by Heidi Rice
‘Why don’t you go and have a look for him?’ Maddy offered. ‘They’re probably at one of their hideouts in the woods and completely forgot the time.’
‘I can’t leave Tess, and there’s only twenty minutes before closing,’ Ellie said, undecided.
She was probably overreacting. Toto and Josh roamed the farm every day without mishap, bar the odd cut, bruise or nettle rash, it was one of the things that had made this summer so wonderful for her son – the freedom, the exercise, the adventure. But she didn’t like that he had forgotten to come home for lunch. He knew that was a deal-breaker for her. And it was especially important this week, so she didn’t have to go hunting for him while she was busy in the shop. She’d made that very clear to him every morning.
Maddy placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘I’ll hold the fort. I’m on tomorrow anyway, so I can get a jump-start checking the stock levels.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Absolutely.’
Ellie yanked her Willow Tree Farm apron over her head as she dashed to the storeroom. After hanging it up, she sent Tess and Maddy and the remaining customers a wave as she rushed out the door.
When she found Josh, her son was going to get a long and overwrought lecture on the dangers of giving his mum a panic attack.
*
‘I dripped some, sir. I’m sorry.’
Art switched off the portable radio and the blaring rock of Kings of Leon’s ‘Sex on Fire’ died as he yanked down his face mask. Ellie’s son stood outside the entrance to the caravan, looking worried.
‘Where did you drip it?’ he asked, although he doubted it could be that bad. He’d hired the kids this morning to slap the all-weather treatment on the canvas he’d stretched over the main frame last night. It was going to need a couple more coats before he actually got round to painting it, so unless the kid had knocked over a whole pot it was unlikely to be a problem.
Josh gripped the hem of his T-shirt, to show Art a couple of splatters on the logo of Wolverine. ‘On myself. And on the floor.’
‘Let’s take a look.’ He needed a break anyway. The interior fit-out was the one part of the process he generally hated. It was intricate, back-breaking work, with his six foot two frame not adapting well to the cramped conditions. And with the temperatures climbing steadily all day, the caravan interior had begun to resemble a Turkish bath about two hours ago. He must have lost at least two pints of his bodily fluids in sweat. Standing up, his knees popped, the cramping in his thighs shooting up to protest in his lower back. He swore softly as he shoved the sandpaper he’d been using into his toolbelt. He pressed his knuckles into the base of his spine as he walked out of the caravan and jumped onto the floor of the workshop.
Josh stood to the side, his face downcast as he gripped the paintbrush. The boy was still pretty shy around him, but he thought they’d made progress today. From the rigid stance it seemed he’d overestimated how much.
Peering round the side of the van, Art spotted Toto, still happily slapping up the treatment, her face covered by one of the masks he’d given them both, her clothes liberally doused with almost as much treatment as the van. He could see the spot where Josh had been working. The treatment had been applied in careful strokes with a lot less collateral damage. The boy hadn’t covered as much ground as Toto since they’d finished eating the pizzas he’d brought back from Gratesbury for them both for lunch, but he’d been much more conscientious. Art addressed the boy, whose chin was now buried in his chest.
‘I don’t see a problem. You’ve done a good job.’
‘I have?’
Art swiped his forearm across his brow to stop the sweat stinging his eyes. ‘Sure, you guys have earned your pay. But maybe you should knock off for the day now?’
They’d been at it for hours, taking only a couple of short breaks for cold drinks and then lunch, which had astonished him. Toto generally wasn’t great at applying herself. She had the concentration span of a hyperactive gnat, and usually needed to run off steam at least five times a day. But today she’d been hard at it, and he knew that was down to Josh. It had never really occurred to him till now, but the other kids at the co-op were all a lot younger than Toto, and her school friends lived too far away to visit during the holidays, limiting her options when it came to friendships.
Josh had been a godsend this summer. Something that had been brought home to Art as he’d listened to their chatter through the caravan wall, which had included in-depth discussions about everything from American baseball to the great Harry vs. Hermione debate. He had no doubt at all that Toto’s diligence had been down to Josh’s influence.
He hadn’t had a heck of a lot of contact with Ellie’s son so far this summer, but he seemed like a good kid. Generally during the summer holidays, ever since Toto had been big enough to negotiate the dangers of farm life, Art had left her to her own devices. She wasn’t a whiner or a fusser and she knew that he didn’t have time to entertain her. But, even so, most summers he would rope her into a project or two when she got bored. He would have been hard-pressed to do that this summer with the construction work on the shop, but Josh’s presence had made it unnecessary.
That said, the boy clearly had issues with him, or maybe just issues with men generally. He must have asked Josh a million times in the last two months to stop calling him ‘sir’. And the boy still forgot half the time.
‘You don’t want me to do it any more?’ Josh said, jumping to the wrong conclusion.
Art’s irritation level rose. ‘That’s not what I said.’ In fact, he had said exactly the opposite. ‘Totes,’ he called to his daughter, who had been so engrossed in slapping on the last of the treatment, she hadn’t been paying any attention to the conversation. He needed help though, before he freaked the kid out completely. ‘How about you guys quit for the night?’
She whipped up her face mask and grinned. ‘How much did we earn, we’ve been at it for hours and hours.’
He pulled his phone out of his pocket and checked the time. Shit, it was nearly six o’clock. For once Toto wasn’t exaggerating.
He did not want Ellie storming out here and giving him the third degree about child labour laws, because he’d been avoiding her since the night at the millpond. Having her eyes on him, seeing the way she had watched him before disappearing back into the woods, had stirred up all sorts of visions in his head he hadn’t been able to shake. He’d begun to fantasise about taking things between them a whole lot further. Which would not be a wise move on far too many levels.
She was Dee’s daughter, she would be going home at the end of the summer, and they didn’t really get on – give or take the odd gin-soaked kiss. And, ever since Alicia, he’d always made a point of keeping his sex life separate from his life on the farm.
He’d been the only parent Toto had for the last twelve years, and he didn’t plan to confuse his daughter by bringing another woman into his life. Alicia had left when Toto was still too young to remember her – she’d never asked about her mum, and he had absolutely no desire to encourage that conversation. If he and Ellie started something, it could lead to all sorts of complications he didn’t need.
But those salient facts held no sway at all with his sex drive. He’d wanted her when she was fourteen, even though she’d been a thorn in his side the whole time, and wanting her now was proving even harder to deny. So the only way to stop things getting out of hand was to avoid her.
‘Thirty quid a piece,’ he said, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket. The two of them had put in a solid six hours today since Toto had wandered in that morning with Josh in tow and asked it they could earn some money to go to Gratesbury the next day.
Toto whooped. ‘You hear that, Josh, we’re rich.’
‘For real?’ The boy’s smile spread across his face, brightening his eyes, and reminding Art of Ellie again. Like he needed any reminding.
He counted out three twenties and handed the cash to Josh. ‘I told you, you’ve earned it.’
The boy ran his thumb over the bills, and then lifted his head. His eyes sparkled in the blaze of fluorescent light, looking disturbingly moist.
Art tucked his wallet back into his pocket, something sharp and surreal kicking his ribs. Was the boy about to cry?
‘Thank you, sir,’ Josh said, his voice thick with what Art hoped to hell weren’t tears. Or worse, awe.
‘You’re welcome.’ Art’s hand swept out without him thinking it through, and he ruffled the boy’s hair. The secret smile that flashed across the child’s face was disturbing. What had he done to deserve such adoration? Not a lot, was the answer.
Either the boy was starved for male attention, or he had a very low threshold for his male role models. He had a feeling it might be both. While he didn’t know a lot about Ellie’s husband, he did know – even though he’d tried not to know, because it shouldn’t have been any of his business – that the boy’s father only got in touch via Skype once a week. Which made Art sure the guy was a dick.
If Josh were his son, no way would he want to be away from the boy for this long.
Toto broke up the moment, singing and bouncing like Tigger on speed as she grabbed Josh’s hands and the two of them danced about.
‘The job’s not finished till you get the brushes in turpentine and roll up the tarp.’ Art interrupted the celebration. Ellie would be in the shop handling the cash out and the clear up until at least six-thirty, so he had time to get her son back to the farmhouse before mamma bear showed up to read him the Riot Act.
The children set about rolling up the tarp without too much fuss, still riding high on their good fortune.
‘Can you take us into Gratesbury tomorrow to spend it?’ Toto asked, as she hefted the heavy bottle of turps off the shelf and began filling the jam jars he kept handy to soak the brushes – splashing liberal amounts of the noxious liquid on the floor.
‘Can’t, I’ve got this to finish,’ he said.
‘Could we take the bus in?’
‘Sure.’ He nodded, then remembered Ellie’s less liberal approach to childcare. ‘But Josh will have to get his mum’s permission.’
The kids shared a disappointed look and Josh’s smile dimmed. So Ellie was unlikely to give the go-ahead to that one? Maybe he shouldn’t have given his permission so easily either?
Not for the first time, Ellie’s hands-on approach to child-rearing made him question his attitude to Toto. But, as he watched his daughter and Josh finish up, he shrugged off the thought. Toto was a responsible kid, and she went to Gratesbury on the bus every day for school, and Josh had been doing the same in the weeks before the summer break – if Ellie had an issue with her son being more independent that was her problem, not his.
He climbed back into the van, his knees hurting as he crouched back down to finish sanding the bed frame. Another hour finishing up and he could call it a night himself. He’d pulled a couple of all-nighters in the last week to get back on track since the shop had opened. He certainly did not have the energy or inclination to worry about Ellie and her parenting preferences.
He was listening to the kids busy chatting away about how they were going to spend their earnings if Ellie let them go to Gratesbury a few minutes later, when the door banged open and Ellie’s voice rang out.
‘Josh, what are you doing here? I’ve been searching for you for fifteen minutes. You were supposed to check in with me at the shop. I’ve been worried sick.’ The monologue was delivered in a pitch that got higher as it went on, not giving the boy a chance to respond.
Art climbed out of the van, his back muscles protesting as he regretted his decision not to kick the kids out a lot sooner.
Wearing a short summer tunic with big red roses stamped all over it and her blonde hair escaping from the topknot she wore while tending the shop, Ellie had her hands on her son’s shoulders.
‘You didn’t go home for lunch and you forgot to check in with me or Dee. You know that’s not the deal. You were supposed to—’
‘The two of them were working for me.’ He interrupted Ellie’s tirade.
Ellie’s head swung round and, for a moment, she looked surprised to see him. But then the flush of temper on her face was replaced by the flash of awareness. The blood rushed to his groin on cue – doing not one thing to stem his irritation.
Why oh why, even when she was tired and anxious, did Ellie always have to be so bloody irresistible?
*
‘Art? I… I didn’t know he was in here working with you today.’ Ellie was holding it together. But only just.
She hadn’t planned to come charging in here. Hadn’t planned to make a scene. But she’d heard the children chattering and assumed that Art was elsewhere. Except he wasn’t elsewhere. He was here, with that inscrutable look on his face and wearing that bloody toolbelt again, which had the ability to melt all her brain cells – especially when she’d just spent fifteen minutes racing about the farm trying to find her missing son.
‘We made sixty pounds, Mom.’ Josh broke into her reverie, waving a bunch of twenty pound notes under her nose. ‘Thirty pounds each. Can we go to Gratesbury tomorrow to spend it? Art said it was OK.’
Flustered and feeling Art’s eyes on her, that penetrating gaze making her feel as if she were under a very large, very powerful microscope, she turned to her son. ‘I can’t take you to Gratesbury tomorrow. I’ll be working in the shop.’
‘But you don’t have to take us, we can go on our own on the bus.’
‘You’re not going to Gratesbury on your own.’
‘Why not? Toto does it all the time.’ The piercing whine in Josh’s voice drilled into her temples. She could feel Toto’s eyes on her too.
‘I said no, Josh.’ She knew she could be overprotective. She’d been working on it really hard. Trying to give Josh space and responsibility this summer. But Josh had always been one hundred per cent loyal to her, and having him challenge her in front of Art and Toto felt like a betrayal.
‘But I want to go. That’s not fair. I’ve worked really, really hard today.’
‘You also forgot to tell me where you were. You know that’s important to me, or I’ll worry about you.’
‘You always worry,’ Josh shouted, his face bright with temper. ‘And you never let me do anything I want to—’
‘Don’t talk to your mum like that.’ Art’s deep voice cut through Josh’s outburst.
Josh stilled, his eyes darting down as his whole body went soft, the temper seeping out of him as his face went the colour of Dee’s raspberry jam. ‘I’m sorry, sir,’ he muttered.
Ellie risked a look at Art. Not nearly as shocked by her son’s impromptu temper tantrum as she was by the way Art had cut it dead so effortlessly.
The look was a mistake, because it gave her another unhealthy eyeful of the worn sweaty T-shirt, sprinkled with sawdust, which stuck to his musculature in some interesting places.
‘And don’t call me “sir”,’ Art said, wearily, as if he’d had to say it a thousand times before. Then he lifted the limp T-shirt and wiped it across his brow, giving her a glimpse of spectacular abs, bisected by the happy trail of dark hair that led beneath his belt. She got a little giddy, as her gaze locked on the jagged scar that trailed across his hip bone. And she recalled the sight of him illuminated in moonlight across the millpond.
Forget a hum or a buzz, liquid fire settled in her abdomen. She tensed her stomach muscles, desperate to ignore it as she dragged her far-too-easily-distracted gaze back to his face.
Unfortunately, that face, the patient gaze rich with knowledge and something a great deal more potent, was no less compelling.
‘He did a full day’s work. He earned the thirty quid.’ Art swept his hand towards the caravan, which was now fully formed in the centre of the cavernous room. ‘Toto’s been to Gratesbury before on the bus, they’ll be fine.’
‘What Toto does is your business, what my son does is mine,’ she snapped, and immediately felt like a shrew when he sen
t her an infuriatingly patient nod.
‘Your call.’ He lifted his hands in surrender.
‘But, Mom, I want–’
‘Why don’t you guys head into the farmhouse.’ Art interrupted Josh’s cry of protest. ‘Go wash up and we’ll be there in a bit.’
She wanted to tell the kids to stay. She did not want to be alone with Art. But she didn’t move, as they ran off together, obviously keen to have Art fight their battles for them.
She took a calming breath, trying to get her rising temper, and the rising temperature, under control. Why did he still have the ability to turn her on to the point of madness? She wasn’t a teenager any more, she ought to be able to control her ridiculous obsession with this man.
‘I’d appreciate it if you didn’t butt into my relationship with my son,’ she said, trying to focus on her anger, instead of the scent of sawdust and man that invaded her personal space as Art strolled past her to unhook the toolbelt and dump it on the workbench. ‘I know you think I’m hysterical and irrational and overprotective, but I’m not comfortable with him and Toto going to Gratesbury on their own.’
He faced her. Leaning his butt against the bench, he crossed his arms over his chest. ‘Then they won’t. I’ll tell Toto she can’t go either.’
‘You… Really? You’d do that?’ Surely it could not be that simple. ‘But won’t Toto be upset?’
‘She’ll probably moan a bit, but she’s thirteen, so she does what I tell her.’ Releasing his arms, he turned back to the bench, and began removing the tools from his belt and placing them in a large box.
She should leave now. He’d agreed to do what she asked. But alienating his daughter as well as her son did not seem like a good idea. What if she was being irrational? The children went to Gratesbury on their own for school, perhaps giving them this independence wasn’t a bad thing?
‘But how will you explain your change of heart?’ she asked.