‘It’s something we do every Sunday,’ the little girl said, lolling against the door jamb. ‘We go up to the castle gardens and hunt for fairies, and pixies, and sprites! I never seem to be fast enough to spot them, but Uncle Ben does sometimes, don’t you, Uncle Ben?’
Alice hid a smile. ‘You do?’
‘Only sometimes,’ he replied seriously.
‘I know!’ Willow said. ‘Why don’t you come with us? Then you can see for yourself.’
‘I’m not sure Alice will want to—’
‘Why not? I’ve never seen a fairy before.’ Alice shot a wink at Ben. ‘And I’d like to see the castle up close.’
‘Yay!’ Willow said, practically bouncing up and down. ‘It’ll be nice to have another girl come along. Auntie Nee-nee’s hips aren’t up to fairy walks. I’ll go and get my coat!’
‘Hang on, wee miss! If you hadn’t noticed, Alice and I have work to do. It’ll have to wait until after lunch.’
Willow’s face fell. ‘That’s going to be ages!’
‘How about you do the homework you’ve got, and then we can have an extra-long walk?’
Willow’s disgruntled expression didn’t change, but she said ‘fine!’ in a way her mother would have been proud of and stomped off.
‘She’s a lovely little girl,’ Alice said when Willow was out of earshot. ‘Quite a character.’
‘That she is,’ Ben said, as he went back into the tiny en suite, knelt on the floor and put a bucket under the U-bend so he could undo it.
‘What brought her to live here with you and Norina?’
Ben stopped what he was doing and stared at the plastic joint he was unscrewing.When he’d got back to Invergarrig, the town grapevine had already been at work so everyone had known what had happened to Cat, which had saved him the chore of telling the story over and over, but it meant he wasn’t used to saying these words out loud. He cleared his throat, continued removing the U-bend, and attempted to keep his tone neutral. ‘My sister, Willow’s mum, died almost a year ago.’
He’d been able to hear the rustle of sheets, pillows being punched and fluffed, but the noise stopped. A shadow fell across the open bathroom door. ‘I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have asked, shouldn’t have been so nosey …’
He turned to look at her, silhouetted against the bright morning light streaming through the tall windows on the other side of the room. She maintained eye contact, didn’t look away, which was more than some of the townspeople had done when he’d returned home.
‘That must have been awful,’ she added softly.
He grunted. That was an understatement. ‘Yeah, it was. But it was worse for Willow.’
He turned to fiddle with the plumbing again, finding it was easier to talk when he was looking at the underneath of a sink. ‘Sometimes I wonder if she really gets it, if she isn’t expecting her mum to walk through the door one day, sit down at the kitchen table and talk someone into making her a cup of tea, the way she always did.’
‘Did your sister live in Invergarrig too?’
He shook his head. ‘Glasgow.’
‘That must have been a big change for Willow,’ she said. ‘To lose her mum and move here in all one go.’
He got up off the floor and met her enquiring gaze. ‘Willow was already living here. Norina’s had custody of her for the last three years. Cat had … issues. Addiction issues. She got clean while she was pregnant and stayed that way for a couple of years. I didn’t ever doubt her love for Willow, but her lifestyle …’ He shook his head and looked away. ‘Willow needed stability, a chance to have a proper education, not skip from place to place to avoid angry landlords. Or worse.’ He sighed. ‘I hoped we wouldn’t need to rely on it, but I pushed Cat to draw up a will, and after she died we discovered she’d named me as Willow’s guardian, not Norina, as we’d all assumed she would, so Willow is my responsibility now.’
Alice nodded, her eyes full of understanding. ‘Well, she seems a very bright and confident little girl. You seem to be doing a terrific job.’
‘We’re … managing.’ At least, he hoped they were.
‘And you sure you don’t mind if I come on this walk with you?’
He turned his attention back to the sink, a messy problem but a simple one compared to examining how he felt about Cat’s death. ‘I’d be glad of the company.’
Chapter Fourteen
Eleven months before the wedding.
