Julie Caplin - The Little Paris Patisserie

A division of HarperCollins Publishers

www.harpercollins.co.uk

Harper Impulse

an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2018

Copyright © Julie Caplin 2018

Cover images © Shutterstock.com

Cover design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2018

Julie Caplin asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008259785

Ebook Edition © September 2018 ISBN: 9780008259778

Version: 2019-06-24

For Alison, office bestie, unofficial cheerleader and all round wonderful egg.

Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page A division of HarperCollins Publishers www.harpercollins.co.uk

Copyright Harper Impulse an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2018 Copyright © Julie Caplin 2018 Cover images © Shutterstock.com Cover design © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2018 Julie Caplin asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work. A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library. This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins. Source ISBN: 9780008259785 Ebook Edition © September 2018 ISBN: 9780008259778 Version: 2019-06-24

Dedication For Alison, office bestie, unofficial cheerleader and all round wonderful egg.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Epilogue

Bonus Material

More From Julie Caplin

Acknowledgements

About the Author

About HarperImpulse

About the Publisher

Stamping her sore and tired feet on the gravelled surface to get some warmth into them, Nina looked at her phone for the ninety-fifth time in ten minutes, almost dropping it. Where the heck was Nick? Fifteen minutes late already and her fingers were about to snap off, adding to her general sense of misery. Standing here at the back entrance to the kitchens in the staff carpark, there was little protection from the biting wind whistling around the sandstone manor house and certainly none from the bleak thoughts in her head.

‘Hey Nina, are you sure you don’t want a lift?’ asked Marcela, one of the other waitresses, in her heavily accented voice, winding her car window down as she backed with some speed out of one of the spaces.

‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s alright thanks. My brother’s on his way.’ At least he had better be. Nina wished she was in the little steamed up car with Marcela and the other two staff members, and almost laughed at the rather annoying irony. Mum had insisted Nick pick her up so that she’d know Nina was safe and here she was standing in a car park in the pitch black about to be completely on her own.

‘OK then. See you in eight weeks’ time.’

‘Ha!’ piped up a gloomy East European voice from the back seat – Tomas the sommelier, a perennial pessimist. ‘You think the builders finish on schedule.’

A good-natured chorus shouted him down.

‘See you soon, Nina.’ They all waved and shouted their goodbyes, Marcela winding the window back up as the ancient Polo roared away, as if she couldn’t wait to escape the end of her shift and put up her feet. Which was exactly what Nina was hoping to do, if her brother ever got here.

At last she spotted the headlights speeding down the drive towards her. This had to be Nick. Nearly everyone else had gone. With a speedy gravel-crunching turn, the car pulled to a halt in front of Nina.

She yanked the door open.

‘Hi Sis. You been waiting long? Sorry, sheep emergency.’

‘Yes,’ snapped Nina, scrambling in grateful for the heat of the car. ‘It’s bloody freezing out there. I’ll be so glad when my car’s fixed.’

‘Tell me about it. It took me all the way here to thaw out. Bloody sheep. There was a ewe stuck in the wire fencing up on the moor road. I had to stop and help the stupid creature.’

Was it really churlish to think that at least the sheep had a nice woolly coat while she was in a skirt and tights on a cold February evening?

‘So how was it? The last night,’ asked Nick, leaning down and turning the radio off, which had been blaring football commentary at full blast. ‘And did your mate get a good send off?’

‘Fine. Bit sad as we all won’t see each other for a while due to the renovations. And Sukie will be in New York.’

‘New York. That’s a bit of a change.’

‘She’s a brilliant chef. Going places.’

‘Clearly. To New York. And what’s everyone else doing?’

‘The regular staff are being redeployed and having lots of training.’

‘Seems a bit unfair. Why not you?’

‘Because I’m on a casual contract, I guess.’

‘Well, I’m sure we can find you a few extra hours at the farm shop as well as in the café. And Dan can give you a bit of work at the brewery. Gail’s sister might pay you for some babysitting and George can ask in the petrol station, they’re always needing extra staff. Although that’s late hours, so possibly not.’

Nina closed her eyes. She was absolutely certain that everyone in the family would pitch in to find something for ‘poor Nina’ to do while Bodenbroke Manor Restaurant was closed for refurbishment, whether she liked it or not. It wasn’t that she was ungrateful, they all meant well, but she was a grown up, she was quite capable of finding work without the vast tentacles of her family network spreading their reach on her behalf. She loved her family to bits, she really did but…