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Prologue

Cat Tinsall was standing by the window, stirring the Christmas pudding, looking out as dark clouds rolled over the hills, threatening a cold and rainy night. The kids would be in from school soon, and her granddaughter Lou Lou was upstairs having a nap. She was glad to be in her cosy warm kitchen, with a cup of tea, and her husband, Noel, who was working from home today, sitting at the table on his laptop.

‘Bugger!’ Noel was angrily staring at his computer screen as if by some miracle it could tell him some happier news.

‘Problem?’ Cat asked.

‘Not sure,’ said Noel. ‘But it looks like we’ve been gazumped again on some land to the north of Shrewsbury Ralph and I have been looking at. We were planning to build affordable starter homes, but this firm, LK Holdings, seems to have got in there first. That’s the second time in the last few months. They’re acquiring a hell of a lot of land in the area. We’ll have to look for somewhere else. Damn. That was such a good spot, and so needed.’

Cat smiled fondly at her husband, his fair hair might be greying now, but his eyes were the same dazzling blue, and thanks to a strict gym regime, Noel was still as attractive to her as the day they met. And bless him, he was always saying the same about her, though her figure wasn’t quite as trim as it once was, and her own fair hair was going to need some help from the hairdresser soon.

She wandered over, still mixing her pudding, to see what had fired him up now. Noel was at his most passionate when talking about sustainable development, a subject he cared about deeply. And so much happier here in the picturesque village of Hope Christmas, working for Ralph Nicholas, a local landowner who ran a small family business, than when he’d worked for a big engineering firm in London and felt all his principles being compromised on a daily basis. One of the many good things about making a home, here, was the new lease of life Noel had gained from the move.

‘Never mind,’ she reassured him, ‘I’m sure you’ll find something else.’

‘It’s not just that,’ said Noel, looking pensive. ‘I’ve heard a rumour that LK Holdings are sniffing around Hope Christmas. They’re big in the leisure business, and want to build a luxury development here.’

‘Really?’ said Cat surprised. Hope Christmas was the kind of place that supported upmarket B&Bs, rather than big hotels: the last of which had long been sold for a nursing home.

‘Really,’ said Noel. ‘There are one or two large bits of land on the market at the moment. I’d say they’re ripe for the picking. I believe Blackstock Farm has been for sale for several months. I know it’s been empty for a while.’

‘Isn’t that the one opposite Marianne and Gabriel?’ said Cat. Marianne was one of her best friends in Hope Christmas, and partly the reason they’d come here. She’d entered a magazine competition that Cat had run to find the perfect Nativity, when she was still a magazine editor in London. Cat had ended up not just finding that, but when she came up to meet Marianne, she’d also found the perfect place to bring her growing family, and hadn’t had a day’s regret since. ‘They can’t build there, it would be a travesty.’

‘Wouldn’t it just?’ said Noel. ‘I think I’d better contact Ralph. He’s already gone away for Christmas, but he’ll want to know about this.’

Cat stared out at the darkening sky, towards the hills of the town she loved. She hoped that Noel was wrong. Hope Christmas was perfect the way it was: small enough to have a really strong community, big enough that you weren’t living in anyone else’s pockets. The last thing it needed was a major development, and she and Noel would do anything to protect the place they loved so much.

A chill wind blew down the valley, as Marianne North struggled up the lane from the village with the double buggy. Her three-year-old twins, Harry and Daisy, were perfectly capable of walking, but they were jacking up today, and it seemed easier to push them. As a few icy raindrops started to fall from a dark, angry sky, she was glad she’d wrapped them up warm. Pausing to tighten her coat against the wind and tucking her dark curls under her hat, Marianne swore crossly at a big dark car driving too fast past her, spraying a cold and dirty puddle up her legs. Thoughtless idiot. Couldn’t be a local, no one drove up here that fast. She wondered where the car was going; once you got past Pippa and Dan’s farm at the end of the road, there was nowhere else to go. She only understood when she saw the car stop and pull in on the right verge, by the gate of Blackstock Farm, which had stood empty for months. A woman Marianne vaguely recognised as a local estate agent leapt out of the passenger door, and fumbled with a key at the gate. Aah, that explained it. Dark car driver must be a potential buyer. She hoped whoever it was showed more sensitivities to the locals, if they did decide to buy.

By the time she reached the gate, there was no one in sight. Just a badly parked shiny black BMW which had churned up the mud going into the farm. In the distance, she could see two figures – a man and a woman it looked like – wandering down towards the woods. She shivered. The rain was starting to come down in sheets, now. She didn’t envy them. It was cold and wet out, and it was a bit of a schlep to the woods.

‘Come on, kids, let’s get you home,’ she said. She cast one last look back at the fields. She wondered who was planning to buy Blackstock Farm, and if they would be keeping it as farmland. There had been a lot of developers sniffing around Hope Christmas of late, and even talk of building on the lower slopes of the hills Marianne loved so much. Whoever was looking around Blackstock Farm, clearly wasn’t a farmer. She shivered again. For some reason, she had a bad feeling about this …

Pippa Holliday walked slowly up to the back field, where she knew that Dan was working on repairing some fencing that had blown down in recent storms, rehearsing what she was going to say. A sharp shrill wind was blowing down the valley, and she felt cold to the bone, despite the layers of warm clothing – stupidly she hadn’t worn her hat, and her ginger curls were damp and wild. ‘Hi Dan.’ She ran over in her head what she might say. ‘You know Christmas Day was supposed to be about us …’ – no that wasn’t right, it wasn’t about them anymore, it was about the kids … ‘Dan, would you mind awfully,’ – god no, she sounded like something out of a seventies sitcom. Best come clean. ‘Dan, I have a problem …’

She found him sitting down on a log, taking a break, with a flask of tea beside him, staring down the valley, into the fields below. It was a gloomy dark day, with storm clouds rolling over the hills in the distance, making them look threatening and hostile.

He looked startled to see her, as if he’d been thinking about something else entirely.

‘Hi,’ he said, running his fingers through his dark hair, his blue eyes brooding and sad – as they seemed to have been ever since the catastrophic accident nearly two years ago, when Dan had fallen from a tree and suffered a terrible head injury which had changed their lives forever. Dan wasn’t the same person anymore, and though much better than he’d been, still suffered from blind rages and occasional depression. Pippa had thought she could live with that, Dan hadn’t wanted her to and moved out.

Pippa felt absurdly awkward. A year on from their separation, and it still felt no easier. This was ridiculous, he was the father of her children and she was going in a new direction with someone else – it was time she got over Dan.

‘Hi,’ she said. ‘Dan, there’s something I need to run by you, about Christmas …’

‘Fire away,’ said Dan, still staring intently towards the fields below.

‘It’s about Richard,’ Pippa said. She was always loath to bring up her new partner’s name in front of Dan, but she had no choice, so, hesitatingly, she told him how Richard’s plans had changed and he had nowhere to go, ‘… so I know it’s not ideal, but would it be ok if he was there on Christmas Day?’

‘Sorry, what?’ Dan looked up at her, as if really noticing for the first time she was there. ‘What do you think they’re doing out on Blackstock Farm?’

He hadn’t been listening at all. Pippa looked where he was pointing. She could see two small figures trudging back from the woods below them, up towards the farmhouse, which had been empty for some months. She could make out a car parked in the farmyard.

‘Do you think someone’s buying at last?’ she said, all thoughts about Richard temporarily forgotten. She, Dan and Gabriel whose farms all bordered their neighbour’s, had been fretting about what would happen to Blackstock Farm for several months. If a farmer didn’t buy, there was plenty of room for development which could have a huge impact on all of them.

‘Could be,’ said Dan. ‘I’ve been watching them for about half an hour. They’ve looked over the whole site really thoroughly.’

‘You never know,’ said Pippa brightly, ‘maybe it’s being bought by a farmer.’

‘You know Old Joe let it go to rack and ruin,’ said Dan. ‘I doubt anyone in their right mind would touch it as a farm. There’s too much to do.’

The rain was starting to come down in sheets now. It was too cold and wet to be up here. Pippa watched as the two figures made their way back up the field. They didn’t look like farmers.

‘We’ll just have to wait and see, I suppose,’ she said, trying to stay cheerful, but her heart wasn’t in it. Something rotten was coming to Hope Christmas. She could feel it in her bones.

‘The farmhouse itself needs a lot of work,’ Jenny Ingles was explaining to her client, as she opened the gate to Blackstock Farm. He was a rather good-looking city type, with fair hair and a charming smile. He clearly wasn’t used to the country though, and was inappropriately dressed in a thin suit, a barely warm winter coat, and smart shiny shoes, which were likely to skitter all over the icy courtyard. Unlike Jenny, who had tucked her red hair into a warm woolly hat, and was muffled in a puffer jacket, scarf, long skirt, woolly tights and fur-lined boots.

Her potential customer didn’t seem all that interested in the farm, focussing on something apparently more vital on his iPhone. ‘And as you can see,’ Jenny continued, ‘there are lots of outbuildings, and plenty of space and a great view of the woods and hillside, part of which belong to the farm. Let me show you inside, it’s freezing out here.’

‘That won’t be necessary. I’m more interested in the land. But I suppose the main building can stay. It might make a decent welcome lodge,’ said her companion, finally looking up from his phone. Really, so very rude, Jenny thought. She wondered why he’d come. He hardly looked the farming type, but no one had shown an interest in Blackstock Farm in months, and she could do with a sale before Christmas. She and her boyfriend, Tom, were planning a skiing trip over the festive season; a bonus would come in handy. ‘Can we walk down to the woods from here?’

‘Yes, of course,’ said Jenny, grateful that she’d had the sense to dress up warmly, ‘but are you sure? It’s likely to be cold and muddy.’

Dark storm clouds were rolling over the hills and the temperature felt like it had dropped a couple of degrees. A few streaks of sharp cold rain fell, making Jenny shiver.

Flashing a devastatingly winning smile, her client said, ‘I’ll manage. I’m sure it will be fine.’

Jenny led him to a gate in the furthest corner of the yard. It was a good ten minutes’ hike down to the top part of the woods, and despite her boots, her feet were like blocks of ice when they got there, and her skirt was soaked through at the bottom where it had trailed in the wet grass. Keen as she was for this sale, as the rain started to fall in earnest, Jenny cursed her enthusiastic companion (who apparently didn’t notice the cold) for dragging her down here. On a sunny day in June it would have been lovely …

‘This is perfect,’ he was saying. ‘We could do so much with this.’

‘Oh?’ she asked. She’d assumed he was a townie looking for an escape to the country, but now she was intrigued. ‘What did you have in mind?’

‘I’m afraid I can’t reveal that,’ he said, ‘but I can tell you that my company will be very very interested, indeed. This is just what we’ve been waiting for.’

He smiled that dazzling smile at her again, and she felt herself go weak at the knees. If she didn’t have a boyfriend …

‘Right, I think I’ve seen all I need to see,’ her client, and, she hoped, now prospective buyer, said, ‘thank you so much for your time and trouble.’

‘My pleasure,’ she said, and hoping she wasn’t being too pushy added, ‘I take it you feel you’ll be able to move forward with this, maybe before Christmas?’

‘We’ll have to see,’ another flash of that winning smile. ‘I have a few calls to make first.’

As they walked back towards the farmhouse, Jenny wondered what his company was planning. This was a lovely part of the world, and she could see the attraction of living on a farm like this. Perhaps they’d be putting starter homes up here. Hell, if she and Tom had the money …

Jenny showed her client round the farmhouse briefly but could tell he wasn’t really interested. Maybe she’d got it wrong; maybe he wasn’t going to bite. She didn’t usually get it wrong.

But then, he said those magic words: ‘I think my boss will be very interested to hear about this property and land. I’ll get back to you as soon as possible.’

Result. That Christmas bonus was looking much more likely. Jenny thanked him and agreed to call him early the following week. As she walked through the icy winter rain to the car, Jenny was delighted to hear him on the phone, presumably to his boss, saying, ‘Felix? Luke Nicholas here, I think we’ve found our location.’