Chapter 8
Briony had her ticket to hand as she crossed the cobbled yard. Cheryl had said that she had time to go and browse in the bookshop while she waited to see Joss, but it felt like she’d been an age. She stole another glance at her watch. It was lunchtime. She was a morning slot. What if Joss had gone to lunch?
As she crossed the yard and approached the old shop front, she couldn’t hear any voices. There was no longer anyone waiting inside. The place was deserted. ‘Oh, no.’ Briony sighed heavily. She’d missed the morning session. Now she’d have to wait until after lunch.
‘Hello.’ A young man stepped out of a door at the far end of the room, putting a jacket on.
She looked him up and down, relieved that someone was still there. He must have just had an appointment with Joss. He looked like a surfer dude who’d just stepped off the beach, with his three-quarter-length shorts, open-toed sandals, and old AC/DC t-shirt. He also had a faint tan and blond windswept hair that looked as though it needed a cut.
Briony looked at her ticket. ‘What number are you? I’m hoping I haven’t missed my slot.’ Maybe, if someone was just leaving and there was nobody else waiting, she’d just made it.
She caught the young man looking at her, bemused. ‘I, um … haven’t got a ticket.’
‘Oh, did you just walk in?’ She assumed he must have. She looked at her ticket. ‘You must have taken my slot.’
The young man grinned. ‘Ah, I think we are talking at cross purposes. I’m not here to see Joss.’
‘You’re not?’ Briony looked past him at the door he’d just closed behind him.
‘No, because I am Joss.’
Briony took a step back in surprise.
He clearly guessed what she was thinking. ‘I don’t like wearing starchy suits, and I’m sure my clients don’t want me to, either. I think it’s just more comfortable all round. Puts people at their ease. I like to keep things informal.’
‘I’ll say!’ blurted Briony. She looked away, embarrassed. ‘Look, if I’m too late for the morning slot—’
‘Not at all. You’re Briony – right?’
Briony smiled. ‘That’s me.’
‘The thing is, Briony, my morning session sort of overran, although there’s nothing unusual there.’
‘Oh, I see.’
‘It’s lunchtime, and I’m starving. Sometimes I like to go for a takeaway fish and chips or get a filled roll and a cup of coffee in the town. Wasn’t Emily meeting you to run you home after our appointment?’
‘Oh, goodness – yes. I’d forgotten.’
‘That’s all right. Sometimes Emily and I meet up in Aldeburgh for lunch if she’s not too busy. Would you like to join us?’ He quickly added, ‘Then you can come back to the office, and we can go over your case.’
Your case. Briony had expected it would be a one-off appointment. She hadn’t thought that he’d be taking her on, like a client, until her issues were resolved. ‘I hope it won’t inconvenience Emily that I haven’t even had my appointment with you yet.’
Joss waved her worries away. ‘Nah, I’m sure it will be fine.’
‘Actually, I am hungry,’ commented Briony, feeling her stomach rumbling. She hadn’t had much to eat for breakfast; she had been far too preoccupied with what answers she might glean about her missing grandparent.
She stepped outside, still feeling embarrassed about assuming he was a surfer who’d popped in for legal advice. She watched him lock the door and thought about how looks could be deceiving.
As he joined her in the cobbled yard, falling in step as they walked down the little lane between the shops into the high street, Briony apologised again. ‘Look, I’m really sorry for mistaking you for one of your clients.’
Joss said cheerfully, ‘No harm done. We do have clients who are dressed in suits, and I have had some interesting reactions from them when they meet me, but they soon look past my lack of dress code when my legal skills are front and centre. I’m pretty good at what I do.’
Briony hoped so.
‘The truth is, I feel more comfortable dressing like this. I could never go back to wearing a suit – that’s not my life anymore.’
Briony understood. He’d left corporate law behind. If you can’t be who you are, working for yourself, then when can you? she thought.
‘To be honest, if it wasn’t for Emily’s business, I’d quite happily welcome my clients into our home. But with so many animals, and the noise sometimes, it just wouldn’t work. Besides, not everyone likes animals, no matter how cute they are. And we are quite off the beaten track. You can’t get a bus to where we live, it would have to be a taxi or a car, so straight away it excludes anyone with transport issues, who might not be able to afford a car or a taxi. At least in Aldeburgh you can get a bus to see me.’
‘Yes, I visited to collect my grandmother’s dog, and two rescue kittens, and I agree that you definitely need a car to get there.’
‘Well, I hope you like my premises.’
Briony hadn’t been in his office, but she said, ‘I love Cobblers Yard, and your reception is like no other reception I’ve been in.’
Joss smiled. ‘That’s good to hear, especially as the theme extends to my office at the back. We don’t sit at desks, we sit on sofas, share a cuppa, eat a biscuit, and have a chat. Then I write up my notes on my iPad afterwards.’
‘Sounds great,’ said Briony, looking forward to her chat with Joss. She just hoped he could help.
Briony felt the hairs on the nape of her neck stand up – someone was watching her. She cast a glance behind her before they left Cobblers Yard. There was no one at the window in the bookshop, nor the charity shop, where she half-expected one of the sisters, probably Mabel, to be standing by the window, watching her walk out of the yard with Joss. But she did see Reggie, who was standing at his window with a violin in his hands. He was passing it over to his client, who must have turned up to collect it.
Reggie wasn’t paying attention to the violin, or to his customer. His attention was firmly fixed on her, she noticed.
Briony paused for a moment, raising her hand to give him a friendly wave.
He offered a perfunctory wave in return, quickly looking away, turning his attention back to his customer.
‘Everything all right?’ Joss asked, noticing she’d paused at the entrance to Cobblers Yard.
Briony was still staring at Reggie. He’d been perfectly friendly in the music shop, letting her go early that morning for her appointment with Joss, but perhaps he hoped she’d pop back to the shop afterwards. I think I might need to pop into Reggie’s music shop.’ She wasn’t sure why she’d need to let him know that she was going for lunch with Joss and Emily. After all, he didn’t expect her back after her appointment.
‘Did you forget something?’
She turned to Joss. She didn’t want to miss out on lunch if she got into a conversation with Reggie. She looked at the paper bag in her hand from the bookshop and thought of the letters in her handbag. ‘No, I’ve got everything.’
‘Good, let’s go then.’
They walked out of Cobblers Yard. Emily was sitting in her car. She wound the window down. ‘Oh, hi Briony. How did it go?’
Briony bit her lower lip. ‘Actually, I haven’t had my appointment yet.’
Emily looked at Joss crossly. ‘Why haven’t you seen Briony?’
‘My morning appointments overran – you know what it’s like.’
Briony noticed that he didn’t mention the fact that she had been late. It occurred to her that he might have been sitting in his office waiting for her to arrive but was too polite to say.
Joss said, ‘How about we all go to lunch? Then Briony can be my first afternoon appointment.’
‘If that’s all right with you, Emily,’ Briony added, conscious of the fact that Emily might not want to hang around Aldeburgh after lunch. Although it was Saturday, she still had a vet practice to run, and might have some appointments. There were also the pets staying at her boarding kennels, not to mention all the lost, abandoned and surrendered ones she had ended up taking in.
Joss and Emily were a lovely couple. If it hadn’t been for them, Briony knew she wouldn’t be there, meeting the lovely people in Cobblers Yard.
Emily got out of the car and smiled. ‘Of course it’s all right with me. However, I do have some vet appointments booked in this afternoon.’
Briony had thought that might be the case. ‘I could come and see Joss another day, if you wouldn’t mind running me home after lunch? Sorry.’
‘I’ve got a better idea.’ She put an affectionate hand on Joss’s shoulder. ‘If you don’t mind doing a house call, Joss, we could grab some lunch to go and head back to The Beach House. We can have lunch there while you chat to Briony and have a look at the letters.’
Emily turned Briony. ‘If that’s all right with you.’
‘Oh, that would be perfect, if you have the time, Joss.’
Joss smiled. ‘I can do that. It’s one of the perks of working for yourself – you do get to have an extended lunch break, if it’s not too busy, although that is a rarity, and it will be a working lunch while I’m seeing my first client this afternoon – that’s you, Briony.’
‘What about your office?’ Briony asked, concerned that people would turn up and it would be closed.
‘Ah, that’s not a problem. Cheryl will be back soon. She’ll open up the office.’
Emily turned to Joss. ‘It’s settled, then.’ She gave him a kiss and took his hand. ‘Come on, sweetheart, let’s get some lunch.’
Briony followed them down the high street, watching them walk hand in hand. Emily pulled Joss close, hugging his arm, smiling as they chatted. Joss was attentively hanging on her every word. Briony looked at Joss and thought of Freddie. He loves me just the way Joss is in love with Emily. Briony knew he’d do anything for her, just the way she imagined Joss would for his fiancée. So, why didn’t I give an answer to Freddie’s proposal? It doesn’t make any sense. We should be engaged now. I should have no qualms about saying yes.
Emily glanced over her shoulder, released Joss’s hand, and joined Briony. ‘Sorry, Briony, didn’t mean to ignore you.’
‘You’re in love – I get it,’ said Briony, smiling. Joss quickened his pace, aiming for a queue outside a café up ahead.
‘I imagine Freddie is missing you so much.’
For a moment, Briony wondered how she knew about Freddie, until she recalled her first visit to Emily’s, when she’d picked up the dogs and the kittens. Troy – a young man whom she’d met when he’d turned up at The Beach House to start some work that her grandmother had arranged, renovating the outbuilding – had given her a lift, and Emily had assumed they were a couple. Briony had only just met Troy. Briony had set the record straight with Emily; she had told her that her boyfriend, Freddie, was back in Oxford.
‘Such a shame he can’t be here with you,’ continued Emily. ‘I bet you desperately wanted him to come.’
Briony just nodded and smiled. She hated lying to her new friends. But she didn’t feel like telling them that she didn’t want Freddie to visit her there at all.