by Sara Craven
By the time he returned, lithe in black trunks, raking his wet hair back from his face, she was replacing the cap on the bottle.
She said with an assumption of composure, ‘Was that good?’
He shook his head. ‘Good doesn’t come near it. And it may be our last chance for a while. There’s thunder in the air. Can’t you feel it?’
As he picked up his towel and began to blot the water from his tanned skin, it occurred to Chloe that she was aware of a number of sensations she would have much preferred to ascribe to atmospheric pressure.
At the same time, she realised that, while it was still hot, there was now a dull look to the sky, and the sun was a brazen globe behind a thin veil of cloud.
When he’d finished drying himself, Darius shook out the towel, spread it on the grass and stretched out on it a decorous few feet away from her.
‘It’s been quite a while, so how’s the world treating you, Miss Chloe Benson?’ He plucked a grass stalk and began to chew the end of it, watching her reflectively. ‘School out for the summer?’
She shook her head. ‘Out for ever. I’ve been offered a place to read English at London University, if my grades are good enough.’
He sat up. ‘Truly? My God, that’s terrific.’ He grinned at her. ‘Your family must be thrilled. Really proud too.’
She returned his smile shyly. ‘They seem to be. And I’m quite pleased myself.’
‘So what do you plan to do with your eventual degree. Teach?’
She shook her head. ‘Journalism, I hope, at least to begin with.’ She flushed a little. ‘I’ve always wanted to write, and one day, when I know a little more about life, I might even manage a novel.’
‘This calls for a celebration.’ Darius got to his feet and strode up the track to where his Land Rover was parked. When he returned, Chloe saw to her astonishment that he was carrying a bottle of champagne and a paper cup.
‘No crystal flute, I’m afraid, and it won’t be as cold as it should be, but—what the hell?’
She gasped. ‘Do you always have champagne in your car?’
‘No,’ he said, removing the foil. ‘This was a farewell present.’
An instinct she’d not been aware she possessed told her that it was from a woman.
She watched with unwilling fascination as he extracted the cork with only the faintest ‘pop’ then poured the fizzing wine into the cup without spilling a drop.
She said, ‘I thought it was supposed to explode out of the bottle and drench everyone around.’
‘Only if you’ve won a Grand Prix.’ He handed her the cup, and sat down on the edge of her rock. ‘Here’s to your first bestseller,’ he said, and drank from the bottle.
Chloe hesitated. ‘It’s kind of you,’ she began. ‘But I really don’t think I should.’
His brows lifted. ‘Why not? You’ve reached an age where all kinds of delights are legally permissible—and this is one of them. It’s not drugged, and there’s not enough in that cup to render you drunk in charge of a bicycle, so there’s no need to be nervous.’
‘I’m not,’ she denied swiftly.
‘Perhaps scared stiff would be more applicable,’ he said, his mouth twisting. ‘But you’re perfectly safe, because I know that if I upset you in any way, I’ll have your formidable Aunt Libby to deal with, and she’s even scarier.’
She was betrayed into a reluctant giggle.
‘That’s better,’ Darius approved. ‘You can’t refuse to drink a toast to your own success.’
She lifted the cup to her lips and drank, feeling the bubbles burst against her throat.
‘You talk as if it’s a foregone conclusion.’
‘Maybe because I believe it is,’ he said. ‘Though I think I’d have put my money on you becoming an actress rather than a writer.’
She took another swallow. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘I remember how you used to read to my mother,’ he said slowly. ‘The way you interpreted the words—got inside the characters. You made the books live—gave her real enjoyment.’ His smile was reflective. ‘She was very fond of you.’
Chloe looked down. ‘It’s kind of you to say so,’ she returned awkwardly. ‘I—I liked her too.’ She hesitated. ‘Actually, I was rather stage-struck for a brief time. But perhaps the readings got me focused on the way stories were constructed and made me realise I’d rather create my own words than interpret what other people had written. If that makes any sense.’
He nodded. ‘I gather you still come up to the Hall sometimes to help with the ponies.’
‘Yes, but that won’t be for much longer.’ She couldn’t avoid the wistful note in her voice. ‘Arthur says Mr Maynard intends to sell them. Yet they’re so lovely, and still really strong and healthy. I—I thought he’d have kept them for his own children.’
Darius refilled her paper cup. ‘Clearly he has other plans for when that happy time arrives. And Moonrise Lady is going too.’
‘Mrs Maynard’s mare?’ She stared at him. ‘But why?’
‘Too nervous.’
‘She’s nothing of the kind.’ Chloe’s protest was instinctive. ‘She has a wonderful temperament.’
‘I was talking about the rider,’ he said. ‘Not the horse. It seems that Penny’s not much of a country girl at heart, and much prefers four wheels to four legs.’
‘Oh,’ she said. ‘Well—that’s a shame, when Mr Maynard is so keen. My uncle was saying he’ll be asked to be Joint Master of the Hunt next season.’
‘I’ve heard that too. Following in a grand old tradition like his father and grandfather before him,’ he added, lifting one smooth brown shoulder in a casual shrug.
‘Don’t you believe in tradition?’ It must be the champagne, she thought. She would never have dared question him like this under normal circumstances.
‘Fortunately I don’t have to,’ he said shortly. ‘That’s Andrew’s job. But, for the record, I believe in progress. In doing what needs to be done.’
A sudden flash lit up the sky and he looked up, frowning. ‘Which at the moment is to get dressed and out of here,’ he added as thunder rumbled ominously in the distance. He emptied the rest of the champagne onto the grass. ‘I’ll go down by the water, and you use that clump of trees. That should preserve the decencies well enough. But be quick.’
Her hesitation was only momentary. She was just zipping her trousers when, with another crack of lightning, the rain began to fall in thick, heavy drops.
As she made for the track, Darius joined her. ‘Get in the Land Rover,’ he told her. ‘I’ll put your bike in the back.’
‘But I couldn’t ask you …’
‘You didn’t.’ He handed her the keys. ‘Now run before you’re drenched.’
It was raining in earnest now so it seemed wiser to do as she was told.
She scrambled into the passenger seat, and waited, her heart thumping, while Darius retrieved her cycle and loaded it on board, along with the empty champagne bottle.
‘Well, we can’t say we weren’t warned,’ he commented as he started the engine, the rain thudding on the roof. ‘But it’s a pity our celebration had to end so suddenly. The glories of the English summer.’ He glanced at her. ‘Not too wet?’
‘I’m fine.’ She sat up straight, hands folded in her lap. ‘It’s—very kind of you.’
‘What did you imagine?’ His swift grin slanted. ‘That I’d allow a future Booker prize-winner to risk pneumonia?’
Chloe flushed, and because she couldn’t think of a single sensible reply, kept quiet.
When he drew up in front of the Grange he said, ‘Here you are, home and dry. And I won’t accept the kind invitation to come in for a cup of tea, which I’m sure is trembling on your lips,’ he added, as he lifted out her bicycle. ‘So let’s just say that I’ll see you around.’
He paused, then said softly, ‘And when your first novel is bought by a publisher, I promise I’ll open more champagne and douse you with it—every last inch f
rom your head down to your toes.’
He blew her a kiss, got back in the Land Rover and drove away, leaving her staring after him, lips parted, oblivious to the rain.
Aunt Libby was waiting in the hall. ‘My dear child, I knew the weather would turn. You must be soaked to the skin. I’ll run you a hot bath.’
‘I’m hardly even damp,’ Chloe returned. She hesitated. ‘Actually, I had a lift home.’
‘Well that was good of somebody.’ Aunt Libby led the way into the kitchen and busied herself filling the teapot. ‘Who was it?’
Chloe tried to sound ultracasual. ‘It was Darius Maynard, of all people.’
‘Darius?’ Aunt Libby placed the lid slowly on the teapot. ‘I thought he was supposed to be working on a stud farm in Ireland. Where did you run into him?’
‘He came back yesterday,’ said Chloe. ‘And I met him down at the Willow Pond. He’d gone there for a swim. Like me.’
‘I see,’ said her aunt in a tone that suggested the revelation was not altogether welcome. She poured tea into two beakers and handed one to her niece. ‘I imagine he’s back for the Birthday Ball. The invitations are being sent out this week, so I suppose it was inevitable.’
Chloe stared at her. ‘You make it sound as if he should have stayed away.’
‘Maybe he should, at that.’ Mrs Jackson sighed sharply. ‘It always seems that whenever Darius is around, there’s invariably trouble and some of it, according to the talk in the village, has been serious. Not all his absences, especially the most recent one, have been entirely voluntary.’
Her aunt shook her head, her expression brooding. ‘But perhaps it isn’t entirely his fault. For one thing, he’s so entirely different from his father and older brother, and, for another, being the second son with no actual role to play in the running of the estate can’t be a happy situation for him. Maybe it encourages him to be wild. To see how far he can push the boundaries even if it means breaking the law.’
‘The law?’ Chloe repeated. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘There’s no reason why you should,’ Aunt Libby said with finality. ‘Just keep out of his way, my dear.’ She added with faint grimness. ‘And being far too attractive for his own good doesn’t help either.’
‘Well, he doesn’t appeal to me,’ Chloe said firmly, taking a sip of scalding tea, and hoping it would disguise any lingering hint of wine on her breath.
And just who am I trying to convince here? she asked herself. Aunt Libby—or myself?
Not that it matters. The Maynards belong in a totally different social sphere to the rest of the village, so our paths are unlikely to cross again.
A view confirmed in a few days when the village grapevine spread the word that Darius had left the Hall again, this time for London.
‘Always restless, that one,’ was Mrs Thursgood’s opinion. ‘Not happy in the same place for more than a week. Never was. Never will be. Was it a book of six or twelve stamps you were wanting?’
But at least Chloe felt able to relax a little without imagining she might bump into him around the next corner.
And his absence encouraged her to respond to a suggestion from the Hall, conveyed by her uncle over lunch, that as the ponies would be leaving early the following day, she might like to say goodbye to them.
‘Well, yes.’ She sighed. ‘Although I can’t believe that Mr Maynard has really sold them, when they’ve both got years left still. Or that Moonrise Lady is going too.’
‘Well at least they’re departing for new homes where they’ll be loved and wanted, so it makes a kind of sense. And the ponies have been bought together.’ Uncle Hal dropped a gentle hand on her shoulder as he rose from the table. ‘I’ll be passing the Hall presently if you want a lift, but you’ll have to walk back.’
Chloe changed quickly, tucking a short-sleeved blue shirt into her jodhpurs. Her uncle dropped her off at the Hall’s gates, and she was on her way up the winding drive when a car’s horn tooted behind her.
Her heart gave a swift lurch, and she turned apprehensively to see Penny Maynard waving at her from her Alfa Romeo.
‘Hop in,’ she called. ‘It’s far too hot to walk.’
As always, she looked devastating, wearing a white skirt topped by a cyclamen-pink blouse, her ash-blonde hair cut into a sleek shoulder-length bob, and her violet eyes fringed by expertly darkened lashes.
She’d always been reed-slender, but now it seemed to Chloe that she was actually thin, and there was an increased definition to her cheekbones and a tautness to her mouth that had not been there before. That made her beautiful face look almost haggard.
‘I’m sorry you’re losing your playmates,’ she remarked as the car sped off. ‘After all, you’re the one who’s really bothered with them. But Andrew has finally accepted that horses are another interest we will never share, so I won’t really be shedding any tears.’
There was an odd note in her voice that Chloe could not interpret, and, anyway, this was Sir Gregory’s daughter-in-law she was talking to, so she confined her reply to a neutral, ‘I suppose not.’
‘Prenuptial agreements seem always to be about money,’ the older girl went on flatly. ‘I think their scope should be broadened, so that everyone knows exactly where they stand. No post-wedding shocks. Don’t you agree?’
‘I don’t know,’ Chloe returned with faint bewilderment. ‘But you couldn’t possibly include everything.’ She paused awkwardly. ‘Besides, isn’t learning about each other all part of the fun of being married?’
‘ “The fun of being married”,’ Penny repeated almost musingly. ‘Yes, you’re quite right. That’s what it’s all about, of course.’ She gave a short laugh. ‘ “Oh, wise young judge”.’
She stopped the car at the arch leading into the stable yard to allow Chloe to alight. ‘Listen,’ she said. ‘I want you to know I’m really glad that you cared about the ponies and Moonrise Lady and made a fuss of them, and I’m sorry it couldn’t be me. It would at least have been one way of justifying my existence.’
She drove off fast, her tyres scattering gravel, and Chloe watched her departure, astonished and embarrassed at the same time.
What on earth, she wondered, had all that been about?
Penny Maynard was at least six years her senior, and, until now, like most local people, Chloe had admired her at a distance. Certainly, they’d never exchanged more than the minimal formalities if they happened to encounter each other at occasions like the annual village concert or the flower show. And they’d never—ever—been on female chatting terms.
How could we be? Chloe asked herself. When I’m just a schoolgirl and she’s a married woman? When she probably knows me only vaguely as the vet’s niece? It makes no sense.
In the stable, Arthur Norris, the groom, was tacking up Moonrise Lady. He greeted Chloe with his usual unsmiling nod.
‘Ponies are in the first paddock,’ he said. ‘I’ve put a few jumps up in the far one, not too high, so you can school this one over them, make sure she minds her manners. Girl she’s going to isn’t all that experienced.’
‘But she’s certainly lucky.’ Chloe ran a gentle hand down the mare’s neck, hearing her whicker softly in response. Penny Maynard, she thought, didn’t know what she’d missed.
She extracted a plastic container of apple and carrot pieces from her shoulder bag, and went down to the paddock. The ponies met her at the fence, jostling each other for the pick of the treats, butting her arm and shoulder with eager affection.
She fed them and stroked their noses, whispering that they should be staying here where they belonged, waiting to take Andrew’s children on their backs, but that she’d remember them always. Always.
Then Arthur came down from the yard with Moonrise Lady, and she mounted, blinking back her tears, and rode the little mare into the other paddock.
The jumps were simple ones, and Chloe took her through them with easy grace, then turned, watching Arthur raise the rail a couple of notches on the final one
, but keeping it still well within the Lady’s capacity.
She rode back to the start, and put the mare at the first low hurdle. Moonrise Lady jumped it perfectly again, continuing to sail effortlessly over the others.
But as they approached the last, Chloe saw out of the corner of her eye a movement over by the paddock gate, and realised they’d been joined by someone else. Momentarily distracted, she allowed herself a quick glance to confirm the identity of the newcomer.
With a gasp, she tried to regain her concentration, but the rhythm of the mare’s stride was broken. She took off at an awkward angle, stumbled on landing and sent Chloe flying over her head to hit the grass with a force that left her panting and breathless at the feet of Darius Maynard.
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘WELL, I’ve seen more elegant descents.’ Darius squatted beside her. ‘Do you think you’ve broken anything or are you just winded?’
Chloe sat up wincing. ‘Just—winded.’ And furious with myself for being such an idiot.
‘Also a little dishevelled,’ he said softly.
Following his gaze, Chloe glanced down and saw to her horror that some of the little pearl buttons on her shirt had come undone during her fall, revealing even more of her firm young breasts in their lace-trimmed cups than her bikini bra had done.
‘I have no objection, naturally,’ Darius added, a quiver of amusement in his voice. ‘But you might give poor old Arthur a heart attack.’
So to that fury, she could also add humiliation, she thought as she struggled to refasten her shirt with fingers made clumsy by haste and embarrassment. And in front of him, of all people.
It was a welcome relief when Moonrise Lady came wandering over to drop a soft and questing muzzle on her shoulder and she could bury her flushed face in the mare’s neck.
‘I’m sorry, darling,’ she muttered. ‘It was all my fault.’
‘She already knows that,’ Darius said crisply. He got to his feet, dusting bits of grass from his elegant charcoal pants.
He held out a hand. ‘Up you come, my girl, and up you get—back on the Lady; restore her confidence in you by taking her over that last jump again. Properly this time.’