sense of loyalty towards the mother he’d never known – and to Sarah, who seemed so fragile and broken by everything. She’d been at rock bottom when she’d turned up on his doorstep and he felt, somehow, that helping her to find her way out of what had brought her to him was the least he could do. If she could develop some self-confidence, she’d be far less likely to end up in another relationship where she was treated the way that Joe had treated her.

  He’d picked up enough intel over the last twelve months to know that Beth at the village shop was a complete gossip hound. Anything she heard was shared with the next person who came into the shop – so he’d just have to try his best to avoid her. If there was one thing his time in the Premiership had taught him, it was that it was possible to be discreet if he had to.

  With that in mind, he walked home with the dogs and then drove quickly into Bletchingham instead of doing his shopping in the village. It mightn’t fit in with the much-repeated call to support local business, but he decided that he’d go easy on himself for once. He picked up some nice bits and pieces for dinner.

  Back at the house, he unloaded the dogs from the back of the car and whistled for them to follow him inside. The sky had cleared and it looked like being a nice afternoon. Sarah, however, was nowhere to be seen. The only evidence she’d been up was that the dishwasher had been emptied and the wellies he’d bought her were missing from the porch. Perhaps she’d actually ventured out for a walk? He unpacked the shopping and made himself a coffee. If she wasn’t about, he might as well sit down and see what was happening with today’s Premier League games.

  What felt like moments later, he woke with a start as the door banged. The coffee he’d made stood undrunk on the table beside him, and the game had almost finished. All this doing nothing was turning him into the sort of person who dozed off on a Saturday afternoon. Thank God he was going to be working with the kids in the village.

  ‘Hello,’ said Sarah, walking into the room and perching on the arm of the sofa. Her dark eyes were watchful, as always. She pushed a strand of hair back from her face, tucking it behind her hear.

  ‘Hi. Fell asleep watching TV,’ he said, shaking his head and laughing. ‘Where have you been? Out for a walk?’

  ‘Went to the shop,’ she said.

  ‘In the village?’

  ‘Yeah. Thought maybe I should venture out a bit.’

  ‘That’s good.’ He hoped Beth hadn’t winkled out the story of his secret past before Sarah had even realized what was going on.

  ‘I – I just want to say thanks, again,’ Sarah said, hesitantly. ‘You didn’t need to put me up.’

  ‘Course I did,’ he said, gruffly. ‘You’re family. It’s the least I could do.’

  ‘I know, but – I mean, I could have been anyone.’

  ‘But you’re not. Have you told – I mean, does anyone—’

  ‘Know I’m here?’ She shook her head. ‘Nobody to tell, really. That’s the thing about growing up the way I did. You sort of lose people along the way. Then when Mum died, I lost myself.’

  ‘How did you know where to find me?’ It had been nagging at him for ages. He’d tried to stay below the radar, and he thought he’d done a decent job of it.

  She looked at him for a moment, then laughed. ‘It’s not exactly hard – you’re famous.’

  ‘Hardly.’ He still struggled with the idea that people knew who he was – or thought they did, at any rate. In his head he was still the same lad from back home. That’s why he found the whole idea of fame so uncomfortable. Other friends of his had lapped up the whole footballer lifestyle – but to him it was everything he hated. He loved the game, loved the camaraderie that came with being part of a team – but he hated the whole high-fashion, image-conscious bit.

  ‘Well, anyway. All I had to do was Google a bit, use my initiative . . . it wasn’t that hard. I don’t know what made me find you.’ She looked down at the floor and scuffed her toe along the edge of the rug. ‘But I’m glad I did.’

  ‘Me too.’

  Chapter Ten

  ‘I can’t believe you’re just upping sticks and disappearing to the sticks.’

  A surprise farewell-to-Manchester party was Hannah’s idea of hell, which was probably why Katie had left her planner open on her kitchen dresser a week before the event with HANNAH’S SURPRISE PARTY written in bold and highlighted in such a way that it was hard to miss. It meant that Hannah – who would otherwise have been in the uniform of filthy, dust-covered leggings and t-shirt that she’d been wearing as she blitzed the house and packed up their belongings – was showered and dressed in something respectable, and had even managed to get a cancellation at the salon so her hair was falling in sleek waves instead of its usual tangled, curly muddle.

  Katie had gathered all their friends – she had a knack for it, in a way that Hannah could only admire – and they were all hovering around Katie’s kitchen island, scoffing the delicious and expensive M&S canapés that had been delivered by UberEats earlier.

  ‘There’ll be no getting food delivered in the middle of nowhere,’ Georgie said darkly. She tucked a long strand of blonde hair behind her ear and popped a piece of sushi into her perfectly painted scarlet mouth. Georgie worked for an investment bank and was – like Katie – one of those friends who made everyone else feel like a scruffy underachiever. She had no children, but was embroiled in a complicated sort of relationship with Naheem, who was unhappily married but seemed to show no signs of leaving his wife. As Hannah watched, she picked up her phone and started typing into it furiously.

  ‘In the immortal words of Nora Ephron,’ began Katie, looking at Hannah and laughing as they chorused in unison: ‘He’s never going to leave her.’

  ‘I know.’ Georgie put her phone face down on the work surface and scoffed another two pieces of sushi. ‘Anyway, enough about me. What’s the deal with Phil staying here while you disappear off to live in bucolic splendour?’

  Hannah took a large mouthful of wine and looked across the room at two of her other friends, who were laughing at something on a phone screen. ‘It’s fine,’ she said quickly. ‘I’m only going ASAP to make sure I get Ben away from this dodgy gang he’s been hanging around with – and of course Beth is keen to get moving as soon as she can.’

  She watched as a fleeting glance passed between Georgie and Katie. She knew what they thought – they’d made it clear often enough. Both of them felt like Phil didn’t pull his weight. They were probably right, but – well, sometimes it was easier not to rock the boat for the sake of a quiet life.

  ‘Maybe you’ll fall head over heels for some handsome farmer before he turns up.’

  ‘Not likely.’ Hannah laughed a little too brightly. She’d found herself thinking about the gorgeous footballer quite a lot over the last couple of weeks as she’d gone back and forth between Manchester and Little Maudley, learning the ropes and being taught the basics about shopkeeping and how the post office was run. Not once, though, had she seen him. Not that she’d been looking, of course. But daydreaming about him on the drive to and from Little Maudley seemed perfectly respectable. It wasn’t as if she and Phil had much of a sex life . . . in fact, if she was honest with herself, it had been quite some time since they’d done anything more than sleep together. Having Ben in the room next door was a bit offputting, but it wasn’t just that – they’d been together so long that in lots of ways they were more like friends than anything else. And (she made a face into her wine glass, thinking about it) you couldn’t just grab your mate and start snogging them, randomly. Katie caught her eye and raised an eyebrow.

  ‘What are you lost in thought about?’

>   Hannah giggled. ‘Nothing.’ She was hardly about to admit that she was contemplating whether or not snogging her best friend would be more or less surprising than leaping on an unsuspecting Phil when he walked in the door that evening.

  Later on, having been delivered back home slightly the worse for several glasses of wine and some celebration champagne, Hannah decided that maybe tonight was the night to actually break the drought. It had been . . . how long had it been? She couldn’t actually remember.

  Phil was lying on the sofa watching 8 out of 10 Cats when she lurched into the sitting room. She was aiming for more of a lazily seductive prowl, but someone had moved the pile of washing that sat permanently behind the door, so instead of shoving it open and it giving way slowly, it swung with force and hit the wall with a clatter and she fell through the gap, giggling.

  Smooth, she thought to herself. She straightened up, catching a glimpse of herself in the big mirror above the fireplace. Her hair looked good for once. Eyes still smoky, and the lipstick reapplied in the Uber home was a dark red. All in all, she decided, ruffling her hair and shaking it before turning to face him, she didn’t look too bad for the mother of a teenager. She readjusted her boobs in her bra.

  ‘You all right?’ Phil looked up from his prone position, a slightly quizzical expression on his face.

  ‘Yes.’ She sat down on the coffee table so she was looking down at him. Perfect position to launch herself into – well, she could launch herself on top, but that might freak him out a bit. It really had been bloody ages. She’d basically turned back into a virgin. Maybe she’d have forgotten how to do it altogether.

  ‘Are you okay?’ Phil repeated. ‘How much have you had to drink?’ He sat up, which completely scuppered her plans to lean over and tenderly kiss him on the mouth.

  ‘Just some wine. And some champagne.’ She eyed the bottle of brandy that was sitting on the bookshelf. ‘Maybe we should have a nightcap?’

  ‘I think you’ve probably had enough.’ He stood up. Well, this was going brilliantly. Hannah pushed herself up from the table so she was standing face to face with him. Phil looked slightly alarmed. His arms were rigid by his sides. She took one of his hands, which was balled in a fist. He looked at her again. ‘Han, are you okay?’