by Kate Hardy
‘It’s good to be home,’ Brad said. And this time he really meant it.
CHAPTER FOUR
CREAM ROSES.
Brad had bought her cream roses.
Had he remembered that had been her wedding bouquet, Abigail wondered, a posy of half a dozen cream roses they’d bought last-minute at the local florist? Or had he just decided that roses were the best flowers to make an apology and those were the first ones he’d seen?
She raked a shaking hand through her hair. It might not have been the best idea to agree to have dinner with Brad tonight.
Then again, he’d said he wanted a truce for Ruby’s sake, and they needed to talk.
But seeing him again had stirred up all kinds of emotions she’d thought she’d buried a long time ago. She’d told herself that she was over her ex and could move on. The problem was, Bradley Powell was still the most attractive man she’d ever met—those dark, dark eyes; the dark hair that she knew curled outrageously when it was wet; that sense of brooding about him. She’d never felt that same spark with anyone else she’d dated. She knew she hadn’t been fair to the few men who’d asked her out; she really shouldn’t have compared them to her first love, because how could they ever match up to him?
She could still remember the moment she’d fallen in love with Brad. She and Ruby had been revising for their English exams together in the garden, and Brad had come out to join them, wanting a break from his physics revision. Somehow he’d ended up reading Benedick’s speeches while she’d read Beatrice’s.
‘“I do love nothing in the world so well as you: is that not strange?”’
She’d glanced up from her text and met his gaze, and a surge of heat had spun through her. He had been looking at her as if it were the first time he’d ever seen her. As if she were the only living thing in the world apart from himself. As if the rest of the world had just melted away...
It had felt crazy.
Abigail had known she shouldn’t let herself fall for her best friend’s brother. Apart from anything else, they had been way too young. Sixteen. There had been no chance their relationship would last, and she certainly hadn’t wanted to put any strain on her friendship with Ruby. Brad had been the last boy she should have dated.
So she’d damped down the feelings.
But then Ruby had set him up as Abigail’s date for their school’s end of year prom, the week after their exams, on the grounds that neither of them had had a date and she had, and Ruby hadn’t wanted either of them to feel left out.
It had been strange. The boy she’d known since she was a toddler, run around on the sand with and thrown snowballs at, had suddenly been a man, in a formal suit. And the look in his eyes when he’d seen her dressed up in a proper long, off-the-shoulder dress—it had been the same for him, too. Instant recognition. Shock at the changes in each other. A realisation that they weren’t kids any more: they were grown up.
They’d danced together, and it had felt as if she were floating. They’d danced to music she hadn’t even liked—and she really hadn’t cared, because she had been in Brad’s arms. She had barely been aware of anyone else being in the room.
At the end of the night, he’d taken her out into the grounds of the ancient hotel where the prom was being held and he’d kissed her among the roses. Moonlight, the scent of roses, the sound of a song thrush warbling into the night air—she would always associate those with the night Brad had first kissed her.
And from then on they’d been inseparable.
Ruby had gone to art college in September, while Brad and Abby had stayed on at their school’s sixth form. And Abby had been happier than she could ever remember, spending as much time as possible with Brad. Of course she’d said yes when he’d asked her to marry him on the night of her eighteenth birthday. They’d kept their engagement secret, even from Ruby.
The original plan had been to wait until after Brad had graduated, but late one night he’d climbed up the drainpipe outside her bedroom window and said he didn’t want to wait another three years to marry her. He’d suggested eloping to Gretna Green.
They’d got married in secret the week before their exam results had come out; and she’d moved to Cambridge with him when he’d started university in October.
Life had been perfect. Brad had studied while she’d worked in one of the local cafés, and they’d spent every evening and every night together. First love, true love, for ever and ever and ever. She’d been blissfully happy, and she’d thought it had been the same for Brad.
Until the weekend when she’d won a competition for a spa break.
And then everything had fallen apart.
Brad had never got over his father’s death. He wouldn’t talk about it, but she was pretty sure that he’d never stopped blaming himself for not being there to save his dad. And he’d built a wall of ice round himself that Abby just hadn’t been able to breach. Even leaving him hadn’t been enough to shock him into breaking that wall; the idea, born from sheer desperation, had blown up in her face. Brad had been supposed to realise how much he missed her and come after her and talk; instead, he’d ended their marriage completely.
Five years.
For five years she’d tried to move on.
And right now it felt as if she was back where she’d been at the start. Raw, aching, wanting a man who clearly didn’t want her any more. Wanting a man who’d shattered her belief in love.
How stupid was this?
Somehow Abigail got through the rest of the day. Though those roses haunted her every time she looked up and they caught her gaze. And they haunted her even more when she went home to put them in water on her kitchen windowsill.
She had enough time to shower, change into a little black dress and reapply her make-up by the time Brad rang the doorbell.
‘You look very nice,’ he said.
‘Thank you. So do you.’ He was wearing a formal shirt and dark trousers, with perfectly polished shoes; she knew that was from his father’s influence. ‘So where are we going?’
‘The Old Boat House,’ he said.
She blinked. The restaurant in Little Crowmell, the next village round the bay, took its name from the building it had been converted from. The food was amazing—unsurprisingly, as the chef had a Michelin star—and you had to wait weeks for reservations. ‘How did you manage to get a table?’
He shrugged. ‘It’s a Tuesday night, so I guess it’s less busy than at weekends.’
It was somewhere they’d never been together—on a student budget it simply wasn’t affordable—but since she’d moved back to Great Crowmell Abigail had been there with Ruby for her birthday, and a couple of times with her parents as a major treat.
She needed to remind herself that this wasn’t a date date. It was simply sorting things out between them and setting the terms for a truce, for Ruby’s sake.
‘Ready to go?’ he asked.
No. She was panicking inwardly, worried that she was going to make a fool of herself over him. ‘Sure,’ she fibbed, trying to brazen it out.
She locked the door behind her and followed him out to his car. He didn’t say much on the way to the restaurant, but put the radio on to a classical station. It suited her not to have to talk, too, and to pretend to listen to the music while her thoughts were whirring round.
Just where did they go from here? she wondered. Had he bought those roses because he too remembered their wedding day and missed the love they’d shared? Did he miss her as much as she’d missed him? Was this the first step towards repairing the bitterness of the past, maybe even trying to rekindle their lost love?
They were both older now, wiser, maybe more able to cope with life. But, if they did try again, there was no guarantee that their life together would be perfectly smooth. Unexpected things happened; the odds were that they’d hit a sticky patch. So what would happen at the next bump in their relationship? Would Brad shut her out again, just as he had when his father had died? She couldn’t bear that, to ma
ke a fresh start but then go on to make exactly the same mistakes again.
Maybe it would be better to keep things between them just as friends.
And she’d tell him that tonight.
* * *
Abigail was as beautiful now as the day when he’d first fallen in love with her at their school prom, Brad thought. He’d gone as Abby’s date simply as a favour to his twin, who didn’t want her best friend to feel like a wallflower because Ruby was going to prom with her boyfriend. But there was something subtly different about Abby, that night. She wasn’t just the girl who spent almost as much time at their house as his sister did and who felt like part of the furniture. She’d haunted him a bit since he’d read the lines from that Shakespeare play out loud and seen the wonder in her eyes, but he’d told himself that he couldn’t possibly get involved with his sister’s best friend. They were only sixteen, and the inevitable breakup would have too much fallout.
But at the prom he’d danced with her all night, and for him there had been nobody else in the room. Just Abby.
And then he’d taken her out into the grounds and kissed her in the middle of the rose garden. He knew at that moment that he’d met his one and only. The woman he wanted to marry. The woman he did marry. The woman he’d been so happy with—until he’d ruined everything.
He really didn’t know where they could go from here. Maybe he could ask her to give him another chance, after Ruby’s wedding. But, then again, how could he trust himself not to ruin things a second time? He was the one who’d wrecked their marriage. OK, while life was smooth, things would be absolutely fine between them; but what would happen when they hit a rocky patch? Life wasn’t always perfect. Would they be strong enough as a couple to weather whatever Fate threw at them, this time round? Or would he end up letting her down again?
He didn’t have the answer.
So maybe it would be better to keep things between them just as friends.
And he kind of wished he hadn’t asked her out tonight. He knew they needed to talk properly and cement their truce, but all the feelings he’d once had for her had come flooding back. It was so unexpected—and it was seriously messing with his head. He really didn’t know what to do. Being here with her made him feel like an awkward teenager all over again.
The same awkward teenager in a creased suit who’d married her over the anvil in Gretna Green, promising to love and cherish her for eternity...
He opened the car door for her, and she acknowledged his courtesy with a smile. His hand accidentally brushed against hers as they walked to the restaurant, and he felt a tingle through his whole body; he didn’t dare look at her in case it showed in his eyes and she noticed.
What was she thinking? What was she feeling? He didn’t have a clue. And asking her would break open too many things he needed to keep buried.
The maître d’ seated them at their table with an amazing view of the sea.
‘I know we won’t see the actual sunset from here,’ Abby said, ‘but we’ll still get to see the sky looking pretty, reflected in the sea.’
Not as pretty as her.
And not that Brad would be gauche enough to actually say that out loud. ‘Uh-huh,’ he said instead.
The waiter brought their menus over.
‘Would you like wine?’ Brad asked.
Abby shook her head. ‘Even though I’m not officially on duty at the café again until next week, I have things to do with Ruby tomorrow, including the final dress fitting, so I’d rather keep a clear head. Still water’s fine for me, please.’
He smiled at the waiter. ‘Still water for both of us, please.’
He looked at the menu. ‘It’s been a while since I’ve eaten somewhere this fancy.’
She glanced at him over the top of her own menu. ‘You picked it.’
‘I wanted to take you somewhere nice.’ And she’d mentioned it inspiring her new range of ice cream, so he’d thought she might like it here.
‘It is nice. Thank you. I love eating here.’
When the waiter came to take their order, Brad discovered they’d both chosen the same. He should’ve guessed. They’d always had similar taste in food; though he’d seen food more as fuel than anything else, since she’d left.
‘So how was it?’ she asked.
‘Which bit?’
She spread her hands. ‘All of it.’
Of course she wasn’t going to let him get away with fudging the issue. This was Abby. The woman who knew him as well as he knew himself—if not better. He sighed. ‘OK. Confession time. I realise now I should’ve come back before. I wasn’t fair to Mum or to Ruby.’ Or to Abby, for that matter. ‘I left them to deal with it and didn’t support them enough.’ He’d abandoned Abby, too.
‘Well, you’re here now,’ she pointed out. ‘You’re not still running away.’
Though part of him wanted to. He’d never actually told her about his clashes with Jim and how much he regretted them. He knew she was close to her own parents and he wasn’t entirely sure she’d believe him, because it was so far outside her own experience. But talking about it now wouldn’t change things, so he didn’t tell her. Instead, he said, ‘It’s when you’re expecting someone to walk into a room and they don’t. That’s the hard bit.’
She reached over the table and squeezed his hand briefly. ‘I know what you mean. Every time I sit at your mum’s kitchen table, I half expect your dad to walk in and ask if there’s any more coffee and where are the doughnuts. It must be so much harder for you.’
‘Mum says you get used to it.’ He blew out a breath. ‘Though I’m glad I’m staying at the cottage so I don’t have to face it all day, every day.’
‘That’s understandable,’ she said, and he was grateful that she didn’t point out his mother had to face it all day, every day. ‘How was the church?’
‘Seeing Dad’s grave was tough,’ he said. ‘So was walking past the quay and seeing someone else’s boat in the spot where his used to be. Though of course I didn’t expect Mum to keep Dad’s boat. It’s much better for it to have gone to someone who’ll use it and enjoy it.’
‘I’m glad you see it that way,’ she said.
‘There’s no other sensible way of seeing it, and I’m not that selfish.’ He hoped. Though he knew he’d already been selfish enough in the past and he needed to make amends. He needed to sort that out in his head before he talked about it, though, so he switched the subject. ‘I noticed you had a new shop on the quayside.’
‘The ice cream parlour. I opened it last year. It’s for people who don’t want to walk all the way down to the beach to get one of our ice creams,’ she said, ‘or maybe they just want to pick up a half-litre tub to eat at home that evening.’
‘Your idea?’
‘Another new direction for Scott’s,’ she said. ‘Yes. Mum and Dad want to take it easier and—’ She stopped and winced. ‘Sorry. That wasn’t tactful.’
‘Spend time together in semi-retirement? It’s what married couples of that age do,’ he said. ‘What my parents would’ve done, if Dad had been more sensible with his medication and looked after himself better instead of leaving it all to Mum.’
She said nothing, simply looked at him.
‘You were right,’ he said softly. ‘Everything you said about Dad, last night. He was stubborn, he didn’t listen to anyone—and I really ought to learn from his mistakes.’
‘Does that include looking after yourself better, rather than spending twice as many hours as you ought to in the lab and living off sandwiches and microwave meals?’ she asked.
It was how he got by.
But he was saved from answering by the arrival of their first course: heritage tomato salad with pesto and burrata, all soft and wobbly and creamy.
‘This is fabulous,’ he said.
He managed to keep the conversation going about food during the second course, too: monkfish wrapped in Parma ham, served on a bed of lentils with samphire, plus a cauliflower and saffron purée.
‘I’m a bit disappointed not to see your Parmesan ice cream on the menu today,’ he said to Abigail after the waiter brought the dessert menu.
‘If you really want to try it, I can always make you some,’ she said. ‘It was very popular in the eighteenth century. Though one glass of ice cream cost about the same as the average daily wage, so really it was only for the super-rich.’
‘Have you thought about making historic recipes?’ he asked. He remembered she’d always loved history. It had been her favourite A level subject.
‘I do sometimes. I have an ancient brown bread ice cream recipe. But I’m experimenting with a few “free-from” options at the moment. Mum’s been diagnosed as having coeliac disease, so that led me to source gluten-free wafers. And I’ve been making non-dairy ice cream with oat milk or almond milk for people who have dairy allergies. Or vegans—you know Ruby’s thinking about taking the next step from being a vegetarian.’
He didn’t. And he felt another twinge of guilt that he really hadn’t paid enough attention to his sister.
‘She’s my main beta tester.’ Abigail smiled. ‘I get people to fill in comment cards in the shop and the café, too—if they do, they go in a monthly draw to win a voucher for Scott’s. Plus then I have their details for our mailing list when we release a new product.’
He wasn’t surprised that Abigail had moved the business forward. Or that she’d turned out to be a savvy, thoughtful businesswoman. That had been so obvious in their Cambridge years; she’d been bubbling over with ideas and it was easy to see that she had what it took to grow Scott’s. Only now he was seeing that potential actually realised, and it was a bit of a jolt to see that the naive, shy teenager he’d married was now well on the way to becoming a tycoon.
‘And everything I sell is made from local ingredients, as much as possible,’ she said. ‘The local dairy supplies my dairy products; the farm shop supplies my fruit and veg; I have an arrangement with the local fishmonger and butcher; my flour’s stone-ground from a local watermill—actually, they supply my bread as well—and even my coffee’s roasted locally.’
