Valtieri's Bride & A Bride Worth Waiting For: Valtieri's BrideA Bride Worth Waiting For

by Caroline Anderson

  Afterwards he walked her back, kissing her once more as he left her at the door of the farmhouse, his touch lingering.

  Struck suddenly by some sense of evil, she pulled off her ring and gave it to him, pressing it into his hand.

  ‘Here—have this. It was my grandmother’s. It’s a St Christopher. It will keep you safe.’ And she reached up and kissed him again. ‘Take care, my love,’ she whispered, and his arms tightened for a second before he let her go.

  He murmured something. She didn’t really catch it. It sounded curiously like ‘Au revoir’, but why would he be saying goodbye? So final, so irrevocable. It sent a shiver through her, and after she went to bed she lay and thought about it.

  She must have misheard. It could have been ‘Bonsoir’, although even she knew that meant good evening and not goodnight. And anyway, he usually told her to sleep well. But ‘Au revoir’? Until we meet again? That seemed too final—not at all like goodnight. It puzzled her, but she convinced herself she must have heard it wrong, until the following day when she went down to make breakfast and found Madame Chevallier in tears.

  A chill ran over her, and she hurried to her side, putting her arm around the woman who’d become her friend. ‘Madame?’

  ‘Oh, Annie, ma petite—je suis desolée. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Pardon? Madame, what is it? What’s happened?’

  ‘Oh, mon Dieu. C’est terrible. Etienne—il est mort! Dead—et Gerard aussi. Oh, mon Dieu!’

  Panic flooded her. Panic and the first terrible, overwhelming crush of grief. She sucked in a huge lungful of air, then another, fighting off the pain. ‘No. You’re wrong. You’re lying! He can’t be dead!’

  But Madame shook her head and wept, her whole body shaken with sobs, and Annie realised it must be true.

  ‘No… Dear God, no.’

  She looked outside and saw the gendarme talking to Monsieur Gaultier, both of them shaking their heads in disbelief, and she ran out past them, up to the place where he’d taken her in his arms and made love to her with such passionate intensity just a few short hours before. Such exquisite joy—

  ‘Etienne, no. You can’t be dead,’ she wept, falling to the soft, sweet earth where she’d lain with him so recently. ‘No! It’s not true.’

  The sobs racked her body endlessly, the pain tearing her apart cell by cell, leaving her in tatters.

  Madame found her there, prostrate with grief, and helped her back to the house.

  ‘I have to go and see him,’ she said. ‘I can’t believe—’

  So Madame Chevallier called a taxi, and she went first to the village, but the gendarme wouldn’t talk to her. Then she went to the town where it had happened, where the hospital was and the morgue, but the information was even less forthcoming.

  The only thing she was sure of was that he was gone, but even his death she had to take on trust. She wanted to see his body, to say goodbye, but she was told his family had taken it already, and no, she couldn’t be given their details.

  ‘It is gone, mademoiselle. You cannot see him. You must go home.’

  Home. It was the only thing in her suddenly topsy-turvy world to make sense. She’d go home, to the only people who really cared about her. Liz and Roger would look after her. She went back, packed her things and set off. She should have phoned them, but she couldn’t bring herself to say the words, and so she made her way to Calais and took the first available crossing, caught the train from Dover and arrived back at ten that night, going straight to their house.

  Roger answered the door, his face haggard, and Annie, even through her grief, could see that something was terribly, horribly wrong.

  A shiver of dread ran down her spine. ‘Roger?’ she whispered. ‘What’s happened?’

  ‘It’s Liz,’ he said, and then he started to cry, dry, racking sobs that tore her apart.

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘In bed. Don’t wake her. She’s got a headache. Annie, she’s dying—’

  A brain tumour. Roger told her the bare bones, but Liz filled her in on all the details in the morning, sitting at the kitchen table after the children had gone to school.

  ‘Inoperable?’ she echoed hollowly. ‘Are they sure?’

  ‘Oh, yes. I’ve had every kind of scan, believe me.’ Liz searched Annie’s eyes, and frowned. Even then, in the midst of such agony, she noticed that something was wrong. Her hand found Annie’s, gripping it hard. ‘Annie, what is it? What’s happened to you? You shouldn’t be home yet. What’s going on? You look awful, my love.’

  She swallowed the tears, not wanting to cry about something that must seem so remote to this very dear friend in the midst of her own grief, but unable to hold them back. ‘Etienne’s dead.’

  Liz’s face was shocked. ‘What? How? Why?’

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. All they’d tell me was he’d been mugged in an alley in the town. He was with another man, and he was killed, too. They were beaten to death—’

  ‘Who would do such a thing? Do they know who did it?’

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t think so. They wouldn’t tell me much. I just— Liz, I can’t believe it. First him, and now you—’

  And then the dam burst, and they held each other and wept the raw, bitter tears of grief…

  * * *

  The gravel crunched under his tyres as he drew to a halt, cut the engine and got out, a lump in his throat. He was about to ring the doorbell when an elderly terrier trotted round the corner of the house and came up to him, sniffing.

  ‘Nipper?’

  The dog pricked his ears, whined and jumped up at him, his stubby little tail thrashing wildly in apparent recognition, and the lump in his throat just got bigger.

  ‘Nipper, it is you,’ he murmured. ‘I can’t believe it! What a good old boy!’ He crouched down, and the dog lashed his face with his tongue in greeting, all the time whining and wagging and wriggling furiously under his hands, unable to get enough of his old friend.

  ‘Nipper! Nipper, get down! Bad dog. I’m so sorry. Nipper!’

  He straightened slowly, taking in the changes that time had carved in his godmother’s face. The lump wedged itself in his throat, so that for a moment he couldn’t speak but could only stand there and let the homecoming fill his heart.

  ‘I’m so sorry about that. What can I do for you?’ she said, moving closer, and then suddenly she stopped, her hand flying to her mouth, the secateurs clattering unheeded to the ground at his feet. ‘Michael?’ she whispered soundlessly, and then recovered herself. ‘I’m so sorry. For a moment there, I thought you were someone else—’

  ‘Oh, Peggy, I might have known I wouldn’t fool you,’ he said gruffly, and he felt his face contort into a smile as his arms opened to receive her…

  * * *

  A river of tears later, they were sitting in the kitchen, his godmother on one side, his godfather on the other, catching up on nine very long years while the dog lay heavy on his feet, endlessly washing his ankle above the top of his sock as if he couldn’t believe his old friend had really returned.

  The dog wasn’t alone. Peggy kept touching his face, her fingers infinitely gentle and tentative, getting to know the new him.

  ‘It doesn’t hurt,’ he assured her quietly. Not much, at least. Not with the painkillers.

  ‘But it did. It must have done.’

  He nodded. ‘Yes. It did. I’m glad you didn’t see it.’

  She shook her head. ‘We should have been there for you.’

  ‘It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t safe. I’m sorry they had to tell you I was dead.’

  ‘I knew you weren’t,’ she told him. ‘The flowers on my birthday, the cards. They said you were dead, but I knew.’

  ‘I didn’t believe
her,’ Malcolm said. ‘I thought she was imagining it. At one point I thought she had a secret admirer—someone from the local horticultural society.’

  ‘Silly man,’ Peggy said with a fond smile. ‘As if.’ She paused, then went on, ‘I don’t suppose you can tell us—’

  He gave a twisted smile. ‘You know better than to ask that. I’ve told you all I can. It’s all over the television, anyway—and all that really matters is that it’s over and I’m alive—even if I don’t really look like me any more.’

  His godfather nodded wordlessly. ‘If I may say so,’ he muttered gruffly, ‘the nose is better.’

  He chuckled. ‘I agree. The nose is a bonus. The headaches I could live without, and the teeth aren’t great. At least they don’t go in a glass at night, though, so I should be thankful for small mercies.’

  ‘So—I take it they gave you a new identity? Who’ve you been all this time?’

  ‘Michael Harding.’

  ‘Oh—like the thriller writer. How ironic. I’ve read all his books…love ’em. Fancy you having the same name.’

  ‘I am the writer,’ he said diffidently, and shrugged. ‘I had to do something while I was marking time, and I thought I might as well put all that experience to good use. I had no idea it was going to be such a success or that I’d love it so much.’

  Peggy’s eyes filled again and she nodded slowly. ‘I wondered if it was you. I could hear your voice in the words. Oh, Michael, I’m so proud of you!’

  Malcolm’s hand curled round his shoulder, squeezing tight as he stood up. ‘Absolutely. And your parents would have been proud—very, very proud, and with good reason. Many good reasons.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said gruffly, unbearably touched. ‘I’m just glad they didn’t have to go through what you have done.’

  ‘Amen to that.’ He harrumphed and made a great production of clearing his throat. ‘Well, I think this calls for a drink,’ he said, retrieving a bottle of champagne from the fridge and putting three flutes on the table. He stripped off the foil and twisted the wire cage, just as Michael put his hand in his pocket.

  ‘There’s something else you should know,’ he said, and pulled out a photograph and slid it on to the table. ‘It seems I have a son.’

  The cork popped loudly in the silence and, while the wine foamed unheeded over Malcolm’s hand, Peggy started to weep again.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ‘GOOD morning.’

  She looked up, and for a second her heart stopped.

  And then he moved, stepped forwards into the room, and as the light hit his face Annie felt the stupid, foolish hope drain away and her heart started again.

  She picked up a tea towel, drying her hands for something to do that didn’t involve anything fragile like crockery. Crazy. For a moment there— But it was silly. It was just because she’d been thinking about him—

  ‘You OK?’ he asked, his voice low and rough and strangely sensuous. ‘You look as if you’ve seen a ghost.’

  She nearly laughed aloud, and dragged her eyes from the battered, lived-in face in front of her, staring down in bewilderment at her shaking hands. Lord, she should have stopped doing this after all these years, clutching at straws, seeing him in any random stranger, but there was just something—

  ‘Sorry. You reminded me of someone. Can I get you anything?’

  He shook his head. ‘You must be Annie Miller. I’m Michael Harding—your landlord. It’s good to meet you. I’m sorry it’s taken so long.’

  He held out his hand, and she dropped the tea towel and reached over the cakes and placed her hand briefly in his warm, strong grasp—a grasp that was somehow safe and solid and utterly reassuring.

  She fought the urge to leave her hand there—probably for ever—and tried to remember how to talk.

  ‘That’s OK, I know you’re busy. Ruth said you’d be coming over,’ she told him, her voice unaccountably breathless. She retrieved her hand and found a smile from somewhere, and his lips tilted in answer, a crooked, distorted smile, one corner of his mouth strangely reluctant. It should have made him ugly, but it didn’t, something about the eyes and firm, sculpted lips devastatingly attractive—

  ‘Any chance of getting a few quiet minutes with you this morning so we can talk?’ he was asking, his soft and yet rough voice doing something weird to her insides. She forced herself to concentrate on his words, and found herself suddenly nervous. Was this it? Was he going to give her notice? Planning to sell up or hike her rent out of reach?

  She schooled her voice and her expression, trying to quell the panic. ‘It’s quiet now that the breakfast crowd have gone. Will this do?’

  ‘Sure. I’d just like to chat, really—have a look round, see it with my own eyes. I haven’t been here for years, but Ruth tells me you’ve done a good job. I gather it’s very successful. I just wanted to make sure you’re happy with everything.’

  She felt the tension ease a fraction and wondered if she was being too trusting. Probably. It was her greatest fault.

  ‘Help yourself, it won’t take you long to see it all—the cloakroom’s through that door at the back, and the store’s out there, too, and the kitchen you can see.’

  He looked at it over the counter and nodded. ‘Nice, having it in the middle like this. Friendly.’

  ‘That was one of the things Liz and I insisted on, having the preparation area right in the middle of this long wall. It makes it relaxed and approachable, a bit like sitting in someone’s kitchen while they cook for you. And you can see everything—there are no nasty surprises, no dirty corners. You know exactly what conditions your food’s being prepared under, and people like that. We thought it was a good idea.’

  He nodded. ‘It’s good. Low key, easy. Relaxed. I like it. Who’s Liz?’

  ‘Oh—the founder, really. She was my late husband’s first wife. She was lovely.’

  ‘Was?’

  ‘She died nine years ago, just after she set it up.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, and for some reason it didn’t seem like a platitude. He didn’t dwell, though, but moved on, his eyes taking everything in, and she followed him, answering questions, smiling as necessary and wondering what he’d think of her housekeeping.

  He went into the store, looked round, checked out the loo, then turned, almost on top of her, and her heart hitched.

  ‘It is small, isn’t it?’ he said, far too close for comfort and trampling all over her common sense.

  Ruth was right. He was broodingly sexy. Very. She backed away, reversing into a table. ‘Intimate.’

  ‘It’s tiny,’ he said, with a lopsided grin that made her heart lurch again.

  ‘Small but perfectly formed,’ she quipped, and his eyes flicked over her and returned to her face.

  ‘Absolutely,’ he murmured, and she stared into those gorgeous blue eyes and felt herself colour. Heavens. How could he not have been Ruth’s type? He’d be any woman’s type if she had a pulse—

  She turned away abruptly. ‘Coffee?’ she said, her voice scratchy and a little high, and behind her she heard him clear his throat softly, more of a grunt than a cough, as if he was reining back, distancing himself from the suddenly intimate moment.

  ‘That would be lovely.’

  So she poured two mugs of coffee and set them down on opposite sides of the round table by the window at the front, where she could see her regulars coming and get their orders under way.

  She took the chair closest to the kitchen area. ‘I gather from Ruth that you want to refurbish the place,’ she said, meeting those dazzling eyes head-on with a challenge, and he nodded.

  ‘I do. It’s looking a bit sad. I hadn’t really registered—Ruth’s been too uncomplaining, and so have you. The flat needs a new kitchen and bathroom, an
d with the antique shop empty I was thinking maybe we could do something more with this place—give you a little more room as well as freshening it up a little. If you want?’

  ‘How much room?’ she asked, trying to concentrate on the overheads and not his face. ‘I can’t really afford to pay much more.’

  He shrugged, his lips pursing, one side reluctant. ‘As much as you need. You could take all of it.’

  She shook her head. ‘The stairs would be in the way. I wouldn’t like it divided into two—it wouldn’t feel the same. And anyway, the kitchen’s not big enough for all those tables. If you’re offering bits of the place, I’d rather have the garden.’

  He chuckled. ‘How did I know that was coming?’

  He peeled back the lid on the coffee creamer and tipped it in, stirring it with deliberation, and it gave her a moment to study him openly.

  His hair was short and dark, the temples threaded with grey. She wondered how old he was. Forty? Forty-five? More, maybe, or less, but it seemed irrelevant. Whatever, he was very attractive in a very masculine and hard-edged way.

  It was odd that he was so attractive, really, because his face wasn’t classically handsome, by any means. There was something peculiar about it, she decided. Irregular. The jaw wasn’t quite symmetrical, the left side of it etched with fine scars that carved white lines in the shadow of his stubble. His chin was a little crooked, his teeth not quite straight.

  And yet it was an attractive face for all that. Interesting. She’d love to know the story behind it, but it wasn’t the sort of thing you could ask.

  Not yet, anyway. Maybe later, when she knew him better—and now she really had lost it! He was her landlord. This was their first meeting in seven years. Once the refurb was finished it would probably be another seven before she saw him again, and at that rate they’d both be dead before she knew him well enough to ask—

  ‘Penny for them.’

  She shook her head. No way! ‘Nothing,’ she denied. ‘I was compiling a shopping list.’