This feels more raw, more primal than usual. It‘s more like fucking instead of our usual love-making, but no less emotional for that. He‘s using his body to drive his words home.
‘Je t‘adore. Toujours.’ He pierces me with every syllable, imprinting me with his thrusts and with his tongue in a physical act of reassurance.
He pauses only to seize my ankles. He hooks them up over his shoulders so he can go deeper still. The different angle means he rubs against the sensitive spot inside me that we spent weeks discovering together.
Aching need builds up inside me again, morphing into an intense explosion of pleasure, another orgasm rocking my body. I fist the sheets at my sides and cry out just before Luc climaxes. I feel the rigid tension in his frame, the sudden jerk inside me and the hot, wet feel of him emptying his seed deep inside me.
When he rolls off me we lie still, drained both physically and emotionally.
Luc is asleep within minutes. I creep to the bathroom quietly so as not to wake him. Max pads after me, his claws clacking on the tiled floor.
He sits watching as I cleanse my face with a baby wipe. I stare at my image in the mirror. I‘m nothing special, just an ordinary girl with fair hair, full breasts and curvy hips. Luc says I‘m far from ordinary, that as well as my very obvious physical charms my kindness has a beauty all of its own. He loves me, enough to sacrifice the family he‘s always wanted. But will he feel the same in ten years’ time or just end up resenting me? Everyone seems to be giving things up because of me. Mum‘s had to give up dreams of grandchildren. Now it‘s her plans for my wedding. Just because of one mistake I‘ll be punished for the rest of my life, the consequences of one stupid action rippling out around me and causing pain in endless concentric circles.
I‘m doing a really crap job of making those I love happy. I shiver, pulling an oversized clean navy t-shirt out of the airing cupboard and over my head. Max moves forward, sensing my distress and rubs himself against my legs.
‘You‘re a muppet, Max. Don‘t you know you‘re a dog, not a cat?’ I reach down to scratch him behind his ear. ‘If only everyone was as easy to please as you, eh?’
I wonder how Luc is going to help sort things out. It‘s a relief to have shared the problem with him, though. I‘m going to try to trust him.
By the next morning some of the edge has been taken off the pressure cooker of emotions building up inside me. Last night and the events of yesterday have left me subdued and a little low, exhausted by the maelstrom of feelings. At eleven-thirty I come into the café from the stockroom to find Holly and Amelia at a table, Maddie in a car seat at their feet.
‘Hey, Soph, take a break and come and join us,’ Holly calls over. ‘It‘s okay, I‘ve cleared it with the boss.’
I glance at Luc and he smiles. ‘Go ahead, I‘m not going over to Vex for another hour.’
Suspiciously fortuitous timing. I bet Luc called Holly and asked her to come over.
‘Hi, Holly.’ I force a smile to my lips. ‘Hi, Amelia, congrats on your Bake-Off win, by the way.’
‘Thanks, I‘m thinking of making my own wedding cake, a ski-resort theme.’ Amelia smiles.
And we‘ve hit the ‚W‘ word within the first minute of conversation. I raise my eyebrows a fraction at Holly. We have a running joke about how often Amelia uses the ‚W‘ word in every conversation. She can turn pretty much any topic around to herself and her forthcoming nuptials with impressive but scary ease.
‘That sounds like fun.’ I sink into a seat next to Holly and reach down to very gently stroke a sleeping Maddie‘s cheek. Her skin is oh-so soft. I blink hard and look back up, aware Amelia and Holly are waiting for my attention.
‘I hope you don‘t mind me tagging along,’ Amelia says and hesitates. I get the sense she‘s psyching herself up to ask something. ‘Holly said she was coming over and it occurred to me you might be able to help me out with a problem.’
‘Oh?’ I eye her warily, worried I‘m going to be press-ganged into cutting metres of white ribbon into precise ten-centimetre segments or other similar bridezilla- imposed activities.
‘Our wedding reception venue has fallen through. The hotel had a fire in its function room,’ Amelia says. ‘Given it‘s such short notice, I‘m not sure it‘ll be possible to find anywhere else and we have about a hundred people coming over from the UK.’
‘I‘m sorry to hear that, but I‘m not sure what I can do to help.’ I frown. ‘Don‘t you have wedding insurance?’
‘We do, but it doesn‘t solve the problem of lots of our guests who‘ve already paid for their non-refundable flights and booked annual leave. Matt and I were wondering if we could hold the reception here. The main café is smaller than the hotel function room, but you‘ve got room to erect a marquee out back, so we could use that space and the main café.’ Amelia gazes at me hopefully. ‘Please consider it, Sophie. Everything else is booked for March. You‘d be a total lifesaver.’
She knows me too well. Via email I might have found a way to say no, but face to face I find it impossible to refuse someone needing help. Holly says my empathy is both one of my best character traits and also my greatest weakness because it leaves me unable to say no to anyone.
‘Okay, I‘ll ask Luc, but we have closed the café for private dos before.’ I ignore the sinking feeling that I‘m going to regret this. Amelia will no doubt email me every day between now and the wedding and I‘ll end up having to repress the desire to strangle her with flower-arranging wire on a regular basis. Oh well, what‘s a bit of murderous repression between friends? I can‘t see Amelia‘s wedding ruined, not when it‘s the only thing she‘s talked about in living memory and I might be able to help.
‘So are you marrying at the mountain chapel where Scott and I married?’ Holly smiles. ‘It was fun skiing down afterwards.’
‘I think I‘m going to snowboard down in my wedding dress. Look, I found this place in Canada that does great winter weddings. I‘m using it for inspiration.’ Amelia takes out her phone and opens up her Pinterest board to show us photos of brides in voluminous white dresses and grooms in full morning dress snowboarding down a mountain. ‘We‘re going for a winter-wonderland theme for the reception. Snowball cocktails, ice sculptures, silver cake pops. The colours will be blue, white and silver. What do you think?’
‘I think it‘ll be wonderful.’ I stare at images of smiling brides and grooms walking hand and hand in the snow and reception rooms turned into glittering ice palaces with frost-laden trees decked out with lanterns.
I hate to admit it, but I‘m jealous.
It‘s the kind of wedding I‘d have if I were free to choose. Free from all the expectations of the people I love and want to make happy. I‘m sure Luc‘s mother would prefer her own village church and priest in Vex to a mountain chapel on this side of the valley. Mum, on the other hand, wants a string quartet, a Church of England service and my second cousin‘s children for my bridesmaids, even though I barely know them. Not to mention having every relative and WI member she wants to show off to in attendance at a swanky hotel.
Luc‘s only stipulation is that his parents are present, which is pretty undemanding, comparatively speaking.
I‘ve been ducking questions about wedding plans because I haven‘t even let myself think about what I want. I even kidded myself I really didn‘t mind about any of the details, but now I know that‘s not true.
I want Amelia‘s wedding.
Chapter 16
LUCY
Inverness airport is tiny compared to the international terminal at Geneva. It feels like I’m stepping back in time when I collect my bag and walk through to the exit. The sky is dark grey and threatening rain. I’m home. Verbier may as well belong to another universe.
I scan the faces of those watching for relatives and am pleased to catch sight of Ben waiting for me. I might not be thrilled to be back in the Highlands but I’m happy to see Ben at least. Genuine affection pierces the layer of numbness that’s covered me si
nce the Avalanche of Bad News Day, as Tash dubbed it.
I reach up and hug Ben tight. At six foot two and broadly built he’s practically a giant compared to me and today that feels like a comfort. We hold onto each other for longer than we normally would. I think we both feel a little adrift. The stubble on Ben’s face tells me he hasn’t shaved today, which is definitely unusual. I peer up at him more closely. His eyes are bloodshot.
What was it like for him to find Dad collapsed in the barn and have to watch him die? I briefly imagine the horror of it and blanch.
‘Have Tom and John stayed home with Mum?’
My other brothers are a lot older than me and we’ve never been close. They took their cue from Dad and basically ignored me. It was Ben, just two years older than me, who taught me to ride and fish and skim stones on the loch.
The riding and the stone-skimming I loved. The fishing not so much, but I didn’t care, I got to spend blissful time alone with Ben and away from the constant disapproval of Mum. He’s basically the only member of my family I’ve ever felt genuinely loved by. The thought makes my eyes burn hot and I squeeze them tight shut.
I knew coming back to Scotland would be hard. I just need to get through the next two weeks. I can do it. If I survived twenty years here I can do a measly two weeks now and offer Mum my support, whether she wants it or not.
Ben nods. ‘Yes. They’re both at the croft. Aunty Sylvia is staying too. Mum put her in your old bedroom, so you’ll be sleeping on the sofa, sorry.’
‘No need to be sorry, it’s not your fault.’ I nudge his elbow.
‘You could have my room,’ he offers.
‘Do you still have engine parts all over the floor and your clothes in piles graded by how dirty they are?’ I ask.
‘Um, maybe.’ He shrugs apologetically.
‘Thanks for the offer, but the sofa will be fine.’
I recognise the move to the sofa as the punishment it’s meant to be. Mum is still angry that I dared to leave the croft and go to Switzerland. I’m lucky she’s not put me out in the barn.
We pay for Ben’s parking and then walk towards his jeep. As we head out of the airport carpark and drive south to Drumnadrochit the threatening grey clouds deliver on their promise – a cold misty, drizzle of a rain shower. The kind that gets under your skin and into your mood, pulling you down with it. In Verbier this precipitation would be falling as snow.
I’ll return to Switzerland once this is over. No matter what Mum says.
Home at the croft I get the sensation of travelling back in time again. This is the world of another Lucy, one who doesn’t exist any more. It certainly doesn’t belong to me and I don’t belong to it. I step on the creaky floorboard in the hallway, a noise that takes me back to all the times I’d try to sneak into the house without Mum hearing me. I’m sure she keeps it that way on purpose. It triggers a familiar anxiety in me, one I try to squash down.
Mum is sitting by the range, Aunty Sylvia next to her. I pause in the doorway, shocked by Mum’s appearance. She seems to have aged ten years since I last saw her. There’s a fragility in her eyes I’ve never seen before. Mum is never frail. Ever.
My instinct is to hug her, but when she sees me her mouth purses in disapproval. It’s a look I’m very familiar with. One that never fails to make my stomach clench in a muscle-memory sort of way.
‘So, you finally made it,’ she sniffs.
Great, I’ve been home for two minutes and already I’m in trouble.
‘I got the first flight I could book.’ I hate the defensive tone that creeps into my voice.
She eyes me coldly and tension ratchets up a notch in my gut. I have to crush the part of me that wants to sob in her arms, to ask Mum to make it all better.
That’s never going to happen. I’m not sure it ever has. When my first pet kitten died I was seven years old. Mum stared at me coldly and told me to toughen up, that as a crofter’s daughter I had no business crying over a mere animal, especially one that had no monetary value. She only let me bring the kitten into the house in the first place because it could grow up to be a mouser. The outside barn cats hadn’t been doing their job well enough and some brave rodents had dared to break into Mum’s kitchen.
I stare at her now and feel an immense sadness creeping over me. Too much has passed between us. Too many misunderstandings and too many words that were, sadly, all too easy to understand. A gulf has opened up and I don’t know how to cross it, or if I even want to.
Why does this have to be so complicated? I remember a phrase I heard once – that friends are the family you choose. I think about Seb and Sophie and Holly with a pang. Right now my friends in Verbier feel more like family than my blood relatives, Ben excepted.
Like I said, he always made time for me. Maybe because he’s the closest to me in age or maybe just because he has a big heart. When John and Tom went out to work as beaters on the local laird’s estate hunt days Ben and I would hide in the barn and read comics. Sometimes we’d take the dogs up on the hills or into the forest for long walks.
Those are the things I miss.
I’m still standing, arms hugging my chest, even though the defensiveness of the posture irritates me.
‘You’ll help with the funeral tea.’ Mum eyes me like I’m a recalcitrant servant who needs putting in her place.
‘Of course,’ I try hard not to sound snappish. ‘I want to help any way I can … I’m so sorry to hear the news, Mum. It must’ve been awful for you.’
She stiffens and glares at me. There’s real malice in her eyes that breaches my defences and breaks my heart.
‘You’d have known how it was if you’d been here,’ she replies tartly.
Aunty Sylvia pats Mum’s arm. I’ll get no help from her.
I try really hard to put myself in Mum’s place. I can imagine the long wait for the air ambulance, how incredibly stressful that must’ve been. It’s one of those things you have to accept if you live somewhere remote – emergency services won’t be able to get to you quickly. It’s why the fundraisers for the air ambulance get such good support in our area. You never know when it might be your turn to need the service.
‘Mum, I …’ I’m struggling to find the right words to make things better between us when Mum cuts in sharply.
‘Maybe you could’ve saved him if you’d been here. You did that first-aid course, after all.’
She glares at me again with real venom. I feel like I’ve been punched. Ben shifts awkwardly at my side.
Mum needs to focus her anger at losing Dad somewhere and she’s chosen to lay it all on me. Right. I take a deep breath.
‘I couldn’t have saved him if it was massive stroke. I’m not a doctor.’ I force the words out between clenched teeth and turn away from her, blinking hard. ‘I’m making tea, would anyone like some?’
As I take the kettle off the ancient stove and put tea bags into the teapot a thought nags at the back of my mind. Aspirin. I read somewhere on the web about how if you put a dispersible aspirin under the tongue of someone having heart attack it might lessen the effects. Is it the same with a stroke? I couldn’t have saved him, could I? And if I had lessened the effects of the stroke, Dad would have hated being an invalid. He always said he wanted to die in his fields, on his own land. He loathed hospitals with a vengeance.
Anyway I wasn’t here. It’s not my fault that Dad died, whatever Mum is choosing to believe. I’m a grown woman, an adult and I can choose my own life. What’s so terrible about leaving home? I hate how Mum gets to me so easily. She never fails to make me feel guilty.
As I pass around the cups of tea I realise the next two weeks are going to be very stressful. I wonder how Seb is getting along. I wish I could be with him, I’m missing him already. The thought pops into my mind and I instantly feel guilty for it. What is wrong with me? Dad is dead and Mum needs me. If she wants to take out her anger on me I’m just going to have to suck it up.
When I hand Mum her tea she looks at me as if
she can see everything I’ve been doing with Seb. Do I look different for losing my virginity? I refuse to feel as though I’ve done something wrong. I don’t have to live by her rigid rules any more.
I sigh and sit down on the sofa with my own tea. Ben rests a hand on my shoulder. Normally he’d have stood up for me, but I can sense he’s at a loss with how to deal with this fragile yet volatile version of Mum.
The next couple of weeks stretch out in front of me like a prison sentence to be endured. As for my own feelings about Dad, I barely know where to start with processing the grief and the loss of the relationship we could have had in a different dimension maybe.
Perhaps if I’d been a boy …
I swallow down that idea along with my scalding tea. I need to do something with my hands too much to wait for it to cool. Briefly I close my eyes and remember Seb holding me, caressing me as though I’m special and I know that thinking about him is the only way I’ll survive these weeks at home.
Chapter 17
BETH
‘Hi, Dan, I got your voicemail.’ My mouth is dry and my pulse racing as I stamp my boots on the camper steps to knock the snow off.
Once in the van, the warmth of the heater hits me and I strip off my jacket and scarf before they turn me into a one-woman sauna.
‘Cup of tea?’ he asks calmly, as if this is just another one of my visits.
‘Maybe later. You, um, said you had some news.’ I sit down on Dan’s bed, resisting the urge to demand he just get on with it and tell me already.
‘I made some enquiries for you. He was convicted.’
I blink hard and suddenly I can’t remember how to breathe.
‘When?’ I whisper, knotting my fingers in the fringed strands of Dan’s cotton throw. My fingers are as rigid as claws. My whole body has tensed, though what good fight or flight is going to do me here, hundreds of miles from London, I don’t know.
Dan sits next to me, thigh not quite touching mine. The expression on his face is grave and I wonder if he’s read the full reports. If it was the same, what happened to those other women? What he did …
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