‘Wild animals?’ She questioned with a frown. ‘What kind of wild animals?’
‘Oh, nothing to worry your pretty little head about. A few gulls and maybe a wolf or two. No lions, tigers or bears.’
‘Wolf…’ She started to ask only to look up and see his smug expression. Promptly shutting her mouth, she decided there was no point in asking anything else, not if he was going to tease her. Okay, so she wasn’t the brightest light on the Christmas tree but that didn’t give him the right to take the Mickey. The remaining questions queuing up on her tongue shrivelled to nothing. Questions like why was he visiting if there was nothing to see? She’d thought they’d got past the animosity of earlier. She’d thought they’d become, if not friends, then friendly.
The trip across to Seil and that cute little humpbacked bridge linking the island to the mainland was so scenic with the first of the spring flowers just starting to show their heads out of the cold bare soil. They’d even managed to share a few laughs about yesterday and how Mr Todd, confirmed bachelor that he was, had nearly died at having to help him lift her into bed and then spoon soup into her. She didn’t remember any of it but had sighed a silent sigh of relief at the thought of there being the two of them present. She wasn’t a prude. Recent events of having most of her assets displayed on the front page of most of the daily newspapers had drummed out any last dregs of prudish behaviour, but she was glad all the same.
However, now she felt like tipping the remains of her coffee all over his head and not just the coffee, her fingers itching to curl them around the nearly full water jug; the sanctimonious little prig.
‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t tease, Tansy…’ he said, grabbing her hand and unfurling her fingers before placing them flat on the table. ‘I don’t know what it is about you but you bring out the worst in me,’ his hand covering hers. ‘Was it the coffee I was nearly wearing or the contents of the jug?’
‘Both!’ She stood up, and picking up her rucksack flung it across her narrow shoulders. ‘Hadn’t we better be going if you’re going to do whatever it is you have to?’
‘Good idea.’
‘When you said bleak, I didn’t quite realise just how bleak.’
They’d anchored offshore and used a rubber dinghy to make their way to the beach, although it wasn't like any beach she’d ever been to. Instead of sand, there were piles and piles of deep grey slate; piles of the slipperiest deep grey slate.
‘It’s a good job I’ve done a fair bit of ice-skating in my time.’
‘Really, where did you..?’
‘Oh, Central Park. My parents used to take us…’
‘Us?’ he asked, grabbing her hand to help her up the steep incline that would take them onto the overgrown path.
‘I think I told you I have two brothers?’
‘That must have cost a fair bit. What does your father do exactly?’
Oh God, what was she going to reply to that? She couldn’t think of anything to say other than the truth and the truth would never do, hysterical laughter building up in the back of her throat.
My dad, what does he do? He doesn’t do anything; he doesn’t have to, what with being the second largest landowner in Surrey, in addition to having homes in both Belgravia and Provence. He is in the House of Lords though. Does that count?
She stumbled and, if it hadn’t been for his arm she’d have landed flat on her face.
‘Are you alright?’
He’d placed his other hand around her, smoothing her hair back under the black beanie she’d had the foresightedness to wear at the last minute.
Was she alright, her eyes meeting his in an echo of the night she’d helped him with his bow tie? Oh, she wasn't injured or anything. Her arm ached a little from where he’d had to wrench her back to standing but she could hardly feel it above the thumping of her heart. Thump, thump, thump, it pounded in her ears, louder than the seagulls overhead or the waves crashing against the shore behind them in a symphony of sound. She opened her mouth to speak, to tell him she was fine but she wasn't fine. She was as far from fine as it was possible to be. She moistened her lips in preparation to speak the words and now he wasn't watching her, his attention taken up with her mouth, her skin, her…
She didn’t know which one moved first, probably her but whatever. Rucksacks crashed onto shale as lips met lips and clocks stopped ticking. The wind stilled, the birds stopped flapping and Poseidon halted the sea on its relentless quest.
There was complete silence. Even the beat of her heart stopped as skin met skin, only to start thrashing around in her chest as his hand drew her in ever closer. He was devouring her. There was nothing she wanted more than to be devoured.
Slowly, imperceptibly, irrevocably, the outside world peeked through the fugue. The waves made up for lost time. The seagulls screeched and squawked while the wind decided to join in the party by trying to blow them off their feet. There was nothing she wanted more than to continue but not here on a bed of long forgotten broken shale.
He hadn’t been wrong about her as she reeled in her senses and started the long hard process of lip reclamation. She liked her creature comforts and, whilst she had a gold D of E medal gently rusting in the bottom of her jewellery box, it was the hardest thing she’d ever done.
Finally the last infinitesimal second of breath, of touch, of sensation was over. Air was drawn into desperate lungs and common sense decided it was time to interrupt their happy interlude – was it happy?
She was standing in the circle of his arms, his forehead dipped to meet hers and she didn’t even like him more than that. Tor was the rudest, bossiest, most overbearing man. A man she’d just discovered she’d given her heart to along with that kiss; her heart and her soul.
And what was she to him? Nothing. Less than nothing. A passing fancy, no more. He hadn’t a good word to say about her apart from comments about her cooking. He even hated her hair but then… She hated her hair so that didn’t mean much.
She eased away, or at least as far away as his hands would let her because it seemed he wasn’t letting go of her any time soon.
‘Are you alright?’ he repeated, smoothing the pads of both thumbs along her cheeks. ‘I didn’t mean for that to happen.’
No, I’m sure you didn’t, the words echoing inside her head as she struggled to turn thoughts into actions. Easing back she shook her head briefly still unable to come up with any words that would be deemed appropriate, words that wouldn’t put her in the wrong because of course he’d blame her. Everyone always blamed the girl. It had happened before and now it would happen again. Well, he couldn’t pull that little trick on her, she wouldn’t let him. She’d done nothing. She’d said nothing. She was wearing jeans, for God’s sake, her oldest, scruffiest jeans. It wasn’t her fault but she’d be to blame just like she’d been to blame in Paris. Louis’s wife had blamed her, only her, when she’d arrived home and found them together because there was no way her beloved husband would ever look at another woman unless she’d thrown herself at him.
She paused, her eyes on the shingle bank ahead; her mind seeing nothing but Paris.
‘I’m fine.’
There, the words were out, lies both of them but they’d have to do. She wasn't fine, she’d never be fine again but, as it was all her fault, the words were immaterial. Reaching down she picked up her rucksack and forged ahead towards what looked like the first in a line of derelict cottages. She could hear him sigh somewhere over her left shoulder but decided to ignore him. Instead, placing her bag on a convenient rock she rooted in the front pocket before pulling out her phone.
‘I doubt very much you’ll get a signal,’ he quipped, his voice laced with sarcasm and something else she couldn’t quite identify. Embarrassment? Confusion? Disgust at snogging the hired help for a second time?
‘Really?’ Head bowed she didn’t see his expression; if she had she might have added desire to the list. But she was too engrossed in trying to fake interest in her messages to notice. A
ll she wanted was to fling herself into his arms and continue where they’d left off, which would never do. However, there was something…
‘Say cheese.’ She looked up, phone raised and clicked. She might not have the man, even now looking increasingly annoyed, but at least she’d have him forever captured as she’d best remember him; windswept, arrogant and sexy as hell with just a hint of redness where her lips had stamped their mark of passion for eternity.
‘Hey!’
‘What? I’ll delete it if you like?’ she said, scrolling back to the photo. ‘It wouldn’t have harmed you to smile.’
‘I smile when there’s something to smile at.’
‘Ever the charmer.’ She pulled back the sleeve of her jacket and looked at her watch. ‘Hadn’t you’d better start doing whatever it is you’re meant to be doing? I’m going to wander around the ruins, but I won’t go far in case there are any wolves about,’ she added, a brief smile on her lips. They both knew there was only one wolf on Belnahua, a wolf more dangerous than any four legged variety.
She started fiddling around with her phone again, well aware she was being studied but to hell with him. He’d had his fun. He was probably laughing to himself at how easy she’d been. Well, bully for him. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of showing her feelings. He could think what he wanted. As soon as Lady Brayely came back, she’d make up some excuse or other and… And that was the problem. She had no idea what came next.
She turned and watched as he stalked over to the other side of the island, his plain black bag dangling from his fingers. She’d fallen in love with the man she was meant to be betrothed to. In itself it sounded the perfect solution to all her problems apart from one little hiccup. He didn’t love her, but more than that. He didn’t respect her and, if and when he found out the trick she’d played on him... Well, she dreaded to think what would happen.
Squeezing her eyes she resisted the temptation to follow, suddenly aware of the silence, a silence only broken by the odd cry from the gulls circling overhead. Instead of following, she turned back towards the stream of tumbledown cottages stretched out before her. She’d do what she’d intended and have a look around. It would be out of the biting wind but, more importantly, it would help keep her mind off her troubles.
The first cottage wasn't really a cottage just three walls and an old warped door swinging back and forward in the breeze; beckoning, enticing, tempting. There was no point in stopping but still she lingered, her gaze drawn to the fireplace and the black embers still visible even after all this time. What was it he’d said again; deserted since the war when they’d closed down operations and flooded both quarries, turning them into lochs. All those families having to leave their homes, their husbands dragged off to fight in a war they probably knew little about.
She felt her eyes prick but instead of giving way to tears, tears that would only in part be for the shadows hovering between the lichen covered bricks, she pulled the door closed and walked on to the next cottage.
This had fared better with the walls and most of the windows intact. There was even a roof of sorts; a slate roof. Pushing the door open revealed a room with an open fireplace carved into stone and an old cooking pot still hanging over the hearth. Apart from an old rickety cupboard listing against one wall, there was little else. Of the occupants who’d lived, loved and presumably died here, there was little trace.
Slate workers, she remembered as she brushed a gentle finger over the rim of the pot. Slate workers and their families cut off and isolated for months on end while the Scottish winter weather did its worst. There’d have been no electricity. No running water. No amenities. There’d have been nothing to dispel the bare bleakness of the place, her foot dragging against the bare earth floor bereft of any flooring or matting. Where had they slept? Where had they eaten? She couldn’t begin to imagine the life they’d led, working long hours in the quarries only to return in near darkness to spend their time reading and sewing by candlelight. Would there have been a school? There’d have been children but… She knew so little about what it must have been like except that it would have been hard.
She closed the door on all the forgotten memories and wandered outside, her eyes now on the horizon. She could live here like that if she had the right man by her side. Her needs, after all, weren’t that extravagant, her eyes tracing down to her boots, her hiking boots she’d bought on a whim last time she’d been in Bond Street. She had no idea how much they’d cost. All she knew was she’d been invited to a weekend party in the country and they’d matched her Burberry, her new Burberry. The Burberry she’d decided to leave at home. She could get away with decent boots because shoes were important but her wax jacket had gone the same way as her Prada sunglasses and the Bulgari diamond earrings she’d worn since her eighteenth birthday. She’d even left her watch at home, instead making do with a cheap digital she’d picked up in the train station. It was fine, more than fine, as she stared down at the fluorescent pink strap. She liked pink. The only thing that wasn't fine was the time.
Tor had said he wouldn’t be long. In fact he’d made a point of telling her not to wander far because he wanted to get back before dark. So where the hell was he then, her attention drawn to the sun’s rapid descent towards the waters beyond her vision? Throwing her bag across her shoulders she raced down the path and across the overgrown track, thankful at least he’d left a trail of flattened bracken and gorse as easy to follow as any breadcrumbs.
It didn’t take her long to find herself on the other side of the island but there was still no sign of him. Shouting his name into the wind her eyes fixed on the sea and their boat gently bobbing on its anchor. She’d imagined for a second he’d been so fed up that he’d decided to desert her. She could imagine many things of him but not that.
She remembered he’d said something about collecting samples as she changed direction and headed away from the beach, her eyes now scanning backwards and forwards until she found what she was looking for. Running now, running and tripping over the shale bed, she galloped across to the centre of the island as she remembered he’d mentioned the rock on the rim of the lochs; lochs forged from the devastation wreaked by centuries of mining. He’d even suggested a dip on a laugh, his gaze running the length of her body; a dip in zero degree waters. He was in for a rude shock if he thought she was stripping off anywhere near him, wind or no wind.
If it hadn’t been for his red scarf she’d never have found him; that was her second thought. Her first thought wasn't really a thought at all just a stream of tears at the relief of finding what she was beginning to think she’d lost; lost before they’d even had a chance to begin. She didn’t concentrate too much on where her chaotic thoughts were taking her; thoughts, selfish thoughts like just how long she’d have survived on a flask of coffee and a pack of chocolate digestives? There was no water on the island, no drinking water that is, her eyes veering across the eerie surface of the drowned mine. They used to gather rain water in buckets and she hadn’t even seen a bucket, only that black pot and its family of bone crunching spiders.
‘Hey, asleep on the job…’
She reached him and the words clogged in the back of her throat because, whilst it might look like he was asleep stretched out on the long grass, the darkening bruise on his forehead told a different story. She wasn't alone as she’d feared. He hadn’t deserted her but he might as well have.
‘Tor, Tor wake up,’ her cries increasingly frantic, her hand gentle and then less gentle, moulding to his shoulder pressing, pummelling before finally dropping to her side. He was dead to the world if not actually dead, her eyes now in a frenzy as she watched his chest heave up and down with an annoying regularity. If he was putting it on, she’d bloody kill him.
But after another ten minutes she finally realised the horrible truth. She was alone on Belnahua, a deserted island with an unconscious man. A man who was in need of first-aid and she didn’t have a clue where to start. The one thing she did
know was the temperature; never much above freezing was dropping. The temperature was dropping and the little light left was disappearing to reveal a cloudless star-filled night sky.
Chapter Ten
‘What the…’
‘About bloody time too!’
Resting back on her heels as he struggled to sitting, she’d have felt scared at the sight of his glare if she hadn’t felt pure unadulterated relief at the sight of him doing anything other than snoring for the last thirty minutes. He was angry, blisteringly angry but angry was better than unconscious any day. Okay, so they were still stranded and he still didn’t look in anyway fit to trek down the hill over all that shale but at least he wasn't dead. He was far from dead, her eyes pinned to his face, his dripping wet face where she’d thrown ice cold water from the loch in a last ditch attempt to wake him up.
‘I thought you were dead,’ she said, fumbling to replace the top on the flask.
‘Me, dead? It would take more than what Belnahua has to throw at me for that,’ he mumbled back, dragging the ends of his scarf over his face.
He still didn’t look right. His eyes in the dim light had that glazed look as if he was trying to focus. She’d expected him to rant and rave but, apart from his initial outburst, he’d flopped back down, his head in his hands.
She moved closer until she was within touching distance and, reaching out a hand, placed it over his.
‘Are you alright?’ Her words mirroring his of earlier.
‘I’m not sure,’ he muttered, his fingers reaching up to feel the egg on his head. ‘I’m not sure I can walk either, I must have twisted my ankle when I tripped, or at least I think that’s what must have happened. I can’t really remember…’ His look dazed. ‘If we don’t move we’ll freeze.’ He shifted, his face dragging into a grimace. ‘I should never have brought you…’
The Englishwoman Trilogy: Box set of: Englishwoman in Paris, Englishwoman in Scotland, Englishwoman in Manhattan Page 26