Chapter 17
SEVENTEEN
MAKE THINGS RIGHT
James
I drove us to Ella’s ladies’ college, and Beth stared out of the window, her gaze distant.
“I had plans, you know? I’m not entirely useless.
There’s this degree course I wanted to get on.
Mechanical engineering. I’ve been doing the prep classes over the past year, one by one as I could afford them.
I… After what happened with my jobs, I just don’t want you to think I’m entirely without ambition. ”
“I don’t think that at all.” If anything, I thought the opposite. Beth had carried the burden of taking care of someone else, and her dismissal in the back room of the cinema came after performing, er, a kindness, for me.
One I’d never forget.
Her selflessness and her spark of personality couldn’t be so unfairly treated. I wouldn’t let them.
Her head lolled, and I could see she was fighting her eyes closing. “Sleep, Beth. I’ll wake you when we get there. Just sleep.”
With my permission, she went under and didn’t wake again until we’d exited the grey motorway and were rolling through green countryside.
“Where are we?” Beth rubbed her eyes. The quiet lane hosted signs for villages with names like Longville and Little Tickleton.
“You slept the whole way. We’re nearly there. I was about to wake you, sleeping beauty.”
“Pity I don’t get my kiss, sweet prince.”
Swerving to the side of the deserted road, I brought the car to a juddering halt. Then I unclipped my seatbelt and stretched over, bracing myself against her headrest. “Wake, beauty,” I uttered, looming over her. Then I laid my lips on hers.
Beth kissed me back and made a sweet, feminine sound.
Lust surged in my body fuelled by the warmth of the car and my cosy, relaxed state. “I’ve been stealing looks at you while you slept and wanting to do this for a long time.”
She wrapped her arms around me and tried to pull me onto her seat.
Not budging, I ran the tip of my nose over hers. “Do you know what else I’ve been thinking about?”
“Tell me. I hope it involved nudity,” she said. Then, with two fingers to my cheek, she pushed my face around so she could lay her lips on my throat.
A thrill ran through me. “Returning the favour you gave me earlier. To make you feel better.”
“Oh yeah? Even though we’re on our way to see your sister?”
I stilled then huffed a laugh.
Beth burst out laughing, too. “I just killed it, didn’t I?”
“No.” I kissed her nose then settled back into my seat. “Just reminded me of my responsibilities. Later, then. And that’s a promise.”
We set off again, and I had to wind down the window to cool off.
At the gates to a large red-brick house, I parked then took out my phone.
“I told her we were coming but…” I blew out a breath.
Ella had every reason to hate me. I’d watched my uncle refuse her calls, I’d heard his conversations with the school, the instructions to limit her in every way—in the money she could spend, in who she saw and what she did.
Richard never listened to me, though I’d repeatedly requested that she live with us.
I should have done more.
I’d behaved like I was powerless, as he was her guardian and I only her brother, but I was the one with the true power. From now on, I was going to act that way.
“Once I’ve seen her, I can’t leave her here. I’m going to tell her to pack a bag—”
“Look!”
I stopped, following Beth’s stare through the window. Two smartly dressed young women approached. One a stranger, the other my sister. She carried a rucksack and her violin case.
“Ella?” Beth guessed, and I gave a small nod. “I think she’s already packed.”
“I haven’t seen her in so long. She’s grown so much like our mother.” My faint Scottish accent came out in my words, maybe at the memory of Mum. Ella was her double. It was like stepping back in time.
We got out of the car.
“Nope. Hop right back in,” my sister ordered. She grinned at Beth. “Hey!” Then she spun around and enveloped her friend in an urgent hug. “Tay, I’m going to miss you so much. But you’ll come see me, right?”
“You can count on that,” her friend chirped in an East Coast US accent. She levelled her gaze at us as we returned to our seats.
“I wondered how similar Ella was to you,” Beth murmured, watching the scene.
“Lucky for her, she’s very different. But then she’s been stuck here,” I replied.
Beth gave a heavy sigh then took my hand. “I really hate how hard life has been on you. Both of you.”
Maybe not hard enough.
Ahead, Ella’s friend kissed her cheek. “Now go! You’ll never get away if they see you. I’ll make sure your bags get to you.”
“Right. Love you. Bye!”
Ella approached the car, and I squeezed Beth’s fingers. My voice came out rough. “I need to make things right with her. I’m not sure I know how.”
“I’ll help. Whatever you need.”
My sister popped the door and climbed into the back seat of the car.
“First,” Ella said to Beth, “I’m so glad to meet you. I can’t wait to get to know you better…”
She paused for Beth’s name.
“Elinor, meet Beth,” I murmured, the moment causing a pain in my chest. This was happening. It felt so right.
“Beth! Gorgeous name,” she continued. “Now, brother mine. Long time, no see, but our reunion can take place on the fly. Put your foot down and get moving. I’m done with this place and I’m never coming back.”
Isped us away, and Ella blew out a breath and clipped her seat belt into place. “Thank you. I’m sorry to spring that on you but I wasn’t sure you’d come if I told you my plan.”
I gave a self-depreciating huff. “Can’t imagine why you’d doubt me. Would you believe me if I told you I was going to take you from here today?”
In my narrow view in the rearview mirror, my sister’s eyes widened, and I wished I could look at her properly. I swallowed, unable to continue.
“Why are you running away from school?” Beth helpfully stepped in, saving the awkwardness of my sister’s denial or my rushed explanations. Neither of which would’ve done us any good.
“The summer sojourn is almost here. It was now or never.”
“What’s a sojourn?” Beth twisted around in her seat.
I navigated the tight country lanes and, for the first time, half wished I wasn’t the one driving.
“My college is an international school. Meaning girls of all nationalities get dumped there by their relatives in exchange for eye-wateringly high fees. One of the guarantees is that we walk away as,” she put on a simpering voice, “finely educated and exquisitely mannered young ladies.”
Beth pulled a face. “Yuck.”
“Exactly. Translation: pompous asshats who are trained to be socialites and rich men’s wives.
” Ella grinned. “In three weeks, I should be travelling to Switzerland for a retreat. I’ve been every year for the past four, and I can’t bear it anymore.
We had deportment classes. Do you know what that is?
How to keep your knees together when you get out of your boyfriend’s low sportscar.
Or how to act without offending anyone if a lecherous old man gets too handsy.
Tay, my friend you saw at the gates, is leaving.
She’s eighteen and finally out of the custody battle her parents have warred since she was a baby.
So I’d be alone in ridiculing the place, and where’s the fun in that? ”
Her tone was light, but the picture she painted was awful.
“I’m glad you came,” she added with her big blue eyes on me.
“I’m sorry it wasn’t sooner.” My words, the tone bleak, were far too little, far too late.
“None of that. Not yet. Let’s just enjoy freedom. Dick’s still away, right?”
By Beth’s snort, I guessed she understood Ella meant Richard, our uncle.
Ella grinned and raised an eyebrow at her. “Have you been to Belvedere before?”
“Nope. But don’t tell me anything. I’m freaked out enough as it is.”
“You’re worried?” I found and squeezed Beth’s warm fingers. “It’s just a house.”
But that wasn’t true. It was history and duty made of sandstone and marble. Taking her there was significant, like I was dragging the place kicking and screaming into a new century.
We drove on into the afternoon. Ella talked confidently, and her quick, ready smile came naturally despite the awkwardness between me and her.
Beth seemed to instantly like her, and the same in reverse.
Ella traded off looks at me with a seeming fascination with Beth.
She didn’t conceal her regard when she finally murmured something like, “I should’ve known. Every change takes a catalyst.”
Was Beth the change? Not entirely. For over a year, I’d been working through my troubles. But she’d helped. That was for certain.
At the gates to the house, I paused the car to enter the code into the keypad.
Ella popped her door and jumped out. “I’ve crashed this date enough.
You do your introduction without an audience,” she quipped.
“I’m going to find Hinchie. I already texted her, and she’s starting on an epic dinner to celebrate our return.
Before Richard figured out what I was doing, I used to come here and stay with them.
On the weekends and sometimes during the holidays. Did you know that?”
“Mr and Mrs Hinchcliffe run the house and estate,” I told Beth. Then I shook my head at my sister. “I wish I’d come sooner. I’m so sorry you were left there.”
Ella waved a hand. “What could you have done? He holds all the strings. But in weeks, you will.”
“We’ll come find you later. Talk.”
She gave us a wicked grin then strode away, throwing over her shoulder, “If we see you before supper, you’re doing something wrong.”
Beth’s laugh had me staring at her. Ella vanished through the trees and down a track.
“What are you waiting for?” Beth winked.
With our hands still connected, she indicated to the clutch, and I depressed it, allowing us to jointly move the car into first gear. Finally, I’d let her take a tiny bit of control.
Then I drove Beth into my world.