by Jessica Hart
Skye took a deep breath. ‘It’s beautiful,’ she said and then, without thinking, ‘It’s almost as if it’s been waiting for me.’ Too late, she realised how Lorimer might misinterpret her words. This wasn’t her house; it never would be. ‘I mean…’
‘I know what you mean,’ said Lorimer, amused. ‘I felt that way myself.’
‘It just seems a very welcoming house,’ Skye tried to explain, hoping that he didn’t think she was assuming some kind of claim over the house before she had even been inside. ‘It’s the sort of house where you know you could walk in and there would be a warm fire and tea and scones.’
Lorimer grinned as he got out of the car. ‘You won’t find any tea and scones today, I’m afraid. I’ve had the builders in all summer trying to make the place habitable, but there’s still a long way to go before cosy teas around the fire!’
Skye saw what he meant as he showed her around the house. It was bigger than it appeared from the outside, with large, light rooms downstairs and a warren of little passageways, and a smell of plaster and new pipes pervaded every room. Most of the floors seemed to have been replaced and their footsteps echoed on the bare boards as they wandered from room to room.
They ate their sandwiches sitting on the doorstep in the weak November sun, sharing the coffee from the top of the Thermos in companionable silence. Afterwards, Lorimer took her for a walk along the coastal path, scrambling over lichened rocks and stepping gingerly between gorse bushes. Fat seagulls preened themselves on the rocks below or wheeled overhead screeching importantly to each other. One stubborn, solitary tree clung to the top of a cliff, so beaten and battered by the wind that it grew leaning backwards at an impossible angle, its thorny branches streamlined against the gales.
Last night’s rain had washed the air so clear that they could see for miles, and across the Solway the hills of Cumbria stood out so clearly that Skye felt as if she could reach out and touch them. Her eyes reflected the crisp blue sky, and the cold gave her face a glow of colour as she slithered down a narrow path behind Lorimer to a flat, sandy beach. The tide was on its way out, leaving shallow puddles of gleaming water on the mud flats, and they picked their way between the rock pools and the seaweed to jump down on the firm sand.
Wandering slowly, aimlessly, along the shoreline, Skye stooped to pick up delicate pink butterfly shells while Lorimer tossed a round, flat pebble from hand to hand, sending it skimming over the water when they reached a channel. He was wearing jeans and a thick dark jumper that seemed to intensify the colour of his eyes, and he looked younger and happier than Skye had ever seen him.
Suddenly seized by the exhilaration of the cold and the light and the warmth in Lorimer’s face, she turned a couple of cartwheels on the sand. Breathless, laughing, she came upright to find Lorimer watching her with a smile. The wind was ruffling his dark hair and his eyes looked very deep and very blue.
Skye’s stomach seemed to disappear as she looked at him, and the truth, so obvious that it was hard to believe it had taken her so long to admit it to herself, hit her with the force of a blow.
She was in love with him.
CHAPTER NINE
WHAT a fool she had been! Skye turned away, her exhilaration draining rapidly into the realisation that she was on new and uncertain ground. She had claimed to be in love many times, but she had never felt like this before. This was no passing attraction; it was a deep, aching need, an instinctive knowledge that could not be denied. She wanted Lorimer, for always, forever.
What was it Vanessa had said about always falling for the wrong kind of man? ‘What you need is to fall really in love,’ she had said. Well, now she had found the right kind of man, the only man for her, and she had fallen in love, just as Vanessa had said she should. The trouble was that she was quite the wrong kind of girl for Lorimer.
Oh, he had been kinder and nicer this weekend than she would ever have thought possible, but he wasn’t in love with her and he never would be. He had made it very clear that he wasn’t interested in marriage, and it would take more than a silly, frivolous girl like her to change his mind. If Lorimer ever chose a wife, it would be a sensible, intelligent, reliable girl who wouldn’t annoy him or embarrass him. A girl like Moira Lindsay. Bleakly, Skye remembered the scarf Lorimer kept hidden in the glove box of his car, and a hand seemed to close around her heart.
She was very quiet as they climbed back up the cliff-path and turned back to the manse in unspoken agreement. Lorimer shot her one or two curious looks, but her change of mood had created a new strain between them, and he said nothing, only dug his hands deeper into his pockets and kept his eyes on the distant hills.
Once back at the house, he excused himself to check on what the builders had been doing, and Skye was left to wander around the house, torturing herself with might-have-beens. She could imagine how it would be with a painful clarity: the house warm and decorated, a little shabby perhaps, not too tidy. Isobel Buchanan had been right when she’d called it a family house. It needed children laughing and shouting and arguing and pounding up and down the corridors.
Skye closed her eyes, shocked at how easily she could visualise Lorimer’s son: a little boy with dark hair and Lorimer’s eyes, the eyes that made her heart twist with love, but without the guarded, unhappy expression that he must have worn as a child.
She opened her eyes abruptly, wincing at the pain the thought of that little boy brought her. She might be able to imagine him with devastating clarity, but if he ever existed he wouldn’t be her son. He would live in this lovely house and belong to quite a different woman. It was just what Lorimer needed, a loving wife and a child of his own to teach him that marriage didn’t have to mean bitterness and betrayal. If only she could be the one to show him what happiness could be! Skye’s eyes darkened. What was the point in taunting herself with wishing? There was no future for her with Lorimer, none at all.
Wherever she went, the images taunted her. She could see herself in the kitchen with its bright light and its windows looking out to the hills, in the dining-room, in the hall. She stood in the sitting-room for a long time, staring at the fireplace, picturing it ablaze, the curtains closed against the wind and the rain, a dog asleep on the hearthrug, eyebrows twitching as it dreamt, and Lorimer relaxed in a deep armchair, watching the flames. And then, in her imagination, he looked up and smiled and it was Skye herself who came into the room to sit at his feet and rest her head against his knee and feel his fingers tangle lovingly in her hair.
She could hear Lorimer’s footsteps above her. Skye shook herself free of the dream and went upstairs. She felt empty and desolate, unable to imagine how life would be without him. She meant to find Lorimer and force herself to talk normally about everyday things, to pretend that nothing had changed, but somehow her feet faltered as they passed the main bedroom and her hand reached out of its own volition to turn the handle.
It was a big room looking out across the estuary to the hills beyond, empty except for a few bits of copper pipe and a pile of planks stacked against the wall. Skye didn’t see them. She was imagining how the room would look with a wide bed, what it would be like to lie there with Lorimer, knowing that she only had to reach out to touch him, to feel his hands running possessively over her curves and his smile against her skin.
The image was so vivid that Skye squeezed her eyes shut involuntarily against the pain of knowing that it would never be. She had never imagined that love could hurt this much. To her horror, she realised that her cheeks were wet and she took a shuddering breath. She could hear Lorimer’s footsteps ringing along the corridor outside, pausing at the open door, advancing in the room. Hastily, she turned towards the window, brushing the tears from her cheeks with the back of her hand.
‘What’s the matter?’ Lorimer asked sharply.
‘Nothing… nothing.’
He walked across to her and took her by the shoulders. ‘What do you mean, nothing? You’ve been crying!’
‘I haven’t!’ Sky
scrubbed furiously at her face. ‘I was just thinking.’
‘What about?’
How could she tell him the truth? Skye wondered what he would say if she told him that she was in love with him. She didn’t think she could bear to see the look of horror that would dawn in his eyes, the instinctive recoil or, worse, a kind of explanation of how it could never be. She knew that already.
‘I was just…thinking about how things never work out as you expect,’ she said at last, and to her surprise Lorimer’s expression hardened as his hands fell from her shoulders.
‘I suppose that means you’ve been crying over Charles Ferrars? I keep forgetting that he’s the reason you’re here, but you don’t, do you?’ Lorimer said harshly. ‘What’s the matter? Hasn’t he succumbed to your wiles yet? You’ll have to work a bit harder!’
Skye stared at him miserably, taken aback by the suppressed anger in his voice. She was tempted to tell him that she hadn’t given Charles a thought for weeks, but what was the point? Let him think that she was still obsessed with Charles; at least it would save the embarrassment of him realising that he was the man haunting her dreams.
‘Thanks for the advice,’ she said flatly.
They glared at each other, helpless before the antagonism which had flared so suddenly between them again. A muscle twitched angrily in Lorimer’s jaw and he made as if to step towards her, before changing his mind and turning away instead.
‘We’d better go,’ he said in the same flat tone she had used.
Skye followed him downstairs and out to the car in silence. The winter sun hung huge and glowing above the hills to the west, gleaming on the shallow puddles on the mud and turning the deeper channels to molten gold. The wind had dropped and there was an unearthly stillness to the air, as if the dusk were trembling in anticipation of the sun’s final disappearance behind the hills. The temperature had dropped dramatically with the sun, and Skye could see her breath cloud in the cold air as she stood with her hands on the car door. The chill set her teeth on edge and intensified the haunting smell of woodsmoke and gorse.
She didn’t want to get in the car and drive away from this house with its welcoming rooms and tempting dreams, but Lorimer was leaning over to open the door impatiently and with a last look around she got in. The time for dreams was over.
Skye never forgot the night of the presentation dinner. It was one of the longest and most miserable evenings of her life, but no one would have guessed from her bright smile and determinedly cheerful conversation. She was conscious of being hopelessly overdressed in a flared, strapless dress of a particularly vibrant shade of jade, but it was just too bad, she told herself desolately. Lorimer was always going to think of her as impossibly frivolous and out of place anyway.
Lorimer himself was in a strange mood all evening, as if he was keeping some strong emotion in check by sheer will-power. Skye took one look at his clenched jaw and shuttered eyes and put on her most brilliant smile. She scintillated over dinner, although the grey Galloway beef and overcooked vegetables tasted like ashes in her mouth, knowing that for all the attention Lorimer paid her she might as well not have been there. It was left to the Buchanans to introduce her around.
The various cups and prizes won by members of the golf club over the year were presented after dinner with mercifully short speeches. Skye applauded dutifully, and with real enthusiasm when Duncan McPherson stumped up to receive a huge cup, but she was relieved when it was over and the long tables were pushed back to make room for the reels.
The accordion and the fiddle struck up the first tune, but it was Duncan, not Lorimer, who swept her off to dance. Skye had never taken part in a reel before, but she had always loved dancing, and picked up the steps quickly. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lorimer lead Isobel Buchanan on to the floor. He hadn’t looked at her once.
Skye’s smile was dazzling as she concentrated on showing Lorimer that she was having the time of her life and couldn’t care in the least that he hadn’t asked her to dance. She whirled and whooped and was swung round by a succession of horny-handed farmers until her face ached with the effort of smiling.
The more Lorimer ignored her, the more vivacious Skye became. She danced every dance, and it was not until they were halfway through the Dashing White Sergeant that she suddenly found herself face to face with him. If he could, she was sure he would have stepped aside with a shudder, but the momentum of the dance was irresistible, and as the couples on either side of them were swinging Lorimer had no alternative but to take her hands and turn her as well.
‘For God’s sake, stop bouncing up and down and whooping like a siren,’ he hissed. ‘There’s no need to draw everybody’s attention to the fact that you’ve no idea what you’re doing.’
Skye, burningly conscious of the touch of his hands, merely stuck out her tongue and directed a brilliant smile at the next man as Lorimer let her go and moved on. After that, she made an extra effort to let him know just how much she was enjoying herself without him, but infuriatingly Lorimer gave no sign that he even noticed. Instead, he devoted himself to his partners, including a very pretty girl who looked rather like Moira and who Skye loathed on sight. Why couldn’t he ask her to dance?
Having danced indefatigably, Skye was flushed and breathless by the time the band changed to a slower tune to end the evening.
‘You do look as if you’ve been having a good time,’ said Isobel Buchanan approvingly. ‘It’s so nice to see someone who’s not afraid to enjoy herself. I think you’ve won a few hearts tonight!’
She hadn’t won the only one that mattered, Skye thought miserably. ‘Everyone’s been so nice,’ she said, mustering another smile and pointedly not looking at Lorimer, who was talking to Angus Buchanan.
It was a relief to stand still and catch her breath, but as the band responded to appeals and struck up another slow tune Angus turned to his wife. ‘My dance, I think, my dear,’ he said gallantly.
‘How lovely!’ said Isobel with a smile and then glanced from Lorimer to Skye. ‘Here’s your chance to ask Skye at last, Lorimer. I’ve seen the way you’ve been watching her all evening when you haven’t had a chance to get near her!’
Her husband whirled her off, and Lorimer and Skye were left trying to avoid looking at each other. Skye stared desperately out at the dancers. She longed for Lorimer to take her in his arms, but it was only too obvious that it was the last thing he wanted.
‘Shall we?’ he said stiffly after a moment.
‘All right.’ Skye knew that she sounded sulky, but she was humiliated by the fact that it had taken Isobel’s heavy hint to practically force him into asking her to dance.
‘You don’t sound very enthusiastic,’ he said as they edged on to the floor.
‘It wasn’t a very enthusiastic invitation!’
‘What do you expect?’ said Lorimer irritably.’ You’ve been making an exhibition of yourself all evening. I’m not likely to fall victim to that smile of yours like all those other poor fools you’ve been flirting with. I’m only too aware that you’d rather be snuggling up to Charles Ferrars!’
He hesitated before he put out his arms almost reluctantly and took one of her hands in his, setting the other in the small of her back. They held each other rigidly, trying to touch as little as possible, but the lights were dim and the dance-floor crowded, and it was inevitable that they would get pushed together in spite of themselves.
Skye kept her eyes fixed on Lorimer’s throat, hypnotised by the steady pulse that beat there and the feel of his hand, hard against her spine. The urge to relax against him and rest her face against his neck was almost overwhelming as desire uncoiled insidiously deep within her, whispering that this might be the last time he ever held her in his arms. Surely it wouldn’t matter if she leant just a little closer?
Slowly, very slowly, she succumbed to temptation, relaxing her body until the gap between their bodies was closed and she could lean her cheek against his throat at last with a tiny sigh of
fulfilment. She kept waiting for Lorimer to thrust her away, but the pressure of his hand against her spine had increased imperceptibly, almost reluctantly, to bring her closer while his hold on her hand had tightened and his head lowered so that he could lay his cheek against her soft, shining hair.
Skye could feel herself pounding with desire. Part of her wanted this moment to go on forever, but the rest of her longed to be able to turn her head and feel his lips against hers. She wanted him to take her upstairs and make love to her. She wanted to taste his skin and feel the glorious hardness of his body beneath her fingers.
Neither wish was to be granted. All too soon, the tune drew to an end and the company broke into a rousing chorus of ‘Auld Lang Syne’. Skye found herself standing by herself, blinking stupidly at the smiling faces around her while her hands were seized and pumped enthusiastically up and down by perfect strangers.
She couldn’t believe that Lorimer could sound so normal as they said goodbye to the Buchanans outside. She supposed she must have smiled and said goodbye automatically, but she felt disjointed and disorientated, her senses still clamouring for Lorimer’s touch. It was a clear night and the cold was hardening into frost. Skye was grateful for the darkness which hid her dazed expression and for the chill air on her burning skin, cooling her senses and bringing her back to reality.
She stood next to Lorimer without speaking, without touching, as they watched the Buchanans drive away.’ ‘Well, I… I think I’ll go to bed,’ she said awkwardly.
Lorimer glanced down at her with a sardonic look, but he said nothing as they went back inside and climbed the stairs. Below, they could hear the cheerful sounds of the last farewells and the band packing up, but here in the dim corridor the atmosphere was one of silent, strumming tension.
Skye’s pulse hammered in her throat and she clutched the key to her room like a talisman against the wild heat of desire, craving Lorimer’s touch but terrified of what she might reveal if he did.