He hadn’t learned enough about this place where Tori had grown up to leave just yet. He hadn’t learned enough about Tori.
She’d disappeared with her Uncle Henry before he’d been able to have a real conversation with her, then hadn’t shown herself at all at lunch, while he and Henry had served up sandwiches and home-made sausage rolls. He’d wanted to go and look for her, take her some food, but Henry had shaken his head and kept him downstairs.
That had been hours ago. Now, making paper chains was the only thing that was distracting his curious mind from driving itself mad wondering where Tori was and what she and Henry had talked about.
What was it about her that made him so desperate to understand? He’d been happy enough for all of his life so far letting other people exist in their own little bubble, without having to know what made them tick, what mattered to them or why they did the things that they did. So what had changed?
Well. He knew the answer to that well enough. Discovering the truth about his family—that his father had lied to him his whole life, that his best friend had done the same for years—it had cemented the lesson that his first experience of love had taught him at nineteen: no one was really what they seemed. Any happy, smiling facade could conceal a whole barrage of lies. If the people who claimed to care about him most could lie to his face, day after day, how many more deceptions and untruths could people who didn’t care about him hide?
But until now that revelation had only made him keep people at arm’s length—so far away that they couldn’t get close enough for their lies to impact him at all. He’d learned in business to assume that everyone was, at the very least, massaging the facts. And in an industry where most people were that caution had served him well.
For some reason, that same assumption had the opposite effect on him when it came to Tori. He wanted to get closer, to draw her in and discover her lies and her secrets.
Maybe it was because they were stuck there, with nothing else to do. Jasper had never been good at boredom. Except he’d found plenty to do, hadn’t he, between the kids and the snowmen and the paper chains and helping Henry serve meals?
Maybe it was that night they’d spent together before he left for America. He’d had plenty of other nights with other women, before and since, but something about that one stayed with him. Not the sex—well, not just the sex, although that had been pretty damn memorable too—but the feeling of closeness.
To start with it had been drunken conversation and tipsy kisses. Then it had been desperate and lust-driven, glorious sex. But afterwards...that was when things had changed. The alcohol wearing off, and the memory of the papers he’d glimpsed in his father’s office coming back to haunt him. Knowing what he had to face the next day, the conversation he had to have. The same frantic feeling of helplessness and concern had started to settle on his chest again—until Tori had stopped it.
Her head resting against his shoulder, she’d run her fingers over his skin and said, ‘You’re worrying about something. Want to tell me about it, or want me to distract you?’
She’d known, he realised now. Known exactly how it felt to have a worry or a fear that nothing could be done about. How it ate you up and you couldn’t stop it.
‘Distract me,’ he’d said then, and she had.
She’d talked for ages. Not about her past, of course—but about her future. Things she’d hoped for, wanted for herself. Carefully curated ramblings of gentle possibilities, designed to lull him into calm and even sleep. Which, eventually, they had, his heart rate slowing and his muscles relaxing as he sank into her voice and let her warmth soothe him.
There hadn’t been any sign of anyone else featuring in her imaginings, Jasper realised with a start, about five years too late. Not him, of course—it had been one night together, she was hardly about to start imagining their future happiness, and he’d have run a mile if she had. But no mention of anyone else, either. Not a shadowy future partner, or kids, or a family at all.
She’d mentioned maybe getting a dog. One day. When she was more settled.
She hadn’t, as far as he knew, got one in the five years since.
He glanced at the greyhound by the fire. Had she been remembering the dogs of her childhood when she’d told him that? And was this place the reason she couldn’t settle enough to imagine owning a dog, let alone having a family? He suspected it was. And that made his heart ache for her.
Ever since he’d met her, Tori Edwards had been a mystery. But she was one he finally felt on the verge of solving. And for that reason alone, he couldn’t be sorry for spending another night here with her, trapped by the snow.
Maybe tonight he’d finally find the answers he craved.
* * *
She was going to have to go back downstairs soon. Lying on her side on her childhood bed, staring out at the falling dusk, Tori knew that she couldn’t hide away for ever. As much as she might want to.
‘You have to know we don’t blame you for what happened to Tyler,’ Henry had said that afternoon, his blue eyes sad, the crinkles and wrinkles at the edges making him look older than she’d ever imagined him being.
Eight years she’d been away. Eight birthdays missed, eight Christmases. Eight anniversaries spent standing by a graveside with a bunch of flowers that changed nothing at all.
Of course they blamed her, whatever they said now. And if they didn’t, they should. They would if they knew the whole story. Even without that knowledge, she remembered the recriminations in Aunt Liz’s eyes the day of the funeral. Remembered how Uncle Henry had barely been able to look at her. Even Flash, the greyhound, had whined and turned away from her.
She’d left the Moorside, left Tyler, for university. And Tyler had died because she was gone.
It was as simple and as awful as that. Of course they blamed her.
The pub itself...that told far more truth than Henry had.
Everything was the same. From Tyler’s paintings on the walls, to the menu, to the bar towels hanging in the same old place. It was as if the Moorside had stopped, the day that Tyler died.
She’d tried to make herself go into his bedroom, but failed at the door. Instead, she sat on the floor of the landing, staring at the wooden door, imagining how it looked inside. Because she would bet money it was exactly as she’d left it, eight years ago, the day of the funeral. From the paint on the walls to the faded grey and white chevron blanket Tori’s mum had crocheted for him at one of her clubs, to his favourite of his paintings hanging on the wall. The glow-in-the-dark constellations still stuck on the ceiling, and the photo of the two of them on the dresser, with her smiling up at him as if he’d hung the moon, while he beamed at the camera—the kind of young, flawless happiness that people could only experience once in their lives. And once it was broken, there was no way to ever get that innocent joy back again.
Nothing had changed.
It was still her fault that Tyler had died. The only man—boy, really—who’d ever known and loved her.
Now, lying on her own bed again, she forced herself to remember that. To remember the way he’d begged her not to leave him to go to university. How he’d raged about long-distance relationships just being a drawn-out way of breaking up—as if York were the other side of the world. The break in his voice as he’d told her he was scared of what he’d do without her.
And then, six months later, the call from Henry telling her exactly what he had done.
‘It was an accident, Vicky. He’d had too much to drink, took the bend wrong.’
But she’d known it was more than that. It was what he’d done—what he’d been scared he’d do—without her there to keep him on the rails, keep him safe.
‘You’re my North Star,’ he’d always told her. ‘You keep me on the right path.’
A path he couldn’t keep to without her.
He’d died because she hadn’t been t
here to stop it. Henry and Liz should blame her.
He was their son. She was just some orphan they took in because she had no one else. And because of decisions she had made, now she had no one at all.
No, that wasn’t true. She had herself, and that was all she needed. She had an employer, and colleagues. She had a career and purpose and a good income and a home. She’d achieved so much since she’d left this place. There was no point looking back now.
Except for the part where she was actually trapped in her own past.
‘Stupid snow,’ she muttered as she pushed herself off the bed and onto her feet.
Crossing to the window, she watched the thick flakes falling against the pale glow of the setting sun behind the clouds. Hopefully it would ease off again soon, and maybe tomorrow the road back to the main road at least might be open. She didn’t want to go the other way—the Moor Road, past the valley that had claimed Tyler’s life—anyway.
Her conversation with Henry buzzed through her mind as she ran a brush through her hair, and splashed her face with water to try and take away some of the blotchiness. The last thing she needed was Jasper asking her why she’d been crying.
Jasper. He seemed to be slipping into life at the inn with astounding speed. Even Henry had commented on how he seemed like a nice young man. Tacit approval for a relationship that didn’t exist.
It might have, once, she supposed. That one night they’d spent together...she’d let herself wonder, just for a minute or two, in between the panic, if it might happen again. If it might become something that happened with regularity. Officially, even.
Like a relationship. Not that she wanted or needed such a thing.
But...it had been...nice was the wrong word. But it had been something. Something she hadn’t expected to feel again, after Tyler died. A connection. A possibility.
Plus, the sex had been kind of mind-blowing. So much better than her teenage fumblings and experimentation, even if it felt like a betrayal of Tyler to think it.
But then Jasper had left, of course, as she should have known he would. Ever since she’d met him he’d had a parade of girls passing through Flaxstone, none ever staying long enough to make much of an impact. Felix always said it was because he’d been burned by love before, but Tori had her doubts. More likely that Jasper’s looks, title and money gave him access to far more adoring women than was good for him, and he didn’t even consider that saying no to any of them was a possibility.
She’d thought she had the measure of Jasper, Viscount Darlton, until the evening she’d seen that strange vulnerability in him, and wondered if there might be something more to the man, behind the charm and the confidence. If that one night could have meant something more to him than simply comfort on a bad day.
But then he’d fled the country before she’d even had the chance to stop panicking about having slept with him at all, let alone moved on to actually talking to him about what happened next. Thank God she’d never been stupid enough to fall in love with him. In fact, she’d decided it was probably all for the best, at the time, and that thought had helped her keep that one night firmly at the back of her memory for the last five years. Well, mostly, anyway.
And then he’d come back. He still had that shining brightness he’d had as an entitled, self-confident young man, but there was something more brittle about it now. As if he was trying too hard to be that person again. Tori hadn’t been around him enough to even think about why, really, until this week. Or to be reminded of their night together.
But now? Stuck in her childhood home, reliving all the other memories she’d buried for the better part of a decade, and sharing a bed with the man?
Yeah. She was thinking about it. She was remembering everything.
At least it was more fun than dwelling on Tyler and her many, many mistakes.
With a sigh, Tori decided she was probably about as presentable as she was likely to get, and headed downstairs. Already as she descended she could smell wonderful food scents rising from Henry’s kitchen, and wondered what he’d managed to concoct for them for dinner, from whatever he had in the freezers and stores. Having missed lunch, she sincerely hoped it was both hearty and filling. Something to ward off the cold so she didn’t feel driven to snuggle quite so close to Jasper tonight.
It would help if he weren’t so damn attractive. As much as he could irritate her with that constant bright-side vision, not to mention his entitled, son-of-an-aristocrat presence, she had to admit she sometimes went out of her way to be irritated by him. Because if her brain kept telling her how annoying he was, perhaps it would override her body reminding her how damn sexy he was, to boot. That optimist’s smile of his was almost impossible not to return, as hard as she tried. And she always knew the instant she failed, because it turned warmer, more heated, as if getting a reaction from her was all just foreplay.
Maybe it was, to him.
Hell, maybe it was to her too.
Because her brain was doing a worse and worse job these days. It had even taken the time to point out how damn cute he was building snowmen with kids, or how non-aristocratic he looked helping Henry dish out dinner last night.
Damn it. She was not falling for her boss’s son. No way. Not after five years of trying to forget about him.
And definitely not here and now.
But then she walked into the bar and saw Jasper standing on the counter, pinning garishly coloured paper chains to the beams, cheered on by a swarm of grinning children, as Slade blared out of the speakers and she realised that she might already be too late to stop it.
Maybe even five years too late.
* * *
Dinner that night was a delicious sort of everything stew that Henry declined to detail the ingredients of, but Jasper suspected was ‘everything I could find in the freezer this morning’. He sat perched at the bar mopping his up with a giant hunk of homemade bread, thankful that it was nearly bedtime at least. The one point in the day where Tori couldn’t possibly avoid him any longer.
She’d arrived downstairs that evening just as he’d finished decorating the bar, and he’d almost fallen off his stool at the sight of her. Not because she’d changed into some glamorous new outfit, or done anything different with her hair or make-up, like in some high-school romantic-comedy movie. Because she looked so young, so open, and so scared, in a way he’d never seen before.
What the hell did Henry say to her?
Now, an hour or two later, she surprised him all over again—by hoisting herself up onto the bar stool next to him, as Henry placed a pint of bitter in front of her.
‘You drink pints?’ Jasper asked, figuring she’d probably clam up again if he asked what he really wanted to know. Are you okay?
Tori shrugged and took a sip. ‘I grew up in a pub. Henry taught me to appreciate the good stuff—whenever Liz wasn’t looking.’
Flashing them both a grin, Henry took himself off to serve someone at the far end of the bar.
Jasper hoped the pub was well enough stocked with kids’ juices to get them through the night.
‘Is it strange, being back here?’ That was neutral enough, right? He wasn’t asking why she’d left, or what Henry had said that had made her hide herself away all day.
‘Very,’ Tori said, with feeling. Her eyes cast around the place, as though she was cataloguing everything that had changed in her absence.
‘I guess it’s a lot different. You said you hadn’t been back in eight years...’
She looked up at him sharply. ‘When did I say that?’
‘When we were talking. Last night.’ Damn. He should have known she wouldn’t remember; she’d barely been conscious when she said it.
‘Right.’ She stared down at her pint. ‘Well, yes. It’s been a while.’
Why? He desperately wanted to know, but he also knew that if he asked she’d never tell him. S
he was contrary that way. It was one of the things he found most intriguing about her.
‘But actually I was just thinking about how everything is exactly the same,’ she went on, unprompted. Jasper stayed silent, listening intently. He’d take any scrap of a clue she gave him. ‘Same paintings on the walls... It’s like a time capsule in here. They’ve kept everything exactly the same. Like they never moved on from—’ She broke off.
‘You leaving?’ Jasper guessed.
Tori gave him a half-amused smile and shook her head. ‘No, not that.’
Slipping from his bar stool, Jasper moved from painting to painting, taking in the landscapes and colours, the drama and contrast. He was no great art connoisseur, but he’d spent enough time staring at his ancestors’ oil portraits in the Long Gallery at Flaxstone to know he much preferred these slashes of paint that somehow encapsulated the wildness and the wonder of the moors.
‘They’re great paintings,’ he said, returning to his seat. ‘And perfect for the location. Why would they change them?’
Her smile was sad, this time. ‘They wouldn’t. Ever.’
Jasper made a mental note to ask Henry about the paintings.
‘So. Are we roomies again tonight?’ he asked, bringing the moment back to the present.
‘I guess so. It’s not like there are suddenly fewer people crammed in here.’ Tori didn’t sound as if she was jumping with joy at the prospect. Really, she was hell on a guy’s ego. But then, just when he was about to say something self-deprecating in the hope of making her laugh—he’d take his wins where he could get them, with her—her expression softened in a way he remembered too well, from one night five years ago. ‘You were great with the kids today. I don’t know what everyone would have done without you here to keep them entertained.’
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