For answer, I kiss him. Only a kiss like his single kisses, but it doesn’t work out that way. We don’t stop. We stay on that little sofa for hours.
Eventually, we go back to talking. And I make us tuna sandwiches, because who needs to cook at midnight?
“This is ridiculous.” He squeezes into a chair behind my kitchen table. “This place isn’t big enough for two people. Come back to Kendric House.”
“I can’t go back. What about my job? Sue Baker has been kindness itself to me. I can’t leave her in the lurch.”
“Isn’t she a gardener? Didn’t you tell me their business slows down in winter? Couldn’t she take over your workshops now? And keep the income for herself?”
“And I can’t go back. My apartment is a holiday let now, remember? The community needs the income from that until the legal issues are solved.”
He swallows the last of his food and washes it down with tea. “You don’t need an apartment. Kendric House has plenty of other rooms. You can even live with me.”
I smack his arm gently. “You’re quick with the solutions when it suits you.”
He laughs.
“Coffee?” I ask, getting up.
“I don’t want coffee, not now.”
I giggle. “Don’t you know anything? Coffee at the end of the date usually means an invitation to bed.”
His gaze travels over me, and even with the dime light, the need, the hunger shines in his eyes. “No. I’m not going to sleep with you. Not in this borrowed place. I want you at home where I can wake up next to you early with the sun streaming in through my windows. Come with me and we can have coffee on our balcony.” He pushes his plate away and stands up, then pulls me by the hand to stand against him.
“Besides,” I murmur into his neck. “I can’t live with you. You have hideous leather furniture.”
“Please? My Evangeline. Please come back to me.”
Chapter
Fifty-Five
Haven’t I always been good at quick exits? It’s part of my skillset. Once my mind is made up, I’m packed and gone very fast.
The only exception this time is that I don’t pack. Osian packs for me. We’ve had a short sleep – yes just sleep – side by side with his arm around me. He says I deserve better than a borrowed bed, and our first time should be somewhere special. So he’s packing for me to save time while I spend the morning handing over to Sue Baker.
She and her husband are genuinely excited to continue the workshops and potting days that I started. But they’re also worried.
“We’ll have to pull long hours the two of us.” Mr Baker can’t hide his concern as he flips through my handover notes.
“Offer internships,” I suggest. “Contact any college with a horticulture course. Some fresh graduates would jump at the chance, and you’d have an affordable but knowledgeable person to help out.”
“Are you sure you want to leave it all to us?,” Sue asks as she walks out with me to where I parked my car. “This is your business, your idea.”
“But your wonderful garden centre.” I stop on the pavement and look up at the sign above their door. “I know you’ll make a huge success.”
Sue gives me a last hug “I can never thank you enough. We’d never have even thought about doing this. The conservatory was stood empty for years until you came along.”
And then it’s all done.
By Ipm, Osian and I are on the A14.
Of course, he insists on taking all my luggage in his car. According to him, my red Mini is a ‘girly car’ that will have trouble enough keeping up with his Land Rover on the motorway without the added weight of two suitcases and a box of gardening gear.
Yet it’s him who keeps stopping. Once just outside Oxford for lunch, and again in Stroud because, as he puts it, “A shame to drive through the Cotswolds and not stop for a good look.” Except he doesn’t look at the town as we sit side by side in the café. He keeps an arm around me and every couple of minutes he drops a kiss on my forehead, my cheek, and when no one is looking, on my mouth.
Now we’re openly and officially in love, he doesn’t seem able to go two hours without touching me. Not that I mind. It’s such a thrill to feel the warm length of his body pressed to my side.
