why are you?’ he asked, thinking that he must be insane, wanting to know the workings of her mind.
‘I didn’t want to risk meeting up with you again,’ she said with a hollow laugh, ‘but maybe it would have been wiser if I’d stayed in. Look at us here by the deserted lake, not a soul in sight, just the two of us. When I left the practice tonight it was with the thought that I wouldn’t be seeing anything of you for two whole days, but I was wrong.’
She was hugging her top coat more tightly around her, shivering in the night air, and he said, ‘Come on. I’ll buy you a hot drink at the hotel and then, unwelcome as my presence might be, will see you safely home.’ As she was about to refuse, he added, ‘Don’t argue!’
They drank their coffees largely in silence and Julianne didn’t think she could feel more uncomfortable in Aaron’s presence until he asked quite suddenly, ‘How is it that you’ve never married?’
‘That is soon answered,’ she replied. ‘The man I was attracted to didn’t love me and I’ve never felt like that about anyone since.’
‘It would seem to be that we do have one thing in common, then,’ he said sombrely, and looked at his watch.
She saw him and said, ‘Do you want us to make tracks?’
He shook his head and as if his thoughts were elsewhere said absently, ‘Whenever you’re ready will do.’
‘I’m ready now,’ she replied, with a sudden urge to be back where she belonged, away from this strange encounter that was the last thing she’d been expecting when she’d left the apartment earlier.
Once they were outside the bakery Julianne said, ‘Thanks for the coffee, Aaron. I had no intention of breaking into your evening, just the opposite, in fact.’
‘Don’t fret about it,’ he told her. ‘It was just a one-off,’ and even as he spoke he was turning in his tracks and with a wave of the hand was gone.
Unlocking the door, she began to climb the stairs and for the rest of the evening sat by the fire, wishing she hadn’t had her boots on when a band had begun playing for dancing in the hotel. It would have given her the chance to test just how deep his aversion to her was.
In the days when he’d been courting Nadine and the two of them had gone out leaving her alone in the flat, she had used to pretend that she was dancing in his arms and would float around the place dreamily, but only she knew that.
CHAPTER THREE
IT WAS Friday night and Julianne was drained physically and mentally by the happenings of a week that had seen Aaron back in Lakeland and herself trying to hang on to the shreds of what had been her life before that.
On any other occasion she would be out enjoying herself, but tonight wasn’t just any night, it was the one when incredibly she’d spent a short time with the man she’d once thought was the answer to all her girlish dreams, and it had been an unnerving experience.
She had known from the moment of his arrival in Swallowbrook that she hadn’t been forgiven for the part he thought she’d played in his moment of ghastly humiliation, yet he’d taken her for a hot drink when he’d seen her shiver in the chilly night air down by the lake, as he might do for anyone who was feeling the cold.
She sighed as she wandered listlessly around the small apartment that she had furnished with loving care when she’d first moved in after taking up the position of practice nurse at the local surgery.
Nadine’s name hadn’t come up once over their brief coffees. That was how she wanted it to be and prayed that he felt the same. If Aaron was prepared to accept her presence in his life again on sufferance, it would be easier to cope with than outright revulsion.
When she went to bed she turned her head into the pillow and wished that he had stayed in Africa instead of coming back to haunt her.
Back at the cottage beside the waterfall Aaron’s thoughts were running along similar lines. Maybe a truce might be the best way to adjust to the coincidence of finding Julianne Marshall back in his life to such an extent. It would have been awkward enough to have her just living nearby. But the fact that she was going to be in his face all the time they were working at the surgery where his friend Nathan, who was not a man to gush, had described her as the ‘bright morning star’ was mind-blowing. Thank God she didn’t resemble Nadine in looks. That would be the last straw. He would be packing his bags and looking for work elsewhere.
It was early, too soon to settle down for the night, and he decided to seek some company, anyone’s but hers. As he walked back along the main street he saw that the lights were out in the apartment above the bakery and thought that she must have gone to meet her friends after all.
As he walked briskly along, The Mallard came into view and after a quick look around inside to make sure that Julianne and her associates weren’t there, he found warmth from the wintry night and friendly chat amongst folk who some day he might find sitting across from him at the surgery.
The two Lawrence doctors, Hugo and Ruby, were seated at one of the tables with the practice manager Laura Armitage and her husband, Gabriel. When they saw him Hugo came across and invited him to join them, and putting his gloomy thoughts to one side he accepted and for the first time since his arrival in Swallowbrook started to feel as if he belonged.
As the evening progressed it was discussed that the Lawrences were expecting a child to adopt soon, which would mean that Ruby being the relief doctor in the pairing-off process might not be available for long, but there would be time enough for Nathan to sort that out when it happened.
He also discovered that Laura and Gabriel had two children—Sophie, nine years old and staying the night at a school friend’s, and Josh, six, who was sleeping at Nathan’s with his best friend, Toby, which had left their parents free to socialise for a change.
The conversation was mostly about themselves and the village as a whole, with frequent mentions of the practice, but as there was no reason for the nurses to come under discussion Julianne’s name didn’t come up and perversely Aaron wished that it would, so that he might pick up some substance regarding her life past and present with regard to the best way to cope with her unwelcome presence in his life.
As he walked back at gone midnight to where the waterfall danced endlessly into the lake he saw that her apartment was still in darkness and thought that she was most likely still living it up somewhere. As a mini-bus unloaded a group of late-night passengers just ahead of him he quickened his step in case she was amongst them. Two accidental meetings in one night was not to be contemplated.
He would have been amazed to know that she was lying wide-eyed against the pillows in her small bedroom, with sleep hard to come by because of him, and when he arrived back at the cottage he paused for a moment before going inside.
A winter moon was turning the still, dark waters of the lake into silver, and in the background the fells, high up above, encircled it like a protective bracelet. The scene was indescribably beautiful and so was the woman who had spoiled his homecoming with her presence, but, then, she hadn’t been exactly overjoyed to see him either.
All you’ve got to do is stick to the job and its demands when you’re in her presence, he reminded himself, and for the rest of it stay out of her way. Unlocking the door of the cottage, he went slowly upstairs and tried not to dwell on how difficult that might turn
