Chapter Seventeen
T he old hay shed smelled like mildew and bad decisions. Danni had been meaning to clean it out for months now, but never seemed to have the time. Honestly, she probably didn’t have the time now, but some cathartic punishment work sounded like a good idea.
Why was she punishing herself? She hadn’t quite decided yet. It just felt somehow necessary.
She’d spent the past hour hauling out rotting bales of hay, only to discover an entire ecosystem of spiders that were far too confident for her liking. A particularly bold large one had stared down at her from atop a beam, clearly judging her life choices. And honestly? Fair.
Her life choices weren’t exactly stellar, were they?
Not when she actually thought about them.
She’d taken everything she had, every penny she’d got from her father’s death, from working every hour that she could, and used it all to put a down payment on a tiny farm.
The kind of farm that most people were aching to sell.
And now she’d fake married an aristocrat in order to pay the bills.
Yeah. Put like that, she wasn’t exactly one of life’s winners.
“You’re muttering to yourself.” Indi’s voice came from behind her. “Which means one of two things. You’re either finally losing your mind or… you’ve developed feelings for a bale of hay. Either way, I’m concerned.”
Danni turned, wiping sweat off her forehead. Indi was standing there, holding two takeaway coffees and wearing the smug expression of someone who had yet to lift anything heavier than a shopping bag that day.
“You could try helping,” Danni grumbled, taking a coffee out of Indi’s hands.
“I could,” Indi agreed, sipping her own coffee. “But then I wouldn’t be able to fully appreciate the sight of you suffering. What’s got you in a bad mood this morning?”
“Nothing,” Danni said quickly. Too quickly.
As soon as Indi had asked the question she’d known the answer.
She was in a bad mood because of yesterday.
Because yesterday she and Eleanor had spent the entire day dancing around…
something. And the tension of it had given her a headache and a strange feeling in her stomach and…
and she really didn’t want to think about it all.
She looked up. The large spider was still there, silently watching. Judging.
Danni took a slug of her coffee and wiped her face on her sleeve. “Why are you actually here?” she asked, voice slightly more friendly this time.
“Came to check on you. Also, because watching you work yourself into an early grave is free entertainment.”
“Glad to be of service,” Danni said. “Remind me to come down to the pub one night and repay the favor.”
“You’ll be welcomed with open arms,” said Indi cheerfully. “More bums on seats, that’s what the boss always says we need.”
“Right,” Danni said, putting her coffee down on a shelf by the door and picking up her pitchfork again.
“So…” said Indi, leaning against the doorframe.
“So…” mimicked Danni.
“You and Eleanor then.”
Danni froze and swallowed. “What about me and Eleanor?” she said eventually, looking anywhere but at Indi.
“I think you fancy her.”
Danni forced herself to laugh and began moving ancient hay again. “I’m married to the woman.”
“And yet,” Indi grinned, “you’re not denying it.”
“Eleanor is… impossible. Stubborn. Bossy. Prissy.”
“And?”
And. That was the thing, wasn’t it. With Eleanor, there were an awful lot of ands.
Danni sighed and turned back to look at Indi.
Indi was her friend, probably her best friend.
“And… And maybe there’s…” She took a breath, puffed it out.
“And maybe I might like her a bit. But it doesn’t matter. ” She went back to forking hay.
“Why doesn’t it matter?”
Danni hesitated, shoving her pitchfork into a pile of hay with unnecessary force. “Because what exactly would a rich, experienced, older woman see in me?”
Indi snorted. “Great sex?”
Reaching down, Danni grabbed a handful of stinking hay and flung it in Indi’s direction. “Helpful, thanks.”
Dodging effortlessly, Indi held up both hands. “Look, I get it, Dan. She’s intimidating. I have actually met the woman. But you’ve got a lot to offer, even if for some weird reason you think you don’t. You’re kind, you work hard, you…”
“Smell like manure and hay?” Danni offered.
Indi ignored her. “More importantly, I think she likes you back.”
Danni gave one of her best eye rolls. “Yeah, sure. I’ll believe that when she stops looking at me like I’ve tracked mud into her soul.”
And Indi just smirked back, like she knew something Danni didn’t. Which was very, very irritating.
THAT EVENING, DANNI trudged into the farmhouse exhausted. She fully expected Eleanor to be out, either panicking over wallpaper in her damn house, or attending some kind of function that insisted on serving tiny food on sticks.
She was looking forward to an evening of scavenging for food and then collapsing into unconsciousness, and was already wondering if it was even vaguely nutritious to just eat her Ramen dry, when she opened the kitchen door.
What she was not expecting was to see Eleanor sitting at the kitchen table, surrounded by stacks of papers, looking like some kind of terrifying, and, to be very honest, slightly sexy school teacher.
“Um… what’s all this?” Danni asked, eyeing the uncharacteristic mess.
Eleanor looked up from the sheaf of papers she was reading, looking over the top of her glasses at Danni. Danni, who hadn’t even known that Eleanor wore glasses, found herself feeling very warm. She gulped.
“Sit,” Eleanor said.
A lifetime of obeying teachers and her mother meant that Danni didn’t even think before pulling out a kitchen chair and sitting down.
“Eat,” said Eleanor. “We have work to do.”
There was a sandwich on a plate next to her place. It looked good, too. Thick bread, real butter, and something that might have been homemade chutney. Danni’s mouth watered. She took a bite, still wary.
“Define ‘work,’” she said between chews.
“A grant application,” Eleanor replied, still distracted by the paper in her hands, as if that explained everything.
Danni blinked. “For what?”
“Your farm.”
Danni nearly choked on her sandwich. “Say what now?”
“Did you know that almost a fifth of British farms have been lost over the last decade?” Eleanor said, putting her papers down and removing her glasses to look at Danni.
Danni, grateful somehow that the sexy glasses were gone, finally took a full breath. “Sounds about right,” she said.
“That’s an immense failure rate, due mainly to government policies and the more economically viable structure of large farming.”
“No arguments here,” said Danni. She knew this of old, she’d grown up around these conversations.
“What you might not know is that there’s now a serious effort to promote smaller and more sustainable farming,” Eleanor went on, thrusting the papers she’d been holding toward Danni.
“In order to stem the growing tide of large farms and to allow smaller farmers to use better, more environmentally friendly practices.”
Danni looked down at the papers, then back up at Eleanor.
Eleanor sighed, rubbing her temples, like Danni was the exhausting one here. “There’s a grant available for farms like yours, ones that prioritize sustainable agriculture. If you qualify, it could mean a significant amount of money every year.”
“Significant,” Danni said.
“For you, life-changing,” said Eleanor.
“And you just… found this?” Danni asked.
Eleanor raised an eyebrow. “I looked for it.”
“Why?”
Eleanor’s green eyes glowed darker under the kitchen light. She sniffed, then shrugged. “Because I wanted to help you.”
The words hit Danni like a sucker punch. Eleanor didn’t even hesitate as she said them. Help. Just help, just offered like that. It was all Danni could do to control herself, to blink her suddenly heavy eyes.
She swallowed, looking uncomprehendingly down at the papers in front of her. She couldn’t look at her wife, her fake wife, who had, somehow, become an infuriatingly wonderful part of her life.
She cleared her throat, pushed her plate to one side, and nodded. “Alright, show me what I need to do, then.”
IT WAS ALMOST midnight. The clock on the mantle over the fireplace ticked into the silence.
After hours of working together, Danni was certain that she’d learned more about governmental bureaucracy than she’d known in her entire life up to this point.
She had a new-found respect for the big spider in the hay barn.
Being a spider suddenly seemed like a wonderfully free and uncomplicated life.
Her back ached, her brain felt fried, and yet, somehow, she wasn’t annoyed. Or at least not as annoyed as usual.
This was almost entirely down to the fact that as well as putting her glasses back on again, Eleanor had taken off her blazer and rolled up her shirt sleeves, and was currently chewing on the end of a pen in a way that was very distracting.
Jesus, she was tired. That must be it. Danni forced herself to look away, clearing her throat. “So, um, we finished here?”
Eleanor stretched, her blouse shifting slightly just as Danni looked back in her direction. Danni felt something in her brain short-circuit.
Eleanor caught her staring.
For one terrifying, heart-stopping moment, neither of them looked away.
Danni felt like she was being dragged down by an anchor, drifting helplessly toward the seabed, drowning but not caring because the water felt so good against her skin.
Then Eleanor cleared her throat and pushed her chair back. “Yes. We should get to bed.”
Danni nodded dumbly, watching Eleanor walk away.
As she lay on the couch that night, as uncomfortable as ever, Danni stared up at the ceiling, replaying that lingering glance.
Which led her to think about every accidental touch, every word that may have been spoken unintentionally.
And all that led her to wonder if maybe, just perhaps, Indi had been right.
Could Eleanor be feeling things, too?