Bluebell's Christmas Magic: A perfect and heart-warming cosy Christmas romance for 2019

by Marie Laval

  A solemn-looking waiter placed an ice bucket on the table and proceeded to uncork a bottle of champagne. There was a discreet popping sound, and he poured some wine into Piers’s flute.

  He nodded. ‘Perfect.’ And the waiter filled their glasses.

  Piers raised his glass. ‘Let’s have a toast. To us and a long and enjoyable relationship.’

  What was he playing at? One minute he had more or less accused her of theft and deception, and the next he was treating her to champagne. All through the meal, he was charming and attentive, and it was hard to determine if she was reading too much into his words and the way he looked at her, or if he was back to his old tricks and flirting with her again.

  ‘Damn, the bottle is empty,’ Piers said as he poured the last drop of champagne into his glass. ‘Shall we have another?’

  She shook her head. ‘Not for me, thank you.’ She’d only had a glass, but whether it was because she wasn’t used to it or because Piers was making her uncomfortable, it tasted like acid and had given her stomach cramps.

  Leaning across the table, he grabbed hold of her hand before she realised what he was doing and turned it over to stroke the inside of her wrist. ‘Lovely, sexy Cassie.’

  She pulled her hand back in shock. ‘What are you doing?’

  He sighed and combed his fingers into his mop of light blond hair, once again giving her his trademark boyish grin. ‘You need to loosen up, darling. Nobody likes a girl who can’t enjoy a bit of fun. In business, like in personal relationships, you have to be flexible to succeed. A little “give and take” goes a long way. Now about the small matter of Bluebell Cottage…’

  He stopped talking as a waitress was bringing them coffee and chocolate truffles. ‘Where were we? Ah yes, as you know Gabrielle Ashville is breathing down my neck about the estate not being as profitable as she had hoped, and I need to find extra sources of revenue. Bluebell would bring a lot more money as a holiday cottage, so I’m afraid I am going to have to terminate your grandfather’s lease in the spring… unless he agrees to a substantial increase in rent.’

  ‘How substantial?’

  ‘With the cottage being on the large side and located in the centre of the village, I think I can ask for at least two thousand pounds a month.’

  Cassie had been expecting it, but her disappointment was still acute. ‘There’s no way my grandfather can come up with that kind of money. It’s almost triple what he’s been paying so far.’

  Piers shrugged. ‘I’m afraid it’s only what Charlie and Gabrielle would expect.’

  ‘But my granddad has lived in that house for over forty years!’

  ‘Perhaps it’s time for him to move… and for you too. It can’t be fun to live with the old man, however entertaining he is. However…’ He popped a truffle in his mouth, leaving a dusting of cocoa on his lips. ‘There is another possibility.’

  ‘Oh?’

  He licked the cocoa powder from his lips, and looked at her. ‘It’s no secret that I’ve always found you attractive. I booked a room here for the afternoon. Come up with me and we’ll talk no more about the lease for your grandfather’s house.’

  Cassie recoiled in shock. She had been right to be wary… A wave of nausea rose inside her, but she took a few deep breaths and tried to remain calm. Her hands shaking, she folded her napkin on the table, picked up her handbag from the floor and stood up.

  ‘You can stick your room and your champagne,’ she said in a quiet but clear voice. ‘I wonder what Gabrielle would think about your “give and take” approach to business. I bet she wouldn’t take too kindly to her estate manager blackmailing women employees into sleeping with him.’

  His grin froze and his eyes became hard. ‘It’s your word against mine, Cassie. You are making a big mistake by threatening me. Don’t you know what is at stake here for you?’

  ‘I do.’ And it was making her sick with worry, but the alternative was even worse. ‘Goodbye, Piers.’ Without warning he grabbed hold of her arm and pulled her towards him. He was a big man, and his fingers held her in an iron grip.

  ‘You led me on,’ he said between clenched teeth. ‘All this time, you smiled and teased, and let me touch you, you little bitch.’

  She swallowed hard, a feeling of guilt and self-loathing almost overwhelming her. He was right, in a way. She should have been more assertive, should have pushed him away before instead of tolerating his behaviour and hoping that he would stop by himself.

  ‘You’re hurting me,’ she said in a stronger voice, although she felt anything but strong inside.

  ‘Consider yourself fired,’ he spat and let go of her so suddenly she stumbled backwards, attracting glances from people at nearby tables.

  Holding her bag tightly, her eyes swimming with tears of shame and rage, she hurried across the restaurant to the lobby where she retrieved her duffle coat, and rushed out of the door.

  Once outside, she ran into the deserted park, crying and gagging and heaving, bent double and was sick behind a bush.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  ‘Come in, my dear.’ The woman peeled her gloves and beret off, patted her curly grey hair back into place, and gestured for him to follow her into the kitchen.

  ‘You were very kind to give me a lift. I don’t know what I would have done without you… You’re that nice young man who is staying at Belthorn, aren’t you?’

  Stefan smiled. ‘I am indeed staying at Belthorn, but it’s a while since anyone called me young or nice.’ Although thanks to Cassie, that morning he felt relaxed, happy and carefree for the first time in ages.

  He pointed at the woman’s shopping bags he was carrying. ‘Where do you want these?’

  ‘Put them on the table and sit down while I make us a drink. You must be hungry too. I have some shortbread biscuits from our village bakery. The girl may come from Spain, but she knows how to bake proper shortbread.’

  He pulled out a chair and sat down as she busied herself making tea. He didn’t dare tell her that he wasn’t keen on tea. He’d just have to smile and drink up.

  ‘Here you are,’ she said a moment later as she placed a plate of biscuits and a mug of hot tea in front of him.

  ‘I realise I didn’t introduce myself. I’m Gwendolyn Parker.’

  He stood up to shake her hand. ‘Stefan Lambert.’ Her name was familiar. ‘Are you the primary school head teacher, by any chance?’

  She took a shortbread finger and bit into it. ‘Retired head teacher, thank heavens. I didn’t realise my notoriety had spread all the way to France.’

  He smiled. ‘It hasn’t, but Mason Austin mentioned your name a couple of weeks ago. He said you were a gold mine of information about the village.’

  Stefan drank a sip of tea and repressed a grimace. It was strong and bitter, despite the milk the woman had poured in. ‘I was hoping to talk to you one of these days about a diary I found at Belthorn.’

  Curiosity shone in her eyes. ‘A diary? Tell me about it.’

  ‘It’s the diary of a French pilot who stayed at Belthorn for a few months in 1919. His name was—’

  ‘André Vaillant.’ She looked at him. ‘Am I right?’

  He nodded. ‘You heard about him.’

  ‘Indeed. His love affair with a local girl created a scandal at the time, all the more when it ended in terrible tragedy.’

  ‘Ruth Merriweather drowned at Wolf Tarn.’

  ‘That’s right. The poor girl died, and her unborn baby too, of course…’

  He blinked in surprise. ‘She was pregnant?’

  ‘I’m afraid so.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  ‘My grandmother was the village midwife. She told me about Ruth’s affair with her French sweetheart.’

  ‘There are people who believe that Ruth’s drowning was no accident, and that she wanted to die because Vaillant had abandoned her.’ That was what Cassie believed.

  ‘Suicide was indeed put forward at the time, but there were other rumours too.’ She
sighed. ‘It’s such a long time ago. It wouldn’t do any good to raise the ugly ghosts of the past now.’

  ‘I’m not sure it would do any good,’ he said, ‘but Ruth’s family – and Vaillant’s relatives if he still has any – might be interested to know what really happened.’

  The woman munched on her shortbread, looking thoughtful. ‘I shall think about it. There is another family to consider, you see, and I don’t want to stir up bad feelings in the village.’

  She was making him even more curious. Whom might she be talking about? It was however obvious she wouldn’t say anything now, so he finished his tea and rose to his feet.

  ‘If you change your mind, please let me know. Thanks for the tea and biscuits.’

  She looked at him and chuckled. ‘You don’t like tea much, do you?’

  He was about to shake his head in denial, but something told him that Miss Parker would see straight through him. He nodded. ‘Not much. I prefer coffee. Black. No sugar.’

  She didn’t look in the least offended. ‘I’ll make sure I remember.’

  Back in Red Moss, he wandered around the streets for a while. Nestling in the valley and surrounded by snowy peaks, the village looked pretty and welcoming. Christmas garlands dangled from lampposts, almost every door was adorned with festive wreaths, and posters stuck in shop windows announced the Christmas Fair. The cold breeze smelled of snow, wood smoke and pine trees. Children ran around laughing in the courtyard of the small primary school. Passersby smiled or nodded at him, some he’d seen in the pub and others he had never met before.

  The warm, fuzzy feeling he’d had since waking up with Cassie in his arms returned, only stronger. It was as if the wind had blown away the thick, stifling grey fog that had weighed down on him for months and he could see clearly for the first time. Perhaps he could stay at Red Moss, find a house, and make the place his home?

  He glanced at a few shop windows as he walked around the village. One of them offered an eclectic mix of clothing and jewellery, expensive stationery and artwork. A display of quirky necklaces in the window attracted his attention. Among them was a tiny, delicate white swan, carved in what looked like porcelain, hanging from a fine gold chain.

  A swan… It was perfect for the woman who had rescued him from his black moods, and given him a reason to smile again, to hope again.

  The door chimed when he pushed it open. A petite woman with pink hair looked up from a book she was reading behind the counter and smiled.

  ‘Hi! It’s nice to see you. How are you doing?’ she asked, as if she knew him.

  He frowned. He was sure he’d never seen her before. ‘Fine, thanks… I’d like the swan necklace in the window, please.’

  Her smile widened. ‘These necklaces are made by a local artist. She made several of the others, but only one swan,’ she said as she bent down to reach out for the necklace in the window.

  She brought the necklace to the counter and held it up to show him. ‘Did you know that in Roman mythology, the swan was associated with Venus, the goddess of love?’

  His face heated up. ‘I didn’t… but it sounds about right.’

  She cocked her head to one side and gave him a wistful smile. ‘There is also a local legend, a rather lovely one, I don’t know if you heard of it. The Swan and—’

  ‘The Hunchback,’ he finished. ‘Yes, I know of it.’ Pity the artist hadn’t made a porcelain hunchback. He could have bought it for himself…

  Ten minutes later, with the necklace all wrapped up in pretty pink paper and safe in the breast pocket of his coat, he decided to call at the garage to ask Mason if he fancied a bite to eat at the Eagle and Child. The fact that he, who had come to Red Moss to be alone, was actively seeking someone else’s company didn’t hit him until he walked into the garage and smiled at Brenda in response to her enthusiastic wave from behind her office’s glass window. What a difference a night filled with the love of a gorgeous woman made…

  Mason welcomed his suggestion with eagerness. ‘I’ve been up to my neck with breakdown calls since dawn. I need a beer and an hour of peace and quiet. Give me a minute to scrub my hands and make myself presentable.’

  Fifteen minutes later, both men ordered pie and chips and half a pint of beer, and sat down at a table near the window overlooking the main street.

  ‘Ah… That’s better.’ Mason smacked his lips after drinking a long gulp of his beer. ‘How did you get down from Belthorn? I would have thought the road impassable.’

  ‘Tim cleared the snow with his tractor so that Cassie and I could drive down. Without him we would have been snowed in, especially as I had crashed the Range Rover on the lane last night.’

  Mason looked up, an incredulous glint in his eyes. ‘Again? It wasn’t that Grey Friar or one of Belthorn’s other ghosts that scared you off the road by any chance?’

  ‘No. It was only the snow and my bad driving.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it, mate. The lane to Belthorn is notoriously treacherous. How did Cassie take it – having to spend the night at Belthorn? She loathes the place.’

  ‘Well… no, she seemed completely… ahem… fine about it.’ His ears and cheeks felt hot suddenly. Damn. He was blushing again…

  Thankfully, Mason didn’t appear to notice. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘By the way, do you know how Cassie is getting on with her new tyres? I can’t believe I didn’t check what was wrong with her old ones. It turned out they weren’t even punctured.’

  Stefan put his pint down. ‘They weren’t?’

  ‘No. They were only deflated. The valves must have been faulty or damaged.’

  Could Morse have been fiddling with the valves that Saturday afternoon at Belthorn? And could he confide his suspicions to Mason and ask for his help, or should he keep them to himself and deal with Morse in his own way?

  He looked out of the window, and watched people go in and out of the shops for a minute or two. Much of the snow had been cleared from the roads, and a narrow path had been dug out on the pavements, but the scene was still very wintry. It couldn’t be a bigger contrast with where he had been the previous year. Then there had been only scorching heat, vast planes of red or golden sand, grit and rocks… and war. He knew and accepted the risks, even though he had never truly believed that anything would happen to him. He had got out unscathed from too many perilous situations before, and that had made him arrogant and over-confident.

  His fingers tightened around his glass. Because of him people had died. Good, innocent people. Women, elderly people, children… and Isa, who would never have another Christmas.

  If he had learned anything since, it was that he couldn’t handle everything alone. He may have only just met Mason but there was a connection, and not just because they both knew about engines, cars and bikes. Mason was a good man, and he was a friend of Cassie’s. He could trust him.

  ‘Actually, there was something I wanted to talk to you about, although you may think I’m mad.’

  Mason put his knife and fork down, leant back in his chair and smiled. ‘Go on.’

  In a few short sentences, Stefan related Morse’s visit to Belthorn, and Cassie’s encounter with him on the road moments after she found that her van’s tyres were flat.

  ‘It could be a coincidence, of course, although having faulty valves on two tyres at the same time is highly unusual,’ Mason commented. ‘Morse strikes me as an oddball, but as far as I know, people seem to like him. I can ask around, if you like.’

  ‘I would appreciate it.’

  Mason smiled. ‘I’m glad Cassie has you to look out for her. She’s a smashing girl and a good friend. She deserves… well… I suppose she deserves to be happy and well cared for.’

  Once again, Stefan’s face felt hot. He had no idea if he was the man who would make Cassie happy, but he would make sure he’d look out for her. He grunted a non-committal noise and drank up his beer.

  Mason went back to work, leaving Stefan with a couple of hours on his hands before meeting the Mou
ntain Rescue Service at Patterdale. He ordered a coffee, took his phone out and googled Morse. Unsurprisingly he found that there were a lot of men called Morse.

  It was time to narrow the search. Patrick had mentioned that Morse had worked in campsites around the country, and he remembered a couple of names – Wizard’s Point in Devon and King’s Forest in Yorkshire – which may be enough to triangulate information. He inputted several combinations but once again drew blanks. He put his phone down with a frustrated sigh. This was pointless. He didn’t even know what he was looking for.

  What if he tried Manchester? That’s where Morse was from. Patrick had also mentioned a luxury retirement home there. He picked up the phone again. This time he got a hit, one link to the crime reports section in the Manchester Herald. He clicked on the newspaper link. It was an article dated three years before regarding the theft of cash and valuables at an old people’s home in Prestwich. Police had interviewed all residents and members of staff but their enquiries had unfortunately been inconclusive. Several names were listed, among which was Darren Morse who worked there as a caretaker.

  Stefan was about to look for more information when he glanced out of the pub’s window and spotted Joseph Bell standing across the main street, looking at a piece of paper and frowning. Suddenly the old man staggered and sat down heavily on a nearby bench.

  Stefan grabbed hold of his coat, waved goodbye to the waitress and rushed out. By the time he reached Bell, Joseph had slumped on the bench, his head in his hands.

  Leaning down, Stefan put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Is everything all right?’

  Cassie’s grandfather looked up. ‘Ah, it’s you, son.’ He nodded. ‘I’m having a rest. My knee is playing up.’ He grimaced and rubbed his knee. ‘Arthritis, you see. It must be the weather.’

  The paper he was holding trembled between his fingers. It looked like a bank statement. When he saw Stefan looking at it, he stuffed it into his pocket and held his hand out. ‘Help me up, son.’