Chapter 9
Even when we weren’t in the same room, I could feel Allegra. Just knowing she was in the farmhouse made me aware of her every second. It chafed. I was used to being able to go about my business without thinking or worrying about anyone else.
After the visit to her sister’s, we’d gone to her parents’ beach house and I tried not to overanalyze the sheer level of wealth Allegra was used to. I mean, I’d married her for it. But actually seeing the houses on the Ardnoch Estate, witnessing the quality of the goods inside, I felt less than. I didn’t want to touch anything. Felt like it wasn’t my place. And I didn’t do well with feeling like I didn’t belong somewhere.
All of that, along with the reminder that I’d married a woman for her money, sat heavily in my gut as we drove back to the farmhouse. What the fuck was I doing? Even knowing Allegra was gaining something from our marriage, too, didn’t make me feel any less of a dishonorable bastard. When North had called me out for it, I’d felt like scum.
Now seeing with my own eyes the world Allegra came from, discomfort and embarrassment rode my shoulders when I brought her back to the farmhouse. That just pissed me off because my family had built this place with their own hands, and there was nothing to be ashamed of here. It wasn’t my fault my fake wife was used to finer things. Or dating men like Taka Aikawa.
I’d googled him when I was alone in my room.
He was a good-looking fucker and according to Wikipedia, he came from money before his acting career took off. Taka was definitely more in Allegra’s league.
Yet here she was. Married to a Scottish farmer who’d once run around with criminals.
Not that she knew that last part.
Our plan was to tell Sarah in the morning about the marriage. I knew Aria and North didn’t believe us, and I had a sneaking suspicion Sarah wouldn’t either. It didn’t matter as long as they could claim ignorance to our scheming in case it went tits up.
I was awake before Allegra to meet Georgie out in the fields at five thirty. Years ago, when Grandad was still alive, I used to run regularly. I’d get up before he needed me on the farm and run for miles down the beach. Since taking over, I rarely had time for running. I missed it. But the farm came first. And we had a fault in the irrigation system to fix. They were forecasting a pretty dry summer, so we’d need it up and running.
“Every year this fucking thing needs fixed,” Georgie grumbled as we got to work. “How old is the system?”
“Too old.” I stopped what I was doing to look at my friend and farmhand. “It doesn’t matter, anyway. This fix is temporary. I’m going to invest in an irrigation boom.”
He snorted. “Aye, and how are you affording that, mate?”
“Allegra Howard and I married yesterday. Her money is now my money.”
Georgie’s head snapped up at my blunt declaration. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“Is this a weird joke?”
“It’s not a joke.”
He sat up, wiping mud from his hands onto his jeans. “Allegra Howard, as in Wesley Howard’s daughter? Allegra Howard is your wife?”
“Aye.” My heart thudded a wee bit faster.
Eyes roaming my face, he shook his head. “What the fuck did you do? What is she getting out of it?”
“We married because we wanted to marry,” I lied. “The money is just a bonus. She wants to help.”
He huffed in disbelief. “You think for one second I’m going to believe you’ve been shagging Sorcha all the while you’ve had Allegra Howard in your bed? Do you think I’m daft? You did this for money, and she’s getting something out of it too.”
Expression hard, I replied, “Georgie, all you know is that I married Allegra and that I’ve been secretly seeing her for a year. Do you understand me?”
He opened his mouth to argue.
“Georgie. That’s all you know. Right?”
Understanding finally donned. “Fuck,” he muttered. “Aye, that’s all I know. But I hope you know what you’ve done here, Jar. And I hope this farm is bloody worth it.”
“It is.” To protect this land from my arsehole of a father, I would have done much worse than marry a woman who was practically a stranger. “Now that we’ve got money coming in, I’m going to buy some sheep, hire a shepherd. But I’ve got bigger plans than that.”
Georgie studied me hard for a wee bit longer, then shook his head with a wry grin. “What are you thinking?”
“Caledonia Sky.” I referred to one of my fields that had far-reaching views of the North Sea. It was currently a meadow.
“What about it?”
“Have you heard of glamping pods?”
A slow smile lit Georgie’s face.
A few hours later, I returned to the farmhouse, annoyed about the nervous churning in my gut as I strode in through the mudroom. As I took off my boots, I couldn’t hear anything. A glance out the front window as I headed upstairs told me Allegra’s rental car was still here. Passing what was Sarah’s room, I heard the low murmur of Allegra’s voice as if she was on the phone to someone. Hurrying by, I strode into my bedroom and closed the door behind me.
The room had once belonged to my grandparents. While Granddad was alive, I’d roomed in the attic conversion, but it was sweltering hot up there during the summers. When Granddad died, Sarah had surprised me by having his old room redecorated for me. New furniture and all. It had been bittersweet to take over the room, but I’d gotten used to it in the last five years.
I’d left Georgie out in the field because Allegra and I had a video call appointment with Sarah. We’d asked Aria and North not to tell Theo or my cousin before we had the chance to.
Last night had been pretty shitty lying to Allegra’s sister, but I suddenly understood how she must have felt about it. I hated lying to Sarah. My cousin might be older than me, but she’d always feel like a younger sister. She was the kindest person I’d ever known, and I wanted to protect her from anything that might hurt her. Even me.
After a quick shower, I changed into a clean shirt and jeans. Then I stared down at my grandfather’s wedding ring where it laid on my bedside table. I hadn’t put it on this morning because jewelry and farm work were a terrible idea. Now, however, I reached out and slipped the cold metal onto my finger. It was a wee bit big, but my knuckle stopped it from slipping off.
I didn’t know how to feel about the sight of it on my hand. It was a claiming, after all, and I’d spent my whole adult life avoiding any woman’s attempts to claim me.
Shouldn’t I feel trapped? Suffocated?
I didn’t.
Probably because I knew it wasn’t real.
Stepping out into the hall, I came face-to-face with Allegra.
“Oh!” She startled at the sight of me as she closed her door. “I didn’t know you were back.”
I tried not to look at her too long as I strode by. “Aye. Just needed a shower.”
At the sound of her following me downstairs, I tried not to tense.
Repugnant.
The word hit me again, not for the first time, since she’d said it yesterday.
This woman actually thought I found her repugnant.
It was baffling. But I hadn’t corrected her. If she knew how much I’d wanted to turn that phenomenal kiss yesterday into multiple rounds of energetic fucking, it would complicate this thing between us. She was better off thinking I didn’t want her.
She was out of my league, but I’d fucked women who had more money or higher social status than me. It wasn’t about that. The fact was that she made me feel something more than attraction. I couldn’t explain it. Had never been able to figure out that spark between us from the moment she sat down next to me in the pub five years ago.
I didn’t want to figure it out. I wanted to run from it.
Instead, I’d bloody married her.
So, aye, it was best I kept my distance, in whatever way I could.
“Ready to do this?” Allegra asked, following me into the kitchen where my laptop sat on the table. I pulled out a chair for her and gestured for her to sit.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I replied gruffly, sliding into the seat next to her to open the laptop to call Sarah.
Allegra rested her hand on my arm and I stiffened.
She immediately withdrew it.
“Sorry,” I muttered.
“It’s fine.” She wouldn’t meet my eyes. I was such a prick. “I just wanted to say that I know how crappy it is lying to someone you love. But we’re doing it for their sake, so they don’t get in trouble.”
“I know.” I nodded at her in thanks. “Let’s do this.”
“Right.” I stood up not long later, grabbing my car keys off the hook on the wall leading into the mudroom. “I’m off.”
I had no time to process the conversation with Sarah, her reaction, or the fact that she’d announced she was now coming to Ardnoch earlier than planned. She didn’t believe us and she wanted to talk to me alone. That meant I had to double down on my lie. Something I was not looking forward to. For now, I had one more person I needed to speak with before I could allow myself to think about the magnitude of my and Allegra’s actions.
“Oh. You’re heading out onto the farm again? I wanted to talk to you about … well … the financial situation.”
I glanced at Allegra as I stuffed my wallet into the back pocket of my jeans. Yesterday, she’d looked stunning in a simple dress and sexy fucking shoes. Today her dark hair flopped around the top of her head in a messy bun. She wore a faded Kaleo T-shirt that slipped off one shoulder. Tight jeans and bare feet completed the outfit, proving the woman not only had great taste in music but that she looked gorgeous no matter what she wore.
It was surreal seeing her in my kitchen, barefoot, like she lived here.
Well, she did live here.
Heat coursed toward my dick, but I doused it with willpower. Like I had done since the first night she slept here.
I brushed past her. “We’ll talk about it when I get back. I’ve got some investment ideas to run by you that would make me more comfortable with the whole money side of this bargain. But I have something to do first.”
“Oh?” At my sharp look, she flushed. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound like a nosy wife.”
Wife.
I shoved the way that word made me feel to the back of my mind. Deep, deep to the very back where it might hopefully one day disappear. Still, we were supposed to be in this together. “I, uh, have one more person I need to tell face-to-face.” At her curious silence, I continued, “Sorcha.”
Allegra’s expression didn’t change at Sorcha’s name, and her tone was calm, neutral as she inquired, “Why didn’t you tell me about her? I didn’t mean to mess things up there.”
“Do you really think if I was serious about a woman, I’d have married you?”
She studied me thoughtfully and then replied in that quiet, soft voice I liked too much, “Fair.”
I sighed. “But she deserves to hear it from me directly. I’ll be back in a couple of hours. We can talk then.”
“Great.” She looked around the kitchen. “I might go grocery shopping, if that’s cool? Buy some things I like to eat.”
“Of course,” I answered gruffly. “This is your home for the next eighteen months. You should buy whatever you need to be comfortable. I’ll see you.”
“See you.”
Fifteen minutes later, I was out of Ardnoch and on my way to Inverness. On the drive, I focused on plans for the farm and for the holiday rental business so I didn’t have to think about my impromptu marriage, Allegra, or how fucking shit it felt to lie to people I cared about.
All to keep my scumbag father’s hands off the farm.
It didn’t say much about me that I didn’t really think about Sorcha until I reached the city and was closing in on her flat. Sorcha’s one-bedroom apartment was on a touristy, Victorian street close to the city center. A lot of the flats and homes around here were holiday rentals. Hers was in a Victorian end of terrace house that had been converted into two flats.
Sorcha knew I was coming because I’d texted her last night to ask if I could drop by. She’d replied in a flirty way that suggested she thought I was visiting for sex. I felt bad about breaking things off with her, but I’d been planning to beforehand, so the marriage was the perfect excuse. I didn’t feel awkward about it because we’d both known the score from the moment we’d started sleeping together.
I parked across her driveway because I wasn’t intending to stay long. As I neared the door, it opened, and she stood in the tiny entrance at the bottom of the stairs that led up to her place. Brechin came bounding past her legs to jump on me.
Grinning, I rubbed the labradoodle’s ears. “Hiya, boy. Nice to see you too.”
Glancing up from him as he slobbered all over my hands, I kept my expression blank as I met Sorcha’s pretty blue eyes. “We need to talk.”
Her expression fell and she stood back, opening the door wider for me. “It’s like that, is it? Well, I suppose you better come in.”