Sunrise at Butterfly Cove: An uplifting romance from bestselling author Sarah Bennett
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Taking a deep breath, she slid her leg from beneath her flannel sheets and quickly drew it back as her toes touched the freezing cold floor. Where the hell were her slippers? Mia rolled to the side and peered over the edge of the mattress in the vain hope the slipper fairy had come through for once and left them helpfully by the bed. Nope, just cold boards still needing to be filled, sanded and waxed.
‘Bollocks,’ Mia huffed, wincing as her breath misted in the cold air.
With a mental count to three, she threw back the covers and dashed from the bed, swearing and hopping from foot to foot as she made her way across the cold floor and into the bathroom and the relative warmth of the bathmat. She grabbed her dressing gown from the hook behind the door and burrowed into it, turning her face instinctively into the collar to seek out an elusive hint of Jamie’s scent.
The man-sized garment swamped her; the sleeves were rolled back at the cuffs several times and still her hands only just peeked out. It dragged a little on the floor unless Mia hiked it up slightly with the belt from her old dressing gown. The fluffy pink belt clashed with the dark green tartan pattern but it did the job and there was no-one around to care about her bedroom attire.
She scrubbed her face until it glowed before cleaning her teeth vigorously in the hopes of generating a little extra body warmth. She spat and rinsed and then made the mistake of looking in the mirrored doors of the little cabinet above the sink. The problem with short hair, she mused, was that it just never looked good in the morning.
Wetting her hands, she made a vague effort to try and flatten the dark crop into some semblance of order but quickly lost interest. She had another dirty day ahead cleaning out the grate of the fireplace in what would one day become the dining room, so there was no point in more than basic ablutions as she would be filthy in no time.
With no more reason to linger on the little island of material any longer, Mia hurried from the bathroom and down the sweeping staircase that dominated the hallway of the house. She hopped and skipped her way down, well-versed in which of the boards were half rotten and ready to try and capture her foot in their splintery jaws.
Reaching the bottom, she dove on her cosy boots, shoved her freezing feet into their fleecy warmth, and sighed in relief. She scuffed her way into the kitchen, moving by rote as she made a cup of builder’s strength tea and gathered the bucket, brush and other cleaning implements she would need to tackle the fireplace. The worst of the old soot and rubbish had been removed from the grate the day before, but the whole thing was still stained from years of neglect.
Carrying her tea into the dining room, she paused to catch her breath as the view from the French windows caught her, as it did every time. This, this is what made her carry on when she wanted to throw in the towel and give up on the whole idea of running her own guest house. The view spread out before her: across the sad-looking collection of cracked paving in front of the window, through the weed-filled garden and beyond. Windswept dunes rolled down towards the sea. Churned to a murky green by the winter winds, it swelled and undulated like a living beast.
Dark clouds glowered above and the horizon was blurred by mist and rain out to sea. It looked dangerous and utterly captivating. Mia had seen pictures of it taken in the summer looking like a benign, soft blanket of blue edged with white lacy waves. She was determined that in a few months she would be sitting out on the patio in the sunshine with a cold glass of wine in her hand as she watched pleasure boats sailing across that blanket.
Finishing her tea, she ran through a mental list of things she had already achieved as she slowly put the house to rights. The daily exercise had become a motivational lifeline and thinking of the positives helped to offset the mountain of tasks outstanding. ‘One thing at a time, one step forward.’ Muttering the mantra, she turned back to the kitchen to fetch the first of many buckets of hot soapy water.
A couple of hours later, Mia sat back on her ankles and wiped her face on the increasingly dirty sleeve of her dressing gown; it would have to go in the washing machine that night, taking her another wash away from Jamie’s scent. It was a foolish thought; it had long ago stopped smelling of anything other than her fabric softener and, she gave a rueful sniff, her sweat.
The fireplace looked amazing; the enamel panels set into the red brick surround had come to life under her determined ministrations and were now a gentle shade of cream with a riot of colourful butterflies dancing over the deep green vines running up the centre of them. She had scrubbed the bricks with several different brushes so they varied in shade from dark, almost black, to nearly new red brick.
The house had history, had been lived in by many others, and each person who had passed through the front door had left their mark. Mia was determined to retain the lived-in, homely feel lurking beneath the layers of grime.
She climbed to her feet, rotating her hips a little to release some of the stiffness in them from prolonged kneeling at the hearth, and then lifted the bucket of cold, dirty water. Trying not to spill the filthy contents, she lugged it through the house and out into the yard. A large drain sat next to the barn and she’d taken to emptying the contents into it, rather than spoil the old butler’s sink in the kitchen. One last trip and then it was time for a shower.
The toot of a car horn and a brisk call of: ‘Ooh hoo, Mia darling!’ startled her, sending cold water sloshing onto her boots, which whilst soft and warm were not waterproof.
‘Well, shit,’ she said with feeling. Setting the bucket down, she folded her arms across her chest. She loved Madeline, she really did, but it had been a long day and Mia wasn’t in the mood for a gossip. She shrugged off the unkind thought.
Both Madeline and her kind-hearted husband, Richard, were a welcome blessing in her life. They had taken her under their wing from the moment they had called around to welcome Mia to the village and found her a sobbing mess on the front porch. In the front porch was more accurate as her foot had gone straight through the rotten wood and been stuck fast until they rescued her.
With a mixture of kindness, humour and tough love when the situation required it, the older couple were helping to turn the ramshackle house into the guest house she dreamed of. Mia turned her attention back to Madeline as her words filtered through. ‘I’ve brought you a present, darling. Your first of what I am sure will be many guests.’ Madeline disappeared back inside the car although her voice carried clearly across the cold air. ‘Out you get, Daniel, there’s a good boy. Mia will see you right.’
The passenger door swung open and Mia prayed to every god that she had ever heard of for a sinkhole to open and swallow her whole as a broad-shouldered, dark-haired, bearded man uncurled from the car, eyeing her with some trepidation.
Madeline appeared out of the driver’s side, opened the boot and wrestled out a duffel bag nearly as large as she was. She dropped the bag on the ground, swiftly closed the boot, and before Mia could utter a word, the gears of the car crunched forcing the stranger to jump clear to avoid being sideswiped as Madeline spun the car around and disappeared back up the drive with a toot and a wave.
‘Well, shit,’ Mia said again as the situation clearly warranted it, before she picked up the bucket and slopped over to the drain to empty what remained of the water.
‘Umm, Madeline said you run a B&B.’ The man’s voice rumbled pleasantly in his chest and Mia decided she needed to make the best of the situation, if she could only work out what the hell that was.
‘I am hoping to open the house to guests later this year; it’s just taking a little bit longer than I anticipated to put things straight,’ she said, with what she hoped was a confident smile as she skirted around the man. She was ripe and in dire need of a shower.
‘Daniel, is it? Would you like to come in for a cup of tea while I try and find out if somewhere else in the area is open and taking in guests?’ Mia tried to sound more confident than she felt about letting a stranger into her house. It was something she was going to have to get used to and surely Madeline wouldn’t leave her alone with a crazy man?
She continued briskly towards the kitchen door. He would follow or not but she needed to get her feet out of her wet boots before they started to rot or hypothermia set in.
Chapter Three
Daniel watched the woman, Mia, disappear through the back door, bucket swinging in hand and a large swathe of her dressing gown dragging along the ground behind her. He supressed a shudder, wondering whether the inside of the house would be as grubby as its owner. He wandered over to fetch his duffel bag and, as he bent over, he noticed a wizened stone face peering out from the depths of the evergreen shrubbery that shielded the back of the house.
Reaching into the pocket of his jacket, he retrieved the digital camera that was always somewhere about his person and stepped closer to take a shot of the green man, for surely that was what the little statue was with its hair and beard carved to resemble ivy. The dark, almost waxy sheen of the leaves of the shrubbery framed the moss-covered stone and he knelt, heedless of the cold, damp gravel of the driveway to take a series of pictures.
The sun found a small break in the cloud and its weak but welcome warmth bathed the back of his head. A glint to the right caught his eye and he turned to study another half-hidden fancy: a bronze fairy this time, standing on tiptoe with her hands held out as though drawing down the sunlight.
Daniel scrambled closer, swearing to himself as the gravel dug into his knees through his jeans. Sitting back on his heels, he brushed a few stray stones from the two damp circles over his knees. He glanced towards the still-open door of the house, intrigued by the woman. She clearly had a sense of humour and imagination if these little secret figures were anything to go by.
He rolled his head on his shoulders then pushed up to his full height and collected his bag, slipping the camera back into his pocket. He was stiff and tired from the long train journey and he could certainly do with the cup of tea he’d been offered. He’d drunk plenty of tea from dirty mugs in his art school days after all. Trying not to look too closely at the cobweb-strewn windows and the patches of weeds poking up through the driveway, he headed for the back door.
Mia glanced over her shoulder from where she stood at the large white sink, scrubbing her hands with a brush. Catching a closer look, he realised she was a lot younger than he’d first assumed. Probably close to his own age. ‘Take your shoes off, please.’ She nodded to where her wet boots were drying on a piece of newspaper on the floor next to the radiator on the spotless stone floor. ‘And shut the door behind you. The boiler’s new but this house takes for ever to heat up.’
Daniel paused to survey the kitchen, relieved to find it immaculately clean. A wooden table dominated the centre of the large square room and a huge cooking range surrounded by granite worktops filled most of the back wall. The appliances looked modern and were a soft duck-egg blue, providing a nice contrast to the stone surfaces and wooden cupboards. He toed off his shoes and placed them carefully on the newspaper as requested.
‘Have a seat. I’ll just grab my cup from next door and get the phone book and see if we can find you somewhere with a bed.’ His reluctant hostess spoke again and Daniel moved towards the table just as she took a step forward and they nearly collided. He reached out a hand to brace her, but she shied away. Wrapping her arms around her body tightly, she took an exaggerated route around the kitchen to keep well away from him. He dropped his hand swiftly, feeling big and awkward in comparison to her delicate height.
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.’ Mia turned in the doorway and offered a weak smile at his apology before disappearing.
Heat rose on his cheeks as he sank into a chair; he was clearly not wanted here. How the hell had he got himself in such a mess? Getting away from London had seemed like such a good idea, but clearly he was not a spur-of-the-moment kind of guy. He was the man with the plan, the designated driver, always booked a table, always thought ahead.
He was not impulsive usually, but he’d woken that morning with a stinking hangover. The scent of cigarette smoke and stale perfume on the pillow next to him had turned his stomach. A wash of guilt over his bad behaviour the day before added to his misery.
His dreams of being an artist, a serious photographer, had taken him from his home to the bright lights of the capital like so many before him. London was where it all happened: where the connections were, the dealers who would frame his quirky black and white pictures and sell them to people with lots of money. His simple but arresting shots had captured attention and sooner than he could have ever dreamed of, he was flavour of the month with his pictures appearing in magazines and on the walls of the hip young things who set the trends others followed.
Before he knew it, Daniel was attending parties and premieres and his picture started appearing in the magazines in the gossip sections more often than images of his work did. Then there was Giselle. Always perfectly dressed and styled, she knew the perfect places to go and be seen with lots of other perfect people.
She was also a perfect bitch, although he hadn’t realised it until they’d somehow ended up living together. He still wasn’t sure how the hell that had happened, but Giselle had decided that she was going to be Daniel’s girlfriend and had attached herself to him like a limpet. He’d been too lazy, too enamoured with his own celebrity, and frankly, too stoned to do something about it until it was too late. The cold contempt in her voice had chased him halfway down the street as he scurried away with his hastily packed bag.
Shaking off his melancholy thoughts, Daniel roused at the sound of Mia shuffling back into the room. ‘This is Orcombe’s idea of Google.’ She dropped the local phone directory on the table before skirting past, back over to the kettle.
Daniel pulled the book towards him and started flipping through until he came to the section for hotels, inns and guest houses. He smiled slightly at using the old-fashioned book. So used to instant access to the world through his phone, it felt strange to be manually searching for information again.
Several of the entries carried small ads detailing seasonal opening so he ignored those. His eyes skimmed down the list but nothing sounded appealing. Even the simple decision to choose which number to try first seemed too much of a trial. Desperate for a distraction, he leaned back in his chair and studied the room around him.
Mia bustled around from the butler’s sink to the large retro-style fridge to fetch a pint of milk, which she plopped on the table before turning to rummage in one of the lower cupboards. Her bottom wiggled a little as she reached deeper into the cupboard.
A man might notice such a thing, even under the swathes of material she was layered in, if he was so inclined. Not that he was so inclined, of course. This pale, scruffy little creature was nothing compared to the sleek London girls he hung with.
Mia found what she was looking for apparently, given her little hoot of triumph as she backed out of the cupboard. She brandished a decorative cake tin in hand before dropping it on the table next to the milk. A quick rattle in the cupboard above the kettle and a side plate appeared, swiftly followed by two mugs of strong tea and a bag of sugar with a teaspoon poking out of the top.
Circling the battered oak table, she pulled out a chair for herself, as far away from him as possible he noted. She added a splash of milk to her tea and nudged the cake tin closer to him, then sat back on her chair with one foot tucked underneath her.
Raising the mug to her face, she blew across the surface of her tea before raising her eyes to meet his across the table. Deep brown, with thick sooty lashes framing them and large, almost purple bruising underneath. Her face was pale, too pale. It made her eyes seem huge above her button nose and dry lips that looked as though she chewed on them too often. As if to confirm his assumption, Mia drew her lower lip between her teeth and nibbled on it. She squinted her eyes at Daniel as though trying to come to a decision.
Daniel ducked his head away from her scrutiny and raised his own mug of tea to his mouth, venturing a sip before quickly pulling the cup away with a rueful expression. ‘No milk,’ he muttered before adding some and taking another drink.
‘Are you hungry? There are scones in the tin. No cream, I’m afraid, but there’s butter and jam if you want it.’ Mia nodded with her head towards the cake tin. He put down his mug and pried open the lid of the tin, giving the contents an exploratory sniff. The sweet, buttery scent of the scones teased his nose and his stomach gave an appreciative rumble.
He reached into the tin then pulled back to quickly head to the sink and wash his hands. Returning to his seat, he lifted out his prize from the baking tin. He sliced the scone in half and slathered on a generous layer of butter.
The first bite had his eyes rolling back into his head and he was afraid a little moan of bliss may have escaped him as the sweet taste of home baking filled his mouth. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had something that hadn’t been mass-produced from a supermarket chain. Not since his mam had passed away probably. He cut his eyes to Mia and was surprised to see her pleased smile.
‘Baked by my own fair hand those are,’ she said before taking a deep drink from her mug. ‘I’d better let Richard know that he’s got competition for my culinary attentions.’
‘Mnphfod?’ Daniel mumbled around another huge mouthful of scone.
‘Madeline’s husband. He trades labour and heavy lifting around the place in exchange for treats. It’s quite the bartering system we have going. I’m holding out on a Dundee cake until he regrouts the tiles in one of the guest bathrooms.’ She paused and some of the merriment fell from her eyes. ‘I think he does it to try and make me feel less guilty for all the hard work that he and Madeline have put in here. I would be lost without them, well even more lost…’ Mia trailed off and blushed as she stuck her nose back in her cup.
‘So you’d pay me in cake if I offered to lend a hand around here?’ The words were out before Daniel realised what he was saying and he mentally kicked himself as Mia stiffened visibly in her chair, her fingers whitening as she gripped her tea.
‘You can’t stay. I’ve no room for you,’ she stammered and Daniel crooked an eyebrow and raised his eyes to the ceiling. How many bedrooms would a place this size have? Five, six maybe. ‘No room fit for habitation. I don’t know you; you can’t be here. It’s a ridiculous notion.’
Mia slammed her mug down on the table and pulled the cordless phone out of its holder on the wall and shoved it across to him. ‘Get dialling. I’m going for a shower and to get dressed and then I’ll drop you off wherever.’
She whirled away and shot out of the kitchen into the hallway. Daniel leaned sideways in his chair and caught sight of her disappearing through another doorway with the stairs framed in the background. The door slammed and he heard the snick of a key as she locked it behind her before climbing the stairs, her passage marked by creaks and groans from the half-rotten staircase.
Daniel blew out a breath and scrubbed his hand thoughtfully across his chin as he tried to decide on what to do for the best. There was a pinboard next to where the phone holder was attached to the wall and he rose from his seat to examine the eclectic mix of items pinned to it. He knew he was being nosy, but he wanted to know more about his reluctant hostess.
There were several photographs—Mia with stunningly long hair and two other women who bore a striking resemblance to her; arms entwined and heads thrown back as they laughed together at something. There was something so free and joyous in the image that Daniel wished he’d been the one on the other side of the camera capturing that tiny flash of perfection and preserving it for ever.
There was another more recent photo of Mia, this time with Madeline, touching glasses of wine together as they toasted each other. Mia was smiling in this shot too, but her expression was much less open and her hair was now shorn off in the mad pixie crop that she sported today.
There were postcards from a random selection of capital cities and scraps of paper pinned haphazardly between the photos, recipes torn from magazines, a scribbled list of tasks to be tackled on the house that daunted Daniel as he scanned down it, quotations for roof repairs and resurfacing the driveway. Daniel double-checked one of the amounts and then forced himself to turn away from the board, guilty at how nosy he was being.
Curious about the rest of the house, he headed out into the hallway, past the locked door to the upper floors, and poked his head into the first room on the right. The room was mostly empty, just an old Welsh dresser and a matching sideboard shoved back against one wall. The wooden floor scratched and dark with age was bare and the windows were lacking curtains.
With nothing to distract and soften the view beyond, Daniel’s gaze was drawn inexorably to the writhing seascape and he moved without conscious thought until his nose was pressed up against the dirty glass of the French windows.
The memory of a long-forgotten poem rose unbidden. His dad had been a great one for poetry. A hard-working man, quiet—and some had thought him grim-faced and taciturn. Daniel had later realised this was a product of his dad’s shyness though he had never found him so. A man with few opportunities who’d resigned himself to a life of manual labour, he’d been determined to learn all he could and made damn sure his son looked beyond his roots to stretch for the heights of whatever he chose to study.
Whenever he pictured his dad, it was always with a book in hand: poetry, biographies, history. He soaked up everything and Daniel had learned to read at his knee, a new poem to memorise every week. His favourite times were when his dad opened his huge atlas of the world, letting Daniel choose a page at random. Whatever location he landed on, they would study and explore. A smile played on his lips. They’d travelled the world together side by side at the dining room table.
Daniel lost himself in the rolling waves and the rhythm of the words as they ebbed and flowed through his mind like the white foam of the tide on the sands before him. He rocked back slightly on his heels—hands tucked into the front pockets of his jeans—and for the first time a little bit of peace and quiet stole into a corner of his heart.
This spot, this view had brought him a tiny step back to where he wanted to be. To whom he wanted to be. He wanted to be that man his father had envisioned as he plied his young son with knowledge and a love of learning, a love of exploration and wonder.
Daniel rested his suddenly hot forehead against the cold glass of the window as a wave of shame washed through him from the tips of his boots to the top of his head. A sudden gush of saliva filled his mouth, the sour taste of bile burning his throat. He wrestled with the handle of the French windows and burst out onto the scruffy patio. Lurching to the side, he doubled over, vomiting into the overgrown bushes that framed the door.
He heaved and heaved, feeling like he would turn himself inside out as the realisation hit of how disappointed his dad would be in the shallow, vain fool his beloved boy had become. For the first time, he was glad his dad had only lived long enough to enjoy the beginning of Daniel’s success rather than being there now to witness his fall from grace.