The Heir’s Chosen Bride

CHAPTER SIX

HAMISH spent the rest of the day being inspected. From every angle. Susie had been right when she’d said his presence would take everyone’s mind off their loss. He could not only hear the buzz his presence was making. He could feel it. He was whispered about, talked about, watched…

‘I need to get this kilt off,’ he told Jake. ‘Did I ever wolf-whistle a woman for having great legs? Kill me now. I deserve it. Everyone’s staring at my knees.’

‘They’re staring at the whole package,’ Jake said. ‘And you can forget any sympathy from this direction. You’re not wearing size twenty purple and red shoes. My feet are killing me.’

‘Did Susie tell me you were a surgeon in the city before you were married?’ Hamish said curiously. ‘What on earth made you move here?’

‘Life,’ Jake said, and Hamish looked out over the fairground and shuddered.

‘Not my idea of life.’

‘And your idea of life would be…’

‘Control,’ Hamish said forcefully. ‘Knowing what I’m waking up to every morning.’

‘I know what I’m waking up to every morning,’ Jake said peaceably. ‘Chaos. I wouldn’t have it any other way.’

‘Poles apart,’ Hamish said morosely. Then he thought of another issue. ‘And what the hell are you about, giving Susie a dog? Hasn’t she got enough to cope with? She’s got to make her way in America, get a career going. How’s she going to handle a dog?’

‘The heart expands to fit all comers,’ Jake said and grinned. ‘I’m a doctor, you know. That’s a very medical sort of diagnosis.’

‘Sure it does,’ Hamish snapped. ‘Susie’s now been loaded with a mutt who she’ll have to love whether she wants to or not.’

‘Love isn’t the same as provide for,’ Jake said, looking at him curiously. ‘It’s a bit different. Sure, it means more work but to not accept it…’

‘You’re telling me there are any real advantages in her getting a dog?’

‘Kirsty’s her twin,’ Jake said definitely. ‘If Kirsty says she needs a dog, then she needs a dog. She’s lonely as hell.’

‘Dogs don’t fix loneliness.’

‘They do a bit,’ Jake said. ‘Anyway, the dog wasn’t my decision, mate. Kirsty thinks it’s a good idea and getting between the twins is like dividing the Red Sea. It’d take a force bigger than I have at my disposal. They’re inseparable.’

‘But Susie’s going home.’

‘There is that,’ Jake said. He surveyed Hamish thoughtfully and Hamish lifted his beer and studied the dregs.

‘If you look at me like that for any more than two more seconds I’m walking out of here and I’ll keep walking till I reach America,’ he said softly, and Jake grinned.

‘Fair enough. You’ve copped a bit of matchmaking, then.’

‘Just a bit. The whole fairground had gone into Wouldn’t it be great? mode.’

‘Well, it would be great.’

‘Except I like my women self-contained, clever, cool and sassy.’

‘Susie’s clever and sassy.’

‘Four or nothing,’ he said, and drained his beer. ‘I’m engaged to Marcia. She’ll be here the day after tomorrow.’

Jake raised an eyebrow. Sussing him. And grinning. ‘First I’ve heard of it. But it’s no business of mine, mate,’ he added, pushing himself to his size twenty feet. ‘I have two hundred more balloons to disperse before I’m off duty. One more beer and I’ll let the whole lot go skyward. Which might not be such a bad thing, if I didn’t have three womenfolk who’d give me a hard time for the rest of my life. They’d probably make me blow up two hundred more.’

‘Marcia would never give me a hard time over a balloon.’

‘Lucky you,’ Jake said. ‘Or unlucky you. Depending on which way you want to look at it, but I sure as hell know what way I’m looking at it. I’ll leave you to your very important phone call.’

‘My…?’

‘If Marcia’s coming in two days, hadn’t you better let her know?’ Jake suggested. ‘If you’re arming the battlements it’s always a good idea to let the armour know what’s required.’

What was it about this place? He’d landed in some chaotic muddle of people who seemed to think they knew him because his name was Douglas. Who seemed to think they knew more about his life than he did.

Which was clearly ridiculous.

But Jake had said he needed to make a phone call-and Jake was right.

Calculation. Midday here. Eight at night there. Fine.

Marcia answered on the first ring. Still at her desk, then.

‘Hi,’ she said warmly. ‘How’s the valuation going?’

‘I’m a bit distracted,’ he told her. He’d emerged from the hubbub of noise within the beer tent, he’d retreated to the side of the marquee but he could still see the colourful chaos that was the fair. ‘Our pumpkin just won a major prize.’

There was a moment’s silence. Then… ‘Well, hooray for our pumpkin. Hamish, are you feeling well?’

‘Are you absolutely imperatively busy at the moment?’

‘I’m always absolutely imperatively busy.’

‘And if you dropped everything and came here…’

‘Why would I do that?’

‘The widow,’ he said, and his desperation must have sounded down the wire because there was laughter.

‘Oh, darling, I did wonder. You’re the heir and she’s the dowager. So there’s a bit of matchmaking?’

‘Not on our part. I mean…she doesn’t want it any more than I do. But the townspeople do, and it’d make it much easier to keep everything on a business footing if you appeared.’

There was a moment’s silence. He could imagine her scrolling down the screen of her electronic diary, juggling appointments. Figuring out imperatives.

‘I can spare you three days,’ she said at last. ‘There’s a financial review in Hong Kong starting next Friday I was tempted to attend. Hong Kong’s almost your time zone so I could get over jet-lag with you. I have no intention of being in Hong Kong if my mind’s not totally focussed. There’s some heavy stuff going down. Oil futures. It could be really big.’

‘So that means…’

‘I’ll be with you Monday your time. I’ll fly out again on Thursday. Will that solve your problems?’

He stared around him. Oil futures in Hong Kong.

One of Jake’s twins-Alice?-was walking toward him carrying a hot dog. She was leaving a trail of ketchup in her wake. She was beaming and holding it out to him as if it was a truly amazing gift.

Marcia here?

She had to come. He needed grounding. Fast.

‘That’ll be great,’ he said weakly.

‘I’ll let you know the arrangements. Is there anything else you need now? I’m in a rush.’

‘No.’

‘Then ’bye.’ Click.

‘Marcia’s coming,’ he told Alice as he accepted her hot dog, and she gave him a dubious smile.

‘Is Marcia nice?’

‘Very nice.’

‘Does she like hot dogs?’

‘I guess.’

‘My Aunty Susie says you have to come,’ she said. ‘The wood chopping’s about to start and the laird always has first chop.’

‘He’s a bit of all right.’

The woodchopping had seemed just what Hamish had needed. His hands were still a bit sore from digging but he put that aside. The sight of logs, waiting to be chopped, meant that he could vent his spleen in a way that didn’t hurt anyone (except him-pity about the blisters!), didn’t involve so much alcohol that he’d regret it the next day and got him away from Susie.

The logs were propped as posts. The woodchoppers were given a truly excellent axe and told to go to it. Hamish did his first ceremonial chop, then watched the champion woodchoppers with something akin to envy. While he watched the woodchoppers, the inhabitants of Dolphin Bay were watching him, talking about him, clapping him on the back-and looking sideways at Susie.

Things were starting to get desperate. His blisters hurt-but would a real earl be deflected by a few blisters? Of course not.

As the novice events started, he stripped to the waist and proceeded to chop.

‘There’s something about a man in a kilt and nothing else,’ Kirsty murmured, and nudged her sister. ‘Ooh-er. A fine figure of a man, our new laird.’

‘He’s not our new laird,’ Susie retorted, a trifle breathlessly. ‘A new laird wouldn’t sell his castle and run.’

‘He hasn’t sold it yet. There’s many a slip…’

‘Cut it out, Kirsty.’

‘Susie, he’s gorgeous.’

‘Kirsty, he’s engaged to be married.’

‘So you have noticed he’s gorgeous.’

‘I’d have to be blind not to notice he’s gorgeous.’

The logs had to be chopped into four. The way it was done was to chop a chunk out, ram a plank into the chunk, stand on the plank and lop the top off. Then lower the plank and start again with a lower chunk. Hamish was on his second level. Chunks of wood were flying everywhere-there was more enthusiasm than science in his technique. His body was glistening with sweat.

‘Kilts are yummy,’ Kirsty said thoughtfully. ‘I wonder if Jake’d wear one.’

‘I’m yummy enough without a kilt.’ Jake had come up behind them, and now he put his arms round his wife and hugged. ‘How do you improve on just plain irresistible?’

‘I liked you better when you were four feet taller,’ Susie told him, eyeing her brother-in-law with disfavour. ‘And I don’t know how it is but the red nose just doesn’t cut it.’

‘It turns Kirsty on, though,’ Jake said smugly, and Kirsty answered by pulling his plastic nose back to the full length of its elastic, holding it thoughtfully for a moment and then letting it go.

‘Yep, I like it better on,’ she said, and turned back to her sister. ‘Now, where were we?’

‘Hey.’ Jake clutched his nose in pain and Susie giggled. But there was a part of her…

There was a part of her that was really, really jealous of her sister and her husband, she decided. She’d met and fallen for Rory, but she’d had him for such a short time and then he’d been gone. His loss still had the power to hurt so much that she almost couldn’t bear it. The sight of her sister and her husband so happy…

Her eyes turned involuntarily back to Hamish. Hamish smashing through his third the level of wood. Hamish concentrating every ounce of energy in getting the log through, pitting his strength against the wood.

She thought of how he’d been yesterday morning, digging her path with just such energy. What was driving him?

What was this Marcia like?

It wasn’t her business.

‘I’m going home,’ she said abruptly. ‘Harriet’s over under the trees with Rosie and Pup. I’ll go and collect them. I think it’d be better if I took Pup home now and settled her into her new home before dinner. Even if that home is temporary,’ she added in an undertone but Kirsty heard and winced.

‘Susie, do you mind? About the puppy?’

‘I love Pup.’ She hugged her sister.

‘But Hamish…do you mind that he’s taking over?’

‘Well…’ She shrugged. ‘I can’t not mind, but it doesn’t make sense to care too much.’

‘If you two got on…’

‘We do get on. And no matter how much better we got on, he’d still sell the castle. It’s the only sensible thing to do. Can you give him a ride home?’

‘Sure,’ Jake told her. ‘If you really need to go.’

‘I really need to go.’

He won.

Hamish stood over his four pieces of chopped logs and gasped until he got his breath back. This was fantastic. Much better than any gym workout. He was standing bare backed, clad only in his kilt and footwear, the sun burning on his skin, the wash of the sea the background roar to the applause of the crowd. His hands were a bit painful-actually, very painful-but what was a bit of pain? It felt like he’d been transformed into another place, another time. Another life.

He’d won.

He turned to where Susie had been standing, and she wasn’t there.

‘Where…?’ he started, and Jake came toward him and wrung his hand.

‘Well done, mate.’

‘Ouch,’ Hamish muttered, and hauled his hand back. ‘Where’s Susie?’

‘Gone home.’

Right. Suddenly his hands were really, really painful.

This was dumb-but it didn’t feel fantastic any more.

Hamish didn’t come home for dinner and Susie didn’t care. She didn’t, she didn’t, she didn’t. She’d eaten far too much rubbish at the fair to worry about dinner-a piece of the inevitable toast was fine. She fed the puppy the mix Adam’s mother had thoughtfully packed. She popped her to sleep in the wet room, and then as the puppy complained she carted her back to the kitchen, sat in the rocker in front of the fire and cuddled her.

‘I’m calling you Taffy,’ she said. ‘I know I had sixty-three other suggestions but they can’t tell me what to call my very own puppy.’

Taffy looked up at her in sleepy agreement, curled into her lap and proceeded to go to sleep.

Susie rocked on.

‘Me and a puppy and a baby,’ she whispered. ‘I have a houseful.’

‘Where will I go?’ she whispered back. ‘Where will I take my little family?’

She’d go back to the house she’d shared with Rory. Of course. That was the best thing to do. The simplest.

But the thought of going back to the house she’d shared with Rory…

‘It’ll be empty, Taf,’ she told the puppy, popping her down onto a cushion by the fire. ‘Even with you. It’s a gorgeous house on the coast. It looks out over the ocean. It’s really wild. Rory worked from home and it was great with the two of us there but…but I’m not sure you and Rosie are going to be good enough company.’

As if in answer to her question, Taffy said nothing at all.

Susie rocked on. She’d lit the range more for company than because she needed its warmth, but the gentle crackle and hiss of burning logs was comforting.

Not comforting enough.

‘I have to go home.’

‘Isn’t talking to yourself the first sign of madness?’

She jumped close on a foot. When she came down to earth she was breathless-and cross.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’

‘Coming home,’ Hamish said and it was so much an echo of what she’d been thinking that she almost jumped again.

‘You scared me.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘It’s your kitchen,’ she said, but she sounded defensive. She took a grip and tried for a lighter note. ‘You’ve had supper?’

But she was still flustered. He didn’t look nearly as together as he’d looked that morning. He was still in his kilt but he’d chopped wood; he’d been drinking beer with the men; he’d joined the tug-of-war teams. He looked dishevelled and tired and frayed, like a Scottish lord coming home after a hard day at battle.

‘You’ve got a splodge of toffee apple on your cheek,’ she managed, a trifle breathlessly, and he wiped it away with the back of his hand and grinned.

‘I’ve had a very good time.’

‘Not like Manhattan, huh?’

‘Not the least like Manhattan. I’ve never had a day like this in my life.’

‘Do you want supper?’

‘Are you kidding?’ He was standing in the doorway looking big and tousled. His long socks were down at his ankles, his legs were bare and there were grass stains on his kilt. And his hair had hay in it. He looked…he looked…

Cut it out, she told herself desperately. Don’t look!

‘I’ve been judging the cooking,’ he told her, still with that grin that had her heart doing those crazy somersaulting things she didn’t understand at all. ‘They made me honorary adjudicator, which means I’ve tasted scones, plum cakes, sponge cakes…you name it, I’ve tasted it. Some of it was truly excellent.’

‘What makes you a judge?’

‘It’s the kilt,’ he told her wisely. ‘Anyone wearing a kilt like this has to know a lot about cooking. A lot about everything, really. That’s why they have the House of Lords in England.’

‘Sorry?’

‘If you’re a lord then you get to be an automatic Member of Parliament,’ he told her. ‘I read it somewhere. I haven’t figured out whether it applies to me or not, but I guess inheriting earldomship must make me wise in some respects.’

‘Like in judging scones.’

‘That’d be it,’ he told her, and all of a sudden they were grinning at each other like fools. The atmosphere had changed and it was somehow…

Different.

She hadn’t felt like this since Rory had died, she thought, and suddenly she felt breathless. Traitorish?

No. Free. It was like a great grey cloud, which had settled on top of her for the last two years, had lifted and she felt…extraordinary.

‘You don’t mind that Marcia’s coming?’ he said, and she caught herself and forced her stupid, floating mind back to earth with a snap.

‘Of course I don’t. This is your house.’

‘I should have told you.’

‘There was no need. There’s plenty of room. And as I said, I can always move out.’

‘I don’t want you to move out…yet.’

Good. Great. She thought about it and wondered if she was being entirely sensible.

‘I need to go,’ she said a trifle uncertainly, rising and moving toward the door.

‘To America?’

‘Not tonight.’ She managed a smile but the frisson of something different was still in the air and she felt strange. This was crazy. This man was engaged to someone called Marcia and she’d have nothing to do with him after she left here. But today… Today he’d made her smile and he’d made everyone here smile, too. She was under no illusions as to how sad a day it would have been for everyone if Hamish hadn’t been here, but he’d bounced around the fair having fun, charming old ladies, eating too many scones and toffee apples, looking fabulous in his kilt. He’d given the locals something to talk about, something to smile over, and even when he left in a few weeks, even though he’d sell the castle, today had been a gift.

‘Thank you,’ she said simply.

‘Thank you?’

‘For today. Everyone loved having a laird for the day.’

‘It was my pleasure.’

‘Really?’

‘It was,’ he said.

And there it was again. Bang. Like in the comics, she thought a little bit helplessly. Wham, bang, zing, splat.

‘Good night, my lord,’ she said simply, and he put out a hand and took hers. And winced.

The gesture had been a friendly good-night touch, but as she took his hand in hers and felt its warmth, touched his strength, she also felt something else.

‘Ouch,’ she said, turning his palm over. And then she saw his palm and she repeated the word with feeling. ‘Ouch!’

‘It is a bit,’ he confessed, but she was no longer listening.

‘Oh, Hamish, your hands. You dope. You blistered them with digging and then to use the axe…’

‘We earls aren’t wusses.’

‘You earls are dopes,’ she told him. ‘I might have known. Angus was just like you. You know, we had to dress his oxygen canister up in tartan so he could go to his last fair without feeling like a wuss.’

‘I don’t have an oxygen cylinder,’ he said, startled, and she shook her head in disgust.

‘Not for want of trying. Hamish, these are awful.’

‘Don’t say that,’ she said uneasily. ‘I’ve been trying to ignore them all day.’

‘Right. Ignoring them why? Waiting for your hands to drop off?’

‘My hands are not going to drop off.’

‘There’s ten blisters on this hand,’ she said, hauling it closer to get a better look. ‘And there’s a splinter in this one. And another. You great dope. I’ll ring Kirsty.’

‘Kirsty?’

‘My sister,’ she said, exasperated. ‘This needs medical attention.’

‘I’ll wash it,’ he said, as if granting an enormous concession. ‘That’ll fix it.’

‘It won’t fix it.’

‘If you tell me how bad it is one more time, I’ll cry,’ he said, like it was a huge threat, and she blinked and stared up at him in astonishment.

‘Really?’

‘Um…no.’

‘I wouldn’t blame you if you did.’

‘I won’t. I have an aversion to the pastime.’

‘Well, don’t stick near me, then,’ she told him. ‘I cry all the time. Just looking at these makes me teary. You great hulking hero.’

‘Hero?’

‘Axing away with all of these.’ She was examining each blister, searching for more splinters, and the thought of him chopping wood, doing it to make the old ladies smile… That’s why he’d done it, she thought. She’d thought he’d done it because it had seemed fun but now, looking at these hands, she thought he’d done it because that’s what she’d asked him to do. Create a diversion from Angus’s death. Give the locals something else to think about it. He’d eaten scones, he’d chopped wood, he’d placed every eye on him and he’d made people smile.

‘Please, don’t cry.’ He sounded so scared that she stared up at him in even more bewilderment. His face was set, and he was backing away. But she had hold of his hand and she wasn’t letting him go anywhere. He was a dope but he was a great, gorgeous dope and he’d done this because she’d asked him to. Therefore-at great personal sacrifice-she’d choke back tears and be businesslike.

‘I’m not crying,’ she said, trying to sound exasperated and not emotional. ‘Sit.’

‘Sit?’

‘I’ll clean them and I’ll pull the splinters out. And then I’ll put on iodine and we’ll see how much of a man you are. You don’t cry, huh? Iodine on these will be a real truth test. Iodine would make an onion howl all by itself.’

So he sat in the old rocking chair in front of the range, his free hand soaking in a bowl of soapy water she’d rested on his kilted knees while she carefully examined each blister, cleaned it, lifted out tiny shards of wood with a pair of tweezers-and then anointed each one with iodine.

‘You should have a bullet to bite on,’ she told him, and he looked down at her mop of auburn curls and thought he wasn’t even near yelling. He was hardly thinking about pain.

She was intent on his hand. She was so…simple, he thought, but maybe that wasn’t the word. She’d changed from the clothes she’d worn at the fair. Now she was wearing a pair of shorts and a faded T-shirt that was a little too tight. Her legs and her feet were bare. She was wearing no makeup. Her hair was falling forward, stopping him seeing what she was doing with his hand but at the same time distracting him nicely.

She smelt of some citrusy soap, he thought. She’d probably showered when she’d come home from the fair. Maybe she and Rosie had bathed together and the vision of her bathing her baby was suddenly…

Whew. It was just as well Marcia was coming, he thought. A man could get himself into dangerous territory here.

And why wouldn’t a man want to?

The thought was so far out of left field that he blinked and almost pulled his hand away. She felt the tug and looked up in concern, all huge eyes and tousled hair and…and Susie.

‘I’m trying hard not to hurt you.’

‘You’re not hurting me.’

‘Tell me about your job,’ she said, turning her attention back to the splinters as if it was important that she look at anything but him. As maybe it was.

‘My job?’

‘You’re a financier.’

‘Mmm.’

‘You love being a financier?’

‘I guess.’ Did he? He wasn’t sure.

‘I’ve been trying to imagine why,’ she told him. ‘I get such a kick out of planting something and watching it grow. Do you see schemes through to the end? Like if someone comes to you and says please can I build a bulldozer factory, can I have some money, does it give you the same thrill? That those bulldozers would never have got built if it hadn’t been for you?’

‘Um…maybe that’s banking,’ he said uneasily.

‘So you don’t do any hands-on supplying of money for doing interesting stuff like building bulldozers.’

‘No.’

‘So what do you finance?’

‘I guess most of my work is taken up with futures broking,’ he told her.

‘Which is…’

‘Figuring out what money is going to be worth in the future and buying and selling on that basis.’

She tweaked out another sliver of wood. Thoughtful. ‘So you buy and sell money. It seems a bit odd to me but if it makes you happy…’

Did it make him happy? He’d never thought about it. It seemed such an odd concept that he almost didn’t understand the question.

The high-powered finance world was where he’d worked all his adult life. All he knew was wheeling and dealing, the adrenalin rush of vast fiscal deals, the knife edge of knowing it was his brains holding everything in place and if he slipped up…

He thought about his mother’s reaction when he’d told her that he’d been made a full equity partner. For once she hadn’t cried. She’d closed her eyes and when she’d opened them things had changed.

‘Now I can stop worrying,’ she’d said.

Full equity partner in one of Manhattan’s biggest brokerage firms…well, if that was what it had taken to stop the tears, then great. And he was good at his job. It had earned him a lot, and he had no time to think about anything else.

What else was there to think about but work?

The scent of Susie’s hair? That was all he could think about now. That and the feel of her fingers carefully working on his hands. Each blister was being tended with care. It was such a strange sensation. An intimate sensation.

Would Marcia ever tend his blisters?

How would he get blisters around Marcia? He wouldn’t. His biggest risk was of repetitive strain injury caused by using his Blackberry too much.

A cold damp something hit the edge of his bare leg and he hauled himself from his reverie and stared down.

Pup.

‘Whoops,’ Susie said, and laid Hamish’s hands carefully on his kilted knees and scooped up the pup. ‘That’s good timing. Taffy, if you’ve woken up, you go outside straight away. Hamish, don’t touch anything. I’ll be back.’ And she was gone, whisking the pup out into the gathering dusk.

Don’t touch anything.

He sat for a bit, not thinking anything, letting his mind go blank. The sensation was almost extraordinary. When had he last done this?

Simply…stopped.

There was always something to do. Always. Reports to read, e-mail to check, constant analysis. If he didn’t keep up then others would get ahead or things could slip by him and, hell, what was the use of being in the heap if you weren’t on top?

His laptop was up in his bedroom. He’d connected briefly that morning, checking things were OK. He should go up now and see…

It was seven at night. Three in the morning New York time. Not a lot was happening over there right now.

The Japanese market would be online, he decided. The yen had been looking pretty shaky when he’d left. It wouldn’t hurt to stay online for a bit and get the feel for…

Susie was out in the garden. With Taffy.

From where he sat he could hear the sea. He could smell the sea.

She’d told him to stay, so he did, sort of. He walked to the kitchen door and watched while she introduced Taffy to the lawn and explained what was required.

As if the dog could understand.

‘There’s no hurry,’ she was saying. ‘I understand it’s all a bit strange and new, and there’s even more strange and new to come, but we can take our time. Me and Rose will be the constants wherever you are, and we’ll always be able to find you a patch of grass. There’s not a lot else you need to worry about.’

What about the Dow Jones? Hamish thought, glancing at his watch and wondering what the financial markets had done in the past ten hours. He always needed to worry about the Dow Jones.

But maybe not now. Maybe worrying about financial indices here was…ridiculous.

Susie was kneeling on the grass. The dopy pup had rolled over onto her back, and Susie was scratching her tummy. She wriggled in delight, her ungainly body squirming with ecstasy on the still sun-warmed ground.

How was she going to cope? Hamish thought. With a baby. With a puppy. She had a lot to worry about. She should be worrying about it right now!

She wasn’t worrying. She lay on the grass herself and the puppy climbed on top of her. The last flickers of light from the tangerine sunset were soft on her face. She was giggling as the puppy tried to lick her cheek. From behind he could hear Rose chirping as she woke from what he presumed was a very late afternoon nap. Susie would never get her daughter to sleep tonight.

But she didn’t care, he thought. She had no sense of order. He remembered his mother if dinner was five minutes late. She’d be almost apoplectic with anxiety.

He thought of Marcia if things didn’t run to plan. What would Marcia do if he gave her a puppy?

Marcia would give the puppy right back. And as for a baby…

Marcia letting a baby having an afternoon nap at this hour? Marcia having a baby?

The idea was so ridiculous that he grinned and Susie looked over and saw him grinning and said, ‘What?’

‘What yourself?’

‘You’re laughing at me.’

‘I’m laughing at your puppy. There’s a difference. Rose is awake.’

‘Goody.’ She scrambled to her feet, put the puppy down and made to go indoors. ‘She went to sleep on the way home and wouldn’t wake up. She’ll be so hungry. I almost woke her but then I remembered there’s an English comedy show I like on TV late tonight, and it’s the best fun watching it with Rose.’

Then as he blinked, trying to reconcile late-night comedy and a fourteen-month-old toddler, she hesitated. As she’d started toward the door Taffy had followed.

‘You haven’t done what you need to do,’ she told the puppy, and pointed to the grass. ‘Duty first.’

The puppy looked up at her new mistress with adoration, and wagged her tail.

‘Stay here with her while I fetch Rose,’ Susie ordered Hamish, and he nodded and put a foot out to stop Taffy following her mistress.

Taffy sat down and howled.

They both looked at Taffy. Taffy looked at both of them, opened her jaws and howled even longer.

‘Whoops,’ Susie said. ‘What have I let myself in for?’

‘Give her back,’ Hamish told her.

‘What?’

‘You don’t have to keep her.’

She snatched Taffy up and glared. ‘What a thing to say. Don’t listen, sweetheart. You’re mine. We’re a family. I don’t mind the odd howl. It’s an excellent howl and it’s all your very own. I wonder if you’ll like my TV programme, too.’

This was seriously weird. There were all sorts of things happening inside Hamish that he had no idea what to do with.

‘You can’t be a family to that…that.’

‘That gorgeous pup? I can be a family with whoever I want,’ she snapped, hauling herself up to her full five feet four inches and glaring. ‘Taffy needs me out here. Can you fetch Rose?’

‘What, get her from her cot?’

‘That’s the plan.’

‘Just walk in and pick her up?’

‘You earls have great courage,’ she said, obviously trying not to sound sarcastic. ‘If you pick her up under the armpits and close your palms, it won’t even hurt your blisters.’

It wasn’t his blisters he was afraid of. ‘I can’t pick up a baby.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. Get in there.’

‘Woof,’ said Taffy.

He stared at the pair of them and they stared back, challenging.

He could do this. Right. You earls have great courage…

Right.

He strode into the house, followed the sound of Rosie’s increased indignation and pushed open the door to Susie’s and Rosie’s shared bedroom. And paused in astonishment.

The bed was vast, a great four-poster with mounds of eider-downs and more mounds of cushions. There were pinks and purples and almost crimsons and gold. It was an amazing bed.

And the walls…

Deirdre’s kitsch ornaments had been taken down, and Susie had covered the walls with prints-not expensive artwork but prints she’d obviously ordered because they appealed.

There were all sorts of prints.

Tree ferns taken from strange angles. Waterfalls. Rock formations. That was one wall.

Another wall was the sea-vast curling waves, surfers doing all sorts of incredible twisting turns, shots of foam, a single rock pool, a tiny minnow against a vast pier pile…

The third was people. Grins. People smiling. These weren’t people she knew. Ancient Tibetan grandmothers with gap-toothed grins. Old men smiling at each other in friendship. A group of kids in Scout uniform, smiling in unison.

And the last wall was photographs blown up. Susie as a kid, he thought, looking at twins cavorting on a beach. Photographs of a man who was obviously Rory. A couple in love. He looked at them smiling at each other, and felt a twist of…

No. Don’t look. You don’t need to feel like this.

It was dumb to put such photographs up, he thought. This was as kitsch as Deirdre’s efforts.

But then he thought, No, it’s not. He thought of his apartment back in Manhattan, and Marcia’s, planned by the same minimalist decorator who’d recoil in horror if she saw this. But this sort of worked. It was a huge collage of life, of living, of all Susie held dear.

An indignant yell brought him back to earth. In the centre of the room was that which Susie held dearest. The toddler was beaming as she saw she’d caught his attention. She was holding her hands out and saying, ‘Up.’

‘Hi,’ he said weakly, and she bounced and grinned and held her hands higher.

‘Up, up, up.’

He could do this. He put his hands under her arms and gingerly raised her.

She giggled and pointed to the bed. ‘Dappy,’ she said.

Dappy. He thought about it. Then he realised what she meant. Um, no.

He made to carry her-holding her at arm’s length-out the door, out to her mother, but her yell became urgent. He had her agenda wrong.

‘Dappy, dappy, dappy.’

You earls have great courage.

‘Where are your diapers?’ he asked, and she pointed an imperious finger to the pile on a side table. Under the Tibetan grandmas.

‘Dappy.’

OK. He set Rose down on the floor but she yelled in indignation. Her routine was obviously to be followed to the letter.

‘Bed,’ she said, and pointed.

‘Give me a break,’ he said weakly, but he was a man under orders. He tossed a diaper across to the bed, then lifted Rose and set her down on the eiderdown. She almost disappeared in its vastness.

She giggled and kicked her feet, squirming away from him and burrowing under the cushions. This was obviously a game, played whenever she woke up.

The bed smelt like Susie.

The room smelt like Susie.

Rose lifted a cushion, grinned at him, chortled and pulled the pillow back over her head again. He considered, then put a finger on the small of her back and tickled.

Shrieks of laughter and she squirmed deeper. Right under the quilt.

He put his head under the quilt and said, ‘Boo.’

‘Dappy,’ she said, and pushed the quilt away, lay flat and waited. ‘Boo’ was obviously the magic word.

And he performed magic as well. Hamish Douglas, corporate financier, ninth Earl of Loganaich, successfully changed a diaper.

‘Like climbing Annapurna One,’ he told himself, setting Rose on the floor, carrying the used diaper into the bathroom in triumph and thinking of the world’s second most difficult climb. ‘A soggy diaper. A soiled diaper represents Everest.’

Then as Rose looked thoughtful he tossed the diaper into the wastebin and dived on the toddler to take her out to her mother before she could send him up his second mountain.

He wasn’t ready for Everest yet.

Susie was still waiting for Taffy to perform. She was sitting on a garden seat, watching the dark settle over the garden, simply…waiting.

Hamish delivered her daughter, Rose squirmed down onto the grass and she and Taffy proceeded to investigate each other.

‘Aren’t you going to make her dinner?’ Hamish asked, and Susie smiled down at her puppy and her daughter and shook her head.

‘No one’s in a hurry.’

It was such a strange concept that Hamish blinked.

‘You want a seat?’ Susie wriggled sideways, making room on the bench.

Why would he sit down? Just to sit?

‘Maybe I’ll work on the path.’

‘With those hands? Are you out of your mind?’

‘We earls have great courage.’

‘You earls need a straitjacket if you work with hands like those. Just stop, Hamish. Rest.’

He sat. Gingerly. It felt weird.

‘Thank you for today,’ she said gently, and he felt even more weird.

‘Why…?’

‘You’ve made today happy for a lot of people. Just by being here.’

‘Just by exposing my knees?’

‘A thing of beauty is a joy for ever,’ she said serenely, and he choked.

‘Right.’

‘Honest, Hamish.’ Her hand came out to touch his arm. Lightly resting. There was no pressure but the feel of her fingers on his arm was almost his undoing. That and the warmth of the night, the soft hush of the sea, the weird domesticity of pup and baby playing at their feet…

‘You were wonderful,’ she said, and suddenly she twisted so she could kiss him. Lightly. It was a kiss of thanks. No more than that. A feather kiss.

Except…it wasn’t.

People kissed all the time, Hamish thought. They kissed in greeting, and farewell, or as had just happened, to say thank you. It meant nothing. There was no reason to think that a twenty-thousand-volt electric charge had just cut off every other circuit in his body.

Why?

There was no reason, he thought, dazed.

Or was it because Susie was a thousand light years away from any other woman he’d ever dated? She was a thousand light years from Marcia. In her faded shorts and T-shirt and nothing else, nothing to attract, nothing at all, she smelt…she felt…

Soft and delicious and absolutely, imperatively desirable.

It was just the day, he thought, hauling back in shock and dazed wonder. It had been a day totally out of his experience, and he was floundering here because he’d never met anyone like this before, and there were probably thousands of women who were like this but he’d just never met them, and he was out of his comfort zone, and…

‘Hey, Hamish, I’m not planning on jumping you,’ Susie said, and he jerked back to reality. To Susie staring at him with eyes that were bemused-and maybe also a little hurt.

‘I know. It’s just…I’m engaged to Marcia.’

Maybe that had been the wrong thing to say.

‘I know you’re engaged to Marcia,’ she said with asperity. ‘You really do think I’m planning on jumping you. Just because I’m a widow.’

‘No.’

‘You do,’ she said, and there was no disguising the anger now. She rose and stood, glaring at him with her hands on her hips, vibrating with fury. ‘If your colleague in the next office said goodbye, have a good vacation, and kissed you, what would you have thought?’

‘Nothing.’ Of course not. It was what had happened. ‘Hey, Hamish is off on a vacation, can you believe that? ‘Bye, Hamish, take care.’ Kiss.

It meant nothing. But he had to stop thinking sideways. Susie was in temper-on mode.

‘But because I’m a widow, everyone looks at me like I’m encroaching. Like I’m just planning how to get the next man into my bed. Like I’m every married woman’s worst enemy. Even you. It’s so unfair. I loved Rory like I’ve never loved anyone. I’m not in the market for another relationship, and hauling Marcia over here just to protect yourself… Don’t think I don’t realise what you’re doing, Hamish Douglas. There was no inkling from you that Marcia would be coming until everyone looked at us like a couple. Then you started looking like a rabbit caught in headlights. It’s just so dumb. Dumb, dumb, dumb.’ She swooped down and lifted Rose into her arms.

‘Come on, sweetheart. We’ll go make you some dinner and leave his Lordship here in solitary splendour. In the knowledge that his virtue can remain intact for his precious Marcia. But know that even if there were a million Marcias-or do I mean if there weren’t any?-there’s no way I’m interested in you, Hamish Douglas, Not the least little bit. Not one skerrick. You leave me as cold as a flat, dead fish.’

She turned and wheeled into the house. Hamish was left starting after her.

Taffy looked at up him, doubtful.

‘I’d follow,’ he told the pup. ‘I’m a flat, dead fish.’

Taffy hesitated a bit more but then as Hamish remained unmoving she obviously decided that maybe Hamish was right. Flat, dead fish were a bit unappetising.

He followed Susie.

There was absolute silence. Even the hush of the sea was fading.

Nothing.

A flat, dead fish.

He should go check his e-mail. He should-

There was a groan from the house and Susie’s head appeared at the kitchen window.

‘Thanks for sending Taffy inside,’ she snapped. ‘She’s done her business in the hallway. Over to you, your Lordship.’

Great. He rose. We earls have great courage.

Even flat, dead fish had their uses.