Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
ELLIE
Douglas is asleep beside me.
I don’t know how long I’ve been watching him.
Long enough for the pale morning light to shift across the pillow, long enough for me to trace the shape of him with my eyes more times than I’d care to admit.
He’s deeply, heavily out, the kind of sleep I suspect he rarely gets at home, where some part of him is no doubt always listening for a small voice or a thud or the creak of a bunk-bed ladder.
His usual tension—the set jaw, the crease between his brows, the tightness around his eyes—is gone. Without it, he looks so much younger.
His scruff is thicker than it was yesterday.
His hair is a disaster, flattened on one side and sticking up on the other, and I have a ridiculous urge to smooth it down.
One arm is flung over his head, the other rests across his stomach.
I can see the scar on his left hand—a rope burn, maybe—and the thick strength of his forearms.
I’ve looked at this man so many times, but always from a distance.
Always carefully, so no one would notice.
Always with the quiet understanding that looking was all I’d ever get.
But now I’m inches away from him, in bed with him, both of us still naked beneath the covers.
His warmth radiates against my skin. I can see the freckles on his shoulders, the copper hair on his chest.
I think about last night. The first time—face to face, his weight over me, the way he said my name when he came.
The second—me above him, the eye contact that was almost too much.
And the third, in the small hours, which was different again.
Slower, sleepier, both of us half-awake, moving together in the dark with a kind of unhurried tenderness, as though we had all the time in the world and no reason to stop touching each other.
I remember the sound he made against my neck.
The way his hand found mine and held it.
A quiet, almost disbelieving satisfaction settles through me.
This is real. I’m here, with Douglas.
I consider getting up to make a coffee. There’s a kettle and a couple of sachets on the chest of drawers. But I don’t want to disturb him, so I stay where I am, on my side, watching the light move across his face.
It’s after nine when I finally shift closer and touch his arm. “Douglas.”
Nothing.
“Douglas,” I try again, brushing the hair from his forehead.
He stirs. Frowns. His eyes open, unfocused, blinking against the light. He looks at me, confusion clouding his gaze, then recognition dawns and a slow lazy warmth spreads across his face.
“Morning,” I say softly.
“Morning.” His voice is rough with sleep. He scrubs a hand over his face. “What time is it?”
“Just gone nine.”
“Nine?”
“Aye.”
“Christ. I can’t remember the last time I slept past six. And six is a long lie for me.” He stretches and yawns. “I feel more human than I have in years.”
I prop myself up on one elbow. “So, I was thinking we should head down for breakfast.”
“Aye, I’m starving.”
“But first . . .”
I swing my leg over him. The duvet slides down as I settle my weight across his hips, and Douglas’s hands come to my thighs instinctively. Beneath me, he’s already hard—morning wood—but when I roll my hips in a slow, deliberate press, his cock twitches and gets harder still.
Douglas looks up at me, delighted, awake, alive.
“Aye,” he says. “Breakfast can wait.”
The rest of the day feels almost unreal, like I’ve somehow stepped into a life I never thought would be mine.
After breakfast, we head out into the morning.
It’s cool and bright, the kind of sharp spring day where everything looks clean-edged and new.
We follow a path from the edge of town into the woods, silver birches and pines rising on either side, the occasional oak among them, the ground soft with needles and last year’s leaves.
“I can’t believe how much you ate,” I say as we walk. “You put away a full Scottish breakfast—bacon, sausages, eggs, haggis, black pudding, toast, a tattie scone—and still asked for more toast.”
Douglas glances at me, amused. “You’re judging me?”
“Oh God, no. I’m in no position to judge anybody for demolishing a breakfast. I’m marvelling, that’s all.”
“Aye, well, normally I’m bolting something down before heading out on the boat, or eating with one hand while refereeing the twins with the other. Today there was no rush and the food was good, so aye, I ate a lot. Besides, between last night and this morning, I fairly worked up an appetite.”
Heat floods my cheeks. I look away, pressing my lips together to stop myself smiling, but fail completely. Douglas gently nudges me with his shoulder, then his hand finds mine.
The path climbs, winding uphill through the trees. As we gain height, the canopy thins and the view opens up—the town below us, a loch glinting further along the glen, the hills rising green and steep on either side.
“It’s beautiful,” I say.
Mum used to love walks like this, back before it became too much for her.
The thought catches me off-guard, and suddenly I’m thinking about Mum. Whether she’s getting on all right with Margaret. Whether she ate the dinner I left in the fridge for her.
But then Douglas squeezes my hand, bringing me back to the present moment.
No, not today. Mum is fine. Margaret will keep an eye on her. I am allowed this.
We loop back down through the woods and into town, where we stop at Morag’s Bakery for cakes—a fruit scone for me, a slab of millionaire’s shortbread for Douglas—then follow the road out the other side of town towards the loch we glimpsed earlier.
It’s beautiful. Almost still, silver in the sunlight, the hills reflected on its surface. A few ducks drift near the far shore. The only sounds are birdsong and the soft lap of water against the pebbly shore.
It’s too pretty not to photograph, so even though I deliberately left my camera back in Ardmara, I take out my phone and snap a few shots.
We walk along the shore, eating our cakes, and soon come to a tree swing hanging from the branch of a sturdy oak. Beneath it is a worn patch of ground where countless children have clearly pushed off over the years.
“I dare you,” I say.
Douglas looks at it, then at me. “You dare me?”
“Aye.”
“I’m a thirty-four-year-old man.”
“And?”
He shakes his head, but he’s already walking towards it. He tests it with a tug, shrugs, then sits down and pushes off.
The whole thing gives a complaining groan, rope creaking as he swings, and I can’t hold back a laugh at the sight of Douglas Fraser on a tree swing like an overgrown bairn.
“What?” he says.
“Nothing.” But I lift my phone and take a photo.
“Oi! Delete that.”
“No chance. You look good.”
“Bollocks. I look like an eejit.”
“No, you look happy.”
He drags his boots against the ground until he comes to a stop, then walks over to me. “Ellie,” he warns.
“It’s a good picture! Here, take a look.” I hold the screen up, and he leans in.
At first he says nothing. Then he frowns.
“What is it?” I ask.
“I don’t know. I just . . .” He takes my hand and tilts the phone, as though a different angle might explain it. “You’re right,” he says eventually. “I do look happy.”
We’re drunk.
Not falling-over drunk. Just warm and loose and pleasantly fuzzy from the wine at dinner—three courses in the hotel restaurant, much fancier than last night’s pub grub.
Douglas’s hand is on the small of my back as we walk down the corridor, and the heat of his palm through my dress is doing things to me.
I fumble with the room key, miss the lock entirely, and let out a laugh that echoes off the walls.
“Shh,” Douglas says, but he’s smiling. He takes the key from me, slots it in on the first attempt, and pushes the door open. We step inside.
The room is dim, just the glow from the lamppost outside filtering through the curtains.
Douglas places his hands on my shoulders and gently turns me around.
His fingers find the zip at the back of my dress, and he lowers it, the sound filling the quiet room.
Goosebumps rise along my spine as cool air meets my skin.
The dress loosens. Slips. Falls.
I turn back to him, sliding the straps of my bra off then discarding it.
Douglas’s gaze drops. His eyes go soft, and he lets out a long happy sigh. “God, I love these,” he says, cupping my breasts in his hands.
A laugh catches in my throat and melts into a sigh. I lean into his touch.