In His Wildest Dreams

by Marie Treanor

  “How?” she got out. “How do you know?”

  “I Googled Anna Ross. And I’m persistent.”

  She dug her head backward into the headrest, closing her eyes while she held tightly to her own fingers.

  “If you Google Izzy or Isabel Ross, you don’t get the same results,” he offered. “You have to start with the name Anna, so you’re as safe as you ever were.”

  On one level, Izzy didn’t want to talk about this or even think about it. She didn’t want her time with Glenn spoiled. But she had to ask. “Did you know him?”

  To her relief, he shook his head. “Know of him. But he’s big league. We were only ever glorified hoodlums to everyone except ourselves.”

  An angry frown tugged at her brow. “Do you think that makes him better than you?”

  “No.” He changed gear as they approached a slow moving truck. “But it makes him richer and more savvy.” He appeared to think about it while waiting for a clear sight of the road ahead. “At least when I was twenty-one it did.”

  “And now?” she asked, fascinated in spite of herself.

  Rounding a corner to a clear strip of road, he pulled out and drove past the truck. “Now I could probably shaft the bastard for you.”

  Shocked laughter sprang up, and she swallowed it back down with a small choke. “Don’t. Don’t even think about it. Why would you even think about it?”

  “Because you wouldn’t have left him and hidden his kid from him just because you didn’t like the way he slurped his soup.”

  She closed her eyes. “There were hurts on both sides,” she admitted. “But he still can’t know we’re here, and you can’t go near him.”

  “All right,” he said peaceably.

  She opened her eyes and stared at him with suspicion. “Just all right?”

  He shrugged. “Your life, your choice. It only becomes mine if you say the word.”

  What did he mean by that? Were they still talking about Ray? Of course they were. A night’s fling, however intense and enjoyable, was not a relationship.

  Chapter Eleven

  They stopped for breakfast at a roadside café, which was much more pleasant than eating at the hotel under the curious gaze of Harry’s dinner-dance friends, and still made it back to Ardknocken in just over the two hours Izzy has prophesied to Louise.

  Glenn glanced at her humorously. “Do you want me to drop you at the end of the road?”

  “It doesn’t matter where you drop me. It’ll be all over the village that you did.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Why? I chose to live here.”

  “Look on the bright side—the windows are so dirty no one’ll be able to see the car isn’t full of people.”

  “My reputation is saved,” she said flippantly as he came to a halt outside the B&B. She reached over to the backseat to grab her overnight back, and paused with it on her knee, her fingers gripping the door handle as she glanced at him, suddenly shy. More than anything, she wanted him to lean over and kiss her, to show that last night’s passion and this morning’s easy friendship wasn’t over.

  But he remained where he was, both hands resting loosely on the steering wheel, his lean face calm, a little secretive perhaps, but not distant. She gave an uncertain smile. “Thanks, Glenn.”

  “Glad you were there.”

  With a parental sixth sense, she heard the click of the B&B door opening and knew it was Jack, running to meet her.

  “See you,” she said hastily, hoping it didn’t sound too much like a question—or worse, a plea. She slid out of the car, bags and all, in time to catch Jack in a huge hug. The Land Rover drove off, and she lifted one hand in a friendly wave she’d have given anyone.

  You’d better call me. You’d better bloody call…

  Jack was tugging her hand, trying to draw her straight up to their own flat entrance, but Izzy insisted on going into the B&B to speak to Louise.

  “Thanks for this,” she said fervently when she found her hovering in the hall. “I hope he was good.”

  “As gold. Slept all night—in your flat, I hasten to add. We just came down here to have breakfast with Mum and Dad. He’s been creaming them at Snakes and Ladders.”

  Izzy laughed. “Well, remember I owe you, now. Take me up on it, because I’m more than happy to return the favour.”

  “I know, I know. How was the dance?”

  “Bit stuffy but fun all the same.” Izzy turned to leave, following Jack as he dashed out and round the house to their own outside stair. “Met some nice people, necked some very excellent food, and even danced the Dashing White Sergeant for the first time since I was at school.”

  “You fall out with Harry?” Louise asked.

  “’Course not.” She knew Louise had seen exactly whose car she’d got out of. “Left him to sleep in until checkout time. The band from Ardknocken House were playing in the public bar of the hotel we were in, so I scrounged a lift to be home earlier.”

  “You didn’t need to do that. Jack and I were fine.”

  “I know you were.” She winked. “But I miss the wee monster when he’s not around.”

  Louise laughed as she was meant to, which was something of a relief. Izzy had no intention of discussing Glenn Brody even with her best friends. For one thing, she’d no idea what she could say, except the sex was fantastic; for another, it was too new and raw and private. She needed to hug it to herself.

  Later, when he didn’t phone, when he avoided her on Monday and pretended Friday night hadn’t happened and she’d got over him, then maybe she’d talk about it.

  You’d better call me. You’d better bloody call…

  She didn’t have Glenn’s number. But he had hers. She’d written it on his hand, and she was damned sure the efficient Chrissy had noted it on more than her mobile phone. If he hadn’t kept it, he knew where to find it.

  But Saturday wore on, and he didn’t call. Izzy and Jack played games, made a halfhearted attempt to tidy Jack’s room and went out to the local shop and bought pizza, Jack’s favourite, for tea. They ate lunch, read some stories together, and Jack helped her sort the washing into piles of whites and coloureds. She showed him the photograph on her phone of her in her evening dress and Harry in his kilt. Fred had taken it at her request, and they did look pretty smart, as Jack pointed out with gratifying awe before he casually began flicking through her other photos too.

  “Hey, that’s Glenn, isn’t it? And the drummer! And the sax guy!”

  Her stomach lurched, her eyes going automatically to the stubbornly silent phone. “Yes, they’re all there. They were playing at the same hotel.”

  “I like him. He’s funny,” Jack observed, dropping the phone on the sofa and trotting over to switch on the TV. “Is it nearly tea time? I’m starving.”

  “I’ll put the pizza in the oven,” she said meekly.

  “Bastard,” she said some hours later, staring at the phone with hatred. It lay on her bedside table, and she was peering at it over the top of her book as she lay supposedly reading. “Would it hurt just to text a hello?”

  Even as she muttered the words to herself, her mind baulked at them. Glenn wasn’t really the kind of guy to text hello or make small talk. He’d only text, or phone, when he’d something to say. That didn’t make her feel better either.

  But she was knackered. She’d had damn all sleep last night, and her body still ached in many intimate places after so much energetic and unfamiliar sex. Her mouth went dry, and her tender pussy dampened with memory. He’d waited a long time for sex, and he’d chosen her. And he’d been the most amazing lover she’d ever known.

  But then, she’d begun to suspect he was the most amazing man she’d ever known. From a vile upbringing on definitely the wrong side of the tracks, in an abusive home, he’d found the strength to get himself out of the inevitable life of crime
and brutality which was all that had appeared to be open to him. And he’d done it by taking the fall for a crime he hadn’t actually committed. How much of it, to him, was escape, and how much guilty payback for what he had done, she didn’t know. Maybe neither did he. She suspected there was more to the story than he’d told her so far. Whatever, he was carving out his own niche here, making things better for others whom society rejected, but in whom he saw hope for redemption.

  The contrast between Glenn and Ray was stark. Although the last thing she wanted to do was to compare the two men, she found herself remembering Ray’s courtship, the warmth that had grown up from her initial feelings of dazzled flattery at his attentions. She could tell herself now that Ray had just come along at the wrong time for her, when she’d begun to long to settle down with one man, to have children and a permanent home, but that wouldn’t have been completely true. Certainly, Ray had seemed to be a man with everything—looks, charm, wealth, business acumen, respect—but she would never have married him without the feeling she was loathe now to call love.

  He’d married her to shut her up, because as a researcher, she’d got too close to the substance of the story that would have blown his respectability sky high. She hadn’t seen that then. She’d been in love.

  She didn’t want to remember how quickly her feelings had turned to fear and hate. Particularly, she didn’t want to remember the depth of the initial hurt that could have destroyed her if she hadn’t needed to look out for Jack.

  She still needed to look out for Jack, so what the hell had she been thinking of, sleeping with Glenn Brody? They really didn’t need any more criminals in their life.

  He isn’t a criminal, not anymore. If Ray grew into it, Glenn grew out of it.

  There was no scam in Brody or the Ardknocken House project. She knew that implicitly. She also knew that even if there was, even if Glenn was up to no good there, she would probably still have gone to bed with him. Because when it came down to basics, he was too damn hot not to.

  Accept it—we had fun; it was fabulous. Move on, and don’t look for more. She sighed, closed the book and laid it down on the bedside table. Then she put out the lamp, lay down and closed her eyes. She didn’t expect to sleep, but she did.

  She woke to another morning of bright autumn sunshine spilling through her somewhat thin bedroom curtains. And the bleep of an arriving text.

  The number was unknown. Her heart drumming like some pathetic, needy teenager’s, she read the message. Want to go for a walk? G.

  A smile broke across her face. She couldn’t have stopped it if she’d tried.

  Glenn would have walked that Sunday, even if Izzy hadn’t come with him. His body still seemed to zing with Friday night’s sex. Despite the massive relief, he was desperate for her again. His body ached for her; his mind was full of her. He’d already spent most of Saturday on the hills with Screw, stretching his muscles and wearing himself out. And, if he was truthful, avoiding the nudges and jokes of the others who must have seen Izzy and him snogging in the pub and leaving together. They’d all known he hadn’t gone back to their own much more downmarket hotel. He was busted.

  Not that he couldn’t deal with a bit of ribbing. He just didn’t want them reducing it to…that. Lewd male talk. Although he could make them shut up without much effort, this thing with Izzy, whatever it was, was like a wound too tender to be poked.

  Alone in his room, on Saturday evening, he’d nearly called her a couple of times. But there was nothing he could say. She couldn’t come over, couldn’t leave Jack or bring him. He didn’t even know if she’d want to. They’d had a fling she could already be regretting. Her awkwardness as she’d left the car, the way she hadn’t looked back as she’d gone straight to hugging her son—these things haunted him as much as the sex. And despite the easy companionship of their journey home, she hadn’t kissed him, hadn’t so much as hinted an invitation.

  He’d been too long away from women, and in any case, the sort of women he’d consorted with in his youth were hardly much of a guide in this instance. He didn’t know if she was signalling an end to lovers and a return to friendly boss-cleaner relations.

  And so he hadn’t called her. Although, like a teenager, he’d grabbed at his phone whenever it made a sound. It was never her, not surprisingly. She didn’t have his number, and she was unlikely to ask Chrissy or the lads for it, even if she wanted it.

  So he’d called his old prison buddy Frog and set a few plans in motion before he fell into bed and slept like the dead.

  He’d wakened at dawn to the promise of another beautiful autumn morning, and a sudden realization of how he wanted to spend the day. He’d texted Izzy, and here she was, striding up the wooded hillside with Jack running and jumping beside her. In the way of kids, he covered at least twice the ground she did by constantly running ahead and then back to her.

  “Hiya!” he yelled to Glenn, apparently pleased to see him again.

  Glenn, who’d been sitting with his back against a tree reading while he waited for them to appear, got to his feet and greeted them laconically.

  “I like your dog,” Jack said delightedly as Screw wandered over to sniff him. “Does he bite?”

  “No. He’s very good-natured—unless you hit me.”

  Jack laughed at this idea and warily stroked the dog’s head. Screw flattened his ears in approval.

  “What’s he called?” Jack demanded.

  Glenn opened his mouth in automatic reply and then closed it again on the impossibility of contaminating the child with prison humour. “Rover.”

  Izzy laughed and said, “Nice recovery” under her breath. Her cheeks were flushed, although this may have been from exertion. Glenn hoped not. He liked making her whole body flush by a simple word or a tiny caress…

  For an instant, he wished the boy anywhere but here, but in fact Jack turned out to be the best antidote for any awkwardness there might otherwise have been between them. His constant curiosity and friendly chatter ensured he was central to the expedition, and by the time he’d calmed down, Izzy seemed to be used to Glenn again. She’d brought sandwiches and cake, juice and coffee in the worn old backpack she brought to work, and they sat on the ridge of the hill above Ardknocken House to eat them.

  “This is fabulous,” Izzy enthused, gazing first out over one vista to the house, the village and the sea, and then over the other, to rolling hills and streams. There was beauty in all directions. She glanced at him. “Thanks for asking us.”

  Uncomfortable with gratitude, especially when he’d been pleasing himself, he shrugged. “Is this the first time you’ve been up here?”

  She nodded and took another bite of her sandwich, watching Jack who’d got up and was running around the hilltop calling to the circling sea gulls. Screw ran with him.

  Izzy waited until her mouth was empty before she said, “Yes, up until now, Jack’s really been too small to go so far. But he’s bearing up well.”

  Glenn reached for her flask and topped up both their plastic cups with coffee. “You haven’t done much without him for a long time, have you?”

  She shook her head. “Not really.”

  “That why you broke out on Friday night?”

  Her gaze flew to his face, and he was glad to see the flush suffuse her skin. “No,” she said, without further explanation.

  Glenn stretched out on the grass, digging his bent elbow into the ground and propping his head up in his hand. “So what was with you and Harry?” he asked, because it was one of the things he really needed to know. The other was Raymond Kemp, but he suspected he’d need to work up to that one.

  Again she shook her head. “Nothing to speak of. He’s someone I’ve always spoken to, ever since we moved here. I’d begun to think of him as a friend. Even so, I wouldn’t have agreed to go with him to the bash in Oban if—” She broke off, her flush deepening, but she had the courage
to hold his gaze. “If you hadn’t pissed me off.”

  No one had ever accused Glenn of being slow-witted. “By jumping you in my bed on Monday?”

  She tore her gaze free, waving one dismissive hand, and helped herself to a small square cake covered in pink icing. “You were dreaming.”

  Glenn let the smile of understanding play on his lips. It seemed he wanted to smile around her all the time. “You mean all I had to do to have my wicked way with you that day was shut the fuck up?”

  She gave a slightly shaky laugh, still flushed, but her eyes were clear as they found his once more. “Something like that.”

  Since it was becoming very difficult to resist the insane urge to haul her into his arms right now and repeat the apparently forgivable offence, it was as well Jack chose that moment to hurtle back for some cake.

  “Can I give the last sandwich to the seagulls?” he asked.

  “I don’t advise it,” Glenn said. “They’ll mob you. Give it to the dog instead.”

  “Drink your juice,” Izzy said. “It’s too cold to sit here for much longer, and it’ll be time to start for home soon.”

  Since they came down the path above Ardknocken House, it seemed natural to say, “Eat with us, if you like. Jim’ll love the excuse.”

  “Can I play the drums again?” Jack demanded.

  “I’m sure you can play something,” Glenn said warily, and Izzy laughed.

  Once again, Jack’s presence took the sting out of whatever vulgar or teasing comments his housemates might have made. They didn’t bat an eyelid when he walked in with Izzy and Jack, just greeted them all cheerily as if it was most normal thing in the world to have Izzy and her kid round here on a Sunday.

  It was a feeling Glenn liked. He’d been contented enough here before, in freedom, working on all his projects, but this, with Izzy around, was…better. Veering off that dangerous ground, he went in search of Jim, who agreed to make macaroni and cheese with such alacrity that Glenn suspected he’d wanted some himself for ages and couldn’t find anyone else to eat it with.

  Then he took Izzy and Jack down to the studio to let Jack bash the drums without bashing at anyone else’s hungover eardrums. However, Dougie and Archie were there before them. Not playing, but listening to the recording Glenn had given to them for quality control purposes.