Chapter Twenty-nine
“So, you haven’t answered my question,” said Gabriel eventually, as Imogen lay in his arms, exhausted.
“You told me not to talk,” she said mischievously.
“You have my express permission to tell me what you think about the bed.”
“Mmm, it’s heavenly,” said Imogen, stretching her arms and then letting them flump back onto the pillow, narrowly missing
his nose.
“I could stay here for weeks—as long as it was with you,” she added, rolling over to face him and resting her head on his
chest.
“I was hoping you’d say that,” he replied, stroking her hair. “Tempting though it is, we have more to see.”
With that, he disentangled himself and slid out of bed, grabbing his clothes from the floor. In just a minute, he was dressed.
She allowed herself the luxury of watching him do his reverse striptease. He had a remarkably well-formed upper body—all that
anvil-work—and the rest of him wasn’t bad either. Altogether, she was sorry to see it disappear, at least for now.
“Hey, you,” he said, grinning. “A little less leering and a little more action, or Genny and Simon are going to be leaping to conclusions.”
“Oh, I see. Although I’m feeling they probably have already. They were in on it, of course.”
“Very good,” teased Gabriel. “What made you suddenly realize?”
“Genny told me the bloke you were going to sell the house to was a grumpy old git. I should have twigged it was you then.”
“Cheeky woman,” said Gabriel, not making it clear whether he meant her or Genny.
“Anyway, how did you buy the house?” said Imogen suddenly. “If you were so hard up you couldn’t afford to repair Middlemass
Hall, how did you suddenly summon up the money to buy this?”
“Good question,” said Gabriel. For a moment she thought he wasn’t going to answer. “I re-leased the Hall,” he said at last.
“You didn’t!” said Imogen. “It’s been in your family forever.”
“Yeah, I know,” admitted Gabriel. “But we still own it. The relief is that running it, maintaining it, making it useful is
now somebody else’s problem for the next twenty years. The company want to run it as a wedding venue, so—obviously that’s
where you and I should... Anyway—at the end of the day—I thought, where do I want to bring up my family? Here in the house
where I was largely raised myself or surrounded by that crusty old ruin on the hill?”
“I don’t think that’s a very flattering way to describe Louise,” she said mischievously.
Gabriel narrowed his eyes. “Don’t mock. That woman saved us both, although she drove a bloody hard bargain.”
“You mean you leased to the conference company?” said Imogen.
“Certainly did. Lock, stock, and barrel. I’ve been working on it for months,” he admitted.
“And we all thought you were spending all that time with Louise because you fancied her,” said Imogen wonderingly. “That’s
the most romantic thing you’ve ever done,” she joked.
“Give me time,” replied Gabriel, and kissed her again.
When Imogen finally had a quick bath and got dressed—still in the striped Missoni dress, now with Gabriel’s huge jumper over
the top—they wandered out into the garden and strolled hand in hand through the dew-soaked grass, over the bridge to the orchard.
There, in the early morning sunshine, Imogen saw the forked apple tree where she had sat with her coffee on the first morning
almost exactly a year ago. She squeezed Gabriel’s hand. In response he gathered her in for another long kiss.
“Shall we?” he said eventually, leading her to the stile.
“You built this, didn’t you?” asked Imogen. “After you saw me climbing over the wall here.”
“Clever you,” said Gabriel. “I wondered if you realized I was keeping an eye on you.”
“Sort of,” admitted Imogen, thinking back.
“It wasn’t creepy, was it?” asked Gabriel.
“No,” Imogen reassured him, “nice. But I’m confused. If you really did care about me all this time, why didn’t you say?”
“Why do you think?” said Gabriel, amazed that she had to ask. “Okay, I couldn’t resist kissing you that time, but—honestly—not being able to keep my eyes off you was one thing, expecting you to let me get close to you so soon after being widowed and then finding out you were pregnant...”
“And you pretend you’re so oblivious to people’s feelings,” she teased.
“And then there was the whole repair bill thing, when I couldn’t keep that from you any longer; of course you hated me.”
“I didn’t!”
“Yeah, you did.”
“Whatever gave you that idea?”
“You told me.”
“Yes, well, I was a bit stressed,” admitted Imogen. “But mostly because I thought you were in love with Louise. Sorry,” she
added, slipping her arm around his waist to give him a squeeze.
Arm in arm, they followed the path through the woods that led to the Hall without talking, Imogen remembering all her walks
there the previous year, feeling secure and knowing—as she did now—that Gabriel or, presumably, one of his staff, was there
in the background, keeping watch and keeping her safe. No wonder he appeared so quickly on the scene when the paintballers
ambushed her that time.
“You used to keep an eye on me here as well, didn’t you?” she asked idly.
“It’s something I plan to carry on doing,” Gabriel agreed. “But yes, I worried about you here on your own.”
When they arrived at the Hall, Gabriel led her into his forge, which all looked as Imogen remembered it earlier that year when she had cuddled up on the settle with the newborn Ruth to watch him work. She gave him a questioning look.
“I didn’t lease this. It’s all ours still.”
He led her up the stairs to his apartment, the space she had so admired as the ultimate bachelor pad when she first saw it
a year before. Instead of the view she expected, Imogen walked into a light-filled space, which was now nearly empty. Under
the central roof light was a drawing board set up in front of an adjustable artist’s stool. She went over to it. Within easy
reach was a plan chest. Opening its narrow drawers, she found row after row of pristine artist’s equipment. Brushes, paints,
pastels, assiduously sharpened pencils all lay perfectly arranged, waiting for her to pick them up and start to draw. It all
looked as if it was from the art shop on Portneath High Street—a place she could imagine spending a lot more time. She looked
up. The light was perfect, the atmosphere was calm. When she looked out of the window, she could see the manor house and the
meadows with sheep grazing in the sun; off to the side, she could see the orchard and, beyond it, the roof of Storybook Cottage.
Best of all, she was going to be just feet away from her future husband, working in the space below.
“Is it really ours?” she asked wonderingly.
“It really is,” said Gabriel. He looked at her, anxious for approval. “Do you think you could work here?”
“I do,” said Imogen, looking around her with awe.
“Even with me working in the forge downstairs?”
“I do,” she said again.
Gabriel cleared his throat and took her in his arms. “Imogen,” he said, “you are the most infuriating, bewitching, artistically
talented, musically destitute, lousy driver of a woman I have ever met. My life is meaningless if I can’t spend it with you.
Do you agree to become my wife?”
“I do,” said Imogen, at which loud cheers erupted, making them both jump.
“Thank goodness for that,” said Genny, coming up the stairs. “Honestly, the trouble we’ve all had to go to. Never mind plan
B, we were practically on plan Z by the time you ran away to London,” she said, arriving at the top with Simon carrying Ruth
behind her. Ruth was now fully awake and clinging to Simon like a little monkey, bright-eyed and interested in all the commotion.
“Oh right, so this was all a setup,” said Imogen, trying to sound disapproving. “I suppose Sally and Alistair were involved,”
she said, almost to herself.
“How else did Gabriel know to come to your party?” replied Genny.
“I see. And my mother...?”
“Oh, yes,” said Genny, “in every way.”
“So really—”
“Absolutely,” interrupted Simon briskly. “I must say, all this romantic stuff is making me feel awfully hungry,” he said,
giving Genny a squeeze.
“Sorry, Gabriel,” said Genny. “We just couldn’t bear not knowing any longer. So we thought we’d come and find you.”
It was lucky they didn’t drop in to Storybook Cottage half an hour ago, thought Imogen, catching Gabriel’s eye.
“Anyway,” continued Simon, “I don’t suppose you feel like coming back to our house and having some breakfast?”
Imogen looked at Gabriel again.
“I do,” she replied, and reached for his hand.