Chapter 31
The first thing Bex noticed was the pressure on her feet. Unfathomable heavy pressure. She tried to shuffle them, to flex her ankles or just wiggle her toes a little, but they wouldn’t move. She couldn’t move her feet.
Panic rose through her as the memories snapped into place.
The storm. She remembered going out and getting caught in the snowstorm.
She’d been freezing. She had been freezing and lost and had known there was no way out of there.
Oh God, was it frostbite? It had to be. With a surge of terror, she tried to roll to her side, expecting the rest of her body to resist. To perhaps be unable to move, like her feet, but instead the pressure beneath her ankles suddenly subsided, and she flopped sideways.
Her whole body felt free, including her feet.
They still ached, but they were definitely moving.
Her toes too. Painful, but wiggling, nonetheless.
Utterly disorientated, she was still blinking open her eyes when she was ambushed by a wet, slobbery lick across her face.
‘Ruby,’ she said, wrapping her arms around the dog and burying her head in the dog’s fur. ‘Oh my goodness. I am so glad to see you. I’m so glad to see you.’
She could feel the tears stinging her eyes against skin already raw and bitten by the ice and snow. How was she okay? How was she here? And where was here exactly? She had so many questions she needed answers to, though at that moment, all she wanted to do was hold her dog as close as possible.
‘That dog of yours is probably the reason you’re alive,’ said a voice.
She tilted her head up to see Kieron standing at the side of the bed. Her bed. Or at least it had been when she had first come up to LochDarroch. This was the room Fergus had given her to stay in. She was back at the castle. But how?
‘The storm,’ she said, the memories coming in bits and pieces. ‘It came in so fast.’
Kieron nodded. ‘But why had you gone out in it in the first place?’
She shook her head, not sure she could give an answer that justified what a complete fool she had been. ‘I was just going for a walk. Clearing my head.’
Pain flashed across his face. ‘Because of what I said? Rebecca, I’m so sorry if that’s the case. If I came on too strong. I would never… I could never…’
As Kieron’s words drifted into silence, Ruby moved again, so close that Bex was practically spooning the dog, and somewhere in the recesses of her mind, she vaguely remembered feeling something warm and wet before she passed out completely.
‘You said Ruby’s the reason I’m alive,’ she said suddenly. ‘How did you find me?’
Rather than replying immediately, Kieron smoothed down the quilt and perched on the edge of the bed.
‘When the storm came in, Gordon came and found me. He said he thought he heard you yell something about going for a walk but wasn’t sure.
Anyway, when you didn’t come back, we got worried and went outside where we bumped into the groundskeeper. I hear you know him quite well.’
It was with a pang of guilt that Bex remembered what she had said to Kieron, about her ex being a guy back in London. Clearly, she had been busted for that.
But Duncan. She remembered thinking about Duncan just before she thought she was going to die. All the things she had wanted to say to him, though now, she struggled to remember what they were. Or how she would even face him after making such a foolish mistake.
‘Yes,’ she said in response to Kieron’s comment. ‘Yes. We were…’
She didn’t finish the sentence, and from the way Kieron’s lips pressed together, she didn’t need to.
‘Well, he was coming up to the castle, and the dog was going berserk. Once it had got our attention, well then we just followed it.’
The tears that had stung her face only moments ago were now rolling freely down her cheeks. ‘Thank you,’ she said weakly, before turning back to Ruby. ‘And thank you, too. Thank you so much. You’re such a good dog, aren’t you? You are such a good dog. Yes, you are.’
As she nuzzled into the animal once more, she realised she was no longer dressed in her own clothes but instead a set of flannel pyjamas. The type of which she had never seen before.
With a flush of heat rising to her cheek, she looked back to Kieron.
‘Are these… yours?’ she asked.
He nodded. ‘Yes. Duncan was the one to put you in them, though. You know, to preserve your dignity and everything.’
It was clearly not a conversation he wanted to have and to be fair, neither did she. So she said something else instead.
‘I thought you didn’t like animals as pets,’ she said, gesturing down to Ruby. ‘And certainly not on the bed.’
A smile flickered on Kieron’s lips and, for the first time since she had seen him standing there, that twinkle returned to his eyes. ‘Well, I thought an exception could be made for this one. After all, I’m not sure I’d have found you without her. You gave us a hell of a scare.’
‘I scared myself a bit,’ she admitted.
His eyes locked on to her. ‘You’ve no idea how glad I am to see you okay,’ he whispered.
A lump filled Bex’s throat as she nodded in response, only now realising that his hand was resting on hers.
Hurriedly, she pulled it away. ‘I’m so sorry.
I don’t even know what time it is. I’ve wasted so much of your day.
I should get going. Get dressed. Get to work.
Get… Get…’ She wasn’t exactly sure what she should be doing, other than not sitting in the large double bed in Kieron’s pyjamas staring into his eyes as he held her hand.
Yet as she pushed Ruby to the side and went to stand, the blood rushed from her head.
It wasn’t just dizziness; her whole body felt woozy.
With her heart racing, she dropped back onto the bed.
‘You’re not going anywhere for a while yet,’ Kieron said firmly. ‘You’re staying exactly where you are. Let me get you something to drink. And as for work, we’re putting whatever it is you and Gordon are doing on hold for the foreseeable future.’
Bex didn’t have the strength to argue. Instead, she nodded, then sank herself down into the pillow as Ruby nestled back beside her.
Ruby had saved her. Ruby was the reason she was alive.
As Bex slung her arm back over her dog, she let out a yawn. Her eyelids were heavy again. Desperate to close. But the sound of voices in the corridor caused them to ping open.
‘I heard you talking to her. If she’s awake, I need to see her. Now.’ It was Duncan’s voice. Her heart fluttered. Duncan was out there.
‘She needs to rest,’ Kieron replied.
‘I need to see her. I swear to God, Kieron, either you move out of my way, or—’
‘It’s fine,’ Bex called out, pushing herself back up. ‘It’s okay, Kieron. Let him in.’
A moment later, the door opened, and Duncan stepped inside. His whole face was grey and sallow. Though she wouldn’t have thought it possible, he looked worse than when she had first arrived at the castle.
A feeling rose through her as she remembered the minutes before she had passed out.
The desperate need to tell him, just one more time, that she loved him.
To let him know, in no uncertain terms, that he was the love of her life and if there was a way, any way, that they could work it out between them, then they had to try.
She knew it now. She knew without a doubt.
That was why Fergus had wanted her to come back here, because he’d not wanted them to go through what he’d gone through, losing his one true love.
Not when there was no need for that to happen.
But as she opened her mouth, ready to say it all, Duncan’s expression changed. A thundercloud rolled across his face as harsh and cold as the snow that had fallen outside.
‘How the hell could you be so stupid?’ he yelled.