It was snowing heavily as Emily made her way back to the holiday let, more than twenty centimetres now where the snow had been untouched. Inside, she found Veronica together with Graham from the council jovially slapping chocolate icing on a line of chocolate logs while singing along to Christmas songs.
‘Going well?’ she asked.
‘Not bad,’ Veronica said. ‘What’s up?’
‘Just visited Trower,’ Emily answered.
‘Ooh, Skeletor? How’d that go? He melt you with his laser eyes?’
‘I made it out alive,’ Emily said. ‘I’m pretty sure he’s not going to sabotage anything. At least, no more than he has done already.’
‘That’s good to know.’
If she were honest with herself, Emily still felt a little uncomfortable with the way her meeting with Nathan Trower had gone. It felt too passive, as though she had got off lightly. This was a man who had manipulated and lied in order to squeeze the life out of an entire village for more than two years. Was the simple gift of a cheap pen and a talking to going to make him change his ways?
She shook her head. Not likely.
‘Are you good with finishing these?’ she asked Veronica.
The girl cracked Graham on the shoulder. ‘Perfectly. Did you know he used to be a professional pub singer? He’s note perfect on most of these songs.’
‘Is there such a thing?’ Emily asked, as Graham looked up from the cake he was icing and smiled.
‘But you know, don’t tell Peter, eh. Just in case.’
‘I’m married with two kids,’ Graham said. ‘Don’t worry, you’re safe.’
Veronica started blushing. ‘I didn’t mean it like that—’
Emily put up a hand. ‘I’ll leave you two to figure things out,’ she said.
Keeping busy was the only way to settle her nerves. Outside her gate, the entire village had turned into a production line of preparations, from the fairy lights stringing up along the church yard fence to the snacks and drinks stalls setting up outside local businesses. Outside the shop, Emily found Skip helping Peter to drag a popcorn machine out onto the pavement.
‘Not sure if it still works,’ Peter said. ‘Mum said we had one out the back, but I didn’t believe her. It was under an old blanket.’
‘What we’re thinking is that Monday’s carnival procession will do a loop of the village green, before making its way up to the village hall car park,’ Skip said. ‘A reversal of the route it used to take before Trower stopped us using the green.’
Emily, who had fought enough battles with Nathan already and had decided to leave his claim of ownership to the village green for another day, nodded. ‘Sounds like a good idea,’ she said.
‘And while people are waiting to get going, they’ll need popcorn, right?’ Peter said.
‘And beer,’ Skip added.
‘I think you guys are on top of it,’ Emily said.
Peter had looked up, but now he frowned as he looked past her. Emily turned to see Veronica coming out of the holiday let with Graham trailing behind her, carrying a tray, its contents hidden by a towel.
‘Who’s that guy Veronica’s with?’ Peter asked.
Emily laughed. ‘That’s Graham. He works for the council. Don’t worry, he’s married with two kids.’
‘I was just asking.’ Peter, his cheeks flushed with more than the exertion of moving the popcorn machine, tried to hide his face as Veronica and Graham reached them.
‘Saw you out the window,’ Veronica said. ‘Snack time.’
‘Thanks,’ Skip said. ‘If you like, I’ll open up the bar and we can get out of the snow.’
‘What’s this?’ Emily asked.
‘Choco log and coffee,’ Veronica said.
‘But we need these for—’
Veronica put up a hand. ‘Tester,’ she said. ‘And the coffee’s my own blend. Another tester.’
‘Let’s go then.’
Graham, still carrying the tray, followed Skip over to the pub. Veronica and Peter exchanged glances while Emily stood awkwardly in the middle.
‘All right?’ Peter asked.
‘All right?’ Veronica answered.
‘Yeah.’
‘Yeah. Ah, thanks for the help last night.’
‘No problem.’
‘You, ah, wanna come get coffee later?’
‘Sure. And we’ve got one to drink now, haven’t we.’
‘Oh, yeah.’
‘Cool.’
Emily smiled. ‘I’ll see you guys inside,’ she said. Veronica shot her a don’t-you-dare-leave-me look, but Emily just winked and headed after Skip and Graham. Inside, she found them setting up the drinks and cake on a table. Skip had switched on the TV, which was playing a Christmas movie, and turned on the lights to reveal he had done his own decorating: a beautiful tree laden with decorations now lit up one corner.
‘Nice,’ Emily said.
‘Well, it is Christmas,’ Skip answered. ‘Got to get into the spirit of it all, haven’t we?’
An hour later, after a pleasant time eating, drinking, and watching Veronica and Peter adorably fumble through one conversation after another, Emily excused herself, returning to the welcome quiet of her holiday let. Despite the upheaval in the garden, temporarily hidden by a blanket of snow, the rest of the house was a sanctuary, protecting her against the racing excitement of the outside world. Veronica and Graham had done an expert job of cleaning the kitchen, the remaining chocolate logs boxed up and left on the work surface. Emily got herself a glass of water and retired to the living room sofa.
The fire was cold in the grate, so she draped a blanket over her knees, not wanting the fuss of starting it. Her laptop was on the coffee table nearby, so she pulled it onto her lap and browsed through local news sites, wondering if Trower had set into action any new sabotage plans.
So far, so good. A couple of notifications had gone out to local press websites, advertising the charity event, although with the roads likely to be icy Emily wasn’t sure how many people would be able to make it. News websites were already urging people to stay at home if they could. She had sent an email to a local bus company to ask about hiring a bus to do a park-and-ride service from the nearest council car park, but hadn’t yet heard back. Although their website claimed that all-weather services were available, she expected that in practice they wanted to keep their buses locked up during heavy snow. And without such a service, Cottonwood’s carnival was limited to those who lived in walking distance: by Emily’s estimation about three hundred people.
Whether they got the numbers to justify its charity event status or not, the carnival had done a fine job of pulling people together. Emily logged on to her social media accounts and discovered she had been added to a new Facebook group for Cottonwood, and even been made an admin. Scanning the list of members, Nathan Trower was noticeable by his absence.
She reminded herself it was probably just as well, even though she couldn’t help but feel that even in her attempt to rehabilitate him, she had only isolated him further. She wondered if he had given Mrs. Taylor a call yet, but it had only been a couple of hours. It was probably best to leave it all alone for a while.
Still, there were no signs of sabotage that she could see. Unable to resist, she loaded a couple of national listings websites and checked the reviews for all the local businesses she could think of, including her own grandmother’s teahouse. No obvious troll reviews. Neither were there any new articles slating any of them. It was as though Nathan Trower had quietly accepted that his lid of Christmas oppression had finally been lifted.
But had he really given up? Emily shook her head, unable to shake a nervous anticipation that Trower was far from beaten, and that despite all the good that was going on, things were about to take a turn for the worse.