from some of the other diners.
James Branscombe acknowledged the waitress briefly, but came to a halt halfway across the terrace. He seemed to be struggling for breath, a hand clutched to his chest, and the waitress watched him worriedly.
‘Are you all right?’ she asked. ‘I didn’t think— The steps up to the terrace are quite steep... Perhaps I should have taken it more slowly...’
‘Please, don’t fuss,’ he said in a gruff voice. ‘Just bring me a whisky, will you?’
‘Of course. Right away.’ His command had been peremptory but, even so, the girl escorted Lord Branscombe to his table and made sure he was seated before she hurried away to get his drink.
Around them, Sophie noticed the hubbub of conversation had died down. People cast surreptitious glances towards the occupant of the table in the corner and then began to speak in hushed voices. Lord Branscombe, for his part, ignored them all, lost in a world of his own. In his early sixties, he looked older, his hair greying, his face taut and a deep furrow etched into his brow.
‘Perhaps he shouldn’t be out and about,’ Jake murmured, echoing what everyone must surely be thinking. ‘He doesn’t look well.’
‘No, he doesn’t,’ Sophie said, a touch of bitterness threading her words. ‘But when did that ever stop him?’
‘True.’ He sent her a quick worried look. ‘I’m sorry. Of course, you know that to your cost.’
‘It’s probably the reason Nate’s back at the Manor House,’ she said, ignoring his last statement. She wished she’d never said anything. After all, what was the point in raking up past history? ‘He’ll be worried about his father.’
‘Hmm...about the estate too, I imagine.’ Jake frowned. ‘You must have heard the rumours going around?’
‘About Lord Branscombe’s business venture overseas?’
He nodded.
‘Yes, I’ve heard them.’ She winced. ‘According to what I’ve read in the national papers, he’s lost an awful lot of money.’
‘Nate won’t like that—the fact that the press have got hold of the story, I mean.’
‘No, he won’t.’ Nate already hated the press after the coverage his father had received a couple of years ago when he was taken ill at the controls of a light aircraft. This new story would have stirred his dislike of them all over again. ‘What makes it worse is that he didn’t want his father to have anything to do with the so-called development out there in the first place, but Lord Branscombe wouldn’t listen.’
‘Oh?’ Jake raised a brow. ‘How do you know that?’
‘I heard Nate and his father having a heated discussion one day when I was out walking the dog. Lord Branscombe wouldn’t listen to reason...but then, he never has.’ And it was James Branscombe’s refusal to take heed of what people said that had left her father in the state he was now. Her lower lip began to quiver slightly and she caught it between her teeth to still the movement.
Jake laid his hand over hers, clasping her fingers in a comforting gesture. ‘This must be really difficult for you, after what happened to your father.’
‘It is.’ She closed her eyes fleetingly. Her father had been a passenger in the single-engine plane that crashed nearly two years ago. James Branscombe had taken the controls against all advice and that decision had left her father with life-changing injuries. He’d suffered a broken back, shoulder and ankle, whereas Lord Branscombe had come out of it relatively unscathed.
Even now she had trouble coming to terms with what had happened.
Jake was concerned. ‘You must be upset at the thought of Nate coming back. You and he had something going for a while, didn’t you? Until the accident put an end to it.’
‘Maybe I had feelings for him, years ago, when I was a teenager, and then later it all came to the fore again just before my father’s accident...but we wouldn’t have made it work. I realise that, now. We were both studying in different parts of the country for a long while, so I didn’t see him very often...and, anyway, Nate could never commit to a relationship. Things went badly wrong for us after what happened to my father. I think Nate only stayed around long enough to make sure his father was okay. He’s been back a few times since then, but I’ve kept out of his way.’ She braced her shoulders. ‘Do you mind if we don’t talk about it?’
Right now she couldn’t cope with having it all dredged up again. She steeled herself to put on an appearance of calm and she and Jake talked quietly for a while.
A few minutes later, though, her outward composure was all but shattered once more. She looked up and saw a man striding confidently across the terrace, heading towards the corner table.
‘Nate?’ The word crossed her lips in a whisper of disbelief and Jake gently squeezed her hand in support. It was a shock, seeing Nate standing just a short distance away from her. When she’d seen him, soon after the crash, she’d been upset, out of her mind with worry, and they’d argued furiously over his father’s actions. But when he went away, in her mind, in her soul, she’d still yearned for him.
Nate hadn’t seen her yet as he stopped briefly to speak to one or two people along the way. Her mind skittered this way and that, trying to find some means of escape, but of course it was hopeless from the start.
He saw her and his eyes widened in recognition. For a moment or two he seemed stunned. Then he started towards her, a long, lean figure of a man, his stride rangy and confident, the muscles in his arms hinting at a body that was perfectly honed beneath the designer T-shirt and casual trousers he was wearing.
The breath caught in her throat. She couldn’t think straight any more. All she could do was drink in his image—the broad shoulders, the sculpted cheekbones and the black, slightly overlong, unruly hair that kinked in a roguish kind of way.
‘Sophie.’ His voice was deep and warm, a hint of satisfaction there, as though he was more than pleased to see her. He stopped by her table and looked at her, his brooding green gaze all-encompassing, tracing the slope of her cheekbones and the soft curve of her mouth and lingering on the golden corkscrew curls that tumbled over her shoulders. ‘It’s good to see you again. You look wonderful.’
Unsettled by that penetrating scrutiny, she lowered her gaze. She didn’t know how to react to him after all this time. She was distracted by a whole host of unfamiliar feelings that were coursing through her.
His glance trailed downwards, taking in the way Jake’s hand covered hers. Then he lifted his head, making a faint, almost imperceptible nod. ‘Jake.’ He gave him a narrowed look and Jake must have begun to feel uncomfortable because he straightened, slowly releasing Sophie’s hand.
‘Hi there, Nate. We haven’t seen you in a while,’ he said.
‘I’ve been busy, working away for the last few months.’ Nate’s gaze swept over Sophie once more, meshing with hers in a simmering, wordless exchange.
Images flashed through her mind, visions of times past when they’d walked together through the woods on the estate, when her feelings for him were growing with each day that passed. Nate had held her hand, that last day before she went away to Medical School, and led her into a sunlit
