A Summer to Remember by Victoria Connelly Read Free Book Online Page A

his paintbrush in his hand as he silently surveyed the scene around him.
    He smiled. It was an artist’s lot to live on the outskirts of society, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.
    The bus dropped Nina off at the end of the lane. She’d nearly missed her stop, not quite recognising the bend in the road and the avenue of trees after so many years. She breathed in the warm June air and rolled the arms of her jumper up above her elbows as she began walking down the potholed lane that would take her to The Old Mill House.
    It was beautiful. A perfect little corner of Norfolk, tucked away from prying eyes. Everything was so still and quiet, too, after the noise of the city, and Nina listened to the hum of insects as she walked, each footfall audible as she crossed the road.
    White campion was growing on the verges, their flowers luminous amongst the deep green of the grass and, as she walked by a little cottage to her left, she noticed the great towers of hollyhocks shooting skywards, their blooms yet to open.
    Nina took her time, looking about her as she walked and humming lightly. This is what summers were about, she thought. Not sweating it out in some paperwork prison with a boss that didn’t appreciate you.
    For a moment, she flung her arms out wide as if she were about to fly, but thought better of it when she heard a tractor in the field on the other side of the hedge, and continued walking.
    In all her years of babysitting, she hadn’t realised that the house was set so far back from the road because she’d always been chauffeured there and back by Mr Milton, and her first glimpse of it made her gasp. The first thing to catch her eye was the driveway packed with cars. It looked like the parking lot of a sales garage. Perhaps the Miltons had visitors, she thought, or perhaps they were the boys’ cars. She looked at each one in turn, half-recognising the white Volkswagen from the incident at the traffic lights. At least that meant someone was at home.
    She turned her attention to the house, its splendid Georgian facade gleaming white in the summer morning. Eight windows, spanning three storeys, winked invitingly in the sunlight, and an enormous climbing rose shot up over the door, its deep red blooms swaying seductively in the light breeze, scenting the air with its perfume and lending the house a softness which winter didn’t know.
    It was all just as beautiful as she remembered it – its understated elegance as timeless as a pearl. And it all looked so familiar: the same curtains at the windows, billowing and blowing; the old rocking horse in the living room, dappled and damaged. It had always been a house full of laughter, and Nina remembered that the very walls seemed to shake at times, its seams almost splitting with the mirth they contained. It was so close to the road and the city, and yet so close to Nina’s idea of rural heaven; seeing it again felt as if she was coming home.
    She listened as her feet crunched up the driveway, the roar of water reminding her of the closeness of the river. Would Olivia be there to welcome her or would she have forgotten she’d even invited her? She walked up to the pale blue door. Just as it had always been, there was no bell and you needed reinforced knuckles in order to be heard.
    Nina knocked as loudly as she could and waited, taking a step backwards to see if anyone was at the windows, but she couldn’t see anyone. Strange then, that she felt as if somebody was watching her.
    Dominic had just emerged from the walled garden where he’d done a quick sketch, when he had a vision. He stopped and, for a moment, thought he’d been out in the sunshine too long and was hallucinating. My God, it was Nina. What was she doing here? How had she got here?
    He watched in amazement as she knocked at the front door. She was visiting, but why? She hadn’t been in touch for years and then, in the space of a few days, he’d almost run her over and now she was visiting his