somehow knew about her.
“You own the antiques store, right?” the woman added, putting down the little notepad she’d been holding and shoving her pencil behind her ear. She stuck out her hand.
Feeling even more bemused, Lacey nodded and took the hand being offered to her. The woman had a strong grip. Lacey briefly wondered whether there was any truth to the wrestling rumors after all.
“Sorry, but how do you know who I am?” Lacey queried, as the woman pumped her arm up and down vigorously with a wide grin on her face.
“Because every local person who comes in here and realizes I’m a foreigner immediately goes on to tell me all about you! About how you also moved here from abroad on your own. And how you started your own store from scratch. I think the whole of Wilfordshire is rooting for us to become best friends.”
She was still shaking Lacey’s hand vigorously, and when Lacey spoke, her voice shook from the vibration.
“So you came to the UK alone then?”
Finally, the woman let go of her hand.
“Yeah. I divorced my hubby, then realized divorcing him wasn’t enough. Really, I needed to be on the other side of the planet to him.”
Lacey couldn’t help but laugh. “Same. Well, similar. New York isn’t exactly the other side of the planet, but with the way Wilfordshire is, sometimes it feels like it may as well be.”
Gina cleared her throat. “Can I get a cappuccino and a tuna melt?”
The woman seemed to suddenly remember Gina was there. “Oh. I’m sorry. Where are my manners?” She offered her hand to Gina. “I’m Brooke.”
Gina didn’t make eye contact. She shook Brooke’s hand limply. Lacey picked up on the vibes of jealousy she was giving off and couldn’t help but smile to herself.
“Gina’s my partner in crime,” Lacey told Brooke. “She works with me in my store, helps me find stock, takes my dog for playdates, imparts all her gardening wisdom to me, and generally has kept me sane ever since I came to Wilfordshire.”
Gina’s jealous pout was replaced by a sheepish smile.
Brooke smiled. “I hope I get my own Gina, too,” she joked. “It’s a pleasure to meet you both.”
She retrieved the pencil from behind her ear, making her sleek blond hair swish back into place. “So that’s one cappuccino and tuna melt…” she said, writing on the notebook. “And for you?” She looked up at Lacey with expectancy in her gaze.
“A cortado,” Lacey said, looking down at the menu. She quickly scanned everything on offer. There was a wide array of very tasty-sounding dishes, but really the menu consisted solely of sandwiches with fancy descriptions. The tuna melt Gina had ordered was in fact a ‘skipjack tuna and oak-smoked cheddar toastie’. “Erm… The smashed avo baguette.”
Brooke noted the order down.
“What about your furry friends?” she added, pointing her pencil between Gina and Lacey’s shoulders to where Boudicca and Chester were pacing around in a figure eight motion in their attempts to sniff one another. “Bowl of water and some doggie kibble?”
“That would be great,” Lacey said, impressed by how accommodating the woman was.
She would make a great hotelier, Lacey thought. Maybe her job back in Australia had been in hospitality? Or maybe she was just a nice person. Either way, she’d made a great first impression on Lacey. Perhaps the Wilfordshire locals would get their way and the two would go on to become firm friends. Lacey could always do with more allies!
She and Gina headed off to choose a table. Amongst the vintage patio furniture, they had the option of sitting at a table made of a door on its side, thrones made out of tree stumps, or one of the nooks, which were made from the halves of sawn up rowing boats filled with pillows. They went for the safe option—a wooden picnic table.
“She seems absolutely lovely,” Lacey said, as she slid to seating.
Gina shrugged and flopped down on the bench opposite. “Meh. She seemed alright.”
She’d gone back to jealously pouting.
“You know you’re my fave,” Lacey told Gina.
“For now. What about when you and Brooke buddy up to chat about being expats?”
“I can have more than one friend.”
“I know that. It’s just, who will you end up wanting to spend more time with? Someone your own age who owns a trendy store, or someone old enough to be your mother who smells of sheep?”
Lacey couldn’t help but laugh, though it was without malice. She reached across the table and squeezed Gina’s hand.
“I meant it when I said you keep me sane. Honestly, with everything that happened with Iris, and the police and Taryn’s attempts to drive me out of Wilfordshire, I really would’ve lost my mind if it hadn’t been for you. You’re a good friend, Gina, and I don’t take that for granted. I’m not going to abandon you just because a cactus-wielding ex-wrestler’s arrived in town. Okay?”
“A cactus-wielding ex-wrestler?” said Brooke, appearing beside them holding a tray of coffees and sandwiches. “You wouldn’t be talking about me, would you?”
Lacey’s cheeks went instantly hot. It wasn’t like her to gossip about people behind their backs. She’d only been trying to cheer Gina up.
“Ha! Lacey, your face!” Brooke exclaimed, thumping her on the back. “It’s fine. I don’t mind. I’m proud of my past.”
“You mean to say…”
“Yup,” Brooke said, grinning. “It’s true. There’s really not as much of a story there, though, as people have made out. I wrestled in high school, then college, before doing a year-long stint professionally. I guess small-town English folk think it’s more exotic than it is.”
Lacey felt very silly now. Of course everything could be blown out of proportion and distorted as it was passed from one person to the next along the small town gossip system. Brooke being a wrestler in the past was as much of a non-event as Lacey having worked as an interior designer's assistant in New York; normal for her, exotic for everyone else.
“Now, as for wielding cactuses…” Brooke said. Then she gave Lacey a wink.
She decanted the food from the tray to the table, fetched bowls of water and kibble for the dogs, then left Lacey and Gina to eat in peace.
Despite the overly complicated description on the menu, the food was actually terrific. The avocado was perfectly ripened, softened enough to lose its bite but not too soft as to be mushy. The bread was fresh, seeded, and nicely toasted. In fact, it even rivaled Tom’s and that was the highest praise Lacey could really give anything! The coffee was the real triumph though. Lacey had been drinking tea these days, since it was constantly being offered to her, and because there wasn’t a local place that seemed to match up to her standards. But Brooke’s coffee tasted like it had been shipped straight here from Colombia! Lacey would definitely switch to getting her morning coffee from here, on the days when she started work at a sensible hour rather than at a time when most sane people were still snoozing in bed.
Lacey was halfway through her lunch when the automatic door behind her swished open and in waltzed none other than Buck and his silly wife. Lacey groaned.
“Hey, chick,” Buck said, clicking his fingers at Brooke and thudding down into a seat. “We need coffee. And I’ll take a steak and fries.” He pointed at the tabletop in a demanding way, then looked over at his wife. “Daisy? What do you want?”
The woman was hovering at the door on her tippy-toed stilettos, looking somewhat terrified of all the cactuses.
“I’ll just have whatever has the least carbs in,” she murmured.
“A salad for the missus,” Buck barked at Brooke. “Easy on the dressing.”
Brooke