Chapter 1

Cooper

This has got to be some kind of April Fool’s joke. There’s no other explanation for it. And believe me, I’ve wracked my brain for one.

The rear end of my agent’s sleek black Audi is almost out of sight, a silhouette instantly as it’s lost to the hazy cloud of tan-coloured dust billowing up from the dirt road. Although, this is going a little far for a practical joke. Abandoning me in the arse-end of nowhere. I should never have got in that car.

There’s a crooked sign, Springfield Farm, its paint faded and peeling. A wooden, five-bar gate hangs awkwardly on its hinges below, and after that it’s field after field, polythene tunnels, cows, a couple of barns, and an old, weathered farmhouse. The vista dips away beyond the house, a valley perhaps, more fields, a river, who knows? What I do know, is this isn’t where I’ll be staying tonight.

A pretty brunette pulls to a halt beside me on a bike that’s almost vintage, front basket loaded with groceries, a bag hanging from both handlebars, and a parcel on the rear rack. Where did she spring from?

“You lost?”

“No, just passing through. It’s all a bit rural for my liking, I need Wi-Fi and hot water, doesn’t look like I’d get that out here.”

She smiles. “Well, you’ve quite a walk to town, and the roads around here aren’t the easiest to navigate. You should call a taxi, get yourself out of here. You want the number?”

She’s talking to me like a normal human being. Is it possible she doesn’t recognise me?

“I’m good, thanks. I’ll walk.”

“Suit yourself, there’s rain on the way though. Pretty bad too if the birds are anything to go by.”

A quick look around and I see precisely one bird, a crow, hopping along the fence to our left.

There’s a tinkling laugh as she speaks again. “Yeah, I know, you can’t see them now, but riding back from town, they were all flying low. That’ll be the rain coming in. You can’t smell it?”

“Smell it?”

She waves her arm out towards the fields. “That earthy scent, petrichor at its best.”

“All I can smell is cow shit. Anyway, your cows aren’t lying down so I think I’ll be fine.”

That laugh again. “Actually, it’s horse shit you can smell. And the cow’s lying down is an old wives’ tale. Cows don’t do that. You can check out leaves though, if they’ve turned their backs up, it’s rain all the way.”

I’ve no idea if she’s messing with me or not, her face inscrutable. I’ve completely lost my ability to read people in recent years, and it drives me crazy. That’s the problem with being me, the fakes, the wannabes, the liars, they’ve all corroded my trust in people.

“You better be going then,” she says as she opens the rickety old gate, wheels the bike through and closes it behind her. “You’ll be able to get a train from town. East Thelwell Station, there’ll be at least one more train before the end of the day.”

She hops back on the bike and pedals away, all poise, grace, and dark hair cascading like silk down her back. For the second time today, I watch a rear end leave me on a dirt road. Hers, though, far sexier than the Audi. And then it hits me – she’s just headed into the farm I’m meant to be staying at. I briefly wonder if she’s the daughter of my contact, a niece maybe, or just a passing neighbour. Whoever she may be, she was certainly a bright spot on this endlessly green landscape.

I don’t have time to hang around thinking about random women on ancient bikes, though. If it’s a bit of a trek into town, I better get going. Taking a guess, town is the same direction the beauty on the bike came from. I grab my bag, sling it over my shoulder, and make a start.

I’m not even five minutes down the road before the sky turns dark and the first droplets fall. Huh, seems she knew what she was talking about. And that smell, what did she call it? Patricia? Pentocore? No, pet something though, I don’t know, but I can smell it now, a deep earthy but fresh scent that emanates from all around. Still doesn’t get rid of the cow – sorry, horse – shit stench though.

The mere whisper of a shower doesn’t stay that way for long. With every step I take, it grows in intensity, gains momentum, until finally the roar of it surrounds me. There’s barely a thing on this landscape for it to beat against, and yet it sounds like a whole percussion section of an orchestra, a wild and untamed rhythm. I hunch my shoulders against increasing winds and unleashed torrents and push onward. It’s when lightning paints the sky with jagged swords, illuminates the world with an eerie, ominous glow, when thunder crashes and reverberates throughout the valley, and a deer darts, panicked, across the road in front of me, that I admit defeat.

Someone at that house is expecting me, it’s got to be drier than this, and quite frankly, if it is all a fucking joke, right now, I don’t even care. I take one last look at the seemingly endless road in front of me, then turn around and trudge back to the farm.

“So, you decided you’d like to stay here after all, did you?” the woman from earlier says as she opens the door to me. “Not too backwards for a fancy star like you?”

She did recognise me.

“Mr Fox,” another woman smiles as she pulls the brunette away, fingers digging deep into her upper arm. “How lovely of you to join us. I’m Blossom, I run this place. Please ignore Tulip here, my sister is currently awaiting an attitude adjustment on the NHS.”

“Tulip?” I can’t help but grin as the brunette yanks her arm away and rolls her eyes, clearly annoyed.

“Yes, Tulip,” she snorts, stepping outside, a human barricade between me and her home.

Shit, did I say her name out loud or mouth it to myself?

“You got a problem with my name?” she asks now, her whole body moving into my personal space, my very wet personal space.

“Not at all,” I reply, something firing inside. “You ever get called Chewy, or Lippy, for short?”

Her nostrils flare, the anger in those emerald eyes almost molten. “Not if you want to live.”

“I think I’m safe,” I say as I look down at all five-foot-four of her.

“Don’t be too sure, you never know when we might need some extra pig feed. That’s the thing about pigs, they’re not fussy what they eat, fruit, veg, crops, commoner … celebrity.”

She’s close, her body almost touching mine, and the way she’s vibrating, seething, it’s only the firm grip of the other woman that pulls us apart.

“Tulip! Mr Fox is our guest, get over it.”

“He’s here for one reason only. You pimped out the farm without so much as consulting me or Clover. But then, why aren’t I surprised? Blossom always gets what Blossom wants.”

“Not now,” Blossom warns, her words sending Tulip marching off down the hall. “Apologies, please, come in.”

I follow Blossom into the farmhouse, into the living room. It’s homey, the decor simple yet elegant, all rustic charm and peaceful simplicity.

Or it is peaceful, until Tulip flies in.

“I was wrong. He’s not here for one reason only. There’s two. One is your stupid plan, the other is the fact he probably needs the money after that last shitshow of a movie he was in.”

Tulip is a law unto herself, fiery, hot-headed, and yet for some reason, even though I know she’ll probably argue me right out the door, I can’t help but answer back.

“That last shitshow, as you so eloquently put it, won me an Oscar. I think you’ll find it won four overall.”

“I won the jam making competition at the village fête last year, doesn’t mean I was any good.”

“You won. Surely by definition and process of elimination, it meant you were the best,” I counter.

“No, it means there was just a distinct lack of competition. Mrs Buttersworth broke two fingers playing with her grandkids, Mrs Hay had a carpal tunnel flare up, and Beatrix gave birth to seven little ones half hour before the event so Mr Allcock couldn’t enter either. You see, just means the big guns weren’t in the running.”

“Beatrix? Seven?”

“Yeah. Beatrix Trotter. Sam Allcock’s prize pig.”

For crying out loud, this place gets weirder by the second.

“Hang on, you’re saying I won an Oscar because no—”

I’m interrupted by an unbroken string of ‘is-he-here-is-he-here?’ in high-pitched tones as loud, hurried footsteps clatter through the old house and, eventually, a younger version of Tulip barrels in. Fuck, there’s more of them! She skids to a halt just inside the doorway, looks at me once, goes beetroot red, and dips her head.

“Clover, we talked about this,” Blossom says curtly as the young girl shrinks further into herself.

“Give her a break, Bloss, she’s a kid, this is exciting to her,” Tulip sighs as she wraps an arm around Clover’s shoulders, pulls her close and plants a kiss on the side of her head.

“It’s fine,” I say. “You okay, kid?”

Clover nods quickly, her redness now at epic levels. “It’s nice to meet you.”

She may look like Tulip, but there’s none of the same fight there at all, she’s timid, shy, sweet, and seeing as she seems to be the most normal of the three of them, she’s instantly my favourite person in the room. She also seems to have brought a calmness to Tulip, her whole demeanour from savage to civilised in seconds.

“Right, come on Clo, homework time,” Blossom says. “Tulip, show Mr Fox here to his cabin. And be nice, this is happening, so get on board.”

As Blossom and Clover leave us, I see the fire spark again in Tulip.

“Come on then, let’s get rid of you.”

She leads me back outside and I’m instantly suspicious she’s taking me to the pigs. When we arrive at our destination, though, it might be even worse. There’s what I can only describe as a wooden tent sitting in the corner of a field. In reality, the compact log structure probably has a fancy name like ‘glamping pod’ or something, all I know is that when my agent said I’d be staying on the farm for two weeks before filming scenes there, I expected a cosy farmhouse, not a shed out back with the cows.

This really has got to be some kind of joke, one of those hidden camera shows. I just can’t figure out which bastard would set me up. And if it’s not a set-up, if this is for real, if Tulip and the rest of this lot aren’t actors, maybe I’ll stay anyway, just to piss her off.