‘Why ever not?’
Another grimace from Saul; Rex thought he looked as though he had a bad case of heartburn.
‘I can hear her, at night,’ he said.
‘Hear what?’ Was she working in the middle of the night? Rex expected she must be, what with the competition ratcheting up. He was so proud of her, getting through to the final, but the pressure on her must be incredible.
‘Crying,’ Saul said.
‘Oh.’ Rex sipped at his pint, using the action to give him a second or two to think. ‘Why?’ he asked eventually.
‘I don’t think she’s happy. She seems…’ Saul paused, and Rex wondered what he was about to say. ‘Fragile, brittle. Driven. But not in a good way.’
‘It’s the pressure,’ he said. ‘It’s bound to be getting to her.’
Saul shook his head slowly. ‘I don’t think that’s it.’
‘What do you think it is?’
He picked up his glass and looked at Rex over the rim. ‘I dunno, mate, but she’s been like it for at least a week. She seems to have lost her spark. You don’t know anything about that, do you? I mean,’ he added quickly, ‘she’s not said anything to you?’
‘I haven’t seen her for a while,’ Rex admitted.
Saul raised his eyebrows. ‘I thought you two were getting close.’
‘It… ah… didn’t work out.’
‘That’s a pity. I thought you’d be good together.’
So did I, Rex nearly said. And they had been, hadn’t they? Until he’d found out Jules was expecting, and Leanne had broken up with him. A part of him wanted to confront her, to hear her say to his face that she hadn’t felt anything for him. He wanted to barge back into her life and try to convince her that they’d been good together, that their relationship had been the start of something wonderful.
But she’d made her intentions more than clear when she’d posted the advert for a shop manager – she was going to London to work for Jarred Townsend, and Rex wasn’t going to try to stand in her way, no matter how much he wanted to drive over to the farm and beg.
Chapter 45
Leanne had been awake since before the sun came up, the flat silver light of pre-dawn creeping into the sky with imperceptible slowness. Unable to sleep (this was getting to be a regular thing), she got dressed and slipped out of the house, her hiking boots on her feet and a down jacket on her back, although she knew she’d probably end up taking the jacket off after a mile or so.
Birds filled the woodland with song, calming her shredded nerves a little; not completely, but being outdoors did help. Her problems and worries faded a little when faced with nature in the raw. With the dramatic peaks and valleys all around, she became very aware of how this land had been here long before she’d been born, and would still be here long after she had turned to dust. The image wasn’t depressing but reassuring – life would go on and she was only a tiny, tiny part of that. It was humbling.
Right now, she felt extremely grateful to be able to witness a brief window in the lives of the creatures all around her: animals getting on with the business of mating and bringing up young, the eaters and the eaten. She understood how lucky she was compared to the robins (not so visible now with other birds all around and the leaves hiding them from prying eyes) and the wagtails, the voles and the rabbits. Her problems were nothing next to theirs. She didn’t have to struggle for survival every day, and if she made the wrong choice, her life wasn’t on the line. No sparrowhawk, falcon or fox would be waiting to pounce; only the fear of failure and a return to Tanglewood with her tail between her legs.
She had the flower shop (she wasn’t going to give that up), she had a place to live, even if it was on her parents’ farm – she actually had nothing to lose by taking Jarred up on his offer. Although she’d already made her decision, she was waiting until tomorrow to tell him officially.
Tomorrow was the final.
The thought made her tummy churn and her heart flutter. She so desperately wanted to win. The competition had consumed her life for the past three months. She’d put so much effort into it, had immersed herself in it totally (more or less), and she deserved to come first, damn it! But there was hardly a hair’s breadth to choose between the three finalists, and she was well aware that the win could go to any one of them. It all depended on performance on the day, so the producers said, although Leanne did have her suspicion that the judges had a favourite.
Slowly and with great care not to make any noise, she tiptoed along the narrow, barely there path. A blackbird called a warning overhead, protesting at her presence, and she mentally shushed it as she opened the door to the hide and slipped inside, closing it behind her softly.
She had a couple of hours before she needed to leave. There was nothing else to be done; the last flower-arranging task she had been set was ready and her overnight bag was packed. The only thing left for her to do was to say goodbye to her old life. The new one was calling, its demands increasing until it would overwhelm her tomorrow. Whether she won or not, her life would never be the same again. Unless she made a spectacular arse of herself.
There I go again, she thought, letting my doubts and insecurity have the upper hand. Jarred would not have made her the offer if he didn’t believe in her, so it was time she believed in herself, because that was the only thing holding her back.
Once, she might have turned her back on this future for a different one entirely, but it was not to be. The man who had stolen her heart hadn’t wanted it, had given it back to her in jagged pieces, leaving her bruised and sore.
For a moment, she wondered what she was doing here, at the beavers’ dam, the place where she suspected she had begun to fall in love with Rex. She could have walked the steep paths above the farm just as easily, although with considerably more puffing and panting. It would have achieved the same result, which was to soothe her, steady her and centre her. So why had she come here?
Then she realised that it was to say goodbye. Not just to her easy, familiar flower shop life; she was saying goodbye to the farm she had grown up on, to this landscape that had helped her to flourish and thrive, to the family who had allowed her the space and the boundaries to become who she was now, and to the friends she had shared her sandwiches at school with and in whose ears she had whispered the name of her first crush.
But more than that, she was here to say goodbye to the man she still loved, despite the way he had disappeared out of her life, and the way he had let their budding relationship wither and die until it was nothing but memories and a pain in her heart that might never fade.
‘Rex.’ His name felt strange on her tongue, like some exotic food she had never eaten before.
She closed her eyes, almost feeling his arms around her, his warm lips on hers, the taste of him, his scent.
When she opened them again, it was with a whispered ‘Goodbye’ and the image of his face seared on her heart.
Chapter 46
Crying, he’d said. Rex mulled it over, again and again. Why would she be crying, and every night, too? He imagined her getting ready to leave for London later today. Should he call by the flower shop and—
No. He shouldn’t. He’d only be torturing himself, like a kid picking at a scabby knee, hurting but unable to stop.
But Saul had said she’d been crying. Why?
Rex had got the feeling that Leanne’s brother had been trying to tell him something. The question was, what? He’d spent half the night thinking about it, worrying at it and annoying the hell out of Nell, who had been trying to sleep. He’d even got dressed and taken the dog for a walk, padding past the flower shop just to feel closer to Leanne.
Nothing had worked.
Lonely and sad, he’d taken Nell down to the river, remembering the last time he’d done exactly the same thing, and wishing he could turn the clock back.
Too late now, of course.
But why had she been crying?
He was still asking himself the very same questio
n, over and over again, and still not arriving at an answer that made any sense, when he popped into Peggy’s Tea Shoppe for breakfast. He had bread and cereal at home, but the thought of eating alone at his kitchen table filled him with dread, so he’d snapped Nell’s lead on and was now sitting on his own in the cafe. At least there was Betty and Stevie, and although they didn’t have much time to talk with him, they did provide some company.
He sat at his usual table and stared at the noticeboard. There was no advert for Border collie pups for sale today. In some ways, he almost wished he’d never spotted it in the first place, although if he hadn’t, Nell wouldn’t now be lying quietly at his feet hoping he’d drop a bit of croissant.
He would also never have met Leanne, and that didn’t bear thinking about. Better to have loved and lost, and all that. Who’d said that? He tried to remember, anything to keep his mind off memories of Leanne sitting opposite him in this very tea shop.
‘Stevie?’ he called. ‘Who was it who said “better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all”?’
Stevie wandered over to his table, wiping her hands on a cloth. ‘Dunno. Shakespeare probably. He said most things.’
Betty followed her. ‘Alfred, Lord Tennyson,’ she said.
‘Was it? I always thought it was Shakespeare,’ Stevie said.
‘Everyone does. It was definitely Tennyson, from his poem “In Memoriam”.’ Betty pulled out a chair and recited, ‘I hold it true, whate’er befall; I feel it, when I sorrow most; ’tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.’
‘You are a dark horse,’ Stevie called over her shoulder as she approached another customer to take an order.
‘They used to teach proper stuff when I was in school,’ Betty commented, ‘like your times tables and poetry. I never thought this one would come in handy, though. It goes to show how wrong a person can be.’ She placed both hands on the table, leaned forward and looked Rex straight in the eye. ‘What have you been wrong about?’
Rex blinked. ‘Um… lots of things?’
‘You’ve got that right.’
‘Excuse me?’
‘I’m talking about Leanne Green.’
‘What about her?’
Betty shot him a disapproving look. ‘You know what I mean.’
‘I don’t.’
‘I don’t know exactly what’s gone on between the two of you, but I know something has, and I also know it’s nothing good. She’s got a face like a wet weekend in June, and you’re quoting Tennyson at me. Now, are you going to tell me what’s up, or do I have to force it out of you?’
Despite himself, Rex burst out laughing, then halted, surprised. That was the first time he’d felt like laughing since he’d learnt about Jules’s pregnancy. ‘How do you suppose you’re going to do that? Beat me? Torture me? Refuse to serve me croissants?’
‘No. I’ll go ask Leanne.’
‘I doubt if she’ll tell you either.’
‘One of you will,’ Betty vowed grimly, determination written all over her face.
‘Bloody hell, you’re worse than the Spanish Inquisition,’ Rex muttered.
‘I’ve been around a bit, and seen a bit too, in my time. Go on, you can tell me, I’m not easily shocked.’ She gave him a wrinkle-faced smile. It was meant to be expectant and hopeful, but it reminded Rex of the expression on the Wicked Queen’s face in ‘Snow White’ when she was disguised as an old woman and was trying to persuade Snow White to eat the apple.
‘Not on your life,’ he said. He really didn’t fancy airing his problems in the middle of a tea shop to an octogenarian with an attitude problem.
Betty clapped a hand to her mouth. ‘It’s not that bad, is it? Who have you slept with and feel so guilty about that you can’t face that poor young girl? You should be ashamed of yourself. Oh, wait, you are, and that’s why you’ve split up with her.’
Rex sighed. ‘She split up with me, not the other way around.’
‘She never did!’
He shrugged.
‘Why, what did you do?’ the old lady demanded. ‘You’ve bound to have done something for Leanne to have ended it.’
‘Nothing. Please stop it with the random guessing.’
‘I can keep this up for hours, so you might as well tell me.’
She probably could, Rex thought, but he wasn’t going to give her the chance. He pushed his chair away from the table and got to his feet.
‘You haven’t finished your croissant,’ Betty pointed out.
‘I’ve lost my appetite. Stevie, can you tell me how much I owe you?’ he called.
Stevie glanced around from arguing with the coffee machine (she seemed to do that a lot), took one look at his face, another look at Betty’s, and asked, ‘Has she been annoying you?’
Rex shrugged.
‘She tends to do that. I’ve always found it best to let her get on with it, whatever it is,’ Stevie said. ‘Give me a sec, Bert is being a pain.’
Bert. She called the coffee machine Bert? Was everyone in this tea shop barmy?
Betty said, ‘Him and Leanne have fallen out and he won’t tell me why. If you make him sit back down and eat his croissant, I’ll winkle it out of him.’
‘Betty, I can’t make him do anything.’ Stevie turned her attention to Rex, as did everyone else in the cafe. Rex’s cheeks grew warm. ‘Why have you fallen out? I thought the pair of you were in luuurrrve.’
Rex’s cheeks grew hotter and he mumbled under his breath, ‘I thought we were too.’
Betty cupped a hand to her ear. ‘What was that? I didn’t quite catch it.’
Stevie stopped fiddling with Bert, wiped her hands and came out from behind her counter. ‘Seriously,’ she said to him, ‘you may as well tell her. For a start, she’ll find out one way or another, and you never know, she might be able to help. If it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t be with Nick, and Tia and William wouldn’t be engaged. Our Betty is a right little matchmaker.’
‘I don’t want to know what it is you’ve done, or think you’ve done, or should have done and haven’t…’ Betty turned to Stevie. ‘Have I covered all the bases?’ Stevie nodded. ‘As I was saying, I don’t want to know – oh bugger, yes I do, but you’re not going to tell me – but the way I see it, you’re as miserable as the devil at an angels’ tea party right now, so it can’t get any worse. You think you’ve lost her anyway, and you really will have if you don’t pull your finger out of your whatsit, get off your behind and go and tell her how you feel. If it don’t work, so be it, but at least you’ve tried.’
Stevie nodded. ‘She’s right.’
‘She broke up with me, remember?’ Rex said.
‘Pish. You must have given her a good reason.’ Betty scowled at him.
‘I didn’t,’ he protested, ignoring the fact that if he’d managed to actually tell her his news, she would have had a very good reason indeed. ‘She said she didn’t think we were any good together.’
‘Believe me, my lad, she doesn’t mean it.’
‘She sounded pretty convincing to me,’ he replied. This conversation was pointless.
‘And you just let her walk away? You didn’t bother to fight for her, to tell her you love her? Shame on you.’
‘She’s moving to London, taking a job there,’ he protested. ‘What’s there to fight for?’
‘Her heart? Your happiness? Look, sunshine, if you don’t let her know how you feel, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. What have you got to lose, eh? A bit of pride? Pah! Go for it, I say. Get over yourself and go get her!’
Rex froze, thinking frantically. Betty was right. He needed to gather his courage and tell Leanne what had happened and how he felt. But…
‘I can’t, not right now. Later, when she comes back from London,’ he said.
Betty put her hands on her hips. ‘You’re making excuses.’
‘What if I spoil her chances in the competition by getting her all upset?’
‘What i
f you don’t? What if you put a smile on her face again and give her the opportunity to decide what she wants for herself? She’s a grown woman. All she needs you to do is to let her know she has another option.’
Chapter 47
With one last look around her bedroom, Leanne picked up her overnight bag and trotted downstairs.
‘Got everything?’ her mother asked, as she always did.
Leanne nodded. Her car was packed with the things she intended to take with her for the prepared task.
Iris stepped towards her and pulled her into a fierce hug. ‘Are you sure you don’t want us to come with you today?’
‘I’m sure.’
The moral support would be nice, but there was nothing her parents could do, and they’d just be hanging around until tomorrow. Besides, she was meeting Jarred tonight, so she wouldn’t see much of them anyway.
There was a party planned for tomorrow evening, when the winner would be announced in front of the finalists’ families. Leanne had packed a dress, the one she’d worn to the Manor’s summer ball last year. She wasn’t planning on staying long, only until about ten o’clock, then she’d make her way back home.
So why was she acting as if she was going away for good? Why did everything feel so final?
Because it was; because very soon she’d return to London and this time it would be for good. She had no idea how any of it was going to pan out, where she was to live, whether she would have an office. These were the details she would have to thrash out with Jarred. She didn’t even know whether he’d expect her to start working for him on Monday, or whether she’d be driving back and forth to London for the next few weeks or months until things were finalised.
No wonder she was terrified.
‘Good luck,’ her mother whispered into her hair. ‘Not that you’ll need it. You’re going to win, I just know it.’
Was she? Leanne wasn’t so sure. But it was reassuring to know that her mother had so much faith in her.
The Tanglewood Flower Shop Page 21