Chapter 4
4
Jade shielded her eyes against the afternoon sun and watched the two people she loved most in the world heading up the yard towards her. Sarah Tate, her best friend forever, and her son, Ben, who was five and a half, which wasn’t much older than Sarah and Jade had been when they’d first met at school.
Ben was the image of his mother. It really hit her when she saw them side by side like this. He had the same honey-coloured hair with streaks that were bleached almost white from playing outside over the long summer holidays. A smattering of freckles curved across his cheekbones, and he had the same small nose as Sarah’s and the same eyes. No, he didn’t, she thought with a small frown. Ben’s eyes weren’t the same shape, and they were grey, not summer blue.
His shorts and tee-shirt were a lot grubbier than her friend’s, too, she saw, smiling as they got closer. Then Ben spotted her standing by the kennels, dragged his hand from his mother’s and came hurtling up the dusty concrete yard.
‘Can I see Sacha’s puppies, Auntie Jade? Have they grown any bigger? How’s the little black one? I bet he’s as fat as a piglet.’ The words tumbled out in one long, unbroken line. ‘Can I help give Sacha her dinner? Mum said you might let me if I was really good and quiet.’
It was impossible to imagine him being quiet for long. Jade smiled into his eyes, which were as wide and innocent as he could make them. ‘Of course you can, sweetheart.’ She bent to kiss his head, ignoring his screwed-up face as her lips brushed his hair. He was going through the ‘kissing is for girls’ stage, Sarah had told her last time they’d spoken.
‘So how was school, Ben? Is it good to be back?’
‘We did maths today. Boring. Double boring. Treble boring.’ Ben spun out the words dramatically. ‘I like art best. We did that yesterday. Mrs Benson said I’m really good. I did a picture of a horse like Wosanna with brown hair and a white patch on her head.’
‘Did you now?’ Jade said, straightening and looking across to where Rosanna grazed in the paddock, flicking away flies with her tail. ‘I’d love to see that some time.’
Sarah caught up with her son, puffing in the heat of the day and flapping her pink tee-shirt with her hands to get some airflow.
‘Still hard at it, I see.’ She eyed the pot of wood-stainer at Jade’s feet. ‘Did you realise you’ve got that stuff in your hair?’
‘It washes out.’ Jade pulled a section of her long dark hair in front of her face to look and wrinkled her nose. ‘Yuck. It doesn’t make very good perfume, though. I should get this cut. It would be much more practical.’
‘It wouldn’t suit you.’ Sarah grinned. ‘So how’s it going? You look as though you’re getting somewhere at last.’ She looked around the smallholding, narrowing her eyes approvingly. ‘You’ve transformed this place. It almost looks like an animal sanctuary. Which reminds me. The woman across the road from me can’t keep her dog any more because her grandchildren are asthmatic. Would she be able to bring it here? It’s a cockerpoo, I think. It looks just like a rug on legs. You might have a job re-homing it.’
‘There’ll be someone out there who’ll love him,’ Jade said, feeling a stab of sadness, because she knew Sarah was right. When she’d been at vet school in Bristol, she’d helped out at a local dog’s home and people did seem to go for looks, passing over the scruffier ones and the older dogs in their quest for cute. Still, at least she was in a position to do something about it now.
‘And if I don’t find him a home, he can stay here forever,’ she added, touching Sarah’s arm. ‘That’s why I started this place. It feels so good to actually be able to do something. When I worked at the vets, I used to feel so helpless when people brought their unwanted animals in for us to…’ She didn’t finish the sentence but spread her arms wide to encompass the kennels and fields.
She’d dreamed of being a vet, but the reality had put her off. There’d been a visit to a slaughterhouse as part of their training and, Jade, a lifelong vegetarian, had known she could no more witness an animal being slaughtered than she could fly to the moon.
‘I’ve decided to call this place Duck Pond Rescue,’ she told Sarah now. ‘What do you think?’
Sarah clicked her tongue. ‘Very apt as you live in Duck Pond Cottage, in Duck Pond Lane, and there’s that flaming great overgrown pond across the road.’
‘That pond’s an iconic landmark, I’ll have you know.’
Sarah rolled her eyes. ‘If you say so. But Duck Pond Rescue isn’t exactly original. Couldn’t you have called it Paws and Claws or Heaven’s End or something like that?’
‘Too trite.’ Jade knew she was an odd mixture. She couldn’t do trite and corny any more than she could do death and destruction .
Sarah glanced around them. ‘Why are there two lots of kennels?’
‘This is the quarantine block. It’s for when new dogs come in. You have to have somewhere to segregate them in case there’s anything wrong with them. The block further down is the regular kennels and I’ve got the cattery sorted now, too. Someone bought a cat in last week. Poor little mite had hardly any fur left. He got trapped under the bonnet of a car and driven for miles before the owner realised he was there.’
‘Is he all right?’ Sarah gasped in horror. ‘Did you sort him out?’
‘It was touch and go, but yes, he’ll be fine. I’ve called him Diesel because it seemed appropriate. I think I might keep him.’
‘You’ll be overrun at this rate. I thought the idea was to re-home them, not keep them.’
‘I’ll only keep the odd one. Did you see the chicken run I’ve just set up in the small field? I scrounged it from a farmer up the road, along with some of his ex-battery hens. I like chickens.’
‘Ben saw it. I had to drag him out of it by his ankles. That’s how he got so filthy. He’s almost as crazy as you are about animals.’
Jade laughed. ‘He’ll clean up. I’ve got another bird he’d like to see. It’s a red kite, a bird of prey. It ran into a woman’s car out on the main road a couple of days ago and injured its wing.’
‘So you’re taking in wildlife as well. Isn’t that the council’s responsibility? I hope the woman left a donation.’
‘She wanted to, but she didn’t look like she could afford it, so I didn’t let her.’
‘You can’t afford it either.’ Sarah shook her head. ‘Jade, you’re way too soft. Your mum’s money won’t last forever.’
‘It’ll last a while and I’ve done well on the sponsorship lately. I’ve got three businesses in the village, including the Red Lion and the vets, who’ve agreed to regular funding.’
Sarah didn’t look that convinced, so Jade changed the subject. ‘I’ve hardly seen you lately. I take it the romance is still going strong?’
Colour crept across Sarah’s freckled cheekbones. ‘You’ve been busy with this place. I didn’t like to intrude while you were setting things up. But yes, it is. Callum’s great. He adores Ben.’
‘Good.’ Jade glanced at her friend’s face, which looked hotter than the sun warranted. ‘So, when do I get to meet him? Or are you keeping him under wraps forever? I’m beginning to think there’s something wrong with him. Or is it me you’re ashamed of? Your crazy friend with the animal sanctuary.’
‘Of course I’m not ashamed of you.’ Sarah sounded genuinely affronted. ‘I just didn’t want to tempt fate. In case things didn’t work out between us – you know.’
‘Hmm.’ There was probably an element of truth in that, although Jade had a feeling there was more to it. She suspected Sarah was being cagey about Callum for reasons that had nothing to do with tempting fate.
‘You can come round for tea one night if you like.’ Sarah picked a piece of straw out of Ben’s hair. ‘How about Friday? I’ll get Callum to cook us something. He’s utterly gorgeous, Jade, and he can cook too. Very important, as I can’t. Did I tell you his dad’s a chef?’
‘Once or twice,’ Jade quipped. She took a deep breath of the balmy Wiltshire air and turned her face up to the sun, which was still warm despite it being late afternoon. There was a part of her that still couldn’t believe she was really here – doing what she’d wanted to do, all her life.
‘So, what have you told Callum about Ben’s father?’ she asked casually when Ben was out of earshot, running ahead of them to the newly installed cattery. She stole a glance at Sarah’s face and could tell by her fleeting look of panic she was right on target. That was why she hadn’t been allowed to meet Callum yet – in case she inadvertently let something slip. Feeling a little put out that Sarah might not trust her, she added softly, ‘I am on your side, you know. I’d back up whatever you said.’
‘Yes, I know you would.’ Sarah glanced at her son, who’d paused just ahead and was crouched in the dust, staring intently at something on the ground. She hesitated and then, aware that Jade wasn’t going to let her get away with that, she added, ‘To be honest, I haven’t told Callum much. I just said that Ben’s father was much older than me and did a runner before Ben was born.’
‘But isn’t it going to be difficult, Sarah, when he finds out the truth? It sounds to me as though you’re pretty serious about this guy.’
‘He won’t find out. He can’t. You’re the only person who knows.’ Sarah flicked back her shaggy blonde mane and gave Jade a sharp sideways glance. ‘And you’re not going to tell anyone, are you?’
‘My lips are sealed.’ Jade smiled to soften the seriousness of her voice, because it did worry her that Sarah was still living a lie. Not because she hadn’t confessed to Callum – after all, they’d only been seeing each other a few weeks – but because Jade knew her friend had never faced the truth herself. She didn’t want Ben’s father in her life, and because of that she’d denied Ben the chance of ever knowing him either.
Jade and Sarah were the same age, twenty-seven, and they’d been best friends forever, but in many ways they were worlds apart. It bothered Jade a lot more than it seemed to bother Sarah that Ben was growing up without a dad. He was growing up without grandparents too because Sarah had fallen out with her adoptive parents a couple of years after he’d been born.
A deeply moral and traditional older couple, they hadn’t liked the fact she’d refused to trace his father and was determined to bring him up alone, and in the end, Sarah, who was the most stubborn person Jade had ever met, had cut contact with them too.
Jade hoped Sarah would reconcile with them one day, but she knew what it was like to have parents who weren’t on the same wavelength as you. She knew what it was like to grow up without a father too. But one day Ben might want to put a face to the man who’d helped to conceive him, and Jade was worried about how Sarah would cope when he did.
Although, to be fair, Jade had never tried to trace her own father. Some deep-down pride prevented her from chasing after a man who’d clearly never wanted to know her.
‘Enough of my love life, how’s yours?’ Sarah asked, fanning her face with her hand and pausing to check on Ben, who was now heading purposefully across the small field towards the chickens. ‘Is he all right in there, Jade?’
‘Yes, he’s fine. It doesn’t matter if he lets them out. I’ll deal with them later.’
‘Has that hunky vet persuaded you to go out with him yet?’
‘If you mean Aiden Southerland, no – and he’s not interested in me.’ Jade wasn’t sure this was true. Aiden had said a couple of things lately that had made her wonder. But he’d certainly never asked her out.
‘I’m too busy for a relationship, so it’s immaterial. And I’ve had enough of vets,’ she added with a small frown.
‘Not all vets are like two-timing Antonio. Anyway, who said anything about a relationship? You could have some fun, couldn’t you?’
‘I am having fun, sorting this place out.’
‘Jade, this is work, not fun.’ Sarah screwed up her face in exasperation and put her hands on Jade’s arms. ‘I know you’ve had a rough time of it lately. And I know that’s why you’ve buried yourself in deepest Wiltshire with a bunch of waifs and strays no one else wants. I’m not completely blind, you know.’ Her blue eyes softened. ‘But you can’t hide yourself away forever, there’s a world out there.’
‘I’m not hiding,’ Jade protested, gazing across the fields of long grass that surrounded her land. The grass, bleached yellow by the sun, flowed like a golden sea in the sultry breeze. ‘I’m fine now. Truly I am.’ She waved her hands in a careless gesture of dismissal, daring Sarah to argue with her. ‘I’m over everything. Antonio, my old life, Mum. All the stuff in Bristol – well, it all seems like it happened to someone else. Really, I’m fine.’ She rushed on before Sarah could contradict her. ‘If Ben wants to feed Sacha’s pups, I’m just about to do it. Do you want to give him a shout?’
Sarah shook her head in exasperation, and then put her fingers to her lips and gave an ear-splitting whistle.
Jade breathed a sigh of relief and hurried ahead of her to unlatch the metal gate that led down to the lower part of the sanctuary. She’d had two stone outbuildings turned into a reception and a feed storage area, and in the old pigsty ‘hospital block’, quiet and out of bounds to the public, she kept the smaller, more vulnerable animals until they were ready for re-homing. Dogs like Sacha and her litter of scraggy black Heinz 57 pups. Not that the fact they were scraggy bothered Jade.
Sometimes, she thought she cared about the ugly ones more than she cared about the sleek, expensive pedigrees that were guaranteed a loving home. They brought out all her protective instincts; she’d have kept them all if she’d had the money.
She tugged open the wooden door of the feed store, bashed her head on the low beam just inside, and swore under her breath. After years of living in houses with normal-height ceilings, she still hadn’t got used to the low doorways of the farm buildings. Her cottage wasn’t much better. When she’d first moved in six weeks ago, she’d banged her head so many times she’d found herself going around with a permanent stoop. She’d got used to the place now and only the odd doorway, like this one, still caught her out.
Standing for a moment in the dim coolness of old stone, she rubbed her head and then hauled down a sack of dog food ready for Ben to open. She wondered what Sarah would have said if she’d confessed the only man she’d felt completely comfortable around lately had been the one that she’d met in the cemetery. Despite the fact she’d spent most of their meeting blubbing.
She’d have bet money on it that he hadn’t been comfortable, however chivalrously he’d behaved. She’d never met a man who’d been able to deal with a woman in tears. None of the vets in Bristol had been very good with tears, especially Antonio, who should have been used to it, considering how many hearts he broke.
Perhaps Sarah was right, perhaps she wasn’t quite as recovered as she thought. Antonio had hurt her badly and she’d still been reeling from his betrayal when she’d lost her mother. Two devastating body blows in a matter of months. It was bound to take time to recover. But Duck Pond Rescue was going to help her, not hinder.
Hard work was a cure-all, her mother had often said. It cured everything from the pain of a broken love affair to the absolute full stop of bereavement. Jade had to admit her mother had been right about that. She was too busy to hurt most of the time. She reached up for the plastic scoop and one of the pristine stainless steel dog bowls from the shelf and put them on the floor beside the sack of food .
As for Sarah’s throwaway line about hiding away from the world, that was rubbish. She shook her head impatiently in an attempt to banish the shiver of unease that always accompanied thoughts of her mother. The clang of the gate heralded Ben and Sarah’s approach. Jade glanced up as they came into the feed room. Sarah might be partly right, she might not be 100 per cent recovered, but she was healing, not hiding. There was a massive difference.