Starting Over by Sue Moorcroft Page B

hadn’t confided in Angel, confessions leaking from all her deepest hurts, oozing through the thin dressings of her tenuous recovery.
    ‘It got worse. I found out I was pregnant. Then I lost it.’
    The amusement faded from his face. ‘Lost the baby?’
    ‘Lost the baby. Lost my grip. God, I lost my grip. Lost my self-respect and my confidence.’
    The afternoon was nearly over. The wine had given her a headache. ‘When I miscarried, I bled and bled and bled . They couldn’t stop it, couldn’t keep me conscious.’ Blood on her clothes, the bed, the floor. Great scarlet splashes. She’d woken attached to a drip, someone else’s blood to replace what her body pumped out so incompetently and a taste as if she’d sucked a penny. Shaking with weakness, losing control of string legs and lead-weight feet.
    ‘It took a while to get over it. To be myself.’
    ‘And now you’re you again?’
    ‘Getting there. But with the amount of blood I lose every month, I’m surprised I’m not two-dimensional.’ What was she doing ? Talking to Ratty about the Curse ? An embarrassed snort and she changed the subject. She was sure she was going to regret this.
     
    Would she regret this tipsy afternoon? His upper arm bounced gently against her shoulder as he walked her home. Angel was right – actually, Ratty was OK.
    ‘I hear you’ve been calling on Lucasta?’
    She laughed. ‘She’s amazing. Sings your praises!’ Swinging back her hair that had sprung out of its clasp some time ago. ‘‘‘Miles does this for me, Miles does that, Miles is such a grand chap!” Difficult to believe it’s you she’s speaking about. More coffee?’
     
    They’d reached Tess’s gate. Ratty was tempted. Turquoise eyes alight, her hair – he must remember to ask Angel what that colour was called – flying in the breeze, and her body neat and lithe, he was tempted to go indoors with her and see where he could make it lead.
    He hadn’t set out with seduction in mind. In fact, he already had a date this evening with Catriona and could do with sleeping this skinful off beforehand. Yep. Sticking with Catriona would certainly be simpler.
    So he addressed the remark before, instead of discovering what the offer of coffee implied. ‘My grandfather ruined her,’ he explained.
    ‘ Ruined her?’
    ‘There was a grand affair between them when they were each married to other people. It became public, Grandfather unsportingly elected to remain with his wife. Lucasta’s husband, in self-righteous fury, stuck her in Pennybun whilst he continued to live it up in Chelsea . Poor old Lucasta.’
    ‘Treacherous men.’ Tess was looking sleepy, maybe the best of the alcohol had passed, for her. He skipped coffee.
     
    ‘This is for me?’
    Pink and edgy without alcohol for insulation and in the cold light of a Tuesday, Tess fixed her eyes on the folder open in Ratty’s rimed hands, another picture of Nigel the pig, this time driving a shell of a car, black curls streaming, tattoos above his trotters.
    ‘If you want it.’ Uncertainty. She’d carried the folded card protecting the inked caricature as she’d walked up Port Road and out of the village between the hedges, almost to the next village of Port-le-bain , before turning back and making for the garage on her way home. How would he receive the little offering?
    Awkwardly, feeling that Tess was showing off?
    Or reluctantly, wondering if he was going to have to fend off a pass?
    It was just a couple of hours’ work. Because Toby hadn’t wanted to part with one of his parade of Nigels, because Ratty had, in offering the innocent pleasure of getting squiffy in a village pub on Sunday afternoon, made Tess feel like any normal person. Shown outrage over Olly and put the whole thing more in perspective. In the past . She wasn’t sure how much she liked him, but she felt grateful.
    Hands jammed in pockets, feet shifting as if ready to race off, she watched as Pete and Jos crowded round to look,