had been a tiring week at work with several minor panics and she was still getting used to the long drive home, but it wasn’t that that occupied her thoughts, but how her life had changed in the last twelve months and especially in the two weeks since she had moved into the cottage. OK, it might be pretty basic right now but it was hers. She had done this on her own. Why hadn’t she had the courage to leave Piers long before she had done and make a new life without him? Why had she tried and tried and tried to make the marriage work long after she had known she’d married a monster? A handsome, charming, honey-tongued monster who had fooled her as completely as he did everyone else. At first. Until she’d tied the knot.
Why? a separate part of her mind answered. You know why.
Yes, she did. She nodded her acquiescence. Piers had been the master of mind games and he had moulded and manipulated her to his will so subtly she hadn’t been aware of his power over her until it was too late. He had convinced her she was worthless, useless, that she couldn’t manage without him, and she had believed him utterly. Because she’d trusted him, fool that she was.
Rising abruptly, she walked closer to the mirror and stared into the slanted green eyes looking back at her. What had attracted Piers to her that night nearly six years ago? There’d been other, prettier girls in the nightclub. But he’d chosen her and she’d been thrilled, falling head over heels in love with him from the first date. Seven months later her parents had been killed and when he’d asked her to marry him just after the funeral she’d accepted at once, needing his love and comfort to combat the pain and grief. A month later they were Mr and Mrs Piers Gregory. And she had been caught in a trap.
Marry in haste, repent at leisure. An older, wiser friend had murmured that to her when she had announced her wedding date but at the time she’d been too much in love and too heartbroken about her parents to take heed to the warning.
Shaking her head at the naive girl she had been then, Willow made her way downstairs. On entering the sitting room she was slightly alarmed by the roaring fire, although it had warmed the room up nicely. Hastily banking down the flames with some damp slack, she walked through to the kitchen and made herself another coffee. Give it a few minutes and she’d toast the crumpets she’d bought for her tea in front of the fire once it was glowing red; there was nothing nicer than toasted crumpets with lashings of butter. And this was definitely a comfort night.
She had just picked up the mug of coffee when a sharp pounding on her front door almost made her drop it. Her nerves jangling, she hurried into the tiny hall and opened the door, her eyes widening as she took in the tall dark man in front of her. And he looked just as angry as when she’d first seen him.
‘Are you aware your chimney’s on fire?’ Morgan said grimly.
‘What?’ She stared at him. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘Look.’ To her amazement she found herself hauled forward by a hard hand on her arm as he pointed to the roof of the cottage. Massive flames were lighting the night sky.
Wrenching herself free, Willow stared aghast at the chimney. Never having lived in a house that accommodated coal fires, she’d had no idea a chimney could catch fire.
‘I’ve called the fire brigade and they should be here shortly.’ Even as he spoke the sound of a siren in the distance could be heard coming rapidly nearer.
‘You called the fire brigade?’ Willow echoed in horror. ‘Can’t it just go out? I won’t put any more coal on.’
‘Are you serious?’ Morgan stared at her through the rain, which had settled down to a fine drizzle. ‘You could lose the whole cottage. The chimney is on fire, for pity’s sake.’
‘But a chimney is supposed to have smoke and flames go up it,’ she answered sharply. ‘That’s what they do.’
‘Up it, yes. If it catches fire that’s a whole different ball game. Did you have it swept before you lit the first fire?’
‘Swept?’ He could have been talking double Dutch.
‘Give me strength.’
He shut his eyes for a moment in a manner that made Willow want to kick him, but then the fire engine had screeched to a halt and in the ensuing pandemonium she forgot about Morgan.
Half an hour later the fire engine and the very nice firemen left and Willow stood staring at the devastation in her sitting room. She was barely aware of Morgan at the side of her until he murmured, ‘What is it with you and fire anyway?’
She wanted to come back at him with a cutting retort, but she knew if she tried to speak she would cry. Swallowing hard, she picked her way across the wet, sooty floor and reached for the photograph of her parents on the mantelpiece. Wiping the black spots off the glass, she held the photograph to her when she turned to face him. ‘Thank—thank you for calling the fire brigade.’ The fireman had said she’d been minutes away from having a major catastrophe on her hands. ‘I want to start cleaning up now, so if you don’t mind…’
He didn’t take the hint. ‘I’ll help you mop up the worst and then I suggest you leave the main clearing up till tomorrow. Nothing will seem so bad after a good night’s sleep and a hearty breakfast.’
Willow stared round the room and her expression must have spoken volumes because Morgan smiled the lopsided grin that she’d registered the first time she had met him before saying wryly, ‘OK, it might, but this’ll take hours and it’ll be better in daylight.’ He shivered, adding, ‘Haven’t you any heating in this place? It’s as cold in here as it is outside.’
Willow’s eyes went involuntarily to the blackened fireplace.
‘No central heating? No storage heaters or fan heaters?’
She shook her head. ‘Not yet, but I will do something soon.’
‘OK, this is what we do,’ he said after a moment’s silence. ‘We mop up like I said and then you’re coming home with me for a hot meal and a bath before you spend the night at my place. I’ll bring you back in the morning and we’ll tackle the cleaning then. At least you’ll be in a better frame of mind to cope.’
Was he mad? Adrenalin surged in a welcome flood, enabling her to straighten and say steadily, ‘Thank you, Mr Wright, but that’s really not necessary. I can manage perfectly well.’
‘I’ve seen the results of you managing…twice.’
Willow’s chin raised a notch. ‘Thank you,’ she said for the third time, her voice thin, ‘but I’d like to be on my own now. I’m not a child so please don’t treat me like one.’
She saw the amazingly blue eyes narrow in irritation. ‘Are you always this stubborn?’
The smell of soot was thick in her nostrils and she was so cold her fingers were numb. All she wanted was for him to leave so she could sit down and howl. ‘Please go,’ she said weakly.
It was like talking to a brick wall. Somehow in the next few minutes she found herself covering the floorboards with a thick layer of newspapers—Morgan had fetched these from the potting shed and to his credit he didn’t make any comment whatsoever—before fetching her handbag and coat and locking the front door of the cottage. She felt shivery and shaky and it was just easier to comply rather than argue, besides which she was cold and hungry and the thought of tackling the cleaning-up
