Fern watched as he disappeared through a doorway at the back of the room, leaving her alone with No. 17 Curiosity Lane in all its eccentric glory. She turned slowly, taking it all in. The place was mad. Floor-to-ceiling clutter. A grandfather clock that ticked with a tired clunk. Lampshades made of things that shouldnotbe lampshades. A doll in a glass cabinet that may or may not have just blinked.
She let out a shaky breath. Inherited. She’d inherited this. From a woman she’d never even heard of.
A great-aunt. A shop. A flat above it.
Her first instinct was to sell, obviously. Get it valued, flog the lot and maybe go on a ridiculously overpriced holiday. But now there was charming Daniel to consider, currently clattering about making tea in the home where he lived. He had no idea that she’d planned to throw the whole place on Rightmove and have done with it. Which would mean tossing him out on the street.
She walked over to the desk and ran her fingers across the battered wood, the layers of varnish worn away by time and stories she would never know.
The place wasmad.
It was like an antique shop had collided with a Victorian curiosity cabinet and then been sprinkled with a generous dose ofwhat on earth is that?Shelves heaved under the weight of peculiar objects like brass telescopes, pocket watches frozen in time, and an alarming number of porcelain figurines with judgmental expressions. Gilded mirrors reflected the glow of a dozen mismatched lamps, their light pooling over old books stacked in precarious towers.
And somehow, in the middle of it all… wasDaniel. The man from the train. Potentially the man of her dreams. And definitely the man whose world she was about to destroy.
Just at that moment she heard something rattle… and it wasn’t coming from the kitchen. Fern froze but her eyes flicked to a tall, glass-fronted cabinet filled with dolls, all of them staring at her with a sort of eerie lifelessness that made her stomach tighten.
And then, just as she took a step closer, one of them– a frilly-dressed thing with faded pink cheeks– squeaked out, ‘Mama?’
She clutched her chest, her heart slamming against her ribs as she staggered back. ‘What the—?!’ she yelled.
Daniel’s voice drifted from the back room. ‘Oh yeah, don’t mind Audrey! She does that sometimes.’
Fern glared at the doll, which sat there innocently, as if it hadn’t just tipped her soul into the depths of hell. She was about to turn away when something hissedat her.
She spun around.
A stuffed cobra, coiled and fanged, stared at her from a shelf, its beady glass eyes catching the light.
‘Nope. Nope, nope, nope.’ She backed away, only to bump into a grandfather clock, which chimed loudly.
She jumped, letting out another strangled yelp, just in time for a wardrobe on the far side of the shop to burstopen.
A gorilla lunged out.
Fern shrieked.
She tripped over a footstool, crashing into a pile of embroidered cushions as the gorilla wobbled, flailed, then toppled over onto the floor with a solidthud.
Silence.
Daniel reappeared, holding a tray with two teacups. He took one look at her wide eyes, then at the stuffed gorilla sprawled on the floor.
‘Oh,’ he said casually. ‘You’ve found Gerald, then?’
Fern pointed an accusatory finger. ‘What isGerald?!’
‘A gorilla,’ Daniel said, laughing. ‘You get used to him. I think he’s been stuffed in there for quite a few years.’
Fern dragged herself upright, inhaling deeply through her nose. ‘This shop iscursed.’
Daniel chuckled, handing her a teacup. ‘Maybe. Here, the tea will fix everything.’
She eyed it warily. The cup was cracked. So was the saucer. ‘Do I evenwantto ask?’
Daniel beamed. ‘They’re antique, and would you believe this is the very teapot I won at that auction? The one Iheroicallysaved from the clutches of a posh bloke who wanted it purely to match his scone set?’
Fern stared at him.
