Hattie offered for him to leave earlier than usual.“I’m sorry.I should have given you prior warning Eve may visit this week.I didn’t realize it would rattle you so much,” she said.
“It is not your fault; Eve and I were bound to meet one another at some point.But yes, I think it best that I go home,” he replied.
Freddie’s mind was singularly focused during the walk home to Grosvenor Square.Had he made a grave mistake in giving Eve the note from Osmont Firebrace?Her face as she had read the note had shown no emotion.He had expected tears, or at least a mouthful of Eve-quality abuse, but she had given nothing away.
Upon reaching home, he let himself in through the kitchen door.Zeus welcomed him with a cheerfully wagging tail and what Freddie surmised to be the remains of one of his mother’s hand-embroidered cushions from the upstairs sitting room.The dead cushion was added to the growing list of items the dog had chewed or slobbered to death over the past few weeks.Even after his father eventually returned him to funds, he would be poorer than a church mouse.It would take months to replace all the damaged and broken household items.
He had done everything he thought possible to keep Zeus below the stairs during the day, but the dog was far smarter than his awkward lopsided face gave away.It was a pity his father had taken some of the household keys home, leaving Freddie unable to ensure Zeus stayed out of particular rooms in the house.
He opened the bag of dog meat he had bought at the market that morning and deposited it into Zeus’s bowl.Claws scattered on the stone floor as Zeus pushed Freddie to one side in his haste to get to the food.
“Steady on, boy,” Freddie muttered.
While Zeus wolfed down his dinner, Freddie pulled some small logs from the fireside stack and arranged them over the embers of the fire he had lit earlier that morning.Using the set of bellows, he managed to give enough air to the fire to soon have a small flame licking at the edge of the wood.He brushed the wood dust from his hands, then hung the kettle over the flames.
In a short while he had hot water, and he settled down at the kitchen table to drink a cup of tea.He lifted the lid of the honey jar and scooped a spoonful of honey in.He was about to grate a small piece of cinnamon into his cup when he remembered Eve’s words.
You have smashed my heart to a thousand pieces.
He put the stick of cinnamon down on the table and stared at it.
His mother’s fine things could be replaced.Even his well-chewed boots could be repaired, but there was nothing he could do to undo what he had done to Eve.He would be forever the man who had crushed her heart.Another of his firsts that held no honor.
And now she was ready to move on and find love with someone else.He should be glad she was over him, that he was simply a cautionary tale in her past.
Someone else.
Someone else who would hold her in his arms and kiss those wickedly soft lips.Another man who would know the soul-deep sound she made when she came to completion.Another who would …
“Damn.”
He had been naïve to think Eve would never visit St John’s.His one place of sanctuary from his misdeeds was a sanctuary no more.Every day he would be looking up from the kitchen table waiting to see if she reappeared in the doorway.She had never truly left him.His erotic dreams of her continued every night.He had worked hard to put another face to the woman he dreamed of making love to, but Eve steadfastly refused to give up her hold on him.Night after night he saw her beneath him, her lips parted as she gave a soft cry as he claimed her love.
Seeing her in the flesh this morning had only reinforced her grip.He knew it was more than lust.The whole time she had been in the garden at St John’s he had wanted to reach out and take her in his arms.To hold her and beg for forgiveness.To offer whatever it would take to have her gift him with her smile once more.
“Yes, well you made doubly sure she will never give you a minute of her time again,” he muttered.
He wondered how many times she would read Osmont’s note.Had she torn it into a thousand pieces like he had done with her heart?Or was it already a small pile of cold ashes in her bedroom fireplace?He prayed she had destroyed it the instant she returned home.The last thing he wished was for her to sit and stare at that damned piece of paper, mulling over all that had been so cruelly taken from her.
Not for the first time since he fled into the woods at Rosemount Abbey did Freddie rue his fateful decision.There had been far too manyif onlymoments for him to have made any headway in the war with his conscience.
He picked up the cinnamon stick and broke off a small piece, stirring it into his tea.The damage was done.At least Eve would now know the whole truth of what had happened at Rosemount Abbey: that she had not in any way been the one at fault.He would have to accept that small grace and move on.
