Cathy Kelly 3-Book Collection 2: The House on Willow Street, The Honey Queen, Christmas Magic, plus bonus short story: The Perfect Holiday

‘Mara, you look wonderful!’ she said.

‘Thank you, Tess,’ said Mara, and stepped into Something Old.

That night in the restaurant, Tess had decided that Mara had a glow about her, like she was lit up inside. Tess couldn’t quite put her finger on the exact cause, whether it was Mara’s rippling mane of auburn hair or the huge green eyes that looked at everything with such interest. Today, she was the same: glowing and smiling, looking as delighted at the possibility of a day’s work as she might have been over being head-hunted for some glamorous corporation.

‘You’re wildly over-qualified for the job,’ Tess said. She knew of Mara’s career history but looking over her CV now, she could see that was definitely the case.

‘Oh, you must read my reference,’ Mara said cheerfully. ‘The ex-boyfriend I was telling you about: he wrote it. They were all terrified I’d sue them or him, so from the reference, you’d think I’d personally run the entire office single-handedly for three years.’

She paused thoughtfully. ‘I could have too – run the office, that is. But property is not the job to be in right now. Too many people selling their beloved homes in misery for half of what they’d bought the place for, and you still have to demand commission. Horrible. I’d probably have been made redundant soon anyhow.’

‘I’m not sure the antique business is much better,’ Tess said. ‘A lot of my current stock is from people who’ve been forced to part with pieces they’ve had in their families for decades and they’ve looked as if they wanted to cry as it went out the door.’

‘So kindness is a necessity if anyone comes in with something to sell,’ Mara said quickly. ‘Trust me, I can do kind.’ A wistfulness crept into her voice. ‘I’d have gone mad if not for other people’s kindness over the past couple of months. Henry James said kindness was the most important word in the English language. He was right.’

‘Do you know anything about antiques?’ asked Tess briskly. She didn’t want to talk about people’s kindness or how she melted into a puddle of tears when she experienced it. It was easy being strong as long as nobody said anything gentle to you: that was when the floodgates opened. There was definitely something magical about Mara: she made people open up. Tess hadn’t been crying much at all these past few days: she’d trained herself not to.

‘Oh look!’ in an instant, Mara had swooped on one of the rosewood jewellery cabinets (a stunning piece for displaying jewellery, but for sale if the correct price was reached), and pointed to a dainty Art Nouveau brooch displayed on a velvet choker on an old gold papier-mâché bust.

The brooch was so tiny that it would get lost worn any other way, but the sinuous silver lines made a perfect adornment to a choker, exactly like the one in the old oil painting of Great-great-great- (Tess forgot how many greats were involved) aunt Tatiana from Avalon House, although in the painting, Tatiana was wearing a vast diamond choker which had come from the Tsar’s court in the 1800s. Pity they’d never been able to find that necklace in Avalon House when they had to sell everything, Tess thought wistfully. It was one of those priceless pieces, with a maharajah’s diamond in the centre of it and a whole history surrounding the necklace. It would be worth hundreds of thousands. But even though she and Suki had searched for it, they’d never found it or Great-great-great…aunt Tatiana’s alleged hiding place for her gems.

As soon as she’d seen the lovely brooch, part of a job lot, Tess had known how beautiful it would look worn as a choker and set against black velvet.

‘That is so beautiful,’ Mara breathed. ‘And where you have it is perfect. I feel like it’s on a lady’s dressing table and she’s about to cast off a silky robe so she can dress for a fabulous party, cover herself in Chanel No. 5 and … oh, I don’t know – what would she be wearing for something of this period?’

Tess grinned. ‘I take it all back,’ she said. ‘You don’t need to know anything about antiques if you can make them come alive like that.’

‘It’s not me!’ exclaimed Mara. ‘It’s you, the way you display everything. It all looks like a room in a beautiful house where you want to wander into each corner and discover …’

Seeing it through someone else’s eyes, Tess looked around at her little kingdom.

Without her realizing it, she had created a microcosm of Avalon House in the two rooms of Something Old. There was the gentleman’s library section where the hunting prints, the wine-drinking paraphernalia and the old leather-bound books lay, the way they had in her father’s library, even though the valuable books had all been sold. There was the ladies’ boudoir area where silver-backed brushes and jewellery sat alongside glass bottles from every perfume era, and where beautifully speckled foxed antique mirrors made everyone’s reflection look hazily lovely. Even Tess, who didn’t have much time for admiring herself in mirrors, looked twice when she caught sight of her reflection in them.

And the larger pieces of furniture at the back of the shop: the bookcases, portraits, giant Victorian vases, old travelling steam trunks, ornate chairs. Every piece could have fitted into her old home and looked as though it belonged.

Tess felt her eyes brim. She thought she’d left Avalon House and all its memories behind, when what she’d done was recreate it in her shop.

She shook herself and got on with explaining the till to Mara.

The next day, Mara walked up the last bit of Willow Street and in through the rusting but imposing gates till she was on the avenue leading to Avalon House. Danae had said it was like walking under a canopy of shimmering greens in the summer, as the branches from each side met in the middle. In winter, the bare branches reached out to their friends, as if waiting patiently for the first acid-green bud to appear. Mara knew nothing about gardening apart from admiring whatever it was that Danae did with her garden, but even she could see that the vast acres Avalon House sat on hadn’t seen a lawnmower or a leaf blower for many years. It was a wild place, with tangled bushes and great clumps of ivy climbing the trees, strangling them.

What would it be like to live here? Would life be infinitely better if you were born master or mistress of this place instead of being the ordinary girl from Furlong Hill? A girl who lived here probably wouldn’t have to try too hard to forge a life. Someone like that would have instantly divined that Jack wasn’t serious. And then again, she knew Tess, knew a little of her history. It seemed as if being born into such a noble family with noble bricks and battlements around you meant nothing. People were still people, whatever their birthright.

Cashel Reilly stood by the entrance wearing a cashmere navy coat. He was very tall and good looking, if you liked that dark, brooding type of thing. Mara once had, but she was over it. Besides, he was too old.

‘Hello, I’m Mara Wilson, I’m here for the interview,’ she said.

‘You walked?’ said Cashel in surprise.

Mara’s very-professional-person-looking-for-a-job look was immediately replaced by a wry smile.

‘My aunt lives outside your gate,’ she said. ‘Hers is the last house on Willow Street. This is the country, not LA: people walk here.’

‘True,’ said Cashel, recovering. ‘In fact, that’s what we’re going to do now: walk round the place.’

He set off at a brisk pace, despite the wellington boots he was wearing. Mara, who was wearing flat boots herself, struggled to keep up.

‘I liked your CV and your application letter,’ he said.

There hadn’t been many suitable applications. If he’d chosen a big city firm to find someone for him, he’d have been inundated, but he wanted to keep this local. It felt right doing it that way, and Mara Wilson had been the only local applicant.

‘Can you take decent notes?’ he asked, beginning to speed up, opening the door into the house.

‘Yes, if I’m not running like a hare after you,’ Mara said. ‘Would I have to follow you around?’

‘I usually pace in an office,’ Cashel admitted. ‘We’d need to find an office in town.’

‘We’d need an office full stop,’ Mara said. ‘I can’t operate out of here.’

They’d reached the old hall, which Cashel scanned rapidly. He couldn’t imagine that broadband had ever been installed in Avalon House.

‘Good point. Look into it. Something in town, big enough for both of us. I won’t be there much, but I’ll need my own office.’

‘Any special chair or desk requirements?’ Mara asked. ‘Does your chair have to be some wildly expensive leather gizmo in the ten grand range?’

Cashel looked at her suspiciously. Was she being funny?

‘People can be very specific about what they like,’ Mara said, as if she had read his thoughts.

‘Surprise me,’ Cashel said – a statement that surprised him. Normally, he assumed total control. Most of the staff in his various offices had been with him long enough to develop a sense of his preferences and knew better than to bother him with the details, but he hated it when they got it wrong.

‘Does that mean I’ve got the job?’

Cashel looked at his new executive assistant in charge of Avalon House. She looked smart, streetwise, and she said what she thought, a quality he liked.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Don’t disappoint me. I like you on instinct, and I’m rarely wrong. See that I’m not.’

‘Okey doke,’ said Mara cheerfully. ‘I’ll get working on an office, architects – unless you have someone in mind – and builders. The best, I’m guessing?’

He nodded. ‘I don’t like being ripped off, though,’ Cashel said grimly.

‘Understood, loud and clear,’ said Mara.

They walked around the ground floor and Cashel found himself speaking slowly so Mara could take notes, rather than rattling off instructions in his normal shotgun manner. He didn’t know if it was this spiky, unusual girl who was having that effect on him or the fact that he was in Avalon House – the house he now owned.

Here, in the town where he’d grown up, he felt different, less like the captain of industry who expected minions to jump when he said so. If he sent Mara off scared, doubtless he’d get a reputation in the town for being a rich bastard, one of those people who’d let wealth change them beyond recognition. And he didn’t want anyone to think that, because it wasn’t true.

Money had changed him, to a degree. The absence of it was a nightmare, and he knew that, because he’d grown up that way. But having money didn’t necessarily change the person you had been from the start.