The House at the Bottom of the Hill Read online

‘No time for picnics,’ Mrs J said. ‘Let’s get this sorted.’

  The temperature of the situation must have risen this morning.

  Charlotte eyed the group. Mrs Johnson. Sweet-natured Mrs Tam. Mr and Mrs Tillman, who ran the stock feeders’. Their oddball twenty-year-old twin daughters, who didn’t quite fit in with their 1950s floral dresses and studious natures. One had a purple streak in her hair and the other a tattoo of a scallop shell on her shoulder. Charlotte wondered why the twins hadn’t left home and made their way to the city.

  ‘It’s our understanding,’ Mrs Johnson said, ‘that you’re planning on repainting the weatherboard on the B&B.’

  Charlotte nodded. ‘Sunflower yellow.’

  ‘And we’re not saying it’s a bad thing,’ Mrs J continued as though Charlotte hadn’t spoken. ‘The house needs a new coat of paint and it’s decent of you for wanting to pep it up.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘That bad storm we had a few years back did a lot of damage, and our good friends, the Cappers, didn’t have the money to renovate, with hardly any customers and their income dwindling as it did.’

  ‘I understand,’ Charlotte said. One of the first things she’d done was repair the sorry state of the veranda railings and put down new turf in the front garden. ‘It’s good of you to take an interest, with me being new. How kind of you all.’

  ‘That’s why they moved west to their son,’ Mrs J said, steamrollering Charlotte’s sarcasm. ‘Forced to retire because the B&B wasn’t producing an income. So what we really want to know is how you think you could do any better because this is a difficult town to live in.’

  Wasn’t it just? ‘Well …’ Charlotte hadn’t given any consideration to answering this question. She hadn’t expected such opposition. Or was it interference? ‘I’ll advertise. Although it might take a couple of months before the house has guests.’ Not that Charlotte would be around to see them. The only advertising she intended was putting the B&B up for resale—and she couldn’t do that without first giving it a cosmetic makeover. It was in a worse state inside than she’d realised.

  Mrs Johnson stared at her, face puckered as though she’d taken a sip of strong coffee, expecting it to be weak tea. ‘It’s been pink for as long as any of us can remember.’

  ‘So yellow would be a refreshing change.’

  ‘Pink,’ Grace Tillman said, nudging her husband, Ted, in his tank of a chest.

  ‘Pink,’ he responded on cue, frowning like a disgruntled Buddha. ‘Can’t go changing it now. We had photos taken of the town four years back—we haven’t got money in the kitty to have more done. We have our own website, you know, and those pictures are up on it. That’s the first impression people get when they go wandering the interweb.’

  Charlotte withheld her smile at the idea of the world looking for the dot on the map called Swallow’s Fall.

  Ted puffed up like one of the local corroboree frogs, although there was nothing endangered about him. ‘This B&B is part of our legacy and we’re proud of our history. Why, it’s practically heritage ranking, is our B&B. It has to remain flamingo pink.’

  ‘My B&B,’ Charlotte said. Parts of the inside were certainly worthy of a museum, but she’d better not mention that. No wonder it had been on the market forever. If it took too long to settle the repainting issue, let alone what she needed to do inside, she’d never resell the place; she’d be here through summer, autumn and winter.

  ‘It’s our further understanding,’ Mrs Johnson said, ‘that you’re planning on putting kiddie beds in the rooms for young children.’

  Charlotte drew her bottom lip between her teeth. ‘Yes. So families can stay.’ Small families—two parents, one child. The rooms weren’t big enough for more.

  The group shuffled and sighed, signalling an overall impression of wrongdoing.

  ‘The Cappers only had couples,’ Grace Tillman said. ‘They advertised their place—’

  ‘My place now.’

  ‘—as a retreat for adults.’

  The bedrooms upstairs were sweet, in a bijou, chintzy way, but you could fit a trundle bed or a cot if needed, so what was the problem with catering for children? The house was small and currently a bit dated but had enough love in its rafters to make families want to stay for the night—cheaply—and have a hearty, home-cooked breakfast the next morning before moving on. Which is why Charlotte felt it would sell once she’d done some cosmetic renovation.

  ‘This is a main thoroughfare off the Monaro Highway,’ Grace continued, her plump cheeks reddening with every word. ‘We have a responsibility to our visitors. We can’t go about our business constantly watching for kids running out of the B&B.’

  Six cars an hour was a main thoroughfare? Charlotte put her politest smile back in place. ‘I recognise it’s a busy little town and that it’s growing. I have thought about the Main Street issue. I’m going to build a fence around the front garden.’

  Silence.

  Charlotte stilled. What had she done now?

  ‘A f–f–fence?’ Ted Tillman spluttered. ‘We’ve never had a fence around the B&B. What colour are you going to paint that?’

  Charlotte held her breath a moment. ‘I was thinking ordinary white.’

  ‘A yellow house and now a fence, for crying out loud. What next?’ Ted took hold of his wife’s arm. ‘Come on, Grace. We need an official town meeting about this.’

  Charlotte breathed deeply. ‘No need for a meeting, surely?’

  ‘A fence around the B&B front garden, young woman,’ Ted said, his tone reminiscent of a brewing summer storm, ‘would run up against the bus depot and possibly interfere with the shire’s transportation arrangements. You’ll need permission. And let me tell you, it might take months. The shire is busy, you know. They’ve got pot holes on the highway to consider before they jump to your wants and needs.’

  Charlotte glanced at the shire’s distinguished depot: a green barricade railing and an open-sided shelter.

  ‘Nothing to worry about,’ Mrs Johnson said as Ted stormed off, pulling his wife behind him. ‘Town meetings are a normal practice when something major is happening. You’ll find that out.’ She turned to the old 4WD she drove. The thing screeched like a pandemonium of parrots whenever she fired it up. Why hadn’t the committee done anything about that?

  Charlotte glanced over her shoulder at her own brand-new 4WD she’d thought would give a better impression of fitting in than the swanky sports car she’d driven in England. Stuff the fitting-in—she’d never fit in here. Good job she didn’t want to.

  The Tillman twins looked at each other and back to Charlotte. ‘There’s plenty for you to find out,’ the one with the purple streak in her hair said. The one with the tattoo of a scallop shell nodded in agreement.

  Charlotte sighed.

  ‘Don’t go worrying too hard,’ Mrs Tam said once everyone had gone. ‘Ted’s in charge of the gavel. Likes to bang it whenever he gets the chance.’

  Charlotte already felt the weight of it. Right on top of her head.

  ‘And I do like to give Ted the chance to let his emotions out,’ Mrs Tam continued. ‘He’s been under the weather recently. Too much study of space travel and the like. And there’s the trouble with—’ Mrs Tam pursed her mouth, suggesting she’d like to say more but felt she shouldn’t.

  ‘I’ll keep all that in mind,’ Charlotte said.

  Mrs Tam looked at Charlotte, head tilted, dark eyes searching Charlotte’s face. ‘Are you sure you haven’t been in town before?’ She smiled. ‘Maybe it’s that beautiful hair of yours making me think I’ve seen you somewhere.’ Charlotte swiped at her shoulder-length hair, pushing it from her face and rolling her shoulders in an attempt to release the self-consciousness settling on them. She’d never been here before. Didn’t want to be here now but had forced herself to come, and buying the B&B had been her only option.

  She glanced down the street to Kookaburra’s where Daniel and Ethan Granger had been standing. Charlotte had seen Eth
an around but hadn’t met him yet. He was quieter-looking than anticipated. Big though; six-foot-five, easy.

  She’d be less tense if she kept an open mind about the best way to approach him, but the questions she had for him might anger any man, especially if the townspeople already had wind of something amiss about Charlotte’s sudden arrival. They were so unexpectedly closed off and protective of each other. She’d have to think about backing down a little, not rushing things. Taking her time would be hard, though. She had so many questions and she needed the answers in order to move on. She had a new life to build, away from this place and free of fear.

  Ethan didn’t look like his father, or even have the same surname, but was he built the same way, emotionally? Perhaps he was different to Thomas O’Donnell.

  Charlotte didn’t know, but she was here to find out.

  Two

  Charlotte locked the front door, slid the bolts into place top and bottom and hooked the chain into its lopsided brass slot. The red paint had chipped where her old screwdriver had slipped. She wasn’t an expert handywoman but she knew how to put chains and bolts on doors—when she had the right tools. A new screwdriver was on her shopping list.

  It was silent outside. Dark.

  She turned to the hallway, fighting fatigue and the dreaded sense of claustrophobia the darkness gave her. She switched the hall light off and the upstairs light on. The large peonies on the flocked wallpaper looked like splashes of raspberry cordial in the evening shadows.

  ‘Goodnight, Lucy.’ The dog lay in her basket in the laundry area off the kitchen.

  Charlotte held her breath, counted to five and released it, putting more than usual mental effort into ignoring the shadows around her as she made her way to her ground-floor bedroom.

  It had been years since the panic overwhelmed her to the point where she wanted to hide beneath her bedcovers, but tension after the death of her gran nine months ago and the loss of the world she’d loved had nudged the fear again. Two weeks in Swallow’s Fall and the angsts were back with a regularity more worrying than the bodily incapacities that came with them: clouded vision and nausea that played a skipping game in her stomach; that terrible closed-in sensation. And the dream.

  She closed her bedroom door, holding on to the tarnished brass knob as she turned the old-fashioned key in the lock. She moved to the window, slipped her hand between the closed drapes and checked that the window lock was hooked properly. She shuffled the heavy brocade fabric, folding one width over the other; locking out the night.

  She got into bed and switched off her table lamp. A light was on in the house; she didn’t need one in her bedroom. She’d taught herself to sleep without it. There’s no monster now, she reminded herself. He’s gone.

  She turned her mind to the jobs on her list. The hall carpet had seen better days and her kitchen could do with an overhaul worthy of two rubbish skips—and she had a pink house to be repainted yellow. Not that she wanted to go overboard with renovations, but the quicker she got the B&B ready for resale, the faster she’d be out of this town. It was nothing like the village in England she’d grown to love. She treasured wide open spaces but there was too much landmass in Australia. Too much country to become too damned lonely in.

  She’d go for a run tomorrow. That would help relieve the sense of the townspeople not liking her, not wanting her, disturbing her normally happy-to-be-alone attitude. Mrs Tam was helpful but Mr and Mrs Tillman were troublesome. Mrs Johnson was probably more bluff than bite … and Sammy Granger. She was on the committee and had been welcoming the few times Charlotte had met her but it would be a colossal mistake to befriend the woman who was married to the man she’d come to town to meet.

  She scrunched her eyes closed and ran a hand over her face. Why should she care what anyone thought about her? She wouldn’t be here long enough for any of it to matter.

  She saw an image of Daniel Bradford resting against the doorframe of his Bar & Grill, arms folded, one leg bent, his weight on his hip. She surprised herself by smiling as she shrugged her shoulders beneath the eiderdown and shuffled her head into the pillow. At least she’d removed the fear of the dream, although she hadn’t expected to fall asleep with a picture of Daniel Bradford’s firm backside in her mind. Still … if that’s what it took. She yawned, snuggled further. The man had a fabulous bum.

  Neither had she expected to get a first-rate view of it so soon, but here it was in daytime, right in front of her in superb display. Clothed, of course—encased in washed denim so soft looking she could imagine the smoothness of it on the palm of her hand.

  The farming aromas of cracked feed and chicken pellets stifled her breath as they did every time she came into the stock feeders’ establishment. The smell of hay and sheep wafted through the open barn doors at the back along with the sound of the twins’ laughter, but she couldn’t take her focus off Daniel Bradford’s tight, two-hundred-squats-a-day backside. He must work out. A lot.

  Ted Tillman had his head bent over a brochure and Daniel was leaning on the counter, nodding at whatever he was being shown. He had his left foot on an upended crate so the denim of his jeans creased where the top of his leg met his hip. The length of his back and legs said six-foot-two, and the firmness of his thighs said runner, or football player. The jeans were what might be called a comfortable fit on an exceptionally taut body. The white shirt he wore, tucked into the waistband of his jeans, showed off a torso that tapered from wide shoulders to trim waist. His brown belt looked old; a scratched leather favourite, or perhaps the only one he owned.

  Her consideration slid downwards again and her focus got snagged on a small rip in his jeans below the left back pocket. About three centimetres long, it was only slightly frayed, suggesting it hadn’t been torn for long. He might not even know it was there.

  ‘Good morning.’

  She shot her gaze up to his face and didn’t know what feature to look at first. His short brown hair should be ordinary by anyone’s description, but it was thick and glossy. His eyes were the colour of sable and his tanned skin suggested he liked being outdoors.

  Charlotte gathered herself. Stay calm. He’s just a guy. So why did she feel like panting the way Lucy did on warm afternoons?

  ‘Something wrong?’ he asked with a quizzical half-smile.

  ‘There’s a queue,’ Ted said, both hands flat on the counter as he leaned forward, his frown meant to scare.

  ‘It’s okay,’ Daniel said to Ted, taking his foot off the crate and turning to face Charlotte. He hooked his fingers into the back pockets of his jeans, and thrust his left leg forwards.

  Alright, so he wasn’t just any male specimen. Hot farmhand on hay stack, the caption said, as a vision of Daniel Bradford standing on the baler of his John Deere tractor erupted in her head. Wearing only his jeans, with fifty-five hay bales he’d hefted at his booted feet, he ran a long-fingered hand down his bare chest where rivulets of dirty sweat trailed down to his … Charlotte looked down at his—For God’s sake. This was not the dream she should be having. Not in daylight.

  ‘Looking for something particular?’ Daniel asked, amusement in his tone.

  The flame of embarrassment singed her cheeks. He’d caught her looking.

  ‘I wanted some screws,’ she said in a breathy little voice. Where had that come from?

  ‘You’re in the wrong place. You need Morelly’s hardware across the street.’

  Did the man have any idea what havoc that shirt wrought with a woman’s imagination? Strong neck, toughened shoulders, an expanse of iron-hard chest and a firmed abdomen—all barely concealed by his thin cotton shirt. Given her reaction to him so far, all this masculinity spelled trouble.

  ‘Screwdriver,’ she managed. ‘I need a Phillips head for the screw-in type of screws.’

  He grinned the sort of grin obviously meant to please anyone who wanted to catch it. Charlotte did her best not to be knocked sideways by the sexual vibrancy of it.

  ‘Screwing?’ he said, his voice
lowered to a soft, deep vibrato. ‘I think I know just what you need.’

  Oh, trouble alright. Hotshot-charm-boy trouble. ‘Screw in,’ she said firmly.

  Ted Tillman coughed. ‘So, shall I order the charcoal briquettes for you, Dan?’

  ‘Yeah, please, Ted. One ton.’

  ‘One t–ton?’ Ted stuttered. ‘What are you going to do with a t–ton of charcoal?’

  Daniel spoke softly. ‘Thinking of throwing a barbecue at Kookaburra’s on Friday nights throughout summer. Something different for the punters.’

  Ted closed the brochure and puckered his mouth and brow.

  Daniel turned a confident-looking smile on the stock feeders’ proprietor. ‘First night I do it, you and Grace get a free feed. Put the charcoal on my tab, would you, Ted?’

  Ted’s brow relaxed. ‘That’s very generous—a free feed, eh?’ He slapped the brochure. ‘Not sure how this will go down, but I’ll order the briquettes for you. Can always send them back if we decide we don’t like Friday night barbecues.’ Ted looked around Daniel’s shoulder at Charlotte. ‘You wanted something?’

  ‘Dog biscuits.’ Charlotte turned, picked up a fifteen-kilo plastic sack and nearly dropped it—it was heavier than anticipated. She’d intended to buy the five-kilo bag but couldn’t bring herself to look weak and fainthearted in front of these men. She had an unflinching public image to maintain. She hoisted the bag under her arm and turned to the counter.

  ‘Cash for smaller purchases,’ Ted said. ‘EFTPOS for others but I don’t accept American Express.’

  ‘I know, you’ve told me before.’ No tab for Charlotte. She deposited the sack onto the counter and dug into the pocket of her A-line skirt for her purse.

  ‘Where’s your dog?’ Daniel asked.

  ‘Outside.’ She inhaled the aroma of coffee coming off him in waves. Freshly ground beans. Strong and sweet.

  ‘Ted!’

  Mr Tillman moved towards the sound of his wife’s voice, his footsteps shuffling on the grainy floorboards. ‘Coming, honey. Guess what’s happening at Kookaburra’s on a Friday from now on—and we’re getting it free!’