Free A French Pirouette by Jennifer Bohnet Page B

nodded. “Thank you. I was going to call the taxi.” The telephone rang as they were all saying their goodbyes and Bruno went to answer it.
    Brigitte was alone and clearing the table when he went back outside. “Who was it?” she asked, absently piling plates on top of each other.
    “Isabelle.”
    Brigitte looked at him sharply. “Is something the matter? It is not like Isabelle to ring during the day.”
    “She is coming up for a weekend next month,” Bruno said.
    Brigitte smiled. “What a treat. How long is she staying?”
    “She didn’t say.”
    “Is Laurent coming with her?”
    Bruno shook his head. “No. She is coming on her own.”
    “I expect he’s too busy at work to take the time,” Brigitte said before seeing the look on Bruno’s face.
    “She said she wants to talk to us about the future.” Bruno paused. “I think Isabelle is maybe planning on coming back to Brittany permanently. But I’m not so sure Laurent is in agreement.”
    Brigitte looked at him in dismay. Surely not. She couldn’t bear it if Isabelle’s marriage had failed.

Chapter Eight
    Libby
    Life, Libby found, was slipping into a routine. One that she knew was bound to get busier as the season wore on and the auberge filled with visitors. Brigitte had warned her that while running the auberge would be fun and interesting, it would also be harder for her as a single woman, but she hadn’t realised just how hard it would turn out to be.
    Mornings she was up early to feed the chickens and ducks before letting them out—egg collecting came later in the day. A quick croissant and coffee before starting on breakfasts for the guests and making her to-do list for the day.
    She’d thought she was getting used to life without Dan but since arriving in France all her despairing emotions of two years ago had surprised her by resurfacing. Shaking them off was proving even harder this time. She kept telling herself, “Buying the auberge was my decision nobody else’s.” Deep down she was convinced it had been a good choice—she just hadn’t prepared herself mentally to face the many memories that were being stirred up daily by being alone in a place they’d both loved.
    Dan’s presence seemed to be everywhere. Out on the terrace drinking a glass of rosé with her. Striding alongside her on the canal path as she walked into the village. Watching her in the kitchen while she prepared food. Every time she took his old toolbox out of the shed to do some little repair job she half expected him to take it out of her hands saying, “This is a job for me.”
    He’d always been a bit chauvinistic over DIY. She’d been happy to let him do things his way but now she had to learn how to do stuff herself. Nothing major—refreshing the grouting in the bathroom, painting the walls of two of the bedrooms and screwing the latch securely onto the chicken house door had been her limit so far.
    What she really missed was his companionship. At the end of the day sitting out on her balcony with a glass of wine she longed to be able to talk to him, go over the day’s events, laugh at some incident together.
    If she was honest too, she was missing Chloe far more than she’d anticipated. Libby had always treasured the good relationship she had with Chloe—sorely tested during difficult teenage years admittedly, but since Dan had died there had been a dynamic shift into a fully fledged adult friendship as they consoled each other.
    After Dan’s death they’d leant on each other for support and had grown close in the process. There had been times when Libby had thought their relationship was more akin to sisters than mother and daughter, especially when Chloe was being upfront with her about boyfriends and the things she and her friends got up to—giving her Too Much Information in the process.
    The weekly Skype call and text messages they were reduced to now they were living in different countries were not the same. There were days when she longed for