Joker in the Pack

by Elise Noble

  Hmm, my desire for acceptance battled against the prospect of an interrogation from every lady in the village. Was I ready for that level of scrutiny?

  No. Not yet. I just couldn’t do it.

  “I can certainly donate a selection of cakes, but I’m afraid I already have plans for this evening.”

  Her raised eyebrow said she didn’t quite believe me.

  “Uh, a conference call with a client,” I garbled. “In the United States. It’s been arranged for a while.”

  And now I’d have to pretend to be on the phone for an hour just in case she sent someone around to check.

  “In that case, you really must come to our next event.”

  “Absolutely. I’d love to.” Did she realise I had my fingers crossed behind my back? “Oh dear, look at the time. I’d better get going—I’ve got cakes to deliver to our other neighbours as well.”

  “I can save you some time there—Dennis and June at the far end are on one of those around-the-world cruises, and Samantha and Julian in between are commuters. They never get back until late on weekdays, and they’re out most of the weekend. Honestly, they’d be better off living in town.”

  Apart from the insane property prices, obviously.

  I ate the leftover cakes myself while catching up on web design work, and by the end of my first fortnight in Upper Foxford, that side of my life was up to date. I’d also begun making more money from eBay as more auctions ended, and four rooms in the cottage were pretty much habitable. Life began to get a little easier, apart from one small issue: loneliness.

  I’d always imagined that if I moved out of my London flat, it would be to shack up with Edward. Despite the rawness I felt from his fling, I still missed him, or at least his company. I longed for somebody to talk to as I pottered around the house, a soulmate to curl up next to on the sofa while I read a book on chilly evenings.

  Night-times were worst, when I had a cold double bed to myself. Would I ever meet another man? One who could love me even with those photos of my Taurus escapade plastered all over the internet? I was still getting messages every day about that, including one this morning from a Middle Eastern prince who wanted to marry me if I’d only help him to launder six million dollars through my bank account.

  I was still moping alone on Friday evening when I heard a quiet scratching coming from the back door. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up as I grabbed the poker from its spot beside the fireplace and tiptoed through to the kitchen.

  “Who’s there?”

  More scratching, followed by a plaintive miaow.

  A cat?

  I opened the door and a skinny tabby slunk between my legs, heading for a spot by the fridge and sniffing around. I recalled the tins of cat food I’d found in one of the kitchen cupboards. Could he be Aunt Ellie’s?

  “Do you live here, little one?”

  He wove in and out of my legs, and I could feel his ribs against my ankles.

  “Are you hungry? Let me find you something to eat.”

  He wolfed down a bowlful of Whiskas and a saucer of milk then stared up at me, eyes big.

  “Do you want more?”

  I opened another tin, and he ate that too.

  “You’re kind of cute. Do you have a name?”

  I reached down to scritch his head, and he purred softly. He’d been surviving on mice all this time, no doubt. There were plenty of them running around in the garden, which was something else that gave me the creeps, and I could hear their little paws pitter-pattering around inside the roof too. The sounds had given me several sleepless nights before I’d worked out what the noise must be.

  I’d never had a pet before, but there was a first time for everything, and a mouse-hunter certainly had appeal.

  “Let’s call you Twiglet, shall we?”

  He mewed in response.

  “I’ll take that as a yes.”

  Apart from the mice, I’d had to get used to the ominous creaks and groans as the house settled for the night. In London, I’d tuned out the slamming of car doors, the shouts of drunken revellers, and my upstairs neighbour clomping around, and now the relative silence kept me awake. Apart from the occasional hoot of an owl or the terrifying screams as a fox caught its prey, nights in Upper Foxford were as quiet as the grave.

  Twiglet did his best, but by the time another weekend drew to a close, I was craving human company. I couldn’t keep running to Maddie every time I felt lonely. She had enough on her plate at the hospital.

  So, on Monday morning, I pulled on my brave pants and ventured into Daisy’s café on the high street, gingerly scanning the menu on the table nearest to the door. Oh, thank goodness—no celery porridge in sight. In fact, the light lunches looked delicious, and they served afternoon tea as well. I’d always loved afternoon tea with Edward, usually at the Four Seasons or the Savoy, but those places were well out of my price range now. Daisy’s served a selection of crustless sandwiches with a scone and mini cakes for six pounds fifty.

  And Daisy herself turned out to be only a year older than me, living out my dream of running a bakery with a few tables for patrons to enjoy her delights. She loved to stop for a natter too, which allowed me to find out more about the local area as well as getting out for lunch each day.

  “I grew up in Lower Foxford,” she told me a week later over quiche. “It’s the next village but one, the other side of Middleton Foxford. You’ve got to give medieval people ten out of ten for originality with those names, huh?”

  “Are the villages that old?”

  “Lower Foxford appeared in the Doomsday book. If you take a walk around, there are some beautiful old Tudor cottages.”

  “I’ll do that one day, but for the moment, I’m using every spare second to sort out the mess in Aunt Ellie’s house.”

  “I heard she was addicted to online shopping. Is that true?”

  I gave a hollow laugh. “Is it ever. She seemed to buy six of everything, whether she had a use for them or not.”

  “The postman used to complain she was giving him a hernia. It was him who found her—did you know that?”

  “What do you mean, found her?”

  “Dead. On the couch. It was a Monday, so she’d been there over the weekend. All swelled up, he said, just like a beached whale.”

  I clutched at my stomach as I ran for the restroom at the back of the café, and luckily, I made it to the toilet before I lost my lunch. Aunt Ellie had died on the sofa? The sofa I’d been sitting on? Hell, I’d even slept on it that first night. The mere thought of that had me heaving again.

  “Are you okay?” Daisy passed me a handful of paper towels.

  I wiped at my mouth, but it was a few minutes before I felt well enough to walk back out to my table. Even then, the sight of my half-eaten food nearly sent me running back.

  “It’s just the sofa…” I explained, and Daisy clapped a hand over her mouth.

  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realise.”

  “How could you? I didn’t even know she’d died in the house. Someone told me the ambulance crew broke down the door to get to her, so I assumed they took her to hospital and she died there.”

  “I think the ambulance was just a formality.”

  “I have to get that sofa out of my living room.” The mere thought of it kept my stomach churning.

  Daisy rose to her feet. “The lunchtime crowd are all gone now. How about I close up for half an hour and give you a hand?”

  “Really? You’d do that?”

  “It’s the least I can do after the whole…” She gestured at the restroom. “You know.”

  Back at Lilac Cottage, we donned rubber gloves and stared at the evil brown monstrosity. I gave one arm a tentative tug, but it barely moved.

  Daisy wrinkled her nose. “Even with two of us, this is going to be difficult.”

  “This sofa is leaving the house today, even if I have to hack it to pieces with nail scissors.”

  “Do you have two pairs?”

 
; No, but I did have a brainwave. “I think Aunt Ellie had a saw in all the stuff she bought. I saw it a few days ago, if you’ll excuse the pun.”

  I’d grown immune to the piles of peril, but Daisy’s gasp as she followed me into the dining room reminded me just how bad they were.

  “Holy crap! I mean, I imagined Mrs. Rigby had a lot of nicknacks, but this is unreal.”

  “It was worse than this when I first arrived. Hold on, I think the saw was somewhere near the window.”

  I clambered over a couple of boxes containing George Foreman-esque grills, cursed under my breath as I stubbed my toe on a fancy plant stand, and emerged triumphant.

  “Here it is.”

  “Isn’t that a wood saw?”

  I didn’t know one type of saw from another. When we’d had to select our classes, I’d done home economics instead of woodwork.

  “If it can cut through wood, surely it must be able to go through a sofa?”

  “I guess.”

  Over the next hour, we sweated and swore as we sawed the disgusting thing in half, straight down the middle. Now that I knew that parts of the pattern most likely belonged to bodily fluids, I felt queasy the whole time.

  Stuffing flew everywhere and one of my eyes nearly got taken out by a wayward spring, but finally, we got the whole thing into the back garden next to the tumbledown shed I’d discovered last week. I had no idea what to do with the sofa from there, but at least it was out of the house. I’d worry about the next step later. Over a glass of wine with Maddie, most likely.

  Daisy glanced at her watch. “I really should get back to the café now.”

  “Thanks so much for your help, and I’m sorry it took so long.”

  She waved my apology away. “Nonsense. If I were in your position, I couldn’t have had that thing in the house a moment longer either.”

  “But still… Thank you. I’ll stop in tomorrow for lunch, okay?”

  She gave me a quick hug. “I promise not to mention dead people again.”

  I shuddered. “And I promise not to puke up your food.”

  “It’s a deal.”

  I smiled as she hurried off up the road. With Warren and Daisy, at least I’d made some new friends in the village.

  CHAPTER 12

  THE NEXT DAY, someone bid six hundred pounds on Eleanor’s TV and picked it up two hours later, leaving me with a handful of crisp twenty-pound notes. I celebrated by taking the bus into town and buying silicone sealant to fix the leaky edges around the bath. My life was just one big party.

  A party with no food, because in the evening, I put my freshly made lasagne into the oven and it refused to turn on. Wonderful. Did anything else want to go wrong?

  I shoved the lasagne dish into the freezer and pulled on my coat. With the money I’d made, I could just about afford to risk my taste buds at The Cock and Bull again and wash anything dodgy down with a glass of Prosecco.

  I’d expected the place to be quiet like last time, but the car park was full and cars overflowed out onto the grass verge, and even outside, I could hear music and the low hum of voices. A chalk sign outside the door gave the game away—I’d forgotten it was Wednesday. I perked up a little. Hadn’t Warren said the food was at its best during the weekly curry night?

  “How does this work?” I asked a passing waitress who was balancing more plates than a circus performer.

  “Pay a tenner at the bar, then grab a plate and help yourself to as much as you want.”

  “Where’s the food?”

  She jerked her head towards an archway on the far side of the room. “Through there.”

  The space looked packed, but I spotted an empty stool at the bar and decided to stop there for a drink first. I’d been on my feet most of the day.

  “What can I get you?” Jean asked.

  “Lime soda, please. I can’t believe how busy it is tonight.”

  “People come from miles around. The chef used to work in Brick Lane, and his Indian dishes are to die for.”

  Brick Lane? How I missed London’s premier destination for a curry. That explained the crowd, although I wasn’t sure I wanted to follow in Aunt Ellie’s footsteps and pop my clogs in Upper Foxford.

  “Settling in, are you?” the man next to me asked, and I stifled a groan as I recognised Floyd from the supermarket.

  At least I’d made the effort to use his shop so he couldn’t moan, although on the last two occasions, I’d been served by a teenage girl more interested in her phone than the customers.

  “I’m gradually getting the place sorted out, but it’s slow going.”

  His animal-like chuckle would have scared small children. “Aye, I heard about the mess. Planning a bonfire, are you?”

  “I wasn’t, but now you mention it…”

  “Thought that was why you had what’s left of a couch dumped in your garden.”

  “I put it out there because I found out Aunt Ellie died on it.”

  “I heard that rumour too.” He turned to bellow across the room. “Oi, Graham. Is that true?”

  A red-faced man made his way over to us, clutching a pint like it was a life preserver in a turbulent sea. His gait rolled from side to side as if he were on board an invisible ship.

  “What was that you said, Floyd?”

  “Is it true old Eleanor Rigby died on her couch?” Before Graham could answer, Floyd explained, “Graham’s our local policeman. Mrs. Rigby caused him no end of paperwork—isn’t that right?”

  “I’m not supposed to talk about that.” Graham tapped the side of his nose. “Official police business.”

  “But this is Mrs. Rigby’s niece, Olivia. It’s only right that she should know what happened to her aunt.”

  Graham still didn’t look convinced, so Floyd attempted what I assumed was supposed to be a smile. “Can I get you another pint?”

  “Floyd Peterson offering to buy someone a drink? Wonders will never cease.” Graham waved Jean over. “Another pint of bitter, young Jeanie, and put it on this gentleman’s tab.”

  Floyd’s plan worked. The alcohol soon loosened Graham’s tongue, and once he started talking, he couldn’t stop.

  “Got the call at eleven on Monday morning when the postie spotted her through the front window, and that was a shock, let me tell you. Nothing much ever happens around here.”

  “Don’t normally have much in the way of work to do, eh?”

  Graham glared at Floyd. “I worked that day, all right. We had to break the door down to get in, and she was all swelled up in the lounge. Never seen anything like it. She wasn’t small before, but I swear she was twice her normal size. Took six men to carry her out.”

  By then, a small crowd had gathered, and everyone grimaced at his words.

  “But she was on the couch, though?” Floyd asked.

  Graham’s eyes struggled to focus. “She was. Propped up in front of her computers. The screen was frozen on one of them, and she played her last poker game just before midnight the previous Friday. She lost her gamble with God, didn’t she?”

  He laughed at his own joke while someone else muttered, “With the devil, more like.”

  Another voice piped up. “She’ll be feeling the heat now alongside her husband and son. Bad apples, the lot of them.”

  Had Eleanor really been that awful? I considered asking what she’d done to upset so many people, but in the end, I decided against it. No point in reminding people that we were related, and besides, she was dead. You shouldn’t speak ill of the dead.

  No, a subject change was in order. “Well, it looks like the queue’s gone down. About time I got some food. Can anyone recommend a dish?”

  Twenty voices spoke at once, suggesting everything from a mild korma to a blow-your-head-off phall, and I made my escape into the next room to scoop aloo gobi and rice onto a plate. Finding a table presented my next challenge, but everyone seemed to be sharing, so I gingerly sat at the end of a large group who all seemed to know each other.

  After a few mou
thfuls, I understood why The Cock and Bull was packed. The delicate mix of spices burst across my palate, and I might even have moaned.

  “That good, huh?” the guy next to me said. “Always good to hear a woman moan, although I’d rather she was underneath me while she did it.”

  Inappropriate much? The speaker was a man not much older than me, and an arrogant smirk tugged at his lips.

  I shuffled my chair an inch or two farther away. “The food’s tasty, yes.”

  “I can see something else that’s tasty.”

  He ran his fingers up my arm, and I shuddered. He wasn’t ugly, but his slug-like qualities weren’t offset by the Ferrari key casually tossed next to his plate.

  “Please, just let me eat.”

  “Oh, I will. I like a woman who knows what to do with her mouth.”

  I almost suggested he look for his type of woman on a street corner, but Mother would have turned in her grave. Instead, I tried another sideways shuffle and accidentally bumped into a brown-haired man standing next to me.

  “So sorry. I didn’t see you.”

  “Is he bothering you?” the newcomer asked, motioning at the sleaze.

  “Uh…” Don’t offend the new neighbours, Olivia. “Maybe just a little.”

  “Henry, leave the lady alone.”

  “She was enjoying it, weren’t you, sweetheart?”

  Delusional as well as slimy? “Not really.”

  My saviour took a step closer. “I’m not going to tell you twice. I’ll have you thrown out if you keep harassing her.”

  Henry shoved his chair back and elbowed his way through the crowd, earning himself more dirty looks and a few muttered curses as I looked up at the man who’d come to my aid.

  “Thank you.”

  “Don’t mention it. Henry’s got a nasty habit of behaving that way. You must be new around here—all the other girls in the village avoid him like the plague.”

  “I’ve been here for almost three weeks now.”

  “Well, it’s nice to meet you. I’m Tate.”

  I forced myself to meet his eyes, and very nice eyes they were too. A pale blue, twinkling to match his smile. “Olivia.”