were killed instantly. Scotty was eleven. He was in the back seat. He just broke…everything. For months we thought he’d be a paraplegic, but he had so much grit. He
‘And your job with me…’
‘See, there’s the fairy tale again,’ she said and smiled, but he didn’t smile back. He looked intent, as if trying to see meaning behind her words. It disconcerted her, but no matter, she had to keep going. ‘I thought I’d get a job in Curalo and commute the twenty miles,’ she told him, ‘but then along came your advertisement and it’s been fabulous. We have a lady who comes and milks for us while I’m not here. Letty’s still active. We’ve coped.’
‘So if I sack you…’
Her smile faded. ‘Then…’
‘Then the fairy tale ends again?’
‘It’s not as bad as that,’ she said and tilted her chin. ‘We’ll manage.’
‘I won’t sack you.’
‘I don’t need sympathy.’
‘I’m not offering it. We’ll put this behind us as an unfortunate aberration…’
‘On my part.’
‘On your part,’ he agreed gravely. ‘It’s been a sad hiccup in your normally exemplary efficiency. We’ll get this weekend behind us and then go back to where we were. You’re normally an extremely competent employee.’
‘Gee, thanks,’ she said before she could stop herself. Who was being snarky now?
‘If that’s sarcasm…’
‘No, I’m overwhelmed,’ she said. ‘Honestly I am.’ She had to get herself under control here. Meek, she told herself. Do meek.
‘I don’t give compliments that aren’t deserved,’ he said stiffly and she thought-what am I doing, joshing with a guy who controls my life? But there was something about this day, or this night, this time, this season-maybe even it was just that Santa was still waggling dumbly overhead-that made her refuse to treat this as normal. She wasn’t going back to being Miss Jardine; not just yet.
‘You know you don’t have to simply “get this weekend behind us,”’ she said cautiously. ‘You could enjoy it.’
‘I’m hardly in a position to enjoy it.’
‘Because you don’t have the phone or the Internet?’
‘Because I’m right out of my comfort zone,’ he said honestly. ‘And I want to be back in New York.’
‘And I want my parents back,’ she retorted. ‘But that doesn’t stop me enjoying what I have. The here and now.’
‘That’s very commendable.’
‘It is, isn’t it,’ she said evenly. ‘In fact, if I’m not mistaken, my boss just commended me. He said I was normally an extremely competent employee. So while I’m ahead I might just stop.’ She swung herself out of the car and waited for him to do likewise. ‘I have an early start, Mr McMaster, so I need to go to bed.’
‘Why do you have an early start?’
‘I milk cows,’ she said, heading for the back door. ‘If you can’t sleep and run out of work, then you’re welcome to join me at dawn. Instead of a gym workout. If I were you, though, I wouldn’t wear a suit.’ And she walked into the house and left him to follow-if he wanted.
What choice did he have?
None at all.
CHAPTER FOUR
HE WOKE to the sound of cows. Many cows. The window of his attic bedroom was open and the not-so-gentle lowing was filling the room. The old, comfortable bed, the faded furnishings and the unaccustomed sounds were so different from his normal environment that he struggled to take it in.
But he got it soon enough. He was trapped for Christmas. On Meg’s farm.
Meg…
In the pre-dawn light the name felt strange, almost dangerous. He linked his hands loosely behind his head and stared upward, trying to assimilate how he was feeling. The planked ceiling ran up to a peak. He’d be right underneath Santa’s sleigh, he thought, and that seemed so unnerving he unlinked his hands and swung himself straight out of bed.
He didn’t intend to lie in bed and think about Santa. About what he’d promised. About what he was missing in New York.
Nor did he intend to lie in bed and think about Meg.
Miss Jardine.
Meg, he thought. The name suited her.
So why was Letty’s order to use her name unsettling?
He knew why. As an adolescent blessed with enough insight to think about emotions, he’d struggled with reasons. He’d even wondered if one of the therapists his mother used might give him answers. But finally he’d worked it out himself. This had been a lesson taught early to a child by a jealous, vindictive mother, who believed employees and friends were to be strictly differentiated.
It was a savage line, said with spite, and the memory of it still had the power to make him flinch.
Unsettled, he crossed to the attic window and peered below. It was barely daybreak; the sun wasn’t yet over the horizon and the farm looked grey-green, barely lit from the night before. He could see the roof of what must be the dairy, and cows clustering beyond. A couple of dogs were fussing around them, but the cows were uninterested. The cows looked as if they knew what they were about, and the dogs were simply demonstrating their role.
A role other than licking Meg.
Meg. There it was again. The word.
He’d been seven. His parents had been away, for who knew how long? It never seemed to matter because the house was much more fun with them gone. It was summer. School was out and Ros, their cook, had been teaching him to make pancakes. But she’d turned her back and he’d tried to flip a pancake before it was ready. The hot batter had oozed from the spatula and onto his hand.
Hannah, his nanny, had come running. She’d held him tight, rocking him, while Ros rushed to apply salve.
‘There, baby, it’ll be fine, see, Ros has ice and ointment all ready. Let Hannah see.’
His parents had walked in as they’d hugged him.
Maybe he hadn’t reacted fast enough. He was shocked and his hand hurt, so instead of rushing to greet them with the pleasure he’d already begun to act instead of feel, he’d simply clung harder to his Hannah.
‘What is this?’ his mother had demanded with deep displeasure, and he’d sobbed then, with fright as well as pain. Already he knew that voice. ‘William, stop that appalling crying and get over here. You do not get close to servants.’
‘They’re not servants,’ he’d managed. ‘They’re Hannah and Ros.’
His mother’s eyes had narrowed at that, and he’d been sent to his room without even salve on his hand.
Who knew where Hannah and Ros were now? They’d been given notice on the spot. He needed to learn independence, his mother had decreed, and he still remembered the sneer.
His next nanny had been nice enough, but he’d learned. His new nanny was Miss Carmichael. He did not get close.
Soon after that he’d been sent to boarding school. His parents had split and from then on his holidays had been spent with his grandparents. The only care he had there was from more servants-though eventually his grandfather realised he had a head for figures. That had resulted in a tinge of interest. William was deemed the new head of the
