Despite the hectic rush behind the counter, the three radiated harmony. Aidan would fill a bag with cookies and hand it off to his sister-in-law, who tied it together with a ribbon. He’d then grab a cup from a shelf that was out of reach for his nephew’s short arms. When Aidan turned to his next customer, the cake box was already waiting. I watched how Vicky smiled at him and how he winked in return.
Aidan.
I studied his face—tired but content—his kind eyes, the dimple partly hidden by his five o’clock shadow, and the flour he unconsciously wiped across his forehead. There was a new expression around his mouth that I could not interpret.
A pang of jealousy shot straight to my heart. Here I was, hardly off the plane, and I already felt out of place. Not even the Border collie jumper helped, although it had filled me with confidence in the morning.
Vicky was beautiful and she looked exactly like Aidan’s late wife. Did she stir the same feelings in him that he once felt for Olivia? I breathed deeply to overcome my rising panic, without success. But nobody had noticed me. If I quietly slipped out now, it would be as if I’d never come.
Without thinking, I stepped from behind the cookie shelf and right into Vicky’s line of sight. She recognised me immediately, despite the fact that my hair was still curlier than before. Her eyes widened and her slender hands stopped tying ribbons.
I had no choice. I gathered the meagre remains of my self-confidence and smiled. Her chin trembled, and she threw a heavy-lidded look in Aidan’s direction. That’s when I decided to run.
“Aidan, there’s a customer for you,” a voice rang out, silencing the chatter and laughter in the room. Vicky still possessed the vocal chords of a drill sergeant.
Vicky was pointing at me and a lady with poufy hair shook her head, probably assuming I was cutting the line. I found myself staring into Aidan’s eyes through a sea of heads and hats. At first, I thought I saw slight irritation. To my immense disappointment, this was neither followed by joy, nor something bigger—something I had yearned for, the reason I was here. Seconds passed in which even the rodeo pony in my chest held its breath.
Then Aidan briefly nodded at me and continued to take care of a gentleman wearing thick glasses, who was squinting urgently at the various cakes.
I could hear myself laugh—it echoed high and clear in my ears. It was the laughter of a quiz show contestant who gave the wrong answer to the very first question and was desperately trying to save face in front of the audience. But the customers’ attention had already returned to the sugary temptations in the display cases. I turned and escaped into the rain.
So this was what lovesickness felt like.
After only a few steps, a gust of wind snatched my umbrella. It cartwheeled across the street and landed in the wheel well of a parked wedding limousine, a bouquet of lilies on the hood. Apparently, Scots didn’t consider white lilies to be funeral flowers. I went to rescue my umbrella, but it was next to impossible to yank it free. It resembled a twisted wire hanger with some tattered shreds of clothing still attached.
“Care to enlighten me as to what the hell you’re doing out here?” a harsh voice said right behind me.
Spinning around, I almost bumped into a broad chest covered by a white apron. Blinking through my glasses, I saw annoyed green eyes flashing at me.
“My umbrella is broken.”
Aidan frowned and followed my pointing finger. Then he examined my soaking wet, curlier-than-ever hair and, with tantalising slowness, the rest of me. His face did not reveal his verdict when he grabbed my wrist.
He pulled me down next to him into the red velvet back seat of the limousine. And as he had so often done before, he seemed to read my thoughts.
“My neighbour doesn’t much believe in locking cars.” He looked at the house next to his shop. “Besides, I doubt he’s in any shape to drive on his wedding day. So don’t worry. He won’t mind if we take shelter from the rain.”
“Okay.” My teeth chattered—whether from cold or excitement, I couldn’t say. Probably both.
“Take off your jumper,” Aidan said.
My jaw dropped. A smile played around his beautiful mouth, which, at last, was no longer pressed into a thin line.
“Come on,” he said. “Otherwise you’ll catch a cold.”
I pulled the wet jumper over my head. Shivering, I pressed the Border collie against my breasts, which looked much too prominent under my clinging blouse. Aidan snorted and shook his head.
“Too impatient to wait a damn minute. You’d rather run out into the rain and catch your death.”
I was too rattled to come up with a reply.
“You’ve a new hairdo,” Aidan said.
“Don’t say anything about it. It’s awful.”
“Hmm.”
“Great. That’s worse than if you’d said it was hideous.”
“Really?” He scratched the back of his head. “I don’t think it’s bad. It’s actually pretty cute. In a way, it makes you look . . . younger.”
“Don’t make fun of me. I look like my own grandmother.”
“You must have a cute grandmother.”
Confused, I remained silent. Aidan pulled back and gave me a questioning look.
“Aren’t you supposed to be on your way to church in a car like this?” His eyes narrowed. “Charlie did give you the ring, didn’t she?”
I slowly raised my hand so he could see my finger. I hadn’t taken the bride’s ring off since the day I’d opened the envelope. The second replica rested in Grandmother’s safe. Aidan seemed confused, but I spoke first.
“How did you find it?”
Aidan grinned. “Well, the neighbour was right. The only way to the MacGrady’s house is down a damn dirt road. What she neglected to mention is that the dirt road is in the Orkneys.”
“You . . .” A lump suddenly appeared in my throat. “You went to the Orkney Islands for me?”
“Obviously.” He frowned as if the question was an insult.
“All of this is completely crazy—even the fact that the pawnbroker still had the ring. He must have known it was a fake. I don’t get it.”
“It doesn’t matter if the ring is genuine gold or whatever,” Aidan said. “What matters is the story that goes with it. Charlie told MacGrady about Emilia and Ludwig. The old man was apparently so moved by their fate that he gave the ring to his wife when Charlie didn’t come to claim it.”
“That’s unbelievable.”
“It was none too easy to persuade his wife to part with it. And she refused to accept money.” Aidan grimaced. “Instead, I had to chop about nine square feet of wood.”
“What?”
“I’d wager that the MacGradys will have a very warm house this winter.”
He made a show of lifting both hands. The inside of each thumb bore barely healed blisters. My eyes filled with tears. Aidan had done everything in his power to get the bride’s ring back to me, just so I could marry someone else. Either he was a zealous do-gooder or—I closed my eyes—or he felt the same things I did just from hearing his name.
“Hey,” Aidan said, putting his arm around my shoulder. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
I sobbed harder still.
“What happened, Mrs. Stone?” he whispered, and I let him pull me to his chest.
His embrace was always natural and effortless—tight enough that I felt protected, yet loose enough to let me breathe and, if necessary, flee. His heartbeat was calming and, oh, how good he smelled. Breathing in the aroma of dough and sugar, of warmth and melted butter, escape was the furthest thing from my mind.
“I hate it when you call me by your teacher’s name,” I mumbled into his apron.
“No, you don’t.”
He helped me to sit up straight. Then he wiped away my tears with his thumb and adjusted my glasses, which were slightly fogged up.
“Now then, I’d like an answer.”
“I forgot what the question was,” I said.
“You know. The question you’ve been asking yourself ever since you sat next to me on the plane and turned my hand black and blue.” There was a catch in his voice. “Why are you here, mo chridhe?”
“It just didn’t feel right,” I said, lowering my eyes. I took two deep breaths. Then I let it all out in a rush. “I hadn’t been happy with Justus for a long time, but I couldn’t admit it. When I came to Scotland, fate and similar craziness seemed to really mean something, while everything that I thought mattered burst like a soap bubble—my job, my relationship, my future . . . everything.” My hands trembled as I took off my glasses. I blinked at Aidan. “I have no idea what happened. I followed your advice and took off the blinders, but what I saw on the side of the road wasn’t flowers. All I saw was you. And so I thought, before I miss my chance to be happy, I should stop and ask if you’d walk a bit of the way with me.”
There, I’d said it. There was no going back.
Aidan was staring at me, poker-faced, and with each passing second, my heart sank lower and lower. What if I was wrong? Was he trying to figure out the best way to let me down easily?
“It’s all right if you say no,” I said quietly, my heart almost breaking.
Aidan leaned over me and took my face in his hands. Placing his forehead against mine, he paused for a moment as if saying a prayer. When he opened his eyes, there was such incredible tenderness there that it took my breath away.
“I thought you’d never ask, my sweet.”
Then he kissed me—a kiss filled with the same incredible tenderness, holding promises of a long, hot, thistle-filled summer and the faint taste of chocolate cookies.
Epilogue
Frankfurt, August 2016
She wasn’t afraid, not the tiniest bit—well, maybe just a little. She’d never travelled such a long way all by herself. If she was honest, she couldn’t remember having travelled anywhere without Bri.
For probably the tenth time, Li reassured herself with a glance at her father’s old pocket watch that she’d make it to the station on time. She fumbled in her purse for the train schedule printout. Her eyesight had got worse these past few months, so she had to hold the paper close to her face to decipher it. In truth, she’d already memorised the information just in case she lost the printout, clumsy and distracted as she sometimes was. She just hoped there were no pickpockets on the train—without her ticket and her wallet, she really would be in trouble. Li pushed aside the what-if scenarios and concentrated on the timetable, which she recited quietly, like a poem.
TGV to Strasbourg. Departure 2:00 p.m., Frankfurt/Main, Main Station, Track 17.
A first-class, two-hour trip requiring no change of train. Crazy how small the world had become thanks to super-fast trains. There was even a dining car where she would have a cup of tea and a piece of cake, even if it had probably been frozen. No comparison, for sure, with the wonderful cherry cake Charlie had baked two weeks before, a goodbye present before returning to her Ian. Li already missed the girl.
Arrival in Strasbourg 4:00 p.m., no track provided.
She hoped Antoine would find her.
“Good heavens, Li, put away that slip of paper. Your constant rustling is making me nervous,” Bri snapped next to her.
Li did as she was told, putting the printout back into the envelope that also contained her ticket. She looked out at the oozing city traffic, heavy even though it was well before rush hour.
“Are you sure we’ll make it to the station on time?” Li asked, upset to hear herself sounding like an old fogey. But she couldn’t help it. Her anxiety and excitement had become almost unbearable.
“You tell me. You’re the one who’s been looking at her watch every two minutes.”
Sheepishly, Li nodded. She was grateful to have Bri escorting her to the station, even if her impatient sister scolded her incessantly. Li knew that Bri, elegant in her shift dress, was only covering her own nervousness. She also knew that neither of them had slept a wink for two nights.
Bri looked out the window of the taxi with a hangdog expression. After a few uncomfortable minutes of silence, Li dared to ask a question.
“Do you want me to call you when I arrive in France?”
“I’d prefer if you called every half hour so I know you haven’t got lost looking for a bathroom.”
Li nodded. “All right.”
“I’m joking, Li.”
“I see,” said Li with a tiny smile.
They lapsed into the same uneasy silence as before.
“Bri?”
“What is it now?”
“I love you, you know. These two weeks with Antoine won’t change that.”
Her sister was silent, but Li had learned over many years to hear the words that Bri didn’t say out loud. She glanced at Bri’s hands, crisscrossed with tiny veins, which were tugging at the dark-blue trim of her dress. Her fingers said, I love you, too. Mostly, though, I’m dying of fear something might happen to you. Li smiled.
“Did you pack enough warm clothes?” Bri asked without taking her eyes off the oncoming traffic.
“Of course—three jumpers, four pairs of slacks, ten pairs of socks, and eight long chemises. I’m also taking my red wool dress and—” Li stopped when Bri lifted her hand.
Pulling out her handbag from under the seat, Bri handed Li a ribbon-wrapped box. It seemed to come from an expensive store, an Italian one. The looping script said “La Passionata.”
“For me?”
Bri pursed her lips. “For your birthday.”
“But our birthday was two months ago.”
“So it’s for the next one. Let’s hope you live to see it.”
Bri reached into her bag and pulled out a pocket knife, which she snapped open in front of Li’s frightened eyes.
“What are you doing?”
She gave Li a surprised look that turned into a scowl. “We’re long past that childish blood pact stuff, you silly goose. It’s for the ribbon. They always tie these things like they contain nuclear waste.”
“Oh. All right.”
Li cut the ribbon, cautiously opened the lid, and peeked under the lavender tissue paper.
“Now really, Bri!” she said, slamming the lid down. She glanced at the taxi driver who, to her relief, was focused on the traffic.
“What?” Bri said. “I bet you only packed cotton panties.”
“No! I . . . Yes, but . . .” Li didn’t know what to say.
“You’re visiting your new boyfriend, not a girl scout camp. Women have to present themselves to their advantage, and these sinful things do make a statement.” Bri laughed at her sister’s appalled look.
“Antoine isn’t like that. He—”
Bri’s expression softened. “I know that your musketeer likes you, quite apart from lace underwear. But these sexy things will make him even fonder. Come on, put them in your bag before I change my mind and exchange them for something in my size.”
“Thank you,” Li said, her eyes damp with tears.
The taxi pulled up to the station. Looking at her sister, Bri’s sternness disappeared and was replaced by a rare softness reserved for very special moments in their lives.
“I hope it’s all right if I don’t come with you to the platform, sis. I have an appointment at the animal shelter and, unless I leave right away, I won’t make it with all this traffic. Besides, it might be a good idea if you tried to manage without me from here on.”
Li looked at her with big eyes. “You’re going to the animal shelter? Why? Don’t tell me you’re going to—”
“What if I am?” Bri bit her lip. “Do you think you’re the only one entitled to a bit of happiness? I’m sure they’ll have a poor, lonely mutt who wouldn’t mind being ordered around. But enough of this. Track seventeen is in the very back, to the right. Just go straight through and don’t talk to any strangers.”
Li swallowed again, and once more. Then she nodded and opened the door. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the taxi driver lifting h
er suitcase out of the boot.
“All right, Bri.”
“Promise that you’ll only stick your nose into your book after you’re in your reserved seat.”
“Promise.”
“And Li.”
“Yes?”
“I wish you tons of fun with your Frenchman. He’s not bad at all.” Bri’s eyes opened wide. “Oh my god, did I just say that?”
Li felt a wave of relief sweep over her, washing away her fears.
Everything was all right. And whatever wasn’t would be.
“So we’re meeting in Scotland?”
“We’re meeting in Scotland, where we’ll attend the most beautiful wedding ever,” Bri said gleefully, blowing her a kiss.
Li stood at the taxi stand, waving, even when the car was long gone.
Breathe deeply in and out three times, Josie had said on the phone when Li almost fainted with happiness at the news that Charlie and Ian were getting married this month. It was going to be a genuine Scottish wedding, in a castle, with bagpipes and a banquet of local delicacies that Li was slightly afraid of. Nobody had noticed that she’d successfully avoided the local cuisine during her Scotland trip, except for Finola’s smoked fish soup. “It’s all good,” as Josie said, laughing down the phone line. “Oxygen helps everything.” So Li took a deep breath. She realised that she hadn’t asked when Josie was coming back to Frankfurt. But she had a hunch about—
“Do you need any help, young lady?”
An elderly gentleman stopped, touched his hat, and grinned. Li responded with a reserved smile and shook her head. The man adjusted his backpack and walked on.
She straightened her back, grabbed her suitcase with her right hand, and pressed her handbag and umbrella close to her left side. With her chin held high and her heart pounding, Lieselotte Markwitz walked towards the entrance of Frankfurt’s Central Station.
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