Summer At Willow Tree Farm: the perfect romantic escape for your summer holiday

by Heidi Rice

  He swallowed down another mouthful. ‘I heard,’ he said. No word of congratulations or encouragement.

  Great, so he’s still being a wanker about the whole thing.

  He carried on eating, clearly attempting to finish his meal before they had anything resembling an actual conversation.

  Sod that. Maybe she couldn’t get Art onside with the project, but she’d had enough of his sulking. And now was the perfect time to call a truce, while she was buoyed up on a wave of success, girl power and Rob’s elderflower champagne – and armed with man-killer toenails.

  She headed for the pantry in search of some additional Dutch courage. The bottles of sloe gin lined up in myriad shades of red and pink on the top shelf made her heart – and the warm hum in her stomach – jump for joy.

  She snagged a bottle and walked back into the kitchen to see Art scraping the last of his moussaka off the earthenware bowl. Lifting two shot glasses from the sideboard, she placed them on the table in front of him with a decisive click and prised open the bottle’s stopper with her thumbs. ‘Fancy joining me for a drink?’

  Dark eyes met hers, the question in them almost as potent as the suspicion rolling off him.

  ‘Unless, of course, you’re scared of me,’ she added.

  His brows lowered and a muscle in his jaw ticked against the day’s growth of stubble.

  Strike one to Princess Drama.

  ‘Why would I be scared of you?’ he said flatly, as if he hadn’t just risked indigestion to get out of her way.

  She poured a liberal dose of gin into the shot glasses. ‘Fabulous. Then drink up.’

  He eyed the glass then wrapped his hand around it. The raw, reddened scar from his tango with the rotary blade drew her gaze before he lifted the glass to his lips and bolted the generous shot down in one.

  The glass cracked back against the table as he smacked his lips, that dark gaze never straying from her face.

  Game on.

  She lifted her own glass and floored it.

  The perfumed drink roared down her throat like liquid fire, hitting her tonsils with a one-two punch. She gulped down the cough, her eyes watering like a faucet.

  Waiting for her hand to steady, she refilled the glasses.

  His eyebrow hooked up again. ‘Really?’

  She picked up her glass. ‘Here’s to Mr Hegley,’ she said. ‘A man who recognises a great investment when he sees one.’ Then drained the glass.

  The gin went down without a problem this time, probably because the lining of her throat had already been cauterised.

  Art was still studying her, with that inscrutable expression on his face.

  For a moment she thought she might have gone too far. Was he about to walk out, leaving her sitting there, with her foolish desire to end the animosity between them pooling round her deadly toenails in a puddle of despair.

  But then he lifted one shoulder in a nonchalant shrug, tipped the glass towards her in a silent toast, and chugged it down.

  Triumph – sweet and heady and possibly a tad out of proportion to what she had actually achieved – charged through her system alongside the fiery shot of alcohol.

  She reached for the bottle, to refill. Maybe she couldn’t get Art onside with the project, but getting pissed with him suddenly seemed like the perfect compromise. But, as her fingers closed over the bottle, his palm wrapped around her hand. The touch was electrifying, zapping endorphins up her arm and down through her torso.

  ‘Slow down,’ he said.

  She prised her hand out from under his.

  ‘How much did you have at Annie’s?’ he asked.

  Not enough.

  ‘Not much… Only two glasses.’ Or had it been three? Because she suddenly felt more drunk than she had a moment ago.

  ‘Right.’ He didn’t look convinced. ‘How about we take a break.’ He hooked the stopper back onto the gin bottle, before carrying his bowl to the sink.

  Ellie let her gaze drift over him, taking the opportunity to admire all his more basic qualities unobserved. Maddy was right, he was a phenomenally hot guy, dark and rugged, with that edge of raw earthy animal magnetism which made women everywhere – even happily married Aidan Turner fans like Annie – take notice. And tonight, his personality deficiencies didn’t seem particularly important. If anything, that air of inscrutability and stoicism made him… well, extra hot.

  Everything about Art was so refreshingly straightforward. He didn’t try to bamboozle women with empty charm, which was mighty seductive to a woman who had spent the last twelve years living with a compulsive liar.

  His back muscles flexed beneath the well-worn T-shirt while he rinsed out his bowl and propped it on the draining board. The alcohol hit ground zero and the hum in her belly built to a slow-burning fire.

  Nope, I have not had nearly enough alcohol.

  He flicked the water off his hands, wiped them on a tea towel, then headed towards the door.

  Need and bravado gathered in her stomach. ‘Where are you going?’

  He stopped. ‘I’ve got stuff to finish in the workshop.’

  ‘Would that stuff involve operating power tools?’

  His lips quirked. ‘Perhaps.’

  The mellow heat in her belly got jittery. Art was definitely less of a wanker when he smiled.

  ‘Then I’m afraid, I’ll have to object,’ she said. ‘I am in no condition to drive you back to A and E tonight.’ Pulling the chair out beside her, she slapped the seat. ‘Join me. You’ve had too much to be sober and not enough to be drunk. I think we should remedy that.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I’m half pissed already. And it’s always a bad idea to do that without company.’

  He settled in the seat beside her and she absorbed the stroke to her ego. Then she popped the stopper on the gin bottle.

  ‘Fair warning, you should watch yourself with that stuff,’ he said, as she poured. ‘The hangovers are brutal.’

  ‘I’ll risk it, if you will.’ She lifted the bottle, charmed that he might actually care about the state of her head in the morning.

  He nodded and she poured them both another shot.

  ‘How about we stop when we’re cross-eyed,’ she said. ‘Or we’ve told each other all our most embarrassing secrets. Whichever is the quicker?’ She blinked. ‘Then again, you have a head start, because most of mine involve you.’

  He laughed, the sound gruff enough to be rusty.

  They drank in silence – the endorphins firing through her body didn’t exactly make it companionable silence, but it wasn’t awkward. Much.

  As Art drank without speaking, it occurred to her he never felt the need to fill the silence, like most people. Was that what made him such an enigma? Or was it just the ten-foot high wall with barbed wire fencing he erected around his emotions?

  Ellie slopped some more gin into her glass. Why not take a pop at the Berlin Wall? Now they were actually playing nice.

  ‘Did you ever wonder,’ she asked, ‘how we both ended up with mums that were lesbians?’

  ‘No.’

  The one syllable answer did not deter her. Drawing Art out was going to require perseverance, but he was dealing with an admin ninja who could talk the notoriously cautious Mr Hegley into a fifty grand bank loan. Plus, they had all night. Or at least until 5 a.m., when Dee would come down to start mixing up her first batch of dough for the loaves she sold at the farmers’ market in Gillingham every other Saturday morning. Art didn’t know it yet, but he didn’t stand a chance.

  ‘Is that because your mum turned out to be a faker?’ she said.

  ‘She wasn’t a faker.’ Art’s work-roughened hand picked up the bottle and tipped it into his own glass. He squinted at her, and she wondered if he were short-sighted. Or drunker than he looked. And if he knew how that intense, penetrating look had always made butterflies flutter around in her stomach?

  ‘Living with my old man would turn any woman into a lesbian,’ he added.

  ‘You
had a father?’ The words popped out, propelled by the complete lack of inhibition caused by the floaty buzz of the gin.

  His lids lowered. ‘Of course. Did you think I was an immaculate conception?’

  ‘No, I thought you were a sperm bank conception.’

  Art coughed, spraying gin across the table. She slapped him on the back, feeling the tensing muscles under his T-shirt. He drew a steady breath. Took another gulp of his gin. ‘I wish. He might have been a medical student then, instead of an arsehole.’

  ‘How was he an arsehole?’ she asked. Had she hit the jackpot already? Was Art actually going to talk about himself?

  He stared into his glass. ‘He drank too much. He hit her. He hit me. Usual arsehole behaviour.’

  Her heart did a backflip at the nonchalant tone. ‘That’s dreadful.’ She frowned. ‘But since when does being in an abusive relationship change your sexual orientation?’

  Art leant back, the intense look making the butterflies in her stomach feel inebriated. ‘It doesn’t, necessarily. But I have a theory about human sexuality.’

  That Art had a theory about anything seemed both incongruous and sort of hot, that he had a theory about human sexuality seemed even hotter. ‘What’s your theory?’

  ‘We may think we’re either gay or straight, but in reality everyone falls somewhere on a spectrum between the two.’ He frowned. ‘I figure we’re all a little…’ He took a contemplative sip of gin. ‘Shit, there’s a word for it.’

  ‘Bi-curious?’ she supplied.

  He slammed his glass on the table and pointed a finger at her. ‘That’s it. Bi-curious. I figure some of us our brave enough or, in my mum’s case, unhappy enough to see where those urges take us.’

  His theory sounded enlightened, especially for a guy as solidly heterosexual as he was. But then he did have a daughter who wanted to be a boy.

  ‘Fair enough,’ she said. ‘But, be honest, have you ever wanted to shag another guy?’

  He considered that for a minute. ‘I guess not. But guys have wanted to shag me. And I found it pretty flattering, so that probably puts me on the spectrum.’

  ‘Art! That’s astonishing.’ So astonishing, she couldn’t quite believe it. He was so earthy and straightforward. The smell of him, the look of him, the gruff voice and surly silent charisma.

  ‘What is?’

  ‘You’re a secret metrosexual.’

  He chuckled. ‘No shit.’ He placed his glass on the table, then leaned forward, spreading his knees, to draw closer. ‘Is that better than being a douche canoe?’

  ‘Absolutely,’ she murmured, distracted by the ticking pulse in his neck for the first time. He had a lovely neck, strong and muscular and not too wide, the shadow of his stubble visible from just above his Adam’s apple. Reddened skin looped across his collarbone where he’d worn his T-shirt in the sun. The working man’s tan. She got fixated on the well of his clavicle, thinking of the warm blood pulsating through the vein under the skin. And the salty taste that would gather on her tongue if she flicked it over the pulse point.

  Warmth settled over the butterflies now jitterbugging in drunken glee.

  ‘Have you ever kissed a girl?’ The rough, low sound of his voice was even deeper than usual. The spice of awareness danced between them, the lingering aroma of Dee’s vegetable moussaka overwhelmed by the phantom scent of sultry summer heat.

  Her gaze rose from his throat. His irises were the colour of chocolate. Rich milk chocolate with hints of coffee and caramel. Yum.

  ‘Don’t tell me you’re one of those guys who fantasises about women making out?’ she said.

  ‘Are you evading the question?’ he said, evading the question.

  ‘I have kissed a girl,’ she murmured.

  ‘Really?’ His eyes flared as he lifted his hand, his big work-roughened hand. The long blunt finger trailed up her arm, tracing the veins in her wrist. She stared at the short blunt nails, the wide bridge of his knuckles, the nicks and cuts and abrasions from the physical labour he did with his hands every day – the jagged line that ran down the webbing between his thumb and his forefinger which she’d watched being sewn up three weeks ago – as the tip of his finger travelled all the way to her elbow. His finger swept across the inside, triggering a multitude of sensations, both brutally exciting and not exciting enough.

  ‘What was it like?’ he said, the husky tone of voice reverberating in her clitoris.

  ‘Hot.’ But not as hot as this. Not even close.

  His thumb pressed into the inside of her elbow, as his fingers wrapped around her arm. He tugged her towards him, until his lips were only a whisper away from hers. ‘Do guys kiss different to girls?’

  She could smell the juniper sweetness of the gin on his breath, see the dilated pupils.

  Who knew? Art was a cheap drunk.

  Her insides clenched and released. The butterflies, their wings on fire, fluttered frantically. ‘I couldn’t tell you, I’ve never done a thorough comparison.’

  He blinked, in slow motion, the thick lashes lowering and then rising again on half speed. ‘I’m a little pissed,’ he said. ‘But I think we should remedy that.’

  His other hand lifted to curl around her neck. The long fingers threading into her hair, the rough caress glorious against the sensitive skin of her nape. Until his large palm supported her skull.

  Her hands fastened on his waist, dipping under the hem of his shirt to find warm, firm flesh.

  ‘So do I,’ she whispered.

  His mouth captured hers, the press of his lips firm and wet and hot.

  She opened for him as his tongue delved, her mind spinning, comparisons forgotten as he yanked her closer.

  Heat shot like a fireball into her nipple as one big hand cupped her breast. Her thumbs pressed into his ribs to hold on to him as he sucked on her tongue. She delved back, getting deeper into the recesses of his mouth, chasing the sweet spice of the gin, the hot spice of arousal.

  Her breathing hitched as he drew away then propped his forehead against hers. Strong fingers massaged her nape, anchoring her arm to his side.

  ‘You’re good at that.’ He groaned.

  ‘Ditto.’ She chuckled – which had to be the gin.

  Her fingertips slid back down to his waist and he shivered.

  ‘So what’s the verdict?’ he said, his gruff voice thick with temptation. ‘Guys or girls?’

  ‘Hard to tell,’ she said, his confidence contagious. ‘I may need more evidence.’

  He laughed, the sound deep and rough. His thumb circled the tight muscles in her shoulder – which relaxed and wept with joy, for the first time in months.

  ‘If I kiss you again, I won’t be able to stop,’ he said. ‘And we’ll both regret it in the morning.’

  ‘I know.’ She straightened away from him, trying to clear the gin-soaked fog from her brain as her gaze roamed over that devastating face.

  As she took in the tanned skin drawn tight across high cheekbones, the aquiline nose, the tapered brows, those wide lips, tipped up now in a tantalisingly lopsided smile, she knew that starting something with Art would not be a good idea, but that didn’t make it any less tempting.

  The possibility of having sex with a guy who might actually notice whether or not she had an orgasm was a pretty powerful mojo. And somehow she knew Art would notice.

  ‘I should go to bed,’ she said. Time to get her wayward mojo under control.

  As she stood up, she swayed.

  He stood too, resting a hand on her hip to steady her. ‘You OK?’

  ‘Yes, I’m just exceptionally drunk.’ She glanced down at the now empty bottle of sloe gin. ‘You’re right, that stuff is lethal.’

  He took her wrist as she turned to go. ‘Hold on.’

  Walking to the sink, he tugged her with him. He took a glass from the shelf above the sink, and filled it with water. He presented it to her.

  ‘Drink it, or you’ll wish you were dead in the morning.’

  She chugge
d down the lot. He poured her another glass and she drank that too. She handed the glass back to him. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Goodnight, Ellie,’ he murmured.

  She staggered out of the room, feeling dazed, and drunk and desperately disappointed.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Dee stood under the shower spray, the needle-sharp streams massaging the knotted muscles of her upper spine, and began to catalogue all the ‘stuff’ she had to do today as she waited for the hollow ache that was always there after dreaming of Pammy to subside.

  She had two dozen loaves to bake for Gillingham market and, once that was done, she had a celebratory meal to plan for everyone to enjoy once the first phase of the barn clear-out was completed.

  The forecast was for a balmy evening, so she would get Josh and Toto to help her put the trestle tables out in the yard, adding fairy lights and lanterns for an air of celebration – to symbolise the launching of this exciting new venture to secure the co-op’s future. She smiled as she leaned into the mirror to apply moisturiser and suncream – thinking of all the high spirits and high fives yesterday evening at the news of the bank loan being approved – and ignored the new twinge in her back.

  An array of salads would be perfect to start the feast – maybe the carrot and ginger, baked aubergine and mint yoghurt, plus some faro and roasted red pepper, she’d have to check her pantry. She’d pick up fresh salmon to bake with lime and organic lamb for kebabs in Gillingham while she was at the farmers’ market, maybe do a trade-off with Donald Allsop and Christy Jenkins who ran the relevant stalls – if not she knew they’d give her a good price. Perhaps she’d pull out the Yotam Ottolenghi cookbook Tess had given her for Christmas to spice up the menu with something new. She rarely stuck to the recipes verbatim, because where was the fun in that, but Yotam never failed to inspire her.

  Her back twinged again. The only thing she needed to make sure of was that nothing on her menu required her to spend six hours standing at the stove stirring boiling fruit like she had yesterday while making gooseberry jam to stock the shop when it was ready.