“Dad explained it to me,” I shared. “Great-grandfather bought the townhouse with some personal earnings and didn’t entail it to the estate.”
“Right,” Christine replied.
“So I can sell it. Give the money to Alex’s charity.”
“That’d be nice, but where would you stay when you’re in London?”
I held her gaze steady, but my tone was soft when I said, “Once I deal with Mum’s personal belongings, I won’t be back to England for some time.”
“I was afraid of that,” she whispered.
“Will you be okay here, on your own, with the help of a maid, seeing to things?” I asked.
“Prefer company, Blake. Yours, to be precise.”
That felt lovely.
Even so, I nodded and said, “I’m sorry.”
Her face got hard. “I am too, and I’ve got the urge to hunt down a notable Scotsman and give him a word or two.”
“We’d only been together a few weeks, Christine.”
“Your eyes are haunted. You’ve got dark circles under them, so I know you’re not sleeping. You aren’t eating properly. You keep yourself busy adding your mother’s clothes to that rolling rail we bought and texting your sister pictures?—”
“It’s not necessary for her to fly halfway across the world to look at some clothes and jewels.”
“I see you’re having a mind to your sister’s state, but, if you don’t mind me saying, luv, this isn’t about your sister being pregnant and having an important job. It’s about you hiding in this big house away from whatever happened to you up in Scotland.”
It really was not her place to speak to me like that.
I didn’t inform her of that fact.
“You need to talk to someone about it,” she carried on. “I know I’m not that person to you, but I could be if you’re willing to share with me.”
“I’m not a nice person and Dair found out I wasn’t,” I told her.
She looked stunned. “How are you not a nice person?”
Honestly?
It just hit me that I was at my happiest when I was in this house.
I felt at home.
I could ride horses.
I liked taking walks.
I could hide in a million (slight exaggeration) different rooms, doing my own thing without Mum bearing down on me.
I’d behaved here.
So she didn’t know the real me.
I wasn’t about to enlighten her.
“Just…trust me.”
