Sadie:
Sunday brunch, then?
An afternoon and night alone with her thoughts? No, thank you. The spasm to her gut wasn’t so much the gift of the sea now, and she clutched her hand to it.
‘You okay?’
She jumped at Freddie’s husky voice so close and angled her head back. He was right behind her, a silhouette against the sun.
She covered her eyes and blinked up at him. ‘Just catching up with my friends.’
‘I meant your stomach.’ He gestured to where she clutched her belly and she wondered how he’d feel if she confessed that he was the cause of that particular gesture.
‘Hopefully I will be soon. What did our guide say?’
Her phone vibrated in her hand and she looked at the screen. It was Sadie.
???
Then Izzy:
Give the girl a second at least...
‘Sorry I just need to sign off and then I’m all yours.’
She sensed his body pulse over her accidental innuendo, and her cheeks flushed—it beat pale and sickly, though.
She tapped out her reply, trying to concentrate on it while her body flooded with salacious warmth.
Saturday night would be better. If you can?
She dropped in a fingers-crossed emoji and added prayer hands too for good measure.
Sadie:
It’s a date! I’ll cook!
Izzy:
No, I’ll cook, you can bring the wine x
Sadie:
Much better plan.
She smiled, feeling their support across the miles, and signed off.
See you then, loves xxx
She popped her phone back into her bag and made to sit up.
‘As you were,’ Freddie commanded softly. ‘I’ll join you.’
‘You’ll get sand everywhere.’
‘Ah, yes, the joy of sand.’ He sank down beside her and lay back, his hand reaching to cover hers. It was such a comforting gesture, so natural and easy. It felt like it meant something and no amount of trying to rationalise it away as just a thoughtful gesture between old friends was working.
‘This stuff is like talcum powder anyway.’ He used his other hand to scoop up a handful and she watched as he let it fall through his fingers.
‘And when was the last time you came up close and personal with talc?’
She lifted her gaze to his and her heart gave a little leap. The sun glinted off his dark hair, the tanned glow to his skin making his blue eyes even more vibrant and highlighting the chiselled angle of his cheekbones, his jaw, and every breath she now took captured his scent...
‘You’d be surprised. My sister thinks it’s very important to thrust uncle duties on me at every opportunity when I visit home.’
She smiled, the idea of seeing him in that role warming her heart all the more. ‘How lovely.’
‘If you say so. James is two but what he lacks in age he makes up for in noise. He’ll make a fine Highgrove.’
‘Though he won’t be a Highgrove, will he?’
‘He is.’
‘Oh, I would have thought he’d have his father’s name. I shouldn’t have assumed in this day and—’
‘He does have his father’s name,’ he interjected, tension bracketing his mouth. ‘But he’s still a Highgrove without the name.’
‘I just—I mean...’ Her voice trailed off as she realised she was pressing him into a conversation that could only spell trouble.
‘You’re talking titles. You’re talking about my child. My heir. The heir I won’t ever have because I have no intention of marrying.’
She swallowed, the pang in her chest too great. ‘Yes.’
He said nothing, his eyes on the sky so very pensive.
‘Have you considered what happens to the line if you don’t?’
Why was she even pressing him on this? Did she hope he would suddenly turn around to her and say, ‘Hey, let’s forget the last ten years ever happened and get married like we always planned, have a home, kids, a dog.’
Wasn’t going to happen.
But...
His eyes flitted to her briefly. Did he see it all in her face? Was that why he’d looked away again so quickly?
‘My sister has another child on the way, and likely another after that. There will be no end of possible heirs if she carries on the way she is.’
He offered her a smile but it left her feeling dead inside, her heart breaking as she thought of Freddie never having a family of his own. Yes, if it couldn’t be with her, she didn’t want to imagine it being with someone else. But to always be alone, to never have kids when it had been his dream when they had been younger. Had she ruined him so much?
The question that left her was far safer: ‘When is she due?’
His brows drew together. ‘Hmm?’
‘You said your sister has another on the way...’
‘Oh, yes.’ Another smile softened his brow. ‘In a couple of months.’
‘Wow, so soon?’
He chuckled. ‘Now you sound like my father.’
‘Not your mother, though. I bet she’s in her element.’
‘You’ve got that right.’ He went quiet again, withdrawing into his thoughts, and she watched as his lips quirked with whatever they were.
‘They make good grandparents,’ he said eventually, his tone sombre. ‘Better grandparents than parents in many ways.’
She swallowed the little lump that formed in her throat. ‘How so?’
‘They’re more relaxed. Mum’s been trying to get Dad home more over the years and he finally seems to be paying attention. You should see him at Christmas now. He’s practically regressed into being the biggest kid of all.’
She covered his hand on top of hers. ‘Christmas was always very special at Highgrove.’
The manor would be lit up with decorations, festive colour in every room, the scent too. She’d spend the entire holiday season buzzing around the house with Freddie, trying not to get underfoot but getting involved all the same.
‘It had its moments.’ He turned to look at her, his smile not quite reaching the wistful look in his eyes. ‘We had some good times.’
She nodded. ‘We had lots of good times.’
So much passed between them in a simple look, so many memories. Her mother would always work late into the night, helping with the parties in the run-up to Christmas, ensuring every need was catered for, so they had been free to do what they’d wanted. Sneak mulled wine, eggnog, mince pies from Maggie, whatever had taken their fancy. All those good years of being friends, and then the one year when they had been more, so much more. Engaged and ostracised in one.
‘I didn’t go back to Highgrove, not even for Christmas, for a long time afterwards,’ Freddie said as he travelled the same road as her. ‘It took a lot of persuasion from Ally to get me back there, and even then four years had passed. I’d graduated, started a new life...’
‘Really?’ She frowned. ‘But—but Christmas was such a huge thing for your family. It was so important for you all to be together.’
He looked away, withdrawing from her and she clutched his hand tighter.
‘Freddie?’
‘I told you, I blamed them. I didn’t want to know my parents after they forced you out.’
‘They did it because they loved you,’ she said quietly. ‘It must have broken their hearts to have you gone for so long.’
‘What about my heart, Jas?’ The force of his words made her flinch as he turned to her. ‘And how can you lie there and defend them, after everything they said and did?’
‘I’m not.’
‘You are.’
‘I’m just saying I understand, even if it hurt, even if—’
‘Even if it tore us apart.’
Her breath shuddered through her and she looked at the sky.
‘Sorry...’ he said suddenly, squeezing her fingers. ‘I’ve come to terms with it, but...’
‘It still hurts.’
He nodded and she gave him a sad smile as she added, ‘It still hurts us both.’
His eyes searched hers, taking in her words, accepting them. ‘It’s a ten-year-old pain, it makes sense that we can’t simply shut it off.’
‘I know.’ She breathed in deeply as she gazed into the eyes of the man she loved so much, the man she’d missed so much... The man who deserved a family of his own to love and to cherish and with whom to continue on all the wondrous Highgrove traditions.
‘It’s a shame you’re so set against marriage, Freddie, because you’d make a wonderful father.’
It may have come out of left field, in his eyes anyway, but she hadn’t been able to keep it trapped inside and it was worth the flicker of emotion in his face, the pulse of his fingers beneath hers. Because for that brief moment she knew she’d opened his eyes to it and the joy of possibility.
But then he shook his head, his expression morphing into one of incredulity. ‘So I can adopt the same parenting technique my father did for all those years? No, thank you.’
‘Technique?’ she frowned. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Absent parenting.’ His eyes were on the sky again. ‘I often thought the only reason he’d had a child was to produce an heir, someone to pass everything on to. When I was younger he was never around, when I was older all he wanted to discuss was the estate, the business...’
‘But he loves you, Freddie.’
He shrugged it off. ‘Either I was invisible or I was an asset. He only had Ally to keep Mum happy, to keep her occupied, give her less free time to call on his.’
‘I’m sure that’s not—’
‘Hey, it’s okay, Red.’ He turned to her. ‘I’m over it and, like I say, things are different now. Dad’s improving with age, just like a fine wine...’
He was trying to make light of it, but she wasn’t having it. ‘Freddie, don’t joke!’
‘I’m not. I’m being serious. Being a grandparent has changed him.’
She stared at him, struggling to find the words.
‘And he taught me my most important lesson.’
‘Which is?’
‘That I make a great uncle. A father...not so much.’
She didn’t stop staring at him, her heart caught in a desperate spiral. ‘Do you honestly think that because your father was an absent parent, you would be too?’
‘Why wouldn’t I? I’m just as busy, I’ll be more so when I take on the estate, the title. I’ll be stepping into his shoes and then some.’
‘But you’ve also learned from his mistakes.’
‘I’ve learnt to avoid them...and before you say it, this isn’t the kind of avoidance that needs rectifying, Jas.’
‘Of course it is, Freddie! This is worse than not standing up to your parents over the years.’ He went to reply, but she wasn’t done. ‘Having a family of your own, being the good father I know you would be...you can’t not do that!’
His eyes narrowed but he said nothing, and she could see the doubt, the sadness, the disbelief that he could be something different, something better.
‘You’re nothing like your father, Freddie... Okay, you look a little like him, and sometimes you can definitely be as brooding and pig-headed,’ she teased, and saw the glimmer of a sparkle in his eyes. ‘But your heart is your biggest asset. Yes, I love your brains...’ stay clear of the L word, came the warning but she pressed on anyway ‘...and your intelligence. You don’t look half bad either.’
She rolled onto her side, forcing back the sudden wave of seasickness and the rocking of the entire world as she rested her hand over his heart. ‘But when you love, you love with the whole of you. You could never be like your father was, because it’s not in you to be that way.’
He held her gaze, quiet, contemplative, and she let her eyes tell him what was in her heart, how she meant every word. Meant it and wanted it...for them.
Baby steps. That’s what this was. Baby steps into doing what Madison had advised and getting him to see how good it could be if he opened his eyes to it. To an ‘us’.
The problem was that her own heart was opening up right along with it and if she couldn’t convince him, if this week truly was to be it...
She shut the thought down and lowered her head to his chest, curled into his side. She had to try, though...
* * *
‘It’s a shame you’re so set against marriage, Freddie, because you’d make a wonderful father.’
Her words echoed through him long after their rest on the beach, but the jeering inner laughter that had brushed off her statement as crazy was gradually softening. Hours later, as they trekked through the rainforest and he was supposed to be focusing on what they were seeing, he could feel the change underway inside. The change tugging him back to how he’d once been, the future so bright and filled with promise. The promise of exactly that: a wife, kids, a home in Scotland.
And not just any wife—Jasmine.
It would be so easy to follow that path again, to let her wrap him up in her warmth, her light, her...love.
But then what?
His parents’ expectations hadn’t changed, the view of their peers hadn’t changed. He’d be dragging her back into their elitist world where they would as readily snub her now as they had back then. Could their relationship truly survive it? Survive and flourish? With children and all the demands on their time from their respective businesses, his charity, the estate? He could feel his heart racing away with him, and not in a good way.
But if Jasmine was willing to face it, to risk it...
You’re getting all fanciful, came the warning. You haven’t had a relationship that lasted more than a month in ten years, why would now be any different?
Because it was her. It was Jasmine. And she’d made him remember how good it felt to be with someone, the right someone.
But what if it wasn’t? What if this only worked now because they were away from all the obstacles that stopped them from having a life together before? What if they risked it now and...?
‘Oh, my goodness, Freddie!’ Her giddy call cut through his thoughts and he looked at her in the distance, her cheeks all bright again and jutting into her sunglasses as she grinned at him.
For the briefest moment he just treasured the colour being back in her cheeks, her body free of the tension that had held her taut on the boat. He’d wanted so badly to take away her discomfort, he’d wanted to be able to do something, anything...and it was just seasickness, nothing life threatening, but he’d felt so helpless in his desperation.
As helpless as he was in controlling the way he felt around her. The way he felt for her.
Day four of seven and she had his world turned upside down. All over again.
He quashed the anxious churn in his gut and grinned at her, grateful that his sunglasses would hide the rest.
‘You have to see these, Freddie!’
He picked his way through the dense rainforest to join her and Michel, their guide.
‘Welcome to the star of our tour!’ Michel chuckled up at him. He was a small man with a big personality. ‘This is the coco de mer—the coconut of the sea.’
‘Look at them, Freddie! Just look!’ Jasmine gestured to the ground. ‘They look like giant...well, you know...’
She made a gesture like she was massaging a long, curved cylinder—she couldn’t mean... He eyed the thick phallic object on the ground, with its small, yellow star-like flowers dotted around it and his grin widened. Oh, yes, she did.
‘That is the catkin of the male tree,’ Michel explained.
Jasmine gave a little giggle. ‘It would be the male, wouldn’t it?�
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‘And you would make that remark,’ Freddie teased, high on her playfulness as their tour guide laughed heartily.
‘Can you blame me? Look at what the female tree produces, it looks like a giant bottom!’ She squeezed her fingers together like they held invisible sponges, as if he needed reminding of what one looked like, and then bent to lift a hefty wooden-looking thing off the ground. ‘Goodness! It weighs a ton!’
‘Yes, the nut or seed of the female tree can actually weigh up to twenty kilograms, if not more,’ Michel informed them.
She turned and presented it to Freddie. ‘See!’
His cheeks ached with his continued grin. It did indeed look like a very round bottom.
‘And you turn it around and it has hair, just there!’ Jasmine really was suppressing her giggles now and he felt light inside, caught up in her happy aura, her healthy glow, the boat all but forgotten along with his worries of moments before.
‘The nut can grow to be as big as half a metre and they come out of the husks you see there.’ Michel pointed up to the palms towering above them and the bulbous green orbs hanging there. ‘It is the largest seed in the plant kingdom and is very rare, found only in the Seychelles, on the islands of Praslin and Curieuse.’
‘Impressive!’ She passed it to Freddie. ‘Here, cop a feel.’
His laugh burst out of him as he shook his head at her and did just as she asked. ‘Very smooth.’
She laughed more.
‘You’re such a kid.’
‘Takes one to know one.’ She winked at him and bent to put it back on the ground, ensuring he got an extended view of another bottom entirely and one that he definitely did want to feel. Not that he would in front of their guide. But later...definitely later.
‘Because of the unusual qualities to both,’ Michel continued, ‘many a legend has been told about these trees.’
‘Oh, yes...’ she sent Freddie a look ‘...we can imagine.’
‘For example, it is believed that at night, when storms rage, the trees come together in a passionate embrace.’
She clasped her hands to her chest. ‘How romantic!’
‘Indeed. But as they are shy, legend also has it that should you catch them at it, you will go blind or quite possibly die.’
Surprise Reunion with His Cinderella Page 14