The Secret Life of Lady Gabriella

‘So are soft toys,’ he pointed out, ‘and they’re much less work.’

‘But not warm.’ She glanced at Ben. ‘Maybe it’s a girl thing.’ She sighed. ‘Poor little things. They’re going to spend their lives shut up in tiny little cages, most of them, forgotten after a week or two. Left for Mum to clean out and feed.’

‘Stupid Mum for buying it in the first place.’

She turned to glance at him. ‘Oh, come on. Didn’t you bug your mother for a pet, Ben?’

‘My mother died when I was very young.’

Oh…Oh…‘I’m so sorry.’

‘Why?’ Then, not waiting for her answer, to hear meaningless words that he’d no doubt heard a hundred times before, he shook his head. ‘Dogs,’ he said. ‘We always had dogs.’

‘I was never allowed a dog.’

‘Given the choice,’ he said, ‘I’d have opted for a mother.’

Damn! He’d finally managed to bring her nonsense to a halt, shut her up. But, confronted by her stricken face, he wished he’d held his tongue.

‘My father had a black Labrador,’he said, in a bid to wipe that look from her eyes. ‘I had a golden retriever and an assortment of mongrels. And there was a red setter, too, that Adele brought home from a rescue centre. You put me in mind of her.’

‘Adele?’

‘The setter.’

Her brows dived in a puzzled frown. ‘But I don’t have red hair.’

‘Then it must be the temperament. Boisterous. Feather-brained. Never knows when to stop.’

‘Feather-brained?’

She had the same eyes, too. Large, expressive, the colour of warm treacle. Nothing was hidden. Every thought laid bare.

‘That’s a little harsh,’ she said. Then, having thought about it for a moment, she twitched her shoulder in the smallest of shrugs and said, ‘Or maybe not.’ Then, ‘No cats, rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters?’ she pressed, as if determined on proving his point. ‘What about mice? Surely you had mice? All boys have mice.’

‘Then you’ve answered your own question, haven’t you? Are you done here?’he asked, with a gesture at the pens.

‘Yes.’ She put the rabbit back. Stood watching it for a moment. ‘I shouldn’t have come over here,’ she said with a sigh, as they headed for the checkout. ‘It was okay when I was a kid. It never occurred to me to empathise with a rabbit when I was six. Twenty years on, I won’t be able to stop thinking about him.’

They had almost reached the checkout when she stopped. ‘Hold on.’

‘Ellie!’ he warned.

‘I won’t be a minute,’ she called back. True to her word, she returned a few moments later with a large terracotta pot shaped like an old-fashioned flowerpot. ‘I’ll take this, too,’ she said.

‘Thank heavens for that. I was afraid you’d gone back for the rabbit,’ he said, as she put it on the trolley.

‘Listen, feather-brained I may be. Plain stupid I’m not.’ She fished her purse out of her bag and took out a twenty-pound note.

‘Put your money away, Ellie.’

‘Oh, but-’

‘My trough. I buy the compost.’

‘But the pot…’

‘Will be in my garden.’

‘I might want to take it when I leave.’

‘Don’t tease me with empty threats. We both know you’re not going anywhere.’ Then, ‘It’s up to you, Ellie, but if you want to pay for it, you’re going to have to come back and fetch it on your bike.’

She lifted it onto the counter without another word. Mouth zipped. Restraint personified.

‘Damn it!’

‘What?’ she asked, startled, as he put the pot back on the trolley and pulled out of the queue. ‘What did I do?’

Nothing. She didn’t have to do anything. She was exactly like that damn setter; she wore her heart in her eyes. Right now, while the rest of her face was doing its best to be on its best behaviour, they betrayed her.

‘Go and get the blasted rabbit!’

Delight and disappointment chased each other over her face, warring for supremacy. ‘I can’t.’

‘Can’t?’

‘It’s not that easy.’ Seeing his obvious bafflement, she said, ‘It’s my turn to play the responsible mother, Ben. Where will it live?’

‘They sell those flat-pack A-frame animal houses here, don’t they?’

‘Yes.’ She swallowed. ‘They do.’ Her shoulders twitched in another little shrug.

‘But?’

‘But he’ll need a wire enclosure so he has somewhere to run.’

He wasn’t being pushed to provide a rabbit palace. Ellie was giving him a chance to have second thoughts, he realised. Back off. Common sense suggested that it would be the wise option.

‘There’s a DIY place next door,’he said. ‘We can call in and pick up some posts and chicken wire.’

‘Do you mean that?’

Yes. No. ‘I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t mean it.’

She shook her head. ‘This is weird. I don’t know what to say.’

‘Is that a fact?’ An unbidden smile broke out, reaching every corner of his face. ‘And all it took was a rabbit? Unbelievable!’

Ellie’s laugh was a joyous sound. ‘You won’t regret it,’ she promised, speech not a problem after all, apparently.

‘Oh, I’m sure I will,’ he warned. ‘I’d advise you not to waste any time.’

‘I’ll, um, need a hand. With the hutch. And stuff.’

‘I’ll sort out the hutch. You sort out the “stuff”.’

‘Something tall enough,’ she insisted. ‘Rabbits need to be able to keep their ears upright.’

‘You’re kidding?’

‘No! I’m buying his house and I want him to have plenty of room.’ She suddenly caught on to the fact that he was kidding and pulled a face. ‘And he’ll need straw. And sawdust.’

How had he seen only the soft eyes, missed that determined chin? How on earth did he come to be buying rabbit bedding instead of sitting in the peace of his study, deciphering a recently discovered early form of Devanagari? How had he somehow committed himself to building a rabbit run for a woman who had no right to be living in his house in the first place?

‘It’s a good thing we brought Adele’s car,’ she said, as he picked up a vacuum-packed bale of straw. ‘We’d never have got all this into your sports car.’

‘My mistake,’ he said.

‘You don’t mean that,’ she said, her eyes sparkling. ‘You put on a good act, Ben, but you’re not the grouch you pretend to be.’

‘I am,’he said to her retreating back. ‘Truly.’ She just waved his words away without even turning around.

When she returned, she had a cardboard carrying box in each hand. Behind her was an assistant, carrying food, feeders, a water container. ‘Rabbits are gregarious creatures,’ she said, undeterred by his horrified expression. ‘Roger will need company.’

‘Not another rabbit,’ he said, with what he hoped was unarguable firmness.

‘Oh, please. I’m not that dumb.’ He gave her a look that suggested the jury was out on that one. ‘Really. This,’ she said, holding up the smaller box, ‘is Nigel. He’s a guinea pig. And you,’ she said, standing on tiptoe and, before he realised what was coming, kissing his cheek, ‘are a very kind man.’

For a moment, with both hands full, she wobbled, and he reached out to steady her, a hand on each arm. Her