CATHY WILLIAMS - Naive Awakening

Freddie whistled under his breath, and she said wryly, ‘I can see that there won’t be a shortage of space here. Do you realise that your house is bigger than the one hotel in our village?’

‘I thought you weren’t impressed by outward trappings.’

‘I’m not,’ she retorted, rising to his bait, ‘I’m merely stating a fact. Do you and your grandfather live here alone?’

‘Most of the year. My parents come over for two months every winter, and there are several people who help look after the house and garden.’

The Jaguar pulled up outside the front door, and Leigh stepped outside, her hat clutched firmly in both hands, her head thrown back as she studied the grandeur of the place. She had not bothered to tie her hair back and it fell down her back, silken copper set ablaze by the sun.

Nicholas had stopped a few feet behind her. He shook his head, as if clearing it of some niggling thought, and brushed past her, opening the front door which had been double locked.

At once there was an oldish man there, waiting to take their cases, and another middle-aged woman hovering in the background, waiting to show them to their re-spective bedrooms.

Leigh would have preferred to stay where she was for a while, and admire the house, if house was the right word. The décor was impeccable, all shades of white and cream, with just enough colour from the pictures on the walls and the huge pots of flowering plants to stop it from sliding into blandness.

A huge winding staircase, stripped with deep burgundy carpeting, ran to the upstairs bedrooms, and probably continued further. She knew, from the outside of the house, that there were three floors. Three floors of rooms all sumptuously decorated.

Freddie had snatched up his two cases and was taking the stairs two by two, overtaking the maid. He disappeared from sight, and Leigh turned to Nicholas, who had been observing her from a distance.

‘I don’t think I’ve managed,’ she almost choked on the words, ‘to thank you and of course your grandfather for kindly asking us here. Freddie’s delighted at the prospect of going to college for his course.’

‘And I gather from your tone of voice that you still haven’t worked yourself up to sharing his enthusiasm?’

‘No,’ she replied stiffly, thinking that it was difficult to become excited over emotional blackmail.

‘You could always have stayed in Yorkshire, you know, and made do with your rambling cottage which would have progressively eaten up more and more of your money, and your job at the library which just paid enough to keep the food on the table.’

‘You might as well know, I wouldn’t be here now if it weren’t for Freddie.’

‘But you are, aren’t you?’ he countered smoothly. The grey eyes swept over her with cool calculation. ‘And you can stop acting as though you’re the only one who’s suffering a change of lifestyle. As I said, the only reason I bailed your brother out was because of my grandfather.’

‘Are you trying to say that you don’t want us around?’

‘I’m trying to say that you’ve been rescued from a difficult situation, and…’

‘I should be grateful,’ she finished for him. She felt all her good intentions to be polite with this man draining away from her. Yet again.

‘Shouldn’t you?’

‘Yes,’ she said tightly. Grateful, she added silently, for being in a gilded cage, because she was caged—trapped by a situation over which all control had been removed from her.

‘I don’t expect gratitude, Leigh,’ he said in a hard voice, ‘but I do expect you to stop acting like a martyr all of the time. Now perhaps you’d like to go upstairs and freshen up?’

‘Perhaps I would,’ she agreed, stinging from his reprimand, but knowing that she had more less provoked him into it. ‘Where is my room?’

‘I’ll show you up.’ He started up the stairs, and Leigh followed him.

Everything about him, his movements, his speech, that watchful, cool air about him, spelt power and self-assurance, and just a hint of arrogance. He was so totally different from all those boys she had been out with in the past. So totally different from her, she conceded. She would do well to remember that.

He began talking to her about his grandfather, telling her how much he had changed after the death of his wife years ago. ‘He hardly ever leaves the house,’ Nicholas said. ‘He says that he’s simply counting down to the day when he’ll no longer be around. He comes down for meals, and he uses the library on the ground floor a lot, and that’s really about it.’

Leigh thought that it was a shame. Her own grand-father had been full of beans right up to the end. Even in those last few weeks, when his illness had made getting around difficult, he had still insisted on taking his walks, on keeping as active as he possibly could.

Her bedroom was on the top floor, along with Freddie’s. Nicholas pushed open the door, and she stepped inside. Her bags had been brought up and were on the floor next to the gigantic old wardrobe. All the furniture in the bedroom, in fact, was old, from the dressing-table and chairs, to the bureau sitting next to the tall, leaded window, and, of course, the four-poster bed.

‘It’s wonderful,’ she breathed, forgetting his presence temporarily and padding across the floor, her hands trailing along the furniture, her eyes taking in absolutely everything. A small en-suite bathroom had been added at some later stage, and had been fitted out in colours of apricot and green, with matching bath towels.

Nicholas had been lounging by the door, and now he walked into the room and looked around it briefly.

‘It’s home.’ He shrugged and walked across to the window. ‘I suppose I’ve become used to it.’

‘I suppose you would,’ Leigh said drily, ‘although you wouldn’t, if you had any inkling of the hardship that a lot of people have to endure. I know some people who have slaved all their lives, working the pits, or toiling in factories, and for all their hard work they will never be able to know what it is to have this sort of comfort. The problem with wealth is that it cushions you against all of life’s unpleasantness, doesn’t it?’

‘Does it? Don’t you think that that’s a little bit of a generalisation? Why don’t you stop dividing people into categories, and start realising that everyone has something to offer?’

‘That’s unfair! I don’t divide people into categories.’

Nicholas moved to where she was, and before she could escape to some other, safer part of the room he was standing next to her, far too close for comfort.

‘You,’ he said, coiling his fingers into her long, unruly hair and tilting her head to face him, ‘have got to be the most argumentative, stubborn woman I have ever met in my life. And I’ve met my fair share of women.’

Leigh stared at his dark, handsome face in silence. She wanted to fire back with a retort. In normal circumstances she could hold her own in any argument, was rarely at a loss for words, but somehow her mouth had managed to go dry and wouldn’t do what she wanted it to.

She had a swift feeling of giddiness, and then she blinked and reality returned.

‘Believe me, the last thing I’m interested in is the number of women in your life!’

Her heart was beating heavily, and she could feel her hands clammy and tightly clenched at her sides. She just wanted to get away from this man. He was overpowering her.

There was a knock on the door, and Freddie bounded in. Nicholas released her abruptly, and her moment of confusion and alarm was over.

She retreated to her suitcases, which she began dumping on the bed, and chatted to Freddie, her words spilling over each other as she tried to shove the effect that Nicholas had had on her to the back of her mind.