Barefoot Bride

by Jessica Hart

  At last, Will drew a long breath and got to his feet. ‘Come on,’ he said, holding a hand down to her. ‘Let’s go to bed.’

  He stopped as he saw her expression rinsed with surprise, and the hand which he had reached out so instinctively fell to his side. ‘Would you rather not?’

  ‘No, it’s not that,’ said Alice, faltering. ‘It’s just…I didn’t think you would want to.’

  ‘We’ve still got a week left,’ he said. ‘You were the one who said that we should make the most of the time we had.’

  ‘Yes.’ Alice got up almost stiffly, overwhelmed by the relief that had rushed through her when she’d realised that Will wasn’t going to reject her. She wouldn’t have blamed him if he had, but the thought that she would never again lie in his arms had been a bitter one. Reaching out, she took his hand deliberately. ‘Yes, I did.’

  They didn’t say a word to each other, but there was a desperation and a poignancy to their love-making that wrenched Alice’s heart. There was no need to speak when every kiss, every touch, said more than words ever could how much they were going to miss each other.

  By tacit agreement, they both threw themselves into the preparations for the open day. Anything was better than thinking about how they were going to say goodbye.

  On Friday morning, Will sat impatiently in the car, waiting for Alice and Lily to appear. He had done his best to talk himself into believing that Alice’s departure was for the best. She had worked really hard on the open day, but she didn’t really fit in here, he reminded himself constantly. She had been right. There would be nothing for her to do on St Bonaventure, and she would soon get bored and restless. Look how little time it had taken for her to get fed up with staying with Beth. Far better for her to go now than to hang around until her frustration soured everything.

  He should never have asked her to stay, Will told himself, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel and glancing at his watch for the umpteenth time. Alice had a pattern of running away at the first suggestion of commitment. She had always done it, and she always would. For someone with such forceful opinions, she was pathetic when it came to taking risks.

  Will was conscious of the growing resentment inside him, which he fed deliberately because it was easier to be angry with Alice than to contemplate life when she was gone. Why had she had to come and upset everything? She could have stayed with Roger and Beth. They could have met a couple of times for some polite conversation and everything would have been fine. But no! She’d had to come and live with them. She had turned his world upside down all over again. She had made him fall in love with her all over again, and, now that she had made sure that she was right at the centre of his life and Lily’s, she was going to leave them both feeling desolate.

  Now the tension between them was worse than ever. They hardly talked about anything except the open day. The only way they could communicate was in bed, where they made love with a fierceness and an intensity that left them both shattered. Will didn’t know whether it making things better or worse. He just knew that his stomach felt as if a heavy stone were lodged inside it.

  If nothing else, the delay allowed an outlet for his feelings. He leant on the horn. ‘If you’re not ready in two minutes, you can get a taxi,’ he shouted. ‘I’ve got to go.’

  ‘We’re coming!’

  Alice and Lily came hurrying down the steps from the front door. Alice was holding Lily’s hand and had a straw hat in the other. Will didn’t know whether it was deliberate or not, but she was wearing the green dress she had worn at the party when he had first seen her again. She even had the same silly shoes on. It was almost as if she was making an effort to revert to the brittle, superficial person she had seemed then.

  His daughter looked charming in a floppy hat, pink shoes, and a straight pink shift that Will didn’t recall seeing before.

  ‘New dress?’ he asked, cocking an eye over his shoulder as she clambered into the back seat and Alice helped her fix her seat belt.

  ‘Alice bought it for me.’

  ‘A goodbye present,’ Alice explained, getting in beside Will and settling herself with much smoothing and twitching of her skirt. ‘I thought it was time to get her used to the idea of me going,’ she added in an undertone as Will let out the clutch.

  Big of her, thought Will sourly, resenting the way she seemed to treat the matter so practically.

  ‘I don’t want her to go,’ said Lily, whose hearing was better than Alice had imagined.

  Now look at the mess Alice had left him in. It was all very well for Alice, swanning back to her oh-so-important career in London, but he was going to be left trying to find a way to comfort a desolate daughter, and he had know idea how he was going to do it.

  ‘Alice has to go home,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you’ll like Helen. She sounds nice.’

  Lily’s bottom lip stuck out. ‘I don’t want Helen. I want Alice.’

  ‘I’m not going yet,’ Alice interrupted, determinedly bright. ‘So let’s all enjoy today.’

  She might be able to enjoy it, Will thought darkly, but he couldn’t. The only advantage was that he was too busy to think much. The open day proved to be a surprisingly popular event and, once the government minister’s tour was out of the way, a steady stream of curious visitors came in to look around and find out what the project was all about and how it would affect them. Fishermen mixed with the expatriate crowd Alice had persuaded to come with a view to drumming up some financial support, and between them all ran what seemed like hordes of children who had got a whiff of the prizes. Alice’s competition was a huge success, and even some of the adults tried it for fun.

  It was a hot day, but Alice was cool and elegant at the centre of it all. It was hard to believe that this was the same woman who had rolled laughing with him in bed, her hair tickling his chest and her mouth curving against his skin, and his heart twisted as he watched her.

  She seemed to be everywhere, organizing children, making sure people had drinks, smiling and talking, working unobtrusively to make the day a success. He couldn’t help thinking that it would be easier for him if she were being selfish and false. As it was, her every move seemed designed to underline how much he would miss her when she was gone.

  And how little she herself cared.

  Alice was not, in fact, enjoying the day as much as Will thought. It was a huge effort to keep the smile fixed to her face, especially when she kept catching glimpses of Will between the crowds. He was dressed rather more smartly today in honour of the minister, but she noticed that he talked to the fishermen in exactly the same way as he talked to the politician.

  He’d told her that he only had the rudiments of the local language which he had picked up on previous trips, but he seemed to Alice to be able to communicate perfectly well, laughing and joking with the locals or explaining the project’s objectives. She only had to look at how people reacted to him to know that he was able to do that clearly and without being condescending or patronising.

  Studying him through the milling crowds, Alice was struck anew by the cool self-containment that set him apart from the others, and she was engulfed suddenly in a giddying thrill of pride and possession that she was the only one there who knew how the muscles flexed when she ran her palms over his back, who knew the taste of his skin, how warm and sure his hands felt.

  Her breath shortened as she watched him, and her mouth was dry, and for the umpteenth time since that awful night on the verandah she dithered. Stay, he had asked her, and she had said no. Was she making a terrible mistake? Sometimes, like now, it felt as if saying goodbye would be the hardest thing she had ever done. And why do it if she didn’t need to?

  But, if today proved anything, it was that Will’s career was as important to him as hers was to her. His marine research was an integral part of him, and she clung to her work as the one thing she had ever been able to feel sure of. She loved Will, Alice realised sadly. She just couldn’t be sure whether she loved him enough to give up ev
erything else that mattered to her, and, unless she was sure, it would be better for her to go home.

  ‘Alice!’

  Startled out of her gloomy thoughts, Alice turned to see Roger and Beth advancing on her, both smiling broadly, and quickly she fixed her own smile back into place.

  ‘It’s lovely to see you,’ she said, hugging first one then the other. ‘Thank you for coming-and for all those prizes, Roger! They’ve been a huge success with the children.’

  ‘Where’s Will?’

  Alice didn’t even have to look. She was always aware of where he was and what he was doing. ‘Over there,’ she said, indicating to where Will stood talking to a group of fishermen.

  Rather overwhelmed by all the strangers, Lily was leaning against his leg, nibbling her thumb, and he had a reassuring hand on her head. Every time she saw them close together, a choked feeling clogged Alice’s throat and she had to bite her lip.

  Roger whistled soundlessly. ‘What a change in them both! Is that thanks to you, Alice?’

  ‘They just needed time to get used to each other,’ said Alice, but deep down she hoped that she had made a difference. At least Will and Lily would have each other from now on.

  She would have nobody.

  Roger wandered off to have a word with someone he recognized, and Beth turned to Alice with mock reproach. ‘We’ve hardly seen you recently!’

  ‘I know, I’m sorry,’ said Alice, guiltily aware that she had been so involved with Will and Lily that she hadn’t given her old friends the attention they deserved. ‘It’s been…busy.’

  ‘Well, as long as you’ve been having a good time.’

  Alice thought about the day out on the reef. About reading with Lily on the verandah. About lying under the ceiling fan with Will breathing quietly beside her, and the thrill of anticipation when he rolled towards her with a smile. To her horror, she felt tears sting her eyes, and she was very glad of her sunglasses.

  ‘Oh, yes,’ she said with a careless shrug. ‘It’s been fun.’

  ‘We wondered if you’d think about staying,’ said Beth, ultra-casual. ‘You and Will must have got quite close.’

  ‘Yes, it’s been nice seeing him again.’ Alice was shocked by how unconcerned she could sound when she tried. ‘But, you know, when it’s time to go…A new nanny is coming out next week, so there’s not much point in me staying any longer. Besides, I’ve still got my ticket home.’

  ‘Oh, you’re going?’ Beth looked disappointed. ‘You will come and see us before you-Oh!’ She broke off abruptly and put a hand to her stomach.

  ‘Beth?’ said Alice in quick concern. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Just a bit sick,’ muttered Beth, and when Alice looked closely she saw that, beneath her hat, Beth was looking grey and drawn.

  ‘Come inside,’ she said, taking Beth’s arm. ‘It’s cooler in there, and you can sit down.’

  She made Beth sit in a cool quiet room while she went to find some cold water. ‘Shall I get Roger?’ she asked worriedly when she came back. It wasn’t like Beth to be ill. ‘You don’t look at all well.’

  ‘I’ll be fine in a minute,’ said Beth, sipping the water. She smiled at Alice. ‘Don’t look so worried. It’s good news. Oh, Alice, I’m pregnant at last!’

  Alice gasped. ‘Beth! That’s fantastic news!’

  ‘It’s early days yet,’ Beth warned, ‘so we’re not telling anyone yet, but I wanted you to know.’

  ‘Oh, Beth…’ Tears shone in Alice’s eyes as she hugged her friend. ‘I won’t tell anyone, I promise, but I’m so, so happy for you! And Roger…he must be thrilled!’

  ‘He is. Neither of us can quite believe it yet,’ Beth confessed. ‘We’ve wanted this for so long, and we were just beginning to think it wasn’t going to happen. Of course, I didn’t count on quite how sick I’d feel!’

  Alice was so elated by Beth’s news that she forgot her own misery about saying goodbye to Will for a while. Leaving Beth to recover in the cool, she sailed out with a wide smile to find Roger.

  Roger being Roger, she found him in the middle of a laughing group. Mindful of the need for secrecy, it took all her ingenuity to extricate him but she finally managed to drag him to a quiet place behind the laboratory where she threw her arms around him and promptly burst into tears.

  ‘Hey, what’s the matter?’ asked Roger in alarm, enveloping her in a comforting hug.

  ‘I’m just so happy for you,’ Alice snuffled against his broad chest.

  ‘Ah.’ Roger began to smile. ‘You’ve been talking to Beth?’

  ‘Yes, and I’m sworn to secrecy, but it’s such fantastic news,’ she said, lifting her head to smile at him through her tears. ‘I know how much it means to you both.’

  ‘Well, we’re expecting you to be godmother, so you’d better come back when the baby is born.’

  For a fleeting moment Alice wondered how on earth she would cope with coming back when she would be bound to meet Will again, but she pushed that thought resolutely out of her mind. It was Roger and Beth who mattered now.

  ‘Of course I will,’ she told him. ‘Try keeping me away from my first godchild!’

  She was still smiling when she and Roger rejoined the party. Beth had recovered by then, but Alice was glad to see that Roger took her away soon afterwards. She couldn’t help noticing the tender way he put his arm around his wife, and she watched wistfully as he ushered Beth out to the car.

  Their devotion to each other brought a lump to Alice’s throat. Roger and Beth were lucky. They loved each other completely and they faced everything together. They had had their sadnesses, but their life seemed so much less complicated than her own. Everything was simple for Roger and Beth. Why had she had to fall in love with someone whose life was incompatible with hers?

  Sighing, she turned to find Will watching her. His jaw was set and his mouth was pressed together in a decidedly grim line, but Alice’s heart still skipped a beat at the sight of him.

  ‘Oh…Hi,’ she said.

  ‘You look very sad, Alice,’ he said, an edge to his voice that Alice was too full of emotion to analyse.

  ‘I’m not sad,’ she said. ‘Envious, perhaps.’

  ‘Of Beth?’

  ‘Yes.’ She was a little surprised that he had guessed so quickly. ‘I think she knows how lucky she is.’

  ‘Does she?’

  This time there was no mistaking the hardness in his voice, and Alice looked at him, puzzled. But, before she could ask what he meant, Will’s attention was claimed by someone who came up to say goodbye.

  The event seemed to be winding down, anyway, and, feeling deflated after the earlier high, she began to help with the clearing up. In spite of her hat, she was beginning to feel the effects of standing in the sun too long, and her head was thumping, so when Will told her that one of the divers had offered her and Lily a lift home she was glad to accept.

  ‘I’ll need to wait and lock up when everyone else has gone,’ he said brusquely.

  Alice had put an exhausted Lily to bed by the time he came back, and she was sitting on the verandah and trying not to think that this time next week she would be home. She tried to imagine herself in her flat. She would pick up the accumulated post from the doormat. She would unpack her case, and put some washing on.

  And then what? Desolation washed over her at the realisation that there would be no one to sit down with, no one to have missed her, no one to pour her a drink or put an arm around her and tell her that they were glad she was home. She would be alone again.

  ‘There you are.’ Will let the screen door crash behind him. He was carrying a bottle of beer, and although he sat down in his usual chair nothing else was normal. His expression was stony, and he was taut with suppressed feeling, wound up so tight that Alice looked at him in concern. Something had obviously happened, but she had the nerve-racking feeling that if she put a foot wrong he would explode.

  ‘Long day,’ she ventured cautiously.

  ‘Yes.’
r />   ‘Still, I think it was a success.’

  ‘Yes.’

  There was a pause while Alice eyed him warily. ‘Do you want anything to eat?’

  ‘No,’ he said, adding grudgingly as Alice raised her brows, ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I wasn’t hungry either,’ she said, and gave up. If Will wanted to tell her what the problem was, he could, but she was in no mood to sit here and coax it out of him if he didn’t feel like cooperating. Let him keep it all bottled up inside him, if that was what he wanted.

  The silence lengthened uncomfortably. Will drank his beer grimly, until at last he put the bottle down on the table between them with a sharp click.

  ‘I think you should be more careful of Beth’s feelings,’ he said abruptly.

  Alice wasn’t sure what she was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t that!

  ‘What on earth do you mean?’ she asked in astonishment.

  ‘I saw you with Roger this afternoon.’

  She stared at him. Surely he wasn’t jealous of Roger? ‘Yes, we’re friends. Of course I talked to Roger!’

  ‘What were you talking to him about?’

  Opening her mouth to tell him, Alice remembered her promise to Beth just in time and closed it again. ‘That’s none of your business,’ she said after a moment.

  ‘Because friends don’t usually sneak away behind the lab to have a conversation, or kiss and cuddle each other when they’re doing it!’

  Will had been gripped by a white-hot fury ever since he had watched Alice drag Roger out of sight. He didn’t know what had prompted him to follow them-all right, he did know, he was jealous-but he was completely unprepared for the fist that had closed around his heart as he had seen Alice bury her face in Roger’s broad chest and cling to him.

  Unable to watch any more, he had turned on his heel and left them to it, and he might have left it at that if he hadn’t caught sight of Beth emerging from the office a few minutes later, looking pale and wan. She’d asked him if he had seen Roger, so of course he had said no. He couldn’t have her interrupting that scene behind the lab, but, from her drawn look, he couldn’t help thinking that she already suspected that something was wrong.