‘You do all you can to keep the Big House going, and the estate gardens too. Everyone sees it.’
‘And pretty soon they’re all going to see me fail. I’m no better than my old man.’
‘Hey,’ Jowan sprang up, reaching for her hand. ‘It’s far easier to squander a fortune than to make one, Mint, remember that. Raising money isn’t easy. Especially these days.’
At his touch, Minty’s teacup rattled in the saucer so loudly she had to put it down, but Jowan didn’t release her hand. In fact, seeing his effect on her made him bolder.
The first crack of lightning over their heads only served to heighten the electric tension suddenly passing between them.
‘You are the finest woman in all of Devonshire, and there’s no way I’d let you believe you’ve let any of us down. Youarea beacon, Mint. Look how everyone here moves around you like you’re the sun itself. We rely on you.’
Minty cast her eyes low and shook her head.
‘Who oversees the Christmas lights?’ he continued. ‘Who makes sure we have daffodil teas in the spring and strawberry teas in the summer, eh? You make so many things happen here.’ With these last words he unconsciously raised his hand to his heart, and Minty’s eyes followed it.
Realising what he’d done, he snapped his arm to his side once more and released Minty’s hand, but he didn’t step away. A tear rolled down Minty’s cheek and he had to ball his tattooed fist to stop himself wiping it away.
She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket. ‘Goodness, look at me. What a state to get in.’ She waved the hankie as though dismissing her sadness as a silly thing, before loudly blowing her nose. Jowan smiled tenderly at the sight of her being vulnerable.
‘You’re allowed to be sad, and you’re allowed to let other people know your worries. Let us help you more. Letmehelp you.’
‘Jowan?’ Minty pushed the hankie back into her pocket and met his eyes. ‘You’re my oldest friend. You already do so much for me. Asking for more would be taking advantage.’
At this, the two stood in silence, neither wanting to cross the delicate line that separated their treasured friendship and the uncharted waters of a romance, and yet they’d both been inching closer to the boundary these last few days.
Jowan, who’d been so bold a moment ago, gulped and faltered as he tried to find the words that would bring them closer.
‘I feel I’ve had a… a revelation of a kind, this week. I feel that having young Alex in the house and giving over…’ Jowan swallowed hard. ‘Giving over my Isolde’s belongings, and letting the girl sleep in that room where I nursed my wife…’ Jowan’s voice shook, and Minty pressed her hand to the spot where his heart was aching. ‘I feel I’ve allowed some… movement, after all these years of being afraid of losing touch with her, keeping her room just as she left it.’ Tears fell fast down his cheeks. ‘I feel now that I could… I could—’
The tumultuous air above the Big House bellowed a sudden thunderous cry as the sky released a flash of lightning so bright they both jumped closer. Jowan was surprised to find it was Minty who heldhimprotectively.
‘Jowan,’ she whispered low, as more thunderbolts split the sky, seeming to pierce the ground all over the estate. ‘I can’t lose your friendship, I couldn’t bear it.’
Jowan pulled back. The sincerity was etched across Minty’s face and it unnerved him, but before he could torment himself any longer with his fears and reservations, Minty pressed a kiss to his lips.
They held still like that for a moment, neither daring to move, as the rain poured and the lightning flashed, until Jowan took her in his arms and kissed her properly, the way he’d wanted to for a long time, longer than he’d wanted to admit.
For the first time in years Jowan’s mind was quiet. He wasn’t poor old Jowan de Marisco, the bookseller who’d given it all up to nurse his wife. He wasn’t the grieving husband haunted by the gaping mouth of the grave where he’d dropped a red camellia bloom on an awful winter’s morning. He was just a man remembering what it felt like to kiss a woman.
For them, there was no more thunder or rain, no sounds at all. There was only the two of them together, not thinking any further than their lips touching.
And yet no kiss, not even one this good, was going to hold it all back for long.
It was Minty who broke away first, blinking and astonished, looking for all the world like a girl of twenty, her eyes great pools of innocence and surprise. ‘Jowan?’ she breathed.
Hearing his name brought him back to the kitchen of the Big House with the harsh unshaded bulb too bright above them. The thunder and lightning was right above their heads now.
He stared back, unsure what to do. His mouth worked, knowing he should say something but no words came. He was frozen to the spot as everything he’d pushed to the back of his mind while they kissed came flooding back to him.
‘Jowan? Jowan, don’t,’ Minty said, somewhere between pleading and warning.
He took a step backwards, then another, as Minty’s eyes widened.
‘Don’t you dare, Jowan de Marisco!’ Minty’s voice quaked as it dawned on her. He was going to run.
That was when the loudest thunderclap rent the sky and the whole of Clove Lore was lit from above by shooting fingers of blinding fire bolts accompanied by the sound of stone blasting apart and bricks flying somewhere at the back of the estate.
Minty picked up her feet. She ran all the way through the house, bursting through the doors onto the parterre patio and out into the lashing rain.
