Her cheeks were now aflame, and tears had risen in her eyes. Frankie stretched and yawned, then took pity, as she always did.
‘Nah, he won’t have noticed. He’s far too busy counting bricks in old stone walls and helping wickle hedgehogs find a cosy bush to snuggle down in. You should tell him, though.’
‘I couldn’t! I mean – oh! I just couldn’t.’
‘Why the hell not? It’s the twenty-first century, you don’t need to sit around with your smelling salts waiting for him to come and sweep you off your feet.’
The idle bickering carried on like this for the next twenty minutes or so and, to Juliet’s relief, they did not return to the subject of Léo. She walked back down to the stable block, wondering if he would be in the kitchen, but when she pushed the door open, the room was empty. The tablet lay discarded on the table amongst a debris of crumbs and an empty wine glass and bottle. She was tempted to turn it on, just to have another quick glance at the page he had been reading, but remembered firstly that her French was appalling, so she would learn no more anyway, and secondly how kind he had been yesterday during the photos and teaching her how to taste the food with the wine, and she felt disinclined to pry. Instead, she wentupstairs and pushed open the door to her little studio. In the short time she had been living there, it had become ‘home’ more comprehensively than anywhere she had ever lived, including Feywood itself. She wandered over to the kettle and made a cup of herbal tea, something she thought she would never do, but which she found oddly empowering, as if she was making a positive decision to take care of herself. Then she sat down and switched on her computer. It was time to tackle those photos.
As ever, work helped the dust storm in Juliet’s brain to settle, and after an hour and a half, she pushed back her chair and sighed in satisfaction. Although many of the photos hadn’t worked, the most problematic being the ones she had taken in the kitchen garden, some of the others gave her a great rush of pride. The close-ups of Léo’s hands working the dough and chopping onions and herbs were almost perfect and would enhance the website, along with her drawings, which she would be able to finish soon once she had completed some other, paid, commissions. She felt shy looking at the portraits. When she was taking them, she had had the detachment of a surgeon, checking light levels, working out the shadows and angles with absorption. But now that she looked at the finished photographs, Léo gazing into the lens with calmness, confidence and humour, his personality fizzed off the screen and she felt as if she could reach out and touch him. This alone made her feel all hot and cold, and she returned to some compositions of oil bottles on the windowsill for a while, before returning to the portraits. Unfortunately for poor Juliet, the effect hadn’t worn off. His warm, brown-eyed gaze held just the slightest hint of sexiness, with a definite invitation teasing her. Even in the more serious shots, his lips curled upwards, with a natural inclination towards joy and fun. Her clever lighting had picked up the tawnyhighlights in his thick hair and shadowed his face flatteringly. Not, she had to admit, that he needed much help. He was a very handsome man, but not in a bland, polished way; not, she thought, like Toby with his sculpted hair and pampered skin. No, Léo had the look of someone who had lived; not dissipated, just well-adventured. Despite her reservations about him – partly because he was a man and therefore not to be trusted, but also because of the magazine article which was unfair, she knew, because none of them had understood enough French to know what was going on – when she looked at these honest portraits, she saw a kind, friendly, open face. It was a shame about the bossiness, she reflected, but maybe she shouldn’t jump to the conclusion that this made him controlling. She could decidethatonce she knew him a bit better.
Juliet knew only too well how it felt to be misunderstood, or labelled as something you knew wasn’t ‘you’, to the extent where everyone else seemed to believe it, and you doubted the tiny remaining nugget of certainty deep inside.
The screen had now become a swirling mass of colours as the screensaver kicked in, but Juliet didn’t nudge the mouse or tap a key to bring it back to life. She stared at it meditatively for a few moments, letting these thoughts wash across her brain and take form. Yesterday’s proximity to that most masculine of men, his calm authority when he had guided her to eat mindfully, his gorgeous eyes gazing into hers, albeit through a camera lens, had unsettled her. She had, she mused, believed her own publicity for too long and her confused push-me-pull-you reaction to Léo was a far cry from the cool, impervious ice-queen image she had cultivated for so long.It’s bloody Feywood, it does this to you. How can I be anyone but myself here, and how can I allow that when it caused me so much pain for so long?An image of Juliet’s mother flicked into her head, of her scorn at her middle daughter’s developing talents and interests and her mockingcriticism and sudden, unexpected rages which had driven Juliet up several different pathways before she left altogether, only to realise years later that she still wasn’t allowing herself to be, well, herself. How ironic that it was being back at Feywood that was finally bringing about the softening she had secretly craved.The ice queen melts, she thought to herself, and laughed.
Juliet didn’t see Léo for the rest of that day. She didn’t go up to the house for supper, preferring to eat some of her village store treats in front of the TV. She would have to get some more comfortable clothes, she thought to herself as she once again pulled on the only soft joggers and sweatshirt she had; this new lifestyle didn’t really call for tight waistbands and sharp tailoring.
The next day, after breakfasting in her pyjamas whilst taking in the glorious golden morning view and wondering how difficult it would be to capture on camera, she dressed quickly and set out to look for Léo. She hadn’t heard him downstairs, but on passing through the kitchen noticed that everything from the previous day had been tidied up, and the tablet removed. She had a brief twinge of regret that she hadn’t looked at the webpage when she had the opportunity, but remembered her new resolve to let Léo show her who he was, and not second-guess or jump to conclusions. She found him in the kitchen garden, tying up some sort of plant to conical bamboo structures.
‘Morning.’
‘Ah, good morning, Juliet.’
‘What are you doing?’
‘These are some beans I am trying to grow. The plants seem to shoot out fast all over the place, but there isn’t a single sign of a bean yet. Please can you help me? Just hold that piece of stringthere…bon! It is done, thank you. What brings you out here? More photos?’
‘Well, actually, the photos I took out here didn’t go well, but I’m pleased with the others. I’ve got some more work to do on them and then I’ll show you. No, it was something else I wanted to ask you about.’
‘Is everything okay?’
‘Yes, yes, I actually wanted your help with something. Something for the village.’
‘Of course, I will help you if I can. As long as it does not involve singing. I do not sing well.’
Juliet laughed with surprise.
‘No, not singing! Absolutely not. No, it’s something much more up your street actually – baking.’
‘That’s more like it. Are we going to enter something in the famous village fete scone-making competition? I have heard a lot about this, it sounds extremely competitive.’
‘No, not that, I wouldn’t dare. Agnes reigns supreme over the scone competition, and I certainly don’t want to get on the wrong side of her by entering, let alone winning, with a professional chef to help me. No, this is just making bread. Well, sort of.’
Léo narrowed his eyes suspiciously.
‘Sort of? Go on…’
‘There is a celebration coming up in a few weeks’ time called Lammas – lots of English villages mark it.’
‘Okay…I haven’t heard of it. Lammas?’
‘That’s right, it means ‘loaf mass’ and is a sort of early harvest festival. It celebrates the first wheat harvest of the season, I think. Something like that. Anyway, we always took a loaf down to the church when we were children – well, I did. It was sort of my thing. I bumped into the vicar yesterday, and he’s asked me to revive the tradition.’
‘It sounds wonderful. In France we have celebrations for the grape harvest, with plenty of wine, of course.’
‘Of course. I’m afraid there’s no booze at this one, but the bread is fun. It’s traditional to make it into interesting shapes. I always just made a plait, but owls and corn sheaves are popular.’
‘You want to make bread in the shape of an owl?’
