The blonde is about five feet away when I turn on my heel and sprint off, dodging through the crowds until I’m around the corner and safely out of sight.
And later, when my mum asks what happened to the bread, I lie and tell her I’m trying to avoid gluten.
CHAPTER 6
Hendricks
My eyes stay trained on Story attempting to disappear around a couple of people who’ve come out of a store on the other side of the high street. If it’s on my account, it’s pointless.
I could find her anywhere, anytime. Her ponytail no longer swings behind her, replaced by blunt edges bobbing along her shoulder, but the way she holds herself with hard-set shoulders, a straight spine, and a determined stride...I’d recognize her anywhere. My mind flashes back to the day I told her Sienna was pregnant, and I watched her storm away.
But if Story’s angry with me—still, again,now—it’s nothing on the anger I feel.
“Was that Max’s teacher?”
Tearing my eyes away from where my ex-best friend has finally vanished around the corner, I turn to Birgitta and nod. “Yeah.”
“She looked mad.”
“Yup.”
“Why?”
I shrug and shake my head, because I don’t have ananswer.
“I didn’t know you were coming into the village. I could have collected what you needed.”
“It’s your day off,” I reply mindlessly, my eyes back on the corner of The One True Love. The last spot Story was visible.
I wonder how far she’s gotten.
I’m so tempted to go after her. I want to run her down and shake some sense into her because she’s clearly lost her mind.
“I’m always happy to do whatever you need.”
My eyes flick back to Birgitta, and it’s then that a piercing pain hits me right between them before turning into a dull throb.
I know what people think when they realize Birgitta is my nanny. It’s what Story clearly thinks. Nothing more than a fucking cliché. ThatI’ma cliché. Not to mention how insulting it is for Birgitta.
Normally, people’s opinions are the least of my concerns, but they’re not holding it against me like Story is. And that brief thirty-second interaction has my blood boiling way more than it should on a frosty Saturday morning, because all it does is remind me of when she left England last time.
“Thanks, but you enjoy your weekend.”
She can’t have gotten far. Even at the speed she was sprinting, I could catch up to her or at least see where she was.
Fuck it.
“Actually, on second thought, could you give me a minute? Max is in the store. Would you mind waiting for him?”
Birgitta’s lips purse in slight confusion, and I’m not surprised. It’s her day off and I rarely ask her to work on a Saturday. Even if it’s only for a few minutes. It’s how I keep the boundaries in check.
“Sure.”
I take off, calling, “Thanks,” as I dodge a couple of Labradors on leads and hope Story hasn’t taken a shortcut through the fields. Though given the rain this week, it’s going to be muddy, and Story hates the mud.
After a couple of near misses where shoppers flock out of a store right as I run past, and ignoring Mrs. Winston calling my name, my memory proves correct. I round the corner and find her slumped against the fence halfway up the road by Miles’s cottage, head in her hands.
It stops me dead because even from where I’m standing forty yards away, I can tell she’s crying, shoulders jerking softly as she sobs, and my anger vanishes.
