Underneath The Mistletoe Collection. Marguerite Kaye

later, Ainsley was pouring their after-dinner coffee. The maid who helped out in the house had left, along with Mhairi, once dinner had been served, for the housekeeper preferred to sleep where she had always slept, in her quarters at the castle.

      Innes stretched his feet out towards the fire and shook his head wearily. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

      ‘It obviously does, else you would not have been sighing.’

      ‘When it comes to sighing, I seem to recall there was someone else in this room doing their fair share earlier this evening. You didn’t say whether you approved of that particular variation, now I come to think of it.’

      ‘I thought it was obvious.’

      ‘A man likes to know he’s appreciated.’

      ‘You are.’

      ‘I’m looking forward to reading that particular chapter of your guidebook. I reckon it will tax even Madame Hera’s newfound vocabulary to describe it.’

      ‘So you were serious when you suggested that I write it?’ Her smile was perfunctory.

      Innes frowned. ‘Why not? It makes perfect sense.’

      ‘And it will give me something to do.’

      Innes put his coffee cup down. ‘Have you something on your mind?’

      ‘It’s been more than three weeks since the Rescinding. I don’t have anything to do, yet every time I ask you how things are going with the lands, you find something else to distract me. I’m wondering if tonight’s variation, as you call it, was simply a better tactic than telling me it was late, and that you were tired.’

      ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

      ‘Nothing.’ She set down her cup. ‘They are your lands,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘You are the one who has set himself the task of making Strone Bridge better than it ever has been. You did not consult me before you made that decision. Why should I possibly imagine that you would think my opinion worthwhile now, when you obviously have no idea how to go about it?’

      ‘Where on earth did that come from?’

      ‘From being ignored! I have tried. I have tried several times now to remind you of the terms on which I agreed to come here, and you’ve ignored me.’

      ‘But you have helped. The Home Farm. The Rescinding...’

      ‘And I’ve entertained you, too, when you’ve found the real problems of this place overwhelming.’

      ‘You’re joking.’

      He looked at her aghast, but she was too angry to care, and had bottled up her feelings for too long to hold them in. ‘I don’t know why I’m still here,’ Ainsley said. ‘I’m not serving any purpose, and I’m a long way from earning back that money you lent me.’

      ‘Gave you.’

      ‘It was supposed to be a fee. A professional fee. Unless you’re thinking that it was the other sort of profession after all.’

      ‘Ainsley, that’s enough.’ Innes caught her arm as she tried to brush past him. ‘What has got into you? You can’t honestly believe that I deliberately—what was it you said?—distract you by making love to you?’

      Ainsley stared at him stonily.

      ‘What?’

      She shook her head. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

      ‘Which means that it does,’ Innes said wryly. ‘You should put that in your book, you know, if you’re including a section for husbands. Whenever your wife says it doesn’t matter, you can be sure it’s of dire importance.’

      ‘I could write the same advice for wives.’

      ‘I suppose I asked for that.’ Innes held out his hand. ‘Don’t go, Ainsley.’

      She hesitated, but she did not really want to run away, so she allowed him to pull her down on to the arm of his chair. ‘I don’t think it’s deliberate,’ she said, ‘but when you don’t want to talk about something, you—you distract yourself. With me, I mean.’ She made a wry face. ‘I am not complaining. I did not even notice it until tonight.’

      ‘And you immediately decided that I was pulling the wool over your eyes. You should know me better.’

      She flinched at the roughness in his voice. ‘I do. That was not deliberate, either.’

      Innes rested his head against the back of the chair, closing his eyes with a heavy sigh. ‘You do know me, better than I know myself, it seems.’

      He looked unutterably weary. Ainsley slid off the chair to stand behind him, put her hand on his temples. ‘Do you have a headache?’

      ‘I do, but I’m not going to risk another excuse,’ he said with a shadow of a smile.

      ‘Why won’t you talk to me, Innes?’

      ‘Because despite my resolve to be the saviour of Strone Bridge, I can’t see how it’s to be done. There’s nothing to discuss, Ainsley, and I’m gutted. That’s why I’ve not wanted to talk to you.’

      She pushed him gently forward and began to knead the knots in his shoulders. ‘If the situation truly is irredeemable, you should turn your mind to something else more constructive, such as that pier of yours.’

      ‘Now that Robert has started work on the foundations and we have most of the supplies in hand, that pier of mine needs little of my time.’ Innes sighed. ‘That’s nice.’

      Ainsley said nothing but continued to ease the tension in his shoulders, her fingers working deep into his muscles.

      ‘It’s different,’ Innes said after a little while. ‘The pier, the new road. I know what I’m doing with those. When things go wrong—as they no doubt will—I know how to put them right. You can’t just pluck new tenant farmers out of thin air. You can’t put heart back into the soil overnight. You can’t make a soil fit only for oats and barley yield wheat or hops, and even if you could, you can’t do anything about the rain or the cold. There’s so much wrong, and every solution I think of causes another problem somewhere else. There isn’t a solution, Ainsley. If the lands here were ever profitable, then it was a long time ago, and I will not clear the land just to turn a profit. I go round in circles with it all.’

      ‘If it’s any consolation, I do know how that feels,’ Ainsley said drily. ‘I also know from experience that bemoaning one’s ignorance and endlessly reassuring oneself that it is both impossible and futile to act is not only fruitless but a self-fulfilling prophecy.’

      ‘You are talking of your marriage.’

      She gave his shoulders a final rub, then came round by the side of his chair to stand by the fire. ‘Yes, I am. I was afraid to speak up because I thought it would make things worse. I was afraid to act because I thought it would make the situation irretrievable. So I said nothing and I did nothing and—and if John had not died, who knows what would have happened, but one thing is for certain, matters would not have miraculously cured themselves.’

      ‘You’re telling me that I’m dithering, and I’m making things worse.’

      ‘I’d have put it a little more tactfully, but yes.’

      ‘You’re right,’ he said with a sigh, ‘I know you are.’

      She settled in the chair opposite him. He was staring into the fire, avoiding her gaze. ‘It is the not knowing,’ he admitted. ‘The ignorance. That’s the hardest bit. I’m so accustomed to knowing every aspect of my own business, to being the man people turn to when there’s a problem. As I said, if something went wrong with the pier, or the new road, I’d know what to do. Or I’d be certain of finding a solution. But here, when it comes to the essence of Strone Bridge, I’m—I’m ashamed. People ask me questions. They look to me for solutions.