Rainy Day Sisters (5 page)

She'd learned her lesson there, at least. No more trying too hard, not with men, not with their children. No more jumping into relationships, convincing herself she was in love just because someone liked her tidying up after him and watching his disagreeable kids.

“Here we go,” Maggie said cheerfully, and Lucy watched with some trepidation as parents began to line up by the glass partition. She listened in semi-awe as Maggie efficiently dealt with lunch money, new uniforms, permission forms for everything from music lessons to using the climbing wall, and a variety of other school matters that had her head spinning yet again.

“I'll never remember all this,” she told Maggie when the flood of mothers—and two dads—had finally stopped. Maggie patted her arm reassuringly.

“Of course you will.”

Lucy had a feeling Maggie was just saying that because she wanted to skip off to Newcastle and her grandchildren.
She
wanted to skip off to Newcastle.

Still, the morning settled down and Lucy found she did get the hang of it, or at least of photocopying staff schedules, which proved to be easy but rather dull. However, even that had its pitfalls, for Alex Kincaid made an appearance just as all the children were spilling out into the school yard for morning playtime, a scowl making him seem, annoyingly, even more attractive. He really had that brooding thing going on, and Lucy wondered how old he was. He had that sort of fit middle-aged quality that made it impossible to tell whether he had just turned thirty or was nearing fifty.

“Miss Bagshaw?”

“Yes?” She lurched out of her seat as if standing to attention, and Alex's frown deepened.

“Did you photocopy these schedules?”

“Er, yes.” Lucy tried one of her bright smiles. “Is there something wrong with them?” Stupid question, clearly.

“The paper,” Alex explained evenly. “Did you notice anything about it?”

She glanced down at the schedule he held in his hand. “Er . . . it seemed quite thick, actually.”

“Yes, it is, Miss Bagshaw. It's card stock,
actually
, and quite expensive. We don't normally use fifty pieces of card stock for staff schedules. We use normal-weight paper. Despite your lack of administrative experience, I think you might have realized that.”

Lucy tried to will herself not to flush. She could hear Maggie busying herself in the office behind her, a few teachers slowing their pace as they ushered their pupils past her. She felt everyone's stares.

“I'm sorry,” she said, stumbling over the two simple words she was saying far too often lately. “I didn't realize.”

“That, Miss Bagshaw, is quite obvious.” He glared at her, and Lucy glared back. It was better than the other option, which was to burst into tears. As a barista she'd had her fair share of angry customers whose Americano didn't come fast enough, or whose cappuccino didn't foam quite the way they wanted it to. And when a customer took somebody's else cup? Always her fault.

She'd always laughed it off, and the other staff had laughed it off too, but somehow it hadn't felt as awful as this. She was too raw to be yelled at right now. She needed to grow back a layer of skin before Alex Kincaid tore another strip off.

“Sorry,” she said again, and Alex glared at her for another five seconds before turning abruptly on his heel and stalking off.

Lucy sank into her seat; she was actually trembling. Behind her Maggie made a sound that was very nearly a snort.

“I know it's the beginning of term and all that, but it is only fifty pieces of bloody card stock.” She sighed and then clapped a hand on Lucy's shoulder. “He is usually fair,” she told her. “He must be having a bad day.”

Lucy bit the inside of her cheek as she felt emotion bottle up her throat; she wasn't sure whether a laugh or a sob was welling up inside her. She'd been flitting from one over-the-top emotion to the next ever since everything had blown up in Boston. On one hand, it was all so
ridiculous
, whether it was her mother's grandstanding about not showing favoritism or Alex Kincaid's dressing-down about card stock or her sister's seeming resentment of her. And yet, however ridiculous, it could still hurt.

She stared at the closed office door, wondering why Alex Kincaid was so tightly wound. He was head teacher of a lovely little primary school in a lovely little village in a lovely little corner of the Lake District. And the sun was actually shining today. What on earth did the man have to be stressed about?

She sank back into her seat and stared blankly at the computer screen. Why had all the text turned green?

Fifteen minutes later Lucy had managed to turn the text back to black, but had lost a paragraph about PE uniforms in the letter to parents and was frantically trying to find where it had gone. She did not relish the idea of asking Alex Kincaid to resend the letter to her e-mail, and Maggie Bains had “popped off” to feed her cats. Lucy suspected she would be gone for some time.

A sudden cry from the school yard where the younger children (called, rather adorably, Infants) played had Lucy lifting her head. With nothing short of alarm she watched one of the playground supervisors bring a tiny-looking girl into the office. She knew she was working in a school, but she hadn't actually thought she'd have to interact too much with the children. She had absolutely no qualifications and yet the playground supervisor didn't seem to realize this, for she plonked the girl down on a chair right next to Lucy.

“Can you do something with this little one, then?” the supervisor asked cheerfully. “I've got to get back out there.”

“Sure, of course,” Lucy murmured, because she could hardly say otherwise. She told herself it couldn't be very hard, comforting such a very small girl, and yet it was her smallness that terrified Lucy.

The girl had huge blue eyes and masses of light brown hair, like a cloud around her pointed, elfin face. She sniffed loudly and then mumbled something so garbled by tears and a Cumbrian accent that Lucy couldn't make out a single word.

“Well, then,” she said in the too-hearty voice she knew was so often used by people who were not comfortable with children. “Let's get you a Band—a plaster, shall we?” Except she remembered as she rose from her chair, Maggie had said the school policy was no plasters, only ice packs. But did you really put an ice pack on a cut knee?

“We can clean it off, at least,” she told the girl, although she had no idea if that was government policy or not. Still, a little water surely couldn't hurt. She went to the staff room and ran some warm water onto a paper towel, and then brought it back to the girl, who had thankfully stopped crying but was still sniffling.

“Here we are.” Cautiously Lucy dabbed at the cut knee. Once the blood was cleared away, it didn't look so bad. “I just need to fill out an accident report,” she said as Maggie's instructions came back to her. She dug through a drawer and filled out the form before handing it to the little girl, who took it with a doleful sniff. “Now you give that to your mum or dad when you get home, all right?”

“I don't have a dad.” The girl spoke matter-of-factly, just as Lucy once had. The telltale wobbly tilt of the chin and the defiant glint in the eye were familiar too.

“Well, your mum, then,” she said, keeping her voice cheerful. The girl nodded, biting her lip, and the gesture caught at Lucy's heart.

Seeing her sitting there, hunched over, her face tear-streaked and her lip still wobbling . . . Lucy knew
exactly
how she felt. “There, there,” she said softly, and impulsively she gave the girl a clumsy hug.
That
had to be against government policy, but this little girl needed a hug.
Lucy
needed a hug. And it seemed like a six-year-old with a scraped knee was the only person who was going to give it to her.

And the little girl must have been grateful, because she threw her arms around Lucy and pressed her face into her shoulder. Lucy was gently easing back when she felt someone's gaze on her. She looked up and froze when she saw Alex Kincaid staring at her with that terrifyingly inscrutable expression from the doorway of his office.

Lucy braced herself for the sharp criticism that was surely coming her way. Only this time she wasn't going to trip all over herself to apologize. She stared back for a moment, her chin lifted in bravado more than actual courage, and then after about two seconds she glanced quickly away. So much for courage. The man had an absolutely basilisk stare.

When she risked glancing at him again, however, he was smiling, rather awkwardly.

“All right, Eva?” he asked, and the girl nodded, wide-eyed. It looked as if most people were intimidated by Alex Kincaid. Although to be fair, he had a rather nice smile. No more than a quirking of his mouth, really, but it softened him a bit.

She straightened and gave Eva a smile of her own. “I think you can go back outside now.”

Eva scrambled off the chair and headed out, and Lucy braced herself for Alex's criticism.

“I'm sorry I yelled at you about the card stock,” he said stiltedly. Someone was actually saying sorry to her. It was a rather nice feeling.

“That's all right,” she answered. “It was only paper, after all.”

Which was, she realized, probably not the right response.

By four thirty she was exhausted. She'd regularly worked eight-hour days at the café in Boston, but that now felt like a jaunt at the beach compared with this. Her mind spun with all the information Maggie had thrown at her, despite the older woman's assurances that she'd be “right as rain” by tomorrow afternoon, when Maggie was leaving. Lucy felt panicked at the thought. Or she would feel panicked if she had the energy to summon the emotion.

Yet there were still a few things to look forward to, she thought as she headed out into the glorious September afternoon that Juliet had told her existed, but Lucy hadn't quite believed. The sun was still high in the sky, bathing everything in gold, and the air was warm—or at least warmish.

Standing there, Lucy felt a surge of love for the place, for the potential of it. Some of the teachers were going to the pub tomorrow night, and they'd invited her along. Back at the beach café a few days ago, Juliet had opened up, at least a little, about why she'd moved here. One of the pupils seemed to like her.

Smiling a little, she headed down the hill.

Back at Tarn House, Juliet was out walking the dogs and no guests were due until tomorrow, and so for a little while Lucy had the house to herself.

She kicked off her shoes amidst the jumble of boots in the hall and put the kettle on in the kitchen, stretching luxuriously. Juliet, she saw as she dropped her arms, had left her a note propped against the salt and pepper shakers, reminding her that it was Thursday, and her turn to make dinner tonight. Halfheartedly Lucy wondered if scrambled eggs would suffice.

She wasn't much of a cook. She didn't bother when it was just for herself, and the meals she'd occasionally made Thomas and his boys had never seemed to satisfy them, if the melodramatic gagging and choking noises Will and Garrett had made during dinner had been any clue. Thomas, caught between apology and accusation, had always ordered them takeout.

Just as with those unruly boys, Lucy had a slightly shaming desire to please or even impress Juliet, and yet she recognized that impressing her half sister was going to be about as hard as impressing her mother, something she'd never once managed to do.

She curled up on the window seat with a mug of tea and gazed out at the same view she'd had from the school, only closer up. She could see the deep puddles in the sheep pasture, the wooden five-bar gate that led to yet another field, and from this angle the sea was no more than a twinkle in the distance. The light was syrupy and golden, gilding everything in sight.

The scene was perfectly pastoral and peaceful, and yet there was something a little melancholy about it too. The fields were empty save for a few dirty-looking sheep, and dark clouds threatened to overtake the fragile blue of the sky.

Some of Lucy's hard-won optimism waned. She should check her e-mail, yet she couldn't stomach the thought of the newsy, concerned messages she'd probably received from Chloe—or those she most likely hadn't received. Her mother hadn't spoken to her since Lucy's one tearful phone call after the story had broken, when Fiona had sighed and said she was sorry, but Lucy really needed to develop a bit of backbone.

“So this is you helping me?” Lucy had asked, her voice choked, and Fiona had had enough grace to admit, “I know it doesn't feel like it, Lucy, but yes.”

Lucy had hung up the phone, and they hadn't spoken since.

She could call Chloe now, and yet Lucy was reluctant to talk to anyone before her life here seemed just a little more promising. Chloe was someone important in marketing, and even though they'd been best friends since freshman year of college, their lives had taken divergent paths: Chloe's towards career success, Lucy's less so. And she didn't feel like having Chloe hear just how much less on a phone call.

She was going to the pub, she reminded herself. She had a job. Juliet could, on occasion, thaw a little bit. Given time, things would surely improve.

In any case, she wasn't about to run away again.

She drained her mug of tea, and went to see what Juliet had in her cupboards for dinner.

Half an hour later Juliet walked in with two very muddy dogs, both of which she banished to the utility room before turning to Lucy.

“Something smells good.”

“Pasta with egg and bacon. I'm afraid I'm not a gourmet cook.”

“Simple works for me,” Juliet replied briskly as she washed her hands at the sink. Lucy laid plates on the table and Juliet fetched forks and knives. She took a bottle of red wine from a rack in the pantry and brandished it, eyebrows raised. “No guests tonight, although you've got work tomorrow. Fancy a glass?”