Set in the picturesque Sennen Cove, Cornwall, Abi’s
Neighbour is the sequel to the bestselling Cornish romance, Abi’s House.
It’s time to catch up with Abi, Max, Beth, Jacob,
Stan, and Sadie the Labrador- and meet some unexpected new faces...
Blurb
Abi Carter has finally found happiness.
Living in her perfect tin miner’s cottage, she has good friends and a gorgeous
boyfriend, Max. Life is good. But all that’s about to change when a new
neighbour moves in next door.
Cassandra Henley-Pinkerton represents
everything Abi thought she’d escaped when she left London. Obnoxious and
stuck-up, Cassandra hates living in Cornwall. Worst of all, it looks like she
has her sights set on Max.
But Cassandra has problems of her own.
Not only is her wealthy married lawyer putting off joining her in their Cornish
love nest, but now someone seems intent on sabotaging her business.
Will Cassandra mellow enough to turn to
Abi for help – or are they destined never to get along?
Complete with sun, sea and a gorgeous
Cornwall setting, Abi’s Neighbour is the PERFECT summer escape.
Abi’s Neighbour can be
read as a standalone novel, or as a follow up to Abi’s House.
Extract
The untidy,
clipboard-wielding woman started talking as soon as she climbed out of her
Mini. ‘Hello, my name’s Maggie, and I’m from –’
Cassandra
cut impatiently across the formalities. ‘Sennen Agents, obviously. It’s written
across your car.’
‘Oh, yes.
So it is.’ Maggie paused, ‘Anyway, I’m sorry I’m late, I got stuck behind a
tractor down the lane.’ She jingled a key ring in front of her. ‘I have your keys,
Miss Pinkerton.’
‘No, you don’t.’ ‘I don’t?’ The estate agent
frowned, looking away from the woman that stood before her in expensive couture
with crossed arms and a far from happy expression. Flicking through the papers
on her clipboard, Maggie said, ‘I was instructed by a Mr Justin Smythe that you
would be accepting the keys on his behalf?’
‘I meant,
no, my name is not Miss Pinkerton. It is Ms Henley-Pinkerton.’
‘Oh. I
see.’ Maggie refrained from further comment as she clutched the keys a little tighter.
Determined
to make sure the situation was clearly understood, Cassandra pulled her jacket
on, turning herself back into the sharp-suited businesswoman she was. ‘In
addition to your error regarding my name, there appears to have been a further
mistake.’
‘There has?’
‘Mr Smythe
has not purchased this property. He has merely rented it, with an additional
agreement to sublet it as a holiday home. I am here for two months to make the
place suitable.’ Cassandra ran a disdainful eye over the beautiful exterior
stonework. ‘It would seem that my work is going to be well and truly cut out.’
‘This is a
much sought-after street, Ms HenleyPinkerton. And this particular property is
in excellent period condition.’ Feeling defensive on behalf of the old miner’s
cottage, Maggie bit her tongue and flicked through her paperwork faster.
Extracting a copy of the bill of sale, she passed it to the slim, angular
blonde. ‘I think the misunderstanding must be yours. Mr Smythe has purchased
number two Miners Row outright. It was a cash sale.’
Snatching
the papers from Maggie’s fingers, Cassandra’s shoulders tensed into painful
knots. Why hadn’t Justin told her he’d done this? She was convinced she was
right. And anyway, he’d never deliberately make her appear foolish in front of
a country bumpkin estate agent… Yet as
Cassandra scanned the document before her, she could see there’d been no
mistake. Closing her eyes, she counted to ten, before opening them again to
regard the badly dressed woman before her, who was once again holding out the
offending set of keys. Failing to take
them, Cassandra gestured towards the little house.
‘Perhaps
you would show me around, after I’ve made a call to Mr Smythe?’ Maggie, already
feeling sorry for this unpleasant woman’s future neighbours, took
unprofessional pleasure in saying, ‘Good luck with that call. The phone signal
here is unpredictable to say the least.’
It had taken a ten-minute walk towards Sennen
village to get a decent reception on her mobile phone, and then, when she’d been
able to connect the call, Justin’s line was engaged. When she’d finally got
through, she was more than ready to explode. ‘Justin! How could you have done
this to me without a word? You’ve made me look a total idiot.’
Clearly
thrilled that he’d managed to buy the terrace for a knock-down price – which,
he’d claimed, was a far more economic use of their funds, an investment that
would make them a fortune to enjoy in their retirement – he’d sounded so
excited about what it meant for their future together that Cassandra had found
it hard to remain cross. Assuring her that the situation remained the same, and
that she was still only expected to stay in Cornwall while he secured his new
position and got the wheels of the divorce in motion, Justin told Cassandra he
loved her and would be with her very soon.
Returning
to the terrace reassured, if lacking some of her earlier dignity, Cassandra
swallowed back all the words she’d have liked to say as she opened the door and
the gloom of the dark and narrow hallway enveloped her. She was sure that awful
Maggie woman had been laughing at her. The agent had taken clear pleasure in
telling her that if she hadn’t stormed off so quickly she’d have found out that
the phone reception was excellent if you sat on the bench in the back garden.
Vowing to
never drink champagne in any form ever again, as it clearly caused her to agree
to things far too readily, Cassandra saw the next two months stretching out
before her like a lifetime. Letting out
some of the tension which had been simmering inside her since she’d first seen
the for sale sign, she picked up a stone and threw it at the back fence, hard.
Maggie had gone, leaving her reluctant client sitting on an old weathered bench
in the narrow rectangular plot at the back of the house.
Playing
her phone through her fingers, Cassandra saw that there was enough reception to
make calls if she sat in this spot – but only in this spot. One step in either
direction killed the signal dead, which was probably why the previous owners had
placed a bench here. And probably why they left this Godforsaken place! The Internet simply didn’t exist here. When
she’d swallowed her pride and asked Maggie about the strength of the local
broadband coverage, the agent had actually had the audacity to laugh, before
informing Cassandra with obvious satisfaction that people came to Sennen for
their holidays to leave the world of emails and work behind them.
Breathing
slowly, she pulled her shoulders back, pushed her long, perfectly straight
blonde hair behind her ears, and took a pen and paper out of her bag. It looked
as if she was going to have to tackle this, old school.
First she
would make a list of what she considered necessary to make the house habitable
for holidaymakers, then she would locate the nearest library or internet café
so she could source decorators and builders to get the work underway. The
sooner she got everything done, and herself back to hustle and bustle of
London, the better.
Deciding
there was no way she could sleep in this house, which Maggie had proudly
described as ‘comfortable’, ‘sought-after’, and ‘ready to be made absolutely
perfect’, Cassandra hooked her handbag onto her shoulder and headed back into
the whitewashed stone house. Shivering in the chill of the hallway, despite the
heat of the June day, she jumped in the silence when the doorbell rang just as
she bent to pick up her overnight bag. For a second she froze. It had been
years since she’d heard a doorbell ring. In her block of flats back home she
buzzed people in via an intercom, and anyway, people never just dropped by. She
hoped it wasn’t that dreadful Maggie back with some other piece of unwanted
advice.
It wasn’t
Maggie. It was a petite woman in paint spattered clothes, with a large shaggy
dog at her side. Cassandra’s unwanted visitor wore a wide smile and held a
bunch of flowers in one hand and some bedding in the other. ‘Hello. My name’s Abi, I live next door.
Welcome to Miners Row. I hope you’ll be very happy here.’
Bio
Jenny Kane is
the author of the full length romance novels Another Glass of Champagne (Accent Press, 2015), Abi’s House (Accent Press, 2015), the
contemporary romance/medieval crime time slip novel Romancing Robin Hood (Accent Press, 2014), the best selling
contemporary romance novel Another Cup of
Coffee (Accent Press, 2013), and its novella length sequels Another Cup of Christmas (Accent Press,
2013), Christmas in the Cotswolds
(Accent, 2014), and Christmas at the
Castle (Accent, 2015).
Jenny’s sixth
full length romance novel, Abi’s Neighbour,
will be published in May 2017.
Jenny also
writes erotica as Kay Jaybee and historical crime as Jennifer Ash.
