by Kate Hardy
‘I go to a Zumba class,’ Parminder said. ‘It’s on Monday nights. Do you want to come with me next week?’
‘Thanks, I’d love to,’ Georgie said, smiling broadly.
‘You could come training with me, too, if you like,’ Alistair offered.
‘Al, you big show-off, of course she doesn’t want to train with you.’ Parminder rolled her eyes. ‘He does triathlons,’ she told Georgie. ‘That’s just radge.’
‘Radge?’ Georgie asked, mystified.
‘Crazy,’ Ryan supplied. ‘It’s Edinburgh slang.’
‘And Al is the living definition. Miles of running, miles of cycling, and then a freezing cold swim—for miles. Totally radge,’ Parminder said.
‘Ye’ve a lot to learn, hen,’ Alistair said, hamming up the accent. ‘Anyway, I’m not the only one with radge tendencies. There’s Ryan tromping through the hills with his wee dawgeh even when it’s stoating.’
‘Stoating?’ Georgie asked, wondering if her colleagues were making up words just to tease her, or if she was going to have to learn a whole new language up here.
‘It’s stoating when the rain’s coming down so hard that it’s bouncing back off the ground,’ Alistair said.
‘And remember this is the dog who chewed Clara’s favourite shoes,’ Parminder added. ‘Three pairs of them.’
‘I replaced them all,’ Ryan protested. ‘Though it’s not my fault if Clara leaves her shoes where Truffle can get them.’
‘Just be warned, hen. That wee dog’s not to be trusted,’ Alistair said in a stage whisper. Then he smiled. ‘So what else did you do for fun in London?’
‘Music, theatre and history,’ Georgie said promptly.
‘Well, you’re a wee bit late for the Fringe,’ Alistair said. ‘But there are good theatres and music venues in the city.’
‘And there’s loads of history,’ Parminder added. ‘Have you been to the castle yet?’
‘On my first morning here,’ Georgie said with a smile, ‘and I loved it.’
‘And there’s Mary King’s Close—part of a seventeenth-century street that was buried when they built the Royal Exchange,’ Alistair added. ‘You might like that. If you don’t mind the ghosts...’
Ryan groaned. ‘Don’t start on about non-existent things, Al.’
‘He doesn’t believe in Nessie, either, poor man,’ Alistair confided to Georgie. ‘No romance in his soul, that one.’
‘Talking of romance, you have to visit Doune Castle,’ Parminder said. ‘I take it you’ve seen Outlander?’
‘I love that series,’ Georgie said. ‘My best friend Sadie and I binge-watched it together. You can’t get better than a gorgeous man in a kilt.’
A dark, brooding Scotsman. She couldn’t help looking at Ryan, who was the epitome of a brooding Scotsman. He was sitting right opposite her. If she moved her foot, she’d be touching his: and the thought made her feel hot all over.
* * *
Georgie had going all pink and flustered—and yet again Ryan noticed how pretty she was. His libido seemed to have taken over his brain; he could imagine how he could make her all flustered, with little teasing kisses that would make her as hot and bothered as he felt right now.
Think of cool things, he told himself.
Going ankle deep into a hidden puddle.
Trudging across the hills with Truffle when the wind and the rain wouldn’t let up.
And how soft Georgie’s mouth was...
Oh, help. He really needed to get a grip.
‘A kilt and a plaid.’ Parminder fanned herself.
‘Don’t forget a jacket and cravat,’ Georgie said.
‘And boots,’ Parminder added with a dramatic sigh.
‘Gorgeous men in period costumes. Totally irresistible,’ Georgie said.
Ryan had a kilt. Zoe had bought it for him years ago, to wear at a wedding. Why he’d even packed it when he’d left their house, he had no idea.
He shoved the thought away. He was not dressing up in a kilt to bowl Georgie over. They were colleagues. They were at work. Focus, he told himself.
Parminder laughed. ‘Seriously, Georgie, Doune Castle is spectacular and so are the views. With or without a man in a kilt.’
‘It’s already on my list,’ Georgie said with a smile. ‘I was planning to go exploring a bit on my day off.’
So why, Ryan thought, did he have to mess it up by saying, ‘Maybe I could drive you at the weekend and show you around the area a bit?’
Georgie’s eyes widened. ‘I can’t ask you to give up your time off.’
Which was his cue to back off. But his mouth seemed to have other ideas. ‘Dogs are allowed at some of the historic places, and Truffle’s always up for a walk somewhere different. There’s the beach, too.’
‘Edinburgh has a beach?’ Georgie looked surprised.
‘Several. There’s loads of golden sand at Portobello,’ Parminder said.
Shut up, shut up, Ryan told himself. But the words came spilling out despite himself. ‘Then maybe we could go to the seaside on Saturday and Doune Castle on Sunday—or whenever our off-duty coincides.’
‘I’d like that,’ she said, giving him a shy smile.
Oh, help. That smile made him feel even hotter. He needed to get the team involved before he really got out of control. ‘I was thinking, we could do with a team night out.’
‘If there’s dancing, I’m so there. If only to laugh at Al’s two left feet,’ Parminder said with a grin.
‘I’ll teach you to dance, Al,’ Georgie promised.
And how ridiculous was it that Ryan felt a huge twinge of jealousy?
‘You’ll be kind to me, hen, won’t you?’ Alistair asked, clearly trying his best to look piteous.
Ryan wasn’t feeling particularly kind towards his colleague, right then. What did Alistair think he was doing, flirting with Georgie like that? ‘It doesn’t have to be dancing. We could go to an open mic night or something.’
‘Dancing works for me,’ Parminder said.
‘Then can I delegate the organisation to you, Parm?’ Ryan asked.
‘Sure. I’ll find us a ceilidh, so Georgie can go to a proper Scots dance,’ Parminder said.
‘That,’ Georgie said, ‘is a brilliant idea.’
‘Thanks, Parm. Put the details on the team group chat when you’ve got them. And maybe we can do a pizza and bowling night or something before then to welcome Georgie to the team.’
‘Yes, boss,’ Parminder said with a grin.
* * *
This, Georgie thought, was the best day she’d had in Edinburgh so far: the first one where she was starting to feel part of the team, accepted for who she was. Nobody pitied her, the way they did in London. And it was all thanks to Ryan, who’d drawn her in to the group.
As for Ryan himself... She was just going to have to damp down the flares of attraction that kept threatening to overwhelm her.
Even if he was gorgeous.
Even if she could imagine him wearing a kilt and plaid, looking incredibly sexy.
Even if she did find herself wondering what it would feel like to dance with him...
Back at the cottage that evening, when Ryan came home from taking Truffle out, he took out his phone and flicked into his calendar. ‘I’m off duty on Saturday and Sunday. What about you?’
‘I’m off, too,’ she said.
‘Then we could go to the beach on Saturday and Doune on Sunday, if you like,’ he said.
‘It’s not fair to make you give up your weekend to play tourist with me.’
‘It’s no bother. Truffle’s always up for a walk somewhere different. We can’t take her to Doune, but she loves the beach.’
* * *
The rest of the week flew by, and on Saturday morning it was unseasonably warm; Ryan drove them to Por
tobello straight after breakfast. Georgie loved all the Georgian buildings with bay windows and turrets; when they got to the beach itself, the tide was out and there were children making sandcastles, and people on paddle-boards.
Ryan crouched down by Truffle. ‘I’m trusting you, mind,’ he said. He ruffled the top of the dog’s head, and let her off her lead. Georgie took her shoes off, enjoying the feel of the warm sand under her toes and the wind in her hair. It was ages since she’d been to the beach and she’d forgotten how much she liked the faint taste of salt in the air, the scent of the ocean and the sound of the waves swishing over the sand.
As they walked her hand brushed against Ryan’s and for a nanosecond she actually thought about curling her fingers round his. What would it be like to walk barefoot on this beach with him at sunrise, hand in hand? Then maybe they’d stop and watch the changing colours of the sky, and turn to each other and kiss...
The urge to hold his hand grew stronger, but fear held her back. Supposing he rejected her? How awkward it would be. Then again, if he held her hand, that was an even more scary proposition: it would be the beginning of a relationship, and she’d have to take a leap and trust him. After Charlie, she wasn’t sure she wanted to risk trusting again.
Truffle circled back to them at Ryan’s whistle; she clearly loved the freedom of running around at the beach. Ryan took a Frisbee from his backpack. ‘Fancy a game with me and Truffle?’ he asked.
Keeping it light and not intense: that worked for her. ‘Sure.’
It was the first time she’d seen Ryan look really relaxed, out here with the sun and the sand and his dog. He looked younger, more carefree; his grey eyes crinkled at the corners when he smiled, and he was so gorgeous that she found herself catching her breath. And when he caught her gaze, she felt seriously hot under the collar. She hadn’t reacted to anyone like that since she was a teenager.
Right in the middle of their game, another dog came bounding past. Truffle dropped the Frisbee and took off after the other dog, clearly relishing a game of chase, and ignored Ryan completely when he called her name.
‘Oh, no.’ He took a box from the backpack and whistled. ‘Truffle! Come here! Sausage!’
Truffle took no notice whatsoever, until the other dog’s owner called him back to heel. Only then did she seem to remember that she was supposed to be here with Ryan and Georgie and trotted back to them.
‘What am I going to do with you?’ Ryan asked, feeding her a bit of sausage. ‘Well done for finally coming back. But we’re going to have to work on recall again.’ He glanced at Georgie, his eyes narrowing slightly. ‘I’m not spoiling her, by the way. I’m rewarding her for doing what I asked, even though it took her a while. If I shouted at her, she’d associate coming back with being shouted at and that’d make her less likely to come when I call.’
She remembered what he’d said about Truffle being abandoned as a pup. Scaring her off was the last thing he’d want to do. ‘Hey, I’m not judging. I know nothing about dog training.’ She put her hand out to stroke the top of Truffle’s head.
Again, her fingers brushed against his. And this time she noticed the slash of colour across his cheekbones. So did he feel this same wobbly sensation in the pit of his stomach? If so, what were they going to do about it?
‘I’ll just give Truffle a drink.’ He took water and a bowl from his backpack.
Ryan McGregor was a man who truly took care of his own.
So unlike Charlie, who’d seemed so caring when they’d first got together but had turned out to be totally careless with her heart.
The more Georgie looked back on her marriage, the more she wondered how she’d missed all the clues. All the little things—like never making her a mug of coffee when he’d made one for himself—that she’d told herself to ignore because they just meant her husband had a tough day in the Emergency Department: maybe they hadn’t been that at all. She’d let herself be blinded by his charm and hadn’t seen the self-centred man behind it all. The man who’d lied to her, and who’d lied to his mistress. The man who’d let her down time after time, and she’d made excuses for him because she’d so wanted their marriage to work.
How could she trust her judgement any more?
‘Are you OK?’ Ryan asked, looking up at her when he’d put the empty bowl back in his backpack.
‘Uh-huh,’ she said.
‘Sometimes you just need the sound of the sea to clear your head,’ Ryan said, and she wondered what had made him feel that he needed his head cleared. His ex, maybe? Did he miss her?
She realised she’d spoked aloud when Ryan said, ‘I miss bits of Zoe. I miss the good times.’ His eyes were unreadable. ‘Do you miss Charlie?’
She had a choice: to keep living the lie she’d told in London, or to tell the truth and clear a way for herself to move forward, to finally get over her past. ‘I miss him,’ she said. Ryan’s expression was still absolutely inscrutable. ‘But, like you, I miss bits. The good bits.’
* * *
Which sounded as if there had been bad bits, too, Ryan thought. ‘Sometime the bad stuff gets in the way and you don’t mean to hurt each other,’ he said.
‘I don’t think Charlie meant to hurt me. He just didn’t consider me,’ she said, looking bleak. ‘I look back and I wonder if I fooled myself right from the start and saw the man I wanted him to be, not the man he really was. And I wanted my marriage to work, so I ignored things I maybe should’ve made a stand about.’
It sounded as if she’d been really struggling; as well as losing her husband she was facing up to the fact that her marriage hadn’t been what she’d hoped it would be. And all the while people had been pitying the grieving widow. That was enough to mess with anyone’s head.
‘Sometimes you need space to think about what you really want,’ he said. ‘And the sea’s good for that. I used to walk here when I was thinking about how things were with me and Zoe. Before I got Truffle.’ When he’d seen the children playing on the beach, seen the families, and wondered what was so wrong with him that he couldn’t give Zoe what she wanted.
‘I’m hoping that distance will stop all the pity,’ she said.
Which told him she didn’t want him to pity her, either. If he offered her a hug, would she see it as pity? Or would she return that hug, hold him close?
And, if she held him close, what then? Where would it go? There was a lot more to her past than met the eye, and he didn’t want to trample on a sore spot—or let her down, the way he’d let Zoe down.
So, even though he had an idea that she too felt that crazy spark whenever they accidentally touched, he didn’t know how to deal with it.
‘Sometimes you have to learn to leave the past behind,’ he said. ‘Try and get past the regrets and the might-have-beens. And then you can make the most of tomorrow.’
‘When you’ve made mistakes, it’s hard to trust yourself again,’ she said, sounding so vulnerable that he wanted to wrap his arms around her and keep her safe.
But he hadn’t kept Zoe’s heart safe, so how could he be sure that he’d keep Georgie’s safe? What she’d just said... ‘You’re so right,’ he agreed. ‘I think all you can do is give it time.’
‘I’ve already given it time. It’s been more than a year, for me,’ she said.
‘Me, too.’
They were almost strangers, Maybe they’d be good for each other; maybe they wouldn’t. But right here, right now, he wasn’t risking it. ‘Let’s go and grab a coffee,’ he said. ‘There’s a dog-friendly café up the road.’ Somewhere with people close by so they wouldn’t be so intimate.
* * *
The café was right on the edge of the beach, with a slate roof, dormer windows and a turret. Inside, it was all scrubbed wood tables, teamed with bentwood chairs; on the walls were fairy lights and framed old photographs.
‘Cappuccino with no chocolate on top, right?
’ he asked.
Georgie was impressed that he’d noticed what she drank in the canteen at work. ‘Thank you.’
The coffee turned out to be excellent. He held up his mug, saying, ‘Slàinte mhath.’
‘Slanj-a-va?’ she repeated.
He smiled. ‘It’s Gaelic for “Good health”—and that was a pretty good first attempt at pronouncing it. Anyway, to friendship.’
It was kind of a warning that he wasn’t prepared to offer anything more. But she wasn’t ready to risk her heart again, so she’d take that. ‘To friendship,’ she said.
* * *
The next morning, Ryan made a fuss of Truffle, promising to take her out later, before driving Georgie the hour to Doune Castle.
It had been a while since he’d last visited, but the building was spectacular: a fourteenth-century courtyard castle with a gatehouse that towered a hundred feet up, made of reddish-brown stone with white quoins.
‘That’s stunning,’ Georgie said, looking awed. ‘I mean, I’ve seen it on TV as the setting for several series, but I still didn’t expect it to be this magnificent.’
Part of him wanted to reach out and take her hand—to walk hand in hand through the castle with her. But the idea made him feel edgy; there was so much that could go wrong. So he fell back on the safety of dry facts. ‘It was built for Robert Stewart, the first Duke of Albany. It has one of the best-preserved halls in Scotland.’
He was really glad he’d checked his phone the night before and looked up facts and figures, because it meant he could talk to her about history instead of blurting out his feelings as they wandered through the castle.
‘Look at that fireplace! It’s taller than me, and it’s massive. I can just imagine sitting here at a really long table with a trencher in front of me, with dishes of carved meats and flagons of ale,’ she said as they walked through the Great Hall.’
He’d always thought that he didn’t have much imagination, but suddenly he could see her sitting beside him in a wine-coloured velvet dress, her golden hair long and wavy and topped by a crown, and a choker of emeralds to match her eyes...
