Page 43 of Sunset at Embthwaite Farm
“Of course,” James added hurriedly, “if you’d rather take a taxi, just say the word. I’d understand. Completely. I’ll call it myself, if you’d rather.”
She laughed, shaking her head, genuinely amused at how quickly he was tripping over himself to make her feel comfortable and safe—and shedid. And once again, she knew what she wanted.
“Thank you, James,” she told him. “That’s a very kind offer, and I’ll take you up on it.”
Chapter Seventeen
Sunlight filtered throughthe curtain as Anna languorously stretched, blinking the world into focus. She couldn’t remember when she’d last slept so well. Maybe it had been all the wine—or the lovely double bed James had shown her to, with a thick duvet and soft-as-silk sheets. The only sound outside had been the calming hoot of an owl and the sweep of the wind over the moors.
James, of course, had been all hospitality, fetching her fluffy towels and assuring her he was right down the hall if she needed anything. He’d even brought a carafe of water and a glass for her bedside table, as well as a spare toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste.
“I feel like I’m staying at a posh hotel,” Anna had told him. “With excellent service.”
“I aim to please,” he’d replied, and with a jaunty little mock salute, he’d closed the door and left her alone.
Anna had been too tired to reflect on the weirdness of the fact that she was staying over, which had probably been a good thing. She’d brushed her teeth and peeled off her clothes, slipping beneath the soft sheets with a sigh of pure pleasure. Then she’d fallen promptly asleep, only to awake now, eight hours later, feeling both relaxed and refreshed.
Pushing her hair out of her face, Anna reached for her phone. It was just past seven, which filled her with relief because she’d been a bit worried she might have slept in and missed an important message from Rachel or Harriet. Thankfully, there were no texts telling her to come quickly because the end was near.
The endwasnear, Anna knew, but at least she didn’t have to rush over without having showered or eaten. She slid out of bed, her bare feet hitting the tiles that were nice and toasty from the under-floor heating. She grabbed one of the fluffy white towels James had given her last night and headed for the en-suite bathroom, which had a full tub in grey marble and a separate, glassed-in shower. Everything about his house, she reflected, was simple, streamlined, and elegant.
She put her clothes from the day before back on, finger-combed her damp hair, frowned at her make-up-free reflection, and the fine lines fanning out from her eyes that were very visible in the morning light, and then with a shrug for it all, went downstairs. The smell of fresh coffee wafted up as she rounded the stairs, and she saw James was already in the kitchen, cracking eggs into a bowl. He looked up as she came down and smiled.
“I was just making myself an omelette. Would you like one?”
“That sounds wonderful.” Anna felt shy suddenly; it almost felt as if they’d spent the night together, but of course they hadn’t. Not in that way. They hadn’t so much as kissed, although right then she thought she would like to kiss James, quite a lot, actually.
He looked as handsome as ever, in yet another button-down shirt—did the man wear anything else?—and chinos. Like her, his hair was damp, and his eyes were creased in concentration as he cracked an egg one-handed into the bowl.
“How do you do that?” Anna exclaimed. “I think I’d get the egg yolk all over me.”
“It took a lot of practice,” James told her. “And a lot of broken eggs and messy hands. It was a trick I mastered for Jane when she was little. I think she’d seen some celebrity chef do it on TV and wanted me to try.”
“And I thought you said you didn’t cook,” Anna teased.
“I don’t, or didn’t rather,” he replied, smiling, “but pancakes and fry-ups were my two specialties. I was in charge of Saturday mornings. Helen made everything else.”
Anna slid onto a bar stool and rested her elbows on the marble island. “You haven’t told me much about her,” she remarked. “What she was like?”
James gave a small, sad smile as he cracked another egg into the bowl. “She was lovely,” he told her. “And fun. Full of energy, constantly moving, thinking, dreaming. I couldn’t keep up with her. We used to joke that she’d tire of me once we retired, because she’d be running around and I’d be conked out on the sofa, watching TV.”
“I struggle to believe that,” Anna replied with a smile. “You seem like someone who is full of energy.”
“Well…I wasn’t always the way I am now,” James answered, a remark that intrigued her. “Coffee?” he asked, and she nodded.
“Yes, please.”
He poured them both coffees, handing Anna a thick, ceramic mug that felt comforting to wrap her hands around. “So, what do you mean,” she asked, “that you weren’t always the way you are now?” Now she was the one levelling it up, but she was genuinely curious. It was hard to imagine James anything other than what he was.
He paused, his gaze on the eggs he was now whisking, as he considered his answer. “Well, when Jane was young, I was a bit of a workaholic,” he finally said. “I wanted to become a partner in my firm, and then I wanted to start my own firm, and there was always some new goal I just had to achieve, by putting in the long hours, working weekends, whatever.”
Anna took a sip of coffee before propping her chin in her hand. “That doesn’t sound like someone who sits on the sofa and watches TV,” she remarked, trying to figure out how to fit the pieces together.
“No, not at work,” James agreed. There was a sorrow in his voice, a tension about his mouth, that Anna had never heard or seen before. “But that’s the thing. When I was at work, I was a dynamo. When I was home…I was so exhausted I didn’t want to do anything. I didn’t want to read bedtime stories to Jane, or chat over a glass of wine with Helen, or…anything.” His mouth tightened. “I threw away a lot of good years.”
Just as she had, albeit in an entirely different way. “I’m sorry,” Anna said after a moment. “I know how hard it can be, to live with regret.”
He nodded slowly before reaching for a copper-bottomed omelette pan and setting it on the stove top to heat. “Helen’s death was so quick,” he continued, his back to Anna as he poured the eggs into the pan. “Her diagnosis so sudden. I didn’t have time to think about how I could recalibrate, rearrange my priorities. One minute I was a workaholic, the next I was trying to manage a huge building project while my wife was having chemotherapy, and the next she was gone, and I had a daughter taking A levels and trying to figure out how to grieve.” He shook his head slowly. “That was how it all felt, anyway, at the time. It wasn’t until after, when I was watching her casket lowered into the ground, that I realised I wanted to live my life differently. It was too late for it to make a difference to Helen, but it could make a difference to Jane. To me.”
