Secrets at Meadowbrook Manor. Faith Bleasdale

relief that she didn’t have to step straight into the lion’s – or Singer siblings’ – den.

      As she stepped into the grand hallway she felt herself shaking slightly – she was in the house! Just as she imagined herself being. The entrance hall seemed as big as her nan’s bungalow, where she had lived all her life. With its polished parquet flooring, art dominating the walls, and the biggest vase of fresh flowers on an antique carved console table, it was unlike anything Gemma had ever seen. As Pippa grabbed her arm reassuringly, Gemma was rendered mute.

      ‘So, where shall we start?’ Pippa clapped her hands together. ‘I know, I’ll show you to your room. It was Harriet’s room, but she doesn’t live at the house anymore, so I thought I’d put you in there; it’s such a lovely room. Also, it’ll give you a feel for what the hotel might be like. God, can you imagine we are going to have paying guests here one day! I almost can’t believe it’s actually going to happen!’ Pippa was hopping around, she was so animated and effervescent, the human equivalent of champagne, Gemma thought.

      ‘I know, although of course there’s a long way to go,’ Gemma cautioned, trying to chase the blind panic away as it threatened to floor her. ‘But it’ll be lovely to see my room and get rid of my bags. Honestly, Pippa, I really want to thank you again – this is a great opportunity.’ Gemma sounded like a stranger to herself as she spoke. She needed to collect herself, to stop acting so weirdly lest she lose the job before she even started.

      ‘Oh no, thank you, I just knew that you were the one to help us from the moment I met you … no, before that, when I read your letter and CV, and I also know we are going to be the best of friends.’

      Gemma was startled as Pippa engulfed her in a second embrace.

      Settled into what was now her bedroom for the foreseeable future, she finally remembered to breathe. If Meadowbrook was to be her home for at least six months, while she helped the Singer family set up their hotel, she needed to think of it as such. She wasn’t sure she would ever get used to the luxury she found herself in, but she was going to have to try. She needed to start embracing her good fortune rather than behaving like a rabbit caught in the headlights. After all, Pippa was so welcoming; she could only hope the rest of the Singers would be the same.

      She unpacked her case; she hadn’t brought too much with her, some work suits and a limited casual wardrobe. She didn’t have far to go to the bungalow in Bristol if she needed anything else, but it felt presumptuous turning up with too much.

      She went over to the floor-to-ceiling window of the bedroom, which looked out onto the front of the house. With views over the Mendips, she was mesmerised. It was as she imagined when she looked at the photo, the woman in the window. That woman was her, it was actually her.

      She pulled all her books out of her oversized bag and put them away in the bedside table. They were text books she’d used when she took her hotel management course, and she was praying they would help her now. Because it was a dream job, yes, but also a rather big job, and she had no idea how she was going to manage … She pushed the negative thoughts away and thought about how she had got to this. Throughout her life, people had put her down, not her nan, but almost everyone else. This job was supposed to end all that, give her a new start. She was not only doing this for her nan, but she was also doing it for herself.

      She knew she was far too cautious, and always had been. Gemma took the safest option when she could, owing to her upbringing, owing to an ingrained fear that never left her. Her nan, who had brought her up, and was her only family, tried her best to bolster her confidence, but her vulnerability dominated her life.

      And now her nan wasn’t around, and Gemma felt alone. At first, the dementia wasn’t too bad. Gemma could juggle her college course and taking care of her nan, but in time it got worse. Hence the residential home.

      Missing her nan was something that would never go away. Watching someone you love slip away from you, however it happened, was the most painful thing. She wanted her nan, the woman who she knew, the one who tried to encourage her, who made her feel loved. But, unfortunately, after visiting her, she often ended up feeling lonelier than ever.

      Now, though, in Meadowbrook she was being offered a fresh start, and God knew she needed it badly. It was a gift, she thought again, as she wiped tears off her cheeks, and she needed to make it work. Those were her new mantras, and she would keep repeating them, until she believed them.

       Chapter 3

      A knock on the door interrupted her myriad of thoughts.

      ‘Hello,’ she said, and after a beat, Pippa appeared.

      ‘Is everything all right?’ she asked. She had pulled her hair back, Gemma noticed, and although dressed casually – jeans, a sweater – she still looked elegant. Gemma glanced down at her suit and wondered if she was overdressed. But then she was starting work, and her nan always said first impressions were crucial.

      ‘This room is stunning,’ Gemma replied truthfully. From the king-size bed with the upholstered headboard and luxurious bed linen, which felt how she imagined lying on a cloud to be, to the en suite bathroom, this was better than she could ever have imagined. ‘Honestly, if the rest of the house is like this, people will be beating your door down to stay here.’ She smiled, trying to sound confident, to sound like the Gemma that Pippa had hired, not the scared little girl she was a minute ago.

      ‘Oh! That’s so lovely of you to say.’ Pippa flushed pink. ‘It’s so important to me to make this work. You see, it’s sort of the only real job I’ve ever had, and I haven’t even really started yet! But I need to prove that I can do this, and I know you are the person to help me. Anyway, enough about that.’

      Gemma was getting used to the idea that Pippa jumped from topic to topic. She had got an inkling of how much opening the hotel meant to her when they first met. Pippa explained how she had gone from living with her father – who had now passed away – to getting married in her early twenties to a man who had hurt her very badly. She didn’t know the full story, but Pippa was so open she assumed she probably would at some stage. And Gemma felt a huge responsibility to help her. She was determined to do so.

      Gemma stood up. She caught her reflection in the large, ornate full-length mirror and it took her by surprise, for a moment.

      She’d undergone a bit of a makeover before her job interview; a long overdue image change. Her dark blonde hair had been lightened and cut into shoulder-length layers, giving it the illusion of thickness. She started wearing make-up, only a bit, but it did brighten her up. Gemma had never thought of herself as attractive, mainly because no one apart from her nan ever told her she was. But not anymore. New job, new Gemma, and now all she had to do was to meet Pippa’s family and help them to open a hotel. How hard could it be?

      She followed Pippa down the long, curved staircase, once again marvelling at the house and almost losing her footing. She couldn’t begin to imagine how it would feel to live in it, or to have grown up here. A fantasy life.

      ‘They’re in here, the dining room,’ Pippa said as she opened the door, stepping back to let Gemma go first.

      Sitting around the most enormous dining table, she found herself looking at the rest of the family. She gulped and tried to find a smile.

      The dining room was every bit as magnificent as she expected. She was so busy staring at a huge portrait of a handsome man, a beautiful woman with three small children and a baby, which she knew must be the Singer family, that she walked into the table.

      ‘Ow,’ she said, reddening and rubbing her hip.

      ‘Are you all right?’ Pippa asked as her family, all sat along one side of the table, looked at her with puzzled expressions.

      ‘Sorry, I was looking at …’ Words failed her.

      Collecting herself, she concentrated on the siblings, who she felt she knew from her Internet research.