She comes reluctantly, looking over her shoulder.
I wait until we’re sat down then say, “In my experience, no matter what’s happened, it’s best to wait till tempers have simmered down.”
Ashe bursts into tears. Maybe I too should have kept my mouth shut. I reach over and wrap an arm around her, pulling her into a hug.
A minute later, Leonie comes out with a tray containing a teapot and three cups. She places it on the table and pulls over a third chair to sit with us. “I’ve left Meredith in charge.” She glances through the window into the café. “She can manage for afew minutes.” Leonie pours tea for all of us. From the smell I can tell this is almond tea.
“Thanks. My favourite.” I give her a grateful smile.
“Mine too,” Ashe says, wiping her tears.
The private smile on Leonie’s lips tells me she knew this. It’s one of her strengths – she remembers what drinks and foods people like. The ideal caterer.
“What are those?” I nod towards a large basket of misshapen biscuits and muffins.
“Deleted scenes,” she says.
“As in… film?” I ask.
“Yes. In every batch I bake there are breaks and failed attempts. Things I can’t sell. I call them deleted scenes.”
I laugh. “In TV we called them outtakes. When footage of mistakes and missed cues ends up in a bin. Or even bloopers.”
Ashe, face clearing, says, “I worked in the garment industry. We used to say offcuts.”
“Offcuts is best. So here”—she offers the basket—“Raisin Bran offcuts, chocolate and mint bloopers plus orange and cinnamon outtakes.”
Thanks to Leonie’s gentle sweetness, Ashe is now smiling. “Sorry about before.” She takes one of the slightly flattened muffins.
“Don’t worry. Men can be a bit black and white about stuff like that. Even Raff, who is usually very good about emotional stuff.”
We carefully stay off the subject of the argument until Ashe leaves, saying she needs a shower before starting work. “You tell Evie everything,” she says as she crosses the terrace and goes back inside.
I catch Leonie’s eye, not sure if it’s my place to know more. Leonie pours us more tea and fills me in.
It seems, last night, there’d been quite a scene when Raff asked Nora to leave his and Leonie’s rooms. Nora had sobbed inconsolably that she had nowhere to sleep and needed someone’s sofa for the night – anyone’s sofa. Osian had not taken the hint; he only offered to pay for her to stay at the Caradoc Arms.
Gethin was more than happy to welcome her into his own room, but Raff again had stepped in and banned her from the Jack Bevan Retirement rooms. In the end, Ashe had taken her in.
“But Ashe only has that little room up on the top floor?” I ask, surprised.
Leonie shakes her head. “She has a double bed.”
“You mean Nora is actually sharing her bed? Bloody hell. Why didn’t she just move to the Caradoc Arms? That’s not fair.”
“Worse. Llewellyn blew a gasket this morning when he found out.”
The memory of Llewellyn’s white face at dinner last night scrolls through my mind. “I don’t really understand why Nora wants to stay here. I thought…” I don’t complete the sentence, but Leonie gets it.
“That she was making the moves on Raff?” She twirls her cup in its saucer, making the tea swirl a little. “It was not an ideal situation.”
Her words make me laugh. “Not ideal? You mean a pain in the backside.”
Her cup swirling gets faster, making the saucer clatter. “She was going through some difficult stuff.”
I lay my hand over hers, and she stops twirling her cup.
“Oh God, Evie. You have no idea. She was always talking to him, confiding, complaining, God-only-knows-what. I had to go to bed by 9:30 because of my early start at the café and she took every advantage of that.”
