Page 124 of The Cottage at Brambleton Hall

‘Best not, Magnus . . .’

She finished the line for him. ‘Would have both our heads . . .’

He grinned at her. It transformed his face; he looked younger and close to carefree.

The hen made another determined jab at a cabbage. Nate shifted his foot, blocking it neatly. ‘Not for you.’ It clucked a complaint and tried from another angle. ‘Oi, off with you.’ He nudged it aside with the back of his hand this time. ‘You’ve had your chance.’

‘They don’t learn, do they?’

‘Maybe they do but think it’s worth one more try.’

Inside, Sammy melted – was he just talking about chickens?

Nate rose and moved further down the path. Sammy followed, the ducklings bumping against her heels. ‘What vegetables should I be working with?’

He stopped beside a patch of dark, rounded leaves, thick at the base. ‘We won’t bother with that,’ he said.

‘Why?’

‘Beetroot,’ he said. ‘You don’t like it.’

He remembered the beetroot. That had to count, surely?

Nate settled beside a bed of pumpkins. ‘Winter squash is ready.’ He smiled at the ducklings. ‘They’ve grown’ he said.

‘Course they have. We’ve done all right by them.’

She sat on the edge of a raised bed, not quite touching, but near enough to be aware of him beside her, snipping carefully at pumpkins, leaving a few inches of stem on each. The night by the duckling shed sat there between them – unfinished.

‘You look like you haven’t stopped for a while,’ he said.

‘I haven’t.’ she said.

‘This isn’t you failing,’ he said. ‘It’s a tough job. And Magnus has worked with the best.’

‘Yeah, well.’ She nudged a bit of gravel off the path with the toe of her shoe. ‘I’m not one of them.’

‘You don’t need to be.’

One duckling squeaked sharply. Nate dropped the secateurs, stepped over, guiding it closer with his foot. Then he was beside her again, secateurs in one hand; she tried not to notice the muscles working in his forearm as he snipped. Something in her tightened, a mixture of hope and anticipation. Say something. Or reach for me. Please.

‘If I can get one clean day,’ she said ‘That’s all it’ll take. Reset it.’

‘Give yourself more than a day.’

She closed her eyes, shaking her head before opening them again. ‘That’s not how it works.’

‘Isn’t it?’

He sat down next to her. And for a second, she thought . . . but he didn’t.

‘No. You don’t get given time in places like this. You prove you deserve to stay.’

The ducklings climbed onto her shoes. It would be easy, she realised, to keep finding reasons to spend time with him. Easier still to pretend that was enough. But it wasn’t. She wanted him properly, not as a possibility tucked away for another day.

The garden kept moving – bees drifting in haphazard lines, dry leaves shifting and rustling against the side of the bed.

‘I’m not very good at this bit,’ she said.