Bella Osborne - Escape to Willow Cottage - The brilliant, laugh-out-loud romcom you need to read in autumn 2018

Ernie pointed at Beth. ‘Breaking in!’

‘What do you think you’re doing exactly?’ The gruffness instantly returned to Jack’s voice as he turned his attention to Beth.

‘I wasn’t breaking in.’ Well, maybe she had been trying to a little bit but now was not the time to confess all. ‘I was only looking at the cottage, seeing what work would need doing.’

‘This is private property. I suggest you leave.’

Beth felt her eyebrows shoot up involuntarily at the resolve in Jack’s voice.

‘Did you notice what was on the board on the front of the property?’ she asked, starting to feel more in control of the situation as she knew she was about to wrong-foot him.

Jack pulled a face that made one of his eyes squint up and he looked quite comical. ‘It’s a picture of a chicken.’

Beth was starting to get frustrated. ‘No, not that one. The one that shows when the auction was. Well, it was last week and I bought it. So technically you are on my private property and you should leave.’

Jack rubbed his chin. ‘You can’t have completed on this place that quickly,’ he said, as Ernie looked on, his face etched with concern.

‘No, not exactly but everything is going through and we complete next week.’

‘So, technically none of us should be here.’ He was being pedantic now and that was quite irritating.

‘Then we should all leave. Come on, Leo,’ and she ushered Leo through the gap in the plant and squished herself through after him with as much dignity as she could muster with the leaves tangling in her hair.

As they all stumbled into the overgrown front garden Beth tugged bits of greenery and small white flowers out of her hair and walked off with Leo. A glance over her shoulder saw Ernie disappear under the canopy of the willow tree and Beth stopped in her tracks, nearly making Leo trip over.

‘Come on, Mum,’ he said, his voice a borderline whine.

‘Hang on,’ Beth had her hands on her hips now as Jack approached. ‘Who is that dangerous man exactly?’ she pointed to the tree.

‘That’s Ernie. He’s not in the slightest bit dangerous. He’s part of the village; lived here all his life.’

Beth felt the dig, Jack wasn’t one that was going to accept outsiders easily.

‘He shouldn’t be living under a tree.’

‘He doesn’t,’ said Jack with almost a smile forming on his lips. ‘He has a bungalow near the school.’ Jack pointed past the B&B.

‘Then why is he sat in my garden like a hostile garden gnome?’

Jack shook his head slowly as if he couldn’t be bothered to speak any more and wandered off towards the pub leaving Beth more confused than ever.

‘Mad. They’re all stark staring bonkers in this village.’

Beth’s phone rang. ‘The voice of sanity! Hello, Carls.’

‘At last it’s not your wretched voicemail. How are you and where the hell are you?’

‘I’m feeling surprisingly normal in the village of the totally insane. How about you and Fergus?’

‘Nick came round here last night. We didn’t tell him anything but he says he’s going to find you.’

Beth couldn’t help the feeling of ice fear that trickled through her body. Her mind flashed back to the night she left. Beth looked around her: another troop of Morris dancers was in the middle of the green hopping up and down as another group practised nearby. People were chatting and laughing and the sound filled the air. This was a world away from her London life; there was absolutely nothing here that could connect her to what she’d left behind. Despite the state of Willow Cottage it made sense to stay here for the time being.

‘He’ll never find me here.’

‘Where is here exactly?’

‘Dumbleford. It’s west of Stow-on-the-Wold.’

‘Sounds like place names from Narnia to me. What’s it like?’

‘The cottage I bought is practically a ruin, there’s a man living in my willow tree, the only person under fifty thinks I’m an idiot, everyone else is barking mad and today they are having a Morris dancing competition on the village green.’

‘Actually, I like the sound of that. The Morris dancing, not the rest of it.’

Beth lowered her voice and took a step back from Leo so he wouldn’t hear what she said. ‘Between you and me I think I may have made a huge mistake with the cottage. I’m speaking to the solicitor tomorrow to see what options I have. I’ll keep you posted.’

The rest of the day was spent watching the Morris dancing and reading books in bed at the B&B. Beth tidied the small room for the second time that day. The stupid things I’ve brought from London and the important ones I haven’t, thought Beth as she picked up her glue gun and wished it was her hairdryer.

She pondered the day and hated the fact that Carly’s statement about Nick had dominated it. Everything was Nick’s fault. If Nick hadn’t refused point blank to leave the apartment they would still be in London. She missed London. She had choices in London; she could have any type of food she wanted, stay in a variety of hotels, shop for virtually anything. Here food was limited to the tearoom or the pub, there were no hotels and the handful of shops sold knick-knacks, souvenirs, and out-of-date noodles. If Nick hadn’t sounded so menacing when he said he would find her wherever she went then maybe she wouldn’t have ended up here.

The solicitor confirmed what Beth had feared – that she was committed to the purchase of Willow Cottage, there were no get-out clauses not even with the dilapidated state of the property. All responsibility for investigating the property before purchase rested with the buyer and, as she hadn’t done any of that, it was entirely her own fault. The solicitor did impart what he felt was good news: that they were completing even sooner than they’d hoped and she could pick the keys up from their offices near Stow the next morning.

‘How would I go about putting it back up for auction?’ she asked, as a sigh escaped.

‘Oh, well, I could do that for you.’

‘You see, I think I may have made a mistake and I need to sell it quickly and get the money back.’

There was a long pause at the other end of the phone. ‘I think I should probably inform you that this was the third time this property has been presented at auction. It’s been looking for a buyer for seven months.’

‘Seven months?’ Beth flopped back onto the B&B single bed. It was bouncier than she’d noticed before as her body jiggled about involuntarily.

‘I’m afraid so.’

She closed her eyes and processed the information. Beth felt her plans had been thwarted, she was stuck here with no obvious escape or quick fix. She felt a sense of resignation. ‘Do you know any good local builders?’

The B&B landlady, Jean, was not doing a bad job of keeping Leo entertained, as it turned out her own grandchildren lived in Canada so having a child in the house was a novelty. It was a shame that Leo wasn’t able to see his own grandparents but, as they had been Nick’s first port of call when she left, they wouldn’t be seeing them for a while. At least it gave Beth precious time to ring a local building firm and set up a quote. She decided that if she could get away with doing the minimum required to make the cottage habitable maybe she could get it back on the market and then make good her escape. The plan had always been to buy somewhere, do it up and then move on and repeat the exercise until she felt that Nick had given up looking for her. It probably wasn’t the finest plan but it was what she had dreamed up when she had found herself staring at another mini-bar in another random London hotel.

Beth picked up the keys to the cottage from the solicitor as planned and with Jean showing Leo how to make fairy cakes she headed off to meet her first tradesman at Willow Cottage. As she walked down the side of the pub she could see the back of a white van that was parked in front of the cottage, which was a good start. However, seeing Ernie peering into the driver’s window was not. Beth’s mobile rang; she didn’t recognize the number so answered it but didn’t speak.