Page 101 of A Recipe for Love
‘Yes. I do.’
‘Shall we walk?’ She set out up the path Adam had come down, leaving him no choice but to follow her. ‘I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. That’s fair, but the first thing is that it was never about you. You were a gorgeous little boy. You were clever and creative and funny.’ She was smiling. ‘And I thought about you, still think about you, every single day.’
‘And?’ Because that was obviously only part of the story.
‘And it was everything else. I did love your dad. I adored him. He was kind and thoughtful and we were really happy for a few years.’
Still not the whole story.
‘But this place felt like a prison. There was a role I had to play, someone I had to be, and I was awful at it.’ She gestured towards her unkempt purple-streaked hair and pulled up her sleeve to show him an arm covered in tattoos. ‘I mean I’m not really the garden party opening sort.’ She half-laughed and then stopped, apparently catching the distinct lack of humour in Adam’s expression. ‘You won’t understand what it’s like when you’re stuck in a place with all these expectations and you know you don’t fit. All I could think about was being somewhere else. It was like I wanted to peel off my skin and climb out of this body and out of the life I was trapped in and float away.’ She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry. I’m not explaining it very well.’
Adam barely realised he was crying until he tried to speak and felt his throat gulp around the sobs. ‘You explained it perfectly. I understand.’
‘You do?’ He could hear the glimmer of hope in her voice, but he was too wracked with tears to respond.
Bella woke that morning with the fuzzy head of just slightly too much wine, and the fuzzy glow of Adam’s touch the night before. She lay back, eyes still closed, and remembered the tracks of his fingers over her body, and the brush of his lips against her skin. She let out a small, involuntary gasp as her mind wandered to the urgency and the need between them.
She rolled towards her fiancé and reached out her hand. Adam’s side of the bed was cold.
She tried not to feel empty at his absence. He must have woken early and decided not to disturb her. Instead she showered, dressed and headed downstairs. Today was a red letter day in terms of the castle’s relationship with the village, at least in Bella’s eyes. Other community groups had met here and had a lovely time already, but today was the first Lowbridge Castle meeting for the only group that really mattered. Today the Ladies’ Group came to the Blue – still yellow – Room.
Flinty was already in the kitchen, baking bowl in front of her. She held out a teaspoon as soon as Bella came in. ‘Taste my buttercream.’
Bella did as she was told. ‘Perfect.’
‘Really? Because I’ll not have Anna say a word about my butterfly buns.’
‘I’m sure she wouldn’t dare.’
‘You weren’t there for the demolition job she did on Netty’s fruit loaf in 2014. The poor woman barely said a word for months.’ Flinty shook her head. ‘If you can even imagine Netty not chattering on the whole time.’
Veronica came quietly into the kitchen and cleared her throat. ‘I wondered if I might join you all this morning.’
Bella’s jaw dropped. Veronica was very clear on her views about the boundaries between the castle and the village.
Flinty nodded firmly. ‘I think that’s a marvellous idea. The Blue Room at ten.’ A glimmer of something naughty twinkled in her eye. ‘Of course all those who live here will be sharing the hosting.’
Bella didn’t point out that Flinty was baking away quite happily but didn’t technically live at the castle.
‘So you’ll have to help pouring teas and clearing away and all that.’
Veronica paled visibly before nodding. ‘I’m sure that can’t be too hard.’
Nina, Netty and Anna were all firmly ensconced in the Blue Room by ten to ten. The curiosity and novelty of meeting at the castle hadn’t quite worn off enough yet for them to be fashionably late. Jill’s lateness, however, was not a question of fashion but of pure chaotic disorganisation, so she rolled in, with a volley of apologies and half-explanations, somewhere closer to a quarter past. ‘Sorry. Had to visit Old Man Strachan up past Hartfield.’
Netty whispered something.
Nina nodded. ‘She’s right. He died two years back. There’s just Young Strachan.’
Jill shrugged. ‘He must be eighty if he’s a day.’
‘Right,’ replied Nina. ‘And Old Man Strachan was a hundred and change.’
‘But he died,’ Flinty pointed out. ‘So they all move up a notch. Otherwise you end up with Baby Strachan and, I don’t know, Tadpole Strachan.’
Nina shook her head. ‘I don’t think that’s how it works at all.’
‘Was Mr Strachan well?’ Veronica’s voice cut through the babbling.
