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“I suppose he needs sobering up,” she said as she watched him. “I could make him a coffee, but I don’t think he drinks it.” She looked at Archie, hoping for some advice, because the truth was she had no idea what to do.
“Or you could dunk his head in a bathtub of cold water,” Archie suggested with a smile. “The lad needs a firm hand. That’s all he’s missing.”
“A firm hand?” It sounded terribly Victorian.
“Aye. He’s had his way too often, as far as I can tell.”
“And how can you tell?” Laurel asked, feeling prickly all of a sudden, defensive although she’d only had the care of Zac for a fortnight. “You’ve barely met either of us.”
Archie shrugged. “It’s obvious.”
Was it? Laurel thought of Zac’s history of misdemeanours and his eventual exclusion from school. Had they happened because he’d been given too much freedom and not enough love? What kind of mother was Abby? Laurel had no idea, and all of it—Zac’s issues, her ignorance—made her feel so very sad.
“I’m not sure I’m the one to give him a firm hand,” she told Archie. Zac’s eyes had closed and he sounded as if he were snoring. With a sigh, she went into the kitchen to fill the kettle. “I’m only in charge for another two weeks.” Not even that now.
“Two weeks isn’t nothing,” Archie returned. “Especially in the life of a teenaged boy. It can seem like forever.”
“Yes, but…” Laurel frowned uncertainly. “It’s not really my place, is it?”
“Your sister gave you charge of the boy, didn’t she?”
“Yes…”
“Then it’s your place.”
Slightly annoyed by his rather highhanded manner, Laurel reached for the tin of teabags and plonked one in a cup. “So what do you suggest I do?” she asked. “What does this firm hand look like? Drag him upstairs by the ear? Shout at him? Take away his phone?”
Archie scratched his chin thoughtfully. “The phone’s not a bad idea.”
Actually, it wasn’t, but Laurel shook her head. “He doesn’t get signal here anyway.” The kettle clicked off and she poured boiling water into the mug, morosely watching the teabag float to the top. Why, she wondered, did life never turn out the way she kept wanting it to? She’d always been a determined optimist, desperately wanting to believe that the magic was real, and that fantasy could become reality. But it never bloody did, no matter how she tried.
“I don’t know what to do,” she said, as much to herself as to Archie.
“You could send him to me,” Archie said, entirely unexpectedly. Laurel turned to stare at him in confused disbelief.
“Sorry…”
“He could help me around the farm for the day,” Archie said easily, as if it were simple, even obvious. “I have a barn that needs mucking out, sheep that need their winter feed, and one or two ewes that might start lambing in a week or two. I’ll find something for him to do.”
“Oh, but…” She could not picture Zac on a sheep farm. He would be horrified. “He’s a city boy, really.”
“All the better.”
Laurel suppressed a smile at that, even though she still was hesitant. “I don’t know.”
“It would give you a chance to catch your breath, as well,” Archie pointed out. “And you need to do something, otherwise he’ll be running rings around you from now till next Sunday, once he knows he got away with this.”
“Next Sunday…”
“Just an expression.” He grinned, his eyes crinkling into bright blue creases. “What do you think to it?”
What did she think to it? A day to herself sounded wonderful, if she were honest, even if that made her feel guilty. She could do her Christmas shopping, a big food shop, even catch up on her work emails. And maybe Zac did need a firm hand… or something. Whatever she’d been trying clearly wasn’t working.
“All right,” she agreed. “One day sounds good. We could give it a try, at least.”
“Or two or three, if you’d rather.”
“I think we’ll start with one. But first I should get him up to bed.” Laurel glanced at the cup of tea she’d made for Zac, but which she doubted he’d drink, judging from the snores she could hear coming from the next room.
