Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
The remainder of the day rolled past, with two families in separate Land Rovers, on a road trip of the Scottish Highlands, enquiring if they could stay five nights in the cottages.
Katie and I had beamed like idiots. Our artwork actually being appreciated brought an excited glow. This refurbishment of the cottages was going even better than I’d hoped.
Katie had departed for the night, and I tugged down the mini-blind we’d installed at the glass panel of the office door. Lights from the cottages pricked the descending dark and I could hear the thrilled squeals of children as they investigated their holiday-home surroundings.
It had been one hell of a day.
A hesitant knock on the door made me start.
‘Poppy?’ came Mason’s rich burr from the other side. ‘Poppy, are you still there?’
There was a wild fluttering in my chest at the sound of Mason’s voice. I smoothed my hair and unlocked the door.
Mason hovered in the office doorway. ‘I just wanted to check you were okay.’
I nodded. ‘I’m fine. Thanks for asking.’
He gave a soft smile. ‘Did you speak to your dad at all?’
I beckoned him in and locked the door again behind him. ‘Yes, I did. I mean, we did. Caleb and Katie did too.’ I threw my hands up. ‘My parents admitted they knew all about this family-feud thing.’ I let out a hollow laugh. ‘It was a bit weird, actually.’
I was feeling frustrated by the whole situation, until with one long stride Mason was in front of me. ‘I feel guilty.’
‘About what? You haven’t done anything wrong.’
‘If I hadn’t dug deeper with my research.’
‘Don’t be silly. That’s what you do. It’s your job, and anyway, we wouldn’t be progressing with the Scarlet Highwayman if you hadn’t. ‘Thanks to you, there’s evidence there are links between him and the Lapley family.’ My mouth gave him a watery smile.
Mason didn’t return it. Instead, his earnest face searched mine.
With a slow, gentle movement, he lifted one finger to trace along my cheek.
I let out a sharp gasp of surprise at the brush of his skin against mine.
I knew I should pull away. I knew I should keep reminding myself about those other women he’d been seen with, but I was on the edge of that precipice again and I didn’t want to back away.
I couldn’t keep lying to myself, denying my growing attraction to him.
I couldn’t keep allowing Nick and his deception to rule my life anymore.
‘What are you doing to me?’ he growled, searching my face. ‘I promised myself…’
My heart lurched. A clump of wiry black hair had fallen onto his brow. ‘Promised what?’ I gulped. ‘Look, Mason, please don’t kiss me just because you feel sorry for me. Only kiss me if you mean it.’
Mason tilted my chin until I was staring up into his face, all angles and dipped, dark brows. ‘Be quiet,’ he ordered, about to seize my lips with his.
Every fibre screamed at me to pull back, but as he held me tighter, I moulded myself against his body. This was a man who had made it clear he wasn’t prepared to commit, and yet here I was about to greedily kiss him back. Even the ghost of Nick and his deception was fading into the background.
A deep groan travelled up from his throat. His fingers reached for my hair. My breathing grew more ragged as he pressed himself tighter against me. I arched my back, feeling his taut muscles pushing against my skin.
‘If I kiss you,’ he groaned, ‘I won’t be responsible for my actions.’ His lips were hovering above mine. ‘Oh, Poppy, please don’t look at me like that.’
‘Like what?’
‘Like you’re doing at this moment.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s driving me crazy.’
My breath was coming out in ragged gasps. ‘I thought we were intending to keep this strictly professional.’
‘So did I,’ he admitted in his sexy Australian burr. ‘That would be the most sensible thing, wouldn’t it?’
I inwardly pleaded with his curved lips to kiss my mouth, when an urgent hammering erupted from the other side of the office door.
Mason’s eyebrows ricocheted upwards as I sprang away from him, flustered. ‘Oh, saved by the bell … well, a knock on the door.’
Maybe it was for the best, I assured myself. I was playing a dangerous game.
I opened up to see one of the dads who had arrived earlier in the day with the army of young children. He was in light-coloured jeans and a faded Bon Jovi T-shirt.
He peered in, the office lights reflecting off his balding head, and nodded to Mason. ‘Sorry to bother you, but is the silvery sports car either of yours? It’s just that there’s some suspicious-looking guy hanging around it.’
Mason and I looked at one another, before darting past the man and out into the courtyard, to where Mason’s car was stationed under one of the carriage’s lights a bit further up.
A long, lean figure, clad in loose, dark clothing, was bent over the windscreen.
‘Hey!’ yelled Mason. ‘What the hell are you doing?’
The figure, his face protected by the hood flapping down over his face, straightened up, took a couple of awkward steps backwards and bolted on pipe-cleaner legs.
Mason started after him, but I grabbed his arm. ‘Don’t. We don’t know if he’s connected to Alex. He could be armed.’
Mason looked torn between my concern and catching the mystery man. He frowned down at me. ‘Do you think that was the same person who gave me the diary? I could have had him then.’
He did take off like the other figure had the other day. I frowned. ‘I think it could’ve been.’
‘Why was he after my car?’ he muttered, striding towards the gleaming vehicle.
‘I don’t think he was,’ I said as I got closer to it. ‘Look.’
On the windscreen, perched behind one of the wiper blades, was a slim, brown envelope. ‘It appears he was leaving this.’
Mason eased the blank envelope from his car windscreen. ‘Hope it’s not a parking ticket,’ he joked, sliding out a sheet of folded white paper.
He opened it and I stepped up behind him to read. It was in a simple typeface.
Her heart discovered that she would ultimately love two men.
We reread the cryptic sentence.
‘Is that it?’ puzzled Mason, turning over the page. ‘There’s nothing else?’ He waggled the sheet of paper in the air. ‘Goodness knows what this is supposed to mean, but it’s my job to find out.’
‘Our job,’ I corrected.
Mason’s penetrating stare was back. ‘Yes. Of course.’
I didn’t know what this was. Maybe I’d almost kissed him because of these revelations about passion-filled family vendettas? Perhaps he’d been tempted to kiss me just for the thrill of it? I mean, it was a compelling series of events that had thrown us together.
Yes, I concluded, brushing aside any regret that lingered, staying as friends and associates was the best thing to do, keeping things professional for the sake of our research.
‘Come on,’ he said, breaking through my thoughts. ‘We’d better go back and close up your office for the night.’