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ALEXANDER SAT WITH a newspaper folded on his lap. His fingers tapped the arm of the chair. The oxygen mask covering his father’s face emitted a monotonous hiss.
That bloody, ceaseless noise was getting to him today. He unfolded the paper and flicked his eyes over the front page. What was the point?
He stood when the carer came in. The teacup rattled in its saucer as she set it down.
‘You’re not reading to him?’
He shook his head.
She touched his arm. ‘I’m sure he’s pleased to see you just the same.’
Alexander acknowledged her comment with the smallest of nods, but he doubted the truth of that sentiment. He wasn’t sure why he kept coming. His gaze moved to the window.
Lord M had always been impossible to please. He’d turned on them all after he’d sent their mother away. And then, in a final act of spite, he’d disowned them with that bloody, vindictive will. His hatred would live on even after he’d gone.
He looked at his father on the bed and thought, as he always did, of the waste. Half a life eaten up with bitterness, and now this.
The oxygen machine hissed as his father’s pyjama-clothed chest rose and fell. The old man was a pitiful sight, slack-cheeked and vacant, but the pain still stirred in Alexander with the memory of that rejection.
Maybe he kept coming in the hope the hurt would fade as the man who had caused it diminished.
The burden of duty lifted as he strode the path back to his car, passing through the care home’s over-tended garden where only the breeze felt natural. It was invigorating after the cloying heat of that room. He slipped off his jacket and pulled at his tie, chucking them onto the passenger seat.
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THE SUN WAS HIGH IN the sky, and wildflowers flecked the verges of the entrance to the Gatehouse. Hettie’s Landy was parked on the drive, and the sight of it buoyed him. The day seemed to brighten in prospect. He jumped out of the car as she came out of the house with her dogs and the dogs’ baskets. She looked surprised to see him. She held up a key.
‘Hi! I got the key out of the shed. Hope that was okay.’
‘Of course. You should have said you were coming.’
‘I’m only here to get the dogs. I can’t stay. I promised to meet Clare.’
Alexander nodded and slid his hands into his trouser pockets. His mood shifted and dipped again. She’d come to pick up her dogs. When she thought he wouldn’t be there.
‘I’ll see you tomorrow though, for lunch at the Hall.’ She stood with her feet slightly splayed, as if squaring up to him. ‘I thought you were working today.’
‘I am, but I’ve been to see Father.’ Pig settled on the ground beside him, and he bent to fuss the dog. ‘You’re taking them now then?’ The question was senseless, she’d already told him. What he really wanted to ask was why she was taking them.
He straightened abruptly. It was pathetic, this need he felt for reassurance that her actions didn’t mean she was removing herself from his life as well.
He ought to get on or he’d be late for his next patient.
‘Yes, I’m taking them now. Thanks for looking after them for me.’
Her choice of words grated, annoyance jarring at the triteness of phrasing and the unwanted gratitude, the implication of a favour having been asked of a friend. It felt like a brush-off. His hands clenched in his pockets. He hadn’t been looking after them for her. They had all been waiting, together, for her to come home.
He watched as she put the pet beds into the Landy, and he couldn’t move to help her.
She was walking to him now, her face bright with a cheeriness he wasn’t able to mirror. He cursed the surliness of his mood. She put her hand on his arm, stood on tiptoe to kiss him, her lips so soft on his.
He kissed her back, his passion quick and insistent, but his pride urged caution and his doubts forced him to be the one who broke their kiss.
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PIG BARKED FROM THE back of the Landy, all the way home to her mum’s.
Hettie parked on the road and clipped on his lead before she got out of the car. They were a team of three again now, her, Doris and Pig. Pig could protest all he liked, and Alexander might have looked like she’d slapped him, but she’d done it. Her dogs were home.
It was exhausting, feeling so bloody guilty about every move she made.
But whose fault was that?
She shoved the back door open so the dogs could go into the garden, sat on the concrete step to smoke a cigarette and watched Pig as he yapped his way around the perimeter fence. The stone was cold through her jeans, the steps still damp from the shade cast by the narrow back alley that led from the kitchen door.
Alexander couldn’t expect her to just jack in her life and move in with him. She didn’t even feel like she had a life to jack in yet. Draymere, the village and Alexander were all good reasons to be here, they had a pull that was hard to resist, but they also reminded her of how little distance she’d travelled in her twenty-six years. Back here, she was just a girl from the village, a failure of the local comprehensive, remembered only for the dirty cloud of scandal she couldn’t seem to shake off.
She took a long drag on the cigarette.
She hadn’t felt like this in South Africa. And she wouldn’t let Alexander be the knight who rode in to save her. She had to do that for herself. Hadn’t she always sworn she wouldn’t rely on a man?
She stood up, ground her cigarette out on the wall and threw it into the bin.
And he shouldn’t rely on her either.
Pig was still barking when she shut the front door behind her.
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SHE MET CLARE AT THE café in the park. They sat outside to share a ploughman’s and watched baby Charlotte toddle on the grass. Hettie rested her elbows on the table and swigged her lager-shandy. This was nice. It was good, catching up with mates. Time to just be herself.
She grimaced in sympathy when Charlotte tumbled. Clare carried her back to the table, and raised her voice above her daughter’s wails. ‘So, is this a stopover, or are you back for good?’
‘I haven’t made my mind up yet, but keep that to yourself.’
‘Who would I tell?’
‘Well, your husband, maybe. Who works with Alexander.’
‘Oh, yeah.’ Clare grinned at her over Charlotte’s head. ‘Alexander thinks you’re back for good, then?’
Hettie nodded and bit on a celery stick. ‘And I might be, but... Oh, I don’t know. Everything’s up in the air until I get a job.’
Clare tilted her head, and peered at her over her sunglasses. ‘And what are you not telling me?’
Hettie shook her head. Clare was just too bloody perceptive, but she couldn’t answer, I love him, but I snogged someone else, and he’ll hate me when I tell him. Maybe that would be a good thing. How could she commit to Alexander when she was still a fuck-up herself? She reached across the table and waggled Charlotte’s hand in her own. ‘Oh, you know me and relationships...’
‘Hardly! I know you and five-minute flings.’
‘Exactly. And now I’m standing on the high board, wondering whether I’ve got the guts to fling myself in at the deep end.’
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THE USUAL PRE-DINNER clamour rang through the Hall as the kitchen swelled with the Melton brothers, Ted’s girlfriend, and James and Grace’s kids, plus Celia, the brothers’ mother, who was helping with the cooking.
Hettie looked on, finding comfort in the midst of the familiar mayhem. The clatter of pots and pans amplified in the high-ceilinged room. The kitchen filled with steam, and Flossie the spaniel begged under everyone’s feet. Grace called for them to go and sit down.
Hettie rescued her glass of wine from the draining board and carried it through to the dining room.
‘Come back to mine after dinner.’ Alexander slipped off his jacket and leant close to her. ‘Stay the night. Talk to me.’
Hettie nodded, but the easiness she had been feeling took a dizzying dive into jittery nausea. She felt a bit sick. This was it then; she’d have to tell him today.
When Alexander turned away to talk to Anju, his brother’s girlfriend, Hettie pressed her eyes shut. She snatched a grateful moment amid the furore of the children’s arrival at the table to quiet the tumult inside her.
She sat back and let the noise swirl around her. She smiled and nodded when the conversation seemed to demand it, but couldn’t find her appetite as dishes piled onto the table.
James stood to carve the meat. Plates passed from hand to hand, cutlery cluttered and glasses chimed. Georgia threw a tantrum every time baby sister Sophie drew their grandmother’s attention away from her, and the boys, Fred and Artie, wound each other up until they were made to sit at opposite ends of the table.
Hettie helped herself to wine, pushed her dinner around her plate and got increasingly tipsy. She watched Alexander joking with his brothers, complimenting Grace and his mother on the meal and teasing his nephews, relaxed and handsome in his shirtsleeves, tanned by the summer sun. He looked at her often, his blue eyes crinkled by the smile he directed across the table.
Each time she caught him looking, she shrank farther inside herself.
She refused dessert, but accepted the bottle of port that moved around the table. The children surged out into the garden with Celia behind them.
‘Are you okay?’ Grace mouthed at Hettie, her eyebrows pulled into a questioning frown.
‘Yes, I’m fine, I might just—whoops!’ She grabbed the table to steady herself. She hadn’t realised how drunk she’d got, until she stood up.
Alexander was on his feet, and he clasped Hettie’s arm. ‘Maybe we should take a walk. Get some coffee at mine?’
‘Yes, maybe we should. I’m sorry, Grace, but thank you. Dinner was lovely.’
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‘SOMETHING YOU NEED to say?’ Alexander propped her up and steered her across the lawn. ‘Is this because I asked you to stay?’
She felt his grip tight on her arm and could hear the catch of fear in his voice.
She shook her head, heat flushing her cheeks. ‘It isn’t about that. I want to stay, I want to be with you. I’m scared you might not want to be with me when—’ Hettie stopped talking. She wanted to cry.
She loved him. She knew that now. He’d been good to her since she got back. And he would leave her when she said what she had to say.
He’d told her as much when he’d strayed, and she’d asked if he would forgive if it were the other way around. No, I don’t think I could, he had said. To be honest, I’m still struggling to forgive you for sleeping with anyone else before we met. I’m praying that you’re a better person than I am.
Well, clearly she wasn’t a better person than him. And now, confessing that one stupid, drunken moment would spoil everything, ruin any chance they had of being together.
Or she could keep it quiet. Say nothing at all.
The thought brought a rush of relief. Why hurt him for an irrelevant, stupid grope with a man whose name she couldn’t even remember?
‘When what?’ Alexander stopped walking, and his hand on her arm made her stop too. ‘I haven’t thought about anything else except being with you for the last six months.’
‘Did you sleep with anyone else, while I was in South Africa?’ It was her final chance to be let off the hook, to be the victim instead of the offender, but she felt shame as she watched relief spread across his face.
‘Is that what this is about?’ He took hold of her hand, his grip was firm. ‘No, Hettie, I didn’t. I swear it on my mother’s life. On the lives of my nieces and nephews. You have to believe me. I promised you it wouldn’t happen again, and I meant it.’
‘I do believe you.’ A tear rolled down her cheek.
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THE COFFEE MACHINE gurgled and a heady espresso aroma drifted through the house. Alexander brought two cups of coffee into the sitting room.
Hettie’s eyes were closed, her sandals discarded on the carpet, bare feet and legs tucked beneath her, her hair a tumble of amber against the brown leather sofa. Dampness still clung to her lashes, squeezing his heart, but she smiled when he set the cups down and sat close beside her.
How had he let this happen? By being so wrapped in his own, twisted insecurities he’d completely forgotten hers. By not allowing himself trust in her, when he was the one who’d proved he couldn’t be trusted. He bent down and kissed her temple. ‘Why would I need anyone else, when you are perfection?’
Hettie opened her eyes. ‘Forget the coffee. Take me to bed.’
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HIS GAZE LINGERED ON her, warming her skin. He slipped his hand beneath her dress. The fabric creased in the fold of his arm as his fingers drifted upwards, trailing heat on her thigh, caressing her hip, taunting her urges as his touch moved away from where she needed him to be. His palm branded her ribs when he leant to kiss her, and the feel of his mouth made her nerves fire, dragging her desire back to the ache in her groin. She moved to get rid of her dress but he held her in place, catching her hand, lowering his head to kiss the curve of her breast, his grip closing around her wrist when she arched to meet the burn of his lips.
His restraint tormented her. Her mind was bewildered by lust, woozy with alcohol, muddied with guilt. She didn’t want time to think, couldn’t bear that his movements implied such tenderness. Her thoughts recoiled from the fear that she didn’t deserve the love behind his touch. She quivered when he slipped the dress slowly over her head, and made herself smile back at him as she fought her body’s demand for the urgent pairing that would render her mindless.
It felt cold when he stood, despite the low rays of sunlight casting stripes across the bed. The shiver came from inside her. She watched him undress, the roll of his shoulders when he lifted his shirt over his head, the ripple of muscles beneath his ribs, his hands on the fly of his jeans... And she moaned at the sight of his cock, magnificent and rigid, declaring his desire better than any words could. Her voice laced with lust. ‘Christ, you’re gorgeous.’
Warmth flushed back through her when he caught her chin, tipping her face to look up at him, smiling as he spoke. ‘I’m up here, you know.’ He bent to kiss her.
His hands were exquisite on her body, deliberate and skilful. He knew her so intimately, and his touch was instinctive, but Hettie was desperate to have all of him now, filling her and releasing her in a way no one else ever had.
Still he teased with his fingers and dropped his mouth to her nipples, then to her stomach and thighs. His eyes flashed darkly when Hettie grew demanding.
‘Patience,’ he whispered.
She tried to push him over, to climb above him, but with a single, deft movement he laid her onto her back and knelt between her legs, trailing a finger between her ribs, thumbing each nipple before his hand continued its journey, grazing her stomach, dipping between her thighs.
She almost shouted his name. ‘Alexander!’
‘Move in with me.’ He shifted above her, his eyes carried a challenge as he held her gaze. His cock tantalised the soft folds of her flesh.
‘You bastard, that’s blackmail!’ Hettie’s half sob, half laugh was broken by a groan of satisfaction when he finally entered her.
Her pleasure released to every nerve ending in pulse after pulse of earthy, animal gratification, almost too much to bear, until the chaser of anxious guilt stained the moment.
She pulled him close and buried her face in the comforting cradle of his neck. It would be so easy to let herself be swept along with this, to be carried by the force that was Alexander. The back of her neck prickled with a drowsy premonition that they weren’t ready yet, that she couldn’t trust herself or him. But in the slow after-burn of lust she couldn’t find any will to stop it. She pressed herself against his side and rested her arm across his as sated lethargy stole through her limbs. The familiar scent of his body lulled her into sleep.
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WHEN HE STIRRED AND opened his eyes, early light was washing the room with a soft, golden glow. Hettie was awake and looking at him.
She bunched the pillow under her head. ‘I’ve got to find a job.’
‘Or you could stay right here and look after me.’
She shot upright.
‘I’m winding you up!’ he quickly added.
She shifted the pillow and leant back against the headboard. ‘What do you think about me setting up on my own, running my own livery yard? I’ve got the experience now, and some money saved up. I could do some schooling and teaching. Is that a stupid idea, or could it work?’
‘What, rent a yard?’ Alexander yawned, and wound a curl of her hair around his finger, his mind slow to catch up with the rush of words.
‘It’s only an idea.’ She stretched her arms above her head, and his body stirred with lust again, but the glimmer of a suggestion side-tracked him, a possible solution to keeping her close while she followed her career.
He knew she would never give up her first love, the horses. Nor did he want her to really, but the thought of her moving away again caused him real fear. She’d left him twice for her work; he wasn’t sure he could take it if she moved away again. Speaking his thoughts out loud carried a risk, the danger of stirring up a time in Hettie’s past she tried very hard to keep hidden. The history had come close to breaking them before. Could he mention it now?
There was only one way to find out.
Alexander cleared his throat. ‘It’s funny you say that, because Hardacre’s up for rent. Carol Greaves told me. The yard and the bungalow actually, but maybe they’d rent them separately.’
He felt Hettie stiffen beside him. ‘You think I would rent from Julian Greaves? I can’t believe you of all people... Christ, Alexander.’
‘Greaves doesn’t own it.’ He propped himself up on one elbow. ‘If he did, I wouldn’t have said anything. He rented it too, and he’s long gone. Hasn’t been seen or heard of in months. Old man Harding owns the place.’
‘Right. Fiona’s father. And I’m supposed to believe it was Carol who told you this?’
Alexander rested his lips against Hettie’s now rigid shoulder. Two names he shouldn’t have brought up. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said anything. But yes, it was Carol who told me. I haven’t seen or spoken to Fiona since... Well, you know when.’
The silence edged in between them.
‘I love you, Hettie.’ He felt her body relax.
She turned to face him. ‘And I love you, Alexander.’
He threaded his fingers gently through her hair. ‘I’m assuming there wasn’t anyone else for you? While you were in South Africa?’
She rolled away and swung her legs off the edge of the bed. ‘Of course not.’