Page 33 of A Recipe for Love
Behind Bella, there was the sound of Flinty’s footsteps retreating briskly back to the kitchen. Bella wondered if she should follow, but held her ground. Darcy was in the middle of the hallway. Her anger was directed at Adam’s grandmother. Adam was standing on his own in the doorway to one of the rooms Bella hadn’t ventured into yet.
‘She’s not saying you have to move out.’ Adam’s tone was placatory, but the tension she’d heard when they discussed the funeral arrangements was back in his voice.
‘That’s exactly what she’s saying.’
Adam’s grandmother held up her hand. When she spoke, her tone was cool. ‘There are ways that things have always been done here. The lady’s bedroom is for the wife of the current baron. You are not the wife of the current baron so you will vacate that room, as every dowager before you has done.’
‘Grandmother!’ Adam tried to interject. He fell back in response to the look he received.
‘Adam will occupy the laird’s room.’ She finally acknowledged Bella’s presence. ‘If at some point he decides to marry, then the lady’s room will be available.’
‘If?’ asked Bella.
Darcy screamed over her. ‘So where am I supposed to go? What if I decide I want the dower house?’
‘The dower house is occupied.’
‘So maybe it makes sense for Darcy to stay where she is?’ Adam suggested.
‘That’s not how things are done,’ Veronica replied. ‘Perhaps the coach house would be suitable?’
Darcy marched over to her rival. ‘Here’s an idea. Why don’tyoumove out? I mean, I’m the dowager now. What are you?’
‘I’m the baron’s grandmother. You are just some New York—’
‘Stop!’ Adam raised his voice for the first time in the conversation. ‘It doesn’t matter who sleeps where. It doesn’t matter whether you both call yourself dowager or neither of you do or you take alternate weekends and school holidays and share it between you. Please…’ He sounded exhausted. ‘Stop.’
Veronica’s tone had already been icy. Now it was at absolute zero. ‘Do not speak to me like that, young…’
But Adam had already walked away. The silence hung for a moment in the hallway punctuated only by the sound of a door creaking and slamming. Bella looked from one woman to the other. She still didn’t really know what the row was about, but she remembered theifVeronica had associated with the question of Adam marrying, so she was minded to side with Darcy.
But neither of them were her immediate concern. Her concern was her fiancé. ‘Excuse me.’ She shuffled past Darcy and made her way across the hallway, and out of the door Adam had vanished through.
The room was cold, which wasn’t surprising. The whole building seemed to be permanently freezing. One wall was covered with bookcases, half filled with the sorts of books that Bella associated with school trips to stately homes – clothbound and clearly unread for generations but still deemed dangerous enough to require caging behind metal grilles. The last bay of shelves was open and full from top to bottom with account books and modern lever arch files. On the desk at the centre of the room there was a computer that looked like it had been recovered from the ark and a stack of papers. Dipper peered out from behind a chair.
At the far side was another door. Adam must have gone out that way. Bella opened the door and stepped out, pausing a second to let Dipper follow. The rain had stopped, finally, and the air was at least warm enough now for her T-shirt and jogging bottoms to be sufficient. Adam wasn’t in the yard outside. She couldn’t see him in the field that was visible from the doorway. She limped around the side of the castle, scanning in every direction. If he hadn’t headed off across the field, he must either still be close at hand or have made his way up the road towards the bridge uphill. Bella set off, slowly, on the increasingly familiar walk.
She was only a minute or two away from the castle itself when she caught sight of him, not on the road, but down towards the river. The bank dropped in a shallow slope at first. She looked to follow him, but the ground was wet and muddy from the day’s rain. She called out, but he was too far away. Her chef’s clogs were not designed for running but she managed a short awkward jog, wincing slightly on her still-sore ankle, to get within earshot of her fiancé. ‘Adam!’
He stopped, turned and immediately ran back down towards her. ‘What are you doing? You shouldn’t be walking.’
‘I’m fine. I wanted to make sure you were OK.’
Everything about his demeanour – his slumped shoulders, the bags under his eyes, the absence of the easy smile he’d worn in Spain – told her he wasn’t.
‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘I just needed a break from the screaming.’
‘Are they always like that?’
‘Kinda. I think my father used to be able to get them to be more polite about it.’
‘Well it’s a difficult time.’
He half-laughed, but there was no joy or humour in it. ‘So I keep being told.’
She took his hand. ‘Anything I can do?’
‘I think I need to take a break. I might go for a walk.’
