Winter's End (9 page)

His jet black hair
was still trimmed short, like the day when she had first met him. But today he
was dressed in a faded pair of jeans and a tee shirt that snug tightly to his
body.
 
She could tell that he maintained
his regular schedule to the gym. And when he looked up at her with his blue
eyes, she almost melted into them.

“Hi,” he said, rising
to his feet. “I didn’t see you arrive.”

“Shouldn’t that be my
line,” she said with a hint of friendly sarcasm. “When did you come?”

“About half an hour
ago. The children told me you went on your walk,” he smiled, his eyes ran over
the details in her face. “You still do that? Go for walks?”

She smiled. “It keeps
me sane.”

He came nearer. “How
have you been?”

“Good. We’ve been
good.
 
The children are well-adjusted.
Their school is quite close so I don’t have any trouble picking or dropping them
off. And they rave so much about their friends and teachers that I know they
love it.”

He put a finger to
her cheeks and brushed away a rebellious strand of hair. “I meant, how were
you
?”

Fixated by his eyes,
she answered, “I’ve been well.” She felt the tips of his fingers spark an
electric current in her nerves and she pulled away immediately.

“How is business?”
she said, quickly.

“Never been better. We’ve
expanded our Hardwick Street office. We even secured a huge multi-million
dollar contract in New York, which did involve a lot of initial work, late
nights and all. It’s why I couldn’t come any sooner,” he said slowly and added
quietly. “I wish I could and I did try, Emma. But things didn’t work out as I
wanted them.”

“So you sent Mr.
Collins,”
she thought to herself.
 
She felt
a spark of anger rising inside her. Attempting to brush it away, she said “I’ll
make us some tea?”

“Emma,” he said,
touching her gently at her elbows.

She hesitated but
only momentarily. “Well, maybe I should get dinner ready too.”

*****

Emma prepared a delicious
beef sirloin roast with mushrooms and creamy, mashed potatoes on the side. She
nibbled at it slowly while Jai and Hannah continued to entertain their Uncle
Richard. He clearly was enjoying both the dinner and the company. She, on the
other hand, couldn’t wait to be alone in her bedroom.

“I can’t believe how
much I missed your cooking, Emma,” he said.

She realised then
that he had been watching her. She didn’t answer but walked silently away with
her plate to the sink and began clearing the dishes.

Richard rose to help
her.

An uncomfortable
silence lingered between them as they cleaned up the kitchen, trying to avoid
clashing into one another.

“When are you
leaving?” she asked at last.

Richard pulled out a
plate from the dish-washer and wiped it dry, looking at her out of the corner
of his eyes as he did.

“I’ve just come,
Emma. And you’re already sending me away? Where are your manners?” he teased.

She gave him a
scornful look before marching into her bedroom.

She didn’t want to
talk to him. She didn’t want to argue with him. Hell, it was hard just seeing
him there.

She climbed into bed,
praying when she woke up in the morning, it would be all a dream. And that she
would be once again happy in Skye, like the way she had been- alone.

*****

She was running
through the dense woods. Something was chasing after her but she couldn’t tell
what it was. Her eyes rounded in fear, her heart beat racing. She looked back
occasionally to locate her predator but she never saw it. She felt it though.
She felt its breath on her skin, she felt fear in her bones.

She saw Robert in the
distance and cried out for help. He looked at her strangely and turned away. As
he did, she saw Richard behind him.

“Richard! Help me!”
she screamed, trying to race closer to him.

But for some reason,
the distance between them remained, no matter how fast she ran towards him.

She could feel her
predator gaining on its distance.

“No! No! Go away!”
she screamed.

She awoke with a
start. Her heart was still racing.

Downstairs, she heard
the excited voices of the children and occasionally, Richard’s voice
overpowered theirs with his laugh.

She ran a hand
through her hair, contemplating the strangeness in her dream. After a brief
while, she sighed, resolving that dreams were usually strange.

She washed up and
then walked down the stairs and into the kitchen. The children had finished
breakfast and were preparing themselves for school. Richard was at the sink,
washing up the evidence of their meal.

“Hi” he said,
noticing her at the door. “I thought we should let you sleep in and helped
ourselves.”

She gave him a small
smile.

“Do you want a cup of
coffee? The pot’s still hot,” he said.

She nodded and sat at
the table. “Thanks.”

He poured her a cup.

“I…I’m sorry about
last night,” she muttered. Her eyes were lowered, her fingers played with the
ear of the cup. “I was rude. I shouldn’t have said that. I just didn’t expect
you. So you kind of caught me by surprise.”

“Perhaps, I should
have let you know I was coming. I suppose I deserved it, arriving at your home
unannounced.” He was leaning against the sink, his arms crossed across his
chest.

“No, no,” she stood
up abruptly. “It’s your right, Richard. You’re always welcome here. You know
that. You are after all the children’s uncle and they love you.”

He looked at her, his
eyes were seething with anger. He brushed past her and out of the kitchen.

“Okay, we’re ready,”
she heard Jai announce.

Jai and Hannah ran
into the kitchen to bid her goodbye and then ran out the door into Richard’s
car.

She heard him rev up
the engine and drive off up her driveway.

She stood alone in
her kitchen. Her house was silent.

But then her heart
began to race as she ran up the stairs and into the guest bedroom that Richard
had occupied. She swung open the door, her eyes filled with fear as she
searched the room with it. But there, beside the window, sat his little black
luggage bag.

She leant against the
door frame and let out a sigh of relief. But it was only momentary, because her
heart was racing again for another different reason. She was going to be
alone…with Richard.

*****

Richard didn’t arrive
home until lunch. He sat sullenly at the table without a word.

Emma was tongue tied,
confused as to how she should break the iceberg that lay between them.

“You’re late,” she
started.

“I didn’t know you
were keeping time.”

Emma swallowed a
nervous gulp in her throat.
 
“I thought
we could have sandwiches for lunch and…”

“I’m not hungry,” he
rose from his chair. “I had a snack in
Portree
.”

“You went all the way
to
Portree
?”

“I didn’t know how
else to spend my time here.”

“You could have come
home. We could have…”

“I’m here for the
children. I thought you made that abundantly clear.” He turned to walk out of
the kitchen. “I’ll pick them up as well. I intend to spend as much time as I
can with them before I return to London.”

Emma saw him head up
the stairs and towards his bedroom. She bit her lip. She had offended him.

She sat on her couch,
attempting to watch a mid-day soap opera, but instead her eyes kept darting to
the stairs occasionally. When he didn’t emerge from his room in an hour, she
rose and made her way towards it.

“Richard,” she
knocked gently on the door. “Can I come in?”

When he didn’t
answer, she turned the door knob gently. But the room was empty and she was
baffled slightly until she became suddenly aware that the guest shower had just
turned off. She turned to rush out the door as he entered the room with a towel
wrapped at his waist. She realised though, she was late and blushed at being
caught in his room.

“I…I’m sorry,” she
stammered. “I didn’t know you were in the shower.”

His hair was damp,
and pearls of water droplets glimmered on his body. She tried desperately to focus
on his eyes as she spoke, however his fresh scent did little to help ease the
rising heat inside her.

“Did you need something?”
he asked, frowning.

“No, I..,” she said,
searching for words. “I don’t know what it is but I do know you’re angry. I
don’t know what I may have said…done, but whatever it is, I’m…sorry.”

His eyes narrowed and
a nerve pulsed at his temples. In a glimpse, he had crossed over to her and
pinned her angrily against the door.

“Sometimes I think
Emma, if you are really so naive. Otherwise you put on a hell of an act,” he
whispered in a low, dangerous tone.

She leant frozen
against the door. The only barrier between his naked torso and her breasts were
her arms that folded between them.

“I don’t understand,”
she said, her eyes welling with tears.

“Don’t provoke me,
Emma,” he warned. He lowered his left hand, slowly running it down her side
until it touched her slender waist. He drew closer to her so that his lips were
almost touching hers and his eyes peering deeply into hers.

Emma felt a sensation
run up her spine.

“You shouldn’t have
come here,” he threatened in that low voice again. He gripped the door knob
that sat close to her waist and turned it.

“Get out,” he
growled. “Get out before I do something we will both regret.”

*****

Emma pushed the
trolley along to the car park. Three days had passed and she and Richard had
barely exchanged words. Finally not being able to bear the tension between
them, she escaped to Broadford under the pretence of shopping. She bought a
pair of gloves she didn’t need, cans of vegetables when she had already a dozen
in her pantry and two gallons of milk, just in case.

“Hi there,” she heard
someone call out. “Emma! It’s Lisa.”

She turned and saw
her neighbour running up to her car, her blonde hair waving in the sea breeze.

“Hi,” she said, with a
very trying smile. Lisa hadn’t spoken to her ever since she discovered
Emma’s
 
closeness to Ethel Kinnaird. She
also had an inkling that she had been avoiding her. Lisa had stopped paying her
occasional random visits to her home and rarely looked her in the eye when she
visited the co-op.

“It’s been a while,
hasn’t it?” Lisa panted. “I have been busy and all, what with work and the
children’s school.”

“I thought it was
more to do with my friendship with Mrs. Kinnaird,” Emma let out frankly.

“I was afraid,” Lisa
said.

“What about? Why is
everyone so afraid of Mrs. Kinnaird?” she demanded.

“Why don’t we sit and
talk it properly over a cup of coffee?” Lisa said. “Please?”

Emma looked at her
briefly, contemplating. “Fine,” she said at last.

And the two women
strolled over to the coffee shop next to the co-op store.

Seated now at a
window overlooking the Broadford Bay, Emma said, “Listen, if this is all about
trying to convince me to stay away from Mrs. Kinnaird, then forget it. I’m not
in the mood. Save it for another day.”

“It isn’t,” said
Lisa.

Emma gave her a
suspicious look.

“I swear, it
isn
‎
’t,”
Lisa insisted.

“So why then were you
afraid?”

“She’s a powerful
woman, particularly in Skye. I don’t want to get on the wrong side of her.
Nobody does. And when I heard that you had befriended her and become quite
close… I thought you would tell on me.”

“Well, I didn’t,”
said Emma, matter-of-factly.

“I know that now. I’m
sorry. And of course, I was a tad bit jealous as well.”

Emma smiled.
“Jealous?”

“Yeah.
 
I was your first friend here in Skye and then
that old Mrs. Kinnaird took over.”

Emma burst out
laughing. “Mrs. Kinnaird didn’t take over, Lisa. You pulled back.”

“Okay. Well, there
were rumours as well.”

“Rumours? What sort
of rumours?”

“Just that…,” Lisa
quietened, thinking. “Just rumours. Silly come to think of it now. Don’t worry
about it. You know what, let’s drop Mrs. Kinnaird here. There’s something else
I want to ask. Who’s the handsome
fella
that’s moved
into your house?”