I patted the pockets of my long, black padded coat, just feeling through the thick layer of down for my keys. I found them as the metal banged against my right hip and I pushed my hand in to retrieve them. With my other hand, I pulled my case up close behind me. It was only then that I realised I still hadn’t turned off the fairy lights in the window. I lowered myself down sideways in the small space of the shop doorway. I felt around to find the switch that would plunge me into the darkness that had devoured our country lane.
My concentration was broken suddenly by a sharp, metallic rap on the door. The sound made me jump and my heartrate quickened in panic. I stepped back on instinct and suddenly found myself flailing around in mid-air as I went backwards over my case and fell down hard onto my backside.
‘Shit!’ I exclaimed, and instinctively my hand came up to my heart as I tried to calm it down. Luckily, although I had fallen onto the hard tiles, my padded coat seemed to have protected me from the worst of the fall.
My eyes, opened wide in fear, searched through the circular glow of the fairy lights and found the beautiful orbs of teal eyes. From the other side of the door I saw his eyebrows lift and then he lifted his hand to apologise for startling me.
‘For Christ’s sake. What the bloody hell?’ I murmured under my breath as I stood back up quickly, trying to save face and not look like a complete bloody idiot.
I slid the bolt across and jerked open the door. Automatically, he took a step forward and I found myself almost nose to broad chest with the most captivating man I had seen in a long time.
‘You frightened the life out of me,’ I reprimanded him.
‘Yeah, I saw… sorry. Are you okay? Not hurt or anything?’ I heard the laughter in his voice and saw his eyes crinkle at the corners and once again I knew he was amused by me.
It seemed I was an endless source of entertainment for teal eyes.
‘Can I help you?’ I was speaking to his eyes only, as the tall figure in front of me was still covered head to toe in the same black clothes he had been wearing earlier.
‘Yeah, well I was sorta hoping you could, but it looks like you’re closing up for the day. I can always come back tomorrow.’
‘Unfortunately, I’m not opening again until the new year.’ I broke eye contact with him, bent my knees a little and grabbed hold of the handle of my case and stood it back up. ‘So, if you want something, it’s now or never as they say.’
Why’s my heart still racing? He must have frightened me more than I initially thought.
‘Are you going away for the holidays then?’
‘You could say,’ I answered with a small smile.
‘It figures,’ he stated.
‘It does?’ I questioned him, bemused by his statement.
He nodded his answer and started to shift around, looking uncomfortable.
‘So, if I can get you anything, it truly needs to be now. The weather is getting worse and I really need to get going.’
I watched his head glance to the side. ‘Well my hands are freezing. I’d forgotten just how cold English winters could be. I could do with a pair of gloves…’
I followed his eyes to the four pairs of fingerless gloves that were still in the window. They certainly didn’t fit the image he had going on. The four pairs were all that was left of the geometric snowflake pattern I had made with the display of gloves earlier in the week. A pink pair, a multi-coloured striped set, a pair of yellow ones with large white daisies all over them, and a pair of turquoise blue ones with a mitten pouch. The pouch could be pulled over your exposed digits and by buttoning them up on your palm they turned into mittens.
It was my turn to smirk. I looked up at him in question.
‘Sure, which ones did you have your eyes on?’
‘You can choose. If they work, I couldn’t give a damn.’
After hovering my hand for a few seconds over the bright yellow ones with daisies, I realised I couldn’t be that cruel and grabbed up the blue ones. They seemed the lesser of the two evils.
‘There you are.’ I held them out to him. ‘They match your eyes, well almost.’
Did I really just say that? I felt my eyes beginning to once again roll upwards at my own words.
‘Thanks, I appreciate the choice.’ He smirked back. ‘How much are they?’
‘Eight pounds, please. They’re homemade, my nan knitted them.’ I really am the queen of giving out superfluous information today.
His eyes smiled again at my completely irrelevant explanation. I watched as he lifted his shoulders to make his coat rise, then he reached behind him into the back pocket of his jeans and pulled out his wallet. Without looking inside, he pulled out a card and held out his hand to pass it over.
I looked at the black piece of plastic he was offering me. ‘Sorry, we only take cash here.’ I had wanted to update the shop and bring it into the twenty-first century, but some things my nan refused to budge on.
‘Ah… Then we have a problem.’
‘Don’t tell me. You don’t have any cash, do you?’ I shook my head slightly, laughing a little at the fact that only I could get an actual customer who didn’t carry cash.
He passed the gloves back to me. ‘Not to worry, you know what they say. Cold hands, warm heart.’
Once again, I could see he was smiling at me. I desperately wanted to move his collar down and away from his face to get a better look at that said smile. I was sure it was as gorgeous as the eyes that were currently holding me spellbound. I shook myself free of my thoughts.
‘Look, I’m really in a hurry. Take them, you can be my good deed for the day.’
I watched as he shook his head in response. ‘I couldn’t do that.’ His warm voice washed over me, caressing me in its embrace.
‘Oh, just take them and buy me a drink sometime.’ I closed his fingers over the open hand that contained the gloves. As our bare skin touched for the first time, my whole body jumped in reaction.
I watched as his teal eyes momentarily opened wider with shock and then just as instantaneously recovered. ‘Let me carry your case for you for now, ok?’
‘Thanks.’ I think. I reached down again to flick off the fairy lights with my left hand. Pretending I needed to see what I was doing allowed me to pull my eyes away from his.
How embarrassing? It could only happen to me. Pluck up the guts to ask a man to take me for a drink and watch him flinch in horror at the thought.
I realised he had moved away when I heard the wheels of my case as they encountered the road outside of the shop. Without looking towards him, I stepped outside and wrapped my long scarf once more around my neck as the bitter wind blew strongly around me.
‘Where’s ya car?’ I heard him shout over the wind.
‘Just around the corner, over there,’ I pointed.
I took a few seconds longer locking up the shop. I ran my fingers over the cold, wet glass to clear the flakes of snow, just so I could read the note I had written and taped there. As I read my words a sense of foreboding ran through me. I felt tears spring to my eyes and sniffed suddenly trying to clear my head. Things were changing, I could feel that, and change scared me. I blinked, trying to clear my head, and pulled myself together.
Snap out of it, Harper.
My minor breakdown had given me a couple of minutes and it allowed me to walk behind teal eyes. I hoped that with the self-imposed space between us and the weather, we wouldn’t have to strike up another conversation.
I got to the passenger door, pushed my key home and unlocked the two-seater car. I was sure I heard a deep growl carrying on the wind as he took in my mode of transport for the first time.
‘Could you place the case on the passenger seat please and strap it in with the seat belt?’
‘Sure.’ He lifted the heavy case with ease and unceremoniously dumped it onto the seat. I observed the car lurch to the side with the weight and then I watched fascinated as he tried to fold his large frame up to lean inside to buckle it in. Very quic
kly he reappeared.
‘I can’t do the belt. There’s not enough room for the case and me in there.’ He smiled again with his eyes. ‘Look, my car is parked just up the road, outside a friend’s house. It would be a much safer way to travel in this weather. Are you sure I can’t give you a ride?’
I followed one of his covered hands, as it gesticulated to a large vehicle outside of Jasmin’s house. I realised for the first time that he had turned the fingerless gloves into mittens and swallowed down a laugh that threatened to escape my open mouth.
Looking at the dark vehicle it all fell into place. So, that was where he had come from. It made sense now. Jasmin’s husband John was American and teal eyes had a similar sort of accent. I knew that all the Carpenters had friends and family staying. The youngest sibling Jack was getting married on Christmas Eve, a week tomorrow.
Our little village had never been so busy with people.
‘No… I’ll be fine thanks. I need the car with me.’ I pulled open my door and held my long coat tightly to my legs so it wouldn’t bunch up as I sat down. I jumped in quickly, eager to leave behind my awkwardness.
‘Ok… Thanks for the gloves, hope to see ya around.’
I turned the key in the ignition. I was sure I saw a couple of other words form on his lips, but I couldn’t gauge what they might be. Instead of being communication, they became puffs of hot air released into the freezing evening.
Thankfully, the engine started first time and drowned out the possibility of any further conversation. I breathed out a sigh of relief as he slammed the passenger door. The closing of the door was hopefully the full stop on my embarrassing behaviour.
‘Not if I see you first,’ I whispered into the cold air of the car. I carefully put the car into first gear and pulled away. I couldn’t help but look to the small rear-view mirror to see him standing in the middle of the lane. He had his hands cupped over his mouth as he blew warm air onto his newly acquired mittens.
I smiled to myself, before I tore my eyes away and concentrated on the road ahead.
As the oldest car I had ever seen in my life started, the roaring engine coming to life cut off my words. Reluctantly, I slammed shut her creaking passenger door. Everything about the vehicle seemed and looked unsafe. I closed my eyes, shutting down my head.
Very slowly and cautiously she pulled away. Well at least that was something.
Even though I hated watching her pull away from me, I felt a grin break out on my face. I was stood smiling, fucking smiling. I had no fucking idea why. The way I felt was difficult for me to decipher. The shrink said it was normal. Normal when you’ve spent so long faking smiles to hide the pain inside you.
I laughed, ‘Me! Fucking normal?’
I blew hot air onto my freezing hands and grinned at the homemade things with the button-up flaps. Looking at them touching the black cashmere of my Burberry jacket made me laugh out loud.
It felt fucking good and I nodded at the realisation. I pushed my hands down inside my jacket pockets and exhaled, watching my hot breath turn into a cloud of condensation.
It was the fourth time today that I had gone past her old Victorian shop and the second time that, not being able to resist, I had gone inside.
Just to talk to her.
I had no idea of her name. All I knew was that I had caught sight of her first thing this morning as I went on a run through the village. The way she smiled with her eyes and laughed throwing her head right back, like she hadn’t got a care in the world, caught my attention. Hearing her joking with her neighbour had made me want to look at her, to study her. As I had carried on down the quiet lane, I had twisted my head to look around the edge of the hood of my sweatshirt and I’d taken a double take.
A fucking double take!
Not being able to refuse myself, I had circled what I now knew to be the war memorial and gone slowly past her shop again. I’d stopped outside to tighten up a shoelace that wasn’t even loose and taken her in as she danced around inside the old place, singing. I had never seen a more naturally beautiful woman, with a thick, chestnut coloured mane of hair and a body with curves in all the right places. I had felt my mouth fall slack at the sight of her. Her beauty was enhanced by the happiness she seemed to feel in the simple things around her, it radiated off the whole of her body. She pulled me in, like the moon pulls the tide to make it turn.
I couldn’t remember the last time a woman I’d just met warranted even a second look, let alone two visits just to talk to her, in the same fucking day no less. Normally, the women I met were just a diversion, a recreational fucking pastime. They came, they went and that was just the fucking way I liked it.
But talking with her made me feel unburdened. In the few minutes we had spent together she had made me remember that life could be simple. I liked it, and I wanted more of it. She held a promise of something I had never wanted, nor expected to want in my life. I needed to get to know her better.
I watched the fucking death trap of the thing she called her car finally leave the edge of the village. I felt my nostrils flare as I inhaled sharply and clenched my fists tightly as I fought off the urge to follow her, to make sure she didn’t kill herself. Stop it, Brody… you can’t control every fucking thing.
The wind blew so strongly that flurries of snow clouded my vision and she disappeared from my view far quicker than I wanted her to.
I was pleased for her that she had somewhere to go.
And pleased for her that it seemed to be somewhere she wanted to be.
What I couldn’t get my head around was the jealousy that was collecting inside my gut as it rolled itself bigger and bigger like a snowball. But, instead of being cold like snow, the ball was red hot and angry. As it rolled around, it spat out its anger like sparks from a volcano.
I was angry and jealous that a woman I had only set eyes on today, wasn’t rushing to spend time with me.
I’m even more fucked up than I thought.
I pulled into the courtyard about thirty minutes later, rested my forehead down onto the steering wheel and exhaled a huge sigh of relief. What should have been a ten to fifteen-minute drive tops, had been much longer due to the difficult conditions. The snow had gusted around in the narrow lanes, creating drifts on the banks either side. My little car, with absolutely no modern technology, had struggled. To add insult to injury, my windscreen blowers had decided ten minutes into the journey to completely pack up on me. I had spent almost the entire journey with my small front windows open to clear the screen. This had made the inside of my car the temperature of an igloo. Along with the flakes of snow swirling around, my long brown hair had been blown into my mouth, up my nose and a couple of times it had even restricted my view of the road ahead. I’d spent the last twenty minutes of the journey wiping the windscreen with the chamois leather, spitting, pulling pieces of hair out of all my exposed orifices and swearing in terror at the weather conditions. I’m sure it would have looked comical if it hadn’t been so terrifying.
But it was the fact I couldn’t turn my brain off that had seemed the most dangerous problem.
My mind was on constant repeat of the strange day I’d had. I’d even shouted at myself at one point on the drive over to “concentrate.” Reminding myself that I needed to focus on the task of driving and not day dreaming about the stranger with the beautiful eyes.
I looked up through the restricted view of my now frozen windscreen, to see the welcoming lights of Lauren’s flat shining through the Velux windows. I felt a wide smile spread over my face.
God, I need this.
I was really pleased to be here. With my nan having put herself in a home to give me some rest, it would have been a sad and lonely Christmas by myself at home. I wasn’t sure she had thought about that, although she had thought about everything else.
She was a bossy one, my nan. I had been informed she was going into the home for six weeks, she had arranged the whole thing herself with the help of Dr. Carpenter. He was our family
doctor and the one who had helped to diagnose her dementia three years ago. Her dementia meant that some days she was perfectly lucid, on other much more exhausting days she was completely and utterly confused. On a funnier note her filter had almost evaporated, she now swore like a trooper and used words I hadn’t even realised were in her vocabulary.
One lucid day, she had written down her exact instructions, in two letters. One letter, to herself, explained why she was where she was. So, on a confused day at the care home, the staff could let her read the letter written in her own hand. It would explain to her exactly what she was doing in the home and how she had made the decision herself to be there.
I hoped it would help.
In the other letter, which she had given to me, she had stipulated that I was only allowed to visit her once a week, but could phone her every other day, but only if I really needed to. Her letter also explained how she knew the opening of The Manor as a hotel and Jack’s wedding would bring life back into the village. She wanted me to join in and be part of that life and then come to tell her all about it. After I had read her explicit instructions, she had sat down and taken my hand in hers.
“Life is for living, Amy. You never quite know when that gift will be taken from you. So, grab it by the balls and ride the hell out of it.”
Hugging each other we had laughed at her choice of words.
Always thinking of everyone else but herself, she had insisted that I needed the few weeks to live exactly like a thirty-three-year-old woman should be living. She hated the fact she thought I had given up on my own life to take care of her. I knew it made her sad that I wasn’t married with a family of my own. Many a time we had the same conversation about her going into a care home. But I wouldn’t have it, she had given me a home when I had needed it and I wasn’t about to refuse her one.
Brody (Default Distraction Book 1) Page 3
