A Forever Home at Honey Bee Croft (The Bumblebee Barn Collection)

Chapter 1

1

JOEL

‘It’s all yours,’ Chris said, logging off the shared PC after our shift change handover. He stood up and pulled on his jacket. ‘Any news about the job yet?’

I shook my head. ‘Hoping no news doesn’t mean bad news.’

‘Got everything crossed for you. Have a good one.’

As he closed the door to the small office which the shift managers and engineering managers shared, I plonked myself down in the swivel chair he’d vacated and logged on for the last of three twelve-hour day shifts.

The wait for news was driving me mad and nobody seemed to know what the delay was – or they weren’t telling me if they did. I was one of four shift managers at Claybridge Fresh Foods – a factory specialising in bacon and pork products on the outskirts of the North Yorkshire market town of Claybridge – and I’d been interviewed a few weeks back for the role of production manager.

Three years ago, I’d been interviewed for the same job and I don’t think anyone in the history of being interviewed has ever made a bigger mess of the process. The outgoing production manager, Roger, had championed me at the application stage and I’d put in stacks of preparation, determined not to let him down, but I’d let the pressure get to me. Leaving my notes at home on interview day had been a bad start and, even though my best mate Barney had managed to calm me down after I panic-called him, nobody could help me in the interview itself. Dry mouth, shaking hands, blank mind. I sat there looking at the thick script in front of each member of the interview panel thinking Don’t turn the page and ask me another question. We all know it’s a definite no, so can one of you please show some mercy and end this torture? But they continued to plough through the questions and I continued to stumble over my words, the facts and figures I’d so carefully prepared completely evading me.

‘There’ll be other opportunities,’ our HR Director, Eloise, had said after confirming the only outcome possible – that I hadn’t got the job.

I’d nodded and apologised for wasting her time.

‘You didn’t waste anyone’s time, Joel,’ she reassured me. ‘You were a strong candidate and we were all rooting for you. What would you say to some coaching from me so you can perform at your best next time there’s a vacancy?’

‘The questions weren’t the problem. It was the nerves.’

‘I can coach you on that too.’

So she did, although neither of us expected the same role to come up so soon. Jeremy Dunn – the external candidate who’d secured the position – needed to relocate back down south due to a change in family circumstances. Thanks to a combination of Eloise’s coaching and some amazing opportunities that Jeremy had given me during his tenure to further develop my skills, my interview this time couldn’t have been more different. Calm, confident and articulate with stronger examples than before, I couldn’t have performed better. I knew I was up against tough competition but the factory manager, Mack, had also championed me for the position, which had to stand for something.

If only they’d hurry up with their decision because I felt like my life was on hold until they did. It wasn’t just about the promotion or the increased salary, although both would be nice. The reason I really wanted the job was so that I could spend more time with my eight-year-old daughter, Imogen.

I’d met her mum, Tilly, a decade ago when she’d temporarily joined the reception team at the factory. A couple of months later, we started seeing each other and were engaged within a year. We hadn’t planned to start a family until after we were married so Imogen was a surprise, but an amazing one. We’d talked about expanding our family after the wedding, but then Tilly dropped her bombshell. One Saturday morning, exactly a fortnight before our wedding, she handed me a mug of tea, a plate of toast, and casually told me she was leaving. I’m really sorry, Joel, but I can’t do this. The whole marriage and kids thing isn’t for me. Despite us already having a two-year-old!

Turned out that marriage and kids were for her – just not with me. That night she went out with her friends to celebrate being free – her exact words to me later – and bumped into Greg, who’d been her boyfriend from age fourteen to sixteen. She’d spoken fondly of him when we’d been together but it was a shock to hear that he was the one that got away and that I’d never quite compared. He’d asked her out that night, proposed on their one-month anniversary and less than a year later, they said I do . Greg was divorced with a son two years older than Imogen and, over the next couple of years, two more children joined their blended family and I was left licking my wounds, wondering how I could have believed we were happy when clearly one of us wasn’t.

You’d think I was the one who’d ripped Tilly’s heart out from the way she’d treated me ever since. I often wondered what had happened to the kind-hearted, bubbly woman I’d fallen for because I struggled to recognise her in the woman constantly putting up barriers in my relationship with our daughter, the biggest one being my job. According to Tilly, my shifts were disruptive to Imogen and to family life , so she’d repeatedly pushed back against my requests to produce a formal schedule around them. I’d spent a small fortune on solicitor fees over the years – money that could have been put aside for Imogen’s future – before I had to accept it was getting me nowhere. Every time my solicitor made contact with Tilly’s, the response was a proposal for shared custody on set days each week, when Tilly knew full well that I was unable to commit to that due to a rotating shift pattern. I therefore only saw Imogen on an ad hoc basis, which broke my heart. That little girl was the best thing that had ever happened to me and I hated that some weeks could pass with me only seeing her for a few precious hours between school and bed or, even worse, not seeing her at all. Those weeks felt so bleak.

I could have applied for a court order, but I hadn’t wanted to go down that route. Tilly and I had a just-about-tolerable relationship, so why escalate that into something hostile and risk dragging Imogen into it? And what would it do to her if she knew her parents were fighting over her in court?

If I landed the production manager job, I’d be working regular hours Monday to Friday. With the barrier of my shifts gone, Tilly would hopefully agree to a parent plan where I saw Imogen on regular days each week. I wasn’t expecting her to spend half the week with me as I recognised that Imogen had friends who she’d want to play with and a couple of after-school clubs, but surely a couple of nights a week and every other weekend wasn’t too much to ask.

But what if I didn’t get the job? I’d spent the past few weeks imagining all the things Imogen and I could do together. I could teach her to cook, like my dad had taught me, I could take her to the riding lessons she longed for and to gymnastics. We could also enjoy just being together – how it should be. I had to get the job. Because we couldn’t continue like this. This wasn’t the kind of dad I wanted to be or that Imogen deserved.

‘I still don’t know how you can drink that.’ I handed Sal – the engineering manager who worked the same shift as me – a mug of strong black tea four hours into our shift.

‘And I don’t know how you can drink that stuff,’ she said, pulling a playful scowl at my coffee. ‘Can’t stand the smell or taste.’

The phone rang and she grabbed it. ‘Managers’ office… yeah, he’s here.’ She glanced up at me. ‘Ten minutes? I’ll tell him.’

I looked at her expectantly when she hung up.

‘That was the new lass in HR. Can you go to Jeremy’s office to see him and Eloise in ten minutes?’ She grinned at me. ‘About time too!’

I ran my hand across my chin, nerves tingling. ‘This must be it!’

‘Unless you’ve done something naughty that you haven’t told me about,’ she said, making me laugh. ‘Look, whatever happens, you know you gave it your best shot and that we all believe in you.’

‘Thanks, Sal. At least they’ve timed it on my last day on. Two days off to get my head together if it’s bad news.’

‘It won’t be.’ She held up both hands, fingers crossed.

Ten minutes later, I stood outside Jeremy’s office and took a deep breath. The door was closed but I could see through the slanted blinds that Eloise was in there and they were sitting at the round table in the corner of the room engaged in what looked like a serious conversation. I took another deep breath and knocked.

When Eloise opened the door, my stomach lurched. She was usually all smiles, but she did not look happy today.

‘Come in, Joel,’ she said, indicating that I should join them at the table.

Jeremy looked up from a pile of papers and nodded his greeting to me. He was a great boss – really friendly and supportive – but he was one of those people who hardly ever smiled, so I couldn’t read anything from his expression.

‘We’re sorry it’s taken so long to come back to you,’ Eloise said. ‘We have some news, but I’m afraid it’s not what you’ll have been hoping for.’

My stomach sank. Clearly I hadn’t got the job, which meant I wouldn’t be free to spend more time with Imogen.

‘There’s been an unexpected development,’ Jeremy said.

He and Eloise exchanged looks and he nodded.

‘This is confidential at the moment,’ Eloise told me. ‘There’ll be a formal announcement to all staff at one o’clock today, but Mack wanted you to know first out of courtesy and respect.’

‘We’ve been taken over,’ Jeremy said.

My mouth dropped open. I hadn’t been expecting that. ‘Who by?’

‘Bramblecote Country Foods.’

Bramblecote had their origins in West Yorkshire but had embarked on a major expansion programme over the past decade, gobbling up smaller food manufacturers to increase their product range. I’d always assumed that Claybridge Fresh Foods would be too big for them but presumably their recent successful growth had provided the kind of capital they needed for a takeover bid.

‘It came as a shock to us too,’ Eloise said, as though reading my mind. ‘We’ve been instructed to put a freeze on all recruitment – even internal moves – and have been advised that they’re sending one of their production managers here a week on Monday to begin a handover with Jeremy. He’ll be here for at least a year while they implement some changes, which means?—’

‘That there’s going to be at least a year’s hold on the position,’ I finished. ‘Or possibly no position at all.’ Either way, I was stuffed. I felt as though I’d missed out on so much with Imogen already. No way could I wait another year.

‘I’m so sorry, Joel,’ Eloise said. ‘This isn’t the news either of us were wanting to give you today.’

‘Are there going to be redundancies?’ I asked.

‘We don’t know,’ they said together.

‘And what about the off-record answer?’

Jeremy shrugged. ‘I’ve seen lots of takeovers and mergers in my time and all of them included redundancies.’

‘Same here,’ Eloise said. ‘When or who is anyone’s guess and let’s be clear that it is only a guess at this point. Mack wanted to tell you himself, but he’s been whisked away so he asked us to do it.’

It was good of Mack to ask them to give me the heads up. Everyone knew I’d applied for the job, and it would have been humiliating discovering that I hadn’t got it at the same time as my peers and my team.

‘I’m sure you have loads of questions,’ Eloise continued, ‘and I wish I could say we have answers but, right now, you know as much as Jeremy and me.’

Jeremy shuffling some papers was my cue to leave. I slowly pushed my chair back, feeling weary with disappointment.

‘Thanks for your time,’ I said instead, fighting to keep the frustration out of my voice. This was hardly their doing and I could imagine they were both feeling bad enough without me creating a fuss. ‘I won’t say anything to Sal about what’s coming at one.’

Eloise fixed sad eyes on me and mouthed thank you .

I was about to pull the door open, but I dropped my hand to my side and faced them both. ‘If Bramblecote hadn’t come along, would I have got the job?’

‘We thought you might ask that,’ Jeremy said. ‘Yes, you would. You were head and shoulders above the rest. I wish…’ He sighed. ‘I’m sorry, Joel.’

I thanked them again and left. Unable to face returning to the office and Sal’s eager expression just yet, I headed through reception towards the exit. As soon as the second set of doors opened, the cold air wrapped round me and took my breath away. We were five days into March and, while the Midlands and south had been enjoying a recent warm spell, it was big-coat weather in the north.

The smoking shack was empty. It wouldn’t give me much relief from the cold but it might keep the wind off me. Somebody had left an empty can of drink on the ground and I gave it an almighty kick, showering fizzy orange over my trousers and boots. Great!

With a heavy sigh, I plonked myself down on the plastic bench, arms folded tightly across my chest. I’d considered the worst-case scenario of the job going to a stronger external candidate, but I could never have anticipated this outcome. And to think I would have got the job too! So near and yet so very far.

Running my hands into my hair, I tipped my head back and stared at the cobwebs wafting from the ceiling, cursing under my breath. This was so unfair!

The only tiny positive here was that I hadn’t said anything to Tilly about being interviewed. Or to Imogen. The only person whose hopes were dashed were mine. Again. And not only had I not secured a day job, I could be out of work altogether. My stomach churned at that thought. I’d started my first job aged twelve, pot washing in the restaurant owned by my dad and Uncle Alvin, and had worked ever since. The prospect of redundancy made me feel sick, as did the thought of Tilly’s reaction.

I closed my eyes and fought hard to block out the voice of doom. There might not even be any redundancies and, if there were, they might not directly affect me, so there was no value in me getting worked up about it. Besides, there was a much bigger issue here – what was I going to do about Imogen? Taking over from Jeremy was meant to be the solution to spending more time with her and that had been taken from me. I needed to find a new solution, but what?