Rebecca Raisin - Rosie’s Travelling Tea Shop

REBECCA RAISINis a true bibliophile. This love of books morphed into the desire to write them. Rebecca aims to write characters you can see yourself being friends with. People with big hearts who care about relationships, and most importantly, believe in true, once-in-a-lifetime love.

‘Absolutely fantastic book, had me hooked from the first page’

‘I absolutely loved everything to do with this book’

‘Rebecca Raisin has a way of writing that is so evocative, it brings each and every scene to life’

‘Romantic, emotional, hilarious in places but most of all beautiful’

‘Full of anticipation, a real page turner. Loved it!’

‘A good holiday read’

‘Be whisked away on a beautiful adventure and pick up a copy today!’

Christmas at the Gingerbread Café

Chocolate Dreams at the Gingerbread Café

The Bookshop on the Corner

Christmas Wedding at the Gingerbread Café

Secrets at Maple Syrup Farm

The Little Bookshop on the Seine

The Little Antique Shop Under the Eiffel Tower

The Little Perfume shop off the Champs-Élysées

Celebrations and Confetti at Cedarwood Lodge

Brides and Bouquets at Cedarwood Lodge

Midnight and Mistletoe at Cedarwood Lodge

Christmas at Cedarwood Lodge

Aria’s Travelling Book Shop

HQ

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd.

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HQ in 2019

Copyright © Rebecca Raisin 2019

Rebecca Raisin asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for 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, downloaded, 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: 9780008330842

E-book Edition © March 2019 ISBN: 9780008282165

Version: 2019-02-26

Table of Contents

Cover

About the Author

Praise for Rebecca Raisin

Also by Rebecca Raisin

Title page

Copyright

Dedication

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

Acknowledgements

Extract

Dear Reader …

Keep Reading …

About the Publisher

For the hero in my very own love story.

This one is for you Ashley.

‘You’re just not spontaneous enough, Rosie …’

I’ve misheard, surely. Fatigue sends my brain to mush at the best of times but after twenty hours on my feet, words sound fuzzy, and I struggle to untangle what he’s getting at.

It’s just gone 2 a.m. on Saturday 2nd February and that means I’m officially 32 years old. By my schedule I should be in the land of nod, but I’d stayed late at work to spontaneously bake a salted caramel tart to share with Callum, hoping he’d actually remember my birthday this year.

He’s never been a details man – we’re opposites in that respect – so I try not to take it to heart, but part of me hopes this is all a prelude to a fabulous birthday surprise and not the brewing of a row.

‘Sorry, Callum, what did you say?’ I try to keep my voice light and swig a little too heartily on the cheap red wine I found in the back of the cupboard after Callum told me we needed to have a chat. Surreptitiously, I glance to the table beside me hoping to see a prettily wrapped box but find it bare, bar a stack of cookbooks. Really, I don’t need gifts, do I? Love can be shown in other ways, perhaps he’ll make me a delicious breakfast when we wake up …

My eyes slip closed. With midnight long gone, my feet ache, and I’m weary right down to my bones. Bed is calling to me in the most seductive way; come hither and sleep, Rosie , it says. Even the thought of a slice of luscious ooey-gooey birthday tart can’t keep me awake and compos mentis . But I know I must focus, he’s trying to tell me something …

‘Are you asleep?’ The whine in his voice startles me awake. ‘Rosie, please, don’t make this any harder than it has to be,’ he says, as if I’m being deliberately obtuse.

Make what harder – what have I missed? I shake my head, hoping the fog will clear. ‘How am I not spontaneous? What do you even mean by that?’ Perhaps he’s nervous because he’s about to brandish two airline tickets to the Bahamas. Happy Birthday, Rosie, time to pack your bags!

He lets out a long, weary sigh like I’m dense and it strikes me as strange that he’s speaking in riddles at this time of the morning when I have to be at the fishmonger in precisely five hours.

‘Look …’ He runs a hand through his thinning red hair. ‘I think we both know it’s over, don’t we?’

‘Over?’ My mouth falls open. Just exactly how long did my power nap last for? ‘What … us ?’ My incredulity thickens the air. This does not sound anything like a birthday celebration, not even close.

‘Yes, us,’ he confirms, averting his eyes.

‘Over because I’m not—’, I make air quotes with my fingers, ‘— spontaneous enough?’ Has he polished off the cooking sherry?

My husband still won’t look at me.

‘You’re too staid. You plan your days with military precision from when you wake to when you sleep, and everything in between has a time limit attached to it. There’s no room for fun or frivolity, or god forbid having sex on a day you haven’t scheduled it.’

So I’m a planner? It’s essential in my line of work as a sous-chef in esteemed Michelin-starred London restaurant Époque , and he should know that, having the exact same position in another restaurant (one with no Michelin stars, sadly). If I didn’t schedule our time together we’d never see each other! And I wouldn’t get the multitude of things done that need doing every single hour of every day. High pressure is an understatement.

‘I … I …’ I don’t know how to respond.

‘See?’ He stares me down as if I’m a recalcitrant child. ‘You don’t even care! I’d get more affection from a pot plant! You can be a bit of a cold fish, Rosie.’