Page 52 of Heirs and Graces at Highland Hall
Applause for the musicians rippled around her, yet Bex stayed frozen, unable to move.
‘Did you hear what I said?’ Kieron asked. ‘Are you ready for the next one?’
Bex knew she needed to reply. It was just basic manners. But she couldn’t. It was like being in Lorna’s cottage earlier that day. Her eyes were locked on Duncan’s, and suddenly nothing else mattered.
‘Actually,’ Bex said, moving out of Kieron’s grasp without a backwards glance, ‘I have to go and talk to someone.’
42
Bex wasn’t sure whether she walked all the way to Duncan, or whether he moved part way to meet her in the middle. It didn’t matter either way. As she stood there next to him, she could only see him. It was as if the entire ballroom had evaporated from around them.
‘Hey,’ she said finally.
‘Hey,’ he replied.
Silence swirled around them again. The shrieks from the dancefloor melted into the ether.
‘That’s some moves you’ve got there?—’
‘About earlier?—’
They spoke at the same time, and with a small laugh of relief, Bex encouraged him to go on.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘You go first.’
She wasn’t sure what she had been going to say, anyway. In fact, she was having difficulty holding any type of thought at all.
A familiar light pink tinge coloured his ears as a sheepish grin curled his lips. ‘I was just going to say you’ve got some moves there. Not too sure about your choice of partner, but youlooked good. Although I don’t know how long my toes would stay intact, but you’ll get better with practice. Maybe.’
‘Hey!’ she said, punching him playfully on the arm. Was it the first time she had touched him since she’d come back here? No, of course it wasn’t. She’d helped carry him inside when he’d been drunk, and that had only been a week or so ago. But somehow, she had forgotten it. That night, those memories didn’t matter any more. The future. That was what mattered.
‘You looked beautiful. Look beautiful,’ he corrected. ‘You are so beautiful.’ He said the words, so simply, so factually, as if only a fool could disagree.
Her stomach fluttered with a swarm of butterflies. She needed to say it, too. Not that he looked beautiful, but that she loved him. She had to tell him. But she didn’t want to rush it. There was something about this moment that made her want to hold on to it forever.
‘I wish I’d asked you to wear this before,’ she said. ‘I love the little purse thing, too.’ She pointed to the small bag slung around his waist.
He rolled his eyes, but she could tell from the smirk on his lips that it was all in good fun.
‘It’s not a purse. It’s asporran,’ he said. ‘And I’ve told you that before.’
‘Right,’ she replied with a grin. Why couldn’t she stop grinning? She was beyond ridiculous. ‘So, do I get to know what you keep in it?’
Laughter lingered on his lips, but then it faded slightly and something far more sombre flickered across his expression.
‘I keep a photo of my ma in it,’ he said.
‘Really?’
He nodded. ‘I don’t have many. But I remember my dad telling me once how she put a photo of herself in my first-eversporran, and I’ve never taken it out. When she died… Well, it’s just something I do now.’
‘Can I see?’
All the time Bex had spent with Duncan, she’d only seen a couple of photos of his mother and most of those were family shots where she had her arms wrapped around him, half obscuring her face. Bex had got the feeling that she was the type of person who hadn’t liked having her photo taken, just like Duncan, but now, she realised, she would make sure they took more of them together. For the family she hoped they would one day have.
Wordlessly, Duncan opened his sporran and pulled out a worn photograph.
‘This was taken at a Burns Night,’ he said, staring at it. ‘I think that’s actually one of the windows here in the background.’
