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Christmas at Lilac Cottage
A perfect romance to curl up by the fire with
Holly Martin
Contents
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Epilogue
Letter from Holly
Also by Holly Martin
Acknowledgments
Copyright
To the wonderful bloggers who constantly tweet, retweet, blog, review, share, shout, gush and generally get very over excited for me. You guys are amazing and I couldn’t do it without you. I love you all. I hope one day we can all meet in a room where there’s lots of cake and I can come round and hug you all personally. Until that day, this book is for you.
Chapter One
The timer went off on the oven and Pe
She looked around at the green-leafed garlands that covered the fireplace and the white fairy lights that twinkled from in between the leaves, the lights that lined the windows also lending a sparkling glow to the room in the dullness of the late winter afternoon. She knew that next door, in the a
Everything was perfect and Pe
Henry and Daisy Travis had been referred to her by the agency in charge of finding tenants for her a
Not that she had an issue with children; she loved them. She had even thought at one point in her life that she might have some of her own but that had passed her by. She just wanted to make friends with people who were at the same point in their life as she was.
One by one all her friends had got married and had children and each time a new child in the town was born it seemed to add weight to her solitary existence. Everyone had someone to love and look after. Pe
She had always lived in Lilac Cottage and she could never imagine living anywhere else. The view over the town of White Cliff Bay and the rugged white coastline that lent the town its name was stu
Renting the a
Pe
It was going to be perfect and she couldn’t wait to start this next chapter of her life.
Henry slammed his hands on the steering wheel as another red light forced him to stop. In a town that was probably no more than a few miles long they seemed to have traffic lights on every corner and every single one of them had been red so far.
This had to be the worst moving day ever. The expression of you get what you pay for couldn’t be more true today. As the a
And what was with the people in the town? They asked so many questions. Stopping for petrol in the town’s only petrol station, stopping at a supermarket, and then a café for lunch with Daisy, he had been accosted by about thirty different people who wanted his whole life story. Daisy was lovely and sweet and would chat to anyone and everyone, the complete opposite to him; he just wanted to tell everyone to sod off and leave them alone.
Daisy was staying with his sister tonight, which was a good job too as he was in a foul mood. All he wanted now was to get to this house, unpack the few things he had brought with him and fall asleep in front of the TV or over a good book.
He just hoped that Pe
He turned onto the long driveway leading up to what he hoped was Lilac Cottage. He had got lost three times trying to find the blasted place and when he stopped to ask directions, people seemed to close ranks and send him the opposite way as if they were trying to keep the place hidden. As he drove over the crest of the hill he saw it. The house was a pale purple colour. He had presumed the name Lilac Cottage would come from nearby Lilac trees not the actual colour of the house. It looked like somewhere Barbie might live. With the lights twinkling happily in a multitude of colours from every tree, bush and fence surrounding the home, it just added to the sickeningly cutesy feel. Daisy would love it. He glared at the lights as if they were causing him great offence. Bloody Christmas. Humbug.
A silver Range Rover pulled up on Pe