The Wedding Cake Tree (22 page)

‘
Yes, I am, but I’m not sure for how much longer—’ She cut me short.

‘
So you’re a paparazzo then? But you look so angelic. It just goes to show, appearances can be so deceptive.’ She smiled serenely and carried on with the soup – I could have thrown it over her, especially as she had proven Alasdair’s point from the previous day. Why did everyone assume I was a pap? Alasdair looked as though he was about to defend me, so I stepped in.

‘
And what is it you do,
Penny
?’

‘
I’m a helicopter pilot.’

There was
no competing with that.

‘
In the RAF?’ I asked, faking interest.

‘
No way! Navy. I work with the marines sometimes, that’s how I met Alex. I’ve flown
him
about a few times, I can tell you.’

Yes,
I thought; you most certainly
can
tell me.

She grabbed the pepper and added some to the soup.
‘Hey this is nice, what is it?’ Tristan picked up the menu sheet.

‘
Believe it or not, it’s Parrot Fish Soup.’

E
veryone stared into their bowl with a little consternation. Quick as a flash, thanks to the champagne, I said, ‘Oh, I’ve had parrot fish before, but I didn’t like it much because it kept
repeating
on me.’

Tristan laughed
and I glanced across to see Alasdair smile. On a roll, my stand-up comedy moment in full swing, I turned to Tristan and said, ‘Tell me Tristan, have you ever tried Clown Fish?’

‘
No, I can’t say I have.’ He held my gaze with a sexy smirk.

‘
Well don’t,’ I continued, ‘I had it once and it tasted really
funny
.’

Once
again Tristan laughed, Alasdair smiled and even Penny tittered, but then added, ‘Honestly, Grace. Singer, photographer
and
comedienne. You should hire yourself out for weddings on a regular basis.’

N
othing witty came to mind immediately so I smiled and looked about the room, slightly embarrassed. Alasdair came to my rescue. He looked at my wine glass as the waiter refilled it.

‘
I take it you aren’t driving us home this evening, Grace.’

‘
Erm …’

P
enny stepped in. ‘
Home,
Alasdair?’

‘
Oh, it’s not home as such. Grace and I are staying at a woodman’s hut in Nethy Bridge.’ Penny’s face was a picture.

‘
Sounds … cosy.’

Alasdair paused for a moment and smiled at me with unspoken affection.

‘Yes, it is,’ he said, ‘it's wonderful.’

Chapter Twenty-Four

If I was merry with alcohol at the beginning of the meal then I was
only one or two stages from blotto by the end of it. But I could still walk, my conversation was fairly comprehensible and the room wasn’t spinning.

Time for dancing!

The lights were lowered by several notches. The band retired to take a well-deserved break, which left an opening for the resident DJ. Tristan wandered off to the bar and Penny disappeared, leaving Alasdair with an opening to change seats.

‘
What about Tristan?’ I asked, turning to look at him at the bar. He had seen Alasdair make his move and had pulled a face of mock anger.

‘
He’ll improvise. So, what I want to know is this. What made you change your mind?’

‘
Change my mind about what?’ I couldn’t resist dragging it out of him.

‘
Well, first of all, about coming to the wedding. The last I saw of you at the hut you were determined to pack a little neckerchief and wander off into the wilderness alone. You wouldn’t have lasted two seconds without me by the way.’

I started to interrupt
but he held a finger to my lips. ‘And second of all, how on earth did you come to the conclusion that you would, after all of that “I can’t possibly do it, Alasdair” nonsense, stand up and sing? Thank you for doing that, by the way.’ He sat back and I considered his questions.

‘
The answer to your first question is, I couldn’t bear for you to leave your lucky shemagh behind.’ I leant towards him seductively as I spoke. ‘And I think you knew I would feel that way when you left it.’ He smiled. ‘And, you know the answer to your second question already.’ I sat back.

‘
Oh?’

‘
Come off it, Alasdair “bloody know-it-all” Finn. You knew damn well that if you got me as far as the wedding, and I saw Alex with his injury, then I would decide to sing, just as Mum probably realised too. Am I right?’

He took a deep breath but didn’t answer.
He leant forward instead and brushed a stray twirl of hair away from my eye.

‘
You look wonderful by the way, and your voice, it blew me away. I heard you sing at St Christopher’s and by the loch, but the way you sang today was something else.’

I would have blushed if my face hadn’t already been flushed with alcohol
. I let him continue.

‘
When I saw you in the ballroom waiting to sing I just wanted to sweep you up and take you away. But then I heard your voice and … and I realised there’s something I really wanted to …’

‘
Hi you two.’ It was Simon. The boy had an extraordinary sense of bad timing. ‘So, you’re going to sing for us again, Grace?’

Alasdair sat b
ack in his chair and raised his eyes to the ceiling.

‘
First rule of cool, Simon,’ I said, ‘keep them wanting.’ I glanced across at Alasdair – a smile had returned to his face. He looked relaxed, happy.

‘
How about a dance?’ Simon asked, pulling at my hand. The DJ had moved on from ABBA to the Bee Gees.

‘
Okay then, but remember, these heels were not made for dancing.’

I mouthed
‘sorry’ to Alasdair as I rose from my chair, and found myself dancing not only with Simon but with Tristan too. Simon danced in a little world of his own (I think he had moved on from the orange juice) and Tristan took the opportunity to take my hand and jive me across the dance floor. He was quite a mover. I glanced across to see if Alasdair was watching, but he had left the table.

The pace of the music shifted down several gears for the
next number. It was a typical slow-dance song and I felt embarrassed when Tristan closed in on his hold and began to smooch. We were only a few bars in when a figure appeared hovering over Tristan’s shoulder. He looked back. It was Alasdair, and he had removed his jacket.

‘
My dance I think, Captain.’

Alasdair
said the words with more raw, sexual presence than I thought any man could ever possibly achieve. Tristan quite literally bowed out saying, ‘Fair enough.’

We danced
to a song that had been chosen by the DJ with Alex and Sarah in mind, but I decided it would be ‘our’ song for time eternal –
To Make You Feel My Love
. In truth, the DJ could have played
Smack Your Bitch Up
and I would still have found a romantic attachment to the words, but it was perfect.

The song moved on
, the singer powered up, but Alasdair remained the perfect gentleman throughout – more’s the pity. He lowered his head to speak into my ear.

‘
You seem to have spent the day running away from me. Why did you do that?’

I pulled my head back slightly.

‘I didn’t want to get in the way, what with you being best man and everything. And anyway, you had
Penny
for company. That woman’s after you, by the way.’ He shook his head with a smile and pulled me in closer. I rested my head on his shoulder and we finished the dance in silence. Alex was watching us. He smiled at me, but his expression was one of concern possibly.

Realising I was the worse for alcohol early in the evening,
Alasdair called a Speyside taxi company and reserved a cab. The final farewell with the bride and groom was emotional. Alex had tears in his eyes as he said goodbye.

‘Take care of yourself, dude.
And no heroics this time, you listening to me?’

Alasdair shrugged, shook Alex’s hand and jumped beside me in the taxi.

‘
Did you have a good time?’ He asked as the taxi scrunched across the hotel driveway. He unfastened the top stud of his shirt as he spoke.

‘
It was fantastic. Just one thing though.’

I rested
my head on his shoulder and yawned.

‘
What’s that?’ He put his arm around me and I nestled further into his chest – we were still tipsy after all.

‘
What time do we have to get up in the morning?’

‘Early
… sorry.’

‘
And where to this time?’ I asked. ‘Snorkelling in the Shetlands perchance?’

‘
That would be fantastic, but, not quite. Tomorrow, we fly to Zagreb.’ For once I took the news in my stride; it was probably the booze.

‘
Oh … right. Well, you’d better find me some more of those blister plasters then, because my feet are bloody killing me.’

Our romantic interlude ended before the taxi arrived at the hut. Alasdair placed his jacket over me in the cold cab and, in a cosy drunken stupor, I fell asleep during the last fifteen minutes of the drive. I woke in the early hours – my throat parched as the desert – still dressed in my wedding clothes but laying under the covers. I couldn’t honestly remember the car-to-bed transition, but managed to muster enough energy to abandon my dress and struggle into my pyjamas.

A glass o
f water sat on the windowsill next to the bed. A packet of ibuprofen rested against it. The room was uncomfortably hot so I tried to open a window, but simply could not work out how to lift the latch
and
push the sash frame down at the same time. I fell back on the bed, defeated, and realised the act of falling was a rash thing to do. The room became a whirling centrifuge machine and my head, weighing roughly the same as a diver’s boots (with the diver still in them), spun around in the abyss. It was not a good feeling. I tried to fix my gaze on the stars through the Velux window …
were they really supposed to jump about like that?

A
t 6.30 a.m. Alasdair opened the cabin bed door, leant across the bed, yanked the curtains open and put a coffee on the windowsill. I didn’t move.

‘
Come on then diva, wakey-wakey, big day ahead. The weather’s changed I’m afraid. Overcast with a little drizzle, but the good news,’ he added, ‘is one of the bandsmen dropped the car off so we don’t need to run to the hotel.’

‘
Go away you horrible morning person.’ My voice was muffled by the bed sheets.

‘
Oh good, you’re alive. Breakfast served in ten minutes – sharp!’

‘
Not you as well.’ I lifted my head and turned over to face him. ‘I had enough tough love from the Sergeant Major yesterday. Just open the window will you and bugger off.’

‘
You know, I think it’s in the mornings you are at your very best. Drink your coffee.’

Alasdair
opened the window and left. I hauled my sorry carcass to the edge of the bed and looked in the mirror. A mutant panda sporting an Amazonian hair-do frowned back at me – beautiful. I put a brush to my scalp, but it felt as though a thousand acupuncture needles were being thrown randomly at my skull.

I
left the security of the bed, stepped into the living area of the hut and sat down tentatively at the table. Alasdair placed a fresh mug of coffee in front of me along with cereal, toast and more ibuprofen. A battered leather-bound book sat on the table. I picked it up.

‘What’s this?’

Alasdair took a seat opposite.

‘That thing
… oh, it’s just my journal. Your mum gave it to me. I thought it would be nice to keep a record of this trip away.’

I thought my heart was going to melt – Mum’s journal, he had kept it going.
I placed it back on the table and smiled.

‘That’s a lovely thing to have done, Alasdair.’
I winked. ‘Maybe I’ll read it one day, learn all your secrets!’

He laughed.
‘You can read it now, if you want. No secrets in there, and I’m crap at writing.’

A thought crossed my mind.

‘Do you know, I had the strangest of dreams last night.’

‘
Really?’

He took the journal and crossed the hut to place it in his bag.

‘I dreamt we were jetting off to Croatia today. How bizarre was that?’

I took a bite of toast
. It didn’t sit too well.

‘
We
are
jetting off to Croatia today, just for one night though.’

H
e returned to his chair and took a sip of coffee.

‘
Right, fine, better get ready then.’

‘
Hold on. What about your breakfast?’ He pushed the toast towards me.

‘
Later, Alasdair.
Much
later.’

I rose from the table and
noticed the envelope he had left for me the previous day. I took the envelope and held it in my hand – it didn’t feel as though there were any letters inside, a few bits of scrunched up paper perhaps. Alasdair jumped up and snatched the envelope from my grasp.

‘
Probably best if
I
keep the letters,’ he said, looking a little cagey.

I glanced
at him, squinting.

‘
Just one question, Alasdair.’

‘
Yes?’ He turned to face me sporting a cheeky grin and perched his posterior on the side of the table.

‘
If I was to open that envelope,’ I said, pointing to his hand, ‘what would I find? Mum’s letters, or some bits of old newspaper?’

He shrugged and murmured
, ‘Erm, just some bits of old newspaper I suppose.’

‘
Alasdair!’ I shouted, but regretted the perforating sound reverberating between my ears a moment later. ‘You are unbelievable.’ He shrugged and I couldn’t help but laugh.

I turned
to fill the kettle for my shower, but paused with my back to him as I approached the stove.

‘
Just one more thing, walking boots or heels today?’

I heard
him laugh.

‘
Heels. One hundred per cent.’

Once seated on the aircraft, I remembered my phone call with Paul – I really ought to have thanked him for the chat. I grabbed my phone and turned it on. Alasdair turned to me.

‘What happened to the phone embargo?’
he asked.

‘
I just need to text a friend and let him know I’m okay. He wanted me to check-in now and again.’ I looked up from texting and smiled. ‘Just in case you turned out to be an axe murderer.’

Just boarded an aircraft for Zagreb. Friends again with Soldier Boy. And guess what? I actually sang at the wedding … did I even mention I’d been asked to sing? Will call when back in the UK and explain. Thanks for the chat the other day. Love you loads. G x

I turned off my phone just as the aircraft doors closed.

‘He obviously cares about you, this friend,’ Alasdair said, leaning his
head towards mine but holding his gaze to the front of the cabin.