Recipe for Love: A gorgeous Cornish romance (Polwenna Bay Book 5) Read online

  Table of Contents

  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

  Epilogue

  Recipe for Love

  By

  Ruth Saberton

  Polwenna Bay 5

  First Edition

  Copyright

  All characters, organisations and events in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  The opinions expressed in this book are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher. The author has represented and warranted full ownership and / or legal right to publish all materials in this book.

  Copyright © 2017 Ruth Saberton

  Cover illustration 2017 Dar Albert

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  Notting Hill Press 2017

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of the publisher.

  Chapter 1

  It felt to Alice Tremaine as though Polwenna Bay had been fast asleep all winter and, now that February half-term had arrived, the village was stretching its arms and yawning as it slowly woke up. A watery sun was peeping out from behind the grey clouds, a few hopeful seagulls had decided to venture in from the cliffs in search of food, and shop shutters that had been tightly closed since New Year’s Day were now being flung open. Whirly stands of postcards had been dusted off, the bakery window was filled with golden loaves and Cornish pasties, and the Harbourside Boutique had optimistically created a display of shorts and swimwear to catch the tourists’ attention. Just looking at it gave Alice goose pimples. The sun might be shining and there might be snowdrops peeking through in her garden, but it was still chilly. The wind blowing across the village was northerly and carried snow in its breath.

  It was just as well the newly refurbished beach café had good heating and a supply of hot coffee, Alice decided as she gazed out across the bay while her granddaughter Mo bought the drinks. This morning the sea was pewter and the sand was a pale lemon sickle frilled with lace where the waves broke. Alice could see the Pollards, Polwenna Bay’s father-and-son builder team, attempting to repair the beach steps while the tide was out, in a race against time that was somewhat hindered by their regular visits to The Ship for medicinal whiskeys and the odd burger – not to mention their general aversion to hard work. Maybe the steps would be ready for the coming season and maybe they wouldn’t. Dreckly was the word Big Rog liked to use when anyone asked him for a completion time frame; it could mean anything from ten minutes to ten weeks.

  It didn’t help either that lately all the builder’s energy was channelled into rigging a top-secret boat hidden away in the depths of his garage. Nobody was allowed inside and this as yet unseen vessel was fast becoming a Cornish mystery on a par with the Bodmin Beast. The other villagers were all dying to know what was going on. Sheila Keverne and Ivy Lawrence were eaten up with curiosity, and rumour had it that Keyhole Kathy Polmartin had asked Silver Starr in the mystic shop if her tarot cards could shed some light on the matter. Alas, Silver Starr’s psychic skills had failed to reveal anything. Even Mrs Pollard pleaded ignorance, while Little Rog just looked blank (although in fairness this could be said to be his general expression).

  “I have no idea what he’s doing. He hasn’t come to me for help and when I asked him what he was up to he just tapped his nose, winked and said it was his retirement project,” Alice’s marine engineer grandson, Jake, had said when she’d asked his opinion. Alice had found this rather alarming. In the run-up to the boating season Jake was always flat out; he had such a good reputation that customers came to Tremaine Marine from all over the county. She would have hoped that Big Rog would have asked for some expert help. If his boat building was anything like his handiwork around the village he’d soon be in big trouble once he set sail.

  “You look serious, Granny.” Mo Carstairs, balancing her baby daughter on her hip as she carried a tray laden with cakes and drinks, joined Alice at her window table. “Penny for them?”

  “Goodness, they’re not worth even that much,” laughed Alice.

  “Are you thinking about your wedding?” Mo asked, setting down the tray and inadvertently sloshing coffee into saucers. “Don’t tell me you’ve finally set a date at long last? I need to be sitting down first for that kind of news.”

  “Cheeky monkey,” said Alice mildly, although Mo did have a point. Her engagement to Jonny St Milton was starting to look rather lengthy – daft really when they were both in their eighties now and ought to be grabbing every second with both pairs of liver-spotted hands! The trouble was there was just so much else to think about before she could focus on their big day. The St Milton family, with their hotel, businesses and perpetual squabbling, were Polwenna’s version of the Sopranos and kept Jonny busy. Alice, meanwhile, certainly had her hands full with her own brood. Her grandchildren might be in their twenties and thirties but that didn’t stop her fretting about them and neither did it stop them getting into scrapes.

  And then there was her son, Jimmy, who – despite being in his sixties – was the biggest child of the lot and caused Alice more worry than all his children put together. He was certainly behaving oddly at the moment with all those furtive phone calls and mysterious emails. Alice only hoped a woman was the cause rather than yet another of his get-rich-quick disasters. These schemes always turned into financial black holes and Alice really couldn’t face, or afford, another one.

  “I was thinking about Roger Pollard’s secret boat,” she told Mo, who grinned.

  “You actually believe there’s a boat, do you? Ashley and I reckon he’s got a cannabis farm in there!”

  “I hope not. I think we’ve had quite enough of that kind of thing to last a lifetime,” her grandmother shuddered. Not so long ago the beach café had been at the centre of a drugs haul and the village had hit the headlines for all the wrong reasons. It had changed hands now and was run by a new arrival called Graham, a gentle divorcee who’d come to Cornwall for a quiet life. Alice thought there was little hope of that happening in Polwenna Bay but she hadn’t disillusioned him. The poor man seemed stressed enough just navigating the coffee machine and it seemed kinder to let him believe he was in for the peaceful existence he craved.

  “Fair point,” said Mo, plonking herself down opposite Alice. “I still can’t believe we were drinking our lattes all that time with tonnes of cannabis underneath the floorboards! I think it’s more likely Big Rog has just made a man cave and is having some time out from the missus. I bet there isn’t even a boat at all. Hey, Granny, can you take Isla for a second while I sort this lot out?”

  She passed the baby across the table a
nd Alice sat Isla in her lap, loving the chubby weight of the little girl and her delicious baby smell. She pressed a kiss into Isla’s soft red curls. There were some good things about growing older: having a great-granddaughter definitely compensated for Alice’s wrinkles and aching hip. It was wonderful to see Mo settled and happy too. Her fiery eldest granddaughter had certainly been the source of many of Alice’s grey hairs and most of her worry lines.

  “What have you done with Ashley this morning?” she asked as her granddaughter mopped up puddles of latte. Mo’s husband wasn’t usually far away from his wife and daughter. They were a tight unit, made even closer after his illness eighteen months ago.

  “He’s sulking at Mariners. I told him to stay there and not inflict his sour face on us. We don’t want to see Daddy until he’s in a better mood, do we, poppet?”

  Instantly Alice was on red alert. “Ashley’s upset? About what?”

  Mo didn’t reply. She was suddenly very intent on crumbling a savoury muffin for Isla.

  “There we are, sweetie! Muffin! Yummy, yummy!”

  Having raised five grandchildren Alice knew avoidance tactics when she saw them.

  “Ashley’s all right, isn’t he?”

  “God! Yes, yes of course! Sorry, Granny, I didn’t mean to frighten you. Ashley’s fine – well, except for being bloody annoying, which is nothing new.”

  Alice didn’t say anything. Mo was clearly bursting to vent and all Alice needed to do was be patient. Three, two, one…

  “I told him I want to get back into eventing this year. I missed the whole of last season and I need to be out competing this season before it’s too late.” Mo’s freckled face took on the determined expression Alice recognised of old. Oh dear. This looked like trouble.

  “And Ashley doesn’t want you to.”

  “He wants me to concentrate on schooling and teaching. He thinks I should let Paula carry on breaking the horses in and he says competing’s dangerous,” said Mo scornfully.

  Since her granddaughter’s choice of career tended to involve her galloping horses across country and jumping huge fixed fences, Ashley had a point. Of course, Alice didn’t dare say so. Instead she just jiggled Isla on her lap and fixed Mo with a searching look.

  “Well, it is a bit dangerous,” Mo conceded eventually, “but it’s what I do, Granny Alice. It’s my career and it’s the only one I’ve ever wanted. I know I don’t have to work and that Ash has more than enough money for us both but I’m not about to sit around and do nothing. I’ll go mad!”

  Alice was just on the brink of pointing out that being a mother was about as far from sitting around doing nothing as it was humanly possible to get, when they were joined by Summer Penhalligan, Jake’s girlfriend. Summer was brandishing one of the national newspapers and her green eyes were shining with excitement.

  “Have you seen this?” Summer placed the newspaper’s magazine supplement on the table with such force that the cups rattled and coffee sloshed onto its pages. She snatched it up again hastily and smoothed the pages out before placing the magazine more gently on the table.

  “Oh!” gasped Mo, leaning forward. “It’s that piece about Symon! He said a journalist had been to The Plump Seagull for a meal.”

  “It must be the week for press. There was a double-page spread in Cornish Coast magazine about the Polwenna Bay Hotel,” Alice recalled. Jonny had been beside himself with pride.

  Mo’s nose wrinkled. “The one about Evil Ella’s wedding-planning business?”

  There was little love lost between Mo Carstairs and the granddaughter of Alice’s fiancé. They’d been rivals since school and things showed little sign of changing just because they were meant to be grown-ups now. Jonny felt that he and Alice should ignore Mo and Ella’s feuding and leave the girls to sort it out, whereas Alice longed to orchestrate a truce. It was one of the few things Alice and Jonny disagreed on. Well, that and his quite frankly old-fashioned refusal to admit that Ella was far better suited to running the hotel than her feckless brother, Teddy. In Alice’s opinion this was just ridiculous. Left to his own devices, Teddy would end up spending the hotel’s every last penny within a matter of days.

  “I know you don’t like Ella, love, but be fair. She’s put her heart and soul into that business,” Alice said gently.

  But Mo snorted. “Evil Ella hasn’t a heart or a soul, Granny.”

  “I think she’s not nearly as hard as she likes us to believe,” Summer remarked thoughtfully. “Maybe we should give her a chance?”

  “Just because you feel guilty for stealing Jake doesn’t mean I have to like her,” retorted Mo. From the expression on her face, it was reasonable to assume that Satan would be making snowballs before Mo gave Ella St Milton the benefit of the doubt.

  Alice sighed again. Bringing the two families together was going to be even harder than she’d thought. Maybe it was just as well she and Jonny hadn’t set a date? At this rate the Tremaines and the St Miltons would make the Capulets and the Montagues look like best friends.

  Summer flushed. “I didn’t steal Jake. He was never with Ella. Not properly.”

  “Tell that to her,” said Mo. “She thinks she owns every good-looking guy in the village. Ashley was lucky I came along before she got her claws into him too.”

  “That’s enough, Morwenna,” said Alice in a warning tone that had never yet failed. It had worked when Mo was a teenager and it still worked even now she was a mother and, supposedly, an adult.

  “Sorry, Sums. Just ignore me. I’m in a really foul mood,” Mo sighed.

  Summer smiled. “I’d never have guessed. What’s up? Ashley and the horses again?”

  While Mo told Summer all about today’s disagreement with Ashley, Alice fished her reading glasses from her bag and turned her attention to the article. Sure enough, a small part of the broadsheet’s weekend section was dedicated to her middle grandchild. There was a picture of Symon, looking deadly serious while he focused on searing scallops over leaping flames. She scanned through the write-up with her heart in her mouth – pieces like this could make or break careers – and was relieved to discover the journalist was singing Symon’s praises. Of course he was. Symon was a wonderful chef and far too good, in Alice’s opinion, to bury his talent in a tiny fishing village when at one point he’d been making a name for himself in Paris. This critic was comparing him to Rick Stein and Heston Blumenthal, so why on earth had her gifted grandson turned his back on the bright lights for this backwater?

  Alice frowned. Something had happened to bring him back here, but what? Symon never spoke about his time abroad but the young man who’d returned was quiet and guarded; there was a sadness in his eyes that Alice hadn’t seen before. His old sparkle had gone and its absence broke her heart. Oh dear. Yet another worry…

  “What are you looking so down about, Granny? It’s a fab piece. I bet Sy will be inundated with bookings after this,” said Mo. “Maybe he’ll actually get that second Michelin star people keep speculating about?”

  “That would be amazing,” Summer agreed.

  “I’d rather he had a day off,” said Alice. She folded up her spectacles and tucked them back inside her bag. “He’s working far too hard. I wish he’d have a little more fun.”

  “Never fear, Granny Alice, I’ve got that in hand,” Mo declared with a breezy confidence that made her grandmother feel the exact opposite.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked, but Mo just tapped her nose.

  “You’ll see.”

  “Have you been meddling?”

  “Maybe just a little,” Mo admitted. “It’s all in a good cause though. You’ll thank me in the end and so will Sy. Just wait. It’s going to be perfect!”

  This sounded ominously as though Mo had been matchmaking. Alice dreaded to think who she’d lined up for her brother. Somebody whose idea of fun was hurtling over five-bar gates? A female farrier? Paula the stable girl?

  “Maybe it’s best not to get involved, love?”
r />   But Mo just laughed. “It’s a bit late now for that.” Draining her coffee and jumping to her feet, she added, “There’s no time like the present either. Would you look after Isla for me? I won’t be long.”

  Alice’s arms tightened around the baby. “Of course I will – but where are you off to in such a hurry?”

  “To find Symon,” Mo said, her blue eyes shining with excitement. “I had the most brilliant idea and I know Sy will thank me later, even if he goes crackers now. You’ll never guess what, Granny! I’ve set him up on a blind date and he’s going to be thrilled! Just you wait and see!”

  Chapter 2

  Symon Tremaine was in his kitchen, reading his review for the third time and allowing himself a moment of satisfaction. These didn’t come very often in the restaurant trade. Mostly days flew by in a blur of hissing pans, shouting and sheer hard work, with his focus trained entirely on the dishes he was preparing. A chef was only ever as good as his last dish and Symon was determined that every single cover served in The Plump Seagull would always be perfect. It didn’t matter whether it was an esteemed restaurant critic at the table or Little Rog Pollard; each customer would have a meal that delighted the taste buds.

  This was the idea anyway – and although Symon was well aware that you couldn’t please everyone, he certainly tried his best. He hadn’t done anything for the reviewer that he wouldn’t also do for any other customer. Although he’d realised who the reviewer was, Symon certainly hadn’t made a song and dance about it. With hindsight, it had occurred to him that this could have been a mistake: perhaps he was supposed to feed the critic’s ego as well as his appetite. When today’s papers had been delivered, a flutter of butterflies had taken flight in Symon’s stomach. A bad review could mean the difference between a successful season and one that would send him grovelling to the bank manager. Again.

  “Happy with it?” Tara Tremaine asked, joining him and pouring herself a coffee. She’d been working in the restaurant for well over a year now and was a key member of the team. Tara was resourceful and determined, and her marketing and promotional skills had resulted in lots of coverage in the Cornish press that was now catching the attention of the national papers as well.