by Holly Ford
Ella stared at him. Damian Priest’s agent wanted to meet her? ‘She said that? Really?’
‘Sure.’ He gave her a pitying look. ‘But the thing is, honey, she’s not going to come here to do it. Nobody is.’
Ugh, he wasn’t telling her anything she didn’t already know, but—
‘Look, I love this town. It’s a hell of a place for an old guy like me to end up. But it’s no place to start out. You know what I’m saying?’
Ella nodded.
‘You want a career doing weddings, pet portraits, you stay where you are. No shame in that. But if you want the big time, you have to go to it. It ain’t going to come to you.’
It was true. She knew it was. But … but a career wasn’t the only thing she wanted. Was it? Surely there had to be some kind of compromise?
‘Think it over,’ Damian said.
Speechless, Ella nodded again.
‘You could go someplace, Ella.’ He searched out her eyes. ‘I really think that you could. But first you have to set out.’
‘I’ll think about it,’ she managed.
‘Think hard.’ Damian got to his feet. ‘I’m heading out for a while. I’m not sure what time I’ll get back. Just lock up and head on home when you’re done. You can let me know what you decide tomorrow.’
‘There you are.’ Throwing his car keys on the bench, Luke seized her hips and pulled her to him. ‘Shame. I’ve spent all day imagining you just where I left you.’
As he kissed her, the intervening thirteen hours washed right out of Ella’s mind.
‘You spent all day thinking about money,’ she smiled.
‘I took the odd minute off.’ Lifting her onto the bench, he unbuttoned her shirt. ‘So,’ he said mischievously, his thumb working down the lace of her bra, ‘tell me about your day.’
Dammit. With an effort, Ella remembered she had something important to say. ‘Actually, I do have to talk to you,’ she said, reluctantly removing his hand.
‘Already?’ With a sigh, Luke straightened her shirt. ‘Where are you off to this time?’
‘Damian’s decided he wants to move back to New York.’
‘God.’ Luke looked shocked, although, for a fleeting second, not entirely displeased. ‘When’s he going?’
‘Friday.’
‘You’re kidding.’ Luke dropped his hands to her knees. ‘Ella, I’m so sorry. But look, don’t worry, you’ll get other work. Just come up to Christchurch with me. We’ll sort something out, I promise.’ Lifting her chin, he looked into her face. ‘Maybe it’s meant to be. Maybe the next job that comes along will be even better.’
‘No, but the thing is …’ She turned her head, unable to bear the look of hope in his eyes. ‘Well, he’s asked me to go with him.’
‘To New York?’ Luke took a step backwards. ‘For how long?’
‘For—’ Ella picked at a speck in the granite. ‘For as long as he ends up staying there, I suppose.’
‘You mean permanently?’
Too scared to look at him, she nodded.
‘And,’ Luke retreated another couple of paces, ‘you’re thinking about this?’
Closing her knees, Ella rubbed her hands over her jeans. ‘Damian’s agent wants to meet me. I — I might even get a book.’ Willing him to understand, she looked at him. ‘Do you know what that means? It’s holy grail stuff.’
She waited. Turning his back on her, Luke spread his hands on the opposite bench.
‘Would you say something?’ she begged. ‘Please?’
‘You should go,’ he said coldly. ‘It’s a great opportunity. You should take it.’
Ella felt sick to her stomach. ‘You could come with me,’ she said.
‘How, Ella?’ Luke turned, his eyes blazing. ‘How could I come with you? I couldn’t work in New York if I wanted to.’
‘And you don’t,’ she said slowly. ‘Want to.’
‘You know how my industry operates.’ He ran his hand over his face. ‘It’s all about networking. Who you know. What do you expect me to do, stand in Times Square and tout for business?’
‘It’s the financial capital of the world,’ she pointed out. ‘I’m pretty sure you could get a job there.’
‘I’m a director of my family’s company. I have responsibilities here.’ Luke stared at her. ‘You know perfectly well I can’t walk away.’
Ella looked down, sifting through the ruins of all the airy schemes she’d spent the afternoon constructing in her head. ‘It’s not like it would be forever. If I went, I mean. We’d still see each other. I could come back, and you could come over … It wouldn’t really be that different to what we do now.’
‘Let’s not even bother pretending that’s true.’
‘You said,’ Ella reminded him, in a very small voice, ‘that we’d find a way to make this work.’
‘If we both wanted to,’ he said, sounding suddenly exhausted. ‘But I don’t think you do. I think the only thing you’re looking for is the nearest exit sign.’
‘That’s not true.’
‘When did you tell Damian you’d let him know?’
‘Tomorrow.’
‘Right.’
‘Don’t say it like that.’ Sliding off the bench, she put her hand to his chest. ‘I haven’t even decided what I’m going to say yet.’
Luke met her eyes. ‘Yes, you have.’ He reached into his pocket. ‘Here.’ With a wry little smile, he handed back her thong. ‘Turns out I was dreaming after all.’
An unknown number of hours after she had gone to sleep alone, Ella woke up to find Luke’s side of the bed still empty. She reached for her phone. It was six in the morning. Had he spent all night out there on the sofa? Sitting up, she switched on the bedside light. Luke’s bag, she saw, was waiting by the door. What the hell?
The bathroom door opened. Seeing her, Luke paused in the doorway. ‘Hey.’ His voice was rough.
‘Where are you going?’ she asked — a horribly unhappy echo of yesterday, she realised too late. From the look on his face, it wasn’t lost on Luke either.
‘I’m heading straight back to Christchurch after work.’
Her stomach lurched. ‘But you were going to stay tonight.’
Luke shrugged. ‘It’ll be easier this way.’
‘Don’t.’ Ella shook her head. ‘Please. I don’t want you to go.’
‘You don’t mean that,’ he said gently.
‘I — I do.’
‘No. You just can’t stand to be the bad guy.’ Crossing the bedroom, he picked up his bag. ‘So I’m going to give you what you really want. Here you go. This is me walking out on you, like you always knew I would.’
Jesus. Ella fought to find words. ‘You can’t leave now. Not like this.’
Luke let out something approaching a laugh. ‘How would you prefer me to leave? Would you like me to help you pack for New York first? Drive you to the airport, kiss you goodbye, say we’ll stay in touch? I’m sorry, Ella, you were right all along. I’m not that nice a guy.’
She stared at him, stunned. ‘So you’re saying this is it? You’re just going to cut us off now, and … and … and what? We never speak to each other again?’
His eyes softened. ‘I’m saying go. Go to New York. Go wherever it takes you. Go and be amazing. I hope you get all the things you want. I think that you will. But I’m not a big enough man to stay here and watch you do it.’
With rising horror, Ella watched him turn and walk away. God, it was like one of those nightmares when all you needed to do to save yourself was cry out … get the car door open, step out of the street … but … but …
Luke’s footsteps faded away down the stairs. Seconds later, the Aston’s engine throbbed into life in the garage below. She heard the thud of the garage door as it closed, the muffled roar of the car as it accelerated into the early morning streets. Then silence. He’d really gone this time. And he wasn’t coming back.
Picking up his pillow, Ella clutched it to her chest and drew up her kne
es, staring out at the slowly lightening sky above the lake. By the time her own alarm went off at a quarter to eight, she knew with absolute and sickening certainty that the one thing she wanted most in the world had already walked out the door.
Chapter EIGHTEEN
On the afternoon Luke was due to drop Cally off, Lizzie drove to Glencairn with a mounting sense of glee, the Land Rover’s lights on and its windscreen wipers working overtime to clear the fast-settling snow. If this kept up, she might just get to use the chains Carr had insisted she buy after all. The first really big fall of the year was rapidly transforming the familiar road into an adventure. What she could still see of it, anyway. With the cloud right down and the snow driving in, it was like being in a tunnel.
Unless Luke got there very soon, she realised, there was no way his car was going to make it up here. Someone would have to go out and pick Cally up from the main road. If indeed she and Luke even made it over the pass before it closed. Catching herself wondering if Luke had checked the weather conditions before he set out, Lizzie grinned. The Hang Seng Index, probably. But the MetService forecast? She doubted it. Oh well, he knew the road. If they couldn’t get through tonight, he’d soon have the two of them tucked up somewhere safe and warm. Picturing a romantic country hotel with a roaring fire, Lizzie was almost jealous until she remembered where she was going. And — oh dear, silly her — that it was Cally, not Ella, Luke had in the car. Poor things. Given that they really didn’t know each other that well, it could be a long night.
Ahead, somewhat to Lizzie’s surprise, Glencairn’s enormous mailbox loomed out of the snow. She had completely lost track of where she was on the road. Bringing the Land Rover to a halt, she climbed out to check the mail, revelling in the muffled grey new world, huge snowflakes dusting her cheeks. She really must wipe the smile off her face, she told herself, getting back into the car with three bank statements and a vet’s bill, before she saw Carr. She doubted that he and Ash were finding this nearly as much fun as she was.
Unsurprisingly, given the weather, the homestead was empty when she arrived. There was at least an inch of snow on the old stone sills, and the roof was already white. The gum trees, too, were covered with snow. Lizzie looked around at the picture-postcard-perfect scene. All it needed were sleigh bells, she thought, joyfully. And perhaps some inside lights on.
In the kitchen, she found the range had nearly gone out. Having stoked it up and got in some more wood, she checked the various ovens. They were empty, too. Obviously it had been a busy day out there. Lizzie opened the fridge. A slab of meat confronted her. Beef, judging by its size. She sniffed it: yes. Shepherd’s pie in the making? Deciding on beef and Guinness instead, she reached a roll of pastry out of the freezer. No one, she suspected, was going to be in the mood for an elegant meal in the dining room tonight. She had got the beef on to braise and was sitting down seriously considering mulling the rest of the stout when headlights raked the drive outside and Ash walked in the door.
‘Hi,’ he said awkwardly.
‘Hello.’
‘Dad’s not far away. I just saw his truck heading down the hill.’
Lizzie nodded. It was very nearly dark. Carr couldn’t stay out much longer. ‘I’ve got dinner on,’ she told him.
Ash let out an audible sigh of relief. ‘Thank you.’ His face was wet with snow and stung red with the cold, and he was giving off a powerful smell of wet sheep. ‘Can I give you a hand with something?’
‘No,’ she smiled. ‘I’ve got it.’
‘Thanks,’ he said again. ‘I’ll go get cleaned up.’ He headed for the door.
‘It won’t be too long,’ she promised, checking the fire.
‘Lizzie?’
She looked up at him.
‘Look, about last weekend—’
‘It’s okay,’ she said quickly. ‘Don’t worry about it.’
‘It’s not okay,’ Ash frowned, running a hand through the hair plastered to his head. ‘I had no right to speak to you like that. None at all. I don’t know what the hell was the matter with me.’
Really? She had a pretty fair idea herself. Lizzie watched his face.
‘Anyway, I’m … I’m really sorry.’ His frown deepened.
‘Seriously, Ash, it’s fine. I’ve forgotten about it already.’
Ash continued to stare at the tabletop.
‘Did Valentina get away all right?’ she asked, as innocently she could.
‘Yeah.’ He glanced up briefly. ‘She left a few days early, actually.’
She nodded. Carr had already told her that. ‘Will she be …’ Lizzie searched for a tactful phrase. ‘Coming to stay again?’
‘No.’ Ash looked suddenly horrified. ‘I don’t think so.’ He gave himself a little shake. ‘No, she won’t.’
Lizzie couldn’t resist. Overriding the voice in her head telling her to mind her own business, she took a punt. ‘Ash, was Valentina the reason you left Argentina?’
Ash stared at her for a full three seconds. Lizzie quailed a little at the force of the Fergusson glare. Had she gone too far?
Suddenly, pulling out the chair he’d been gripping since the conversation began, Ash sat down. ‘I liked her,’ he said, in a desperate voice. ‘She’s a nice girl.’
Lizzie was silent.
He frowned again. ‘Once you get past all that stupid stuff on the surface, I mean. That shit about her family … She’s not like that when you get her alone.’ He paused. ‘She gets nervous, that’s all.’
Was there any creature Ash wouldn’t try to calm? ‘So you and she …’ Lizzie prompted.
‘We got on,’ Ash said. ‘There weren’t many people to talk to out there, especially not who spoke English, and we spent a bit of time together, you know, with the horses and stuff, and … and she started to relax around me …’ He gave Lizzie a guilty look. ‘And I liked that. Seeing her be herself. So I guess I — I let things get out of hand.’
Lizzie waited.
‘Then they kind of got out of hand more and more, and I kept trying to — to stop it, you know? But nothing I said seemed to make any difference. Next thing I knew, I was having dinner with her parents at the polo club every week.’ Ash shot Lizzie a tiny smile. ‘They wanted to make me a member.’
‘So you just left?’
He shrugged. ‘Dad told me he needed a shepherd back here. It seemed like pretty good timing.’
‘But did you tell Valentina it was over?’
‘I’d never told her it had begun,’ Ash defended himself, sharply. He rubbed his forehead. ‘But yes, I thought I did. I tried. I told her I was leaving and I wouldn’t be back.’
‘But,’ said Lizzie, as gently as she could, ‘you invited her to come here.’
‘I didn’t mean to. It was my last day, and she was standing there, and she asked if we could keep in touch and— What was I supposed to say? No?’
Lizzie bit her tongue.
‘Then she said maybe we’d see each other in New Zealand one day, and I said yeah, sure, who knows, maybe we would — you know, like you do — and three months later I had an email from her saying she’d booked her ticket.’
‘Why didn’t you just tell her you didn’t want her to come?’
‘How do you do that?’ Ash demanded. ‘How do you tell somebody that you don’t want them? How do you tell them to go away, when you know they want to stay?’ He stared at her furiously. ‘I don’t understand how anybody can say that to a person. Any person. Even if they don’t give a shit about them.’
God, that certainly seemed to have hit a nerve. Whoever had broken his heart appeared to have done a bang-up job. Lizzie thought carefully about her next words.
‘It’s horrible to have to hurt someone,’ she said, ‘but I don’t think anyone has ever got through life without doing it once or twice.’
‘I know,’ he said shortly. ‘I know I just fucked everything up and made it worse. I didn’t want to hurt Valentina, so I hurt Cally instead, and now everything’s the wron
g way round and she hates me and — and I don’t know what to do.’
‘I don’t think Cally hates you.’
‘Yeah, well, if she doesn’t, she should. I’m not too keen on myself at the moment.’
Lizzie’s heart went out to him.
‘Anyway, it’s probably just as well.’ Ash’s voice was grim. ‘Cally doesn’t belong with a guy like me. She’s too smart. She should be off doing—’ He shook his head. ‘One of those things that Luke said.’
‘You know,’ Lizzie said, ‘I’ve always found it best to let people make up their own minds about where they belong.’
They both looked towards the window as the lights of the Hilux lit up the drive outside, snow swirling thickly in the beams. It was, Lizzie realised, completely dark now.
‘You never know,’ she told Ash, ‘things might work out.’
‘Yeah.’ With a shake of his head, he pushed his chair back, his eyes still on the window. ‘Thanks. It’s good to have someone to talk to.’
‘You could talk to your father.’
‘Yeah,’ Ash said again. ‘We don’t do that.’
‘I know,’ she said carefully, ‘it isn’t easy. Carr can be a man of few words—’
‘He doesn’t have any problems talking to you,’ Ash cut in.
‘I’ve been making him practise.’
The door opened. Seeing Carr standing there, Lizzie’s breath caught at how much she’d missed him. It was ridiculous — it had only been four nights. She felt a wave of pure happiness as his eyes found hers, the dark, hawkish gaze softening into a smile. He looked as windswept as Ash, and more than usually rugged. As intimately as she’d come to know that lean-muscled body, still, every time he walked into a room his sheer physicality left her spellbound. Her mind wandering to the recollection of the power of his grip on her shoulder blades in the early hours of Monday morning, Lizzie hurriedly tried to gather her thoughts.
‘What is it?’ she asked him, realising he was still standing in the doorway looking at them. ‘Is there something wrong?’
‘No,’ Carr said gruffly, the smile still in his eyes. ‘Not a thing.’
