Forgotten Fiancee

by Lucy Gordon

  “Yes,” she said huskily. “I’m fine.”

  But he heard a note in her voice that worried him. “What is it?” he asked urgently, shutting the door behind him. “Have you been crying?”

  “It’s just—I’m tired, and it’s been a long day.”

  “Tell me what’s upset you,” he insisted half-angrily. “I’ve got the right to know. No.” He checked himself hastily. “Not right. I didn’t mean that. But I want to know what’s in your heart. What about him?” he demanded jealously. “Would you have told him?”

  “I don’t think he’d ever have asked. He didn’t notice things as you do. Let it go for now, Justin. One day you’ll understand—and then perhaps you’ll forgive me.”

  “Forgive you?” The words startled him. “You could never do anything I’d need to forgive. I don’t believe you’ve everdone an unkind act or thought an unkind thought in your life.”

  “Don’t think too well of me. If you only knew…”

  “I know you,” he said simply. “And that’s all I need to know. Good night, my darling.”

  Chapter Seven

  The only small cloud in Sarah’s sky was the problem of finding time to be alone with Justin. Oddly enough, it was Nick who solved it. Sarah came into the kitchen one morning to find him just replacing the phone.

  “That was your uncle Joe,” he said. “He and Ethel booked a vacation in a seaside caravan, but she’s got a funny tummy, so they’re going home early. The van’s paid for until the end of the week, and we can have the last three days if we like.”

  “It sounds lovely, but how can we leave the shop at short notice?” Sarah asked wistfully.

  “You can if I stay here,” the old man said. “You and Justin. I’ll look after Nicky. It’ll be just you two.” He gave her a sly wink.

  Sarah threw her arms around his neck. “You do like him, don’t you?” she asked gleefully.

  Well, I will say he went up in my estimation when I saw him taking Mrs. Timmins’s orders with never a word of complaint.” He assumed a falsetto voice. “’Do this, do that, hurry up, young man, we haven’t got all day.’ And him saying, ‘Yes ma’am, no ma’am,’ as meek as a baby. But I don’t think he’s a meek man normally.”

  “He certainly isn’t!”

  “So why was he doing it?”

  “To help the Haven Players,” Sarah said primly, but her eyes were dancing.

  “Hmm! Put it that way if you like. He’s sure trying to get into someone’s good books.”

  Justin arrived a moment later, was told of the plan and immediately endorsed it. But with a condition. “I’m hiring a car in Market Dorsey to take us there,” he said. “You say this place is only ten miles away, but…” He paused tactfully while Nick bridled.

  “You were going to say something about my car?” he demanded.

  “I was going to say we can’t deprive you of it,” Justin continued smoothly, and shushed Sarah out of the side of his mouth when she giggled.

  He got the bus to Market Dorsey and returned driving a car that had been carefully chosen from the middle of the range. It offered a smoother ride than Nick’s bone shaker—but then, what car didn’t?—without marking him out as a rich man.

  The weather was broiling hot, and the caravan site, on the edge of the beach, was a welcome sight. The site manager showed them to their van, which was large and comfortable, told them where to find some shops and departed with Justin’s tip.

  After Sarah called home to reassure herself about Nicky, they shopped, stocking up on food, buying swimming trunks for Justin, then hurried back to change for a swim. A few moments later they were plunging into the sparkling water, gasping at its chilly impact on their skins and splashing each other like children. They raced, and he was chagrined to find that it took him an effort to beat her. She had the strength of a countrywoman, and he still wasn’t at his best.

  A motorboat came by, slowing so the driver could shout at them, “Go back. There’s a dangerous undertow beyond here. People have been drowned. The council ought to set up warning signs, but they won’t in case it damages trade.”

  They thanked him and swam to shore. In the evening they visited the funfair and tried everything, clutching each other on the ghost train, laughing at their distorted images in the hall of mirrors and eating toffee apples. Justin tried a rifle stall and won a fat, furry gorilla for Nicky.

  “And it only took you thirty attempts,” Sarah teased him. “You could have bought it for half that.”

  He did better at the next stall, winning a tiny bear at the first try and solemnly presenting her with it.

  “What shall we do now?” he asked. “Go out for a meal or go home and make love?”

  Sarah sighed and clutched her stomach. “I’m simply starving,” she declared.

  “So am I—but not for food.”

  “I’m starving for food,” she insisted, looking at him innocently.

  But he was a man of action. And he took it.

  “Justin, put me down. There are people watching. Put me down!”

  He did, but not until they were inside the caravan, when he deposited her on the bed and locked the door.

  “What about my supper?”

  “Afterward,” he said firmly, beginning to undress her. “Afterward.”

  They made love in a riot of joy. Then he cooked the supper, but they only got halfway through before being distracted. They were too weary to eat after that, and fell asleep in each other’s arms.

  The three days they spent in Barton were so happy as to seem almost unreal. After the long time spent parched of Justin’s love, Sarah found herself bathed in it, reveling in it. Surely now, she thought, she might risk telling him the truth? She began to plot her moment, waiting for a natural opening. Perhaps it would happen at night, when they’d fulfilled each other and were resting in peace and contentment. On their second night in Barton she was lying with her head against his, relaxing from the pleasure of love, when Justin spoke quietly above her head.

  “I wish I’d met you earlier in my life.”

  Sarah’s heart almost stopped. “Why?” she asked breathlessly.

  “You’d have been good for me. I might have liked myself better now.”

  “You don’t know what you’re like now.”

  “Not from memory, but I can read the signs in the paperwork of the past two years. People I put out of business, took advantage of. It wasn’t a nice man who did that. He was hard and cruel—”

  “Not cruel,” she said at once, and caught herself quickly. “I mean, I don’t believe you could ever be cruel.”

  “I hope you go on thinking so. Perhaps it’s as well you didn’t know me then. You’d have hated me, and I couldn’t bear that.”

  “I could never have hated you,” Sarah said. “It might have been painful to love you, but I’d have done it anyway.”

  “Then you might have stopped me going wrong.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” she said softly. “What you are now is what you were then. The good and the kindness were always there.”

  “But it took you to bring them out.” He sighed. “Why couldn’t you have come into my life sooner? Where were you when I needed you, Sarah?” Then he tensed. “Ah, yes. I was forgetting. You were in love with someone else.”

  She said nothing, hoping he wouldn’t pursue the subject. She knew her plan of telling him the truth would have to wait.

  “I wonder what would have happened if we’d met then,” Justin mused. “You’d have been with him, and I’d have liked to meet him face to face and see what kind of a swine won your heart. I can’t say I admire your taste.” There was a bitter note in his voice. The harmony that had united them a few minutes ago was fractured.

  Justin knew it would be wiser to keep quiet, but he couldn’t help himself. The imp of jealousy, which he usually stifled, had leaped on him while he lay with Sarah in his arms, reminding him that her heart held another loyalty.

  If she’d been a di
fferent sort of woman it would have mattered less. If Nicky had resulted from a casual affair, Justin knew he could have lived with it more easily. But Sarah wasn’t the woman to indulge in casual affairs. When she loved she gave all of herself, heart and soul as well as body, and it was that all he resented, feeling as if someone had stolen a gift reserved for him..

  He knew he should stop now, but the imp was at work, tearing him, driving him to make her miserable, too.

  “Was he anything like me?” he asked in a light voice to disguise his real feelings.

  “Justin, stop this,” she said desperately. “It’s over. Please forget it.”

  “How can I forget him when you can’t? Whatever you feel for me, I don’t think you’ve stopped loving him.”

  It would have been so easy to tell him what he wanted to hear, that her love for Nicky’s father was dead. But one day he would remember everything, including what she said now. “I can’t forget,” she said at last. “But I love you.”

  “You love me, you love him. It’s getting damned crowded in here!”

  He rose abruptly, pulled on some shorts and left the caravan. It was night but the moon was brilliant, bathing the shore and the sea in silver. Justin ran barefoot along the edge of the water, going faster and faster, trying to leave behind the thoughts that hounded him. But they pursued him, snapping at his heels, and when at last he slowed for breath they were still there.

  He sat on a rock and buried his head in his hands, trying not to see the images behind his eyes. They’d been there since he’d heard how her lover had received the news of their child. It was like a scene on film that played over and over. He knew exactly how Sarah would have looked, her face radiant with the glory of life and love, then distraught at the brutal rejection. The man was in shadow, but Justin didn’t need to see his face to hate him. From Sarah’s words he knew the kind of man he was, cold, efficient, incapable of love.

  “You bastard!” he muttered. “Oh, you rotten bastard! Why can’t I have you here now, for just five minutes?”

  He couldn’t keep still. Only movement gave him release. He headed for the sea, plunging into the chilly waves and stroking strongly out to the horizon. He swam until he was tired and rested to catch his breath before heading to shore. But then he felt the yank of the current at his feet, and realized he’d come out beyond the safety point.

  Horrified, he saw how much distance lay between him and the shore. Already tired, he must fight his way against the undertow that was insistently trying to haul him out to sea. Already, simply treading water, he’d been drawn out a good twenty feet.

  He began to swim to the shore, forcing his weary limbs into greater efforts. The current fought him every inch of the way, tugging at his feet like a determined enemy. It was fatal to stop for breath. He plowed on blindly and at last realized with relief that the current had died away. He’d reached the safety area, but was still some distance from the shore, and he was exhausted.

  He paused to tread water, taking deep breaths, trying to will himself to the last effort. Then he heard his name echoing across the water.

  “Justin!”

  It was Sarah’s voice. He could make out her tiny figure on the shore, calling him frantically. He raised an arm to wave and immediately went under. He surfaced, gasping, his eyes filled with water. For a dreadful moment he couldn’t tell which way he was going. Then her voice came again, pinpointing the shore, guiding him home. Using all his strength, he forced himself on, and at last felt the blessed firmness of sand beneath his feet. He tried to stand but his legs gave way. Then Sarah was there beside him, pulling his arm around her shoulders, supporting him the last few steps. At the edge of the water his legs went again, but she gripped him tightly, refusing to let him fall. “You’re not lying down until we’re well clear,” she said, in a more commanding voice than he’d ever heard her use.

  At last she released him, and he sprawled on the dry sand, breathing hard. He couldn’t open his eyes, his head ached, and there was singing in his ears, but he was conscious enough to hear Sarah.

  “Justin, look at me, please. Oh, God, I can’t bear this. I can’t lose you again, I can’t.”

  “It’s all right,” he managed to gasp, “I’m not dead—be fine in a minute—”

  “You idiot!” she breathed. “You idiot. How dare you do such a stupid thing?”

  That made him open his eyes. Sarah’s face was frantic, the tears pouring down her cheeks. “I’m all right, honestly,” he said in a voice that was hoarse from sea water. “If you’ll help me I can make it back to the caravan.”

  He had to lean on her all the way, and collapsed again onto the bed. He resisted her attempts to call an ambulance, even going so far as to hide the mobile phone and threaten her with retribution if she went out to call, although he’d begun to realize that under her quiet ways was a core of no-nonsense strength he hadn’t discovered before.

  “Fancy you bawling me out,” he said, sitting up in bed to eat the soup she’d heated for him. “I’ve never heard you like that before. What happened to my gentle Sarah?”

  “She stops being gentle when people do daft things,” she said firmly. “What’s more, the next time you pull such a stupid stunt, your gentle Sarah is going to kick your shins.”

  He grinned. “That’s my girl!”

  “Now, eat the fish I’ve cooked for you.”

  “I’m not sure—”

  “Eat it.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She didn’t take her eyes off him until he’d obeyed, and he had to admit he felt better for the hot food.

  “What possessed you to swim out that far?”

  “I was trying to outrun my jealousy. But I know now that’s not the way.” He took her hand. “I’m sorry for what I said tonight.”

  “You have nothing to be jealous of.”

  “You don’t now how I feel about you, Sarah. I don’t just want your love. I want everything about you, not merely what this man left over, but everything.” His voice became wry. “Couldn’t you at least pretend to hate him, just to make me feel better?”

  “Is that what you want from me? Pretense?”

  He shook his head. “No, I want only what you are, good and honest, incapable of mean or petty thought. I guess I’ll have to learn to think my way around this.”

  When he was half-asleep he remembered wondering what Sarah had meant by, “I can’t lose you again.” But then he realized she must have been referring to the time he walked away from Haven.

  That was the only incident that marred their time at Barton. When the moment came to leave they both looked around the caravan, trying to imprint it on their minds. There was an ache of regret in Sarah’s heart that only the thought of seeing Nicky again could assuage.

  Her reunion with her son was everything she’d hoped. He bounced around in her arms and squeezed her until she gasped. Justin, too, got an eager greeting. He hugged the little boy, wondering who, if anyone, had ever welcomed him so warmly before. He presented the gorilla, which was warmly received, and tried to teach Nicky the word. But all Nicky could manage was “Ger—ger,” and his new friend was called Ger from that moment.

  Sarah wanted to spend some time with Nicky to make up for her absence, and Uncle Nick wanted to resume his feud with Colly. It was noticeable that on the days when they didn’t trade insults both men seemed to wilt a little.

  The Haven Players didn’t meet in the summer, so when Sarah and Justin had been back a week they deposited the baby with the Graingers and took Uncle Nick to the Haystack..

  But as soon as they entered the pub they could see that something was wrong. The air seemed to hum with indignation. Brenda stood in the corner of a small crowd, talking furiously.

  “I don’t believe it,” Miss Timmins was saying, pink-cheeked. “You must have misunderstood, Brenda, dear. Nobody could do such a wicked thing.”

  “There’s no misunderstanding.” Colly stoutly defended his granddaughter. “I saw it myself
in black and white.”

  “But they can’t do it,” Ted roared. “It’ll destroy Haven.”

  “What’s happened?” Sarah asked anxiously.

  “They’re going to develop Haven,” Brenda said. “There’s going to be a shopping complex on the green and blocks of high-rise flats over the fields behind. I was talking to someone on the County Advertiser today, and he says it’s all settled.”

  “It can’t be,” Ted insisted. “That land belongs to the village.”

  The parish council is selling it,” Brenda said, almost in tears.

  “Councillor Norton!” Sarah exclaimed. “That’s what he meant when he said Haven’s time had come. Oh, how could he?”

  “Has the sale actually gone through?” Justin demanded.

  “All but,” Brenda told him. “There’s going to be an announcement any day. Look, my contact gave me a copy of the plan.” She held out a sheet of paper, and Justin studied it. It showed development all over the green, where the hall now stood and onto the fields in the rear. Some apartment blocks had been indicated, but they were crowded to one side, like an afterthought.

  “The official line is that the development will be a fine thing because people need houses,” Brenda said. “But it seems to me the real point is the shopping complex.”

  “Brenda, did you get the name of the company?” Justin demanded.

  “Yes, it was D and S. I’ve never heard of it.”

  “I have,” he said quietly. “It’s a powerful firm, and it gets what it wants.”

  Sarah was watching him with the eyes of love that noticed every detail. She saw that whatever he knew about this company had given him a vision of what was to come. She saw, too, that his old and new selves were facing each other uneasily, the one applauding a shrewd money-making deal, the other…

  Abruptly Justin turned and went out, striding over the crossroads to the green. The others followed. He was still a stranger among them, yet he was so purposeful it seemed natural to follow his lead.

  Summer was at its height, and there was still enough evening light for Justin to look around and see what the company had in mind.