Josephine Cox Sunday Times Bestsellers Collection. Josephine Cox

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СКАЧАТЬ of her eyes, she hurried out of the back door, her voice raised in song and her feet skipping as she went.

      By the kennels at the side of the house, Lucy stopped to pet the hounds. She had a marvellous way with animals; whenever they had the chance, the squire’s hounds would follow her everywhere, and while everyone else would stay clear of the bull in its pen, Lucy could often be seen defying instructions to lean over the gate and stroke its nose.

      Lucy was halfway down the hill when she stopped to take off her shoes. The grass looked so warm, lush and inviting in the evening heat. Tying the ankle-straps together, she slung the shoes over her shoulder and went on in bare feet.

      She was almost at the brook when she saw the figure of a man coming towards her. It wasn’t the squire, or he’d have his dogs with him, and it wasn’t Barney Davidson from Overhill Farm, because he was smaller-built.

      She often spoke with Barney when he was out on the hills with his sheep or doing other work on the land. She liked him; he had a kind, caring manner, and was easy to talk with. In fact, if he wasn’t married and she wasn’t still completely infatuated with Edward, she could have fallen for him herself.

      While Lucy grew increasingly curious about the man approaching from the bottom of the hill, he was also straining his eyes to see if it really was Lucy drawing ever closer, though when he saw that familiar wave of long hair flowing in the breeze and the cheeky swagger of her long limbs, he knew it was her and began to run. ‘LUCY!’ The wind carried his voice across the valley. ‘LUCY BAKER, IT’S ME! IT’S YOUR SWEETHEART COME HOME!’

      Hearing the voice, but unable to decipher the words, Lucy stopped and stared. With the sun directly in her face she couldn’t see his features. But she saw the long, confident strides as he ran to her, and when he dropped the kitbag from his back, there was something disturbingly familiar about the way he moved. Slowly but surely, realisation dawned. ‘Edward? My Edward?’ She whispered his name; was it really him? Excitement coursed through her, but she didn’t call out or run forward. She didn’t dare trust her own judgement.

      By the time he got close enough for her to recognise him, she took to her heels and ran to meet him. When he caught her in his arms and swung her high in the air, she laughed and cried with sheer joy. ‘Oh Edward, I thought I’d never see you again!’ She looked into his dark eyes and thought she would never again be so happy.

      ‘I told you I’d be back.’ Breathless, he set her down. ‘I’ve never forgotten you, Lucy. Every day, every minute we’ve been apart, I’ve thought of this day.’

      Caught up in the excitement of the moment, he kissed her long and hard, and held the kiss until Lucy thought she would suffocate.

      ‘Stop!’ Flattening her hands against his chest she remembered how he had walked out on her. ‘What makes you think you can waltz back into my life and just pick up where you left off? You signed up and sailed away without a by your leave, and now you’re back with the same damned cheek of it!’

      Lucy had not forgotten the humiliation, the pain of it all, and then the despair. It had been a bad business for her, and then she found out she was with child and had to suffer in silence until she could hide the secret no longer. Her pregnancy – which caused a great scandal in the neighbourhood – created rows and repercussions between her parents, and in the end she witnessed the break-up of her family, and that was as much Edward’s fault as her own.

      For a long time things had gone from bad to worse, and still she had hoped he might return. But he never did – until now. And though she was thrilled beyond words to see him, she couldn’t help but chide him. ‘You let me down good and proper, Edward Trent!’

      When he now looked desolate, she instantly forgave him and taking off at the run, shouted, ‘If you want me, you’ll have to catch me!’

      And catch her he did; on the little slope just above the stream. He threw himself bodily at her, and together the two of them went rolling down the hill, until they landed up right next to the brook. She cupped a handful of water and chucked it at him while he lay helpless with laughter.

      ‘You’re a bloody lunatic!’ he screeched, and she couldn’t speak for spluttering. Her heart was leaping about inside her like a crazy thing: after all this time, when she had given up any hope of ever seeing him again, Edward Trent was back.

      It was too wonderful for words. Her baby’s father was home to make a proper life for them. They would be a family at last, and if Lucy could have jumped over the moon right then and there, she would have done.

      Wrapping his strong sailor’s arms about her slim waist, he inched her towards the soft rich grass that lined the stream’s edge, and right there, with the clean, fresh water lapping over their bare feet, he laid her down and took her with a kind of animal hunger; not tenderly, not gently or cruelly, but the only way he knew how, driven by lust and the over-riding greed to be satisfied. This was his third partner of the day, his fourth coupling, and for a little while, his passion subsided.

      ‘That was so good, Lucy,’ he said hoarsely. ‘You don’t know how long I’ve waited to be with you like that.’

      But Lucy had not yet heard the words she yearned to hear. ‘Do you love me?’ she asked hesitantly. ‘Really love me?’ Somehow she couldn’t be sure, even now.

      He laughed. ‘That’s a silly question.’ And then, as though to dismiss the thought, he kissed her mouth. ‘Didn’t I just show you how much I love you?’

      Lucy drew away. ‘But you didn’t say it. All the time we were making love, you never once said you loved me.’

      ‘I did! I’m sure I did.’ Bloody women, he thought. Are they never satisfied?

      ‘Say it now.’ Lucy needed convincing.

      ‘What? Say what?’ Anger trembled in his voice.

      ‘That you love me … say it!’

      ‘Jesus, but you’re a persistent bugger.’ Suddenly amused, he grinned down on her. ‘But then you always were a spirited devil. It’s what I liked most about you.’

      ‘Say it then.’ Melting to him, Lucy traced his lips with the tip of her finger. ‘If you don’t say it, I’ll know you’re not serious about us.’

      Twice he opened his mouth to say it, but telling a woman that he loved her did not come easy, mainly because his idea of love and hers were not the same. Where she might think of something precious to them both – a sharing, giving emotion, with a deep-down need to build a life together – he was a cold, selfish man who saw his own needs to be of paramount importance.

      Now, as he looked into that small, upturned face with the appealing brown eyes and the sunlight dancing off her long unkempt hair, he had to appease her. ‘Silly bitch, o’ course I love you!’ Snatching her to him, he held her there for what seemed an age; until she drew away, to divulge a secret which shocked him to the core.

      ‘Edward, I’ve got something to tell you.’ She was so nervous, she could feel herself trembling.

      He kissed her again. ‘Have you, now. Well then, you’d best tell me, hadn’t you?’

      She nodded. ‘When you were here before …’ She hesitated, not knowing whether he would be pleased or angry. Yet, if they were to be married and start their own home together, he would have to know, and so she told him in a СКАЧАТЬ