Rachel said nothing as she wiped her eyes and then loudly blew her nose.
‘Now tell me why you need to sell the tearooms?’ asked Clara. She felt like she was back in the bank, helping her clients see reason or sense and not to panic. Panic about money made people do silly things and she did not want Rachel to panic, because Moira would find her way back into the cracks.
As though Moira could hear Clara’s thoughts, Rachel spoke.
‘I have to sell because Moira needs money and I don’t like her but she has nothing. I don’t want to ruin her, but if I decide to do something about it, then I would have to sell it all anyway and start again. I thought if I sold the tearooms part of the business and that building, I could put a wall up and just keep the bakery.’
Clara gasped. ‘No, the tearooms are where the potential is. That’s the cream on top, so to speak.’
‘But the kitchen is connected to the bakery,’ Rachel reminded her.
‘So maybe my idea isn’t so stupid now,’ said Clara.
‘What idea?’ asked Rachel.
‘I had an idea that I thought was probably too forward and pushy but now I think it might be the answer.’
She paused, feeling strange at being on the other side of the desk, so to speak, pitching her idea like her customers at the bank used to have to pitch to her. She took a deep breath and spoke.
‘Let me buy the tearooms and give the money to Moira, and I can be a partner. You will have a bigger cut since I can’t really bake, but I’m good with business and we can do the renovation. Henry could do it, and I can help with marketing and so on. I mean, I think we could make the tearooms the best in the country. Really inject some life into the village again.’
Rachel’s eyes widened as Clara was speaking. ‘How can you afford that?’
Clara swallowed. ‘I have money.’
‘But that’s such a lot of money,’ said Rachel. ‘Are you rich?’
‘Not rich, but I got some money after my dad died. Well, Mum got some, and so did I, and Mum saved it. I invested it when I learned banking at uni, and it grew. Was supposed to be for my retirement but why not start living now?’
The money from Victims of Crime for the death of her grandmother and father had been a weight since she had become aware of it after the court case. It was blood money, she had told her mother who had disagreed. ‘Money is money, Clara. Don’t tie emotion to it; it will help you one day.’ Clara had never wanted to spend it until now. It could help Rachel and it would help her create a life in Merryknowe.
‘Please let me do this,’ she said. ‘It’s only money and I want to do this. It will help me also – I’ll have an actual job in the village and can stay here. I would have a purpose, a source of income, a reason to get up every day.’
‘You could do that?’ Rachel asked, still looking confused.
‘Which part?’ asked Clara.
‘All of it.’
Clara heard her mind click into gear and she nodded. ‘Pen and paper?’
Rachel jumped up and found both. Clara started to write on the pad and scratched out some figures.
‘Okay, we can do it. Moira doesn’t deserve anything from you, except maybe criminal charges, but I understand you not wanting to create any more drama in your life. In fact, I respect it.’
She showed Rachel the numbers she had in her head to buy the tearooms and invest in the shop for the renovations.
‘That’s too much money. It’s not worth it,’ said Rachel shaking her head.
‘It is worth it, your talents are worth it, and I can afford it,’ Clara said firmly.
Rachel looked at the figures again and then handed the notepad back to Clara. ‘I’m not great with numbers or the accounts.’
‘I am.’
‘And Henry would help us?’
Clara liked that Rachel used ‘us’.
‘I think he will.’ Would he say yes? She still had to talk to him about them, their ‘us’. Why was it all so complicated or was she making it complicated? She was trying to have a simple life in Merryknowe and now she was offering to buy half a business and was in love with a man who was still in love with his dead wife.
‘Okay, let’s do it.’ Rachel’s voice interrupted her train of thought.
Clara was surprised. ‘Don’t you want to think about it? Speak to a lawyer? Get some advice?’
Rachel frowned at Clara. ‘Why? I trust you. You saved me.’
‘I don’t think I did. I mean, life just worked out a funny way for you.’
But Rachel shook her head. ‘No, I know what you did for me and I know what I could have done if Moira came back here.’
Clara was silent for a moment as she played with the pen. ‘That’s finished now. You don’t have to think about it again,’ she said though she wondered if she was really saying it to herself. So why did she always think about what happened?
She hadn’t told a soul throughout her life. She had gone to school and university and dated boys and had friends and lived with Giles and had a career and no one knew what she did.
Did it matter? Did she need to tell anyone anyway?
But deep down she knew, she had to tell Henry. She had to be honest and tell him and then if he left then that was that. At least she would know.
She had imagined telling Giles when they were together. She even tried once but Giles had been so scathing of the story on the news about the woman who killed her husband, she’d said nothing. He wouldn’t understand, he couldn’t understand, she
