There was no time to answer any of Graham’s questions about my unexpected, and unwelcome, guests because by the time I returned to the Grow-Well, Nell was decidedly off-colour.
‘I heard her behind the compost bays,’ Sara told me with a concerned frown. ‘I don’t think she’s eaten anything she shouldn’t, but she’s looking a bit sorry for herself, isn’t she?’
She was right. Poor Nell was looking very green around the gills and I was certain it wasn’t because of anything she had eaten. Her pallor – if a dog can have one – was the result of seeing Jackson. She might have only had the briefest glimpse, but it was enough to upset her and further proof, not that I needed it, that going back to Broad-Meadows would be damaging for both of us.
‘I think you’d better take her home,’ said Graham.
‘But I’m supposed to be helping,’ I reminded him. ‘I don’t want to let you down.’
‘I can manage,’ he said stoically. ‘Everyone’s off and running now.’
‘And I can help too,’ offered Sara, who felt like a regular visitor now, which I supposed, given that she’d attended every Winterfest session, she was.
‘Take Nell back to the square and get her settled in the warm,’ Graham insisted.
‘All right,’ I agreed as my poorly pooch began to retch again. ‘She’s not setting quite the tone we were aiming for, is she?’
We had a slow walk home and I settled my little love, who was trembling, in her basket in the kitchen. It wasn’t the warmest room, but it did have a tiled floor and once I’d put a jacket potato in the oven for my dinner, it soon heated up.
I sent Finn a text asking if we could give our planned evening a miss and then returned my attention to reassuring my nervy companion that all was well and she had nothing to worry about.
Unfortunately, my words didn’t soothe her and it was a long night for both of us. I spent much of Monday flitting backwards and forwards from the square to the garden and trying not to think about what my parents were planning for the gardens at Broad-Meadows or what Jackson had in mind for the house. I wasn’t going to play any part in it, but that didn’t stop it dominating my thoughts.
‘How’s Nell?’ Luke asked, as I loaded tools into a wheelbarrow after lunch. ‘Graham said she was poorly yesterday.’
I wondered if he’d talked about my visitors too, but as Luke didn’t ask after them, I didn’t mention them either.
‘Yes, she was,’ I sighed, ‘and she still is. I’ve left her wrapped in a blanket at home feeling very sorry for herself.’
‘Then why are you here?’ Luke tutted. ‘You should be with her.’
‘I can’t take the day off just because my dog’s sick.’
Luke clearly didn’t agree.
‘It’s not as if she’s a child,’ I pointed out.
‘As good as,’ Luke smiled. ‘Take the rest of the day. And tomorrow.’
‘But I can’t.’
‘I’m the boss,’ he said firmly, pulling rank, ‘and I’m ordering you to go home and look after Nell. I don’t want to see you back here until she’s well enough to come with you. Got it?’
‘Got it,’ I smiled, pushing the barrow back into the shed. ‘Thanks, Luke.’
‘Oh, and about the fireplace,’ he said. ‘I’ve got a sweep lined up to come and take a look at the chimney, but I’ll put him off for a few days.’
‘I’d appreciate that,’ I told him, ‘and so would Nell.’
The last thing my little bag of nerves needed was a strange man, with scary, noisy equipment, coming into the house. It was frustrating to think that all the progress she’d made in the last couple of months had been undone in moments, but it had happened and I would just have to help her bounce back. Still feeling unsettled myself, I knew it was going to take me a little while to bounce back too.
‘Is that it then?’ Chloe asked the next morning when she popped in to collect the list of jobs I had collated for her and Graham to work through in my absence.
‘That’s it,’ I said. ‘That should keep you both out of mischief, shouldn’t it?’
‘I should think so,’ she agreed, ‘and how’s the patient?’
‘Much better,’ I said, looking over at Nell who was watching our every move.
She hadn’t been sick overnight and had wolfed down, and thankfully kept down, the dry food I’d put out for her that morning.
‘Was it the virus that’s doing the rounds?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘She got a bit stressed at the weekend and that’s what set her off.’
I had spoken to the local vet, just to be on the safe side, and she was in agreement with me. Had Nell caught the nasty bug that was currently plaguing dogs everywhere then she’d have been knocked off her feet for far longer.
‘Poor little mite,’ Chloe tutted nonetheless.
She knew all about Nell being a rescue with a less than happy start in life and therefore felt kindly sympathetic towards her fragile mental state.
‘Do you want a coffee?’ I offered, holding up a mug.
‘Just a quick one,’ she said, glancing at the clock. ‘I don’t want the boss thinking I’m slacking and I know Graham will be itching to get on.’ She pulled out a chair at the table and sat down. ‘Nell wasn’t the only one across the road who was stressed out at the weekend, was she?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘When I dropped my wellies back late Sunday night, I heard a godawful row going on in Finn’s studio.’
‘Did you?’ I frowned.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Didn’t you know?’
‘No. Who was it?’
‘Well, to begin with, I wondered if it was the pair of you, having your first lovers’ tiff.’
‘What?’ I gasped.
Chloe rolled her eyes. ‘Oh, come off it,’ she tutted, ‘we all know that you’re together now.’
‘All of you?’
‘Yes,’ she laughed. ‘We’re taking bets on how long it’ll be before you go public.’
‘I see,’ I said, focusing on making the coffee.
‘Anyway,’ Chloe continued, ‘it wasn’t you, obviously.’
‘Why obviously?’
‘Because it was two guys shouting.’
‘Oh crikey. I hope it wasn’t Zak.’
The brothers had been getting on so well, it would be a shame if they had a setback and had to start all over again.
‘I thought of him too,’ Chloe frowned, ‘but it didn’t sound like him.’
‘Do you think Luke and Kate could hear it?’
Luke hadn’t mentioned anything about it to me, but then why would he?
‘Probably,’ Chloe sighed. ‘They were really going for it.’
I hadn’t seen or spoken to Finn since we’d exchanged text messages late on Sunday afternoon. He was fine then, happy to put our plans off under the circumstances. I had told him Nell was unwell, but not why, and he told me that he was going to carry on working in the studio. As we were both so busy, we’d agreed to catch up later in the week, and I knew how immersed he got once he was in the creative zone. As we’d sorted everything, I hadn’t given his subsequent silence any further thought, but now…
‘And Finn’s not at the studio this morning. The place is locked up and looks deserted,’ Chloe elaborated further. ‘It’s all very mysterious.’
‘I see,’ I said, handing her a mug. ‘It is a bit, isn’t it?’
‘I take it you don’t know anything about it at all then?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘Nothing.’
‘Curiouser and curiouser,’ she mused.
On Wednesday, Nell was well enough to walk from the square to the garden office, where I tucked her up, with a hot-water bottle, while I ran through my to-do list.
I’d knocked at the studio, and tried the door, but the place was still locked. There was no sign of life and Finn hadn’t responded to any of the texts I’d sent him after my chat with Chloe either.
‘Is he not about?’ came a voice as I was eating my lunch and checking invoices.
I looked up to find Zak standing in the doorway and watched in amazement as Nell climbed out of her basket and trotted around the desk, her tail wagging, to greet him.
‘Well, I never.’
‘Well I never, what?’ Zak smiled, stroking Nell’s head.
‘She’s been ill and basket-bound since the weekend,’ I told him. ‘That’s the first bit of enthusiasm she’s shown for anyone in days.’
‘What can I say?’ Zak sighed, looking very pleased with himself. ‘I’m irresistible to the female sex.’
‘Don’t start that again,’ I snapped.
If he’d reverted to being bad old Zak then he might well have been the person Chloe had heard Finn arguing with.
‘I’m only kidding,’ he frowned. ‘What’s up?’
‘I take it it’s Finn that you’re looking for?’
‘Yes, I just tried the studio, but it’s all shut up. Do you know where he is?’
‘No,’ I said, the uncomfortable feeling I’d been brewing settling more firmly in my stomach. ‘No, I don’t. No one’s seen him since Sunday.’
‘Oh right.’
‘You didn’t see him then, did you? Only he was heard having an argument with someone.’
‘Not me.’
‘And not your dad?’
He was the only other person who I thought it possibly could have been when I’d lay awake wondering.
‘No,’ said Zak, shaking his head. ‘We’ve all been okay recently. It’s a bit weird, isn’t it?’ he added, once he’d taken a few seconds to let the situation sink in.
‘Just a bit,’ I agreed, chewing my bottom lip.
‘Have you messaged him?’
‘Of course, I have,’ I tutted. ‘A dozen times, but he hasn’t replied.’
‘That’s even weirder then, because surely he would have told you where he was off to if he was going away,’ Zak said pointedly.
‘Why me?’
He rubbed a hand around the back of his neck and I guessed that Chloe had made a bet with him about mine and Finn’s coming-out party too.
‘What with you two being so close and everything,’ he grinned.
‘I see,’ I sighed.
Our relationship was clearly common knowledge.
‘I’m really chuffed for the pair of you,’ Zak continued as my phone vibrated loudly in my pocket. ‘I honestly didn’t think you were ever going to get yourselves sorted, but I’m pleased you got there in the end.’
‘Thanks, Zak,’ I said, knowing there was no point denying it.
‘I’ll bet that’s him now,’ he said, nodding towards where the noise from my phone had sprung. ‘Can you ask him to give me a call?’
‘Why don’t you call him yourself?’ I asked. ‘I thought you were worried about him.’
‘Nah,’ he shrugged. ‘Finn can look after himself. We’re no doubt making a fuss over nothing.’
I wasn’t so sure.
‘Do you want to wait and find out?’
‘No, but you can send him a kiss from me.’ He grinned.
‘Idiot,’ I muttered as he left, pulling the door shut behind him.
He was right about the message being from Finn, but there was no mention of Christmas, or where he’d gone. Just the unsettling words,
I had the pleasure of speaking to your former boss Sunday night and he told me you’re going to be heading back to Broad-Meadows to be with him in time for Christmas …
All of a sudden, and in spite of the chilly temperature, I felt far too hot to be wearing a coat. I shrugged it off as my head spun with all manner of nauseating thoughts.
It didn’t take many seconds for me to work out that Jackson had somehow established, most likely via one of Mum’s many sources, that Finn was the man I was in love with, and then, because I hadn’t fallen in with his plans, after I’d dismissed him and Mum on Sunday, he’d spitefully gone all out to sabotage my new-found happiness.
This had to be the reason behind Finn’s sudden and unexplained disappearance. He had believed what Jackson had said and then left Prosperous Place wanting to put as much distance between us as he possibly could.
‘Mum,’ I gasped, my breath tight in my chest, when she eventually answered her phone. ‘I have to talk to you.’
‘I’m in the middle of something right now, Freya,’ she responded tersely.
‘I don’t care,’ I told her. ‘And don’t hang up, because I’ll just keep calling.’
I heard her rustling papers and excusing herself from whatever meeting she was in. Was she with Jackson?
‘What happened on Sunday?’ I demanded.
‘You know exactly what happened,’ she said, sounding slightly less sure of herself. ‘You turned Jackson’s offer down and then threw us off the premises.’
‘But Jackson didn’t leave, did he?’
She was quiet for a moment.
‘No,’ she admitted, ‘he stayed in Norwich.’
‘And went back to Prosperous Place to stir up trouble.’
She didn’t answer.
‘Didn’t he?’ I shouted, making poor Nell flinch.
‘I honestly don’t know what he did,’ Mum said, sounding ruffled, ‘but I wouldn’t have put it past him. He was in a foul mood when we parted company.’
‘You could have warned me,’ I said bitterly. ‘He’s caused a lot of trouble for me here, Mum.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘What?’
Had she really just apologised?
‘I said I’m sorry, and I really am.’
A lump formed in my throat, adding its bulk to the band around my chest and the weight in my stomach.
‘I saw a very different side to that man after we left you, Freya,’ she continued with a sniff, ‘and I told him he could keep his precious contract. The firm won’t be working on the Broad-Meadows project in any capacity now.’
I didn’t know what to say. Obviously, I was delighted about that, but why hadn’t she let me know? If I’d known she and Jackson had fallen out, I could have worked out who Finn had argued with the second Chloe mentioned it and acted far sooner.
‘Subsequently,’ Mum carried on, ‘I’ve found out that there’s a lot of local objection to Jackson’s plans and I’ve advised the chap in charge of rallying the troops to officially lodge everyone’s complaints, and their desire to protect the gardens, through the appropriate channels.’
I could hardly believe it.
‘So, your beloved Broad-Meadows might be saved yet.’
‘That’s wonderful,’ I swallowed, feeling shell-shocked.
‘I think your Eloise would think so too, wouldn’t she?’
‘She certainly would.’
‘And I really am sorry if Jackson has messed things up for you, Freya. From what I saw, the Prosperous Place gardens are actually very lovely.’
‘Thank you,’ I said, thinking more of Finn than the flowers.
‘I hope it all gets sorted without too much heartache.’
‘So do I,’ I told her, still feeling floored. ‘So do I.’
Everything that had happened – from Mum and Jackson’s visit, right up to Finn’s text – kept running on a loop in my head as I tried to get on with my work. I was astounded that Mum had pulled out of the project. She’d never done anything like that before, not even when she didn’t think much of the client. Jackson must have been especially foul to her, but I couldn’t fret over that. My sole priority was to find Finn and set him straight about the lies Jackson had told him.
Every few minutes, I stopped to call his mobile but it must have been turned off and, until he turned it back on, I had no way of finding out where he’d gone or the amount of damage Jackson had selfishly done.