The Once in a Blue Moon Guesthouse: The perfect feelgood romance

‘Hi, Robin.’ Will dropped his hand. ‘I don’t suppose, by any chance, you’ve got any rooms going? Just so I can be a wuss in comfort and deal with the leak tomorrow, in the daylight. And I know it’s a lot to ask, but could you also accept my dog? I don’t want Darcy to be left in a strange, empty house on her own.’

‘Yes,’ Robin said, ‘of course. Please come in.’ Will grinned, his shoulders dropping in relief. He picked up his bag from the porch and stepped into the hallway. ‘Darcy?’ she asked tentatively.

‘Long story.’ He was standing close to her, looking around him, failing to meet her eye all of a sudden. ‘This place is great,’ he said. ‘A far cry from what Tabitha’s left me with. Look,’ he turned towards her, ‘I do appreciate this. I know it’s after midnight, and you’re probably not in the habit of accepting guests – and dogs – so late. So if you just tell me where my room is, I’ll dry Darcy off, get out of your hair and we can regroup in the morning.’

‘Sure, sure. No problem,’ Robin managed, her head so full of questions about Tabitha, and how come he’d appeared now, and why had Robin never met him while she was growing up, and did he know about the plans that Malcolm and Tim had for the house, and had they found his number and got in touch with him, that for a moment she forgot the reality of the situation. ‘Your room. Yes, of course – let me show you.’

‘Please don’t put yourself out. I’m sure I can find my way. I’ve got navigational skills like Bear Grylls, even if I don’t have his stamina.’ His face fell as he caught Robin’s eye and she didn’t return the smile. It had just dawned on her, through the shock of the unexpected situation, which room she was going to have to put Will in for the night.

‘I’d like to show you if that’s OK?’ She hurried into Sea Shanty and took the key from the top drawer, the icon of GuestSmart winking accusingly at her from the desktop. She would check him in later. ‘My rooms are a bit … unique,’ she managed, taking a towel out of the bottom drawer and handing it to him.

‘Oh?’ Will raised his eyebrows, suddenly looking slightly nervous. They stood in the hallway, facing each other, as the rest of the guesthouse settled into darkness around them. ‘Unique in what way?’ He crouched and rubbed Darcy with the towel. She stood perfectly still while she was dried into a caramel puffball.

‘You’ll see,’ Robin said. ‘Come with me.’ Without asking, and with her heart pounding in her chest, she picked up Will’s holdall and started climbing the stairs towards their destination at the top of the house.

She was going to have to put Will Nightingale, Tabitha’s nephew, and his little dog Darcy, in Starcross.

Chapter 5

‘Here we are,’ Robin said, her chest tightening as she stopped on the tiny landing outside Starcross. Will stopped on the top step behind her. There wasn’t enough room for both of them on the landing, and she could feel his breath on her ear, but for some reason she couldn’t open the door. She had a mental block. She looked at the nameplate, pearly white with Starcross written in swirling blue, as with all the other name signs, and wondered if she could do this. Put this tall, imposing, though so far very nice-seeming man in this special room. A room full of dreams and hopes and finding meaning in the stars.

‘Uhm, is everything all right?’ Will asked.

‘Yes, of course.’ She put her hand on the door handle. Pushed it down. And he had a dog. A very cute dog, some kind of poodle-cross, though she wasn’t sure exactly what. She had only ever intended for dogs to go in the rooms on the first floor. Not up here.

‘Robin,’ Will prompted, ‘if this isn’t convenient or … or if the room is really specialist, then I can always—’

‘No no,’ she said, not wanting to encourage his mind to wander. If she hadn’t wanted guests here, then why had she designed it in this way? Angry with herself, she pushed the door open quickly, forcefully, almost falling into the room. She turned on the light and took another two steps, allowing Will to follow her. Darcy ran ahead and put her paws up on the duvet.

‘No, Darcy.’ Will covered the room in a couple of strides and gently lifted her paws off the fabric, stroking her fuzzy coat. He stood up straight, his eyebrows rising as he noticed her looking. ‘Are you sure this is OK? You’re not bending your rules for me, are you?’

Robin shook her head, enamoured by how softly he spoke to his dog. ‘Not much,’ she admitted. Will’s attention turned to the room, to the telescope in front of the balcony doors, a framed map of the constellations next to the glass, the modern, slate-grey furniture with subtle silver accents. She chewed the inside of her cheek. She’d put solar-powered sun and moon jars on the chest of drawers alongside the mini Kilner jars containing teabags and sugar sachets, but realized that unless she turned the LEDs on, guests wouldn’t know what they were.

‘The bathroom’s in there.’ She pointed to the only other door in the room. ‘And details about breakfast, and all the other information about the guesthouse, is in the pack on the dressing table.’

‘It’s a beautiful room,’ he said, as she put his holdall on the floor. ‘Are you a bit of a stargazer, then?’

‘Not at much as I’d like to be,’ she admitted. ‘I have good intentions, but never seem to take enough time to learn what everything is. But I do love the stars, and this room has a perfect view of them on a clear night.’

‘No light pollution over the sea.’ Will was moving slowly around the room, looking at everything. He stopped at the balcony doors, the curtains still open, and flipped the light switch that Robin had put there for that very purpose. The room was plunged into darkness, and she held her breath as Will peered out. After a moment, he turned. ‘It’s too cloudy tonight, so – oh!’

The pinprick lights that Robin had installed in the ceiling began glowing softly, casting the room, and Will, in an eerie bluish hue, like moonlight.

‘Nice touch,’ he said quietly. ‘So you get stars, even if they’re hiding behind cloud cover.’

‘They fade after a while. You can set the time they stay on, so you don’t have to sleep with it like this.’ She pointed to a small timer on the wall behind the headboard, then hugged her arms tightly around herself. It was close to one in the morning, but she felt as tight and fidgety as a wind-up toy desperate to be released. She hadn’t quite prepared herself for a guest staying in Starcross, and had definitely not been ready for Tabitha’s nephew to turn up and be so imposing. Was he imposing? He was certainly making his presence felt, but then Starcross was the smallest room, and there were three of them in it – if you counted Darcy.

‘Does she need some water? I’ve got a bowl downstairs.’

‘I’ve got that covered, at least.’ Will pulled a metal bowl out of an end-pocket of his holdall. ‘I didn’t know what I’d be faced with when I arrived. Clearly, I didn’t account for all eventualities.’ He indicated his sodden shirt.

‘I’d better leave you to it,’ Robin said, backing towards the door. ‘Let you get some sleep.’ She realized she hadn’t given him his keys. ‘Here you go. One key for this room, and one for the front door.’

‘Thank you,’ he said, his voice weighted with sincerity. ‘This room is perfect. Unique, granted, but not in the way I was imagining.’

‘What were you imagining?’

His green eyes fixed on hers for a moment, the smile there rather than on his lips. ‘Maybe I’ll tell you when we know each other a bit better. I’m not sure you’d appreciate it, and the last thing I want to do is get kicked out now I’ve found a great place to stay.’

Robin gave a nervous laugh. ‘OK, sleep well, then. I’m on the ground floor if you need anything. You or Darcy.’

‘Thank you, Robin. For coming to my rescue.’

‘You’re very welcome.’ She backed up to the door, slid through it and closed it. No dancing on the landing this time; she fled down the stairs as quietly as she could, scooped Eclipse into a hug as he pattered into the hall, and then went to bed herself, pulling the cover up to her chin, her kitten buzzing gently, his soft fur warming her feet.

Most of her guests appeared for breakfast at the same time. Officially, Robin ran it from seven thirty to nine thirty, though she was prepared to deal with requests that deviated from her plan. On her first morning everyone picked eight thirty to appear, and so she led them, en masse, out to Honeysuckle, the patio garden where she would serve breakfast on days the weather allowed it.

Robin was prepared for this. She had learnt much of it by osmosis, by just being there during her teenage years, and now she had her mum and dad’s bible. Running the guesthouse, Sylvie and Ian assured her at the top of the first page, was completely different to being on the periphery.

Robin kept her focus, staying in the kitchen while Paige served and cleared the tables. Molly’s daughter was the perfect balance of polite and cheerful with the guests, and Robin could hear chatting and laughter through the open door. She had baked sourdough and parmesan bread, and had found a recipe for shredded hash browns. Outside, each room had its own table, so Robin could keep track of any food requirements or allergies included on booking forms. Mr and Mrs Barker both went for full fried breakfasts with extra hash browns, Neil had the vegetarian version and Catriona picked scrambled eggs and smoked salmon on toast. Ray and Andrea, the guests in Wilderness, opted for croissants, and Dorothy seemed happy with muesli and toast.

The only empty places were at the Starcross table, but Robin thought Will was probably having a lie-in after his late arrival.

Robin could have done with a lie-in too. She was usually a morning person, and had pictured herself rising at five thirty during the summer to walk on the beach before breakfast, but after dealing with Will she had lain in bed and stared at the ceiling, wondering how long he had set the timer and watched the gently glowing lights above him. She had known that her first guest in Starcross would feel strange; she would care what anyone thought of it, regardless of who that person was. If it had been an old married couple, instead of Tabitha’s nephew, with the broad shoulders and green eyes and that way of being completely present, even in the long, high-ceilinged hall, she would have felt equally anxious. That’s what she told herself as, the cooking finished, she took a pot of Marmite out to Dorothy.

‘Thank you,’ Dorothy said, squinting as she turned her face up to the sun. ‘The weather seems to have welcomed our arrival.’

‘This is the first properly warm start we’ve had in a while,’ Robin said. ‘It feels like summer is almost here.’

‘It always feels closer by the sea, somehow,’ Dorothy said. ‘Probably because summer memories are beaches, sandcastles and ice creams. Down here you get a bigger summer quota than in big cities.’

‘I don’t know,’ Robin said, picking up an empty juice glass, ‘there’s something lovely about sitting outside a city pub and soaking in the atmosphere and the heat from the tarmac after a long day at work.’ As she said the words, she contemplated whether she still felt that way. She’d loved doing that with Neve and other friends in London, but had it ever come close to being by the sea?

Dorothy was looking at her closely, her pale eyes unblinking. ‘It’s not the same though, is it?’

Robin shook her head. ‘No, you’re right, it’s not. I should be promoting Campion Bay, not sending everyone scurrying back home.’

‘Nobody wants to leave once they come here,’ Paige said, wiping down the Barkers’ table. ‘Campion Bay ticks all the boxes.’ Robin stared at her for a moment, searching for signs of sarcasm, but couldn’t find any. She’d wanted nothing more than to escape when she was Paige’s age, not because she hated the seaside town, but because she felt there was so much more to explore. Maybe Paige was made from the same mould as Tim, finding everything she wanted in the quaint Dorset town, seeing no need to look further afield for her future.

‘Birmingham has its moments,’ Neil chipped in as Robin wove through the tables, ‘but it doesn’t have the views.’

‘A sea view is pretty unbeatable,’ Robin admitted. ‘It’s never the same, from one day to the next. Can I get either of you anything else?’

Neil shook his head. ‘I’m going to have to think hard about lunch at this rate. I couldn’t eat another mouthful. It was delicious, thank you.’

‘It’ll keep our energy up round the wildlife park,’ Catriona added.

‘Oh, you’ll love it.’ Robin’s thoughts drifted back to the times she’d been there growing up, with her parents and then friends. ‘It’s got a great petting zoo.’

‘And monkeys,’ Paige added. ‘Though don’t take your car through that bit, or you’ll lose a wing mirror.’

‘I’m heading straight for the penguins,’ Catriona said.

‘Too smelly for me, even if they are cute.’ Neil wrinkled his nose and Catriona gave him a playful slap on the arm.

Robin left them to their excitement, and was stacking plates in the dishwasher as she heard the front door close. She peered down the corridor and saw Will walking towards her, wearing knee-length black shorts and a faded blue T-shirt. He had a red towel looped around his shoulders and Darcy at his feet, which were only half in a pair of battered trainers, his heels pushing them out of shape at the back. ‘Hi,’ he said, giving her a quick smile. ‘Am I too late for breakfast?’

‘Not at all.’ Robin saw that his hair was, again, damp. ‘Been for a swim?’

He nodded. ‘The water’s freezing, but it’s the best way to wake up. And Darcy loves it.’

Robin laughed. ‘You take your dog swimming with you?’

Will shrugged. ‘I couldn’t go without her. There aren’t any restrictions, are there? I didn’t see any.’

Robin shook her head. ‘No, not yet. Campion Bay is dog friendly, but you won’t be able to take her on the main beach from June. You’ve still got a month, though.’

‘That’s good to know, thank you.’ Will looked down at Darcy, who was standing obediently beside him. Robin couldn’t help but smile. They seemed so out of place next to each other, as if Darcy had adopted Will without him having any say in the matter. She could imagine the little dog following him around until he got bored with trying to shoo her away. ‘So, I’ll just …’ He pointed upwards and Robin nodded, trying not to laugh. She heard him tread lightly up the stairs, the patter of Darcy’s paws following closely behind.

As Robin went back to her work, she wondered if she’d ever get the chance to see Will with dry hair. Then she wondered why she was even thinking about it.

By the time Will and Darcy came down to breakfast, the other guests had left to start their days, exploring Campion Bay and beyond. Robin had let Paige go home, and was tidying up the last of the crockery.

‘Where do I go?’ Will asked, peering into the kitchen. ‘Can Darcy come into the breakfast room, or should I take her back upstairs?’

‘Out here.’ Robin dried her hands on a tea towel and led him into the garden. ‘And of course Darcy can come – it’s just me now. Take your pick of the tables and see what you fancy off the menu. Tea or coffee to start?’

‘Coffee, please.’ Will sat at the table closest to the kitchen door. He was still wearing the faded blue T-shirt, but the shorts had been replaced by dark jeans that emphasized his long legs, and the trainers exchanged for tan Wrangler boots.

‘Does Darcy have dry or wet food?’

He looked slightly surprised. ‘Dry. But I’ve fed her already, upstairs. I didn’t realize you actually catered for dogs, I thought you just agreed to have her because I didn’t give you a choice.’

‘I could easily have said no to both of you.’ Robin said it with a smile, and Will narrowed his eyes as she disappeared inside.

‘Coffee coming right up!’

She cooked her last breakfast for the day: scrambled eggs, Cumberland sausages, grilled tomatoes, local smoked bacon and homemade hash browns, and took a photo of it for the guesthouse Instagram feed before she gave it to Will. She left him to eat and cleaned and wiped down the kitchen, then went outside to offer him more coffee. His plate was clean and he was intent on his phone, Darcy lying a few feet away in a wide patch of sun, her head resting on her paws. Robin noticed with amusement that Eclipse was sitting beyond the French doors looking out at the dog, and that Darcy’s large brown eyes were trained on the kitten, her tail wagging gently.

‘More coffee would be great.’ Will put his iPhone in his pocket. ‘I’ve got a long day ahead of me.’

‘What are you doing down here? If you don’t mind me asking,’ Robin added hastily.

‘I’ve come to clear out Tabitha’s house,’ he said with a sigh, glancing up at the building next door and squinting slightly. His hair had dried in the suntrap of Honeysuckle and Robin saw she had been right; it was a toffee-brown colour with a few natural blond highlights.

‘You’ve got to clear out the whole place on your own?’ She took a step closer to the table.

He shrugged and turned to look at her. ‘There’s nobody else to do it.’

‘What will you do with it once you’re done?’

‘Sell it, I suppose. I haven’t thought that far ahead.’

Robin’s stomach clenched as she thought of Mrs Harris’s scorn at the prospect of a modern development on Goldcrest Road. Even if her assumptions of a shopping centre were way off, this was likely to be the easiest negotiation Tim had ever done.

‘You’ll sell it?’ She hadn’t meant to sound so stunned, but Will looked at her closely.

‘I’m going into this blind,’ he said. ‘I know nothing about Campion Bay, about what’s in my aunt’s house and really, I have no clue what I’m going to do. I only know it falls to me, and the longer I leave it the worse things will get. Hence the impressive leak.’

‘I’ll get your coffee,’ Robin said quickly. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked. It’s none of my business.’

‘Hey’ – he reached his hand out towards her, palm up – ‘why not make enough coffee for both of us? You can give me a crash course in Campion Bay – if you’ve got time.’

Robin smiled, relieved that he hadn’t taken offence at her intrusiveness. ‘Give me five minutes.’

When she sat down, Robin’s knees, clad in orange skinny jeans, briefly pressed against his before he moved them.

‘You don’t seem too happy that I might sell the house,’ he said, after Robin had added milk to both mugs.

Robin kept her eyes focused on the table. ‘It’s not up to me,’ she said. ‘It surprised me, that’s all. Tabitha has owned the house as far back as I can remember, and then, after she died, it stayed empty.’ She glanced at him but his gaze was steady, no flicker of emotion at the mention of his aunt’s death. ‘I hadn’t thought about what happens next,’ she added, pushing her coffee shop discussion with Tim from her mind.

‘You and me both.’ Will rested his elbows on the table. ‘I’ve known about the house – that it would fall to me – ever since her will was read, but this is the first chance I’ve had to come down here and take a look at it.’

‘What do you do, if you don’t mind me asking?’

He pressed his lips together, seeming to weigh something up before he answered. ‘I work – worked – at a historic house, in Kent.’

‘Doing what? It – you don’t own it, do you?’

Will shook his head, giving her a rueful smile. ‘No, nothing like that. I do a bit of everything – help to manage the estate, odd jobs, pitching in as a tour guide. It’s not a large house, not English Heritage or National Trust, but it’s open to the public so there’s always work to keep on top of.’

Robin tried to imagine him wearing a Barbour jacket and Hunter wellies, striding across a manicured lawn with a lurcher at his feet. She couldn’t do it, and not least because when she tried to picture it, the lurcher was immediately replaced with Darcy, scurrying to try and keep up with Will’s long strides, unprepared to let him out of her sight. ‘But you said worked. You’ve quit?’

Will sighed, his chin dropping to his chest. ‘It’s obviously not something I can do freelance. I’ve known for a while that I’d need to come and sort out Tabitha’s house and it – it was suddenly the right time.’

‘Did you enjoy it?’

‘I did. No two days were the same, always a new challenge, always meeting new people. Being a guide is fun, as long as the guests are vaguely interested. You can measure your success by how many of them are still maintaining eye-contact at the end of the tour.’

‘Did you make things up?’ Robin took a sip of her coffee but it was too hot, and she spluttered, spilling some over her hand. She put her mug on the table and sucked at the scald.

‘Here,’ Will said, pressing a paper napkin into her free hand. ‘Are you OK?’

Robin nodded, stopped sucking the injury like a small child and wiped at it with the napkin.

‘Make things up?’ he asked. ‘You mean on the tours?’

‘You know, embellish the stories, add a few more juicy details.’

Will shook his head slowly. ‘I can’t believe you’d even ask that. Of course not. People come to find out about the history of the house, not hear some sensation-filled fabrication.’

Robin felt a flush of shame, but she could see that he was amused by the suggestion. She took another, tentative sip of her coffee. ‘At least your love of old buildings will help you today,’ she said softly.

Will winced, lines forming at the edges of his eyes. ‘Clearing out an empty house isn’t quite the same thing.’

‘So do you know how long you’ll be down here? Will you have to find another job, or can you focus on next door?’ Robin knew that she was firing too many questions at him, that it was none of her business, but she had such a strong desire to know. Now he was sitting at her table, he could give her more insight into Tabitha and into her house, which suddenly seemed the object of so many people’s attention.

Will leaned down to stroke the top of Darcy’s head. ‘I have no idea how long it’ll take, but if it stretches into months, if I’m making slow progress, then I’ll have to start looking for something round here. I knew I’d need space away from everything to make a proper start. I didn’t want the pressure of employers waiting for me, however reasonable they were about it.’

‘I can understand that,’ she said quietly. She watched him sip his coffee, drawn to his forearms, tanned and with a dusting of pale brown hair. It looked like he spent a lot of time outside, and Robin could picture him leading a group of awed tourists across a beautiful garden, an impressive stately home behind them – it fitted much better than the Barbour and the wellies, though Darcy was still in place, trotting loyally alongside. He had the presence to be a tour guide. She could see him commanding everyone, holding their attention with his green eyes. Especially, she thought wryly, the females of the party.

‘Have you run the guesthouse for long?’ Will asked, startling her out of her reverie.

‘Nearly twenty-four hours,’ Robin said, laughing at Will’s confused expression. ‘It reopened officially yesterday, with me at the helm. My mum and dad ran it for years, but they’ve moved to France and … well, now it’s my turn.’

‘Wow.’ Will’s eyebrows went skywards. ‘So this morning was your first time cooking everyone breakfast? You look like you’ve barely broken a sweat.’

‘I helped Mum and Dad out over the years, so I was more prepared than someone starting from scratch, and I’ve got my friend’s daughter working with me. Your breakfast is actually an Instagram star.’ She took out her phone and showed him.

‘That’s an accolade I never thought I’d get – devourer of a famous breakfast.’

‘You’d better remember this moment,’ she grinned.

‘Pretty sure I will,’ he said quietly, and her smile faltered under the weight of his stare. ‘Unflappable even when I turned up at midnight on your first day. But it must have been much more of a disruption than I imagined. I’m sorry.’