A Starlit Summer Page 23
‘I told him the truth – that some day someone would find out about him and Timothy and sell the story. I suggested he’s better than the persona he’s hiding behind, basically making himself out to be a womanising bastard. Or words to that effect. I’m sure he didn’t come out just because of me. He had to have been thinking about it for a while.’
‘Probably his whole damn adult life.’ Carla picked up her flat white. ‘I think it’s a smart move. I mean, he wanted the column inches, which is why he was talking to Heidi about them “getting back together”. Well, he’s certainly got the attention he craves – the media are having a field day. And, most importantly, he’s got so much support for being honest.’ She sipped her coffee and looked across the table at them. ‘Anyway, enough about Milo. When are you two lovebirds getting the keys to your flat?’
Finn smiled. ‘A week Monday.’
‘Great, so you can stick around here for a few more days. You’re welcome to stay at mine unless your parents want you back for a bit.’
‘Actually I’m really sorry, we can’t,’ Jenna said. ‘We’re going down to Cornwall.’
‘And I’ve got a job lined up in Bristol the week after next which is going to take me through to Christmas,’ Finn said. ‘So it’s our last opportunity to have a break for a while.’
‘Ah bugger, I thought you’d be hanging around for longer.’
‘Plus I’ve got a garden to weed.’
Carla laughed.
‘You think she’s joking?’ Finn put his arm around Jenna’s shoulder.
‘In fact I’ve got two gardens – Bramble Cottage when we’re in Cornwall and then the garden flat in Bristol.’
‘Ah, Jenna Wilson, you’re the most unshowbizzy, showbizzy person, you know that right? You look like a film star without even trying but you love everything that’s not about being in the limelight. I think it’s amazing that you know your own mind and are following your heart.’
Jenna reached across the table and took Carla’s hand. ‘I’m going to miss you.’
‘Don’t be so soppy. You spent weeks away down in Cornwall last year, what’s the difference?’
‘The difference is this move is permanent.’
‘And yet you’ve already told me you’ll be back in London in two weeks for a casting. We’ll get to see each other loads. Now let’s talk about something else before I start crying.’
~
The two sides of Jenna’s life felt like ying and yang. In the space of a weekend, she’d gone from walking the red carpet of a major film that she’d starred in, to driving down to Cornwall in Finn’s van for a quiet few days pottering around the garden, going to the beach, surfing, and eating fish and chips by the sea.
The move to Bristol had happened naturally in the end. After her summer working on The Cornish Affair had come to an end, along with her last day and night in Cornwall with Finn, holed up together in the cottage, she was torn when she left on the Sunday. The start of a relationship with Finn seemed to finish the moment she got in her car and drove out of the gate leaving him and Bramble Cottage in the rear-view mirror. She’d cried all the way back to London.
The pull of Finn was bigger than the pull of Cornwall, and although she missed the peace of the cottage and its garden, the sea air and the countryside, she embraced the opportunities that came her way back home. With auditions lining up she began to be choosey about the roles she went for and when the opportunity to work on a mini-series in Bristol came her way, she jumped at it. It was closer to Cornwall and that meant being closer to Finn.
It was only for a week, but Jenna realised there was the possibility of living somewhere other than London and still being able to work as an actor. Not only did she realise it was a vibrant and creative city, but it was also a filming hub. An idea began to form. Cornwall had stolen her heart as much as Finn had, but Finn was eager to escape his quiet country life, even if it was a wrench to move away from the coast. He was desperate to move out of his parents’ house and an offshoot of Harrison & Son in a city location seemed the ideal solution, and so their new life together had taken shape.
It felt like coming home, pulling into Bramble Cottage’s weed-free drive. Although Finn’s parents lived close by, Jenna and Finn wanted to stay in the cottage while it wasn’t being rented out, to have a proper mini-break in the place where their romance had started.
Jenna got out of the van and slammed the door shut; the noise sent wood pigeons flapping into the tops of the trees. She looked up at the cottage as she walked along the path.
‘You and your dad did such a good job.’
‘Goes without saying, doesn’t it?’
Jenna reached the front door, now painted a mint green, in keeping with the surroundings. She unlocked it and pushed it open.
The kitchen had been transformed from a set of tired 1970s units to a sleek country kitchen. Extra touches finished the place off beautifully: a new blind on the window over the sink, a vase of dried wild flowers on the table, and a new light shade where a bare bulb had been for so long.
Finn dumped his bag on the kitchen table and looked around. ‘Do you know, being back down here has made me realise how completely mad this weekend has been.’
‘It’s not always going to be like this. You know my life is rarely as glamorous as it has been these last couple of days.’
‘Thank God.’ He pulled Jenna to him. ‘It’s been fun though.’
‘And now we have five days down here to enjoy the cottage like holidaymakers. Lazy mornings, days on the beach...’
‘Sounds blissful.’
‘Even the weather is perfect.’ Jenna went over to the fridge and pulled open the freezer compartment. They were still there from earlier in the year when she helped her parents do some work on the garden. Jenna turned back to Finn and waggled an ice cream at him.
‘For old time’s sake.’ She handed him one, took his hand and pulled him outside and around to the back of the cottage.
It was late September; the sun was shining but Jenna was glad of her chunky cardigan thrown over her sleeveless top. A cool breeze whistled through the trees, rustling leaves and branches, but back out on the daisy-speckled lawn she could still feel the sun.
Jenna sat down on the grass and stretched her legs out. Finn joined her and ripped open his ice cream. He leant back on his hand. ‘Aah, the good old days. I loved working on this place.’
Jenna gazed at the cottage with its neat slate roof, the walls repaired and painted, the sash windows all renewed. The cottage had been transformed from the tired shell of a place she’d first seen.
They sat in silence eating ice cream and listening to the birds chirping in the trees.
‘Do you remember how hot it was that day?’ Jenna wiped the ice cream from her lips and turned her gaze to the pale blue sky with wisps of white cloud. ‘Doesn’t even seem possible now.’
Finn shuffled closer and wrapped his strong arms around her. She thought back to that first brief and unexpected kiss, the way the jolt of excitement had gone through her, along with the desire for him to kiss her again. To know their fates had been so aligned made this moment perfect.
‘I’m so glad I met you.’ She nestled her head in the crook of his shoulder. ‘The scary thing is we so easily couldn’t have. If Milo hadn’t hand-picked me for the film, if I hadn’t persuaded my parents that I should stay here while the place was being done up; if my dad hadn’t clicked with your dad when he popped round to give him a quote – so many factors came in to play for us to meet and fall in love.’
Finn squeezed her tighter and kissed her again. ‘It was one hell of a summer.’
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There are five books in my Romantic Escape series. They all feature different characters and can be read as a standalone book. Alongside A Starlit Summer is Tanzania set The Baobab Beach Retreat, which is available now, and Santorini based The Greek Heart can be pre-ordered. The Amsterdam Affair and The Love Island Bookshop, which is set on an island in the Maldives, are coming soon.
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Acknowledgements
The inspiration behind A Starlit Summer came from the time in my twenties and early thirties when I worked as a Supporting Artist in film and TV. I was on Mad Dog Casting’s books and got to work a few times on the long-running TV series Casualty (which at the time was filmed in my home city of Bristol), as well as the BBC costume drama The Young Visitors, and the comedy Trollied. I was also lucky enough to work on three films. I spent a day in a field with dirt smeared on my face as part of a crowd of equally peasant-like fellow extras for King Arthur; I was a member of an eighteenth century theatre audience jeering at Keira Knightley and Ralph Fiennes in The Duchess; and in Vanity Fair, I played one of the wealthy ladies who snubs Reese Witherspoon’s Becky Sharp.
I always knew that I wanted to set a book on a film set, and the idea of a young actress escaping London for a summer in Cornwall working on a movie seemed like the perfect match. And so that’s how the idea of A Starlit Summer came about.
The Cornish setting is both real and fictional. Bramble Cottage is a fictional place in an unspecified location within driving distance of Mullion and Falmouth on the Lizard Peninsular, which of course are real places, as is Porthleven and Port Isaac. I’ve taken liberties with the beach Jenna and Finn visit by not naming it and by giving the beach near it a fictional name, although it’s not dissimilar to many of the beaches found along the Cornish coast.
A huge thank you as always goes to Judith van Dijkhuizen who beta read an early version of the book. Always honest and thoughtful with her comments, she never fails to help me make a novel better because of her suggestions. My wonderful editor, Helen Baggott, polished the final manuscript ready for publication.
Jessica Bell worked on the covers for the whole of my Romantic Escape series at the same time and I could not be happier with the results. The cover for A Starlit Summer evokes the setting and the idea of an escape to the countryside, which I love.
I wrote the first draft of A Starlit Summer in 2019, well before the world was turned on its head with Covid-19. I think it’s important for fiction to allow readers a virtual escape from the real world, so there’s no mention of coronavirus and there won’t be in the subsequent novels in the series either. They’re romantic escapes and I want them to remain uplifting, heartfelt and hopeful with a good dash of romance. Pure escapism.
Thank you to all my readers who have read my books, supported me and left such lovely reviews, it means the world. Lastly, a huge thank you to my husband Nik, my son Leo, and my parents for their never ending support.