“So,” she said after a few seconds when the man was simply staring at the cupcake, marvelling. “Are you, ah, going to buy it?”
“Buy it?” His eyebrows rose once more, with comical drama. “Of course I’m going to buy it! How much?”
“Two pounds fifty.”
“You are grossly undercharging, then. Cupcakes the size of a small rodent go for nearly five pounds in London.”
“What an unappealing comparison,” Olivia returned with another laugh. “And this isn’t London, it’s the Cotswolds.”
“So you should really be charging six pounds.”
She laughed again, properly, and he grinned in return, and right then something in Olivia stirred to life, something that had been so dead and buried she’d forgotten it had even existed. But that tiny winkle of interest and yearning felt a bit like the poke of an electric cattle prod. Whoa. I’m alive. Here is a man.
And a man unlike any other she’d seen in Wychwood-on-Lea, which usually ran to golf-playing retirees and self-important City types, whose wives had dragged them out to experience so-called country living.
“Still, it’s two pounds fifty,” she said firmly. “I’m having a hard enough time selling them as it is.”
“Are you? But you’ve only one left.”
“I gave five away just now, and another one this morning.” When Ellie had come in for a coffee and a chat. She grimaced good-naturedly as she confessed, “And I ate one myself.”
“Which means you sold…?”
“Four.”
“Think of the profit you could have made! Two pounds fifty extra per cupcake… That’s…”
He frowned, and she supplied with a smile, “Ten pounds.”
“Which is not to be sneezed at.”
“No.”
They smiled at each other, rather foolishly, or at least Olivia felt foolish. The banter had been witty and fun, but now that they had fallen silent, the man looked suddenly earnest and serious and she…she didn’t know how she looked. Or felt.
“It must be hard running a tea shop in a village this size. Do you have much help?”
“No, it’s just me.” Which, for some ridiculous reason, nearly brought a wretched lump to her throat. How bizarre. “But it’s fine,” she said quickly. “It’s all fine. You’re right, though, Wychwood-on-Lea is a small place. Not as much foot traffic as I’d like, but I try to make up for it in other ways. Still, it’s all good.”
The man nodded slowly, in a way that made Olivia think he didn’t believe her, which was exasperating because she was telling the truth. It was all good. Definitely.
“So the cupcake. Would you like it in a box?”
“You have boxes?” He sounded delighted, making Olivia smile again, and she went to fetch one of her many boxes.
“Tea on the Lea,” he read off the front with satisfaction. “Very clever.”
“Well, at least it rhymes. But I didn’t come up with it. My mother did.”
“Your mother?”
“It was her shop originally, but I took it over six months ago.”
“So has this shop been in your family for ages? Should there be a sign over the door, ‘Established in 1854’ or something? ‘Purveyors of Tea to the Queen’?”
She laughed and shook her head. “Sadly we have not supplied the Queen with anything. And my mum started the shop ten years ago, after she retired. It was always a dream of hers, to own a little shop like this.”
“Kudos to her for following her dreams.”
“Yes, exactly.”
“And is it your dream as well?”
Goodness, this was getting rather personal. “It’s become my dream,” Olivia said firmly. “I love baking, and I’m happy here.” Which, for some reason, made it sound as if she wasn’t. As if she had to convince herself, which she didn’t. “Anyway.” Olivia took a length of silver ribbon she usually saved for her wedding cake orders and wrapped it around the box, tying it with an elegant bow. “There you are. That will be two pounds fifty.”
“Why don’t you charge me five pounds?” the man suggested as he handed over his debit card. “Really, I insist. It’s practically a crime otherwise.”
“Two pounds fifty,” Olivia repeated firmly. “But if you come back again, I might have upped the prices by then.”
“I certainly hope so. Do you make cupcakes every day?”
Olivia thought of Mallory’s idea. “Actually, I’m running a promotion,” she said a bit recklessly. “The Twelve Days of Cupcakes. A different flavour of cupcake every day in the run-up to Christmas…and if you buy one on each of the twelve days, you get a free one at the end. But you have to come every day.” For some reason her heart had started beating fast as she said all this. She gazed at him, eyebrows raised. “What do you think?”
“That’s an absolutely cracking idea. Simply cracking.” He grinned. “Count me in.”
Olivia’s heart flipped over. She was being ridiculous, of course. She didn’t even know this man and he was, it had to be said, a tiny bit on the eccentric side, with his enthusiastic manner, his endless scarf. But still. There went her heart. She reached for the card reader, unable to keep from glancing at the name on the debit card as she pushed it into the reader. Simon Blacklock. What a perfectly appropriate name—like something she’d read in an Austen or Brontë novel. Very Wuthering Heights-ish.
In some ways Simon Blacklock seemed like someone from another century, with his friendly, open face, his interest in everything, even his battered tweed jacket and winding scarf. He was decidedly old-fashioned, and Olivia liked that about him.
“Put your PIN in please,” she said, and pushed the reader towards him, averting her eyes while he pressed the numbers on the keypad.
He pushed it back towards her with a smile, and Olivia gave him his card back. She had a strange, almost panicky sense not to let him simply walk out the door, out of her life.
“Enjoy your cupcake,” she blurted a little too fast. “And see you…again?” She cringed a little inwardly at how hopeful and eager she sounded.
“Yes, definitely.” He hoisted the
