Chapter 15
CHAPTER 15
S aul jumped down from the van near the bus stop, raised a hand at Clayton as he drove away, and began to walk the short distance along the road to home.
He shouldn’t have told Laura about Clayton’s sister and the hit-and-run. Yes, he’d made a mistake there. As soon as he saw her face, he’d realised he should have kept his big mouth shut. They were friendly, those two. More than that, they fancied each other rotten; their body language couldn’t be more telling if it tried.
They never missed a chance to get together, either; Saul had noticed that. If they were working on the garden at Spindlewood and Laura was about, the chances of Clayton accepting tea in her kitchen were sky high, even though he might have been quaffing the stuff from a flask all morning. Today was another example. As soon as Laura had got home from work, she’d hardly had time to park the car before she’d come hot-footing it back down the drive, the same as she’d done the other day. It wasn’t as if she’d had any particular purpose, except perhaps to keep an eye on what was happening to her garden. It wasn’t that, of course. She’d wanted to see Clayton, pure and simple, and he, in turn, was as pleased to see her as a dog with two tails.
So, Saul thought, as he reached home and cut across the garden to enter by the kitchen door, what would happen next? If the two of them were as close as he imagined, would Laura offer her sympathies to Clayton over his sister’s death, and would Clayton be dead pissed off that Saul had gone and blabbed to her? That could make things a tad awkward between him and Clayton. More than a tad, if Clayton decided he wasn’t to be trusted. Well, there was nothing he could do about it now. That ship had well and truly sailed, so it was pointless worrying anymore.
Saul grabbed a fruit scone from the cooling rack on the kitchen island as he passed, walloped on a lump of butter from the dish and took a large bite. It was deliciously warm and crumbly. There was no sign of his mum, but the telly was on in the den, so she was probably in there with Katy, watching one of Katy’s dumb American teen dramas. He’d catch up with them in a bit. Meanwhile, he had important business to attend to.
Reaching his room, Saul dropped onto the bed, undid the laces of his work boots and kicked them off. He was supposed to take them off by the back door, but usually he forgot. They weren’t all that muddy anyway, since he’d only been selling Christmas trees, not doing any actual gardening. Taking his mobile from his pocket, he checked for messages – not for the first time today. Nothing. Well, there was one from George and another of his mates but nothing from Holly Engleby.
He didn’t need to check when he’d last heard from her; it was one week and one day ago – one week and half a day, to be precise. He’d sent her a text, a casual How’s it going? kind of thing. Three days later, when he was on the point of giving up hope of a reply, her text had pinged through. Hiya. I’m good, thanks. Working hard, hope you are too. Right now in lunch queue. Talk to you later. She’d added a smiley.
Three days, though. He wondered why she’d waited so long to reply, but she must be dead busy, with it being near the end of term and everything. The talk to you later thing wasn’t meant to be taken literally; it was just one of those throwaway phrases. God, if she had actually rung him, he’d have been over the bloody moon and back! He’d had a wild idea about ringing her instead of texting, but decided it would seem too much like chasing. Nobody liked to look desperate, least of all himself. No, best to keep it cool and be patient.
But not that patient. According to her mother, Holly wouldn’t be home for another week at least; a gentle little reminder that he’d be here, waiting to see her, wouldn’t hurt, would it?
Saul thought for a few moments, then pressed in a text: Hi, I just realised you’ll be home soon. Looking forward to seeing you. Will buy you first drink in the Goose. x
The kiss sign might have been a bit girly and OTT. But hey, he’d sent it now, and it wasn’t that inappropriate, remembering that night, back in October; a night he couldn’t wait to repeat. He hoped Holly couldn’t, either.
Saul slid the phone into his jeans pocket and lay back on the bed for a nice little daydream about Holly, and the pleasures in store.
It was ten o’clock on Saturday morning. Still in her pyjamas, Holly sat cross-legged on top of her bed, yanked the laptop towards her and propped it up on the leopard-print cushion that one of her housemates had given her as a joke. As she opened the laptop, the rough draft of her essay on the romantic poets popped up, rough being a generous description. The essay had been due in at four o’clock yesterday, but she’d managed to blag an extension until Monday because she’d had a throat infection. The illness was genuine – the doctor’s note said so – but it hadn’t stopped her seeing Lorcan last night. Nothing short of the Black Death could have stopped her doing that.
At least she hadn’t been drinking. The antibiotics had put paid to that, which meant she had a clearish head this morning. In fact, she felt a lot better altogether. Her eyes strayed from the screen to the view from the window. It wasn’t an exciting view, just the other side of the Birmingham street with big old terraced houses similar to this one, many of them divided up into student accommodation. But she wasn’t really looking at the view. Instead she saw Lorcan, with his chocolatey-brown hair all messed up where she’d run her hands through it, the smile that made his face shine, and his compact, huggable body. He hadn’t stayed the night – they hadn’t done anything like that yet – but the way things were going, it wouldn’t be long.
Holly hadn’t intended to fall in love in her first term, but fate had other ideas, and besides, he was so damned cute that she hadn’t been able to help herself. He’d invited her to a Halloween party at his student house, which was where it had all begun. It wasn’t a forever kind of love; she was too much of a realist to believe that, as was Lorcan. They were too young to think of making a lifetime commitment, they’d both agreed on that.
But still, you never knew how life was going to pan out. She thought of her mum. Losing her dad had been the saddest, most tragic thing ever, and it always would be. At the time, the idea of her mother being with somebody else had never entered Holly’s head. When her mum met Spencer, she’d been careful to explain to Holly that she could never love anyone as much as she’d loved Dad but she didn’t want to be on her own forever more. She’d been trying to spare Holly’s feelings, obviously, because how did Mum know she wouldn’t love another man as much as she’d loved Dad? Well, she didn’t know, that was the truth of it, and Holly was fine with that. All she wanted was for her mum to be happy. But with Spencer Jennings? Really ?
He was quite good-looking, if you liked that sort of romance-novel tall-dark-and-handsome look, which Holly didn’t, and she didn’t think Mum did either. Spencer was too smooth, like he’d been sandpapered down. There was nothing quirky or mysterious or… interesting about him. The plain fact was, Spencer was okay, and that was all you could say about him. The relationship had lasted, though, which made Holly think she might have missed something, and perhaps when she got home and saw Spencer again, she’d realise there was a whole lot more to him than she’d thought.
And that, Holly said to herself, was about as likely as her getting anything more than a lower B for this essay. She looked back at the words on the screen, then at the three textbooks and pile of lecture notes on the desk, and felt totally uninspired. It might help if she got showered and dressed. Despite the heat from the radiator, which had developed an annoying tapping noise, it was chilly in here. There’d been a thick frost first thing; she’d noticed that when she’d gone down to the kitchen earlier to make tea and toast.
Thinking about frost and wintry weather reminded her of home. The garden looked so pretty and delicate with a sparkling of white, as did the woods and fields around Charnley Acre. Really Christmassy. Christmas . She couldn’t wait. What was it Mum had been going on about when she’d rung the other night? Something about Christmas trees being sold in their garden? She hadn’t been paying full attention because she’d had to leave Lorcan in the pub while she’d gone outside to take the call. It was all to do with Green and Fragrant, those people who did the gardening at Spindlewood. Holly bit her lower lip as her mind belatedly made the connection. There were only the two gardeners. One was Clayton, the owner of the business, whom Holly couldn’t help but notice was pretty hot, despite being as old as the hills – or at least as old as Mum. The other was Saul. If she’d got this right, she’d be practically falling over him every time she came out of the front door.
She hadn’t replied to his text yet, the one he’d sent yesterday. She felt a bit guilty about that, but the truth was she didn’t know how to respond. Saul was great; she liked him a lot. He was good-looking too; black hair and blue eyes were one of her favourite combinations in a bloke. She’d known him as one of the village crowd since she was a kid, but it wasn’t until the October reading week that she’d begun to see him in a different light. With a couple of drinks inside her, it had been easy to get carried away, and she’d encouraged him far more than she should have done because she was having such a good time.
She’d noticed the way Saul’s mates had ribbed him for making a beeline for her as soon as she walked into the pub. The girls had done the same with her, but they’d both laughed it off. The old village grapevine had done its work, too, because her mum had mentioned Saul to Holly, pretending to be dead casual about it when really she wanted to know what was going on between them. Naturally, Holly hadn’t given anything away – not that there was much to give.
If she had to describe how it was with Saul, she’d say it was like a holiday romance, only in reverse. And this was where she had to be really careful because, reading what lay behind Saul’s texts, he was expecting to carry it on over the Christmas holidays, and that was never going to happen. She may not be with Lorcan forever, but they were together for now, and they weren’t seeing anyone else meanwhile. Besides, it would be so unfair on Saul. Getting with him for a bit of fun at Christmas would be like using him, and she’d never do that.
Holly jumped off the bed, toppling the laptop. Grabbing a towel from the radiator, she padded along to the bathroom and took a shower. Back in her room, she was wriggling into her jeans when her phone lit up with a new message. She hoped it wasn’t Saul again. Holding her breath, she viewed the message. A giggle escaped as Lorcan’s name appeared. Morning gorgeous, fancy doing something this afternoon? They’d already arranged to meet tonight. It was so sweet of Lorcan, and typical, that he couldn’t wait till then. Holly righted the laptop on its cushion and stared at the pathetic beginnings of her essay. She could smash it, if she put the work in this morning. She texted back, and got a happy smiley in return.
Okay, she might as well reply to Saul now, before she started work, and get that out of the way. She brought up his text and pressed in a reply. Yep, not long till Christmas. I’m sure I’ll be in the Goose at some point. Catch you then. Friendly, but vague. No smiley, and no reciprocal x . Definitely not.
Throwing the phone onto the bed, Holly pulled on a pair of thick socks and a sweater and went out of the room. Ten minutes later, she was back with a mug of hot chocolate and a toasted buttered muffin. She moved the laptop to the desk by the window and sat down. The sooner she started work, the sooner she’d be free to indulge in the pleasures of the day.