hesitantly turning to Fern and kissing her cheek too. ‘Desolé,’ he muttered and walked away.
Anouk sighed. ‘One of the solutions he suggests if you won’t move out is that he, Carole and the children move in with me.’
‘How do you feel about that?’ Fern asked. ‘Would it work? You’d have someone on hand to keep an eye on you.’
‘I think it would be less my home than theirs. Selfish, I know, but I’ve lived alone for so long now,’ Anouk shrugged, ‘it would be like an invasion of my private space.’
Fern hesitated. ‘Do you know what he’s thinking of as the second possible solution?’
‘I ’ardly like to tell you.’ Anouk paused. ‘You and I should move in together into one of the houses. He’s not fussy which but would prefer for you to move in with me.’
Fern stared at her, open-mouthed. She could see from Fabian’s point of view that that idea made perfect sense.
‘I can see you no like that idea any more than I do,’ Anouk said. She pushed the coffee cup in front of her away. ‘Sometimes I feel I’ve lived too long. Fabian knows my house will be his when I die, he’s just going to ’ave to wait.’
‘Oh, Anouk.’ Fern reached out and held the older woman’s hand, sensing her distress. ‘Please don’t talk like that. I know Fabian doesn’t wish you dead. If he wishes anyone dead, it’s probably me.’ Right now, though, she could cheerfully murder Fabian and his wife for their selfishness and lack of compassion towards his grandmother.
An hour later, driving back to the auberge, having taken Anouk home, Fern felt despondent and unsettled. She’d thought she was beginning to recover from the loss of Laurent, but the events of the morning had shaken her. The pressure Fabian was putting on her to move out of the auberge made her feel guilty, when she truly had nothing to feel guilty about Laurent’s death. It was French inheritance laws that were at the root of the problem. Fabian would get his inheritance in due course, but her girls would get significantly less if she simply walked away from the auberge.
She had Laurent’s insurance money tucked away for the girls as a safety net, but she’d been banking on the auberge earning money and being able to recuperate at least some of the money they’d spent on renovations. The inescapable fact, though, was wherever she lived she needed a steady income of some sort. Jobs were notoriously difficult to come by in this part of France, put a middle-aged English female into the equation and it became damn near impossible.
Maybe she should think about Fabian’s second suggestion of she and Anouk moving in together. Not in the Huelgoat house, but in the auberge. With Anouk installed in one of the bedrooms, there would still be five bedrooms to let out. Anouk was becoming increasingly frail and as much as she might hate the idea of leaving her beloved family home, it was inevitable. At least she wouldn’t end up in an old folks’ home if she moved in with her.
Fern’s grip on the steering wheel tightened. ‘Bloody drunken driver,’ she cursed under her breath. ‘You annihilated more than Laurent’s life when you killed him – you stole my happiness and created turmoil in his family.’
15
The remaining days before Belinda returned to the UK passed in a whirl of activity. The village shop owners had jumped at the opportunity to run the campsite shop rent-free over the Easter holiday period, even though Belinda had stressed there were unlikely to be many customers. They’d also indicated they’d be interested in a proper rent-paying lease for the summer months once the campsite was up and running.
Which meant that one morning, Belinda joined everyone in cleaning the shop, whilst Alain checked out the freezers and the electricity with one of the men.
When everyone disappeared for lunch, Alain ignored her protests and insisted that she joined him for a snack at Yann’s.
‘A crêpe and a glass of wine, an hour at the most,’ he said. ‘You’ll be back working before you realise it.’
‘I was going to do some admin over the lunch hour,’ Belinda answered, surprised by his offer. ‘Besides, I’m dirty from all the scrubbing.’ She glanced down at her grubby jeans and sweatshirt.
‘It’s a village bar. People, they go from work.’
Belinda sighed. She was hungry. ‘An hour, no longer. There’s still so much to do before I leave.’