Next to the mirror I had placed a card Ian had sent to me on the first anniversary of our meeting. I had liked it so much I had kept it and framed it.
To my darling, the love of my life.
My Heart, my Soul and my Love is Yours Forever.
I realised for the first time that it wasn’t true, it wasn’t even grammatically correct.
I sat at the kitchen table at Holly Cottage dunking one of the herbal tea bags my sister had left behind in a mug of boiling water. It said on the label it was camomile and raspberry. It tasted like compost smells.
Perhaps having had me, Bryn had decided I wasn’t worth the bother. I felt a cold shiver of fear. Maybe he, like Ian, had found me substandard in the sack.
I sat up a bit straighter and thought about this more seriously. Maybe that was the problem.
It was my fault.
I was no good in bed. Ian hadn’t thought I was, and nor did Bryn.
How absolutely shaming.
These days when the mildest mannered women’s magazine gave helpful advice about pelvic floor exercises and how to keep a man happy, there was no excuse. Perhaps I should have read a few more instead of laughing at the letters from women who worried that they were too fat, too old, too flat chested to keep their man happy.
How did you get to be good in bed anyway?
By reading special books? Erotica? I’d have to get them on Kindle to avoid embarrassment and I didn’t have one.
Therapists?
Evening classes?
I pictured a dusty room in the FE College in Stokeley with a group of self-conscious women on a circle of wooden chairs, a bearded tutor giving us breathing exercises and talking about Hubby. Maybe his partner would come in on week three, encouraging us to buy her organic massage oils. He would encourage us to talk about erogenous zones and fantasies and I would probably die of embarrassment. I didn’t think I had either, actually. Although if I’m pushed I’ll admit my feet are very ticklish and I’ve always had a bit of a thing for Melvyn Bragg.
I think I might have been getting a bit lightheaded at this point.
Perhaps I should watch some porn?
Hi Bryn, I’ve brought over some breadsticks and some hummus, shall we watch Debbie Does Dallas?
No. Not a good idea on any level.
I finished my tea and averted my gaze from the half bottle of red wine that was posing seductively on the worktop. Instead I picked up my laptop and went into the sitting room. I would work on Love at Last for a bit and try and at least get the colour of Jake’s eyes consistent.
I flopped down on the sofa and opened my laptop. After a moment I wriggled, realising something was wrong, and began patting around me. The cushion by my hand was damp. It was too dark to see properly. So of course I did the stupidest thing I possibly could, I switched on the lights.
There was a threatening crackle of electricity from somewhere in the ceiling, followed by an explosion as the bulb blew up. I screamed and all the lights went out.
CHAPTER 20
Lily-of-the-valley – returning happiness
I stood, not daring to move. There were fragments of glass everywhere. I could feel it in my hair. I had no shoes on; I was probably going to cut my feet to ribbons. I whimpered in the growing darkness, not sure what I should do. One thing was certain – I couldn’t just stand here for the rest of my life.
I shook the glass out of my hair and took a cautious step back, wincing as a glass fragment bit into my toe. I vowed to the gods of health and safety I would never sneer at slippers again. I would buy some and I promised I would wear them in future. Second step, another crunch, another stab of pain. I gave a strangled cry of rage. Bloody hell, how was I going to get out of this?
‘Are you OK? I heard you scream, have you had a power cut?’
A voice shouting through the back door, it was Bryn. I bit my lip to stop from crying with relief.
I brushed the glass off the front of my sweatshirt, cleared my throat and tried to sound normal.
‘I think it was me. I put the light on and I’ve blown everything up,’ I called out. ‘I’m a bit stuck.’
I heard the door handle rattle as Bryn tried to open the kitchen door. Of course I had locked it.
‘Can you unlock the door?’ he called.
‘No, I’m surrounded by broken glass and I haven’t got any shoes on. Well I could try…’
A second later he must have put his shoulder to the door, and it burst open. Hardly worth locking it if it was that easy to get in. He stood in the doorway looking at me. I could see his eyes, bright in the gloom.
‘Are you OK?’
‘I turned the light on and the bulb blew up. There are bits of it all over the floor. Please be careful. You know what you’re like with blood…’
He took two steps towards me, his boots crunching contemptuously over the glass fragments, hooked one arm under my knees and lifted me up in his arms.
‘Hold tight. I’ll have you out in a jiffy.’
Obediently I put my arms around his neck, resisting the impulse to bury my nose in his neck. He carried me out into the garden and then he paused, looking down at me.
I met his gaze in a moment of almost unbearable honesty and there was a second when I had a choice. I could have struggled for him to put me down. I could have said something stupid. I could have made a silly comment about my weight. I did none of those things.
I just looked at him, taking in his face as though I wanted to memorise it; his dark blue eyes framed with thick lashes, the smooth clean lines of his jaw, the texture and colour of his skin. I knew what was going to happen. So did he.
Without a word he carried me down to the end of the garden where the evening air was chill and clear and scented with autumn. The first stars were coming out above us as, still holding me in his arms, he bent his head and kissed me. My hands moved up to his head, my fingers deep in his warm hair. He walked on, kicking open the gate to his garden. I looked up at the heartbreaking sweep of his cheekbone and knew that I was lost.
He carried me into his house and sat me on the kitchen table. I curled my legs around his waist and he kissed me again. He pulled my sweatshirt off over my head and unhooked my bra, his hands warm on my breasts. Then he lifted me up, his hands under my bottom, and carried me through to the dark hallway where the grandfather clock ticked softly at the bottom of the stairs. He kissed me again, pulling me hard against his body. In the dim light his eyes glowed as he looked at me. A question was asked between us that needed no answering. Then he carried me upstairs and into his bedroom.
He laid me on the bed and pulled his shirt off over his head. He lay down beside me, stretching himself out against me, watching me as he traced my face with his fingers, smoothed my hair back from my face, outlining my lips with his thumb.
He spoke at last. ‘Lottie. Oh, Lottie.’
I couldn’t speak. I could hardly breathe. I was back where I had longed to be. I hadn’t realised just how much I had wanted him. I was alone with him at last in the quiet twilight of his house, my hands touching him, feeling the muscles of his back, the lovely indent of his spine, his mouth on mine.
I remembered him, I knew him. He knew me. The slow way we undressed each other was sweet and familiar. The sound of his sigh above me, the weight, the feel of him – all of him – along the length of my body, pressed close and then closer still. Soft nips and gentle kisses on my naked shoulders. His breath against my back, his mouth on my body, mine on his.
He was breathless. His heart beating against mine. Mine against his. He kissed my forehead; he tangled his hands in my hair. He looked at me. Really looked at me as no one ever had before.
I wanted him. He wanted me. I wanted all of him in great gulping mouthfuls, taking his very essence into my heart with his sweat and his scent. I cried out in the warm darkness. No longer two. We were one. Two heads, two hearts but one soul. I pushed my hands against his chest. It was too much. God help me. Too much. He was compassion, he wa
s everything, he was pitiless. He sought me and found me. The universe and everything else in it was meaningless and unnecessary. My world started and ended with him. Our need for each other. Now, yes, now. And again. There I was. Only him.
A gasp from him, a long groan of pleasure. He dropped his face into the hollow of my neck. Still he did not release me. He rolled onto his side, my legs wrapped around him. Time passed. Seconds? Minutes? Days?
I looked at him at last, his head on the pillow beside me. His eyes were closed. My sweat on his face. His on mine. I ran my fingers over the beautiful curve of his lower lip and he kissed them. I could feel the strength of his pulse inside my heart. I breathed in his breath. He breathed in mine. His skin smelled of me.
This then is what has kept the world turning. Poems written. Songs sung.
We lay together, quiet and spent. He lifted his body a little so I could pull my arm out from under him, but still he held me. I curled around him, his life flowed into me and mine into him.
After a while I thought perhaps he was sleeping but then he turned his head and looked at me. He pulled me yet closer and spoke against my hair.
‘I’m not letting you go until I know you won’t run off. If you promise not to I’ll get you something to eat.’
I smiled in the darkness. ‘I promise I won’t run off.’
‘What do you want?’ His hand traced a warm, slow path from my shoulder to my waist and back again.
I closed my eyes and stretched out my spine like a cat under his fingers. ‘You.’
‘Anything else?’
‘Just you.’
He pulled his head back and I knew he was looking me.
‘You’re so beautiful, Lottie. So brave and beautiful.’
He kissed me and at last he let me go. The movement of his body away from mine was a little death, a loss.
He rolled onto his back and pulled me in against his side. He pulled the quilt over me to keep me warm.
‘Toast and brandy?’ he said. I could tell he was smiling.
I nodded. ‘Don’t be long.’
‘Don’t go away. Stay here,’ he said, and this time I did.
He put on the bedside lamp and I watched as he pulled on the blue robe. I listened as he went down the stairs and I heard him in the kitchen crashing about. I think I must have dozed off for a few minutes and I woke as he came back into the room. There was a delicious smell of toast in the air and I pulled myself up against the pillows as he put the tray on the marble-topped washstand under the window. I could see the same glass butter dish and a pile of toast. He put the tumbler of brandy on the bedside table and then got into bed and pulled me into his arms. I ran my hands over his shoulders and down the muscles of his back until I found that particular place at the base of his spine and I traced my nails over it.
He gasped, his eyes closed for a moment.
‘I’ve been thinking about you, Lottie,’ he said against my hair. ‘I’ve missed you.’
He looked at me again and his eyes told me everything I needed to know. He lost his breath in a shaking sigh.
He drew me down underneath him and kissed me.
‘Will I ever get enough of you?’ he whispered. ‘Will you ever get enough of me?’
‘No, no, never.’
I could feel myself dissolving into him. I was hungry for him, thirsty for him, desperate for him.
He pulled off his robe and threw it on the floor and then he made love to me again and it was wonderful, just bloody wonderful.
I woke up the next morning just as confused as the first time. But this time I did not scrabble to find my clothes and dash off. The little bedside clock was still ticking away; it was just after eight o’clock.
I was glad to see there were no flashy earrings this time, but to be honest I don’t think I would have cared if there had been. He had explained the situation to me. Bonnie had deliberately left her earrings there, Bryn had found them, given them back to her and she had admitted it. She had the feeling there was someone else. And of course, although I hadn’t known it at the time, there was someone else. There was me.
We had stayed up through most of that night, eating toast, sipping brandy, kissing, talking, making love. At about four thirty we had slept.
I pushed my hair out of my eyes and turned my head to look at Bryn. He was still asleep, his head burrowed deep into the pillows. I reached out one hand and touched him. Not to wake him up, just for the pleasure of touching him. To feel his smooth, warm skin. I kissed his shoulder and felt the muscles in his arm move as he woke.
He stirred and turned over, reaching for me, and spooned in behind me even before he opened his eyes. He held me close, my back against his chest. I could feel him breathing.
‘Good morning, Lottie,’ he said, his voice rumbling against me.
‘Good morning.’
‘What time is it?’
I checked the clock again.
‘Quarter past eight.’
Bryn thought about this in silence for a few minutes while he stroked me.
‘I think I’m ill,’ he said at last. ‘Very unwell indeed. I think it could last for a while, to be honest.’
‘Oh dear, are you?’ I turned my head to try and look at him. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Then?’
‘I’ll phone Malcolm in a bit and tell him I won’t be in today. Or tomorrow. I think I might have to stay in bed, certainly for the rest of the day.’
‘Hmm. I might need to stay here with you. In case.’
‘In case of what?’
I looked at him and laughed. ‘In case I want to do this.’
I rolled up on top of him and kissed him. He reached down and his hands smoothed my bottom.
‘Or this.’
I bent to kiss his body, teasing, flicking with my tongue, making him gasp with pleasure.
‘Or this.’
We made morning love, quickly, urgently, him silencing my cries with his kisses until I trembled in his arms.
‘I don’t think there’s anything the matter with you,’ I said a long time later. ‘I think you’re skiving.’
‘You’re an excellent nurse,’ he said. ‘I’m beginning to feel better already. I’ll go and make some coffee and phone Malcolm. I’ll be back in three minutes. Don’t move.’
I didn’t.
CHAPTER 21
Gladiolus – courage and strength
We stayed in bed all day, something I hadn’t done since a few years ago when I had flu. I mean proper flu, not just a bad cold. The sort of flu when you feel so ill you couldn’t pick up a fifty-pound note on the pavement if you saw it. That’s supposed to be a diagnostic test. But I digress.
Staying in bed all day with Bryn was a zillion squillion times better than having the flu, even so I think I might have ignored that fifty-pound note for quite different reasons.
First we had breakfast in bed, scrambled eggs and toasted bagels, with a cafetière of coffee and a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. Then we brushed all the crumbs out of the bed, straightened the sheets and got back in again. We had a snooze and then elevenses. Bryn had some Danish pastry things in the freezer. More coffee. Then I spilled mine all over the sheets so we had to change them. We both had a shower. I mean at the same time. That’s something else I’d never done and I can highly recommend it. It took a long time though, all that soaping and rinsing and snogging, and then one thing led to another and – well, it was amazing.
After we got in between the clean sheets we had another snooze, and then it was time for a very late lunch and Bryn made some vegetable soup and we took that, a bottle of wine and a very crusty loaf back up to bed and got butter everywhere, which was more fun than you can possibly imagine. And we had more wine and more food and dozed and we talked and held each other and sometimes we didn’t speak at all.
We talked to each other about our lives and from time to time one thing would lead to another and we seemed to be in a state wh
ere making love to each other was an ongoing thing, like a conversation between us that occasionally involved his body speaking to mine.
We tried out different positions, some of them quite tricky, others rather inventive, and I didn’t care if I had cellulite or wobbly bits. And if I did it was obvious Bryn didn’t care. We drank wine and ate chocolate. We looked at each other. We got through a tub of raspberry ripple ice cream in a new and unusual way.
I sat between Bryn’s legs and he pulled me back against him and brushed my hair, pulling it to one side and kissing my neck, running his tongue up behind my ear and whispering what he was going to do to me, what he was thinking. He seemed absolutely absorbed in me, penetrating my needs and giving pleasure until I thought I would faint.
We lay in each other’s arms and watched the afternoon fade. Just the rosy glow from the sunset sent a gentle, flattering light over us, so that the many imperfections of my figure disappeared. His face, half in shadow, had the look of mystery, of a Renaissance artist, maybe. I looked at him and he smiled, pulling me onto his lean, hard body. We fitted together so well, like one person divided into two. And for the first time in my life I felt beautiful and valued and content.
We were almost drifting off to sleep in each other’s arms, my hand on his broad, warm chest, when I stretched up to look at him and he bent to kiss me. He took hold of my hands and pinned them on the pillows for a moment. Then I broke free and ran my fingers over his wide shoulders, remembering our shared shower.
The steam lacing the shower screen, his soapy hands on my breasts, my back forced hard against the cool tiles on the wall, his face above me, his gasping cry of pleasure. The way the water had run down his body into my mouth.
And then I remembered.
I prayed it wouldn’t be too bad. I wanted to open the door and perhaps find things were as I had left them. Just some broken glass on the floor, some unspecified damp on the sofa. In my heart I knew it wouldn’t be like that, and it wasn’t.
The Summer of Second Chances Page 22