Winter at Pretty Beach by Polly Babbington (inspirational books txt) 📕

‘Yeah, I was thinking about that. I’ve no idea what to wear. Maybe a cream wool dress, then I’m done.’

‘Me too, I’m going to get either a dress or a blazer and some wide-leg trousers - keep it simple and comfortable.’ Sallie replied.

‘By the way, I forgot to ask how the podcast went. I love that show, I used to listen to it before I moved here. So, what was Lucian like?’

‘Oh my, it was a hoot. He’s a character - a bit crazy, very flamboyant and lovely too. That podcast is listened to by millions. I thought he might be a bit, what's the word, up himself, but he was great. Loves Pretty Beach. He’s coming to stay in the cottage soon with his new boyfriend.’

‘That’ll be great publicity for the Orangery,’ Nina replied, bouncing Tillie up and down on her knee.

‘I couldn't even buy it, to be honest. He’s a big-time influencer now - I had a look at his media pack and it’s thousands of pounds for him to even mention a brand, let alone the slot I got on the show. So what a stroke of luck that Guy knows him.’

‘Luck and hard work go together really well,’ Nina nodded.

‘Talking of Guy, how’s that going?’

‘Ahh, time will tell. He’s definitely moved out of the family home now even though his wife decided after their break that she did want to carry on with the marriage. I bet she’s gutted.’

‘I bet. What an idiot. So are you two moving any further on?’

‘Just friends... for now,’ Nina replied and did the fluttery thing with her eyelashes.

Chapter 14

Sallie was having trouble sleeping. There wasn’t a problem dropping off, not at all, in fact the opposite. It was about three-thirty when she would wake up, toss and turn and stare up at the ceiling thinking. It was ridiculous and not even as if she was worried about anything or had anything on her mind. It was mainly the business - she wanted to get the Orangery up and running but the burn had slowed it all down and then the weather had turned. It wasn’t as if she had to worry about money - that was covered. So why was she constantly awake in the middle of the night?

The first few times it had happened she’d woken Ben up too by disturbing him. When it carried on and she kept waking him it was concerning - if he was getting up early to fly, he needed to be alert and not awake half the night. After it happened for a few weeks in a row, they’d made a loose plan that if he was getting up at five for a flight then he would sleep in the spare room.

The insomnia between three and four was driving her insane - she’d even thought to herself that she might as well have a newborn, or at least look after one in the early hours - she could fit in a few feeds while she was waiting to go back to sleep.

She got up and pulled the curtain back and opened the window. An ice-cold wind whistled through the room. She blinked her eyes at the sparkling white all over the ground outside the window, the thick layer of snow on the roof next door and the tops of the boats anointed in the white powder. She sighed - at least there was snow. Snow made everything better.

There was one thing that was going over and over in her head. She’d had an idea about the Orangery; it had come to her just after the podcast recording with Lucian. When she had arrived home from the meeting, she’d researched a bit more about the podcast and her mind had begun to whir. Lucian had fundamentally played down his popularity - each podcast episode had been downloaded millions of times. His social media accounts had millions of followers with extremely high, worldwide engagement. She felt very lucky that he’d been gracious enough to interview her and include her business on his podcast, but once she’d seen his numbers, she’d wondered if she could leverage it further.

Her mind had gone over it again and again and she’d brainstormed a few ways to make it work for both him and for her; his following loved everything about Pretty Beach and she wanted to get more international tourists into her brand so it would be super beneficial for them to collaborate somehow. And now that she had the Orangery nearly up and running, the flat over the cottage garage ready to go, the marquee and the cottage at the Boat House she had a lot more avenues to fill up - and a lot more ways to make money.

She came up with a few different ideas - she was already doing a free stay for Lucian and his boyfriend at the cottage in exchange for the podcast interview and she’d sent him a special bottle of very expensive whisky as a thank you. She thought about a special offer to give to his followers but there was nothing special about that - every other brand gave special voucher codes out every other day. Then browsing the internet a couple of days later she'd come across a post of a live feed of a mother giving birth - she’d watched the baby being born right there and then on the internet in disbelief.

It had blown her away that someone would want to broadcast the birth of their child on the internet, especially after what had happened with her own birth and losing the baby. But it had given her the idea that maybe through her own and Lucian’s social media followings, they could run a competition for a wedding and stay in Pretty Beach and broadcast the ceremony live on social media. She’d gone over it in her head and had quickly realised that it would be great for both