‘There was a time you couldn’t stand me.’
‘You werenae all that keen on me either. But that lasted all of a few days. I seem to remember somebody throwing themselves at me behind the Gowk Heid Rock over on Skye when I was innocently taking them out on a friendly picnic.’
‘Ah, is that how you remember it?’ Beatrice laughed, knowing full well they had both been awkwardly leaning nearer and nearer and totally failing to close the distance between them with a kiss. ‘You took me to meet your family that day. I’d say that was serious.’
‘They gate-crashed our date!’
‘So itwasa date?’
Atholl held his hands up in defeat and stooped to kiss her lips. ‘Just don’t go overboard with your matchmaking, or the event planning,’ he pleaded. ‘This festival seems to have a life of its own now.’
Beatrice turned back to the screen with a sigh. He had a point. The event had become grander than she’d first anticipated but it was nothing she couldn’t handle. In fact, she needed the festival to divert her.
‘Atholl… it’s only because Iknowthat the festival will definitely happen, but with babies… nothing’s guaranteed. So, I’ll control what I can, for now. I can’t bear to let myself think about the future. You understand, right?’
She didn’t need to look up to see the sadness in Atholl’s eyes. He kissed her once again on the top of her head. ‘OK, well, you say the word when you want to think about gathering together a few baby things and I’ll be here. I even know what a baby bumby is now, thanks to Vic and Angela. I’d add one to your list when you feel ready to start writing one.’
‘I will,’ Beatrice laughed lightly, and Atholl watched her continue to work for a moment or two before leaving her in peace.
However, only moments later, the flashing of headlights outside the reception and the tooting of a car horn, followed by the sounds of an argument taking place on the pavement shattered any calm at the inn. Beatrice and Atholl ran to the door to see what the noise was all about.
Chapter Twenty-two
The Upgrade
‘I saidI don’t need to be carried. Why do you think they gave me crutches?’ Nina was practically shouting, as Mutt, with Nina’s Birkin cargo bag over his arm with her broken shoe sticking out of one of the pockets, gave in and held open the inn doors.
Mutt bit back. ‘You’re obviously feeling better; you’ve started snapping at me again. What were you doing up in the hills in that haar and mucking about on the road anyway?’
‘I told you, there was a cow, and it pushed me.’
‘I didn’t see any cow. Are you sure you’re not concussed?’
Nina slapped Mutt’s hand away from her forehead.
‘Seriously, let’s go back to the hospital, get your head checked.’ Mutt tried to stop her by walking in front of her.
‘Out of my way. I’ve got crutches and I know how to use them.’ Nina nodded her head towards Mutt’s crotch and he quickly moved aside.
Twisted not broken, but very painful to walk on for a few days, total bed rest and no flying. That’s what the doctor had told her after he’d thanked Mutt for his quick-thinking in driving her to the hospital.
It had taken over an hour to get there and Nina had slept most of the way with Mutt’s navy fisherman jumper tucked around her for warmth. The whisky and the shock had made her sleep, in spite of Mutt’s attempts to keep her awake with small talk and singing along to songs on the radio.
She couldn’t have known, as he’d helped her into the wheelchair at the doors of A&E, quite how rattled he’d been to have nearly struck her with his truck, even if he had only been crawling through the haar at less than ten miles an hour, coming back from collecting his big ladders from Port Willow castle where he’d done some work just before Christmas.
‘Stay with me, Nina. No sleeping now. We’re almost there,’ he’d begged over and over again as he’d suffered through every slow mile until they were at last free of the haar and on the dual carriageway where he’d put his boot down to get her the help she needed.
He’d told the doctor, ‘I thought she’d been hit by a car before I found her! I thought she was hurt, and badly too. With no way to get the helicopter out, I knew I’d be quicker setting off in the fog than waiting for an ambulance to come.’
The doctor had shaken his hand and Nina had rolled her eyes, telling them both, ‘I’m right here, you know? And Iwashurt!’
Her ankle was now a horrid greenish-blue beneath its bandages and there was no way she’d fit her foot inside the now-broken Jimmy Choo which the doctor had firmly –
and rather arrogantly, in Nina’s opinion – blamed for her fall. Nobody had listened when she’d shouted, ‘I told you, it was the cow!’ and the doctor had told Mutt he’d administered some pretty strong painkillers and she was to avoid any more early morning whisky sampling sessions while completing the course. Nina hadn’t reacted well to this and everyone had breathed a sigh of relief when she’d been discharged on the condition she rested at the inn for a few days and didn’t put any weight on the ankle.
‘What happened to you?’ Beatrice cried, overtaking Atholl to reach the limping woman first.
‘I fell, but it’s nothing. I’m just going to lie down for a bit.’ Nina stopped at the foot of the stairs. ‘Oh.’
