Chapter 39
Seventeen Years Earlier
Marcus was fuming.
Rae had never seen him in such a state. He paced up and down the conservatory, cursed under his breath, and smashed the teacup he was drinking when he left it down so hard on the marble wash table.
‘What’s wrong?’ Rae said softly from the doorway.
She began to wipe up the mess with a cloth from the bucket she was carrying.
It was all over his trousers and when she started to pat the wet from his shoes, he kicked forward to shunt her off, his foot only missing her face by a hair’s margin. She almost lost her balance.
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, now look at what you made me do, will you stop that fussing about,’ he barked.
‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you.’ But she was in shock, trying to steady herself on her feet, trying to make sense of what could be wrong.
‘Well, you did,’ he thumped his fist into his open palm. ‘That bloody sister of yours.’
‘Blythe, oh no, what has she done? Did she say something to you? Or?’ Rae’s mind raced with terrible scenarios.
‘I suppose you’re in on it too?’ He rounded on her now.
It was something that always bothered him, the idea that Rae was too close to Blythe, that she told her sister far too much.
Marcus always sulked when she went to visit Still Water House, she had a feeling the only reason he thawed was to interrogate her for every word that had been uttered by Blythe.
‘In on what? I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,’ she said now.
‘Oh, please, you’ve probably known all along.’
‘Marcus, you’re not making any sense, known what?’
‘This guest house she’s opening, of course?
’ He moved right up before her, so she had to take a step backwards, but now, she was pinned against one of the tables and it was bruising into her legs.
‘It’s all just a game to both of you, isn’t it?
You have no idea what it’s like to start out with nothing.
’ She watched as a thin film of sweat seeped from his upper lip, his breathing suddenly heavy.
His asthma. An upset like this, a few months earlier had led to a full attack.
It was horrible. Honestly Rae thought he would die.
And for what, he’d nearly collapsed over table settings in the dining room.
‘Blythe is opening a guest house? Where?’ Rae stopped, but of course, there was only one place she could open it.
‘At Still Water House?’ she said. It made perfect sense.
Of course, Blythe should make something of the place.
‘But isn’t that good news? I mean, if you want to stay on here, doesn’t that make things easier? ’
‘Are you mad?’ He was fuming, his whole body had turned to the colour of wet cement.
She realised that he had no idea how close he was standing to her, pinning her there, his body throbbing with anger, his breath coming now in ragged bursts.
She had to do something. She reached into his pocket.
Pulled out the inhaler he always carried and held it up for him to take it.
‘Marcus, please, it isn’t good for you to get so upset.’ She tried to move away from him. He stepped back then, just a little, took two puffs, but still it seemed, he couldn’t quite keep up with his short breaths.
‘Do you think?’ He was so angry, she wasn’t even sure she recognised him anymore.
‘Please,’ she begged. And maybe it was the terror in her voice, but he stood back another fraction, puffed the inhaler once more. They stood there, for a long while, staring at each other. One trying to breathe, the other willing him to.
‘You really don’t get it, do you?’ he said, wiping the sweat from his face with a fresh napkin he picked up from the table.
‘I don’t, I really don’t. We should be happy for Blythe and Kip, they’ll have their own business. They’ll be able to maintain Still Water House and what a wonderful place to have a family…’
‘Can’t you see, I’m looking at my future being flushed down the toilet here.’
‘How can you say that?’
‘Rae. Really?’ He ran his hands through his hair; she wondered if he was about to have another attack, but he took his inhaler again and this time she knew he was stronger. ‘It’s an island – there are only so many visitors every year.’
‘It’s not just visitors, we have weddings and funeral lunches and a good passing trade all the year through, really, the hotel has always been busy enough to make a good profit.’
‘That’s all well and good when you own the place, but what about me?’
‘What about you?’
‘Rae, honestly, your head is so stuck in the clouds, you have no clue.’
‘You’re overthinking this.’
‘Of course you don’t understand?’ he rolled his eyes. ‘You wouldn’t know what a balance sheet was if it hit you on the head, but turnover and growth is a reflection of a manager’s dynamism – and there can’t be growth if you’re halving the market.’
‘Bloody hell, Marcus, Blythe can’t possibly cut into our profits in any real way. She won’t have more than a couple of rooms and even then, there are no ensuites in Still Water House. The hotel is in the middle of the village, the ferry docks just a couple of hundred yards away.’
‘And yet, for all of that, she’s managed to get into the tourism guide for this year, so she’ll be booking in people just as readily as we are…’ He drawled as if he was talking to someone with no understanding of any of it.
‘Seriously?’ Rae was impressed, but she always knew Blythe could do anything she set her mind to. In that moment, Rae felt so happy and proud for her sister, but she bit down the words, because that was the last thing Marcus would want to hear.
The next few days, Rae found herself desperately wanting to go and visit Blythe. She yearned to hold the baby in her arms, sit by the old Aga in the kitchen in Still Water House and feel as if the world was still safe and open-hearted.
But the fact was, she was reluctant to tell either Marcus or Pappy that she was going to visit Blythe.
She wasn’t even sure Blythe would want to see her.
She had heard Pappy and Marcus talk about the Still Water House listing.
It had been chosen as the cover image for this year’s tourism board brochure.
Pappy, she could tell, was just a little proud of Blythe’s achievement, but he was worried too.
It was all wrapped up in the idea that she had married Kip so quickly.
He still didn’t like Kip, it was as if he expected the worst from him.
Rae felt torn between the two sides, but she missed Blythe desperately.
Sometimes, she’d go down to the old broken-down tree house at the end of the garden and sit beneath it, remembering when they were girls – not all that long ago, really and she would cry, for the way things had turned out between them.