‘Look, I understand your roots lie in manual labour, but…’
His gut clenched. ‘But?’ Jacqueline had hated that about him.
‘But I don’t understand how you can stil be so comfortable and capable and
Her admiration—admiration she didn’t even try to hide—made him stand a little tal er. He drained his juice and then shrugged. ‘It’s like riding a bicycle.’
‘Believe me, I’d wobble. I’d stay upright, but I’d wobble.’
She made it so easy to laugh.
‘Top up?’
She held up the jug and, before he knew what he was about, he found himself ensconced in the other chair, sipping more juice. ‘I have had some recent practice,’ he found himself confessing. ‘In Africa.’
She leaned forward. Her lips twitched. ‘Did your cabin fal down or something?’
He tried to warn himself that this was how her enchantments started—teasing, fun, laughter. He promised to bring a halt to it soon and get back to work. ‘How much would you laugh if I said yes?’
Her eyes danced. ‘I’d bray like a hyena, but…’
She suddenly sobered. ‘I understand you did some aid work?’
It was hardly a question, more a statement, but he nodded anyway. ‘How d’you know?’
‘The rumour mil at Hal am’s was ful of it before I left.’
‘I was part of a team that helped to build an orphanage.’ When he’d read the brochure he’d hoped that building an orphanage would help him forget Kit. And that it would help al ay some of the guilt raging through his soul.
She waved a finger at him. ‘You might like to act al hard and self-contained, Alex Hal am, but I have your number, buddy.’
He went to correct her, to tel her he was hard and heartless and that she’d be wise not to forget it, but before he could get the words out she said, ‘You’re nothing but a great big mushroom.’
That threw him. ‘Mushroom?’
She stared back at him in incomprehension for three beats, and then she chuckled. ‘Oops, marshmal ow. I meant to say marshmal ow. Baby brain, I tel you.’
He grinned. ‘Is this where I point out that hyenas don’t bray?’
‘Of course they do.’
She promptly gave her impression of a braying hyena and Alex almost fel out of his chair laughing.
‘That’s not a hyena, it’s a donkey!’
‘No, this is a donkey.’
When she gave her impression of a donkey, he lurched out of his chair to roar at ful -stretch on the ground. When he opened his eyes again he found himself staring up at an elderly lady.
Her lips twitched as she stepped over him on stil spry feet. ‘So kind of you to vacate your chair for me, young man.’
‘Hi, Grandma.’
Kit’s grandmother! Alex shot to his feet and did his best to dust himself off.
‘Alex, this is my grandmother, Patricia Rawlinson.’
‘Pleased to meet you, Mrs Rawlinson.’
‘It’s Patti, dear.’
‘Grandma, this is Alex Hal am.’
‘Ahh…’ Those piercing amber eyes—so like Kit’s
—turned to him again. ‘So you’re Alex. I’ve heard al about you.’
She said it exactly the same way Caro had on his first morning here. The col ar of his polo shirt tightened around his throat. Was she going to threaten him with a meat cleaver too?
‘I hope you mean to do the right thing by my granddaughter and great-grandchild.’
‘I…um…’ Al the fun and laughter Kit had created in the garden bare minutes ago fled now. He had a in the garden bare minutes ago fled now. He had a feeling ‘doing right’ meant more than fixing Kit’s house up.
Those amber eyes gleamed and he didn’t trust them. He didn’t trust them any more than Caro’s spitfire green. ‘I’d eventual y like to see you make an honest woman of my granddaughter.’
‘Yeah, right.’ Kit snorted. ‘The way you let Granddad final y make an honest woman of you on Mum’s twenty-first birthday.’
‘I did say eventual y, dear.’
Kit’s
grandmother
