Out
Now—Abi’s Neighbour
by Jenny Kane (@jennykaneauthor)
#romance #cornwall
Set in the picturesque Sennen Cove, Cornwall, Abi’s
Neighbour is the sequel to the bestselling Cornish romance, Abi’s House.
It’s time to catch up with Abi, Max, Beth, Jacob,
Stan, and Sadie the Labrador- and meet some unexpected new faces...
Blurb
Abi Carter has finally found happiness. Living in
her perfect tin miner’s cottage, she has good friends and a gorgeous boyfriend,
Max. Life is good. But all that’s about to change when a new neighbour moves in
next door.
Cassandra Henley-Pinkerton represents everything Abi
thought she’d escaped when she left London. Obnoxious and stuck-up, Cassandra
hates living in Cornwall. Worst of all, it looks like she has her sights set on
Max.
But Cassandra has problems of her own. Not only is
her wealthy married lawyer putting off joining her in their Cornish love nest,
but now someone seems intent on sabotaging her business.
Will Cassandra mellow enough to turn to Abi for help
– or are they destined never to get along?
Complete with sun, sea and a gorgeous Cornwall
setting, Abi’s Neighbour is the PERFECT summer escape.
Abi’s Neighbour can be read as a standalone novel,
or as a follow up to Abi’s House.
Available
in eBook and print from Amazon (universal link): http://mybook.to/abisneighbour
Extract
The untidy, clipboard-wielding
woman started talking as soon as she climbed out of her Mini. ‘Hello, my name’s
Maggie, and I’m from –’
Cassandra cut impatiently across
the formalities. ‘Sennen Agents, obviously. It’s written across your car.’
‘Oh, yes. So it is.’ Maggie
paused, ‘Anyway, I’m sorry I’m late, I got stuck behind a tractor down the
lane.’ She jingled a key ring in front of her. ‘I have your keys, Miss
Pinkerton.’
‘No, you don’t.’ ‘I don’t?’ The estate agent
frowned, looking away from the woman that stood before her in expensive couture
with crossed arms and a far from happy expression. Flicking through the papers
on her clipboard, Maggie said, ‘I was instructed by a Mr Justin Smythe that you
would be accepting the keys on his behalf?’
‘I meant, no, my name is not Miss
Pinkerton. It is Ms Henley-Pinkerton.’
‘Oh. I see.’ Maggie refrained
from further comment as she clutched the keys a little tighter.
Determined to make sure the
situation was clearly understood, Cassandra pulled her jacket on, turning
herself back into the sharp-suited businesswoman she was. ‘In addition to your
error regarding my name, there appears to have been a further mistake.’
‘There has?’
‘Mr Smythe has not purchased this
property. He has merely rented it, with an additional agreement to sublet it as
a holiday home. I am here for two months to make the place suitable.’ Cassandra
ran a disdainful eye over the beautiful exterior stonework. ‘It would seem that
my work is going to be well and truly cut out.’
‘This is a much sought-after
street, Ms HenleyPinkerton. And this particular property is in excellent period
condition.’ Feeling defensive on behalf of the old miner’s cottage, Maggie bit
her tongue and flicked through her paperwork faster. Extracting a copy of the
bill of sale, she passed it to the slim, angular blonde. ‘I think the
misunderstanding must be yours. Mr Smythe has purchased number two Miners Row
outright. It was a cash sale.’
Snatching the papers from
Maggie’s fingers, Cassandra’s shoulders tensed into painful knots. Why hadn’t
Justin told her he’d done this? She was convinced she was right. And anyway,
he’d never deliberately make her appear foolish in front of a country bumpkin
estate agent… Yet as Cassandra scanned
the document before her, she could see there’d been no mistake. Closing her
eyes, she counted to ten, before opening them again to regard the badly dressed
woman before her, who was once again holding out the offending set of
keys. Failing to take them, Cassandra
gestured towards the little house.
‘Perhaps you would show me
around, after I’ve made a call to Mr Smythe?’ Maggie, already feeling sorry for
this unpleasant woman’s future neighbours, took unprofessional pleasure in
saying, ‘Good luck with that call. The phone signal here is unpredictable to
say the least.’
It had taken a ten-minute walk towards Sennen
village to get a decent reception on her mobile phone, and then, when she’d been
able to connect the call, Justin’s line was engaged. When she’d finally got
through, she was more than ready to explode. ‘Justin! How could you have done
this to me without a word? You’ve made me look a total idiot.’
Clearly thrilled that he’d
managed to buy the terrace for a knock-down price – which, he’d claimed, was a
far more economic use of their funds, an investment that would make them a
fortune to enjoy in their retirement – he’d sounded so excited about what it
meant for their future together that Cassandra had found it hard to remain
cross. Assuring her that the situation remained the same, and that she was
still only expected to stay in Cornwall while he secured his new position and
got the wheels of the divorce in motion, Justin told Cassandra he loved her and
would be with her very soon.
Returning to the terrace
reassured, if lacking some of her earlier dignity, Cassandra swallowed back all
the words she’d have liked to say as she opened the door and the gloom of the
dark and narrow hallway enveloped her. She was sure that awful Maggie woman had
been laughing at her. The agent had taken clear pleasure in telling her that if
she hadn’t stormed off so quickly she’d have found out that the phone reception
was excellent if you sat on the bench in the back garden.
Vowing to never drink champagne
in any form ever again, as it clearly caused her to agree to things far too
readily, Cassandra saw the next two months stretching out before her like a
lifetime. Letting out some of the
tension which had been simmering inside her since she’d first seen the for sale
sign, she picked up a stone and threw it at the back fence, hard. Maggie had
gone, leaving her reluctant client sitting on an old weathered bench in the
narrow rectangular plot at the back of the house.
Playing her phone through her
fingers, Cassandra saw that there was enough reception to make calls if she sat
in this spot – but only in this spot. One step in either direction killed the
signal dead, which was probably why the previous owners had placed a bench
here. And probably why they left this Godforsaken place! The Internet simply didn’t exist here. When
she’d swallowed her pride and asked Maggie about the strength of the local
broadband coverage, the agent had actually had the audacity to laugh, before
informing Cassandra with obvious satisfaction that people came to Sennen for
their holidays to leave the world of emails and work behind them.
Breathing slowly, she pulled her
shoulders back, pushed her long, perfectly straight blonde hair behind her
ears, and took a pen and paper out of her bag. It looked as if she was going to
have to tackle this, old school.
First she would make a list of
what she considered necessary to make the house habitable for holidaymakers,
then she would locate the nearest library or internet café so she could source
decorators and builders to get the work underway. The sooner she got everything
done, and herself back to hustle and bustle of London, the better.
Deciding there was no way she
could sleep in this house, which Maggie had proudly described as ‘comfortable’,
‘sought-after’, and ‘ready to be made absolutely perfect’, Cassandra hooked her
handbag onto her shoulder and headed back into the whitewashed stone house.
Shivering in the chill of the hallway, despite the heat of the June day, she
jumped in the silence when the doorbell rang just as she bent to pick up her
overnight bag. For a second she froze. It had been years since she’d heard a
doorbell ring. In her block of flats back home she buzzed people in via an
intercom, and anyway, people never just dropped by. She hoped it wasn’t that
dreadful Maggie back with some other piece of unwanted advice.
It wasn’t Maggie. It was a petite
woman in paint spattered clothes, with a large shaggy dog at her side. Cassandra’s
unwanted visitor wore a wide smile and held a bunch of flowers in one hand and
some bedding in the other. ‘Hello. My
name’s Abi, I live next door. Welcome to Miners Row. I hope you’ll be very
happy here.’
~ * ~
Bio
Jenny Kane is the
author of the full length romance novels Another
Glass of Champagne (Accent Press, 2015), Abi’s House (Accent Press, 2015), the contemporary romance/medieval
crime time slip novel Romancing Robin
Hood (Accent Press, 2014), the best selling contemporary romance novel Another Cup of Coffee (Accent Press,
2013), and its novella length sequels Another
Cup of Christmas (Accent Press, 2013), Christmas
in the Cotswolds (Accent, 2014), and Christmas
at the Castle (Accent, 2015).
Jenny’s sixth full
length romance novel, Abi’s Neighbour,
will be published in May 2017.
Keep your eye on
Jenny’s blog at www.jennykane.co.uk
for more details.
Jenny also writes
erotica as Kay Jaybee and historical crime as Jennifer Ash.
Release
blitz organised by Writer Marketing
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