Escape for Christmas (4 page)

“Perfect.”

“Really?” Gemma wasn’t convinced. “It looks a bit small. I don’t think I’ll fit in.”

“That, my dear innocent one, is the point,” Angel said patiently. “You don’t wear this to Waitrose, Gem. You wear it in the bedroom.”

Gemma thought that if she wore this in their bedroom she’d die of hypothermia. Cal said every time he nipped to the loo he felt like Captain Oates. Still, sometimes it was easier just to let Angel do her thing. Following her friend around the store, she let her select some red and green Christmas underwear, a set of Santa-style handcuffs, a red crop which The Pony Club would have never allowed, and some glittery edible body paint. She drew the line at a festive-style bunny though.

Gemma wasn’t a prude. She’d had vibrators in the past, usually as a daft presents or bought when several sheets to the wind on pink wine and at a hen party (and she’d even carted one to Rock because she’d thought her love life was over back then), but to actually buy one and present it to Cal as a festive treat? The very idea made her feel faint. Oh dear. Maybe she was less liberated than she thought?

Gemma held the bright red contraption nervously. It wiggled and jiggled cheerfully in her hand but quite frankly all she wanted to do was call the RSPCA. Why on earth had the designers given it a cute little face and sweet little ears? That was just wrong! It needed to be eating carrots and living in a hutch, not going… there!

“No way,” she said firmly.

“You’re mad,” shrugged Angel, “but up to you. Laurence bought me one when he had to go on a stag weekend; Ludo somebody or other, I think it was. Posh people really do have silly names. Anyway, bringing Bugs home was the worst mistake he ever made!” She started to cackle at the memory and several other shoppers looked up and gave her a conspiratorial smile. Then recognition dawned on their faces and before Gemma knew what was happening
they’d whipped out their mobiles and were taking pictures.

Taking pictures of her clutching a vibrator.

Gemma had the hideous sensation that she was in a lift and descending very, very fast. Those pictures would be all over the social media by the time she even reached the till, and the celebrity magazines would go mad. Oh God! What if her mother saw the pictures? Or even worse, Cal?

“Chill out,” was Angel’s advice when Gemma pointed out what had happened. “Breathe, Gemma. It’s a couple of blurry selfies that they’ll probably forget about. Besides, this is the twenty-first century. And if the worst comes to the worst maybe we’ll get a deal out of it? You could be the new Pulse poster girl! It’s got to be more fun than baking cakes.”

Gemma wasn’t amused. It was all very well for Angel. She had a knack for falling in the stinky brown stuff and still coming up smelling of Coco Mademoiselle, whereas Gemma just ended up needing a good bath. Hoping that the girls were more interested in Angel than in her anyway, she followed her friend to the checkout.

“This is on me,” Angel insisted, handing over Laurence’s well-worn credit card. “I’ll take one of these as well,” she told the shop assistant as she picked up a copy of
Fifty Shades
. “Don’t argue, Gemma. Call it an early Christmas present. Fingers crossed it’ll spice up your Yuletide.”

Gemma doubted it. As soon as she was home this lot was getting shoved to the back of the deepest darkest cupboard she could find. The book might be handy for kindling. There was no way she was prancing around dressed like something from a nineteen-nineties’ Mariah Carey Christmas video. No way at all.

“Thanks,” she said politely, taking the carrier bag.

“Don’t thank me until you’ve tried it,” said Angel. “I know you, Gemma Pengelley! You’re planning to shove that bag somewhere and forget all about it, aren’t you?”

Gemma stared at her. “Are you psychic?”

“No, I just know you. But remember you wanted to try and spice things up again, and having fun is the best way. Don’t take any of this seriously. It’s just a bit of a giggle. It can’t hurt to give it a try.”

Privately Gemma thought that the damage to her self-esteem when Cal saw her dressed as sexy Mrs Santa and gave himself a hernia laughing could be fatal. Even worse, what if all her fat bits turned him off totally? The outfit was a size twelve but Gemma knew in her heart that she was more like a fourteen these days. It was living in the Lion Lodge. She was eating to keep warm. And entertain herself. And comfort herself.

Something had to change. She couldn’t go on like this.

Outside now in the sharp cold air, the girls rejoined the Christmas crowds. Angel threaded her arm through Gemma’s and together they strolled along the high street, listening to the carols and peering in at the festive shop windows. The air was thick with the aromas of roasting chestnuts and mulled wine from the market vendors, and the excitement of the shoppers was palpable. This was what Christmas was all about. There was nowhere like Cornwall for Christmas. Devon was lovely but it wasn’t home; Gemma missed her native county more and more every day. She wanted to visit the Lanhydrock Christmas shop and toast her toes in front of the log fire, meander with Cal through the Cothele Christmas Food Fair and pick out a few goodies to try. She wanted to wake up with him on Christmas Day and walk on the beach. She wanted to go home for Christmas.

And that was when her brilliant idea finally took shape. It was no longer just a nebulous mass of ifs and maybes; now it was solidifying and appearing before her very eyes, becoming more real with every second. It was so simple and so obvious that Gemma laughed out loud. Of course! The solution had been there all along. Coming back to Cornwall had just made it clear.

It was time she took matters into her own hands. Forget the silly costumes and the fluffy handcuffs, buzzing bunnies and glittery body paints.

Gemma had a much better idea of how to give Cal a Christmas to remember.

Chapter 4

Leaving Cornwall was always hard, but for some reason Gemma couldn’t quite fathom it was getting even harder. Maybe it was a coming-up-for-thirty thing? Getting away from the sticks and heading for the bright lights of London had once been her biggest dream. When she was sixteen you’d hardly have seen her for the cloud of dust on the A30. Theatres, shops, the Tube – all these things had beckoned, and for a while it had all been great fun. There’d been her time at the BRIT School, which had been brilliant, then a few TV roles and a bit of theatre too, as well as all kinds of parties and craziness. But somewhere along the line something had shifted and Gemma had found herself longing for Cornwall’s lemon-sharp air, broad light and ever-changing sea, as sludgy as the Thames one moment and Caribbean blue the next. That wonderful summer in Rock had only confirmed what Gemma had long suspected, that Cornwall was etched deep into her soul, written through her like a stick of Looe rock, and that it was only when she was back over the Tamar that she’d feel at home again.

East Devon was lovely too and she was lucky to live there, Gemma reminded herself sternly as Angel backed the Land Rover Defender out of the narrow parking space they’d been lucky enough to find, right at the furthest end of the Tesco car park. How Angel could see was anyone’s guess; the back seat was piled high with carrier bags and parcels, her best friend having been determined to make inroads into her Christmas shopping. Gemma closed her eyes in terror. When she opened them again they were on the ring road and heading out of town, past the spires of the cathedral as it drowsed in the afternoon sunshine, and following the road that hugged the bank of the river. The water sparkled as it danced out into the sea. Seagulls clotted the sky, circling high up in the chilly air, and their calls could even be heard above the engine. They brought to mind images of sunnier times, of picnics, stripy windbreaks and thick wedges of golden beach.

What was to stop her and Cal moving to Cornwall once he’d finished with
Bread and Butlers
? Gemma wondered idly. The bakery could relocate; Pengelley’s Cakes
could be made anywhere in the UK, and if they stayed away from the trendy areas like Rock they’d get more for their money. Cal was always on about how much they needed to watch the pennies. It was one of the reasons he worked so hard, and having squandered more than Gemma would ever earn in a lifetime she guessed he knew what he was talking about. They could buy a little place down here, maybe find a way of linking up with Prince Charles’s organic Duchy Originals range, and begin a whole new life. She could see it now: the pretty cottage they’d buy, the big kitchen complete with the red Aga she’d always longed for and a squashy sofa, and upstairs a massive sleigh bed with snowy white pillows, mounds of duvets and not a patch of mould in sight. OK, so maybe there would be a little bit of mould somewhere; Cornwall was a damp county after all. And the white pillows might suffer as a consequence of Gemma’s habit of eating toast and Marmite in bed. Nevertheless, as fantasies went this was a great one – much more up her street than dressing up in a sexy Santa costume and walloping Cal with a red crop. Maybe she was boring, but Gemma felt a lot more excited about filling her imaginary kitchen with mugs and Le Creuset cookware than she did about the contents of the Pulse bag.

“Can we make a detour before we head home?” Gemma asked Angel. Her idea was mutating now, taking on a life all of its own. It was the same delicious and tingly sensation she had when she knew that she’d totally nailed a cake recipe.

Angel, who was weaving in and out of the busy Christmas-shopping traffic with a skill that Lewis Hamilton would envy, threw her a curious look.

“Not to Rock is it, babes? I know you’d like to see Dee but it’s a bit out of our way – and besides, the place will be dead this time of year.”

“No, it’s nowhere near as far as Rock. I know you have to be back to shoot this evening. This’ll only take an extra half an hour or so, I promise.”

“Now I’m intrigued,” said Angel. “What is it? A designer pasty shop? Are we on a mission to carry out industrial espionage? Watch out Ginsters;
we’re coming to get you?”

“First of all, as a self-respecting Cornish maid I don’t consider a Ginsters to be a real pasty,” Gemma told her sternly, “and secondly I don’t just think about food, you know. I wanted to have a look at this cottage I know. It’s not far; it’s just beyond Bodmin, on the edge of Dad’s farm.”

“Any particular reason?”

“Just curiosity really. It’s ever so pretty, right on a little creek that flows into the River Fowey. It’s been derelict for as long as I can remember – my brothers and I used to play there as kids – and I’ve always wondered whether it would be possible to do something with it.”

“Sounds cool,” said Angel. She checked her watch and groaned. “I have
so
got to get this bloody thing fixed. I don’t care that it’s an heirloom; what’s the use if it doesn’t work?”

“It’s just gone two,” said Gemma. Her Baby-G might not date from the reign of Louis XIV or whoever, but at least it worked.

“Fab.” Angel grinned at her. “Magical mystery tour, here we come!”

The road to Penmerryn Creek was every bit as twisty and turny as Gemma remembered. From the relative speed and normality of the A30 it was a shock to be plunged into the sunken lanes that laced together numerous small Cornish villages and hamlets. At this time of year the trees were bare, their limbs reaching into the Wedgwood-blue sky like stark fingers, and patterns of winter sun dappled the tarmac. Horses wrapped in thick rugs stood waiting hopefully in muddy gateways with their breath rising in smoky plumes, and cows huddled against the hedgerows. That was her father’s herd, Gemma thought, instinctively assessing them. They looked good for the winter: healthy enough to still yield milk and make it through the dark cold days before another meeting with Henry, the prize bull. She craned her neck and, sure enough, there Henry was, all alone in the next field, sporting his gold nose ring like a gansta rappa. He was a chunky mountain of a beast with the sex drive of a premier footballer (Cal being the exception to the rule here, unfortunately) and all the finesse of a wrecking ball. With his beady eyes and thick neck he reminded Gemma of Mr Yuri. She gulped nervously. Persuading Cal to step away from the show was going to be harder than she’d thought. If Anton Yuri took exception it would be concrete-boots time for sure.

The lane ended rather abruptly at a T-junction and Angel paused the car here, waiting for directions – but Gemma was still distracted by the view. The empty fields rolling away on the right were evidence of wheat and maize long harvested and put away for the winter months. Past these and stretching to the horizon were endless acres of corduroy plough hemmed with green set-aside; from a distance, it looked like a giant had opened a packet of chocolate limes and scattered them across the landscape. Gemma knew every inch of this land, every ditch and boggy patch and dry-stone wall, because this was the farm that belonged to her family. Just over the brow of the hill, nestled from the wind by a copse of gnarled trees, was the old stone farmhouse. Chickens would be scratching in the yard and a grinder would be screeching away from one of the barns as repairs were made to machinery. Meanwhile, inside the farmhouse a hearty stew would be bubbling away on the range and Radio Four would be chatting away to itself. Penmerryn Farm. Home.

“Which way now, babes?” asked Angel. She peered nervously at the road in front. To the right it was fairly well maintained, but to the left a thick spine of greenery ran down the centre of the asphalt; it reminded her of a stegosaurus. “Please say right. I know I’m in a four-by-four but I’m not really up for off-roading.”

“Sorry, it’s left,” Gemma told her. “It’ll be fine though. There’s only a mile or so to go.”

Angel let up the clutch and Gemma’s heart began to thud with a heady cocktail of excitement and dread. The lane looked relatively unused, which had to be a good sign. If nobody was using the road then the cottage was still empty. And if the cottage was still empty then maybe, just maybe, she could persuade Cal to buy it? If his memories of the place were anything like hers then Gemma just knew he wouldn’t be able to resist it either.