Authors: Maggie Cox
‘Sometimes it’s so hard raising a child. I mean it’s wonderful too, but when you’re in bed at night you lie awake wondering if you’ve got it all wrong … You worry that you might have missed something vital that will significantly impinge on their lives later on. Do you know what I mean?’
It wasn’t the easiest question in the world for him to answer, even though they had joint custody, because the lion’s share of Saskia’s care fell upon Ailsa. With every fibre of his being Jake wished it could be different. If only
they had been able to ride out the terrible storm that came in the aftermath of the accident … if only they had—He cut the thought off short, impatient and angry with himself for even going there, because it was a soul-stealing exercise.
‘I do … But at the end of the day it seems to me that all any parent can do is the best they can. If they love their child unconditionally, whatever happens, then it will work out.’
‘I’m sure you’re right.’ Handing him his plate, Ailsa managed the briefest of uncertain smiles. ‘Have your sandwich,’ she urged. ‘It’s only ham and mustard—nothing terribly exciting. You must be famished.’
‘You should eat yours too. You barely ate anything this morning.’
‘Are you trying to fatten me up?’ she joked.
He levelled a serious gaze at her. ‘I wouldn’t care what size you were as long as you were well and happy,’ he said, low-voiced.
Responding with a sigh, Ailsa awkwardly dragged her glance away. ‘I am well and I’m not unhappy … It’s just that—Never mind.’
‘What?’
‘It’s nothing … really.’
‘Tell me.’
‘I wish we had talked more when we were together, that’s all. You were always so driven to make the family business even more successful that often it felt as if there wasn’t room for much else in your life. Anyway … I don’t want us to argue again, so I’ll leave the subject alone for now. Let’s just eat our food and drink our coffee, hmm?’ Glancing out of the window, she gave an exaggerated shiver. ‘All we have to do is just sit here in the
warmth and look out at that winter wonderland, knowing we don’t have to go anywhere or do anything very much.’
Uneasy at her disturbing admission of what she’d been musing on, Jake reluctantly agreed. ‘Okay … if that’s what you want.’
‘You never were very good at relaxing.’
He lifted an eyebrow. ‘Oh? And you were?’
‘At least I could sit and knit—do something productive and relax at the same time.’
‘I suppose you’re going to suggest I take up knitting now?’
About to sip her coffee, Ailsa quickly put the mug down again, her hand against her chest as she fought to control the laughter that bubbled up inside her.
She failed.
‘That would have to be the funniest sight in the world,’ she giggled.
‘I’m glad you think so.’ His lips twitching with the urge to give way to laughter himself, Jake just about managed to keep his expression on the stern side—but it wasn’t easy.
As he stared back into the sparkling golden eyes across the table the sight of this pretty woman’s enjoyment was more effective at demolishing his defences than anything else he could think of. It reminded him how often in the past a dark mood had been rescued by her humour.
It was another precious facet of her that he missed
… These days—except for when he was with his daughter—the dark moods were sadly more and more prevalent.
‘Don’t be so serious,’ she scolded him cheerfully. ‘Apparently men who take up knitting are on the increase.’
‘Now you’re going too far.’ This time Jake couldn’t hold back a grin. ‘Besides … I don’t have elegant, nimble fingers like you. My hands are too big to wield knitting needles!’
‘Let me see.’
Before he could stop her, Ailsa reached for both his
palms and turned them over to examine them. The sharp intake of breath she exhaled made his heart turn over. She was staring at the vivid patchwork of scars that decorated his skin—some deep and jagged, others pale and thin.
‘I’d forgotten about these,’ she murmured softly.
He wanted to drag his hands back, keep them out of sight so as not to remind her of what had happened to them both, so as not to remind himself that he had failed in not keeping her and their baby safe. But Ailsa wouldn’t let him drag them away. Instead she was lightly smoothing her fingers over the scars, and the touch of her infinitely soft skin was just too soothing and mesmerising for him to want to be free of it just then.
‘I’ve always loved your hands, you know?’ She looked straight into his eyes. ‘It doesn’t matter that they’re scarred. They don’t diminish you in any way, Jake. You got these scars because you were protecting me … they’re heroic.’
His heart thumped hard. For a long moment a sensation of
white noise
prevented him from thinking straight. When he finally could, he snatched his hands away rubbing them almost with distaste. ‘Heroic is the last thing they are,’ he muttered angrily. ‘Because at the end of the day I
didn’t
protect you, did I?’
Ailsa’s expression was stricken. ‘It all happened so fast … It was like some horrific dream … a nightmare. What more could you have done? You did everything you could to protect me and the baby. You risked your life for us and got badly hurt in the process.’
Reaching for a sandwich, Jake took a bite—but it might as well have been cardboard, because his tastebuds were so deadened by anguish and regret that he couldn’t even taste it.
Returning it to the plate, he shoved his chair away from the table and got up. At the door, he threw up his hands in
a gesture of apology. ‘I can’t do this. I can’t keep revisiting what happened. I only end up feeling like the whole of my life’s been a waste of time.’
‘That’s dreadful. How could you even think such a terrible thing for even a moment? What about your daughter? How do you think
she’d
feel to hear you speak like that? As if you’d given up on everything? To maybe think she could never even have a chance of making you happy?’
Knowing that he’d hate for Saskia to hear him sounding so low, or to believe that her existence didn’t mean the world to him, Jake forced himself to rally as he regarded the increasingly troubled look in Ailsa’s eyes. ‘Some hero, huh?’ He grimaced. Then, turning away, he made his way back upstairs to his room …
Some hero, huh?
Jake’s self-deprecating comment hung in the air long after he’d left the room, making Ailsa feel like weeping.
He was a hero … he was! Fresh panic gripped her that she had been too hard on him at the time of the accident and during the long recuperation period they’d both endured afterwards. All her grief and anger at the loss of their baby and the realisation that she would never again bear children had been targeted at Jake. No wonder he’d wanted a divorce!
Her heart thumped hard. But then the difficult memory returned of how even before the accident their marriage had been in trouble. It had been just as she had described it to Jake earlier. They hadn’t talked nearly enough because he was always working so hard. They’d never discussed what was most important to each other—never found out who they really were, what had shaped them into the people they were. They had simply left it to chance that somehow any difficulties would work themselves out and things would be good again.
The only place that Jake had truly revealed his feelings had been in bed. As wonderful as that had been, it hadn’t been enough to help their relationship endure. They’d needed to build a foundation of honesty, respect and
truth that would carry them through the hard times. They
hadn’t.
One look into the desolate valley of his glance was enough for Ailsa to realise that he had suffered greatly—perhaps
beyond
endurance. She had no doubt that his father’s death had added to that suffering.
She lightly thumped her breastbone to help release the distress that threatened to gather force. If she did nothing else, she decided, Jake would walk away from here knowing that she wasn’t going to add to his suffering any more—if Ailsa could just convince him that in future she only wanted the best for him, that she forgave him for the way things had worked out between them and genuinely regretted everything she’d ever said or done that had wounded him, then maybe … maybe this time they could at least part as friends?
Restless now, she wrapped the uneaten sandwiches and stored them away in the refrigerator. Tonight she was determined to cook them a delicious meal that they would both eat and enjoy. Maybe she could suggest it was a peace offering—a new start for them both as friends? But even as Ailsa turned the idea over in her head her stomach roiled in protest.
She didn’t just want to be Jake’s friend … She wanted … She wanted …
With a heartfelt sigh she remembered the delicious warmth of his seductive lips, how his hard body fitted hers so perfectly—as if they’d been created just for each other and nobody else. Then, like a blow she hadn’t been quick enough to duck, the memory of their baby growing inside her—of Jake pressing his lips to her belly each night before they slept—cruelly returned and devastated her all over again.
Choking back a sob, she found her anguished gaze captured by the fresh shower of delicately drifting snow outside the window. Hugging her arms over her chest, she let
her thoughts immediately turn to her living child … darling Saskia. Her racing heartbeat steadied. In a few more days she would be home again. And, however her daughter was spending the time with her grandmother, she hoped she was enjoying herself.
Adding a quick heartfelt prayer that she and Jake could somehow find a way of making the remaining time they had together before he left for Copenhagen less traumatic and much less wounding for them both, she reached for her favourite recipe book on the shelf above the fridge, already decided on the appetising dish she would make for dinner …
Opening his eyes to the darkened room, Jake realised he must have fallen asleep again. One minute he’d been lying on the bed, staring up at the beamed ceiling with his stomach churning and his thoughts racing, then the next …
bam!
He’d been out like a light. The emotional exhaustion that had regularly visited him since the accident had caught up with him again with a vengeance. It had laid him out with a punch worthy of a prize-fighter.
Sitting up, he scraped his fingers through his hair, then rubbed his chest because his heart ached. The dark and heavy sense of loss that sometimes imprisoned him when he awoke returned.
‘Dear God …’
The harsh-voiced utterance sounded desolate even to his own ears. Accompanying his return to consciousness was another disturbing element. He might have been comatose but his heavy sleep hadn’t been dreamless … not by a long chalk. His mind had been full of arresting images of Ailsa … of her incandescent amber gaze, her lustrous long hair, her ‘pocket Venus’ figure and flawless velvet skin. The most disturbing thing of all was that the images had been so erotically charged.
Right then Jake knew that if the roads weren’t cleared
soon then he was going to be in trouble. Lusting after his beautiful ex-wife had not been one of the problems he’d envisaged when he’d decided to make this trip.
Why had she said those things to him, as if she still held some residue of feeling for him?
‘I’ve always loved your hands …’ she’d admitted, then gently touched his scars as though she was far from repelled by them … as if they signified something almost precious …
Shaking his head with a groan, Jake swung his long jean clad legs over the side of the bed. The night was already drawing in, and he reached towards the lamp to turn it on and illuminate the gloom. If the temperature in the room hadn’t been quite so chill he would have taken an ice-cold shower to help quell the searing ocean of need that his erotic dreams of Ailsa were making him drown in. As it was, now that he was fully awake he found himself concerned that she didn’t have a better heating system in place.
For a few distracting seconds sexual need was overshadowed by irritation and frustration that she hadn’t used some of the money he’d given her to live more comfortably. After all, there wasn’t just herself to consider. Didn’t their daughter deserve to benefit from her father’s wealth too? he thought angrily.
She was cooking again.
The most sumptuous aroma he could imagine was emanating from the kitchen as Jake walked down the stairs. His empty stomach growled hungrily. Ruefully he recalled that he hadn’t eaten the sandwich Ailsa had made him earlier. She was stirring something in a generous-sized cast iron pot on the range cooker, her slim back to him as he entered the cosy, much warmer room.
But the first thing Jake asked didn’t concern her cooking.
‘Have you tried the phones again to see if there’s any service?’
Laying down her wooden spoon on a nearby saucer, then smoothing her hands down over her ridiculously cheerful apron, Ailsa turned to him with a frown. ‘I have. It’s no-go, I’m afraid.’
‘Pity.’ The comment was uttered with more force than he’d intended.
‘I’m sorry it’s such disappointing news. Were you resting?’ she asked lightly, clearly attempting to divert his sullen mood and proffering an unexpected smile. A near-
angelic
smile that made Jake feel like the very worst boor. ‘You look a lot less tired than you did earlier.’
‘What have you done to me? Drugged my coffee? Woven some kind of spell? I don’t think I’ve slept so much in my entire life!’
Her smile didn’t disappear. She gave a slight shrug of her slim shoulders, her serene expression the personification of kindness itself. ‘Then it must be exactly what you needed. I’m envious. Don’t knock it. I’m making us
coq au vin
for dinner tonight. I thought something more substantial as well as perhaps a bit more adventurous would be good.’
‘I don’t want you to spend all your time cooking for me. I’m not helpless. I can easily rustle something up for myself.’
‘I’m sure you can.’ Now her smile was a little tight-lipped, as if he had offended her.
He found himself cursing his boorish inability to be more amenable.
‘But I’m making a special meal as a kind of truce between us,’ she continued, ‘When the time comes for you to leave, I want you to know that you’re welcome here if you should ever want to visit again.’
‘Well, it doesn’t look as if that time is coming any time soon … at least not tonight.’
Standing in front of the uncurtained window, Jake glanced up at the darkening skies and the lacy fall of snow that showed little sign of abating. It took him aback that Ailsa had asserted he was welcome if he ever wanted to return. Yet frustration gnawed at him that he wasn’t yet able to head back to Copenhagen, as he’d planned, and sign off his work so that he could go and spend some time with Saskia and his mother. Even more frustration reigned because he wasn’t able to corral the desire that automatically seized him whenever he was in the same vicinity as Ailsa. Just being in the same room was becoming a physical and emotional
torment
that tested him to the very edge of his reason.
‘Dinner will be ready in about half an hour. The chicken is in the oven and I’m just making some vegetable soup for a starter. Would you mind going into the dining room and lighting some candles? If you need any spare you’ll find them in the sideboard drawer.’
Did she know that he’d do anything she asked him right then—
even climb onto the roof and howl like a wolf—just
for the chance of a repeat showing of that sweet angelic smile she’d given him earlier?
Deliberately holding her gaze, Jake couldn’t help grinning at the wild reaches of his imagination. ‘Sure.’
‘What’s so funny? Have I got dirt on my nose or something?’ Rubbing her face with the edge of her sleeve, she sounded vaguely upset.
‘No. Your face is fine … perfect, in fact. I was just amused at what I’d be prepared to do to be on the receiving end of one of your smiles again.’
‘Really?’ Her voice dropped to an entranced whisper,
and the already slow and heavy primal beat in his blood throbbed even harder and headed devastatingly south.
‘Really …
Are the matches in the sideboard drawer too?’
‘Yes, they are.’
‘I’d better go and light the candles, then.’
Switching on the light as he entered the dining room, Jake moved towards the heavy mahogany sideboard where a pair of elegant silver candelabra stood. Blinking at them unseeingly for a moment, he took some deep slow breaths to reorientate himself. If he’d ever forgotten that Ailsa had the power to hold him in thrall with just a simple innocent glance, then he was forcefully reminded of that power now.
Distractedly, he opened a drawer to retrieve the box of matches that she’d told him he would find there. He’d just struck one when the dining room was suddenly plunged into darkness. An answering jolt leapt in the pit of his stomach. Touching the flame in turn to the candle-tips in front of him, he watched the fire’s sensuous shadows weave and dance against the wall for hypnotic seconds before transporting the candelabra out into the hallway, almost bumping into an agitated Ailsa, who’d come to find him.
In the glow of the candle flames, her beautiful almond eyes were as bright and golden as a cat’s. ‘It must be a power cut. We haven’t had one in ages, but we do get them out here from time to time.’
‘Why doesn’t that surprise me?’ he answered. Because he hadn’t been able to keep his growing desire for her in check, Jake failed to keep the irritation from his tone. ‘Have you checked the fuse box?’
‘It was the first thing I did. None of the switches have tripped, so it must be a power cut.’
‘Take this.’ Handing her one of the candelabrum, with its flickering trio of candles, he turned back into the
dining room to collect its twin. Back in the dimmed hallway, he said brusquely, ‘Let’s get back into the kitchen, shall we?’
‘Thank goodness for the range cooker.’ Returning to the stove, Ailsa resumed her stirring of the fragrant soup she was cooking. ‘At least dinner won’t be ruined.’
Setting his candelabrum down on the table, Jake moved to stand beside her. ‘Is the stove oil-fired?’
‘Yes.’
‘So it supplies the central heating too?’
She stopped stirring the soup. Her smooth brow was distinctly worried as she turned to face him. ‘I’m afraid not … But I’ve got the wood-burner in the living room. We can go and eat our dinner in there to keep warm, if you like?’
‘When you’ve had these power cuts before, have they lasted long?’
‘The last one lasted a whole day. It was a bit of a nuisance because I lost all the food in the freezer. Apart from that … we managed.’
Jake bit back an accusing retort. He didn’t have any say about where or
how
Ailsa chose to live any more—he knew that. But Saskia was a different matter. ‘I can’t say I’m en-amoured of the idea of you and our daughter just “managing”. Don’t you think that it’s crazy, choosing to live in such an isolated place where you could potentially be cut off from the rest of the world for days in bad weather, and are prey to inconvenient losses of power that could leave you without heat and light for God knows how long?’
‘That’s a bit dramatic. They have power cuts in the city, as well you know. Besides … I’ve lived here for a long time now. I’m used to it and I like it.’ Looking as though she wanted to embellish upon that statement, she chewed down on her lip instead and said nothing.
Jake sighed. ‘You should at least see about getting your own generator, so you’ll have back-up if this happens again. Look … this probably isn’t the time to get you to think about moving somewhere less remote, but now that I’ve experienced what you and our daughter have to contend with for myself, I can’t promise I’m going to leave the subject alone.’
Dropping down to a low cupboard next to the cooker, Ailsa retrieved two plain white dinner plates, along with a pair of matching soup bowls, and put them on the lowest oven shelf to warm them. As she straightened again, her previously pale cheeks were rosily flushed, Jake noticed. Was she angry at what he’d just said? If so, she’d clearly decided not to express it.
He wondered why.
The Ailsa he had known after the accident used to explode at the least little thing.
‘We’ll eat in here, shall we?’ she suggested. ‘The heat from the stove will keep us warm for a while.’
As she stole a furtive glance at the strong-boned, scarred, but still handsome visage on the other side of the table where they sat eating dinner, Ailsa was glad she hadn’t irritably responded to Jake’s declaration that she and Saskia should be living somewhere less remote. Having promised herself that she wouldn’t add to his store of unhappiness, she meant to keep that vow. By the time he came to leave she wanted him to know that living ‘out in the sticks’, as it were, wasn’t nearly as dreadful or inconvenient as he imagined. She also wanted him to realise that she was much more together than she’d used to be … that she was capable and strong and forging a good life for herself and their daughter after the unspeakable tragedy that had wounded and demoralised them all.