Page 9 of Christmas at the Home Farm Vets (Hartfell Village #2)

Hartfell, present day

Erin didn’t ever think she’d take for granted the reality of achieving her dream to live and work in the Dales.

Even on this bitter December morning Hartfell was still glorious, despite drizzle threatening to become heavier as she drove Oli to the practice.

The fells were shrouded in mist drifting across a grey sky, but even that couldn’t spoil the view of snug stone cottages and Christmas lights wound around the topiary in planters outside the pub.

Half a mile from the village she turned into a driveway lined with trees.

The farmhouse where Gil lived with his partner Pippa and her teenage daughter Harriet was opposite a paddock on the right.

The drive curved around to the courtyard, where the practice was housed in one of three buildings formerly belonging to Home Farm.

Harriet was opening the paddock gate to let Posy, their resident single-minded skewbald Shetland pony, through.

Posy loved Harriet and loathed Gil in equal measure.

When Pippa and Harriet had moved into the farmhouse last summer, he’d been relieved to let Harriet take over Posy’s care.

Harriet smiled at Erin, who waved back, as the teenager shot Oli a curious look.

Harriet adored animals and was planning her own career as a vet, and Erin enjoyed taking her out on calls to see practice.

Harriet was good company, always got stuck in and didn’t mind the dirtiest or smelliest jobs, a given in Erin’s line of work.

Erin pulled up in the car park. When she and Oli made their way into reception, she was surprised to find the staff had apparently planned a welcome for him.

‘Last Christmas’ was playing via a speaker, and she smiled; Gil had half-heartedly tried to ban seasonal songs but he’d been firmly overruled by everybody else.

‘Oli, welcome to Home Farm Vets!’ Jess shot forward, her hair bundled into a loose knot and held in place with an emerald band.

She made the introductions, and he shook hands with everyone as he thanked them.

Elaine quickly established that he drank espresso and had a weakness for dark chocolate.

She promptly whipped the lid off her tin of homemade brownies and proffered it.

Jess was enthusing about how thrilled they were to have him, though Erin really couldn’t see why; she wasn’t that impressed by his CV as a self-employed locum with a postgrad certificate in small animal medicine.

Already the usual early morning meeting – when the staff gathered with a brew to plan the day ahead – had been sidetracked by his arrival.

Oli helped himself to a brownie, and when Elaine returned with his coffee, she persuaded him to take another for later before they all disappeared.

Head nurse Steph asked how he was settling in with Erin, and Jess gave Erin a knowing grin when he offered a casual reply.

Even Gabi, who ran the practice with a firm hand and did her level best to keep Gil in check, was looking a little less fierce at the sight of their handsome new locum laughing at something else Steph had said.

Erin accepted Elaine’s offer of tea and a brownie.

Working such a physical job, often outdoors in all weathers, meant she was usually hungry and burned calories nearly as fast as she consumed them.

They all took their turn to bake, even Gil, and Elaine was arranging a mince pie tasting closer to Christmas.

Oli was charmingly explaining that he’d never baked a cake in his life, and it took Jess, who was expert with eggs, flour, butter and sugar, about five seconds to offer to teach him.

‘I’m all packed up at home, though, as my partner and I have just bought a house and we’re moving in soon.

We’d have to do the lesson at yours, Erin.

’ She grinned and Erin just managed to avoid rolling her eyes.

This was already getting a little too snug for her liking but if she wasn’t careful, Jess would smell a rat and want to know why she was so keen to avoid her own lodger.

‘That depends on whether Erin minds?’ Oli was looking at her too and she shrugged.

‘Just don’t blow up my oven, and I get first dibs on anything you make as long as it’s edible.’

‘Deal.’ He gave her a grin and she dropped her gaze.

After their first year at Catz and how it had ended, she’d had the barrier of studying wedged firmly between them.

All she had to protect her now was her professionalism and a determination that they wouldn’t get drawn once again into each other’s lives.

‘Why don’t you give Oli a quick tour before we head out,’ she suggested to Steph, who was Jess’s senior and therefore, Erin hoped, less likely to be susceptible to his charm.

Oli promised Elaine he’d never tasted brownies as good and set off with Steph.

Elaine settled at her screen behind the counter with a happy sigh, muttering something about beautiful manners and what a pity he wasn’t permanent.

Erin, who disagreed with her about the permanence bit at least, ignored Jess as she disappeared into a treatment room with a merry smile, and made for the office with her mug of tea.

It was a squeeze with an expanding staff, and they were all looking forward to the future and a state-of-the-art farm animal building, improved consulting rooms and a new lab.

She cast an eye over a large paper diary on Gabi’s desk.

All companion animal appointments were booked online but this method for recording farm calls had stuck, and Erin loved how it connected the present-day practice to the past one.

There was something about names and planned visits on the page in black and white that were solid and real, like the farms and their people.

A flicker of satisfaction followed when she scanned her appointments for today: a calf with diarrhoea, a donkey castration and Dorothy Pilkington. Even better.

All perfect for Oli’s induction, and it promised to be very different from his usual consultations.

She wondered if he might loathe mixed practice in such a rural location and decide it wasn’t for him after all.

But that wasn’t a thought on which she wanted to linger.

If Oli left early then her new bathroom fund would be seriously depleted and Gil would have the headache of replacing him.

Erin finished her tea and ran over the timings; the calf was first call and most urgent as it could quickly deteriorate without prompt treatment.

Back in her pickup with Oli fifteen minutes later, having collected everything they might need for the day, Erin rolled a shoulder to loosen her tension as they set off. ‘So the calf, what do you think?’

She checked for traffic before pulling onto the quiet lane, wipers working furiously now the drizzle had become heavy rain. A thick hawthorn hedge opposite was bare of its leaves on spiky stems and the scarlet berries the birds had already taken.

‘How old?’ Oli’s level tone implied that he too was prepared to keep their conversation professional.

‘Ten days.’

‘Right. So it’s at serious risk then, and I’d be thinking most probably a viral infection rather than a bacterial one. Let’s see, shall we?’

Erin crossed a bridge spanning a narrow, gushing river, and drove past the primary school and church with its sturdy square tower.

She paused at a T-junction; where the village green was bordered by the river and edged with planting on her right, a crumbling stone cross in the centre beside the remains of wooden stocks.

The cobbled main street was empty in this weather, a few white cottages adorned with seasonal lights opposite a pair of larger houses standing behind railings and low evergreen hedging.

She turned left past the Pilkington Arms, built of the same creamy golden stone as Home Farm, smothered in ivy climbing to the rafters.

The old youth hostel, which Pippa had bought a few months back and was converting into an art gallery and community space, sat opposite the pub, and the scaffolding hadn’t long come down.

Tatty rendering on the walls had been stripped back and the pale stone underneath revealed, making the building more welcoming.

Pippa was holding a pop-up Christmas craft event on Friday to launch the gallery, and Erin was hoping to find a few gifts and maybe some decorations for her new home.

Oli’s gaze was turned to the window as she drove, the radio a background of chat keeping the silence at bay.

Low meadows bordered by walls rose to moorland fells, still smothered in mist, and dotted with ancient stone barns standing firm against all the weather flung at them.

The river snaked below them, twisting beneath tight humpbacked bridges, and gushing over giant stone boulders to crash into deep rocky pools.

Most cattle were indoors for the winter now the grass offered little sustenance, and Erin noticed some hardy Belted Galloway cows, black with a distinctive white stripe around their middles, roaming loose amongst the Swaledale and Rough Fell sheep, all tough enough to withstand most conditions.

The sheep grazed the fells all year round, coloured marks on their fleeces identifying the flock to which they belonged.

Most of the ewes would be pregnant and preparing to give birth in the new year, and she felt a thrill of excitement at the busy lambing season ahead.

‘It’s stunning,’ Oli remarked. She nodded, catching his eye when his gaze flickered back to her. ‘I can see why those days out with your mum made such an impression and why you wanted to practise here.’

She’d thought he would’ve forgotten her passion for the Dales and that practising here was the pinnacle of her professional ambition. How many other confidences had they shared that weekend when she’d brought him home to her family and he’d somehow fitted right in?