Page 6 of Sunrise over Strawberry Hill Farm

Flora managed not to roll her eyes and studied him instead. Not knowing anything about Lorenzo, she had no comparisons to hold him up against. Nico had wavy dark hair, a roman nose and dark eyes. His skin looked the type to go instantly bronze as soon as summer arrived. He was tall, dark and, rather annoyingly, good-looking.

She felt supremely irritated by him. She knew it was embarrassment on her part. Why hadn’t she been driving her tractor feeling confident and in her comfort zone instead of dripping wet, half naked in the middle of the lake when he had found her?

Nico walked towards Grams and held out his hand. ‘Mrs Barton,buongiorno. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you. I’m Nico Rossi.’

‘And I’m Helen. Let’s dispense with the formalities, shall we?’ said Grams, stepping forward to draw Nico into a hug.

Her tiny stature only emphasised his tall body as he gently returned the embrace.

‘Let me take a look at you,’ said Grams, stepping back to stare up at Nico. ‘You are a chip of the old block, I must say. The splitting image of your grandfather. Dear Lorenzo. I can’t believe he’s gone when he was always so full of life. What a character he was.’

Nico gave her a sad smile. ‘Thank you for your letter,’ he said, in a soft tone. ‘Your words were a great comfort to me.’

Grams gave a heavy sigh. ‘I was so sad not to attend the funeral, but I’m not up to plane rides these days.’ She shot a look at the Ferrari once more. ‘But I’m looking forward to heading out in that gorgeous beast at some point.’

Nico laughed. ‘Any time you want a spin, just say the word.’

He looked across at Flora, but she was thankful to see his laugh falter a bit as he met the glare of her eyes.

Grams too glanced over at her and gave a start. ‘What happened to you?’ she asked, her eyes wide. ‘You’re all wet.’

‘I fell over,’ lied Flora.

‘Under water?’ asked Grams, somewhat bewildered.

‘I’ll go change,’ replied Flora, heading towards the open door.

Behind her, she could hear Grams and Nico laughing over something and she felt even more rattled. Grams wasn’t friends with handsome Italian playboys. Grams was steady, secure. She was a farmer and she was sensible, just like Flora. Wasn’t she?

Flora stalked through the spacious kitchen, down the narrow hallway and up the staircase. It wasn’t a large farmhouse, but it was plenty big enough for the two of them. It had four bedrooms. Grams, of course, had the master bedroom and Flora was in the second largest on the other side of the corridor.

In the hope of making more money, or at least trying to stay afloat financially, Flora had given the other two bedrooms an extremely cheap makeover and they had been mildly successful for a while in renting the rooms out through Airbnb in the autumn. But a winter storm had ripped some of the tiles off the roof and now one of the bedrooms and the bathroom both leaked every time it rained. So there had been no more visitors and the money had dried up once more.

Flora went into her bedroom and shut the door, leaning back against it. What a morning and it was barely eight o’clock yet.

She looked across at the picture on her bedside cabinet. A picture of her grandparents looking happy and relaxed as they stood in the middle of the strawberry field. It had been taken many years ago when the farm had been successful and they had all been together.

She thought back to the conversation earlier with Joe and the selling of all the farm equipment. Now what? For all of his expertise, Joe didn’t have any answers as to where their future lay. The majority of the fields were on a floodplain so couldn’t be sold off for building purposes, nor could they be used for farming. With nothing left for them to sell except the farmhouse, Joe had been stumped for ideas and so had Flora.

They could only hang on to the farmhouse with some new type of income, but what? For a moment, Flora had a daydream of taking on a normal job and having the weekends off to lie in the warm sun and relaxing, something she rarely did. Maybe even taking up painting again. But she suddenly felt restless, unsettled by what the future held.

At the sound of laughter outside, she headed over to the window. Nico was showing Grams the inside of the Ferrari and they were both laughing along. At a crossroads in her life, the last thing Flora needed was some smooth playboy coming over and distracting Grams. Hard decisions needed to be made and they could hardly have those kinds of conversations when Nico was there.

Flora determinedly looked away at the rest of the view. Her room overlooked the strawberry field and the empty one next door. It too was now left to fallow. In fact, it had ended up making them more money than with crops the previous summer being used as a car park for the visitors to the lavender fields.

At the far end of the field and across the narrow path towards the much larger village of Cranbridge were two large fields planted with lavender. Owned by her best friend Harriet, the fields had been opened up to the public for the first time with huge success the previous summer. Harriet had been successful in love as well, having fallen for Joe, with whom she now lived in a cottage on Railway Lane.

On the opposite side of the railway tracks was the old railway station. The railway line had long since been closed, so Harriet had turned the small postroom at the far end of the station into a successful spa, using her talent as a beauty therapist to work wonders with the lavender products.

Next to the spa was the main part of the station, which had been turned into a successful coffee shop and restaurant thanks to her friend Katy, who lived and worked there with her boyfriend Ryan.

The last of her group of friends was Libby, who was Harriet’s neighbour in one of the cottages just along from the station. She worked as an airline flight attendant and was often away on trips abroad, just how free-spirited Libby preferred it. But when she was home, they always met up.

Flora was pleased with her friends’ success, both in their careers and in love. It seemed that only her own position was financially precarious.

She didn’t really care about the lack of a love life, however. She prided herself on being sensible, practical and level-headed. Love had no place in her ordered way of life, whatever Grams might wish for her.

Hearing Nico roar with laughter once more, Flora turned away from the window to get dressed into warm, dry clothes, all the while grinding her teeth in irritation.