A Marrying Man?

‘Georgia?’ he said in an entirely different voice. ‘Is it your back?’

‘Of course it’s my back, you blithering idiot,’ she retorted with an effort. ‘What does it look like?’

‘Here, let me help you.’ And he picked her up and put her gently down on the bed against the pillows.

She groaned again and bit her lip.

‘May I make a suggestion?’

‘What?’

‘Do you think some heat would help?’

‘I suppose so,’ she said ungraciously.

‘Then why don’t you have a hot bath? We’ve got at least an hour and a half to fill. And I’ll try and rustle up a hot-water bottle or something for you to take with us.’

She couldn’t hide what the thought of soaking in a hot bath did for her, and without further ado he went into the small bathroom and started to run it. He also brought her bag in from the car and helped her across to the bathroom with it when her bath was ready.

‘Thanks,’ she said briefly at the door.

‘Can you manage?’

She glanced up at him and her eyes said it all.

He smiled with some irony but said nothing, and she locked herself into the bathroom.

She soaked for a good half-hour, and when she climbed out her back felt better. She decided to change into something more comfortable and less constricting and put on her blue tracksuit. It was still raining outside and looked cold and miserable.

What greeted her when she left the bathroom came as a bit of a surprise. There appeared to be a minor feast laid out on the Formica-topped table: a cooked chicken, some rolls, a bucket of coleslaw, some cornish pasties, some apples and oranges and a bottle of wine. And there were plates and glasses and utensils from her own picnic hamper, which she’d forgotten was in the car.

‘I hope you don’t mind.’ William Brady rose as she emerged.

‘You’ve been busy shopping, Will!’ she commented. ‘Why should I mind?’

‘I found your hamper in the car.’

‘Good work,’ she said drily.

‘I also got this,’ he said, and held up a tube of embrocation. ‘In case you didn’t have any.’

‘Super! I haven’t. I suppose you’re proposing to rub it all over my back yourself?’ she said witheringly.

‘It’s probably easier for me to do it,’ he replied gravely, ‘and it might just give you some relief.’

‘Now look here, William Shakespeare—’

‘Georgia, after the way we kissed each other just now,’ he said patiently, ‘this would be nothing. You wouldn’t even have to undress, just push your top up—why don’t you stop behaving like a spoilt child?’

She smiled at him through gritted teeth, hobbled over to the bed, lay down on her front and said, ‘Off you go, then, Will, but take one liberty and you’re liable to get a black eye this time.’

‘There,’ he murmured a few minutes later, and pulled her top down modestly. ‘How does that feel?’

Georgia opened her eyes. She could still feel his hands gently massaging the cream into her back and had to admit—to herself, that was—that it had been heavenly. ‘Better, thanks,’ was all she said briskly, and she turned around to sit up.

He put the lid on the tube. ‘You’ve got a couple of spectacular bruises.’

‘I thought I might have.’

‘Par for the course, I suppose,’ he commented.

‘Yep!’

‘Why don’t you stay there? Are you warm enough?’

She gazed at him, then leant back against the pillows. ‘Yes, Mum. Thank you, Mum,’ she murmured, and looked blandly into his hazel eyes as he handed her a plate of chicken and salad. ‘So, Will,’ she went on, ‘want to tell me why you did it? I really thought I wasn’t your type.’

He poured wine into two of her gaily spotted plastic glasses, handed one to her, then sat down at the table and looked meditatively across at her. ‘Why I kissed you? It amused me to do it, I guess. Why did you kiss me back, Georgia?’

She nibbled at a chicken leg, then said thoughtfully, ‘I can remember thinking at the time that I might as well give back as good as I got. I wasn’t getting anywhere doing anything else, now was I?’ She took a sip of her wine and gazed at him challengingly.

He said nothing and his expression was enigmatic.

‘And I suppose,’ she continued, waving the drumstick, ‘it amused me to think that someone like myself, so fallen and wicked, could tempt you out of your ivory tower, Will. Or at least—well, you can’t feel quite so superior now, surely? I mean, we did get a bit carried away together, didn’t we?’