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.
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.
Jenny also writes
erotica as Kay Jaybee and historical crime as Jennifer Ash.
