With This Baby.... Caroline Anderson

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      Claire, used to Pepper with her shaggy blonde coat and little neat ears, stared at Dog in amazement. Black, with a white splash on his chest, and smaller than Pepper, he had the biggest ears she’d ever seen except on a German shepherd, and his body couldn’t seem to decide if it was terrier, Labrador or collie.

      Pepper didn’t seem to care, however. She was just enjoying the attention and his lineage was obviously the last thing on her mind.

      ‘So much more direct than people,’ his owner said, watching them circle with their noses up each other’s bottoms, and she laughed, surprised by the dry flash of humour.

      ‘I think I’ll settle for being human.’

      His smile was slow and lazy, and crinkled his eyes. It crinkled her stomach, too, and she felt as if she’d been punched by the force of that latent sexual charm. Good grief! No wonder Amy had fallen for him.

      Amy. That’s what this was all about, she reminded herself before she could get totally sidetracked by his charm. Amy.

      She brushed her hands together and looked up at him again. ‘Um—you brought the car. Thank you. What do I owe you?’

      ‘Owe me?’ he said, sounding surprised. ‘You don’t owe me anything. I had to get here somehow.’

      ‘And getting that heap out of the pound and driving here in it was your preferred choice of transport? Give me a break!’

      He chuckled softly. ‘OK. I’ll admit I’m glad I don’t have to drive it back, but it made it, which I have to say surprised me.’

      It surprised Claire, too, but she wasn’t telling him that! It would no doubt collapse on her the very next time she took it out—just like the mower and the strimmer and everything else.

      ‘Having problems?’ he asked, jerking his head towards the mower, and she rolled her eyes and sighed.

      ‘You don’t want to know. I hit something, and the cutting deck’s dangling now. Goodness knows what I’ve broken. I’ll get John to look at it.’

      ‘John?’

      ‘A mechanic-cum-miracle-worker. He keeps my bits and pieces going.’ When I can afford to pay him, she added to herself silently. ‘By the way, George wouldn’t take any money from me on Monday for bringing me back, so I owe you for that, too, and the cash you gave me.’

      He shrugged. ‘I’ll let you pay it back in kind. I didn’t dare stop the car in case it wouldn’t start again, and it’s been a long morning. I reckon a cup of coffee should settle the score.’

      ‘That’s a very expensive cup of coffee,’ she told him, ‘and anyway, you’re in luck because I haven’t got any. I’ve only got tea, but no milk, so you’ll have to let me pay you back.’

      ‘Tea will be fine,’ he said, cutting her off. ‘Shall we?’

      He held out a hand, gesturing for her to lead the way, and with a shrug of defeat she took him into the house through the boot room—as untidy and scruffy as ever—and through to the kitchen, where Jess was beginning to stir in the pram. ‘Have a seat,’ she said, pushing the cat off the only decent chair, and he sat and looked around curiously.

      ‘What a lovely kitchen,’ he said, and she nearly choked. It was ancient, the cupboards were all chipped and scratched, and it needed a match taking to it—or at the very least a bucket of hot, soapy water followed by a paintbrush.

      ‘I thought you were an architect,’ she said with a thread of sarcasm, and he chuckled that lovely, deep, sexy chuckle again.

      ‘I am. I spend my life specifying high-tech glass and stainless-steel kitchens, somewhere between an operating theatre and the control room of a spacecraft, and you daren’t touch them for fear of leaving a fingerprint. You could come in here with a muddy dog and feel at home—it reminds me of my childhood, visiting my grandmother. Homely. Restful. Soothing.’

      She looked around her and saw it with his eyes—saw the old black Aga that she couldn’t afford to run, and the deep butler’s sink with its mahogany draining board, the painted solid timber cupboards—all the things that everyone wanted, by all accounts, only new, of course, and made to look old. Distressed. Claire nearly laughed aloud. It was certainly distressed!

      Still, the blue and white Cornishware china on the dresser shelves was highly collectable now, and the brightly coloured mugs hanging on the hooks above the kettle brought a vivid splash of colour to the room. And through the gap in the hedge opposite the kitchen window, you could see across the meadow and right down the valley to the church in the distance.

      Yes, it had charm, and she loved it—which was just as well, because she was no more likely to be able to fly than refit it. She’d been working her way steadily through the house until Amy had died and she’d had to give up her job. Now there was a huge list of essentials ahead of the kitchen, and the mower was tacked right onto the top as of today. Really, April was not a good time for the darned thing to fall apart.

      ‘How strong do you like your tea?’ she asked, dropping a teabag in a mug and pouring on the water.

      ‘Not very. Have you got lemon? No, forget it.’

      She snorted. ‘I don’t have it anyway. I’m sorry, you’re not getting a very good return on your investment here, are you?’

      ‘That’s not why I’m here.’

      No, it wasn’t. He was here because she’d given him very little choice, and all these smiling pleasantries were just exactly that. Any second now, she guessed, the gloves would be off.

      She fished the teabag out of his mug, dunked it up and down in her own and wished, for the hundredth time that day, that she’d got milk. She’d tried some of Jess’s formula in it, but it hadn’t been the same, and, anyway, she was running out of that, too.

      She turned to face him, mugs in hand. ‘So, where do you want to start?’ she asked, taking the bull by the horns.

      ‘I’d like to see those photographs.’

      ‘Ah.’

      She set the mugs down in front of him and turned away. She hated looking at the photos. They weren’t sordid, thank God, but they were intimate—hugely intimate, emotionally revealing. Things no one should see except the participants—things Amy should have taken with her to the grave, locked up in her heart.

      Still, he’d been there, so it hardly mattered if he saw them, did it? She didn’t have to look again and upset herself with the painful images of her sister with this undeniably attractive man.

      She went to the study and pulled out the packet of photos from the bottom drawer, and gave them to him.

      ‘Here.’

      He took them, opened the envelope and eased them out, a strange expression on his face. Cradling her tea, she watched him as he sifted through them slowly, over and over again.

      Then, without a word, he put them away in the envelope and looked up at her, his eyes curiously sad.

      ‘You’d better sit down,’ he said, and she sat, wondering СКАЧАТЬ