‘Can’t I simply want to visit my favourite sister?’
‘Of course.’ Beth’s gaze was probing, taking note of the sharpness in the tone, the flawless beauty perhaps a touch drawn, the figure more gaunt. Was something wrong? ‘You’ve told me nothing yet about where you’ve been, what you’ve done. What happened to you after you left Pietro?’
‘Oh that.’ Sarah shrugged. ‘We got back together in the end.’
Beth felt a shiver run down her spine. ‘You mean he’s with you. Here?’
‘Naturally. Didn’t I say?’
‘No, you didn’t.’ Beth was struggling to cope with this new information, trying to decipher how she felt about it. ‘So you married him after all?’
‘No, we’re not married.’
‘Not...?’ Beth wasn’t sure whether to be pleased or distressed by this news. ‘But if you got back together, why not marry him?’
‘Oh, Beth.’ Sarah tossed back her sleek bob. ‘At first I didn’t want to marry. Wasn’t interested in commitment of any kind.’
‘But you changed your mind?’
‘We’d had a disagreement over - well, never mind about what now. I walked out on him and we were apart for months. You wouldn’t believe how much I missed him.’ The violet eyes grew misty. ‘I changed during that time, Beth. I came to see that the only way I could be happy was to be with Pietro. Really with him, for always. I was ready to make that commitment, d’you see?’
Compassion pushed aside the last remnants of jealousy. ‘Yes, I do see. We all change and grow up in time. Even you.’ A small silence while she waited for Sarah to continue. When no more came, Beth casually started to fold baby clothes and lay them in the basket ready for ironing. ‘So have you come home to do the deed then?’
‘Not exactly. Possibly. Probably. Oh, I don’t know. We haven’t quite worked it out yet.’
Beth raised a quizzical eyebrow but said nothing.
Sarah avoided her gaze and went to the window, staring out at white clouds sailing majestically by, at the sleeping baby and the washing fluttering in the breeze. ‘If I had a problem, Beth, I mean a really serious problem, you’d help me, wouldn’t you?’
‘What sort of problem?’
‘Whatever. Anything. I mean, we are twins.’ An edge of hysteria came into her voice and Beth hastened to calm her.
‘If I could help, I would, naturally.’
Sarah swung round, her face alight again, like the laughing young girl she had once been. ‘I told Pietro you would. You’re so loving and generous you always put me first didn’t you?’
‘Yes,’ said Beth, more thoughtfully, smoothing a matinee jacket into the basket. ‘I did, didn’t I?’
Sarah rushed across the room and hugged her, kissing Beth on the cheek. ‘Wake those gorgeous children of yours. I want to visit with my niece and nephew. We’ll save all talk of problems for another day. I’ve only just arrived home, for goodness’ sake. And I may not need your help in the end. We’ll see. OK?’
‘Whatever you say, Sarah. Whatever you say.’
Sarah came every day. She happily kept the children occupied while Beth got her moccasin project under way. She played with William, took Emily for long walks and behaved in every way as a besotted and devoted aunt. Even more astonishingly, the two sisters never disagreed, and not a single word of complaint crossed Sarah’s lips. Beth thought it was really quite amazing, how she had matured.
Andrew’s attitude to his sister-in-law was polite but cool. He watched the two sisters together, but said very little. He could find no quarrel with Sarah’s behaviour, yet he was uneasy. She seemed oddly secretive although it wasn’t his place to pry if Beth was content.
The worst of it was that she’d brought Pietro Lawson with her. Andrew meant to keep that young man very firmly in his sights.
She talked little about the past and would say only that she was staying close by. Beth didn’t ask. She was too concerned over seeing Pietro again, but it couldn’t be put off for ever. Meeting him was the hardest thing she had ever done. It came about quite accidentally. She was walking down to Broombank one bright sunny morning, Sarah having taken the children off to Windermere for the day to give them a steamer ride, and with the promise of a big ice cream at the end of it. Beth had been reluctant to let Emily go at first.
‘She’s too young. She’ll cry all the time and ruin your day.’
‘Nonsense. She’s a sweetie.’
‘And you’ve had her every day for near a week. I’m beginning to miss my own daughter.’ Said in a joking manner, but with an element of truth in it. Beth hated to be apart from Emily, for all she wasn’t an easy child.
Sarah had protested that she could manage very well, and was Beth turning into an overprotective mum?
So she had set aside her misgivings. Baby bottles and nappies had been packed, a picnic prepared and copious instructions issued. Then she’d seen them off with smiles and waves, while one half of her mind wondered where Pietro was and why he wasn’t going with Sarah on this trip.
Now, suddenly, there he was, right before her, like a genie leaping from her mind.
‘You startled me,’ she said, trying to smile. She’d quite forgotten how beautiful he was. Even her dreams had lied. It made her tremble just to be near him, and not for the world could she meet his eyes.
He was smiling, patting a rock by which he was standing. ‘Ciao, little one. I take the walk, as you do. It is a beautiful day, sì? Come, sit with me. I have waited long to see you. I wish for to say something of great importance.’
‘I really don’t have time.’ She glanced at her wrist, and realised in the rush she’d forgotten to put her watch on. She was forgetting a lot of things these days. ‘I’m sorry. I have to get to Broombank, and work.’
He was taking her arm, pulling her down beside him and she felt too weak to protest. Then even more outrageously he cupped her chin in his hands and dropped a kiss on the tip of her nose, exactly where Andrew usually kissed her. She very nearly protested but that would have been childish.
‘Sweet Beth, how I have missed you.’
‘I very much doubt it.’
‘You think that I forgot you? This is what I must say to you. I never forgot. Never. Every minute I am away, I think of you. But Sarah, she need me. What could I do?’ He shrugged, in that particular Latin way of his.
Beth wanted to tell him how he had hurt her beyond endurance. He’d walked out without a single word of explanation or a simple good bye. Yet she couldn’t find the words. Pictures of Andrew kept getting in the way, confusing her. Her children’s faces rose before her eyes and she kept wondering how Sarah would manage if Emily got colicky again, and why hadn’t she thought to put in her gripe water? He was still talking. She’d forgotten how he always had so much to say about himself.
‘You know in your heart that nothing has changed between us, Your eyes tell me this.’
‘Everything has changed.’
‘How?’
She meant to say because she was happily married. ‘You chose Sarah.’
‘Sarah chose me.’
‘You went along with it. Now I have Andrew.’ There, she had said it. ‘I’m a happily married woman.’
‘Are you?’
‘Yes. And you shouldn’t be saying all of this. I have to go.’ She swung away from him but he caught her arm and whirled her about, crying her name. Then he was crushing her in his arms and smothering her face with kisses, his mouth taking hers as it never had before. Beth was momentarily overcome, felt again that all too familiar sensation of need. When she broke away her cheeks were on fire, heart hammering in her chest. Shock, she told herself. Only shock at his outrageous behaviour. ‘H-How dare you? You have no right.’
‘I have the right because of my love for you. It has never died. I see the way you look at me. With the great longing.’
Beth backed away, trying for a laugh which came out as an odd sort of squeak. ‘What nonsense you do talk. Don’t play the La
tin lover with me, Pietro. It won’t work, not any more.’ And now she had started talking she couldn’t seem to stop. ‘Andrew and I have had our ups and downs, it’s true, but we are man and wife and I’ve never regretted marrying him for a moment. We have two beautiful children whose happiness I wouldn’t risk for the world. I won’t have you walk back into my life and turn it upside down.’ It was entirely the wrong thing to say. The delighted smile upon his handsome features told her so in an instant.
‘Is that what I have done?’
She closed her eyes and drew in a slow, steadying breath. ‘You know very well what I mean. Don’t play the innocent, it doesn’t suit you.’
‘We came back for a reason. Has Sarah told you?’
‘What reason?’
‘Ask her. You love your sister, sì?’
‘Of course.’
‘And always help her.’
Beth frowned, answering with caution. ‘Whatever is troubling Sarah, she’ll tell me in her own time. I would always help her, if I can.’
‘That is good. What would you do for me, little Beth?’ There was something in his face that panicked her.
‘For God’s sake, Pietro, leave me alone.’ Then she swung from him and ran away down the path, stumbling over stones and dashing angry tears from her eyes. How could he be so cruel, so uncaring of her feelings? How dare he remind her of how frighteningly easy it could be to love him?
‘Beth?’ Andrew stepped out of nowhere on to the path before her and she almost fell into his arms, her feet skidding on loose stones. ‘What is it? Are you all right?’
She struggled desperately to gulp down her sobs and collect herself, her face feeling stiff as cardboard as she forced it into a smile. Had he seen her with Pietro? ‘Of course I’m all right. Why shouldn’t I be?’ she snapped.
‘Why were you running?’
She gave a high pitched laugh that sounded false even to her own ears. ‘I’m late, and on my way to work, as you should be. You know how it is when you start hurrying downhill, you find yourself going faster and faster till very soon you run out of control.’
Andrew stared back up the path, his eyes upon the approaching figure. ‘Yes,’ he said, thoughtfully. ‘I can see it’s very easy to let things get out of control.’
Beth’s commitment to her marriage was severely tested over the following days. Every time she saw Pietro, which was more often than she would have liked, she was terrified he might repeat that outrageous kiss. Try as she might she couldn’t get it out of her mind. It reminded her of those stolen kisses out on the high fells, the feel of his arms tight about her, his fingers caressing her breast. Her thoughts got so out of hand that she imagined he followed her, and she took to constantly glancing back over her shoulder wherever she went, not quite sure whether she wished to find him there or not.
She remembered, too, her own shameful betrayal of Sarah. Even that didn’t prevent her from starting to question herself, and her life. Was she really content? Could she truly be happy with a husband she had married without love? Each night she tossed and turned, going over and over these questions and feelings of guilt in her mind, so that her restlessness often woke Andrew, and he would be concerned.
‘Are you unwell? Is it the baby?’
‘No, I’m fine. Go back to sleep.’
She worried too about Sarah. Something was wrong. Sarah wasn’t herself. Always highly strung, she seemed more edgy than ever. She’d made no further mention of the problem she’d hinted at on that first day, and Beth worried about this with increasing anxiety. Was she ill? Was that why she had come home? To deliver bad news. Oh no, please not that. Yet she knew something was preying on her mind.
Beth was aware too of Andrew’s increasing unease. She could feel him watching her, growing suspicious. Not that she’d given him any reason, but how could she reassure him without bringing the whole subject of Pietro out into the open again, which she really couldn’t bear to do.
Andrew waited for her to explain the kiss he had so painfully witnessed. But she said nothing.
There was no more love-making between them. From the day he’d seen her out on the fell with Pietro, all relations between them ceased. Jealousy and resentment burned in him like an unquenchable fire. He knew he was becoming prickly and distant, yet could do nothing to prevent it. Beth had never pretended to love him, he thought miserably, so why wouldn’t she choose Pietro over him?
Miserable as they both were, each kept strictly to their own half of the bed, becoming more entrenched in their stubbornness, each resolving not to be the one to break the stalemate.
Pietro doesn’t mean a thing to me, Beth assured herself, but couldn’t quite bring herself to say as much to Andrew. And then Sarah casually told her that it had been Pietro who’d bought Larkrigg Hall, which was where they were living now.
A revelation which left Beth stunned and weeping with distress.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Ellen was sitting at the door of Rowan Cottage shelling peas into a big blue bowl when the car drew up outside her gate. She glanced up, curious to see who was visiting at this time of day and whether she should put the kettle on. Visitors were always welcome if they came ready for a chat.
When he got out of the car, unlatched her gate and walked towards her she knew, in that instant, that trouble was walking up her path. Even before he spoke, in a voice low and hard with contempt, she sensed disaster. His words, however, were entirely unexpected and stunned her into silence for a whole half minute. A state of mind from which she very rarely suffered.
‘You didn’t leave. Despite my instructions that you should do so.’
Ellen eased herself stiffly from her stool. ‘Leave? Heaven help us, are you saying that you are the new owner of Larkrigg Hall? Was it you who bought the house from the bank?’
His arctic smile made her shiver. ‘I seem to recall giving you ample notice to quit. Why have you not done so?’
‘Because I don’t answer to threats, particularly from absent landlords. And why should I leave? This is my home. Where else would I go?’
‘I really don’t care, but go you must. I’ll not have you on my land.’
‘Your land is it now? And who’s looked after it all this time?’ The shock was passing, replaced by anger. What did she have to lose? ‘You tried to get rid of me once before, years ago, but then I’ve known all along that you weren’t what everyone took you for. I wasn’t a daft young lass, in love with you, you see. Makes a big difference. Those two girls were besotted, poor lambs. You hurt them. I could’ve told them many things, if I’d put my mind to it? Happen I should’ve done.’
His eyes were hard as sapphires. ‘Yet you didn’t.’ He was thinking fast. Finding the old woman still here had been a blow. Just when everything was coming together at last, when he almost had his revenge. His final plans were in place and he would have no one spoil them. He was successfully driving Sarah over the edge. The more he resisted her charms, the more desperately she tried to win his love. It was highly diverting. Beth too was as besotted as ever, though he doubted she would agree to her sister’s latest wild scheme. Not that he cared. It mattered only that she suffered, that they both did, as he and his family had suffered in the past. And he hadn’t even started on the rest of them yet. He smiled at Ellen. ‘I wouldn’t recommend you tell them anything, even now.’
‘Why not, if I’m to lose my home anyway? Happen I don’t like seeing you play one off against the other. Happen you should exercise a bit of caution for once, Mr Fancy-Pants Lawson..’
He stepped closer. They were of a height and to his intense disappointment, the old woman showed no sign of intimidation as he glared straight into her eyes. Her mocking gaze was telling him that he’d met his match. But it troubled him only slightly. He could handle her. He could handle anyone. Given time.
‘They would never believe you.’
After a moment or two of furious thinking, Ellen snorted, forced to agree. ‘Mebbe you’re right.’ Sh
e moved away, disgust curling her lips. ‘Your friend seems to have settled down nicely with our Tess. Knows what side his bread is buttered. If you’ve only complications in your own life, you’ve only yourself to blame. I’ll say nowt, for the sake of them lasses. But see you don’t hurt them, or you’ll be sorry.’
Dark blue eyes narrowed, his next words coming through gritted teeth. ‘I have the power to silence you, believe me.’
‘As you tried, and failed to do, once before.’
‘I’ll make sure I succeed next time. I can make your life not worth living.’
‘And I yours,’ Ellen told him with a smile. ‘I’m not one to interfere, or moralise. Live and let live, that’s my motto. So long as I can stay in my little cottage I’d have no reason to say owt, now would I? Checkmate I think.’
The two girls stood at the head of Whinstone Force, icy waters dividing into a curtain of white lace over the dark rocks as it racketed down to the gill below. Kingcups and globe flowers starred the peat-rich soil at their feet, and a holly blue butterfly landed silently on a forget-me-not. Beth glared at it, unseeing. ‘I’m upset because you and Pietro high-tailed it over the proverbial blue horizon and left me with a total mess. Yet all the time, he was rich enough to put everything right.’
‘Hardly. Besides, the money was given him by his stepfather, to make a new start with his life. Why should he give it to us?’
‘Even so ...’ Beth turned impatiently from the waterfall, the sound of it seeming to drum against her heart. She sank on to a rock, uncaring that it was slick with damp moss. ‘He was happy enough to spend our money and eat our food when he was living with us, so why shouldn’t he help to bail us out when we were in trouble?’
Sarah had no answer, but the shades were beginning to drop from her eyes, and Beth didn’t like what she was seeing.
Larkrigg Fell Page 34
