Page 21 of The Sugar and Spice Bookshop Bakery

He puts the book back on the shelf.

‘There’s nothing to be sorry for,’ he says. ‘It’s a beautiful choice. But I want to buy it from your bookshop.’

‘You can be my first customer,’ she says. ‘But the book will be a gift.’

She holds his gaze for a moment. His eyes still look sad, and she bites her lip, afraid she’s going to cry again.

And then, his tummy rumbles loudly.

He puts his hand on it, and her eyes follow, wondering what it might look like under that jumper. A washboard stomach, she imagines. Smooth skin. Perhaps a touch of light, downy hair.

‘I think I need coffee and cake after all,’ he says. ‘Come on. Let’s find a café. Since you’ve been waiting on most of Applethwaite all week, it’s about time someone spoiled you.’

*

The small side street cafe is popular. Every table is full, so Jack buys lattes in takeaway cups and pastries to go, and they perch on a bridge overlooking the canal to eat them.

‘Delicious, aren’t they?’ she says.

Jack is licking his fingers after devouring a cinnamon swirl.

‘They certainly are.’ He peers into the brown paper bag that the pastries came in, searching for the last few crumbs. ‘Are you okay? You looked like you’d seen a ghost back in the bookshop.’

Louise smiles. ‘I did. Kind of. But I’m fine now. Baked goods make everything better.’

But it’s Jack who makes everything better, she thinks, not baked goods. When she’d fallen over and the electricity had gone off, there he was. When she was wondering how to tell her mother she didn’t want to run the bakery, he encouraged her to pursue her own dream. And just now, when she saw Sheila’s books relegated to the bottom shelf of the bookshop, he sensed that something was wrong.

And she loves how he doesn’t ask too many questions, doesn’t press her to explain.

Which is good.

Because Louise doesn’t want to talk about what happened with Sheila.

She will never want to talk about it.

Eight

Louise puts Sheila Penhaligon to the back of her mind on the way back from Skipplewell and focuses all her attention on Jack, stealing sideways glances at him as he concentrates on the road ahead.

You can tell a lot about someone, she thinks, by the vehicle they drive. From the outside, Jack’s van looks like the sort a builder might have, but inside the cab, it’s squeaky clean. Still, she’d been surprised by his choice – she’d expected him to have something smarter – and had nearly said as much.

And you can tell a lot by how they drive that vehicle too. Jack is confident, undaunted by the narrow Yorkshire lanes with their drystone walls and infrequent passing places. But he’s courteous as well, pulling into the side and allowing oncoming traffic to pass, and far calmer than she would be when a huge tractor approaches and he has to reverse around a bend to allow it by.

Unflappable is the word that springs to mind, and Louise decides he’s the sort of man she’d like by her side in a crisis.

Actually, Jack is the sort of man she’d like by her side in a non-crisis situation too. He’s easy company. Louise has spent her whole adult life – up until now – working with words, but sometimes she doesn’t want words. Sometimes she enjoys silence, but people often feel compelled to fill silences with unnecessary chit-chat. Jack doesn’t, and that’s yet another point in his favour.

On a country walk, Louise thinks, Jack would stroll along, listening to the birds and the wind rustling in the trees and the crunch of autumn leaves underfoot.

He’d stand beside you in an art gallery, breathing in the beauty of the paintings, feeling no need for any commentary, no need to try to impress. (Her stepdaughter Maddie, with her penchant for art galleries, would undoubtedly approve.)

And he’d lounge quietly beside you in bed on a lazy Sunday morning, a tray laden with a cafetière and pastries, the Sunday papers spread out.

Whoa, slow down, Louise, she mentally admonishes herself. Don’t jump too far ahead. You’re imagining lying in bed with him when you haven’t even been on a date.

Although…

This bookshop trip wasn’t a date, was it?