Julia pursed her lips. “What did you do?”
“What didIdo?” Nora’s eyebrows vaulted skyward.
“Daniel would turn the world over to find a grain of sand you wanted,” Julia continued calmly, one dimple peeking out of her otherwise smooth cheek.
“And I wouldn’t do the same for him?” Nora demanded, surprised by the sting in her chest.
“Of course you would.” Julia held up her hands. “Perhaps you’ve been a bit sensitive?” she added more gently.
Nora tamped her rising temper and settled against the tree again. Even if she wanted to deny it, Julia had just proved her point. Something she was terribly good at. “Just because you and your husband never quarrel—”
Julia’s eyebrows interrupted her. “We’ve been married over two years. If you really think we’ve never argued—”
“Not that I’ve ever seen,” Nora amended. “Harry’s never grumpy with you.”
The obvious rejoinder—Julia was never, to Nora’s knowledge, grumpy with him—sounded loud in the silence.
Nora muttered, “And Daniel hasn’t exactly been grumpy with me.” She picked a bit of grass off her skirt and tossed it aside. “What hehasbeen doing is injecting his opinion into my work.”
Julia frowned. “You work together. All of you. All I hear all day is four doctors sticking their noses into one another’s work. I thought you liked it that way. What’s different now?” Julia waved a leaf at Queenie. The round wombat peered at her through impossibly small eyes.
Nora rearranged her legs, but that didn’t ease the growing discomfort in her back. Daniel was usually supportive of her ideas. But the way he’d looked at her when he talked about Dr. Adams… “Thisisdifferent.” She started slowly, finding her way through the words. “He took Dr. Adams’s side over mine before he’d heard my account of it.” The memory still stung.
Julia scratched Queenie on her round rump. “I know a bakery—it’s in Clerkenwell. Serves the best pastries I’ve ever eaten, but you can hear the husband and wife bellowing at each other before the sun comes up. Perhaps blending marriage and a business is difficult for everyone?”
Nora wrinkled her nose. Poor comfort, being compared to the screaming bakers of Clerkenwell. She had no interest in bellowing at her husband and no tolerance for being bellowed at, either. “But we love collaborating. At least, we always have before.” Given her current feelings, some qualification was necessary.
“And I’m sure you always will,” Julia hastened. “Most of the time. But differences are bound to happen—and that’s often how you push each other forward. Horace is beastly to Harry, but—” She licked her lips. “Harry’s much more confident in his work than he was two years ago. And he’s not ashamed of his mistakes. They don’t get in his way anymore.
“Some conflict can be helpful, I think. And from what I see of you and Daniel… Well, you are so connected because of your work. This is a tiny wrinkle.”
“Julia.”
They both turned toward the sound of Harry’s voice. He had a fine one: deep, with a warm Scots burr. Walking out from the house toward his wife, he wore a matching smile. “Are you trying to get your fingers bitten off by that savage thing?”
“Queenie’s about as savage as your slippers,” Julia scoffed.
Harry swooped up the unresisting wombat, careful to aim her claws well away, and kissed her on the top of her head. “I’ve missed my girl all day,” he said with a teasing look at his wife over the furry bundle.
Julia pretended coolness. “Well, you can promenade round the park with her if you like, but you’ll need to buy her a fine dress first.” Harry worked long hours, but Julia insisted on a stroll with him every Sunday.
Nora shifted onto her knees. She ought to leave them alone.
Harry squinted at Queenie’s face. “No dress could help this homely thing. Still, I can’t help adoring her.”
He dropped to the grass with a tired groan, and Julia lifted her hands, making room for him to put his head on her lap. “What a day,” he said. “I had to put a man’s shoulder back in place. I swear he was eighteen stone. It felt more like a wrestling match with a bear than a medical consultation.”
“Sounds dreadful.” Julia ran a finger through his short, ruddy hair, and he fell silent.
Nora studied the picture of utter contentment before her, unable to leave just yet. Perhaps she’d try to paint it from memory later and give it to her friends as a gift. There was something so complementary about the angle of Harry’s face and the turn of Julia’s shoulders. A purple smudge on his sleeve, from the shadows of the thick branch overhead, and a yellow stroke across Julia’s jaw where the light slid down her face…
She didn’t know where Daniel was today. They’d just nodded at each other this morning. He’d left before breakfast.
She sighed. Her trouble with Daniel was nothing compared to what Harry and Julia had overcome in order to sit contentedly together. Nora didn’t like to think of it, but it was heartening to see no trace of unhappiness left over. There certainly could have been.
Years before, Julia had been raped at a house party while away from her family. When she’d discovered she was pregnant, she tried to kill herself, cutting her arms to ribbons. Miraculously, she’d missed her arteries, but she’d come perilously close to bleeding to death.
At the time, Harry was a mere acquaintance, but one Julia’s father had trusted enough to summon for this emergency. Anxious lest she try again, he’d begged Harry to end his daughter’s pregnancy, though she was still unconscious and performing abortions was illegal and highly dangerous for the patient.
