Summer At Willow Tree Farm

They drove past a collection of old detached stone houses, their high garden walls lovingly decorated with trailing lobelia.

She’d once moaned incessantly about the lack of any fashion options for women under sixty in Gratesbury or the chances of getting a soy vanilla Frappuccino because they didn’t even have a Seattle Coffee Company café, which were all the rage in London, when her mother had brought her here during that summer. But in retrospect, weekend trips to the town had been a quaint and pleasant way to spend the afternoon – and the Women’s Institute market had done a phenomenal lemon drizzle cake.

The road narrowed ahead and seemed to be coming to a dead end. ‘Where is this place?’ she asked, wondering why she hadn’t spotted the sign.

Art stilled beside her. A brief glance confirmed his face had gone deathly white. Sweat dripped down his temple to furrow through the stubble on his jaw. It was a sunny day, and pleasantly warm, but not that warm.

She wondered how many more pints he could afford to lose, because the metallic smell had begun to permeate the whole car.

‘No idea,’ he said. ‘I’ve never been to it before.’

He closed his eyes and pressed his head into the headrest, the tight grimace signalling how much pain he must be in.

She almost felt bad about the Princess Drama crack. The man was nothing if not stoic.

She slowed the car, and finally spotted a blue sign emblazoned with the NHS insignia. ‘At last, found it.’

He shifted beside her as she drove into an almost empty car park. The one-story utilitarian building had a glass front and an ambulance bay with a paramedics van parked in it.

‘I hope it’s actually open,’ she said.

Still no comment.

‘Do you want to wait here while I investigate?’ she asked, concerned he might be about to pass out for real.

‘Sure.’

The bloody towel covering his injured hand had started to seep onto his T-shirt.

She got out of the car and sprinted across the lot, propelled by panic.

Art Dalton might be a pain in the arse, but she really would prefer it if he didn’t die in her rental car. Not only would that be a difficult one to explain to the car hire company, but she had a sneaking feeling her mum would be devastated.

*

‘Art, wake up, it’s open and the receptionist says the doctor can see you straight away.’

‘I wasn’t asleep.’ Art dragged his eyes open, because some bugger had attached ten-ton weighs to his lids. Ellie’s intent green gaze roamed over his face.

He must really look like shit for her to actually be anxious about him, although maybe her anxiety was more to do with the threat to her upholstery than the threat to his health.

He certainly felt like shit. His hand was throbbing as if someone had tried to hack it off with a chainsaw – not completely untrue. But worse was the sick sensation in his belly, and the anxiety that had his chest in a death grip as he stared at the plate glass panel twenty feet away.

He hated hospitals. Really hated them.

He’d been trying to convince himself all the way here, this wasn’t strictly speaking a hospital, more like a glorified GP’s surgery. And it looked deserted. He wouldn’t walk in and be accosted with the sound of hurrying feet slapping against linoleum, the smell of blood and urine and bleach, or the beep of monitors, phones ringing, hushed conversations or shouted demands, or worse, the groans and mumbles of other people’s pain – everything that had haunted him in nightmares for years.

Even so, he’d rather risk losing his hand than have to walk through those sliding glass doors in the next few minutes…

Worst of all was the knowledge that if he hadn’t been thinking about Ellie, while he was supposed to be concentrating on sharpening the blade to start the cut-out on his latest commission, he wouldn’t have got into this fix in the first place.

‘Haul arse, Art, let’s get this over with.’ Ellie sounded exasperated and anxious.

‘Give me a moment,’ he said.

He needed to hide the fact he was not only terrified of going inside that building, but also terrified of losing it in front of her.

‘What for? Do you want to wait until you need a blood transfusion or something?’ The high note of panic gave lie to the snark.

And spurred him into action.

‘Fine, let’s do this thing.’ He tried to sound sure.

He gave his head a quick shake, to clear the fog enveloping him, and grabbed a hold of the car door while ignoring the rabbiting heartbeat punching his ribs. And the nausea sitting like a roaring lion under his sternum.

Do not puke.

He placed his feet on the tarmac, levered himself out of the car and staggered, his balance shot.

Ellie caught him round the waist. ‘Don’t you dare fall on top of me, Dalton.’ Banding a supporting arm around his back, she propped his good arm over her shoulder. ‘If you go, I’m going to go with you, because you’re too much of a big lummox for me to catch. And I’m telling you now, I will be severely pissed off if that happens.’ The snippy motormouth monologue was weirdly comforting.

‘I’m OK.’ He tried to take some of his weight off her, even though his equilibrium was iffy at best, the scent of her – summer flowers and sultry spice – as disturbing as the prospect of flattening her in an NHS car park.

‘Shut up, and lean on me,’ she said, holding him upright.

He gave up objecting – he didn’t have the strength to walk and argue at the same time.

The shaking hit his knees as the glass doors slid open, the electric hiss bringing with it the sucker punch of memory.

‘Don’t make a fuss, Arty. Everything will be OK. As long as you don’t tell, baby.’

His mummy’s voice whispered in his ear while the scary man with a white mask over his face kept prodding at his tummy, making the screaming agony a thousand times worse.

‘Art, you’re not really going to pass out are you? I can go and get a wheelchair?’ Ellie’s frantic questions beckoned him back to the present.

He breathed, ignoring the lion now roaring in his ears. And realised he’d yet to cross the threshold.

‘I’m fine, Princess Drama.’ But he didn’t feel fine, he felt terrible.

She didn’t comment, so he knew he must look terrible too.

He forced his feet to carry him through the door and back into purgatory, grateful for the feel of her flush against his side, her fingers digging into his hip. He clung on to her, reminding himself every step of the way that the throbbing pain was coming from his hand now and not his stomach. And wasn’t anywhere near as diabolical as it had been when he was a boy.

*

‘Ouch, nasty.’ The female doctor snapped on a pair of surgical gloves then unwrapped the layers of blood-soaked tea towels and dropped them in a surgical waste disposal unit. ‘How did you do this, Mr Dalton?’

‘Rotary blade slipped,’ Art supplied, in his usual talkative fashion from his perch on the gurney. The room was sunny and smelled of orange blossoms, not bleach or blood like most hospitals. Ellie was surprised Art hadn’t kicked up a fuss when she’d followed him into the treatment room. But then, from the pasty face, she wasn’t sure he would notice if she started tap-dancing naked in front of him.

‘At least it’s a reasonably clean incision.’ The physician, who was called Susan Grant according to the nametag pinned to her white coat, wiped away the sluggish seep of blood with a succession of antiseptic wipes. ‘And you don’t appear to have severed any tendons. But it’s deep, so it’s going to need quite a few stitches.’

Ellie cringed as the woman, who had a pleasantly upbeat and efficient manner, began to probe at the cut.

If Art could feel it, he wasn’t letting on, his eyelids sinking to half-mast, as if he were struggling to remain awake.

He looked dreadful, but not as dreadful as he’d looked when they’d been entering the building. The electrical hum of the doors had triggered and, for a split second, he’d looked completely terrified, the whites of his eyes showing. She’d said something to him, worried he was about to keel over and take her down with him, and she’d had the strangest feeling she’d called him back from somewhere far away.

What was that about?

Because Art definitely wasn’t the swooning type, even after managing to hack off half a hand. Something else had been going on, something other than his injury, because he looked as if he’d rather do anything in that moment than take a single step into the medical centre.

‘When was your last tetanus shot?’ the doctor asked.

Art shook his head, his eyelids drooping.

The doctor turned to Ellie. ‘Do you know if he’s had any recent boosters? I think he may be a bit shocky.’

‘No, I’m afraid not.’ This would probably be a good time to say she was just the taxi service. But after the episode as they entered the centre, she wasn’t going anywhere.

‘All right.’ The doctor turned back to Art. ‘I think we’ll err on the side of caution and give you one just in case. I’m going to call the nurse so she can help me stitch you up.’ She applied a dressing to the wound as she spoke, the thick wadding absorbing the worst of the blood, which seemed to have finally stopped flowing so copiously. ‘In the meantime, Ms…?’

‘Preston,’ Ellie said, then realised she’d given her maiden name.

‘Ms Preston. Could you help him get his T-shirt off.’ She lifted a gown off a neat stack in the corner of the room. ‘And get him into one of these.’

Ellie took the gown, before the doctor disappeared out of the door.

She stared at the neat blue and red geometric pattern on the starched cotton then back at Art. She was going to have to undress him?

Suck it up. You’ve seen a lot more of him than just his chest.

So what if the memory of seeing his chest hair peeking out of his overalls had made her react like a nun yesterday evening.

‘Art?’ She nudged his shoulder. His lids snapped open, but his eyes were blank for a moment, as if he wasn’t sure where he was.

‘We’ve got to get your T-shirt off.’ She held the gown aloft. ‘And put this on.’

‘I can do it,’ he said, or rather croaked, still channelling he who shall never need any help.

He yanked up the hem of his T-shirt with his good hand. Then swore as the wad of cotton got stuck. With his sore hand dangling in space, his face covered by the blood-soaked shirt and some phenomenal abdominal muscles trembling with the effort he was making to try to yank the garment the rest of the way off, he looked stuck fast.

‘Ready for some help yet?’ Ellie quipped.

The reply was an annoyed grunt.

‘I’m going to take that as a yes.’ After dumping the gown on the bed, Ellie circled his wrist with gentle fingers, and eased his injured hand through the armhole, ignoring the sight of the dark hair fanning out across the defined slabs of his pectoral muscles.

There was not an ounce of extra belly fat on the man, the black elastic of his boxer briefs peeking over the low-slung waistband of his jeans. The black hair around his nipples tapered into a thin line to bisect the ridges of his six-pack.

The hot flush struck somewhere around her backbone and raced up her spine as she dragged the T-shirt over his head.

He groaned, cradling his hand as he positioned it in his lap. She spotted the ridged white scar that had shocked her all those summers ago. She’d only seen it from a distance then.

She could see it more clearly now, illuminated by the treatment room’s harsh fluorescent light. It still looked nasty, but for the first time she noticed the tiny white dots that travelled up either side of the line trailing out of his groin all the way to the bottom of his ribcage.

When had the injury happened? Was this where his fear of hospitals came from? Because it looked like he had once had at least fifty stitches in a wound that must surely have been life-threatening.

She dragged her gaze away not wanting to get caught staring, but Art seemed unconcerned, or uninterested, busy trying to unfold the gown and put it on with one hand.

‘Here, let me.’ She took the gown and held it for him to thread his arms through. For once he didn’t protest, or insist he could do it himself.

She edged it up over his shoulders, standing on tiptoe – because even hunched over, his shoulders were impressive. Clearly spending hours on end rotary-blading things and doing whatever else was needed to keep a seventy-acre farm going was better for the male physique than pumping iron in a gym.

‘What?’

Her gaze snapped to his. And she realised she’d been caught staring.

What a shame those impressive shoulders came with his not-nearly-as-impressive personality.

‘Nothing.’ She sat on the moulded plastic chair in the corner of the room, grateful his distracting chest was now covered in the blue and red geometric cotton of the gown. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘Like shit.’ He adjusted his hand on his lap. ‘I’m guessing I look pretty terrific in this outfit too?’

‘Not at all, the red triangles blend with the bloodstains beautifully.’

He gave a gruff cough, which might almost have been mistaken for a laugh.

A small amount of colour had returned to his face. Whatever had spooked him seemed to be passing. While he could hardly be described as comfortable, he didn’t look as if he wanted to bolt for the door.

‘You don’t have to hang around,’ he said. ‘I can make my own way back when I’m done.’

‘Uh-huh, were you planning to jog back to the farm then?’

He coughed again, coming even closer to a laugh. ‘Did anyone ever tell you, your bedside manner is rubbish?’

‘Good thing I never considered becoming a nurse then, isn’t it?’ she said and was rewarded with an actual honest to goodness chuckle this time, albeit rough enough to sound as if someone had been sandpapering his larynx.

‘You’re not wrong.’

The door opened and Dr Grant walked into the room, followed by an older woman dressed in bright blue nurse’s scrubs and wheeling a metal trolley laden with what Ellie assumed must be the supplies needed to stitch Art’s hand.

‘OK, Mr Dalton, Tina is going to give you a tetanus shot and something to numb your hand and then I’ll get to work,’ Dr Grant said.

Art straightened on the bed, making the gown slip off one shoulder.

Apparently, the entertainment portion of the afternoon was now officially over. Sympathy whispered through Ellie. However annoying he was, and however many times he’d been stitched up before, this was liable to be unpleasant. And from the tension on his face, he knew exactly how unpleasant.

Watching Art get tortured wouldn’t have bothered her nineteen years ago after the way things had ended between them. But as the doctor and her assistant injected him, cleaned and irrigated the nasty gash and finally proceeded to stitch him – while Art remained stoic and silent and uncomplaining throughout the whole ordeal – Ellie had to admit that seeing him in pain now actually did bother her, a little bit.

*

‘You are not driving. Are you bonkers?’ Ellie marched ahead of Art across the car park and ignored his beyond stupid suggestion.

‘Why not? I’m fine now. And I’m a safer driver than you are.’

‘You’re not fine.’ She clicked the locks with the key fob and flung open the door. Settling in the driver’s seat, she waited for Art to climb in on the other side. The mulish expression on his face didn’t bother her as much as the white bandage on his hand which covered thirty-two stitches. She knew this because she had counted every single one.

As he wrestled with the seat belt with his right hand, she remembered that he was left-handed. She turned on the ignition and left him to struggle with the seat belt on his own.

‘I can drive one-handed,’ he said. ‘And even one-handed, I’ve got a better chance of getting us back alive than you have.’

‘Hardly. You’ve been shot full of enough painkillers to fell an ox, plus driving will only open up the wound.’ She crunched the gears, shifted into reverse, and wheeled into a three-point turn. Art gripped the dash like an old woman. She ignored the not-so-subtle hint. ‘And even though that would totally serve you right,’ she added, ‘the good Dr Grant’s just wasted twenty minutes stitching you up.’ Twenty minutes that had felt like twenty years. ‘And I’m not going to let you undo all her hard work just because you’re an idiot.’

A dark brow hitched up his forehead. ‘Since when did you become my keeper?’

‘Don’t worry, I’ll be resigning the position as soon as is humanly possible.’ With that in mind she accelerated down the country lane that led to the town’s main street. ‘And anyway, this is my car, so you don’t get a say.’

He didn’t reply, finally having conceded defeat. Feeling magnanimous in victory, she eased her foot off the accelerator as they headed over the speed bumps on the outskirts of town, and took her time getting onto the roundabout, waiting for a space big enough not to require the need to play chicken with any articulated lorries.

They’d been driving along the A30 for a good ten minutes, before he finally spoke again. ‘Thanks for helping me out. The cut was worse than I thought.’

The admission sounded weary and grudging.

‘Just a tad,’ she said, unable to resist a smile at his frown.

They drove on, the road passing the newbuilds on the outskirts of Gratesbury to wind through a landscape of fields banked by high hedges.

His eyelids kept drifting to half-mast and then popping open again. She remembered Josh doing the same thing as a toddler, when he was exhausted but didn’t want to go to bed. The thought made her think of Art as a boy, and the terror on his face when they’d walk into the unit.

‘Why didn’t you tell me you have a phobia of hospitals?’

His eyelids jerked open. He stared at her, the slow blink making her aware of exactly how long his lashes were.

He had the most amazing eyes, the tawny hazelnut brown embedded with flecks of gold. The bloodshot quality added to the glittery sheen of the low-grade temperature the good Dr Grant had told her to keep an eye on – because, at some point during today’s drama, she had become Art’s keeper.

‘I haven’t got a phobia. I just don’t like them much,’ he said, but his gaze flicked away as he said it and she knew he was lying.

How about that? She could still tell if Art Dalton was or was not speaking the truth. The way she had all those years ago.

It was a heady feeling, like discovering a superpower she thought she’d lost.

She drove down the track that led to the farm, recalling their exchange in the treatment room before Dr Grant had returned to give Art his thirty-two stitches.

OK, maybe she wasn’t totally immune to Art’s non-charms. But there would be no more flirting, with or without abs. Handling the fallout from one disastrous relationship was more than enough incentive to keep her libido on lockdown for the next decade, let alone the rest of the summer.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Driving into the farmyard, with Art dozing in the passenger seat, Ellie spotted a woman busy loading a muddy four-by-four while a young girl danced around beside her.

Art jerked awake as Ellie braked. As he hauled himself out of the car, the woman rushed towards them, the little girl bouncing behind her.

‘Art, what the hell happened to your hand?’ The woman’s eyebrows drew together. Tall and slim, with her long mahogany-coloured hair tied back in a ponytail, she looked elegant even in an ensemble of faded jeans, a baggy T-shirt and wellington boots.

‘Just had a disagreement with the rotary blade.’ Art lifted his bandaged hand as if to prove it was still attached. ‘It’s sorted.’

‘Give or take thirty-two stitches,’ Ellie added.

Art shot her his stop-being-a-drama-queen look.

‘Thirty-two stitches! In one hand?’ The woman crossed her arms over her chest, her concern escalating. ‘That sounds like some disagreement.’

‘Mummy, has Art lost his fingers?’ The girl clung to her mother’s leg, her eyes widening with a combination of fear and fascination. A puff of wild red hair surrounded a face covered in freckles, making her look like Little Orphan Annie after she’d been electrocuted.

‘No, sweetie, they’re still there,’ the woman murmured patting the child’s head. ‘Just about,’ she added under her breath.

Art crouched down and wiggled his fingers inside the bandage. ‘See, Melody, it’s all good.’ Straightening, he swept a sharp look over Ellie and Melody’s mother. ‘Stop scaring the children, ladies.’ He lifted the bag of medication out of Ellie’s hand. ‘I’ve got work to do.’ He rubbed the girl’s hair. ‘Bye, Melly,’ he said, then headed across the yard and disappeared behind the farmhouse.

What work did he think he was going to be doing on a farm with an injured hand? Ellie wondered, but stopped herself from shouting after him. Time to relinquish her responsibilities as Art’s keeper.

‘There goes the most stubborn guy on the planet,’ remarked the woman standing beside her.

‘You have no idea,’ Ellie murmured, the stomach muscles that had been knotted tight ever since Art had raced into the kitchen dripping blood finally starting to relax. ‘I had to practically kidnap him to get him to the doctor’s.’

‘Why does that not surprise me,’ the woman said, before unfolding her arms and offering Ellie her hand. ‘Hi, Tess Peveney, I’m Mike’s wife. You’re Dee’s daughter?’

Ellie nodded, returning the firm handshake.

Mike had to be the red-headed guy she’d met the day before. Melody had obviously inherited her father’s mercurial hair.

‘Ellie Preston,’ she introduced herself, her maiden name coming out more naturally this time. ‘It’s nice to meet you.’

‘You too. Sorry I missed the welcoming party yesterday. I was busy suffering the tortures of hell in Gratesbury. Otherwise known as helping out at a birthday party for sixteen four-year-old girls.’ She tucked her hands into the back pockets of her jeans and shuddered. ‘If I hear “Let It Go” or see another pink balloon, Barbie cupcake or sparkly deely bopper again in this lifetime I may have to be sectioned.’

Ellie laughed. ‘That sounds almost as traumatic as having to drag a bleeding man to Gratesbury’s minor injury unit.’

Tess grinned. ‘Nope, it’s much worse. I think I may actually have post-traumatic Frozen disorder.’

‘I like Frozen, Mummy,’ Melody piped up, hopping from one leg to the other. ‘Anna and Elsa are the best.’

‘I know how much you love Frozen, baby.’ Tess rolled her eyes for Ellie’s benefit, before addressing her daughter. ‘Run into the farmhouse and have a pee before we head for Salisbury.’

‘Do I have to?’ Melody begged, wiggling furiously.

Swinging her daughter around, Tess gave her a pat on the bottom. ‘Yes, because you need to…’ Taking a deep breath she launched into the Frozen anthem… ‘Let it go…Let it go.’

Her daughter ran off, struggling to complete the song’s chorus around her delighted giggles.

‘Are you going anywhere near the market in Salisbury?’ Ellie asked, once they had both stopped laughing. ‘I was supposed to be helping out my mum today on the stall.’

‘Actually, that’s exactly where we’re headed. Melly and I just finished baking the stall’s supply of strawberry shortbread and sourdough loaves. Or rather I baked and Melly ate as many strawberries as she could cram into her mouth.’ She swung round to indicate the trays she’d been loading into the car when Ellie and Art had arrived. ‘Why don’t you tag along?’

‘That would be terrific,’ Ellie said, pleased to get the chance to escape her unnecessary concerns about Art. Spending the rest of the afternoon in the company of women seemed like the perfect antidote to the morning’s drama.