Frozen Heart

by Carol MacLean

Genres: Romance

Synopsis

The new Accent Amour romance by popular author Carol MacLean. Jenna MacKenzie has reached a low point in her life - she's lost her business, her home and her boyfriend. Reluctantly she goes to live with her step-family where she's treated like Cinderella. Then she meets Gus, a handsome stranger with his own problems. When they fall in love it looks like Jenna will get her own fairytale happy-ever-after – but there are troubles to overcome before Jenna and Gus can finally reach for a life and love together…

Release date: October 14, 2016

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 200

Sample

‘I have no choice,’ Jenna said, but her hand hovered hesitantly above the telephone. Could she really make the call?

Ann lifted the cherry red phone and placed it firmly out of reach on the counter top, where it loomed large in Jenna’s mind, like a beacon.

‘You must think again,’ Ann said, ‘there must be an alternative.’

But there wasn’t. Jenna gazed around in despair at the empty shop. It was small and had been, until recently, cosy and welcoming with the scents of chocolate and vanilla, mint and other sweet flavours. Now the glass counter, where she’d so proudly displayed the baking, was empty. A ‘for sale’ sign hung at an angle across the plate glass window. Beyond she could see the wild, grey sea and the fishing boats in the harbour bobbing up and down with its force.

‘I made a mistake coming back up here,’ she said with a sigh.

‘Don’t be silly,’ Ann said, moving around briskly, filling the kettle with water. At least the kettle and two mugs were still here. Everything else was packed and sorted. It would be sold or stored or recycled, depending. ‘You couldn’t have predicted the credit crunch. No-one did. Besides, your bakery shop was a success for five years. So let’s have no more talk of mistakes. The question is, what are you going to do now?’

Jenna smiled fondly at her best friend. Dear Ann. What would she do without her? She was always a source of help and support and fun too. She kept her spirits high and was able to see the positive side to everything. Which was more than Jenna could do right now. She was twenty-six years old and had lost everything. She had no job and, since yesterday, no boyfriend. She had nowhere to live either. The house had to go along with the shop to pay her debts. If she was frugal she would have a small amount left over on which to live for a while. But how she would pay for rent and buy food to eat as well, she had no idea.

When her father had died six years ago, he’d left her with a reasonable inheritance. It had brought her much-needed freedom from her home circumstances. She’d used the money to return to the Western Highlands of her childhood, to follow her dream. She’d learned the art of baking from her mother at an early age and with that and patisserie training at cookery school, was able to create her own hand-made cakes and pastries to sell in her tiny shop. There she’d met Ann, who owned the clothes shop next door. Ann had a constant stream of mums and kids buying cheap but cheerful clothes from her affordable racks and Jenna was always grateful when a few would spill over into her tiny shop afterwards. They made an odd pair of friends. Ann was so tall and willowy, with straight platinum hair, beautiful like a model. While Jenna was of average height with brown shoulder-length hair and quite ordinary. She would melt easily into a crowd. She had ‘one of those faces’ as her stepmother Lisette had been fond of telling her. She wasn’t special at all. That had been drummed into her by Lisette and Shelley until she quite believed it. Only with her father had she felt unique and loved. She missed him still so much.

Ann put a mug of hot tea down in front of her. The fragrant steam helped lift her spirits from her miserable thoughts.

‘You need a holiday,’ Ann told her, with a critical eye. ‘You don’t look at all well. In fact, you look downright peaky. A week in some winter sunshine abroad is the tonic you need.’

Ann was right. Jenna knew she wasn’t at her best. She’d lost weight with the worry of her business, but instead of looking slim, she was scraggy and her clothes hung unattractively on her. Her hair was lank despite frequent conditioning, its copper gleam quite disappeared. Her skin was pasty and she couldn’t shift the cold she’d harboured for the last couple of months.

‘There’s no way I can afford a holiday just now.’ She shook her head. ‘I have to be realistic, Ann, about my future. I need a place to stay until I can find a job.’

They both looked at the telephone and back at each other.

‘Come and stay at mine,’ Ann said.

‘It’s a kind offer but you don’t have room.’

Ann lived in a tiny one-bedroom flat above her shop. It was cramped even for one. Jenna blew her nose and pulled more tissues from the hanky box. She carried it around with her as much as her handbag these days. She shivered as a rackety breeze pushed under the shop door and she buttoned up her thick, woollen cardigan more tightly. If it hadn’t looked ridiculous, she’d have added a woolly hat and gloves it was so cold. November was such a dreary month, nothing but grey light and darkness to look forward to. She felt her spirits sinking again and made an effort to smile as Ann watched her with concern.

‘Sorry, Jenna, but I have to go. I’ve left Cammie in charge but you know what she’s like. There’ll be no sales without me. She’s a dear girl but so shy she wouldn’t dream of talking to the customers.’

‘I’ll be fine.’ Jenna waved her away. ‘I need to tidy up in here anyway. That’ll warm me up.’

She found the act of sorting and dusting therapeutic. There was no need to think about other things. She could make simple decisions such as keep this filing cabinet and throw out that cardboard box. She even whistled while she mopped the floor until a bout of coughing overcame her and she had to stop, leaning over the mop handle until the spasm lessened. She didn’t hear the door open behind her until he spoke.

‘Jenna?’

She turned happily, letting the mop drop with a clatter to the floor. ‘William! You came back.’

He looked uncomfortable, his feet shifting in their scruffy trainers, his big hands shoved in his pockets. She longed to run her fingers through his long hair as though nothing had changed. Perhaps nothing had, she thought hopefully.

‘No, no ...’ He flushed. ‘I meant what I said yesterday.’

Jenna’s heart sank like a lead balloon, leaving a raw, painful hole in her chest. ‘I don’t understand,’ she whispered, praying the tears wouldn’t well up again, ‘We were happy together, weren’t we? What changed?’

I need you more than ever now, she wanted to cry, I’ve lost everything else. I can’t lose you too.

‘We had a good time together,’ he agreed, the colour still high on his narrow cheeks, his gaze not quite meeting hers, ‘But things change, don’t they? People move on. That’s what’s happened to us.’

‘You make it sound inevitable,’ Jenna said miserably, ‘I thought we were growing closer together.’ He’d never said he loved her. But Jenna hadn’t minded. She wasn’t sure she loved him either. She liked him very much. She was confident that feeling would grow and develop. What was love anyhow? How would she know when she got there? She didn’t know but now she wasn’t to have the opportunity to find out. William had made it very clear yesterday that it was over between them. He needed space apparently. It wasn’t her, it was him. He needed ‘time out’. This was put rather vaguely so she wasn’t sure why he suddenly needed it or what he was going to do with this ‘time’ so abruptly acquired from her.

He picked up the mop awkwardly and leant it against the counter. The mop head wasn’t dissimilar to his own hair style, Jenna thought briefly. She felt a terrible urge to giggle but suppressed it. Hysteria was sure to follow.

‘The thing is,’ William was saying slowly, and Jenna could predict what was coming, ‘I’m a bit short of cash right now. Any chance of lending me some, to tide me over until my next jobseekers’ allowance comes through?’

The hysteria was building like the fizzy bubbles in a shaken bottle of lemonade. Jenna gestured helplessly at the hollowed out shop and the ‘for sale’ sign. She waited for William to say, I see what you mean, to apologise for bothering her, to even acknowledge that for once her situation was much more desperate and serious than his own. But no. He stood there like a doleful hound.

‘Your mum?’ Jenna asked faintly.

‘Naw. She’s run out, she says until her next pension cheque. It’s not like I’m not trying,’ he added with an edge of belligerence. ‘It’s not my fault I can’t get a job, is it?’

‘What about getting some training? Get a qualification in some trade or other.’

‘Let’s not argue about that all over again. I’ve managed fine in the past with odd jobs and day labour. I don’t need a wimp’s degree to earn a wage, do I?’

‘A few years ago when the economy was booming, then no. But now, well it wouldn’t hurt.’ Jenna tried for the hundredth time to make him see sense.

William shrugged his shoulders under the old greatcoat, ‘Are you going to give me the money or not?’

Jenna bit her lip. She fumbled in her purse and came up with a twenty. She handed it over. ‘It’s all I can afford. William?’

He was already on his way out, the crisp note tucked away in his jeans pocket. He turned as though surprised to find her still there.

‘I’m leaving town. I ... I just wanted you to know.’ So she’d made her decision after all, without knowing it herself. Her subconscious knew it was the only solution. What did she want William to do with this dramatic news? Did she hope he would run back to her, clasp her in his arms and beg her not to leave? To say that he couldn’t live without her? There was a pause during which Jenna could smell the winter salt from the nearby sea. She’d miss that. The way the sea air pervaded everything here.

‘Okay,’ he said, ‘keep in touch.’

She heard the crackle of her money in his pocket, then the door shut and she watched him slouch into the stiff air of the seafront and then out of sight.

What did she see in him anyway? Jenna tried to feel angry with him and failed. She was going to miss him. He had problems, goodness knows, but then again who didn’t these days? The fact was William could be charming, entertaining company when he tried. They’d had some good dates where music and laughter had mingled. It was only latterly he had distanced himself as Jenna’s problems multiplied. She couldn’t blame him. She hadn’t been much fun to be with, worried as she was by her situation.

She couldn’t put it off any longer. Jenna reached for the telephone.

It rang and rang for ages. She imagined Lisette at the other end of the house, slowly moving the wheelchair to get to the receiver. But it was Shelley who answered. ‘Oh, it’s you,’ she said coolly when Jenna greeted her. She let a silence grow on the raspy line. Jenna gripped the phone and fought for calm. Shelley could rile her too easily. She’d learned in the past to ignore her barbs. Somehow in the intervening years she had forgotten what her stepsister was like.

‘How are you?’ Shelley asked emotionlessly.

‘That’s why I’m phoning,’ Jenna said carefully, ‘I’m in a bit of a pickle and I need some help.’

‘What on earth has happened to you?’ There was no mistaking the lightness of her tone. There was no concern for Jenna there but a sneaking delight in her woes.

‘I’ve lost my business, Shelley. With it, I’ve lost my home too. I’ve nowhere to go.’

‘Why are you phoning here?’

She was going to make Jenna lay it all out. To make her beg for help. Well, if that was what it took, she would do it. There was no room for pride now. Jenna took a deep breath. ‘Would it be okay if I came to stay? Just for a while until I sort myself out.’ There, she’d said it. For one appalling moment she was sure Shelley was going to say no.

‘You want to come here? That’s funny. You couldn’t wait to leave home five years ago. Now you’re begging to return.’

Shelley was right. Jenna had been desperate back then to escape the cloying atmosphere of the Glasgow townhouse. To escape from Lisette’s bitterness and Shelley’s jealousy and Donna’s sullen behaviour. She’d been mourning her father and it had all been too much to bear. Coming back to the Highlands had released her, freed her to soar high. Only she’d crashed to earth with a painful bump.

‘I’m at rock bottom,’ she said plainly, ‘I’ve very little left. You are my family. I hoped ...’

‘We do need a cleaner,’ Shelley said, over the crackling connection, ‘Mummy had to let the last one go, she was so lazy. I suppose you could take that on, in return for lodgings.’

Jenna heard a voice in the background at Shelley’s end of the line. The line went mute as if Shelley had muffled the receiver with her palm. Then it crackled again and Lisette’s sharp voice floated out of the ether to her.

‘Jennifer? Are you still there? Answer me!’

Jenna winced at the use of her full given name. She hated it and had turned it into ‘Jenna’ as soon as she’d left home. Lisette’s use of her original name reminded her strongly of her childhood and all the reasons she’d wanted to leave.

‘Hello, Lisette. Yes, I’m here. How are you?’

‘You know how I am, Jennifer. I am always, but always, the same. I don’t know why they bother with the massages, the physiotherapy. It’s a waste of time. I wish your father could see me now. How he has left me.’ Lisette’s English was perfect but her French accent remained and a certain stilted turn of phrase.

‘The accident wasn’t his fault. He died in it.’ Jenna blinked away warm tears.

Six years had passed since the awful road traffic accident which had claimed her father’s life and left her stepmother crippled and in a wheelchair. Lisette blamed Norman Mackenzie’s driving. He hadn’t seen the car coming towards them out of the mist, driving on the wrong side of the road. In vain Jenna had tried to explain that it didn’t matter whether he’d seen it or not, there was no time to . . .