‘I only did what I was told.’

  ‘You’re still part of it. Part of the creation, part of the landscape. Doesn’t it feel great?’ Her eyes were lit with fire, not only from the setting sun but with passion and joy. Her art wasn’t a job: it was part of her and she was part of it.

  Ruan’s pulse skittered when Tammy held out her hand and took his. That small gesture was so innocent yet so erotic, it sent him off into the stratosphere. His stomach tightened low down with exquisite pain. Never had he wanted someone more. Never had he felt as if he’d do anything for someone, abandon everything, gamble it all.

  He reached for her and gathered her into his arms. He pushed his hand under her hair, his fingers supporting her neck as he kissed her, tasting the salt on her lips before the vanilla and honey of her lip balm.

  She kissed him in return, holding on to him, bunching his T-shirt in her hand, exploring his muscles and pressing tighter against him. His body responded, predictably yet to the max. The need was so intense, it scared him. He didn’t want her to know how badly he wanted her, or the way she was scrambling his brain, his nerves, his responses … it made him too vulnerable.

  The waves pounded the beach in the distance yet Ruan didn’t care if they broke over him and dragged him under. He wasn’t going to end this kiss for anyone.

  ‘Ruan …’

  His eyes were still tightly closed when Tammy murmured his name.

  ‘Ruan,’ she said again, louder and making it sound like the key to a magic portal. An open sesame … Where had these fanciful feelings come from? This terrifying jumble of physical feelings and emotions he couldn’t put a name to?

  ‘Wow,’ he murmured.

  ‘Mmm. Wow …’

  ‘I don’t want this to end,’ he said.

  She stiffened in his arms. He knew immediately that he’d said the wrong thing. The worst thing.

  ‘Everything has to end,’ she murmured, lowering her hands to his waist and resting them lightly there, as if she wanted to get away but was letting him down gently. Why had he said such a stupid thing? It was way too soon for her and he hadn’t really known what he meant himself.

  ‘This thing – between us. Us,’ she said. ‘We should enjoy it while it lasts.’

  ‘While it lasts? It’s only just started.’

  ‘Yes, but I want us to have no illusions.’

  ‘Illusions about what?’

  She shook her head. ‘About some kind of holiday romance.’

  ‘I’m not on holiday,’ he said indignantly. ‘I live and work here.’

  ‘So you’re definitely planning to stay in the caravan?’ she asked.

  ‘Well, no. That is only temporary. I – need a more permanent home. I just haven’t decided one hundred per cent where that should be yet. It depends on work and on – other stuff.’

  ‘Don’t make it depend on me,’ she muttered. Then she spoke briskly. ‘Right, I have to go. It’s later than I thought. I promised to call round to Lola’s to help her eldest with his school art project.’

  ‘OK … Lucky boy.’

  ‘He won’t think that, but Lola says he needs inspiration.’ She hesitated. ‘I really enjoyed today. It was fun having a helper and sharing – everything. I just need to take things a little slowly for now. OK?’

  ‘Of course it’s OK. Take it at any pace you want to. It’s all good,’ he said, torn between hope and disappointment.

  ‘Thanks. See you soon, then.’

  Back at the car, Ruan flicked the lock on his Audi.

  She got into her van, leaving Ruan wrestling with a much more pressing problem than admitting he’d inherited a beautiful old wreck. Tammy hadn’t suggested they make another date.

  She closed the door of her van.

  Christ. He had to try to salvage the evening.

  He leaned down to the open window. ‘I’ll call you tomorrow, then? Fix something up?’ he said with a what he hoped was an encouraging, though not desperate, smile.

  She nodded and smiled back. ‘Sure. That’d be good.’

  ‘Great,’ he said warmly. ‘Speak soon.’

  With a wave, she started the van and drove off, leaving him on the clifftop, trying to make sense of a mix of conflicting emotions. She’d told him she wanted to take things slowly and then asked him whether he planned on staying around again.

  She was as changeable as the sea and as unpredictable: and probably even more of a threat to his previously ordered, safe life. A life that – he realised to his horror – would be drabber and paler without her in it.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  ‘What’s wrong with me?’ Tammy muttered in the middle of attempting a downward-facing dog on her hammam towel the following evening.

  ‘I don’t know. What is wrong with you?’ Lola’s voice came from a few feet away.

  Their yoga class had been cancelled while the instructor was in Ibiza so the two friends had arranged to meet up at a quiet corner of Porthmellow beach. It was a beautiful June evening, the sun still warm and high in the sky at 7 p.m. Dogs chased across the sand, kids scoured the rock pools, and the waves barely kissed the shore. It should have been idyllic.

  Tammy wobbled more than usual because her mind wasn’t on her pose or on her breathing or even on the festival. Ruan’s comment after their kiss on the beach the previous evening had intruded so many times.

  ‘I don’t want this to end,’ he’d said.

  Before those words, Tammy had been ready to drag him off to some secluded cave and rip his clothes off. By this had he meant only the kiss? Or their relationship?

  She’d been scared he wanted too much too soon so she’d tried to dampen his expectations – then asked him if he was planning to stay around. He hadn’t called earlier as he’d promised, probably because she’d pre-empted the call with a message of her own saying she’d be busy all weekend.

  Talk about giving off mixed signals. No wonder he’d looked confused. If Ruan hadn’t been brave enough to ask her if they could meet again, she didn’t know what their next move would have been.

  Lola rose to her feet, assuming the tree pose, foot on the inside of her knee, palms pressed together as if in prayer.

  ‘As you’re not going to answer your own question, do you want me to tell you what your problem is?’ Lola said.

  Tammy thought before answering, mainly because she didn’t want to get into the details of how she’d made the first move on Ruan and pulled away when he’d shown the slightest hint that he wanted their arrangement to last.

  ‘Go on, then,’ she said, wavering but determined to hold the pose.

  ‘You end things before they can leave you.’

  ‘Argh!’ Tammy collapsed on to the sand.

  Lola laughed. ‘You’re not in the zone tonight, are you?’ She held out a hand and helped her friend to her feet. ‘I’m right about men though, aren’t I? You sabotage any relationship before you have the remotest chance of being hurt.’

  Tammy thought before replying. ‘How do you work that out? Things just come to a natural conclusion. Remember Robbie Kingston, who joined the army? How was that my fault?’

  ‘He was trying to get away from a broken heart. He couldn’t join the French Foreign Legion, so he signed up.’

  ‘Not because of me. He wanted to be a tank engineer.’

  ‘Hmm. Let’s try the tree again.’ Lola pressed her hands together, unwavering in her one-legged pose. ‘What about that Welsh chap from the wildlife trust? I liked him.’

  Tammy tried to focus on a rock to aid her balance. ‘Dafydd went back to Tenby because he was offered a new job.’

  ‘He applied for that job because there was no point in staying in Porthmellow.’

  Tammy turned her head to face Lola and teetered again. ‘Did he actually say that?’

  ‘Well, yes. Not to me but to my ex.’

  Tammy returned her foot to the sand. ‘You never told me that.’

  ‘I didn’t see the point in upsetting you. You said you hated having to finish it.’

  ‘I did. I always hate ending things. It would be better if I didn’t start things, which is why, since Sean, I’ve been behaving like a nun.’

  ‘Have you wanted to behave otherwise?’ Lola shot back.

  ‘Well … no. I haven’t met anyone I liked enough.’

  ‘Being celibate is no sacrifice then?’

  Tammy sighed in frustration. ‘You have an answer for everything, Lola, but I’d like to point out I’ve actually only had three vaguely serious relationships in the past ten years, including Sean.’

  ‘Did you love them?’

  ‘Love? I – I liked them. A lot. I cried every time when it ended.’

  ‘When you ended it.’

  ‘When it came to a natural conclusion – apart from Sean. I’ll admit that the idea of forever spooked me.’

  ‘Forever with him or anyone?’

  ‘I don’t know … and as you’ve just got divorced, I do think you could cut me some slack on the permanence front.’

  ‘Hmm. I suppose you have a point, but I was with Vince for six years. Then he had an affair, but things had been going wrong between us for ages. Now I’m glad because I feel like a weight has been lifted off me.’

  ‘There you are then. Sometimes not being together – sometimes an unhappy ending is the right one.’

  ‘Maybe, deep down, you’re scared you’ll lose someone again, like your mum and dad – and not on your terms?’ Lola said gently.

  ‘Shall we end with the tree again?’ Tammy said, already getting into the position. She put her hands together and then raised them above her head, determined to nail it this time. Yet balancing was almost impossible because Lola’s assessment was so accurate, it gave her the shivers.

  Lola groaned, and stood on one leg, wobbling. ‘Damn you. You’re only suggesting the tree because you know I’m knackered now. Argh …’ She staggered forward, dissolving into laughter. ‘Is this new self-reflective Tammy anything to do with Ruan?’ she asked, hands on hips.

  Tammy ended the pose, pleased to have both feet back on the sand. ‘Maybe. OK, yes. He mentioned something to me last night that spooked me. I do like him, but I don’t know how to apologise or explain the way I feel.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘That I’m scared of liking him too much and of thinking too far into the future. We’ve only just met.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter how long you’ve known him. If it feels like he could be the One or someone special, you need to run with that. Have you even tried to explain it to him?’

  ‘Not yet. I want to take things slowly but then we kissed and he mentioned not wanting things to end between us. It spooked me. I need to tell him he’ll have to match my pace.’

  Lola picked up her yoga mat and arched her eyebrows. ‘Let’s hope he has a lot of patience, then.’

  After iced coffees in the evening sun outside the Nauti Café, they went their separate ways, Tammy musing on Lola’s comments.

  When she walked down the alley to the rear of the Harbour Studio, her nose wrinkled. Davey had hung out in an artists’ commune for a brief time in his youth and it still wasn’t unheard of for him to indulge in the odd joint, even though he thought Tammy didn’t know.

  What she did know was that the acrid stench which had reached her nostrils wasn’t weed.

  She crept quietly to the end of the alley and suddenly called out loudly, ‘Hellooo!’

  Just as she strolled around the corner into the rear yard, Davey was stubbing out the fag with his boot while simultaneously wafting his hand around as if a wasp was attacking him.

  ‘Well, it’s good to see you can multitask,’ she said with a glare. ‘Thought you said you’d given up.’

  ‘I have.’ He sank on to an iron garden chair he’d been meaning to restore for the past three years. There was an empty bottle of lager and an open packet of cigarettes on the table.

  ‘Don’t lie. You packed in the fags years ago. You know how much I hated it. You need to look after yourself.’

  ‘Quit sounding like my parent. You millennials. You’re just a bunch of tofu-eating, yoga-obsessed young fogeys.’

  She laughed. ‘I’d rather be a fogey than a boomer.’ She sat down on the spare chair, enjoying their banter. ‘But why are you smoking again? Are you stressed out by this project? Can I help you out? Or can you ask Breda to lend a hand? I don’t want you to be ill. Neither would Breda.’

  ‘Neither of you can stop that happening.’

  She went cold. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Only that I’m not getting any younger.’

  ‘God, you’re sixty-two, not ninety-two!’

  He smiled wearily. ‘I feel it sometimes.’ He patted her hand. Goosebumps popped up. The gesture was gentle and tender but was so un-Davey-like, it made her blood run a little colder.

  ‘Come on, what’s up? You can talk to me. Wondering what’s wrong makes me worry more. Is it Breda? Are you two splitting up?’

  ‘Breda?’ he exclaimed.

  ‘Don’t pretend you don’t care for each other.’

  He gave a hollow laugh. ‘OK. I surrender. We do “care for each other” as you so quaintly put it. She’s a good woman.’

  Now it was Tammy’s turn to laugh in derision. ‘You make her sound like a character from Jane Austen.’

  He feigned hurt. ‘She is a good woman. A kind, talented and brilliant woman who’s far too good for me, which is what’s bothering me. If we became “official”,’ he said, curling his lip at the word, ‘and moved in together, I’m not sure I could live up to her expectations.’

  ‘I’m sure she doesn’t have “expectations”,’ Tammy said, bracketing the word with her fingers. ‘She loves you for who you are.’

  ‘Loves me?’ Davey said in genuine wonder. ‘Christ, I don’t think it’s gone that far, has it?’

  ‘I give up on you!’ Tammy burst out in frustration. ‘You’re losing sleep and you’ve started smoking. You’re worrying yourself silly about a woman and whether you’re good enough for her. If that isn’t love, I don’t what is.’

  He shook his head. ‘You’re so idealistic …’ Tammy sensed what he was thinking: who was she, a young woman, to tell him about love? She who had never truly loved a man – not romantically – how could she possibly understand?

  ‘I’m being realistic,’ she stressed. ‘If you’re scared that moving in with Breda would leave me stranded here, don’t be. I’d love to be able to bring men back to the flat without you watching over me like Nana the dog in Peter Pan.’

  He scoffed. ‘Men? Where are these mythical men? I’ve only seen one man since Sean the Builder – Ruan the Suit.’

  ‘There have been others,’ Tammy said indignantly.

  ‘True, but I only feel the need to watch over you with this one.’

  ‘Well, don’t. I know what I’m doing, and besides, this conversation was supposed to be about you. Promise me you’ll talk to Breda. Properly talk to her. Stop tormenting yourself and her, and accept that maybe, for once, you can be in love and be loved back. This is your time, Davey, and I don’t want to mention it, but you said yourself you aren’t getting any younger.’

  He laughed and stood, scooping up the ciggies. ‘I’ll take your advice.’ He lifted the lid of the wheelie bin and tipped the half-full packet inside. ‘Happy now?’

  Tammy pressed her lips together. ‘It’s a good first step but let me know when you and Breda have sorted things out. Then I’ll be happy.’

  Before he could argue any more, Tammy whisked off upstairs to the flat, feeling a little lighter at heart. She might possibly have actually got through to Davey. Sorted out his love life.

  Now all she had to do was not sabotage her own.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Ruan exhaled as the builder’s van trundled off up the track from Seaspray.

  It hadn’t been the best few days. First, he was convinced he’d blown his chances with Tammy, or at least made her super wary of him. All he’d heard from her since their kiss in the cove was a message saying she had to work all weekend in the gallery and had a memorial tribute to do for a local fisherman. She’d said speak soon at the end of the text but he wasn’t holding his breath.

  He kept himself occupied by tackling more work on the gardens, convinced that the plants he’d chopped down had miraculously shot up again over the week. He also met up with two mates at Kane’s, batting away any questions about Tammy.

  Now, he was reeling from the scale of work that needed to be done on the fabric of the house itself. Even before his great-uncle had moved to the home, he’d let the building fall into disrepair, and once the place was empty, the elements had done the rest. Ruan was beginning to think he’d bitten off more than he could chew in selling his flat and trying to tackle a renovation.

  He hung his waterproof on the hook inside the caravan and shut the door.

  He was working from ‘home’ that morning, partly because he had a meeting with a long-standing client of the firm whose remote farm was situated near Land’s End. It made sense to travel straight from Seaspray.

  He was also at the van because he’d scheduled two site appointments with builders. The first, now disappearing up his drive, had left him with a cloud over his head to rival the stormy morning. She’d worn gold wellies and a permanent scowl – and had taken one glance at the house before sucking in a breath and pronouncing, ‘It needs a lot of work.’

  Tell me something I don’t know, Ruan had wanted to retort but had politely laughed.

  ‘What exactly do you want me to quote for?’ she asked while she clicked her tongue and huffed discouragingly. ‘The walls, the roof, clearing the site, new windows, remortaring the façade, new joists and RSJs internally, possible underpinning? Have you had a mining survey done yet?’

  ‘Mining survey? There are no old tin mines round here, are there?’

  ‘Maybe not in the immediate vicinity, but within five miles there are plenty. This is West Cornwall, you know.’ She smirked. ‘You won’t get a mortgage without a mining survey. Unless you don’t need a mortgage?’

  ‘Er. I hadn’t fully decided on finance until I got some quotes,’ Ruan replied, trying not to sound pompous.

 

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