by Annie O'Neil
‘Cooper. You obviously loved her. Anyone can see that.’
‘But I didn’t make good on my word. Having her die the way she did, alone, made me take a really hard look in the mirror.’
‘And what you saw was Santa?’
They both stared at one another and then, unexpectedly, began to laugh. Proper belly laughs that carried on for ages—until all of a sudden Cooper looked out of the window and said, ‘Quick! Get out.’
He leapt out of the car with such urgency Audrey followed suit.
‘Here.’ Cooper beckoned to her. ‘Come and have a look.’
He held his arm out and, when she approached, put it around her shoulders then tugged her close to him, as if he’d been doing it for years. He pointed up to the skies and there, dancing in the heavens, were the most beautiful, celestial lights she’d ever seen. Greens, reds, golds. The colours of Christmas.
‘It’s the aurora borealis,’ he explained, his arm still round her shoulders as if it belonged there.
It felt so nice she had to resist the urge to snuggle into him. Wrap her arms round his waist. Which was just plain wrong, considering she’d vowed not even to think about a man, let alone cuddle up to one until she got herself back to being the Audrey she respected.
A moment’s weakness, she told herself. She’d just poured her heart out to him. And the fact he didn’t think she was pathetic for falling for such a duplicitous conman had touched her. That and the fact she was drawn to him. To a man who understood what it felt like to love and lose and then wonder how on earth to get up again.
‘The Vikings thought the northern lights were a reflection of the Valkyries’ armour as they went into battle,’ Cooper said, his blue eyes still trained on the heavens.
‘Sounds scary.’
Cooper gave a little shrug. ‘Apparently dying in battle was a great honour.’
Audrey snorted. ‘I’d prefer to delay that honour for quite some time, thank you very much.’
‘Now, that sounds like a woman who is taking charge of her own life,’ he said.
A bloom of hope swirled round her heart. ‘You think?’
‘Absolutely.’ Cooper looked down at her, his expression shifting. ‘Do you want my honest opinion?’
Not it if involved kissing. His lips were so close...
She was staring at them as she said, ‘I think I’m going to get it, whether or not I want it.’
He gave a good-natured laugh. ‘Fair enough. I was thinking that for someone who’s endured a broken engagement so recently...you seem more angry than heartbroken. Are you sure you were properly in love with the guy? Perhaps it was more—and don’t take this the wrong way, because I’m not judging you—that you might’ve been in love with the idea of him?’
It was a good point.
She’d been so swept off her feet she’d barely had time to think these past few months. She’d had boyfriends before, but they’d never showered her with so many gifts and sweet nothings. With beautiful bouquets of flowers that had blinded her to the truth. Flowers wilted. Sweet nothings were exactly that. And that fancy flat he’d asked her to move into hadn’t been a home.
Not like Cooper’s gran’s house was, anyway. Gertie’s home gave an instant sense of comfort and healing.
Why had she fallen for such artifice? It wasn’t like her. Not at all.
Had it been the promise of a family? An identity? Or the promise of being loved as much as her father had clearly loved her mother. The mother she’d never really known.
She thought back to those final days with her father. His insistence that Audrey must never settle for second best when it came to love. Never, ever compromise who she was, because true love didn’t mean losing yourself. It meant becoming a better version of yourself than you’d ever believed possible.
She’d sure messed that up.
She looked up to the skies and thought of those ancient warriors heading off to battle. It was an interesting way to see the mesmeric whorls and flashes of colour. Proud and strong instead of fleeting and inaccessible.
Perhaps instead of writing her story as that of a wronged woman fleeing a humiliating situation, she owed herself a different version. Sure, she’d left with tears streaking her cheeks and remarkably little to her name, but she still had her name. Her nursing skills. Enough pride to get herself a job, a place to stay and to make a vow never to let herself be hurt that way again.
She’d already helped some of the people here on Bourtree Castle through the type of nursing she loved. And, although living with Cooper hadn’t been part of the plan, in a way it was good to have someone else there. Surprise hot chocolate in bed was far better than sobbing herself to sleep at night.
Two wounded warriors seeking a new life...
A gust of arctic wind blew in from the sea. Audrey shivered. Cooper pulled her in a bit closer to him. She turned towards him, and as if by unspoken agreement he turned to her.
As their eyes met a heated pulse of electricity flashed between them and grew taut.
Cooper was very good-looking. More so than she’d initially given him credit for, given the whole Santa suit thing and...
Oh...wait a minute. Was he...?
Cooper was tipping his head towards hers. Audrey’s heart began to pound. Was he going to kiss her?
The sound of blood rushing through her nervous system drowned out the sound of the waves as he reached out and tucked a stray tendril of her pixie cut behind her ear. Her skin felt as though it had been brushed by the same light that coloured the skies. Their bodies shifted slightly. They were aligning themselves so that...yes...their heads could ease into place for what surely had to be a kiss.
Did she want this? Her body seemed to. Did her heart?
Her brain made a loud, plaintive cry that travelled straight to her gut. What did her heart know? It had fallen for a complete idiot. A liar. A Christmas romance was not the wisest way to embark on her new life...whatever that might be. If this kiss happened, it would definitely be a rebound kiss.
She looked deep into Cooper’s eyes for a sign. Something—anything—to say that whatever was happening between them was genuine. She didn’t see promises, but she saw kindness and respect. Two things she now knew for certain hadn’t existed in her last relationship.
He shifted so that one of his hands spread across the centre of her back and the second slid along her waist. They were standing closer than they ever had before. So close she could feel his warm breath upon her mouth. Feel the pounding of his heart rate as it matched her accelerated pulse. Her lips parted, her body all but making the decision for her.
At the last minute, just as her lips began to physically ache for his touch, for the completion of a kiss, he dropped his arms from around her and took hold of her hand. Together, silently, they leant back against the big Jeep, her heart still pounding.
It was the right decision. One Cooper had been strong enough to make for both of them. It was a strength she’d have to develop if she didn’t want her life to come crashing down around her again. She wasn’t staying here. Cooper might be. He might not be. He didn’t know.
They watched the lights weave and wend their way through the heavens with a new powerful energy coursing between the pair of them. As if the mesmeric lights had stamped an indelible mark on her and Cooper, uniting them for ever in this one magic moment. A moment of power. A moment of possibility.
* * *
‘Right!’ Cooper clapped his hands together and gave them a rub as they finished washing and putting away their supper dishes. ‘How do you feel about gingerbread men?’
Audrey flopped down onto a cushioned kitchen chair with a grin. ‘If you’re offering to give me a plate of them with a huge mug of tea I’m all for ’em. I’m pooped.’
‘Not surprised. It’s been a busy couple of weeks.’
Audrey swept her fi
ngers through her pixie cut, leaving a couple of locks of dark hair sticking out in adorably errant revolt. ‘Is it always this busy on the island?’
Cooper gave a little shrug. ‘To be honest, I’m not really sure. I know the islands struggle in general, but Dr Anstruther’s been here for ever. As has Noreen, to be fair. The two of them are public health battle axes. Undeterrable. Who knows? Maybe now that we’re around, more folk are calling in.’
Audrey made a hard to decipher noise. ‘Difficult shoes to fill. Dr Anstruther’s, anyway. I take it Noreen is coming back?’
‘Oh, aye. Unless this whole grandmother thing pulls her to Australia permanently she’ll be here for years yet. She’s one of those women who claims she’ll retire when she’s dead.’
‘It’ll be a lot of work for her, with Doc A retiring.’
It would be a lot of work for a new doctor, too. But that wasn’t the problem. The job of an island doctor wasn’t just a full-time GP role. It was more... It was a calling. Community service. Above and beyond the regular oath of a doctor to do no harm. It was being there when people needed you most.
Not his forte.
But could it be? It wasn’t as if anyone had pushed him behind the bike shed since his return. Taken a pop at him for having parents who didn’t make the grade. Quite the opposite. He’d been welcomed with open arms. Arms he’d spent a lifetime telling himself he didn’t deserve to be embraced by.
He slammed the door shut on those thoughts and did what he did best: focused on the here and now.
He gave Audrey a grin. ‘All of which is precisely why we need a good biscuit fix.’
Audrey laughed and toed off her ankle boots. ‘And where exactly is this magic plate of restorative biscuits going to appear from? Down the chimney?’
Cooper gave his eyebrows an impish jig. ‘Me. And you. If you want to give me a hand?’
Audrey gave him a sidelong look.
A couple of weeks ago he would’ve caught a healthy dose of scepticism in those chocolatey brown eyes of hers. Today the look was more impish. Playful. Not as heated as that moment they’d shared beneath the aurora borealis, but he caught glimmers of that now and again—just as he was sure she saw glimmers of what was clearly a shared attraction in his own eyes.
Yes, things between the two of them had been...interesting since that night. And by ‘interesting’ he meant two weeks of loaded looks and his bloodstream lighting up like a Christmas tree every time their hands brushed—with or without gloves—and lots of weird throat-clearing when their eyes locked over some shared commonality only for them to remember they were in front of patients who needed their assistance.
‘What are you actually talking about, Coop?’
He smiled.
That was another thing. Somehow over the past fortnight he’d become Coop, rather than Cooper. Dr Anstruther had become Dr A. And their regular patients, if they were happy with it, were also referred to by nicknames.
In short, Audrey had been accepted by the islanders with open arms. No more suspicious, ‘Where’s Noreen?’ when she came in. It was smiles and hugs and promises to pass on information about how to make Helen’s Scottish Tablet or Mr Gibbon’s black pudding bonbons. The fact they’d even had to make supper tonight had been a change. Most of their patients were so busy plying them with seasonal nibbles they came home stuffed and ready for bed.
Another awkward time. They were always loitering at the bottom of the stairs, reminding each other of ‘just one last thing’ before yawns and fatigue finally forced them to their own rooms.
Cooper reached into a cabinet and pulled out a homemade scrap book. Inside were the recipes that had literally made him the man he was today. He placed it on the table in front of Audrey.
He could tell Audrey was aware that the book was precious to him. She wiped her hands on a tea towel, gave him a wide-eyed look and then, hands aloft over the thick coloured cardboard cover, asked, ‘May I?’
‘Please.’ He nodded at the book, which had his grandmother’s script all over it except for the cover, where she’d used stencils: Gertie’s Good Eats, it read. And they certainly were.
He pulled out the chair next to Audrey and sat down.
‘Are these all of your grandmother’s recipes?’
‘That they are.’
Audrey made a low ooh noise, then asked, ‘The chicken pie is in here?’
Cooper nodded.
‘Want to make it one night?’
He sucked in a sharp breath and Audrey instantly fell over herself apologising. ‘Sorry. I shouldn’t push. I know we’ve talked about her a bit...but it still must be hard. Living here. Seeing signs of her every day but not actually seeing her.’
Cooper nodded. ‘It is. Sometimes I can’t bear it. But I hate that I wasn’t with her at the end even more.’
Audrey gave his hand a squeeze but said nothing. What could she say? He’d messed up one of those things you should get right. The only thing he could change now was himself.
He looked at Audrey as she began to flip through the pages. She would be worth changing for. He checked the thought. Change came from within and had to be composed of purity of intent. Otherwise... Well, you’d end up where Audrey was. Seeking solace from a romance that had been a mirage.
Was that what this was to him? A romance? No... Was it?
He definitely enjoyed their verbal sparring. And the way they’d worked together as a team pretty much from the start. She had the guts to stand up to him. The courage to press her patients for the truth. She was firm but fair. Like his gran. She was incredibly beautiful. And also very vulnerable. She deserved someone with a solid foundation. Someone who came from a good family with kind, warm hearts. Not a man who problem-solved by moving away from things that troubled him instead of facing them head-on. Owning his mistakes like a man.
Or was that what this was? Working here on Bourtree? Owning his mistakes... Was this him working towards being the type of man a woman like Audrey could love?
Ach. Too intense. They were meant to be making biscuits.
He clapped his hands together. ‘I thought we’d pick up one of Gran’s traditions so that the islanders know that we—that I—well, that some of Gertie’s traditions are still alive and well.’
‘And you’re talking about gingerbread men?’
‘Aye. And snowballs and chocolate crinkle biscuits and jammy stars and—’
Audrey started laughing and waving her hands. ‘Wait a minute. I don’t know about you, but I’m not much of a baker. Wouldn’t we be better off going down to the bakery and buying them?’
‘Absolutely not. Homemade is the only way when you’re a MacAskill.’
‘Er... Cooper? I hate to point out the obvious, but... I’m not a MacAskill.’
Her tone was light, but when their eyes met their gazes held with a magnetic tension.
She could be. Of all the women he’d known, Audrey was the strongest contender. But he wasn’t ready. Might never be.
For her sake he broke the eye contact. She deserved better.
‘Ach,’ he said, with a dramatic sweep of his hand. ‘You’re living here. Consider yourself an honorary MacAskill.’
Something lit up in her eyes that he couldn’t quite identify, but it felt positive. As if being an honorary MacAskill worked for her. For now, anyway.
Cooper pushed his chair back onto its back legs and gave her a faux shocked grin. ‘So... Are you up for putting a bit of flour and butter together for the islanders?’
‘And sugar and baking soda and who knows what else?’ Audrey shot back, her voice bubbling with laughter.
‘That’s what Gertie’s recipe book is for. To guide us along the way.’
She’d promised it to him years back. Said that when she was gone it would keep him well fed. On the straight and narrow.
‘So...’ Audre
y shot him a cheeky grin. ‘I suppose you’re going to tell me you grew up making these biscuits every year and you’re an expert?’
The smile dropped from his lips. No. He hadn’t. It was one of an increasing bouquet of regrets jammed into his conscience.
His gran had used these biscuits to lure him out of his room after he’d been teased about his parents being pulled over by the police for being drunk and disorderly. To bribe him to come out in the car with her as she took plate after plate of Christmas treats to ‘folk less fortunate’ when his father had been fired from yet another job. She’d even made them out of season for the entire week between his parents’ dying and the funeral.
A funeral, he had to remind himself, that had been for her son and her daughter-in-law. She must’ve been in deep mourning herself, and all the time she’d risen above her own sorrow to tend to his.
He’d never forget what she’d said as they lowered his father’s casket into the ground. She’d taken Cooper’s hand in hers, fixed him with a steely gaze and said, ‘I’ll get it right with you, son. I’ve made my mistakes. Now let’s see if I can get it right.’
‘Hey...’ Audrey gave his leg a tap, her voice reflecting his change in mood, and then picked up the book. ‘Let’s try. What’s the worst that could happen?’
His becoming everything his grandmother had feared. Lonely, angry, furious at the world for being dealt a poor hand.
He looked down at the book, at his gran’s scrawling penmanship, and saw nothing but love and dedication in each page. In each addendum to a measurement. Each little note scribbled on the margin.
Double vanilla if baking for Coop!
He’d change. He’d dig down to his very essence and become the man his grandmother had believed he could be.
* * *
Two hours later, Audrey and Cooper had discovered that they were both pretty terrible in the baking department. Regardless, making the biscuits together had lifted the gloomy atmosphere and elevated it to something bright and optimistic.
Now Audrey was lifting a deformed snowman—or was it a reindeer?—to her mouth as Cooper watched. ‘You’re brave.’
