Page 35 of Forgive Not Forget
“Thank you. I can’t take all the credit. The developers did most of the work, and then I added my personal touch. Would you like a glass of champagne?”
“Please. What are we celebrating?”
Anna laughed. “Nothing, Katherine’s a fan. Look.” She opened the fridge to reveal a stack of champagne bottles.
“Golly, how the other half lives.”
“I don’t hear you making any complaints when I pour you endless glasses, Anna,” Katherine said with a wink as she passed her a glass.
“Admittedly I’ve become quite accustomed to it. I wouldn’t want Katherine to drink alone. Anyway, she buys it in bulk, Laura, so it’s no more expensive than a decent bottle of wine. We restrict ourselves to a couple of bottles a week; we don’t live off it.”
“Unfortunately,” Katherine added with a sly grin.
Laura took a sip from her glass. “Who could blame you if you did?”
“Dinner won’t be long; shall we eat in here or the dining room?” Katherine asked.
Katherine had previously suggested to Anna that they make more use of their opulent dining room. This wasn’t exactly the best time to do that, though, as children could be messy. As if reading her thoughts and having just had a tour of the dining room, Laura answered correctly.
“In here is fine, isn’t it? I don’t want the kids making a mess.”
“Fine,” Anna answered before Katherine could object. “I’ll lay the table.”
The table was a new addition to the kitchen. When Anna had moved in, they had taken their meals in the dining room, and although it was a nice space, with sage-green wallpaper and a pedestaled mahogany dining table from the late Regency period that sat twelve, it didn’t feel particularly cosy for just two people. On their search for furniture for Anna’s dressing room, they had come across a table that suited the more modern style of the kitchen. It seated six in a much less formal manner. Placed in front of the long, sliding patio doors, it made a welcome addition to the kitchen.
With Abigail’s assistance, the table was soon laid, and Katherine presented them with a steaming dish of shepherd’s pie, served with peas and carrots, and gravy. All the eyes around the table widened with delight.
“This looks delicious, Katherine,” Laura said. “Thank you. It’s so nice to have a night off from cooking. Sometimes it can be so difficult to just stand for long periods of time in the kitchen.”
The centre of Katherine’s brow furrowed at her confession. “You’re welcome. Dig in.”
Anna allowed them to get halfway through their dinner before she announced that she wanted to pick their brains about something. She and Carrie had a meeting at the end of the week in which they were expected to present their ideas to Katherine for the new gift shop. She and Carrie had split the list of merchandise they would need to source to fill the shop. Now was a perfect time to extract some information from potential customers.
Luckily her audience was ready and willing to help.
“Abi, what would you like to see in the abbey shop for kids?”
“Stationery, so maybe notebooks, pencils, erasers.”
Katherine gave Abigail a wink. “Great idea.”
Abigail returned her wink and raised it with a cheeky grin.
“Tom?”
Tom shrugged as if out of habit. A moment later he spoke. “Chocolate bars, pen knives?”
“We saw some nice den kits and outdoor things when we went to Halsey Castle, didn’t we, Tom?” Laura added.
Tom nodded and then looked down at the plate. Anna felt she’d extracted all she would from him.
“When the kids were little, I used to meet up regularly with a group of friends at a historic house,” Laura said. “They had a wonderful shop. Tom used to love the wooden swords and slingshots, that sort of thing when he was little, didn’t you?”
Tom nodded his agreement and smiled momentarily before his eyes fell back to his plate, the smile slipping from his face along with it.
“What about you, Laura?” Anna asked, quick to move the focus away from Tom and whatever memory had come to him.
“Well, I can’t resist a mug, an apron, or an oven glove.”
