relieved to see him looking relaxed for the first time in months as he stretched out in a deckchair.
‘I’ll be able to get your mother’s garden in proper shape now,’ he said later, yawning. ‘You should have an early night, pet, to make sure you’re on top form in the morning. I think I’ll stay out here in the cool for a while.’
Knowing it was where he felt closest to her mother, Sarah bent and kissed him, told him not to be too late, then went up to bed. When she woke in the night and found his bed hadn’t been slept in Sarah ran downstairs, panicking, and raced barefoot into the garden to find Sam Carver still in his deckchair, fast asleep. Scolding, she hurried to shake him awake, then let out a cry of raw anguish when she realised he would never wake again.
The following period remained a blur in Sarah’s mind. The only thing constant had been the solid presence of her mother’s cousin, Oliver Moore. Like a rock in her sea of grief, he had seen to all the arrangements, and supported her through the well-attended funeral. Sam Carver had been a popular employer, and it had seemed to Sarah that anyone who had ever worked for her father had turned up to pay their respects. Financially Sarah was well provided for. Her mother had left a sum of money in trust for her, and this security, together with the proceeds from the sale of the business and the sum expected for the large, well-maintained house in a sought-after North London location, had given Sarah breathing space to consider her future.
But constantly keeping the house up to inspection standards had been tiring on top of a day’s work, and living alone in it had been hard. Keeping strictly to office work in her new job had been even harder. She’d missed the camaraderie of the building site. The final blow had come when the family home had finally been sold and she’d had to find somewhere else to live. When two office colleagues had offered her a room in their flat she’d jumped at the chance, glad of their friendly company, but her Sundays had usually been spent with Oliver. He liked to drive her into the country and feed her substantial meals at some inn he’d seen reviewed in the Sunday papers, and during one of their trips they’d come across the Medlar Farm cottages. At first glance she’d thought they were part of a Merrick Group hotel site, but when she’d found they were up for sale by auction Sarah had known at once how she wanted to spend her inheritance. Oliver had objected strongly at first, but eventually bowed to the inevitable by paying a building surveyor to value the houses and confirm that they were worth buying. When Oliver had been informed that the cottages were sound and the auction was to be sealed bid, he’d advised Sarah that if she were really determined she should bid slightly more than the properties were considered worth.
Sarah had taken his advice, confident that her father would have approved. Her euphoria when her bid was successful had gone a long way to reassuring Oliver, but he’d had serious qualms when she’d immediately resigned from her job. His reaction to the one-room ‘studio’ flat had been equally gloomy, but Sarah had been adamant that it was a good investment. The former school building had charm, and she’d assured him that she was more than capable of making the flat so inviting she would make a tidy profit on it when she came to sell.
But now she’d knocked it into shape she didn’t want to sell it. Sarah frowned as she looked round her lofty, uncluttered space. After working on the flat practically every evening since she’d moved in, she was at a loose end now it was finished. But the cure for that was easy enough. She’d spend the long, light evenings working in the cottage gardens instead, and at night pore over gardening magazines instead of the building manuals and style publications she’d studied while doing up the cottages. And maybe, just maybe, she’d say yes some time if one of the likely lads at the Green Man asked her out.
Having fully expected Alex Merrick to hound her over the purchase of Medlar Cottages, Sarah was surprised—and rather nettled—to be proved wrong. She heard nothing more from him, and assumed that the offer from the Merrick Group, just as he’d warned, was no longer on the table. Not that it mattered.
‘That’s a ferocious frown, lass,’ said Harry, as he climbed down a ladder. ‘Something wrong?’
‘I haven’t put the cottages up for sale yet, but I can’t help wondering how well—and how soon—they’ll sell when I do.’
‘Don’t you worry. You’ll have no trouble selling this lot,’ he said with certainty. ‘They’re attracting a lot of attention locally. Mind, it doesn’t hurt that the developer’s a pretty young female—’
‘Harry, are you by any chance being sexist?’ she accused.
‘If I was you’d sack me,’ he said, chuckling, then shook his head as a van came cruising up the lane. ‘More visitors,’ he grumbled. ‘I reckon we should start selling tickets.’
Sarah’s eyes lit up. ‘It’s Mr Baker.’
Charlie Baker heaved himself out of the van and came to look at the houses in approval. ‘Morning, Miss Carver, Harry. I’ve brought the plants you wanted, my dear, and a few bags of compost to get you started.’
Sarah rushed to inspect the plants, and helped the men carry everything to the parking space cleared at the end of the row. ‘Lavender for fragrance and buddleia for butterflies,’ she said, delighted. ‘My mother’s favourites.’
‘I brought you some viburnums and a couple of hollies, too,’ he told her. ‘No point in putting in bedding plants, otherwise you’d be down here every night watering.’
‘I’m not really clued up about gardening. I wish now I’d helped my mother more in our garden at home,’ said Sarah with regret. ‘I was always making a nuisance of myself on one of Dad’s building sites instead.’
‘It paid off,’ Harry reminded her. ‘Now, we’d better get back to the real work. I want to finish painting number six today.’
‘Thank you so much, Mr Baker,’ said Sarah as she paid him.
He handed her a receipted bill in exchange. ‘Come down the pub some time and I’ll buy you that drink.’
‘Done,’ she said, as they walked back to his van, ‘By the way, I was wondering about some trees.’
Harry grinned as he waved at the tree-lined lane. ‘Plenty of those here already, boss.’
She made a face at him. ‘I meant a smallish flowering tree in the courtyard, and maybe another in the front. What do you think, Mr Baker?’
‘I’ll bring some catalogues to the pub and you can have a look,’ he promised.
Later, when Harry had finished for the day, Sarah waited until his pick-up was out of sight, then, feeling ridiculously furtive, took her mother’s garden tools from the boot of her car. It wouldn’t take long to plant some of the shrubs in front of what would be the show house. Now that the machinery and skips of rubbish had been hauled away and the parking spaces at either end of the row were clear, the site was beginning to shape up as a very attractive proposition. It was also a mere half a mile to the bus stop on the main road, and only another five to Hereford; a selling point Sarah intended to stress when the houses were advertised.
When her doorbell rang later that evening Sarah’s eyes widened as she heard Alex Merrick’s voice on the intercom.
‘It’s very late, Mr Merrick,’ she said coldly.
‘I wouldn’t disturb you if it wasn’t important,’ he assured her. ‘I need a word.’
Thankful she’d bothered to get dressed after her shower for once, Sarah
