Chapter 12 Finn #2
I ignore her and take the stairs two at a time, yank the panel open, and flick the breaker for the upstairs sockets and lights. “You’ll want to live to repay me for this,” I say, fixing her with a look. “Water and electrics aren’t a great combination.”
Her eyes flash. “I am aware.”
“Right then, get your things.”
“Don’t bark orders at me. I’m not at work now.”
“You can’t sleep here. The next squall will lift another row of slates, and you’ll be frozen as well as soaked.”
Tilda folds her arms, the picture of defiance in a damp purple jumper and sodden mismatched socks. “I’m not your responsibility.”
She’s infuriating. “You’re an islander in a dangerous house in a storm. That makes you everyone’s responsibility. I just happen to be here.”
Another flash of lightning illuminates her heart-shaped face. Outside there’s a bang as someone’s bin goes flying, and a fresh torrent of rain hits the windowpane.
“Get your things together.” It’s a command, not a question.
She doesn’t move. The wind howls down the chimney and Flora emits a small, low groan and presses herself against Tilda’s shins, and somehow that seems to shift something inside her.
I can’t believe I’m grateful to that bloody hound.
“Where?” she says at last.
“I’ll take you back to the house. We have plenty of room and a functioning roof.”
She lets out a strangled laugh. “I am not moving in with you.”
“You are not,” I agree. “You’re staying for a night. Two, at the most. The slater is going to be busy. As soon as he gets the cottage roof sorted, I’ll take you straight back. But I’m not leaving you here in the dark.”
“Since when do you care?”
I want to say I don’t. That would be the easy solution, but I’d be lying, and I cannot lie.
“Since Malcolm let me know you were Gordon’s daughter. And he’d be mortified if he knew I’d let you be washed out of his house.”
I watch as the name hits her. Her whole body stills and something flashes across her face – pain, confusion, anger, all at once. She flinches like I’ve struck her.
There’s a story there – one I know nothing of. One I want to understand, despite myself.
“Bag.” I turn and start making my way down the narrow staircase. “Ten minutes max, please.”
“I’ll be five,” she snaps back. I turn my head away, fighting a smirk. Even when she’s soaked to the skin and on the back foot she’s still pushing back.
I find a leash and clip it on Flora while she moves around upstairs, opening doors, and crashing into metal pots and pans as she throws some things together.
Flora sits down heavily and turns her head, trying to chew her way through the lead.
I pull it tighter and she sighs gustily then noses my leg.
I run a hand down her back to settle her.
She’s like a tank compared to the spaniels, her sleek coat rougher under my hand.
She turns and gives me a nudge, and I run a hand down one long, silken ear.
“Not a word about that,” I warn.
When Tilda comes back ten minutes later – I don’t comment about the timing – she’s carrying a lumpy overstuffed holdall with a grey sweatshirt caught in the zip.
“Ready?” I pull open the door and we pause.
The harbour is almost black, rain coming down in steady sheets.
A gust of wind catches me unawares and I step backwards, bumping into Tilda.
My back hits her front and I feel the soft give of her body against mine for one electric second.
She jumps back as if she’s been burned and I turn to face her.
We’re close – too close. Her eyes are wide and startled.
“Sorry,” I manage.
She swallows, her throat moving.
“I can lock up,” she says after a long moment, lifting the key.
“We’ll come back in daylight.”
She puts the key in the lock and I take the bag, which appears to contain a sack of compost or some gardening tools by the weight of it, and she takes Flora’s lead.
“Ready?”
We drive up out of the village through the wet darkness.
The wipers beat like a frantic metronome, making little difference to the visibility.
I’ve driven the road so many times I can do it by instinct, which is just as well.
All three dogs are lined up on the back seat, and Tilda reaches back an arm to reassure them but says nothing, her hair hanging in still-damp coils, her jaw set.
I glance over at her and for a split second it’s not her I see – it’s her father, Gordon MacLean – eighteen years ago, lecturing me after a bad batch of malt screwed up my first run.
I’d thrown my toys out of the pram and behaved like an idiot.
“If you walk away because it’s hard,” he’d said, fixing me with a steady look, “you’ll never find out how to do it right. ”
The same expression that’s reflected on her face now, knocks me sideways. It’s the same stubborn determination. I grip the steering wheel harder but say nothing. The last thing she needs is to know how much she reminds me of him.
Gordon taught me more about whisky than anyone except Malcolm.
He was a rare man, with sadness written in the depths of his dark hazel eyes, but whatever was in his past, it was something he never shared with me.
In all the years I knew him, he never mentioned having a daughter.
Never mentioned family at all, come to think of it.
The wind has blown the green gates closed, barring our entry.
I pull up the Land Rover and jump out into the rain, shoving them back and lodging a boulder at the foot of each one so we can get onto the track safely.
We rattle down the potholed track with the weather showing no sign of easing up.
The lights of Benruar House glow in the distance, coming in and out of view as we make our way through the jungle of rhododendron bushes that line the drive.
“I need to make a start on the drive,” Tilda says out of nowhere.
“Perhaps not tonight.” I flick a glance sideways, and it pleases me to see the ghost of a smile at the edge of her lips.
I pull up as close to the back door of the house as I can and kill the engine. All we can hear is the thunder of rain hammering on the metal roof. The dogs shake themselves in anticipation and Flora gives a deep bark.
“Come on then,” I say, heading out once more into the rain.
I open the kitchen door, and the house throws a square of warm light into the courtyard. The dogs shoot straight inside to the warmth of their beds by the Aga.
I turn around and Tilda’s standing in the porch, brows gathered, and biting her lower lip. She folds her arms.
“Are you planning to spend the night there?” I move towards her, but she stays frozen in place, a wet strand of hair plastered to her forehead. In the distance, I hear another rumble of thunder and step into her space, reaching behind her.
“If you are,” I say, my hand closing on the doorknob, “I might shut the door, at least.”
She presses herself back against the stone wall.
“This is not charity,” I say in a low voice. “It’s practicality. Nothing more.”
Her eyes meet mine, and I’m not sure she believes it any more than I do. This stopped being practical when her smile started making me laugh despite myself and the moment I started looking for excuses to be near her.
I close the door against the storm, but I can’t close the door on whatever this is becoming.