Carole Singer's Christmas (7 page)

‘Fine. Forgive him. Just don’t get involved with him again, that’s all. If you’re having doubts about Dom, I can understand that but please, don’t convince yourself that you’re still in love with Sebastian because you’d have to be insane to feel like that.’

Carole sighed and hugged the mug of coffee. ‘Then I think I have to say I’m insane, Josie, because that’s exactly what I do think – and I’m not sure that I ever really stopped.’

Josie slumped forward on the table. ‘And Dom? What about him?’

‘That’s the real problem, Josie. I love him too.’

‘Oh dear God! It’s not even eight o’clock in the morning! You’ve only been back in the village for one night, and I need a drink already. Look, I’ve got to get to work. Why don’t I pop round this evening and we can have a proper talk about all this ... over a bottle of wine?’

‘Um ... I think Sebastian asked me to meet him in the pub,’ Carole said.

‘And you’re going? You’re actually going on a date with Sebastian the day after you get here? What about your gran? I thought you were supposed to be looking after her.’

‘Oh, that’s true! Perhaps I’d better suggest Sebastian comes round to gran’s instead. But it’s not a date! Just to talk, that’s all. Nothing else.’

Josie stared at Carole in silence for a full ten seconds.

‘Your gran will just
love
that idea. Well, I think you’re right about one thing. You really are insane. I’m going to work. Haven’t you got some apologising to do?’

‘Oh bugger! I’d almost forgotten about that.’

CHAPTER SIX

Carole had been to the old plant nursery on the outskirts of Jutsdown village, hundreds of times, as a child and young teenager. The nursery was one of her dad’s favourite places and he’d taken Carole there to help him choose plants for the sprawling garden of their Victorian villa many times over the years.

After her father’s death Carole avoided the place like the plague. Even when she and her mum moved back to the village to live with her gran again, she couldn’t bring herself to visit it.  It had taken all her will power to go there when she returned to the village after finishing her art and design course in Edinburgh. She was twenty-one, single and about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime – starting her own illustration and graphic design business from the study of her gran’s house funded by the £5,000 her gran gave her for her twenty-first birthday.

This was a new beginning and as such, it was time to put the past behind her. Somehow she felt she needed to. And part of that meant visiting all the places she had known and loved; places she’d been with her dad; places where she’d been truly happy.

One of those places was the old plant nursery. It was as if this was the final ghost she needed to lay to rest. She walked through the gate that day, spotted Sebastian and took the first step on the path of what she later believed to be
True Love
.

They’d been friends for most of her life, of course. They both grew up in the village and Jutsdown wasn’t exactly large. At the last count there were still only just over two hundred people living there. But she and Sebastian had never been anything more than friends – until that summer. That wonderful, glorious, blissful summer when she’d walked into the nursery to buy herself a plant for her new ‘office’– just one plant – as a memento of her dad, and … Sebastian had smiled at her.

His eyes were the brightest blue she’d ever seen; she couldn’t remember them being that blue at school. And had his hair been quite so fair? Or quite that wavy? It fell in a tumble of curls across his suntanned temples.

She noticed he watched her move from one bed to another; one long wooden bench-table to the next until he asked if he could help. He wasn’t working there; he too had just popped in, and his knowledge of plants was less than hers but his enthusiasm was infectious. He followed that up with an offer of a cup of coffee, followed by several long, passionate kisses, followed by–

‘What have you come to accuse me of now? Trying to kill the cat?’

Nick’s acerbic tone brought Carole back from her daydream with a rather unpleasant jolt and she almost forgot that she was there to apologise. She hadn’t even realised that she’d walked through the open gates of the new garden centre and she looked about her as if she were drowning in an ocean with neither ship nor shore in sight.

‘I ... oh ... ah ... um.’

Nick’s dark brows arched. ‘Smell the blood of an Englishman,’ he said. ‘Have you come here to quote historical quatrains and nursery rhymes?’ Suddenly a smile crept across his mouth. ‘Hmm. That’s actually rather amusing I suppose as this was historically, a nursery – and I do sell beans, as it happens.’

‘What? Oh, I see. Jack and the Beanstalk. But wasn’t that “Fee-fi-fo-fum”? Anyway,’ she said, shaking her head as if she thought the conversation were absurd, ‘No. And I haven’t come here to accuse you of anything either. Although having said that, I would like to know what my grandmother was doing up a ladder at her age and what her role here is, exactly.’

‘Why don’t you ask her?’ he said, looking away from her, grabbing a bag of compost and tossing it onto his shoulder as if it were a speck of dust.

‘Because I’ve only just found out,’ Carole replied, screwing up her nose and stepping backwards as tiny black grains of earth like jet black flakes of snow fell from the corner of the bag.

‘That doesn’t explain why you’re asking me and not her,’ he said, disappearing into the distance in just a few long strides.

Carole followed after him sidestepping piles of upturned terracotta pots, lumps of wood, half open bags of bark, discarded, dirty tools and a myriad other hazards and affronts to cleanliness.

‘Because I came here to apologise and bumped into someone who told me how Gran broke her leg. As I was on my way here anyway, I thought I may as well ask you.’

‘You came here to apologise?’

The hint of sarcasm was evident to Carole but as she was busy negotiating her way between a rather grubby-looking wheelbarrow and a large shrub which wouldn’t be out of place in a horror film about man-eating plants, she chose to ignore it.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘Gran was very upset and I think I may have possibly … arrgh!’

For the second time that morning, Carole bumped into someone because she wasn’t looking where she was going. She hadn’t noticed that Nick had stopped in his tracks. This time it wasn’t such a pleasant encounter.

Her head hit the edge of the bag with a thud. Her flailing hands caught Nick sharply under his chin with a resounding
thwack.
She tried to steady herself but stumbled further, kicked over a half-full watering can and tipped forward, head-butting Nick firmly in his stomach.

Nick tried in vain to retain his balance and his hold on the bag of compost as both he and the bag toppled backwards. He was the only thing stopping Carole from falling flat on her face and she fell with him, landing squarely on top of him with her head coming to rest with some force, in the area of his crotch.

Carole’s open mouth slammed shut on impact, causing her to bite the tip of her tongue and Nick let out a sound like nothing Carole had ever heard before.

It was several minutes before either of them could move. It was only when Carole realised that her face was within millimetres of Nick’s groin and that the warm liquid she could feel between her teeth was blood, that she managed to roll over and scramble to a sitting position on the compost-covered concrete floor.

Nick rolled over too, bringing his knees up to his chest, his eyes screwed up in pain.  Carole watched him in a daze, wondering whether she’d bitten off the tip of her tongue. Bizarrely, if she had, it occurred to her that she would never again be able to say the phrase, ‘It’s on the tip of my tongue.’

Nick moaned quietly and opened one eye. ‘If that’s your idea of an apology, please don’t bother to apologise in future.’ His dark eyes sprang open and filled with concern, and in spite of the pain he was clearly experiencing, he managed to pull himself up. ‘Are you hurt? This hurts like hell but there’s blood on your chin and, I’m pretty certain it’s not mine.’

Carole shook her head and tears crept into her eyes. ‘My tongue!’ she sobbed, trying not to move her lips or teeth. ‘I bit my tongue. Is ... is the tip still there?’ She gingerly slid her tongue out between her lips.

Nick’s brows creased and he managed a grin. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘it’s all in one piece. I think you’ve just nicked it.’

Even Carole managed a slight smile at the absurdity of that statement. ‘Nicked it on Nick,’ she said, and their eyes met as they grinned awkwardly at one another.

Nick struggled to his feet. ‘Come to the office with me and I’ll get the first-aid kit. You can use the sink in the kitchen area to get cleaned up. Does your tongue hurt? I’ve got some pain killers.’ He held his hands out and taking her hands in his, he pulled her to her feet.

Carole felt an odd sensation shoot through her as his fingers closed around hers but it was nothing compared to the jolt her highly charged nerve endings gave her when he gently brushed some specks of compost from her cheek with his thumb. She pulled away as if she’d been stung by one of his bees and she rubbed the spot he’d touched with the back of her hand in an effort to regain her composure.

‘Are you okay?’ he asked.

She nodded. ‘Yes. My tongue does hurt but I’m sure it’ll be fine. My pride, however, may take longer to recover.’ She glanced down at her favourite green coat, now covered in compost and she dreaded to think what else. ‘I must look an absolute mess.’ She brushed at the dirt but realised she was only making it worse.

‘You look lovely,’ he said.

Her eyes shot to his face and she was sure she saw him blush.

‘Especially with that blood on your chin,’ he added in a lighter tone.

‘It’s all the rage this season.’

‘You wear it well,’ he joked. ‘It suits you.’

He turned and led the way to his office and she followed behind him, her eyes taking in every inch of him. His broad shoulders and his strong, oddly elegant neck; his dark, almost black hair with hints of dark chestnut where it had been lightened by the sun; his firm bum and his long, powerful looking legs which his jeans clung to in places she thought she probably would – if she were a pair of jeans.

Stop it, Carole, she silently rebuked herself. You seem to keep forgetting you’re practically engaged.

‘Are you okay with dogs?’ he asked, turning to look at her, his hand resting on the doorknob of his office. ‘I’ve got Nicodemus with me and he can get quite excitable, although sometimes he’s a bit of a wimp and timidly shrinks into the corner. Depends on whether he likes you or not, I guess.’

Carole nodded. ‘I like dogs. Is he big?’ she asked, envisioning the sort of dog Nick would have.

Something powerful, dark and mean looking she supposed, like a Rottweiler or Bull Mastiff. She braced herself. She had told the truth; she did like dogs but she’d just fallen over once today and she didn’t relish the prospect of being knocked for six by an overactive solid mass of canine muscle.

She almost laughed when Nick opened the door and she came face to face with a svelte honey-coloured dog that looked something like a cross between a Doberman and a whippet. His sleek, short golden fur gleamed in the fluorescent light of the office.

‘This is Nicodemus. Nicodemus meet Carole – and be nice.’

Nicodemus lifted one brow, glanced up at Nick then over to Carole, got up from his plush bed and gracefully trotted towards her, nuzzling her hand with a very wet, pink nose. His long slim, pointed tail wagged furiously from side to side, like a metronome at a rave and his tall pointed ears were bolt upright and had a rosy glow to them.

‘Wow!’ Carole exclaimed. ‘He’s gorgeous! What breed is he? Or is he a cross?’

‘A mutt you mean, like me?’ Nick said, smirking. ‘No, he’s a pure bred Pharaoh Hound.’

Carole tutted at his remark. ‘He looks as if he’s blushing,’ she said, giggling at Nicodemus’ enthusiastic greeting.

‘They do. Pharaoh Hounds are unique in that their nose and ears go that rosy colour when they get excited. He clearly likes you.’

‘And I like him,’ she added, completely forgetting her tongue or the fact that her coat was now having a dog’s head rubbed against it. ‘I’ve never heard of a Pharaoh Hound before. His head does sort of resemble Anubis’ but he wasn’t a Pharaoh, he was a god.’

‘The name doesn’t come from that. It’s an ancient breed and it’s believed that the Pharaohs kept them as hunting dogs. They love hunting and they’re exuberant chasers. Having said that, they are quite calm, sensitive creatures and they’re good with people including children, and other animals. Pretty much the perfect pet. They even get on with cats – apart from Arten that is, but that’s because Arten doesn’t like Nicodemus, not the other way around. Sorry, I’ll get the first-aid kit. Move over, you mad dog,’ Nick said tenderly. He grinned across at Carole. ‘I meant Nicodemus, not you by the way.’

Carole smirked. ‘Very funny,’ she said.

He handed her the kit and nodded towards the open door of the small kitchen area.

‘It’s a bit of a mess in there,’ he said, ‘but it’s one hundred times cleaner than the bathroom. That’s full of dirty boots and towels and stuff. There’s a washing machine in there so it’s a bit of an all purpose area whereas the kitchen, well, I only use that for making tea and snacks.’

‘I’m sure it’s fine,’ Carole said, taking the kit and stepping into the kitchen. She almost reeled from the shock and she couldn’t stop the little gasp of horror escaping.

‘I did warn you.’

‘Not sufficiently,’ she said ungraciously. ‘I ... I think I’ll wait until I get back to Gran’s.’

Perhaps by some people’s standards the kitchen may have just needed a quick wipe over with a damp cloth and a bottle of disinfectant but to Carole’s eyes, it required nothing less than an industrial standard intense clean, possibly fumigation.

Nick was by her side in a split second. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. There’s nothing in here that’ll kill you and you can’t walk the streets with blood on your face. I’d offer to take you home but my staff won’t get here for at least another half an hour and I’m expecting a big delivery.’