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Never Forget Me
Marguerite Kaye
As war blazes across Europe, three couples find a love that is powerful enough to overcome all the odds…A KISS GOODBYE – 1914As war looms, genteel Flora’s ancestral home is turned into a hospital, where she meets dashing revolutionary Geraint, whose passionate, sizzling kiss has her praying for this soldier’s safe return!DEAREST SYLVIE – 1916Rugged British soldier Robbie had one hedonistic night in Paris with beautiful French Sylvie. But, as all Europe is torn apart, can these star-crossed lovers forge a lasting bond through their letters?FOREVER WITH ME – 1918Nurse Sheila is shocked to discover that the French surgeon she woke beside after Armistice Day is her new employer! Fighting for his love will be the bravest thing she’s ever had to do…A heart-wrenching new anthology from powerfully emotional author Marguerite Kaye


‘If we are not enemies, but we are not on the same side, then where on earth are we?’
‘I'll tell you where we are, we're in no-man's-land.’
‘No-man's-land,’ Flora repeated. ‘Our own private land.’
‘For the time being.’
No-man's-land. A place where only one man existed, she thought. A man whose eyes glittered darkly down at her, mesmerising beneath the thick curtain of his lashes. A man who, by his own admission, confided in no one, yet had confided in her. A dangerous man. A lonely man. A challenging man. And a very enticing one. ‘I think I like noman's-land,’ Flora said.
‘So do I,’ Geraint said softly, closing the space between them. He slid his arm around her waist. His fingers were delicate on her jaw, her cheek, making her catch her breath in anticipation, making her tremble, scattering her inhibitions to the four winds.
Her body was pliant, melding itself to his hardness as she reached up to put her arms around his neck. As his lips touched hers, her eyelids closed. His tongue ran along the soft skin on the inside of her lower lip, and she shivered at the shocking intimacy of it. It was like the first sip of a fine French cognac. Warmth flooded her.
Born and educated in Scotland, MARGUERITE KAYE originally qualified as a lawyer but chose not to practise. Instead, she carved out a career in IT and studied history part-time, gaining a first-class honours and a master's degree. A few decades after winning a children's national poetry competition, she decided to pursue her lifelong ambition to write and submitted her first historical romance to Mills & Boon. They accepted it and she's been writing ever since.
You can contact Marguerite through her website, www.margueritekaye.com (http://www.margueritekaye.com).
Never Forget Me
A Kiss Goodbye
Dearest Sylvie
Forever With Me
Marguerite Kaye


www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
Also available from MARGUERITE KAYE (#ua76a7906-ccb6-594e-9bd6-c7976cbe360a)
Strangers at the Altar
Desert Prince, Bartered Bride
The Wicked Lord Rasenby
The Rake and the Heiress
The Governess and the Sheikh
The Highlander's Redemption
The Highlander's Return
Innocent in the Sheikh's Harem
Rake with a Frozen Heart
Outrageous Confessions of Lady Deborah
The Beauty Within
Duchess by Christmas
Rumours that Ruined a Lady
Unwed and Unrepentant
Titanic: A Date with Destiny
The Captain's Wicked Wager
The Highlander and the Sea Siren
Bitten by Desire
Temptation is the Night
Claimed by the Wolf Prince
Bound to the Wolf Prince
The Highlander and the Wolf Princess
The Sheikh's Impetuous Love-Slave
Behind the Courtesan's Mask
Flirting with Ruin
An Invitation to Pleasure
Spellbound & Seduced
Lost in Pleasure
How to Seduce a Sheikh
The Undoing of Daisy Edwards
The Awakening of Poppy Edwards
The Lady Who Broke the Rules
AUTHOR NOTE (#ua76a7906-ccb6-594e-9bd6-c7976cbe360a)
War, conflict and the impact it has not just on those who fought, but on those left behind, have been recurrent themes in my books. While the First World War has long been a subject which I found compelling, I've always shied away from it as the backdrop to romance. The sheer scale of the suffering, death and destruction seemed prohibitive and the war itself is still very much present in the memories of the families of those who fought in it.
With the centenary of the start of the ‘war to end all wars’ coming around though, I began to seriously rethink my stance. Between 1914 and 1918, the world, or at least the world of those countries involved in the conflict, really did change utterly and it wasn't all negative. Out of such suffering, those who fought and those who lost loved ones were determined some good must come—not just the long-term peace that the League of Nations was established to protect, but ‘good’ for the individual. And it did. Of course, there were other influences and dynamics of change that were in train before the war, but no one can deny (though no doubt someone will now!) that the war gave women's liberation a kick start, not only in enfranchising them, but in getting them out of the home and into the workplace and in Britain making a start on eliminating sexual discrimination by allowing them into the legal profession and the higher echelons of the civil service. A maximum working day (and week) and a stronger trade union movement were just some of the measures that protected workers.
I could go on, but this isn't a history lesson. What I'm trying to say is, the idea of somehow showing the impact of these huge changes on my characters really appealed to me. But how to do this and at the same time capture the essence of the war? I decided that rather than pick one key moment in the conflict, I would write three different stories set at the beginning, the middle and the end. Building on my experience from working on the Castonbury Park series, I'd have some continuity characters who would act as landmarks for the changes and so I came up with the idea of having a house and a family central to all three stories, who would then represent the shift from the old world to the new.
All very well, but finding a way of setting not one but three romances against a backdrop of war without shying away from the reality was a tough one. What I hope runs through all the stories is the triumph of the human spirit and the power of love.
My own spirit, I must admit, was at times crushed by this book. Thanks once again to my Facebook and Twitter friends for all their help and encouragement. You kept me going and you fed me ideas—having letters form a key part of my second story is just one of them. Many thanks to Alice, who shared the amazing story of her grandfather's war and allowed me to borrow his surname for one of my heroes. And finally, a huge big thank-you to Linda F at Harlequin Mills & Boon for taking a chance on this book and as ever to my wonderful editor, Flo, who hauled me out of the mire that my third story had become entangled in.
This has been by far the most challenging book I've written, but because of that it's also been the most rewarding. I truly hope you find it as rewarding to read.
Table of Contents
Cover (#u07ba2904-363b-5b95-abc5-d94c679f43c3)
Introduction (#u9ec17335-e667-5579-a0ca-63398007440e)
About the Author (#u083128af-5a18-5f86-95c0-1abfaf72f0db)
Title Page (#uac6cfa5f-7b0e-5818-9570-fd8c69b9413a)
Booklist
Author Note
A Kiss Goodbye
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Dearest Sylvie
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Forever With Me
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Historical Note
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
A Kiss Goodbye (#ua76a7906-ccb6-594e-9bd6-c7976cbe360a)
Marguerite Kaye
Chapter One (#ua76a7906-ccb6-594e-9bd6-c7976cbe360a)
Argyll, Scotland—October 1914
Corporal Geraint Cassell, late of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers and currently seconded to the Army Service Corps, gazed out of the window as the staff car swept up the impressive driveway. There was something about the quality of light, the way it filtered through the battleship-grey clouds, casting a soft haze over everything, that made him think of home. The picturesque villages they had skirted on the journey north, though, looked nothing like the gritty Welsh mining village in which he had been raised, where the narrow houses huddled into the valley, their tiny windows looking blindly out onto the road, which rose steeply towards the pit head and the winding wheel that dominated the skyline. In contrast, the whitewashed Highland cottages seemed like something out of a child’s fairy tale.
Private Jamieson pulled the car to a halt in front of Glen Massan House. Geraint surveyed the place with a jaundiced eye. It was more like a castle than a house. Built in the Scots’ baronial style, he had gleaned from the requisition orders, it sat on a promontory with a commanding view over Loch Massan. A large tower five stories high with crenellated battlements bolstered one side of the grey granite building, while the main body of the house, with its steep-pitched roofs and its plethora of smaller, conical towers, seemed to have been added higgledy-piggledy. The result was strangely attractive. It was easy to imagine generations of Carmichael lairds striding out from that massive portico in their plaids, hounds yelping at their heels, to go off on a stag hunt or whatever it was that Scottish lairds did.
Generations of crofters and serfs had no doubt dutifully served their lord and master here, working the land for a pittance and shivering in their thatched cottages, Geraint reminded himself. Whatever this war brought, one thing was certain, it was the end of the line for people like Lord Carmichael and his privileged family.
The war would see the end of the line, too, with a bit of luck, for the ‘Old Contemptibles’ like Colonel Aitchison, whose ilk were bumbling about with General French over on the Western Front. Geraint belatedly turned and saluted as his so-called superior officer finally stumbled out of the staff car juggling gloves, hat and swagger stick. No doubt the Carmichaels of Glen Massan House would resent being evicted from their pretty Highland castle, but Geraint refused to feel sorry for them.
* * *
‘I simply can’t comprehend why the army wants our home. Why Glen Massan?’
The question was rhetorical, though Lady Elizabeth Carmichael had asked it repeatedly since the requisition order had arrived. Her daughter, Flora, looked up from the newspaper in which she had been reading the first encouraging reports of the battle being waged at Ypres. ‘Perhaps it really will be over by Christmas,’ she said, ‘in which case, we will only have to decamp to the Lodge for a few months.’
‘A few months! The place is tiny. There are only three bedrooms.’
‘Then Robbie will have to bunk with Alex the next time he comes up from London,’ Lord Carmichael said patiently.
‘But that means you and I will have to share a bedroom.’
‘We are married, Elizabeth, and there is a war on, in case either fact had escaped your attention. It is up to all of us to make sacrifices.’
Lady Carmichael took a sip of tea. ‘Do you really think it will be over by Christmas as they say?’ she asked her daughter.
Flora’s opinion was so rarely consulted that for a moment she was quite taken aback. ‘I don’t know,’ she answered simply. ‘If the newspapers are to be believed...’ She halted mid-sentence, because the growing casualty lists and the claims of imminent victory seemed to her at odds. The reports in the papers were unrelentingly cheerful, full of praise for the bravery of the men who went ‘over the top’. At times, they made life in the trenches sound like some sort of Boy Scout camp. In the first weeks, Flora had been as enthusiastic as everyone else, but now that men from both sides were dying in unimaginable numbers, she was beginning to have the most unpatriotic doubts about the ability of those in charge to do their job.
Not that she would dream of saying so in front of her parents, who considered any talk of casualties defeatist. Leaning across the table to clasp her mother’s hand, she smiled weakly. ‘Perhaps it will be over soon. I sincerely hope so.’
‘It is selfish of me, but you know how much your brother Alex wishes to join the older boys from his school who have already enlisted.’
‘Alex is only seventeen,’ the laird said pointedly. ‘He is at no risk.’
But Robbie, Flora’s other brother, who was twenty-five and currently running his wine-importing business from London, certainly was. The laird did not say so, but it was obvious to her that all three of them were thinking that Robbie’s joining up was a distinct possibility. ‘It’s almost a full year before Alex is eligible to enlist,’ Flora said, trying to sound more reassuring than she felt. ‘If it’s not over by Christmas then it certainly will be long before then.’
‘I hear that our ghillie’s son, Peter McNair, is talking of joining up,’ Lady Carmichael said. ‘Mrs Watson from the village shop told me that they are attempting to form one of those units Kitchener made such a fuss about.’
‘A Pal’s Battalion,’ the laird said dismissively. ‘Foolish name, foolish idea. This is a small community, we can ill afford to lose significant numbers of men.’
‘I quite agree,’ Lady Carmichael said. ‘Our local young men would be better served tending to the fields. Not that I would dream of saying so outside these four walls,’ she added hastily. ‘We are at war after all. Though why that requires us to be cast out of house and home...’
‘We shall know soon enough,’ her husband retorted sharply. ‘The army are due this morning.’
Lady Carmichael sighed. Weak autumn sunshine filtered through the voile curtains draped over the two long windows of the dining room, bathing her in its unforgiving light. Her mother’s stern beauty had held up remarkably well, Flora thought. They were so unalike, mother and daughter, sharing little but the same grey-blue eye colour. She would have liked to possess some of her mother’s curves, but she had inherited her father’s physique, being tall and slim.
‘Would you like me to deal with the army chaps?’ she asked, thinking that at least she might spare both her parents and the unsuspecting officer in charge.
Lady Carmichael, however, looked horrified. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. You cannot possibly take on such a task, it would be quite beyond you.’
‘I am twenty-three years old, and since you trust me with little more than flower arranging, I don’t see how you can have any idea what I am capable of.’
‘Flora!’
Lady Carmichael looked scandalised by this unexpected riposte. Flora was rather surprised at herself, for though she often disagreed with her mother, she rarely allowed herself to say so. ‘I beg your pardon,’ she said, feeling not at all contrite, ‘but I would very much like to feel useful, and I wished to spare you what can only be a painful process.’
‘Flora is quite right,’ the laird said, coming unexpectedly to her aid. ‘It will be difficult for us to relinquish the house. Perhaps we should delegate the task to her after all.’
‘Father, thank you.’
‘Andrew! You cannot mean that. Why Flora is— She has no experience at all. And besides, think of the proprieties. All those rough young soldiers.’
‘For goodness’ sake, Elizabeth, those rough young soldiers are British Tommies, whom I’m sure will treat both the house and our daughter with respect. Whatever the army’s intentions are for Glen Massan, it will require our home to be stripped of its contents. I am trying to spare you the trauma of witnessing that, and frankly I have little stomach for the sight, either.’ Lord Carmichael patted his wife’s hand. ‘Best you concentrate your energies on making the Lodge comfortable for us, my dear. If Flora makes a hash of things, I can always step in.’
It was not quite the wholehearted endorsement she would have liked, but it was nevertheless more than she had hoped. What was more, loathe as she was to admit it, her father was entitled to his reservations. ‘I shall do my best to ensure it doesn’t come to that,’ Flora said, pleased to hear that she sounded considerably more confident than she felt. It was wrong to think that any good could come from this horrible war, but it would be equally wrong for her not to seize the opportunity it provided to prove herself.
Outside, a horn honked, gravel scrunched and in the distance, a low rumble could be heard growing ever nearer. Flora ran to the window. ‘Speak of the devil. It’s an army staff car. A Crossley I think, Father. Alex would know.’ She gazed out in amazement at the convoy of dusty vehicles following behind the gleaming motor car. ‘Goodness, there are so many of them. Where will they sleep?’
‘Certainly not in the house. At least—I suppose we could accommodate some of the officers,’ Lady Carmichael said unconvincingly.
‘My dear,’ the laird said, ‘this will be their house very soon. They will sleep where they choose. In the meantime, I expect they will put up tents.’
‘On the lawn! In full sight! Andrew, you cannot...’
‘Elizabeth, you must allow Flora to worry about the details.’
As truck after truck pulled to a stuttering halt and what seemed to Flora like a whole battalion of men began to descend, she struggled not to feel quite overwhelmed.
‘It is like an invasion,’ her mother said in horror, and Flora couldn’t help but think that she was right.
The driver of the staff car pulled open a door and a polished, booted foot appeared. Flora straightened her back and took a deep breath. These are our brave boys, she reminded herself. ‘I think we’d better go and see what we can do to assist them.’
Her father gripped her shoulder. ‘Bravo,’ he said softly. ‘Get your mother to the Lodge first. Join me as soon as you can.’
Feeling anything but brave, Flora watched him leave before turning to her mother and pasting on a smile. ‘Well, it looks as though the war has arrived in Glen Massan.’
Chapter Two (#ulink_684c58fe-149f-56c5-8e22-62d9c3d322b6)
Geraint listened distractedly as Colonel Aitchison droned on, reading out the army regulations, statutes and by-laws governing the requisition of the house in the manner of a judge delivering a death sentence. Across from him, seated on an ornately scrolled and gilded sofa, Lord Carmichael held himself rigidly, his face expressionless, though judging from the way his fingers curled and uncurled compulsively, this was merely the aristocratic stiff upper lip on full display.
A tall, thin man with a helmet of red hair and a neatly trimmed beard, the laird looked more like an academic of some sort than the exploitative landowner he surely was. There was an aesthetic quality to that long, narrow face, intelligence in that wide brow and those piercing eyes. Very piercing, Geraint thought, catching the man’s glance and finding himself being scrutinised with disconcerting thoroughness. He squared his shoulders and glared back, and was surprised when the laird gave him a wry smile in return.
As the colonel turned to the specifics of recompense, Geraint’s attention wandered. The drawing room was huge, the cornicing of the high ceilings formed in a geometric pattern that looked vaguely Oriental. A bay window at the far end looked out onto the gardens at the rear of the house, and at the opposite end, a massive white marble fireplace was flanked by a pair of statues bearing gilded torches. Aphrodite? Artemis? Athena? Knowing that he had not the slightest chance of attending university, and having besides a natural antipathy towards anything that smacked of privilege, Geraint had been dismissive of the classical elements of his education. All Greek goddesses looked pretty much the same to him.
The door opened and a girl burst in, startling the colonel into temporary silence. Her bright head of auburn hair gave her away immediately as the laird’s daughter. Geraint got to his feet several seconds before the portly colonel could manage to do the same. Not a girl, but a young woman in her early twenties. Tall and slim, clad in one of those white dresses that only the well-heeled could afford to wear, she had around her neck a strangely masculine little black silk cravat that served to emphasise her femininity.
‘Colonel, may I introduce you to my daughter, Flora.’
She didn’t walk across the room so much as float, though Geraint could see that her feet in their delicate little shoes were firmly planted on the antique rugs that covered the floor, and he saw also, because he took the trouble to look, that her ankles were as slim and elegant as the rest of her. Her hair, which she wore piled on top of her head, was a shade darker than her father’s, the colour more lustrous. Beneath it, there was just a touch of haughtiness in her startling blue-grey eyes and humour, too, in that generous mouth. She was no Greek goddess, but she was lovely.
And she was looking enquiringly at him now. ‘Corporal Cassell,’ her father said by way of introduction.
‘Corporal Cassell. How do you do?’
The hot dart of desire that made his belly clench took him entirely by surprise. Flora Carmichael, spoilt little rich girl, was most certainly not his type. She turned to him with one dark brow raised, holding out her genteel little hand. He caught a waft of her flowery scent and it was intoxicating. For a moment, for just a moment, he actually thought she felt the jolt of connection, too, as his fingers touched hers and her eyes widened a little. Then he remembered who he was and where he was. Women like Flora Carmichael did not look twice at men like him, and men like him did not fraternise with the enemy. He dropped her hand abruptly and sat back down, realising too late that he hadn’t even returned her greeting and had thus most likely confirmed her assumption that he was a complete boor before he’d even opened his mouth.
* * *
Flora took her place by her father’s side on the sofa, somewhat confused. Had she just been snubbed? Across the room, the rude corporal kept his eyes firmly on his commanding officer, allowing her to study him covertly. He looked to be about Robbie’s age, perhaps two or three years older than herself, though it was difficult to tell, for there was a hard edge to him that her elder brother did not possess. Jet-black hair, cropped ruthlessly short. Was he, then, a recent recruit? Dark eyes rimmed with thick dark lashes were set under a high, intelligent brow. His face was all angles, softened only by the fullness of his lower lip. It was a memorable face and a handsome one, though not in the least gentle or kind.
His attention switched, and he caught her staring at him. She refused to avert her gaze, though she could feel the colour creeping up her neck. What had she done to earn such overt antagonism? He was positively bristling with it.
‘Flora?’
She stared at her father blankly, her fingers straying to her cravat.
‘The colonel has been explaining that Corporal Cassell will be in day-to-day charge of the requisition handover. Unfortunately the lieutenant assigned to the role is indisposed.’
‘Naturally I will be keeping tabs on things,’ the colonel said. ‘I’m staying with an old colleague who lives just next door, a Colonel Patterson—do you know him, Lord Carmichael? We fought the Boers together, you know.’ Colonel Aitchison paused, looking somewhat confused. ‘What was I...’
‘The guided tour. Sir,’ the corporal prompted, none too subtly, ‘to ascertain which rooms can be utilised for what.’
His voice was unexpected, his accent softly lilted. ‘You are Welsh,’ Flora exclaimed in some surprise.
‘I am a soldier, Miss Carmichael.’
It was not just antagonism, he had obviously taken an instant dislike to her, which shouldn’t matter one whit, and most certainly should not hurt her. Flora got to her feet, forcing the colonel and the rude corporal to stand. He was taller than she expected, more intimidating as he stood there in his pristine uniform, his feet in their gleaming boots planted slightly apart, as if he was on guard duty and would challenge her right to pass. In her own home!
‘Let us proceed with the tour at once.’ Because the sooner this is over, the sooner I shall be rid of you, she implied as she strode past him, her nose in the air, knowing that she must look perfectly ridiculous as well as appearing dreadfully rude. ‘Good morning, Colonel.’
‘My daughter is right,’ she heard her father say, ‘the sooner the better. If that is all for now, Colonel?’
‘A few signatures, the rest can be ironed out later. As I said, I shan’t be far away. Hoping to bag a few grouse while I’m here, actually. Maybe even a salmon. Patterson was telling me there is excellent fishing on his stretch of the river. In the old days...’
The meeting was clearly over. Flora fumbled with the latch.
‘Allow me.’
Corporal Cassell reached around her, the sleeve of his jacket brushing her arm, ushering her through the open door. She was absurdly conscious of how slight she was compared to his broad physique. ‘Thank you.’
‘You’re welcome.’ She had expected him to return to the drawing room, but instead he followed her out to the Great Hall, wandering over to the stone fireplace and studying the display of claymores ranged in a wheel on the wall above it. ‘Do you keep these in readiness to repel an invasion by the English?’ he asked.
Flora rarely lost her temper, but she felt her hackles rise. This man was insufferable. ‘It may have escaped your notice, but we are actually fighting on the same side in this particular war.’
‘I doubt you and I will ever be on the same side, Miss Carmichael,’ Corporal Cassell said, turning his attention to the array of muskets in a case by the window. ‘You’d do well to make sure the colonel doesn’t clap eyes on these, else he’ll be requisitioning them.’
‘They would be of little use, since they are over a hundred years old.’
‘I’m willing to bet they’re still a damn sight more effective than what they’ve been giving our boys to train with,’ he exclaimed with surprising viciousness. ‘Broom handles, pitchforks, guns minus bullets if they are very lucky,’ he added, in answer to her enquiring look. ‘This war has caught the army on the hop. If you could but see...’ He stopped abruptly.
‘If I could but see what, Corporal Cassell?’
He shrugged and turned away to look at a large flag displayed on the wall.
‘The standard you are looking at was borne at Culloden,’ Flora said, addressing his back. ‘Though some of the clan fought for Bonnie Prince Charlie, others were on the side of the crown.’
The corporal made no reply. Thoroughly riled, and determined to force him to acknowledge her presence, Flora went to stand beside him. ‘Above the standard is our family crest, which is also carved over the front door. Tout Jour Prest. It means...’
‘Always ready. You see, I am not wholly uneducated.’
‘I did not think for a moment that you were. Why do you dislike me so much, Corporal?’
He twisted round suddenly, taking her off guard. ‘I bear you no ill will personally, Miss Carmichael, but I do not approve of your type.’
‘My type?’ His eyes, she realised, were not black but a very dark chocolate-brown. Though he clearly intended to intimidate her, she found the way he looked at her challenging. It was deliberately provocative. ‘And what, pray tell, do you mean by that?’
‘All this.’ He swept his arm wide. ‘This little toy castle of yours. All these guns and shields and standards commemorating years of repression. A monument, Miss Carmichael, to the rich and privileged who expect others to do the filthy business of earning their living for them.’
‘My father works extremely hard.’
‘Collecting rents.’
‘He does not— Good grief, are you some sort of communist?’
She could not help but be pleased at the surprise on his face. ‘What on earth would you know about communism?’ he demanded.
‘You haven’t answered my question.’
‘I am a socialist and proud of it.’
‘Like Mr Keir Hardie? He has made himself most unpopular by campaigning against the war. Are you also a pacifist?’
‘A conchie? Hardly, given my uniform and my rank. What do you know of Keir Hardie? I wouldn’t have thought someone like you would be interested in him.’
‘Someone like me! A female, do you mean, or one of my class? Do you have any idea how patronising that sounds? Silly question, of course you do.’
‘I did not intend to insult you.’
‘Yes, you did, Corporal Cassell.’ Flora glared at him. ‘Please, feel free to continue with your barbs. Being a patriot, I am delighted to afford you the opportunity to practise something that gives you such obvious pleasure.’
To her astonishment, he burst out laughing. ‘I will when I can think of one. I must say, you are not at all what I was expecting.’
His backhanded compliment should most decidedly not be making her feel quite so pleased. Quite the contrary, she should have taken extreme umbrage by now, and left him to his own devices. Instead Flora discovered that she was enjoying herself. Corporal Cassell was rude and he made the most extraordinarily sweeping assumptions, but he did not talk to her as if she was witless. ‘I have never met a socialist before. Are they all as outspoken as you?’
‘I don’t know. I’ve never met a laird’s daughter before. Are they all as feisty as you?’
‘Oh, I should think so. Centuries of trampling over serfs and turning crofters out of their homes into the winter snows leave their mark, you know.’
He smiled wryly, acknowledging the hit. ‘And then there is the red hair. Though it would be a crime to label it something so mundane as red.’
She knew she ought not to be standing here exchanging banter with him. She was also quite certain she should not be feeling this exhilarating sense of anticipation, as if she were getting ready to jump into the loch, knowing it would be shockingly cold but unbearably tempted by its deceptively blue embrace on a warm summer’s day. ‘What, then, would you call it?’ Flora asked.
The corporal reached out to touch the lock that hung over her forehead, twining it around his finger. ‘Autumn,’ he said thoughtfully.
She caught her breath. ‘That’s not a colour.’
‘It is now.’
The door to the drawing room opened, and he sprang away from her. ‘Flora?’ her father said.
‘I was showing Corporal Cassell our collection of firearms.’
The laird drew her one of his inscrutable looks before turning back to the colonel. ‘Good day to you. I will see you in a few days, but in the meantime you can reach me by telephone, and I’m sure my daughter will keep me fully briefed.’
With a gruff goodbye to the corporal, her father picked up his walking stick and headed for the front door where the deerhounds awaited him. He’d be off for a long tramp across the moors. Her father supported the war unequivocally and would like as not have enlisted himself if he’d been of age, but Glen Massan House was in his blood, and giving it up was no easy sacrifice to make.
A horrible premonition of the other, much more painful sacrifices her family might ultimately have to make made Flora feel quite sick, but she resolutely pushed the thought away. There was no point in imagining the worst when there was work to be done. Besides, neither of her brothers was currently in the firing line, for which she was guiltily grateful.
She turned her attention to the forecourt, where the corporal was in earnest conversation with his colonel. The engine of the staff car was already running. She could not hear what was being said, but she could tell the Welshman was not happy. Eventually, he stepped back and saluted. The car drove off in a flurry of gravel, and the corporal re-joined her.
‘What do you intend to use our house for?’ Flora asked.
‘It’s supposed to be hush-hush, though I can’t imagine why. You’re not a German spy by any chance, are you?’ he asked sardonically. Pulling off his cap, he ran his fingers through his hair. ‘It’s been earmarked for special training. That’s all I know, and even if I did know more I couldn’t tell you. One thing I do know, though, we only have a few weeks to get the place ready before the first batch of Tommies arrive, so me and the lads are going to have to get our skates on.’
‘Which means that I, too, will have to get my skates on. I would not wish to be responsible for delaying the British army,’ Flora said, trying not to panic. Outside, the soldiers were playing an impromptu game of football on the croquet lawn. She prayed her mother had for once done as she was bid, and kept to the Lodge. ‘How many of you are here as the—what is it, advance guard?’
‘Just the one section, me and twelve men.’
‘Goodness, when you arrived it seemed like hundreds.’
‘It most likely will be soon, but for now it’s just us. And the colonel, of course, whenever he deigns to join us.’
Flora eyed him sharply. ‘You sound positively insubordinate, Corporal.’
‘Do I?’
‘The colonel strikes me as the kind of man who is rather more efficient in his absence than his presence,’ she ventured.
‘And you are qualified to make such a judgement, are you?’
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, why must you be so abrasive?’ Flora snapped. Though he raised his brows at her flare of temper, he made no attempt to apologise. She suspected he was the kind of man who made a point of not apologising for anything, if he could avoid it. ‘Look, the truth is, I have no idea whatsoever what it is that you expect of me,’ she said with a sigh. ‘So if you can bring yourself to let me in on your plans, I would very much appreciate it.’
His expression softened into a hint of a smile, which did very strange things to Flora’s insides. ‘Since I’ve only just been dumped with— Since I’ve only just assumed responsibility, I don’t actually have any plans. You’re not the only one who is in uncharted territory.’
‘Thank you. I know that shouldn’t make me feel better, but it does.’
‘As long as you don’t go bleating to your daddy.’
‘I am not a lamb, Corporal,’ Flora snapped, ‘and I am certainly not in the habit of telling tales.’
‘I apologise, that was uncalled for.’
She glared at him. ‘Yes, it was.’
Once again, he surprised her by laughing. ‘You really are a feisty thing, aren’t you, Miss Carmichael.’
And he really was rather sinfully attractive when he let down his guard. ‘Call me Flora. We shall sink or swim together, then,’ she said, holding out her hand.
He did not shake it, but instead clicked his heels together and bowed. ‘If we are to swim together, then you must call me Geraint.’
He held her gaze as he turned her hand over and pressed a kiss to her palm, teasing her, daring her to react. His kiss made her pulse race. Seemingly as shocked as she, he dropped her hand as if he had been jolted by an electric current.
They stared at each other in silence. He was the first to look away. ‘We should start by making the tour, and take things from there,’ he said gruffly.
Had she imagined the spark between them, or was the corporal intent on ignoring it? Flora was so confused that she was happy to go along with him. ‘Yes,’ she said, aware that she was nodding rather too frantically. ‘That sounds like a plan.’
‘In the meantime, my men will unload the trucks and set up temporary camp.’
‘Oh, please, not on the lawn. My mother specifically asked...’
‘What, is she worried that we’ll dig latrines next to her rose beds?’
‘Actually, manure is very good for roses.’
She caught his eye, forcing a smile from him that relieved the tension. ‘Perhaps you could suggest somewhere more suitable, Miss Flora.’
‘At the back near the kitchens might be best. The house will shelter the tents from the wind coming in off the loch, and they will be near a good water supply.’
‘Practical thinking. I’m impressed.’
‘Goodness, a compliment Corporal—Geraint.’
‘A statement of fact.’
‘Did I pronounce it correctly? Your name, I mean. Geraint.’
‘Perfectly,’ he said shortly.
Really, his mood swung like a pendulum. ‘What have I said to offend you this time? I can almost see your hackles rising,’ Flora said, exasperated.
‘Nothing.’
She threw him a sceptical look.
‘I don’t think I’ve heard my Christian name spoken since I joined up, that’s all,’ he finally admitted. ‘I’d almost forgotten how it sounded.’
She was instantly remorseful. ‘But don’t you get leave? I am sorry, I am afraid I know nothing of these things.’
Geraint shrugged. ‘Why should you? No, we don’t get leave. Leastways, nothing long enough for me to go back to see my family.’
‘Your family! So you’re married,’ Flora exclaimed, inexplicably appalled by this.
‘Good God, no! I wasn’t married when the balloon went up and I’d be a fool to get hitched while there’s a war on. Even if there happened to be someone I wanted to marry, which there is not,’ Geraint said. ‘I meant my parents, my brother and sisters.’
‘Yes, of course you did,’ Flora said. ‘I knew that.’ Which she had, truly, for she also knew instinctively he was not the kind of man to flirt with another woman if he was married. Not that he had flirted with her. Had he? She sighed inwardly, wishing that she was not such an innocent. ‘You must miss them,’ she said, trying to pull her thoughts together. ‘Your family, I mean.’
But Geraint merely shrugged, his face shuttered. ‘We didn’t see much of each other this last while, frankly,’ he said, and when she would have questioned him further, turned his attention elsewhere. ‘I must go and see to the men, else they will happily kick a ball about all day. I’ll see you in a couple of hours.’
Which was definitely not something she should be looking forward to, Flora thought, watching him stride off purposefully.
The men were lined up on the driveway now. She could not hear what the corporal was saying to them. He seemed not to be the kind who barked orders, but rather spoke with a natural, quiet authority that made the troops pay attention. Once dismissed, they started to pull back the tarpaulins on the trucks, revealing iron bedsteads, tents, trestle tables and a host of other equipment including what looked horribly like field guns. Flora headed back to the Lodge. It had been an extremely eventful day already, and it was only lunchtime.
Chapter Three (#ulink_5a4ddd1e-5679-5ad9-9bea-2000f1b6f89e)
Three days later, Geraint was in the morning room with Flora, where a phonograph sat incongruously on an antique marble-topped table. Like the rest of the house, the room was a mixture of styles, reflecting the changing tastes of the Carmichaels through the generations. Glen Massan House was too eclectic to be aesthetically pleasing. It was not a showpiece, but a home. Flora Carmichael’s home. Which it was now his duty to pillage.
He must not allow himself to think about it in that manner. She and her ilk neither deserved nor required his sympathy, yet he found it increasingly difficult to think of Flora as belonging to any clique. She seemed slightly out of place, a misfit. A bit like himself, if truth be told. ‘I can’t quite work you out,’ Geraint said, surrendering to the unusual desire to share his thoughts.
Flora looked up from her notebook, her smile quirky. ‘I thought you had me neatly labelled from the minute we met.’
‘That’s what I mean. You should be empty-headed, or your head should be stuffed full of fripperies—dresses and dances and tennis parties. I’m not even an officer. You should be looking down that aristocratic little nose at the likes of me.’
‘The likes of you?’
She eyed him deliberately up and down. If anyone else had appraised him so brazenly, it would have provoked a caustic riposte. Instead, Flora, with her sensuous mouth and her saucy look, made him want to kiss her.
‘I am not in the habit of categorising people, as you are,’ she said. ‘In any event, I very much doubt there is anyone quite like you. Which is why, despite myself, I find your company stimulating.’
Stimulating! She certainly was. ‘Then that makes two of us,’ Geraint said, trying not to smile, ‘though let me tell you, it is entirely against my principles.’
Flora gave a gurgle of laughter. ‘You are the master of the backhanded compliment. I am sorry that you find you cannot dislike me when you have tried so hard to do so.’
‘You sound as if you wish me to try harder,’ he retorted.
‘Perhaps I do. Your barbs, Corporal Cassell, have been a welcome distraction while we dismantle my home.’
Which was the nearest she had come to saying what she felt about the requisition. Her father wasn’t the only one with a stiff upper lip. Guessing that sympathy would be most unwelcome, Geraint gave a mocking bow. ‘I am delighted to have been of service.’
Flora’s smile wobbled. ‘It is silly of me, but I feel as if we are doing something very final. I doubt things will return to what they were, even when this war is over.’
‘I sincerely hope they do not.’
She sighed. ‘No, of course you don’t, and you’re probably right.’
The perfume she wore had a floral scent. Not cloyingly sweet, but something lighter, more delicate and springlike. ‘I don’t understand you,’ Geraint said. ‘You’re not some empty-headed social butterfly. Don’t you feel suffocated, stuck here in this draughty castle with nothing to do but—what, arrange flowers and sew samplers?’
‘Do not forget my playing Lady Bountiful for the poor of the parish,’ Flora snapped. ‘Then there is the endless round of parties and dances, the occasional ceilidh in the village that I must grace with my presence. Added to that, there is tennis in the summer and...’
‘It was not my intention to patronise you,’ Geraint interrupted. ‘You just baffle me.’
‘So you said.’
Her eyes were over-bright. Annoyed, as much for having allowed himself to notice the soft swell of her bosom as she folded her hands defensively across her chest as for having been the cause of the action, Geraint spoke in a gentler tone. ‘It just seems to me that you’re wasting your life, shut away here. Aren’t you bored? Why don’t you leave?’
She stared at him blankly. ‘I cannot just leave. Where would I go? What would I do?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said impatiently. ‘What do you want to do? You must have thought about it.’
‘I have never had to,’ Flora said, looking troubled, ‘which is a shocking thing to admit, but the truth, for it is not as if I spend my days idly, is that there is always something to do here. I suppose it has always been assumed that I would marry well.’
‘You mean replace your father’s patronage with that of another wealthy man so that you can carry on arranging flowers ad nauseam.’
‘That is a very cynical way of looking at matrimony,’ Flora said coldly, ‘and quite beside the point, since I have no intention of making such a match. The problem is, I am not actually qualified to do anything else. Thank you very much for bringing that fact to my attention, incidentally.’
‘You are making a pretty good fist of managing this requisition, despite your claim that you had no idea how to tackle it,’ Geraint pointed out.
‘That is because I have had your expert lead to follow.’
He shook his head firmly. ‘Do not underestimate yourself.’
‘I doubt that is possible.’
‘Flora, I meant it. You are bright, quick-witted, practical and articulate. You’ve a talent for organising, for creating order.’
‘Do you really think so?’ She spoke eagerly.
‘I wouldn’t have said it otherwise,’ Geraint replied, touched by the vulnerability her question revealed. ‘You should know me well enough by now to know I don’t say anything I don’t mean.’
‘My parents are both fairly certain that I will make a hash of things.’
‘Then you shall surprise them by proving them wrong.’
He was rewarded with a smile. ‘Perhaps I shall surprise you, too, at the end of it,’ she said. ‘Despite the melancholy nature of our task, I have to admit that I am enjoying the challenge. Perhaps I should reconsider joining the VADs, like Sheila.’
‘Sheila? You mean the maid? Blonde, pretty girl?’
‘Do you think she’s pretty?’
Geraint laughed. ‘I think that’s the first predictable thing you’ve ever said to me. Yes, she’s very pretty and I’d have to be blind not to have noticed.’
‘We went to school in the village together until I was removed to an academy for young ladies,’ Flora said, making a face. ‘Sheila is counting the days, waiting to be assigned to a hospital. I shall miss her terribly when she goes. I did consider volunteering, but my mother was appalled. She thinks it would be most improper work for me, and my father thinks that I would find it far too taxing, and the demoralising fact is that he is probably right.’ She held up her hands for his inspection. ‘Lily-white and quite unsullied by hard work, as I am sure you have noted.’
Which so exactly mirrored his own, original opinion of her that Geraint felt a stab of guilt. ‘There are plenty of other things you could do, I’m sure,’ he said gruffly.
‘Would that I had your confidence in me. Which sounds really rather pathetic. You are right, I am stuck in a rut and have no purpose whatsoever in my life save to look decorative while waiting for a suitable husband to appear,’ Flora replied brightly. ‘Thank you, as I said earlier, for pointing that out, but if you don’t mind, I have had quite enough picking over my empty life and my character flaws for one day.’ She picked up her notebook and pencil. ‘I think we should get back to work.’
Her smile was fixed, her cheeks flushed, though she countered his scrutiny with a determined tilt of her chin. Geraint was not fooled, but he was not such an idiot as to ignore the signs. No trespassing. He ought to be pleased with himself for making her face up to some unpalatable truths, but he wasn’t. She had taken his criticisms on the chin, too. She would have been within her rights to tell him to mind his own business, which was what he would have said had the roles been reversed. Flora Carmichael might look as if a puff of wind would blow her away, but she had backbone. He had to admire her for that. In fact, the more he got to know her, the more he liked her....
The realisation set him quite off-kilter. Geraint got to his feet and made a point of consulting his wristwatch. A gift from his parents on his twenty-first birthday, it was a plain, functional timepiece, but it was one of his most precious possessions. ‘You carry on without me. I need to check on the lads.’
* * *
The door closed behind him, but Flora remained where she was. Geraint did not, as Robbie would say, pull his punches. It was a dispiriting thought, but she suspected she had been merely marking time with her life without even realising it. Forcing herself to think about it now, the very idea of turning into her mother, which she would, if she continued to allow herself to drift with the tide, made her shudder. Her parents expected so little from her that it was ridiculously easy to please them. And it would, sadly, be ridiculously easy to disappoint them, were she to pursue some sort of independent course.
‘Whatever that may be,’ Flora muttered to herself. Pacing over to the window, she stared morosely out at the loch. The problem was that now Geraint had pointed it out, she could not deny the creeping dissatisfaction she had been feeling, and nor could she ignore it, though to do something about it would be to fly in the face of her parents’ expectations. ‘So I am damned if I do, and damned if I don’t,’ she said wryly. ‘Which brings me no nearer at all to knowing what it is I am going to do.’
You are bright, quick-witted, practical and articulate, Geraint had said. None of those epithets had ever been applied to her before, yet Geraint never said what he didn’t believe. He was blunt to a fault, but he also saw things in her that others did not, and expected much more of her than anyone else did, which both pleased and scared her a little. What if she failed?
Think positively, Flora castigated herself. She would not fail, because that would reflect badly on Geraint, and she wanted Geraint to succeed. Almost more than she wanted to succeed herself. Which was a novel, not to say startling, thought. ‘Sink or swim,’ Flora repeated, remembering the pact they had made.
An image of a naked Geraint swimming beside her in the loch, rivulets of water coursing down his muscled back and buttocks, sprang shockingly vivid into her mind’s eye. ‘Swim it shall most definitely be,’ Flora muttered, pressing the backs of her hands against her flaming cheeks.
Chapter Four (#ulink_38d4e5a3-0183-5fd8-b466-036080a4476b)
A few days later, as October was coming to a close, Flora and Geraint were in the attics, a jumble of rooms at the top of a narrow staircase. Though the main part of the house had electricity, which ran from a generator, there was no light here, save for what crept in through the occasional dusty skylight and what was given off by the two oil lamps they had brought with them. It had been Flora’s idea, since the outhouses and the old stables were already full to overflowing with displaced furnishings, to put the smaller and more valuable artefacts here, but she was beginning to wonder if it had been a mistake. ‘I hadn’t realised there was so much up here already,’ she said, looking around her in dismay.
Geraint was standing just inside the doorway, clutching the low frame, staring past her into the cramped room, his eyes unfocused. ‘Geraint? Are you feeling unwell? You look quite pale.’
Flora set her lamp carefully down and put the back of her hand on his brow. It was clammy with sweat. ‘It’s nothing,’ he said brusquely, before pushing her hand away and ducking his head to enter the attic. ‘I see what you mean. I’ve never seen such a collection of junk.’
His voice sounded brittle to her, but his colour had returned. If he was feeling ill, he did not care to admit to it. Flora edged her way into the confined space, which was strewn with bric-a-brac. Old trunks, dusty boxes, broken furniture and huge empty picture frames comprised the majority of it, but there were also moth-eaten rugs, several stacks of account books, and an assortment of stuffed animals in various states of decline. ‘I doubt I’d recognise that thing if it were alive,’ she said, pointing to a decrepit mound that looked like a large shoe with fangs. ‘What on earth is it?’
Geraint picked it up gingerly. ‘It appears to be a baby crocodile or alligator. Did one of your ancestors have a penchant for taxidermy?’
‘I have absolutely no idea. Why do you ask?’
‘I’m just worried we might stumble across a stuffed laird or two.’
Flora burst into laughter. Geraint, now seemingly quite restored, was smiling at her in a way that made her heart beat erratically. It was an intimate smile, a complicit smile, and at the same time a very sensual smile. His eyes looked more black than brown in the dim light and there was a warmth in them that triggered a corresponding heat in her blood. Tearing her mind back to the job in hand, she looked around despairingly. ‘I shall have to clear some space, though how I am to decide what can be jettisoned...’ She took the crocodile from Geraint and eyed it distastefully. ‘You can go for a start, my lad.’
‘And what about this?’
She whirled around to find him draped in an ancient sheepskin cloak, clutching a dagger. The leather was worn, the fleece was moulting in places, the blade of the dirk was rusted through, and yet he managed to look both fierce and proud, not just a warrior, but a warrior king.
‘What do you think, wench?’ he growled.
She thought, rather fancifully, that she could understand why a woman would let herself be carried off by such a man to be—well, who knows what? ‘You look very—convincing.’ There was a smear of dust across his cheek. His hair was dishevelled. The cloak emphasised the breadth of his shoulders and his chest, just as the army puttees so tightly bound around his legs showed off the muscles of his calves. ‘They’d have worn that thing over a plaid originally,’ Flora said.
‘Shall I take off my tunic for the sake of authenticity?’
They both knew he meant it for a joke, but as she looked at him, the smile died on his face. She touched the fleece, which was hemmed with a complicated design of coloured wools. Her hand brushed against the rough khaki serge of his tunic. She snatched it away. ‘It must be like wearing a hair shirt,’ she mumbled.
His eyes were dark, dangerous. She stood rooted to the spot, unaccountably certain that he was going to kiss her. Then he took a deliberate step back and discarded the cloak. ‘No worse than a plaid would be, I imagine,’ he said.
Did she imagine it, that almost kiss? She did not think so, but she had so little experience, she could not be sure. She had wanted him to kiss her. Had been wanting him to kiss her since that first day when he had pressed his lips to her palm. Had it been her own latent desire that had made her mistake his intentions? Slanting a glance at him, she received an inscrutable look.
‘Is this the only attic?’ Geraint enquired.
‘No, though it is the biggest,’ she replied, which caused him to flinch slightly, before he turned away quickly and picked up the oil lamp. ‘Let’s take a look, then.’
* * *
They began to work their way through the rooms, deciding what could be moved, what could be thrown out and which items Flora would have to consult with her father about. Two hours later, they had completed about half of the task, and Geraint stopped to push open a skylight, taking greedy breaths of fresh, cold air. Alone in this cramped space, he’d undoubtedly have parted company with his breakfast, but Flora’s presence was proving a welcome, and surprisingly effective distraction.
Leaving the skylight slightly ajar, he sat down on an old steamer trunk. ‘Do your family never throw anything away? There’s enough stuff up here to furnish the entire valley back home.’
Flora perched beside him on a moth-eaten stool. ‘You know all about my family, down to the intimate details of how we live, yet I know nothing of yours. You mentioned sisters and brothers, I think.’
‘Three sisters between myself and my brother, Bryn, who’s the baby of the family. Bethan and Angharad are in service, Cerys is training to be a nurse.’
‘And your parents, what do they think of you joining up?’
Geraint shrugged. ‘What every parent thinks, I suppose. My father will be proud I’m doing my bit for my country, though he’d prefer I did it down the mine.’
‘So your father is a miner?’
‘He is, as I was until a few years ago. As Bryn will be in a year, unless I have a say in it.’ Geraint frowned. ‘Bryn is such a bright lad. He could do so much better for himself. He’s at the grammar school on a bursary, just like I was, but he has no ambition to stay on as I did until I was eighteen. Worships my dad, does our Bryn—he wants nothing more than to follow in his footsteps down the mine. All the more so, since I’ve so signally failed to keep up the tradition.’
‘But surely, with a grammar-school education, you had no reason to work in the mine at all.’
Geraint laughed bitterly. ‘I had every reason. I am my father’s son. It’s what the men in my family do. Not becoming a miner would have been viewed as the ultimate act of disloyalty, because any other white-collar job I could have got above ground would have entailed working with them. The bosses, the owners.’
‘Surely you exaggerate.’
‘That is how it would have been seen by my family, our neighbours. A betrayal.’
‘And yet you gave it up all the same,’ Flora said, looking puzzled. ‘Why?’
It was an innocent enough question and a perfectly natural one, but it made Geraint realise how personal a turn the conversation had taken. He never talked about his family, had a policy, forged of bitter experience, of not explaining himself. ‘I had my reasons. So I left.’
I left. Such a simple phrase to describe one of the most difficult decisions of his life. So many nights spent lying wide awake in bed. The long days when he was due on late shift, walking in the nearby hills, trying to talk himself into staying on for just another year, month, week. Geraint leaned back against the attic wall, turning his face up to the skylight, to the wide, grey-blue sky above, which was the colour of Flora’s eyes. ‘I left,’ he repeated sadly. ‘To find something better, is the reason I gave my dad, and he took offence, thinking I was demeaning his life’s work’
‘There is nothing wrong with trying to better yourself,’ Flora said indignantly.
‘Tell that to the toffs at the grammar school.’
The words did not come over as light-heartedly as he’d intended. Flora had her arms clasped around her knees. His own legs were sprawled in front of him, so that they were almost touching hers. ‘It must have been very difficult for you there,’ she said. Her hand touched his knee tentatively.
‘I coped. I fought my corner. Literally. It was a long time ago. I really don’t know why I’m telling you all this.’
‘I am glad that you have.’ Flora twisted the little pearl ring she wore on her pinkie finger round and round. It was a habit she had, he’d noticed, when she was struggling to voice her thoughts. ‘We have more in common than you might think. You’ve made me face the fact that I don’t want what my parents have planned for me, either. I was— I suppose I was simply avoiding facing the issue before. Now you’ve forced me to look, I can’t pretend I haven’t seen. I have no choice but to hurt them.’
She was saying that she understood, and Geraint could tell she did. He covered her hand with his. ‘My dad thought I was ashamed of him, of our family, our village,’ he admitted painfully. ‘I had no choice but to leave, when my presence there was a daily reminder of my betrayal.’
Flora reached up, touched his cheek fleetingly, but to his relief she sensed that her pity would not be welcome. ‘So you joined the army,’ she said. ‘I confess, I’ve wondered why a man so radical as you, who has such contempt for hierarchy and tradition, would enlist in an institution that sets such store by it.’
‘I didn’t, not straight away. I went to London and found a job in the office of a factory that manufactured automobiles. A job with prospects,’ Geraint said mockingly, remembering the interview. ‘Maybe it would have been, if I’d stuck it out. I have a head for figures, and a talent for organising, just like you, but I also have a nose for injustice, thanks to my dad. Those poor lads on the factory floor worked bloody hard—beg pardon—for a pittance in conditions almost as dangerous as those down the pit. I was working for the Labour Party in my spare time. Eventually my employers found out, and that put paid to my prospects. By then it was obvious war was going to be declared, so I enlisted.’
‘I still don’t understand why,’ Flora said.
‘I joined the Royal Welsh Fusiliers,’ Geraint replied.
‘To fight alongside your own people, was that it?’
‘It was. Brothers in arms and all that. But the moment they got wind of my accounting experience, they transferred me to the Army Service Corps and I washed up here, destined once again to play the pantomime villain by desecrating Glen Massan House,’ Geraint said with a twisted smile.
Flora frowned. ‘Do you really believe we are on opposing sides?’
‘I’d hardly be confiding in you if I did.’
‘So we are fighting on the same side?’
‘I wouldn’t go that far, Miss Daughter-of-the-Laird-Carmichael,’ Geraint said, grinning and getting to his feet. He held his hand out to help her up. Her fingers were slender, perfectly manicured, her palm smooth against his rough calloused hand.
‘If we are not enemies but we are not on the same side, then where on earth are we?’
‘I’ll tell you where we are, we’re in no man’s land.’
‘No man’s land,’ Flora repeated. ‘Our own private land.’
‘For the time being.’
* * *
No man’s land. A place where only one man existed, Flora thought. A man whose eyes glittered darkly down at her, mesmerising beneath the thick curtain of his lashes. A man who, by his own admission, confided in no one, yet had confided in her. A dangerous man. A lonely man. A challenging man. And a very enticing one. ‘I think I like no man’s land,’ she said.
‘So do I,’ Geraint said softly, closing the space between them. He slid his arm around her waist. His fingers were delicate on her jaw, her cheek, making her catch her breath in anticipation, making her tremble, scattering her inhibitions to the four winds.
Her body was pliant, melding itself to his hardness as she reached up to put her arms around his neck. As his lips touched hers, her eyelids closed. His tongue ran along the soft skin on the inside of her lower lip, and she shivered at the shocking intimacy of it. It was like the first sip of a fine French cognac. Warmth flooded her.
Her heart pounded. His kiss deepened, his tongue tangling with hers, sending sizzles of heat coursing through her veins. His hand cupped her breast. They staggered back, stumbling over the steamer chest, until her back was pressed against the attic wall, directly under the skylight. He slid his hands down, cupping her bottom, lifting her. The rough stone grated on her back as she arched against him, encountering the hard length of his erection through his uniform. He moaned, a low growl that made her spine tingle. And then he dragged his mouth from hers.
For a long moment they stared at each other, eyes glazed with desire, breathing shallow and fast. Then slowly, reluctantly, he released her. As her feet touched the dusty wooden boards of the attic, Flora caught at his sleeve to steady herself. ‘I think the air in no man’s land has rather gone to my head,’ she said.
Geraint laughed softly. ‘I could tell you what it’s done to me, but I suspect you already know.’ His smile faded as his eyes met hers. ‘I didn’t mean to get so carried away.’
‘I ought not to have let you,’ Flora said, realising this very belatedly. Which made her realise that the thought had not occurred to her, any more than it had occurred to her to be embarrassed. On the contrary, what she felt was a kind of elation. This strange, interesting, dangerous man wanted her, and she wanted him. ‘No man’s land,’ she said softly, looking at him with a deliberately teasing smile, ‘is a dangerous but exciting place to be.’
Chapter Five (#ulink_abe7ab3b-3e29-5fc0-8fb0-1f5678caf793)
‘You actually kissed him! Oh, my, who would have thought it?’
Sheila and Flora were in what Lady Carmichael termed the garden room, which was in reality an old scullery at the back of the house used mainly for flower arranging. At this time of year it lay empty and quite unoccupied. Outside, a neat row of army tents had been erected amongst which soldiers bustled around, some in full uniform, some minus jackets, in singlets and braces. Unfamiliar accents echoed over the once-peaceful loch. Sporadic bursts of raucous laughter punctuated the Highland air. ‘I don’t know why you look so astonished,’ Flora said. ‘I’ve been kissed before.’
‘Not like that, I’ll bet,’ Sheila replied, grinning. ‘Your Welsh firebrand looks like a man who would know how to kiss. I would kiss him myself if he gave me the chance, but he’s not shown the least bit of interest. To be honest, I find him a bit intimidating. Not exactly stand-offish, but a bit of a loner. I suppose I’m—well, just a wee bit envious.’
‘Are you shocked?’
‘Your ma would be. The man is not even an officer,’ Sheila said in an excellent imitation of her employer.
‘I’m not my mother,’ Flora said.
Sheila raised her brow. ‘Do I hear the sound of a worm turning?’
Outside, one of the soldiers, sitting on a box cleaning his boots, was singing, ‘Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer true.’ Flora turned away from the window. ‘I kissed him because I wanted to. I’ve been wanting to from almost the first moment I set eyes on him,’ she admitted sheepishly. ‘But you’re right, it’s not just that. He’s made me realise that I’ve taken too much for granted.’
‘You just make sure that Corporal Cassell doesn’t take too much for granted,’ Sheila said. ‘You’re from different sides of the fence, you and the corporal. Kiss him, why not, there’s no harm in it, but what I’m trying to say is, be careful, Flora.’
‘You’re making too much of one kiss.’
‘Good. And good for you!’ Sheila rubbed her eyes. ‘I was up till all hours last night sewing my new uniform. I heard in the village that Mrs Oliphant got a telegram yesterday. Her Ronnie is missing.’
‘Oh, no! Oh, the poor woman.’
‘I really hope I’ll get my posting to one of the hospitals soon. News like that, it makes you want to be doing something.’
‘I’ve been thinking again about volunteering myself.’
She expected to receive an approving smile, but Sheila frowned. ‘I’m not so sure. It’s very physical work, Flora, and you’ve no experience.’
‘Nor likely to get any if no one will let me try.’
‘I’m just pointing out the truth. There’s no need to take the huff.’
‘Actually, there is every reason,’ Flora exclaimed. ‘It’s bad enough to know that my parents think I’m useless, but you are supposed to be my friend. Just because I’ve never lit a fire or mopped a floor or ironed a shirt doesn’t mean I can’t learn. You have never washed a wound or applied a splint or given an injection of morphine, but you are pretty certain that you’ll be able to. You haven’t ever seen anything worse than a nosebleed, yet you have every confidence you won’t faint at the sight of blood, and just as much confidence that I will.’
‘Flora! What on earth is the matter with you?’
‘I don’t need to be pampered and cossetted. I’m not a lap dog.’
‘Right now, you’re more like an angry terrier.’
She was forced to laugh. ‘I’m not angry, I’m just disappointed. I thought you would be on my side. I need to be doing something.’
‘You’re managing the requisition.’
‘That will be complete in few weeks.’
‘And then your corporal will probably be sent off to the front, I suppose.’
‘He’s in the service corps.’
‘For now. Didn’t you just tell me that he signed up with the Welsh Fusiliers?’
‘I hadn’t thought of that.’ Flora shuddered. ‘I’m terrified that Alex will lie about his age to enlist. His letters from school are full of talk about the boys from the year above him who have joined up already. And Robbie—it’s probably only a matter of time before he leaves his job and joins up. I don’t want to think of Geraint on the front line, even if it is what he wants.’
‘No point in worrying about it until it happens.’ Sheila smoothed down her apron. ‘I must get on, I’ve a hundred things to do. Look, forget what I said. If you think you’re capable of volunteering, then you volunteer. Better to try and fail than not to try at all, as my mum would say.’
Which was hardly likely to fill her with confidence, Flora thought as the door closed behind her friend. Examining her hands, their white, unblemished state the mark, her mother was forever telling her, of a lady, she felt quite dejected. Perhaps Sheila was right.
Or perhaps not. What was it Geraint had said? You’ve a talent for organising, a talent for creating order. Picking up her notebook, Flora looked at the neat list of tasks, the ticks that were steadily accumulating, and felt a glow of satisfaction. She was making a good job of this. There must be some way of applying her newfound skills elsewhere.
Her eye fell on the last task. Sign off paperwork and complete handover. If they kept to the tight schedule Geraint had set up, that would be in just a few weeks time. Glen Massan House would be a fully operational military training school, and their time in no man’s land would come to an end. ‘Carpe diem,’ Flora muttered to herself. ‘Seize the day. That’s what we’ll all have to do while this dreadful war rages on. And I intend to do just that.’
* * *
The list of tasks was nearing completion by the middle of November, the requisition proceeding exactly to schedule. ‘There, now, what did I tell you, is this not the most spectacular view?’ Flora pointed down at Glen Massan House, several hundred feet below.
They were at the peak of Ben Massan, a short but steep climb. Her eyes were sparkling, her cheeks flushed, her hair blowing in wild, fiery tendrils around her face. She wore an old mackintosh coat that was far too large for her, the sleeves turned up to form a cuff, the hem flapping around her ankles. On her feet were sturdy brown brogues, much worn and eminently practical.
‘Spectacular, but not as pretty as you,’ Geraint said, pulling her into his arms and kissing her hard.
Laughing, she put her arms around his neck and pulled him closer. Her lips were cold, but her tongue was warm. She kissed him back as fiercely as he kissed her. He felt the familiar rush of blood to his groin and reluctantly let her go.
‘Why do you do that?’ Flora was staring up at him, her expression hurt. ‘Stop kissing me, I mean. Don’t you like kissing me?’
It hadn’t occurred to him that she wouldn’t understand. ‘Don’t look at me like that,’ Geraint said, putting his arm around her, pulling her onto the soft, peaty ground in the lea of the cairn that marked the summit. ‘It’s because I like it too much.’ He cupped her face, smoothing her hair away from her cheeks. ‘Flora, it’s all very well to joke about being in no man’s land, to talk about seizing the day, but we have to be careful. We have to see this for what it is, a bit of fun.’
‘Fun.’ She said it as if she were turning the word over, inspecting it from every angle. ‘What you really mean is that there’s no future in it. I already know that, Geraint. There is no need to warn me off.’
But there seemed to be a need to remind himself of that salient fact. ‘When the war is over, I intend to go into politics,’ he said. ‘Things need to change for the better for ordinary working people.’
She smiled wryly. ‘You mean we shall end up on opposite sides again.’
‘Something like that.’
‘And because of that you don’t want to take advantage of the situation,’ she said with a crooked smile. ‘I know,’ she said, putting her fingers over his mouth to prevent him replying, ‘that the idea of being called a gentleman appals you, but nevertheless, your sense of honour would put a lot of so-called gentlemen to shame. And I suppose I should be embarrassed now, for I have admitted to a very unladylike wish that you would not behave so very honourably.’
‘Which I am delighted to hear,’ Geraint said with a gruff laugh, ‘because behaving honourably is just about killing me.’ He pulled her to him, running his thumb over the soft, sensual skin of her lower lip. ‘The things I imagine us doing together would make you blush to the roots of your hair.’
She caught his hand, closing her mouth around his thumb, pulling it into the moist heat of her mouth before releasing him. ‘Tell me,’ she said.
He shook his head. ‘Certainly not. That would be most ungentlemanly.’
‘I already told you that I feel most unladylike. Please tell me, Geraint. I know we cannot, but I would like to know what it would be like if we could.’
She was smiling, one of those smiles that did strange things to his guts, and he thought he had never found any woman more irresistible. In the throes of passion, he had been able to ask—Do you like this? Do you want this? Harder? Slower? Faster?—but he had never before articulated his own desires. I want to know what it would be like if we could. He pulled Flora closer to him out of the wind, resting his chin on the silky mass of her hair. ‘The reality could never match my imaginings,’ he said, willing himself to believe it.
‘I would still like to know.’
She had slipped her arms under his greatcoat, wrapping them around his waist. Geraint closed his eyes, drinking in the scent of her perfume, her soap, the fresh Highland air and the intangible something else that made the heady mixture uniquely Flora. ‘When we kiss,’ he whispered, ‘I feel like I am diving into a deep, dark pool. And the more we kiss the deeper I want to dive.’ His fingers found the warm, delicate skin at the nape of her neck. ‘I want to touch you. All of you. I want to taste you, every part of you.’
Flora shuddered. He pulled her closer so that she lay half over him, her leg between his. ‘I want to kiss your mouth,’ he said, unable to stop himself doing just that. ‘I want to kiss your breasts.’ He undid her coat, cupping her through the soft wool of her dress. She rolled onto her back. He covered her with his body. ‘I want to kiss your breasts until you can’t take any more,’ he said, his voice ragged, his thumbs stroking her nipples.
Flora arched under him, her eyes glazing over. ‘What else, Geraint? What else would you do?’
He was already hard. ‘I would kiss your belly.’ He flattened his palm, sliding it over her. ‘I would kiss the inside of your thighs. Soft, your skin would be. So soft and so warm. When I kiss you there, I can feel you want me, feel it here,’ he said, pressing down on the taut muscles of her stomach, then farther down. ‘I want you every bit as much, but I don’t want it to be over too soon, so I touch you. Here.’ Flat palm gliding over her sex. Flora’s hands on him, clutching at his tunic. Her eyes wide, dark, her cheeks bright with colour. Her breath shallow, fast. ‘I have never wanted anyone as I want you,’ he whispered.
‘Never. Not ever,’ she answered.
‘I want to taste you. Here. This. I want to taste all of you.’ The words, shocking, stark, raw with need, formed without thinking. He touched her, just covered her, through her dress, and felt her arch up under him just as he had dreamed. ‘I taste you,’ Geraint said, his eyes fixed on hers, stroking now, just stroking, ‘and I kiss you. Here. Like this.’
Her mouth under his. Her lips soft, velvet, clinging. Tongues tangling. His erection throbbed. She bucked under him, moaning softly as he kissed her, as he touched her until she shuddered. She was going to come. He saw it in the faraway look, felt it in the way her body reacted. And if he did not stop...
He rolled abruptly away, closing his eyes tight, thinking of cold snow, of army drill, and when that did not work, of the cramped recesses of the mine workings. Sweat of a different sort broke out on his brow, and the danger passed.
Flora sat up, pulling her coat around her, feeling as if she had been caught, yanked back at the last moment from falling. No, it was more like a dream where she fell and fell, and woke up just before she hit the ground. Beside her, Geraint had his eyes screwed shut. She stared down into the glen at her home. Her former home.
Geraint got to his feet, holding his hand out to help her up. ‘Well, I think that rather proved the point,’ he said shakily.
‘That reality is no match for your imaginings?’ she asked, still keeping her eyes on the view.
‘I think we had better stop this before we get in too deep.’
She turned to face him. His mouth was set, resolute. Before we get in too deep. It would pain him to know it was already too late. It would be painful for her, much more painful, if she let herself fall any deeper. ‘You’re right,’ she said, summoning a bright smile and rummaging in her capacious coat pocket for her notebook. ‘We should concentrate on what we came up here for before the light fades. Tell me, then, which parts of the grounds do you think best suited for target practice.’
* * *
‘So, given the two new sections that have arrived, and with the main body of men due on the seventh of December, which is next week, we felt it prudent to establish a regular patrol in the village.’
Flora glanced up from her notes at her parents, who were seated opposite her at the dining table in the Lodge. She would have held the meeting in the parlour over tea. She would not have called it a meeting, but a chat. It was Geraint who insisted she formalise matters. ‘Else they will not take you seriously,’ he had told her. ‘You need to stamp your authority on this, make them realise that the decisions are already made, and not up for discussion.’
‘Wouldn’t it be better if you did it?’ she’d asked him, but he shook his head.
‘I’m not the one with something to prove.’
And he had been quite right, on all fronts. ‘I see no need to patrol the village,’ her father said. ‘Simply keep it out of bounds to the men, and there ends the problem.’
He spoke in his don’t-be-a-silly-girl voice. Flora counted to three and made sure to reply in her well-rehearsed voice of reason. ‘First, making the village out of bounds will only encourage the men to want to go there. It is human nature to wish to do what one is told one cannot.’ A lesson she had been learning on a daily basis, these past couple of weeks, since agreeing her pact with Geraint on top of Ben Massan. ‘Second, drawing demarcation lines between the village and the House will create unnecessary tension. We are all in this together, Father. Third, it is inevitable that without some sort of patrol as a safeguard, there will be trouble between the village lads and the Tommies. And that leads me to my next point. The Christmas concert and children’s party. We feel this will provide an ideal opportunity for the men to help maintain good relations with the village, so Corporal Cassell and I have decided...’
‘You and Corporal Cassell seem to have decided a great deal,’ Lady Carmichael interrupted. ‘I thought Colonel Aitchison was in charge.’
‘The colonel has naturally approved the details of the plan,’ Flora said, which was essentially true. The colonel having been given a brief summary by Geraint and listened to Flora’s assurances that the laird was in full agreement, had nodded, signed the latest batch of requisition orders and returned to his fishing.
‘You seem to have spent an inordinate amount of time with this corporal,’ Lady Carmichael said pointedly.
‘It has been necessary in order to carry out my duties.’ Which was true.
‘Duties you have discharged very thoroughly,’ the laird said. ‘I must say, Flora, you have surprised me.’
She had surprised herself, but she remembered just in time to suppress her gratified smile as her father got to his feet. Flora cleared her throat. ‘I am not quite finished yet, if you don’t mind.’ The laird sighed, but sat back down again. ‘The main convoy arrives next week, as I’ve said,’ Flora continued. ‘There will be a company of over two hundred men complete with a major, four lieutenants and a number of ancillary staff including officer trainers, cooks, medics and drivers.’ She paused, reminding herself not to sound apologetic. ‘The kitchen garden will form a shooting range. The high walls make it an ideal location. Artillery practice will be carried out on the grouse moor. And the croquet lawn—the croquet lawn will form the main area for parking and storage of large equipment.’
‘The croquet lawn?’ Lady Carmichael said icily.
Beneath the table, Flora clasped her hands together tightly. Despite not being the least bit interested in croquet herself, and the fact that the hoops had long been removed for the winter, Flora had been anguished, too, when Geraint raised the issue. Losing the beautifully manicured lawn set aside for the genteel pursuit seemed almost an act of vandalism. ‘Since the forecourt will be used for drilling the troops, this is the most convenient area.’
It was a full thirty seconds, which felt like thirty minutes, before her father broke the silence. ‘What about the cellars? All that valuable wine your brother Robbie has stored there?’
‘Corporal Cassell was equally concerned, so he had all the wine moved to the cellars here at the Lodge. There was just about enough space.’
Flora frowned, remembering how Geraint had been that day. The cellars at Glen Massan House were deep, a warren of narrow passageways from which various rooms led. ‘Like going down the mine,’ she had joked at the time, standing over the hatch, watching Geraint slowly descend alone, for she had no intention of encountering the rats she was certain lived down there. He had emerged no more than fifteen minutes later, sweating profusely, his pallor ghostlike. She thought he was going to faint, though he brushed her offer of water away, just as he also brushed away her concern. ‘Were there rats down there?’ she’d asked fearfully, foolishly staring at the wooden staircase as if they might have followed Geraint up. ‘I’ll get Hopkins to deal with this,’ he’d finally said, ignoring her question, pushing past her hurriedly and out of the basement.
There must have been rats after all, she had decided. And he simply didn’t want to admit his dislike of them. Although you’d think he’d be accustomed to rats, working down a mine. Presuming mines had rats.
‘Are we quite finished?’ the laird said, looking pointedly at his watch.
Flora dragged her mind away from Geraint and hastily consulted her list. ‘Unless you can think of anything we have omitted?’
He shook his head. ‘You have been most thorough. Forgive me, but I must— I need some air.’ The laird patted his wife’s shoulder as he got to his feet. ‘Flora has only done what was required of her. What is required of us is to accept these very painful decisions with good grace. Excuse me.’
The door closed behind him. ‘This bloody war,’ Lady Carmichael exclaimed. ‘I think the world going to hell in a handcart.’
Flora dropped her pencil, staring open-mouthed at her mother, who never swore.
‘I do not, as you know, have any time for those women who claim we females should be enfranchised,’ Lady Carmichael continued, ‘but I’m beginning to wonder, if we did have the vote, whether we’d have avoided this dreadful situation in the first place. I had a letter from your brother Alex this morning. He wants to leave school at the end of this term. Your father had a separate communication from him, asking permission to enlist.’
‘Oh, no!’
‘He will refuse, of course, but—I can’t bury my head in the sand for much longer. It is inevitable that my sons will join this war, and I do not want...’ Lady Carmichael dabbed frantically at her eyes.
Flora got up and knelt at her mother’s chair. ‘There’s nothing to apologise for—what you’re feeling is perfectly natural. We can be as patriotic as the next woman and still wish that our loved ones did not have to do what other people’s loved ones are doing.’
Her ladyship sniffed. ‘I am sure there is something quite flawed with the grammar of that sentence, but I must endorse the sentiment. Now the handover of Glen Massan House is nearing completion, I can admit that I have never been entirely comfortable with you having to be so much in the company of that corporal. A most intimidating young man, and insolent with it. It’s not so much in his words, but he has a way of looking at one. You will be able to spend more time with me again. I thought we could take a trip to Edinburgh next week, to do some Christmas shopping.’
Flora sighed. ‘Mother, you know that I am considering joining the VADs.’
‘You cannot, Flora. I need you here.’
‘Nonsense. These past few weeks while I have been working with Geraint, you have managed perfectly well without me.’
‘Geraint? You mean Corporal Cassell, I take it? You do realise, Flora, that he is not our sort. I sincerely hope that you have not allowed the man to take liberties.’
‘Geraint is not the sort of man to take unwelcome liberties,’ Flora said, which was true. Another thing Geraint had taught her—always tell the truth when confronted, even if you tailor it to suit your needs. And in fact, since that kiss on the top of Ben Massan they had both been at pains—extreme pains—to avoid anything but the most casual of contact.
‘Well, I am pleased to hear it,’ Lady Carmichael said. ‘I expect he will be posted somewhere else soon, in any event, since his task is nearly complete.’
‘I suppose so,’ Flora replied. She did not want to think about that. ‘Mother, what I’m trying to tell you is that I shall be looking for something else to do.’
‘Such as what, precisely? And please, Flora, do not persist with this notion that you can become a volunteer nurse. You are quite simply not cut out for it.’
‘I can learn. I do have some skills. I am an excellent organiser, and I am a good negotiator, too. It was I who agreed the terms of the regular local deliveries, and many of those coming from Glasgow. I did those on the telephone.’
‘Well! So it has come to that, my daughter discussing terms with tradesmen.’
Flora burst out laughing. ‘For heaven’s sake, Mother...’
‘It is not funny.’ Lady Carmichael pushed her chair back violently. ‘It is very far from funny. This war will not go on forever, Flora Carmichael. When it ends, if you are not careful, you will discover that you have become quite unsuited for real life. Think about that before you ruin your hands with carbolic soap and ruin your chances of making any sort of match by compromising your reputation nursing common soldiers.’
‘So much for my determination to have the last word,’ Flora said as the door swung shut behind her mother. Picking up her notebook and pencil, she got to her feet, staring out of the window at the darkening sky, all her pleasure in having completed her meeting exactly to plan quite spoiled by her mother’s reaction.
But beneath her mother’s bluster there was genuine concern. Leaving home, flying in the face of her parents’ wishes, would change things irrevocably between them. What was more, if the war continued as it seemed inevitable it would, into 1915 or even 1916, there was a good chance they would lose all of their children to it, one way or another.
Chapter Six (#ulink_5a043e52-a361-59d8-81ce-1bd39d0c5ad5)
Several days later, in the drawing room, Flora’s shoes echoed on the bare boards. It looked enormous without its furnishings, the last of which had been shrouded in old sheets and in placed in the stables. Dust motes danced in the air as a faint streak of winter sun penetrated the gloom. ‘Is it selfish of me,’ Flora asked Geraint, ‘to want to leave here just when my parents may need me the most?’
‘What about your needs?’
‘I need to leave,’ she replied without hesitation, ‘though it makes me feel horribly guilty just saying it.’
‘I know how that feels.’
‘Of course you do.’ She touched his arm sympathetically. ‘Do you regret it, Geraint?’
His hand covered hers briefly before he snatched it away. ‘It’s tough, walking away from the life you know, the people you love. I—I miss them.’
‘I find it appalling that you have not had sufficient leave to go to Wales since joining the army.’
Geraint flushed. ‘I haven’t been home in three years.’
‘Three years! But I thought— You said— I assumed...’
‘It’s not that we’re estranged. I write every week.’
Geraint was staring down at his boots, the toes of which were polished to a mirror-like smoothness, which, he had told her, severely compromised their waterproofing. ‘But you have not seen them since you enlisted,’ Flora said.
‘I told you, when I left the pit, they thought I was being disloyal.’
‘Don’t you think that perhaps the problem lies more with you, and not them? Geraint, they will surely be more hurt by your staying away than the fact that you left in the first place.’
When he finally looked up, his eyes were bleak. ‘You don’t understand,’ he said.
I don’t want to discuss it, his tone made very clear. Make me understand, explain it to me, Flora wanted to say, but the pain in his eyes stopped her. ‘The news from the front is as gloomy as the weather,’ she said instead. ‘The Battle of Ypres continues on into its fourth week, although the press claim that we have repulsed the last German attack.’
‘I saw the latest figures. Fifty thousand British casualties so far and the French have lost over eighty. Small consolation that Jerry has lost the same amount combined.’
‘And every one of them someone’s husband or brother or son,’ Flora said sadly. ‘In the village, the talk is all of the boys who enlisted alongside Ghillie McNair’s son, Peter. Ten of them in total, and no doubt hundreds more from the rest of the county, all now training with the Argyll and Southern Highlanders.’ She smiled weakly. ‘One piece of good news, if you can call it that. Mrs Oliphant’s son has rather miraculously turned up alive at a hospital in France, though he has lost a leg and the sight in one eye.’
Geraint grimaced. ‘It could have been much worse.’
‘My mother said that it would have been better if Ronnie had remained missing.’ Flora flushed with embarrassment at the memory. ‘She said that now he will forever be a burden to his family.’
‘Maybe she’s right, for once,’ Geraint said roughly.
‘You don’t mean that.’
‘I do, Flora, I mean it sincerely. Maybe not if it was just a leg, or just one eye, but if it was worse—and there’s an awful lot worse, from what I’ve heard—if it was me, I wouldn’t want to be packed off home to be looked after like a baby for the rest of my life. And if you’re honest, really honest, if it was your son or your husband, you wouldn’t want it, either.’
‘Don’t say that. Don’t talk like that.’
She covered her ears, knowing it was a childish gesture but unable to stop herself. Geraint pulled her hands down. ‘Imagine what it really means, to devote your entire life to a man who can’t lift his own fork, or who can’t eat anything but soup because he’s lost most of his face,’ he said brutally. ‘Think about how it would be, tied to a man who might not ever be a man in any real sense ever again.’
She shook herself free angrily. ‘Stop it! Why are you saying these things to me? Do you really think so little of me, that I would actually prefer one of my brothers to die?’
‘I wasn’t talking about your brothers. I meant me. I could not stand it. I would rather die.’
The blood drained from her face. ‘Have you had orders to go to the front? Geraint, please, is this your way of telling me that you are going to France?’
‘No.’ He swore, catching her as she swayed, holding her tight against his chest. ‘Flora, I’m not going anywhere just yet. They want me to stay on until this place is established. I’ll be around at least until the new year. Flora, do you hear me?’
‘I’m fine.’ She was shaking, but she pushed herself free and went to stand at the window. Across the loch, the clouds were gathering, turning the water on the far shore iron-grey in stark contrast to the deep blue, white-crested waves lapping the shore nearest to the house. It was one of the things she loved about Glen Massan, the sheer drama of the constantly changing weather, but as the sun disappeared behind the scudding, rain-sodden clouds and the drawing room darkened, she could not help but think it was an ill omen. Winter was approaching here in the Highlands, and it would descend, too, on the trenches of the Western Front. It signalled the end of the campaign season, which meant months waiting for the conflict to resume in the spring, though it also meant that the men at the front would be relatively safe in the interim. Cold, but safe. The war would not be over by Christmas. Even the most jingoistic of supporters acknowledged that much.
‘I don’t think you’re selfish.’ Geraint stood at her shoulder. ‘To want to leave here, I mean. I think your parents are the selfish ones, wanting to keep you here.’
She turned around to face him. ‘You don’t think I’m being disloyal?’
‘No. And before you say it, I know that’s contradictory of me.’
‘Can’t you find a way to make your peace with your parents?’
Geraint shook his head sadly. ‘It’s complicated.’ He looked at his wristwatch. ‘They’ll be setting up this room this afternoon. The last one. Why don’t we get out of here, get some of your fresh Highland air?’
‘Won’t they need you here?’
‘I’ve put one of the new lance corporals in temporary charge. When the company arrive tomorrow, we move into full service mode. It might be our last chance to get out together for a while, though it looks as if it’s about to pour.’
Flora smiled, looking out of the window where the rain clouds were already passing overhead. ‘Four seasons in one day, that’s what we get here. I think we’ve missed the worst of it. Let’s take our chances.’
* * *
They left by the front door, but instead of taking the path down to the loch with which Geraint was familiar, Flora led the way through a gap in the huge rhododendron bushes that grew on one side of the driveway, and onto a narrow track. She had pulled on her old mackintosh coat, which sat incongruously over her emerald-green dress. As usual, she seemed to glide rather than walk, which had the odd effect of making it look as if the coat itself was floating along the narrow, rutted path as he walked behind her.
Geraint had tried very hard since that day on Ben Massan not to give in to the temptation of kissing her again. For long periods of time, when they were involved in the detail of packing up the house and writing out the various lists and inventories, he’d succeeded, after a fashion. Then Flora would laugh at something he said, or stop in the middle of wrapping some object to tell him its history or, more often, some story associated with her own childhood. She would go misty-eyed on those occasions, and her smile would soften, especially when she spoke of her brothers, both of whom she adored unreservedly and in equal measure, just as he loved his own siblings. Listening to her speak of their games of make-believe, their childish squabbles, the endless aligning and re-aligning of loyalty that went on as they grew up, made him think of his own childhood. It disturbed him, this affinity, more even than the depth of his desire for her. He had warned her they must not get in too deep. He would do well to heed his own warning.
Flora stumbled on a tree root and righted herself, looking over her shoulder at him, her face flushed with the fresh air and the cold. ‘You haven’t asked where I’m taking you.’
Because he didn’t much care, so long as he was with her. Geraint quickly cornered this thought and bundled it away. ‘Go on, then,’ he said. ‘Where are we going?’
‘It’s a surprise.’
He laughed. ‘Then I won’t ask.’
She stopped and turned towards him. The wind had whipped her hair, loosening long tendrils from the confines of her elaborate bun to cluster around her face. She seemed, now they were away from the house, to have cast off her oppression. ‘Don’t you want to guess?’
‘I prefer to be surprised. You smell of flowers.’ He hadn’t meant to say it, but for once spoke without thinking. ‘Flora,’ he said. ‘You were well named.’
‘Geraint was a knight at King Arthur’s court. I wish you had a white charger to carry me away from here, just for a while.’
He brushed her hair from her face. ‘I’d do it gladly, if I could.’
She caught his hand and to his surprise pressed a kiss on his scarred knuckles. ‘Does it all feel unreal to you? I read the reports in the papers of the fighting, and I think, this can’t be happening. It is almost Christmas. Alex will be home then, but our soldiers will not. Christmas in the trenches. I cannot imagine...’
‘Then don’t.’
‘But I have to, I have to try to make it real. You were right to try to open my eyes about the—the horror of it. I’m frightened about the future.’
He caught her to him, wrapping his arms tightly around her, resting his chin on the damp silkiness of her hair. ‘You’re right to be,’ he said, wishing he could say otherwise but knowing her well enough to understand that her need for reassurance was second to her need for the truth. Her hands rested on his chest, caught in the warmth of their bodies pressed together. ‘Let’s not talk about it,’ he said. ‘Just for this afternoon, let’s pretend it’s not there. That there’s only us.’
‘A brief return to no man’s land,’ Flora said.
‘If you like, yes.’
* * *
When his lips touched hers, it was all she wanted. Pressing herself against him, opening her mouth to his, she wrapped her arms around his waist and kissed him back fervently. He pulled her with him under the shelter of a tree. Raindrops fell from the bare branches onto her hair, her face, stinging cold on her skin, mingling with the heat of his kiss.
It was not like before. There was an urgency in both of them, in the way their lips clung, their tongues touched, their hands clutched and stroked, hindered by the damp, by the layers of their clothes. Heat and desire flooded her, making her reckless, beyond thought. An urgent need possessed her to prove that she was alive, that he was alive, that here was something that had nothing to do with war and destruction and the real world. Something ephemeral yet utterly earthy. The primal urge to connect, unite, join with another.
His hands were inside her mackintosh, sliding up her back, cupping her bottom, stroking her sides, her waist. Her breasts were pressed against his tunic. She stroked his cheeks, ran her fingers through his hair, flattened her palms on his chest. His kisses deepened. She slid her hands down to rest on his flanks and he moaned, pulling her closer. He was hard. It excited her, knowing that she was doing this to him, that this man, so different from any other she had known, so determinedly difficult, at times so deliberately obtuse, the fascinating, intriguing, lethally attractive, determinedly solitary, dangerous Geraint Cassell desired her. Wanted her. Knowing all this made her want him even more. She had never wanted any man like this. Never, in such a basic, uncomplicated way, wanted to use her body to show what she felt.
When he tore his mouth away from her, she had to bite back a moan of protest. ‘I’m not going to apologise this time,’ he said. His hands were still on her waist. His cheeks were flushed, his eyes dark and heavy lidded. ‘I’ve not been able to stop thinking about it since the last time I kissed you. It is a very bad idea. You know it and I know it, but right now, I don’t give a damn.’ He looked up at the sky, now guilelessly blue. ‘Come on, you’d better show me this surprise of yours while the rain holds off.’
* * *
They walked to the end of the woods, emerging suddenly at the edge of the loch where the path skirted round the rocky shore to a small inlet. The ruined church stood on a raised promontory surrounded by a low perimeter wall. ‘It dates from the fourteenth century,’ Flora said, ‘though there was a monastery here from about the sixth. They say the Vikings razed that.’
They entered the burial grounds through a creaking gate. The gravestones, some flat, some lurching at haphazard angles into the soil, were ancient. Wandering slowly around, they read what they could of the faded stones until they came to the wrought iron enclosure set apart from the rest that contained the Carmichael family graves. The crypt faced out over the loch.
Geraint gazed out at the choppy waters, which turned from blue to iron-grey to blue again as the clouds scudded over the sun. ‘It’s a beautiful spot,’ he said. ‘There’s something about it. Peaceful. Calming’
Flora squeezed his hand. ‘Enduring. This place has survived so much. It gives me hope. Don’t laugh at me.’
‘I’m not.’
They walked back up the hill towards the ruined church. There was shelter from the wind here, and a wider panorama that swept out over the loch to the mountains beyond. Aside from the distant bleating of a sheep, there was not a sound. Geraint drew her down to perch beside him on one of the inner walls, putting his arm around her and hugging her close into the shelter of his body.
‘I know we agreed not to talk about it today, but I hate to think of you being ordered to the front,’ Flora said, after a short silence.
Geraint’s expression tightened. ‘I joined up to fight with my countrymen. The men I enlisted with are at the front. It’s where I should be.’
‘I know it’s wrong of me to say it, but I don’t want you to go to war and I don’t want Alex to sign up or Robbie, either.’
Suddenly it was all just too much. She had not allowed herself to cry, not once since the army had arrived. There were others enduring so much more than her, she had not felt as if she had the right to cry, but now the tears came, hot and acrid and unstoppable. She tried desperately to brush them away with her hands, rubbing her eyes furiously. ‘I’m sorry. It’s unpatriotic of me.’
Geraint laughed. Not a humorous laugh, but a bitter one. ‘Unpatriotic but healthy. I sometimes wish I could cry.’
This unexpected admission brought her tears to an abrupt end. ‘I cannot imagine such a thing.’
He flushed. ‘Because tears are for women?’
‘No. No, I did not mean that at all. Are you afraid, Geraint?’
‘A coward, you mean?’
‘I meant nothing of the sort! I cannot believe there is a man in uniform who has not been afraid at some point. I merely meant...’
‘Forget it.’ Geraint pulled out a handkerchief from one of the capacious pockets of his tunic.
His expression was closed, unreadable. ‘I didn’t mean to offend you, or to imply...’
‘I said forget it.’ He closed his eyes, took several deep breaths before opening them again. ‘Let’s not talk about the war, Flora,’ he said in a gentler voice. ‘Let’s pretend it’s not happening, for just one day.’
Hurt. He was hurt, and he was hiding something. What had he said earlier? It’s complicated. Flora longed to ask him what, exactly, was so complicated, but he was so very determined that she should not know, and she could not bear the thought of him walking away from her. Not today. She shivered. ‘It’s getting cold, but I know a place nearby, a shepherds’ bothy, which has a fire.’
Chapter Seven (#ulink_dfc890ef-b75c-595c-9343-becb58be1277)
The bothy was a rough hut used by local shepherds to shelter from the weather. Pulling a box of lucifers from her coat pocket, Flora set light to the kindling, which was always left for the next occupant.
‘What a surprising wee lassie you are,’ Geraint said in a fair attempt at a Scots accent.
Relieved that his mood had lightened, Flora laughed. ‘I’m five foot eight. Not so wee, thank you very much, though beside you I feel like a skelf.’
‘You’ve lost me now.’
‘A skelf is a Scots word for splinter.’
‘Given that a splinter is something that gets under your skin, you might have a point, Miss Carmichael.’

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