The Dog House (Harding's World of Romance) (11 page)

Colin laughed and slapped him on the back.
“One dinner, man. That’s all it’s been. And this week I’ll be going on a hill-walk with her while she conducts research. If that’s serious, it isn’t in the way that you mean.”

Aiken looked unconvinced. “Remember my Aunt Mildred,” he said darkly.
“The charming local who seemed like a breath of fresh air until she landed him and he took half of everything. Fortune-hunters, Colin. They’re lurking out there for the likes of you and me.”

Colin gave a dry laugh. “I don’t think she’s overly taken by the likes of you and me, to be honest,” he said.
“More the opposite. More pro-Scottish, anti-idle English, I’d say. She probably has a poster of Braveheart on her bedroom wall. And no, I haven’t been there, if that’s your next question.”

“Well, that should keep things from going too far,” Aiken declared, sounding somewhat relieved before his brow fell again. “But you intend to see her again.”

“A walk, as I said,” Colin said with a sigh. “She doesn’t seem to be falling for my charms. At this rate, there’s a high risk that we’ll end up as friends.”

Aiken gave a low growl. “Well, I suppose we’ll have to meet her properly, then,” he said
with resignation. “But if we all start naming plants and quoting poets…”

“
You can put me out of your misery with a five-iron,” Colin assured him. “I’ll save my impressive new botanical skills for my mother and the poetry for my father. That way he can at least drop “thrown- away education” from his list of strikes against me.”

“They’re really coming up, are they?” his friend asked with sympathy. “That might put a damper on the end-of-season parties.”

“They won’t stay long,” Colin said, trying to sound positive. “They can never stand my company for too much time.”

Aiken looked doubtful. “Unless the who
le point is to curb your spending,” he said, concern starting to creep back into his voice. “It’s as if everything is conspiring to change you.”

“Do I seem changed?” Colin asked in surprise, his mind racing back over his behaviour at recent social occasions, unable to recall anything out of the usual.

“No, not really,” Aiken admitted grudgingly. “But this Scottish girl will try, you mark my words.”

“I haven’t started to give history lectures yet, have I?” Colin asked meekly, trying for a laugh.

His friend accorded him a smile. “You’re not a complete bore yet,” he assured him. “But we’re keeping an eye on you.”

“Will you lads hurry up?” Bridget’s voice called impatiently. “You have to catch up and take a look at what Millie is wearing.”

The two men exchanged wry glances. “I could do worse and get serious about one of our closer associates,” Colin said mildly.

“That’s why I feel safer here,” Aiken said sourly. “Not as likely to happen.”

“Is this about you starting to feel serious toward Em?” Colin teased his friend, waiting for and receiving the expected look of shock and horror.

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Just checking,” Colin said with satisfaction. “Now what if we actually concentrate on the game?”

“Now there’s the Colin we all know and love,” Aiken said, his wolfish smile spreading slowly over his face. “I’ll bet you a tenner on the next hole.”

“Make it twenty,” Colin said nonchalantly. “I’m supposed to be taking things more seriously, remember?”

“I think that’s meant to be financial responsibility, according to your father.”

“Life in general, according to Fiona.”

“How about golf, according to old
Rabbie Aiken?”

“Sold,” Colin agreed with satisfaction.
“For a twenty.”

Chapter Seven

It was a beautiful early
autumn afternoon. The air was crisp and clear; the light, pale on the turning leaves of the heather they were walking through. The hills were yellow and red, empty and inviting, rolling in crumpled folds to the horizon where dark clouds were starting to gather. The side valleys were wide and gentle, cut through with the white flash of clear-running streams.

Fiona
’s cheeks were rosy with fresh air and exhilaration as she led the way along the hilltop. For her, this was the most beautiful landscape in the world and she couldn’t resist a quote about the wide open country in her eyes.

“More of your man Campbell?”
Colin asked cheerfully, wandering along beside her with an easy stride.

Fiona
grinned. “Close. Bruce Springsteen.”

Colin raised his eyebrows. “I had no idea that he was Scottish,” he commented mildly, eyes twinkling.

Fiona made a face at him. “I surprised you, didn’t I?” she asked triumphantly.

“Impressed me, I would say,” Colin corrected her cheerfully. “That almost counts as frivolous listening, or at least as music that isn’t full of Scottish nationalism.
Although he might well have been inspired by Campbell’s “wide open country that opens eyes and hearts and minds.””

It was
Fiona’s turn to be impressed. “You’ve read Campbell,” she stated, in obvious awe until a slow grin spread across her face. “You read up on him just before this walk to impress me.”

“He’s not such a bad read,” Colin said casually. “I’d rather have waited for the movie, but…”

Fiona smiled happily. They had spent a relaxed and enjoyable afternoon together, with a lavish picnic on the banks of a stream and breathtaking views of the endless, empty hills. Now they were slowly making their way along the ridge to come down in the next valley, where they had left Fiona’s car for the return.

“I really wanted to see this area because he made it sound so beautiful,” she said, stooping to brush the springy heather with her hand. “And because it might not be like this for much longer. The farmer who owns it has been approached by some developer who wants to put a resort on it, maybe a golf course.”

“Too steep for a course,” Colin said dismissively.

She sent him a doleful look. “That’s not the point,” she said sharply. “This area should be protected.
There are several species of protected wildflowers that grow along the streams that really shouldn’t be disturbed.”

“I thought we had laws to protect them,” he said with a slight frown.

She sighed. “We do, and the developer will have to do some sort of compensatory measure elsewhere, but it isn’t the same as just preserving the land as it is.”

“So what we see right now is how Campbell saw it?” Colin asked, bringing the subject back to a more positive note again. “I should take a picture of it while we can.”

“I think he met someone,” Fiona said as she looked down at the valley below. “His writing was dark and gloomy at the start of the notebook and now it sounds brighter, more positive, even though summer was over and the landscape itself should have seemed bleaker and more desolate. Or maybe it was the land itself that slowly won him over. I have to read further and see if I can figure out which one.”

“It’s probably both,” Colin said. “He met somebody who made him see the landscape d
ifferently, see everything differently.”

Fiona
glanced at him surreptitiously but his eyes were on the distant hills and his face wore the same cheerful, unreadable mask as ever.

She felt a slight twinge of exasperation. This game, whatever it was that was going on between them, was certainly fun and kept her on her toes, but she found Colin’s charm impossible to take seriously. He was constantly saying nice things about her, or teasing her in a way that seemed like flirting, but at the same time he never pushed things, keeping a sort of respectful distance between them as if this were his normal way of interacting with anybody.

Which it probably was, she reminded herself. He was famous for his charm and for making a person feel special. So it was up to her to be smart enough not to take it too seriously, simply to enjoy his company for what it was. Ironically, after years of only dating friends, she was now starting to worry that this relationship was headed that way and that this would put an end to the tension which she felt building between them. She didn’t want him to start seeing her as a sister.

“Do you have siblings?” she asked out of the blue, following her line of thought.

Colin looked startled by the unexpected question. “Let me guess, you have a sister named Heather and these walks fill you with family memories,” he said lightly.

She stared hard at him. “Or is it true that in high society you never talk about personal things?”

He smiled down at her and placed a sprig of heather behind her ear. “I should have known you would bring this down to class lines,” he said, not looking the least bit put out. “Didn’t you know that in the upper class, family isn’t considered personal? It’s more like a business arrangement, and it’s all public knowledge, as you would know if you studied the celebrity gossip as thoroughly as you study your poetry. I am the sole heir of the Parker fortune, if that’s what you’re checking on.”

Again she looked at him to see if he really thought that she was thinking about his money. “That’s not what I was asking,” she said heatedly, before the amused gleam in his eye told her that he was teasing.

“However,” he said, rubbing his hands together with childish glee, “You have just opened the season on personal questions, which I have been too much of a gentleman to broach until now. So what about you? Are you the unique apple of your father’s eye or just one of a bunch of little apples gracing intelligent pies, scattered throughout the UK’s centres of higher education?”

“There are several of us,” she answered vaguely. “But
most didn’t roll so far from the tree. I’m the only one who thought that education was a good way out.” She gave a small laugh. “As you can see, the opportunities for employment in history are enormous.”

“You’ve been commissioned to write a book,” Colin pointed out with what sounded like genuine respect. “That sounds fairly successful to me.”

“It is destined for a very select audience,” Fiona said ruefully. “A handful of universities and libraries at best. I won’t be on the best-seller list.”

Colin shrugged. “Then make it more accessible. Popularize it for the uneducated public, such as myself. Break out of your elitist academic bubble.”

She glared at him. “I’ve got quite a specific mandate,” she said coldly. “My writing grant comes from academic sources.”

He was grinning at her and she gave an exasperated sigh. She had fallen into his trap again.

“You do seem rather defensive as far as references to academic snobbery are concerned,” he said lightly. “Does Miss History have a sensitive nerve on this subject? Too close to the truth?”

“I am not a snob,” she said shortly.
“Academic or otherwise.”

“Then why do you refuse to set foot into my world?” he pressed. “We are on uneven ground here. Well, the hills, obviously, hence the hiking boots. But
so far we are meeting in your world, while you cold-shoulder mine. Does that sound equal to a so-called egalitarian?”

“It’s not a question of snobbery,” she mumbled crossly.

He arched his eyebrows. “Really?  Not reverse snobbery from you? Or assumed snobbery on the part of my circle?”

She looked away quickly, not wanting him to see the doubt in her eyes. Despite her academic success, she had never forgotten where she came from and with her accent, nobody would ever let
her. Not that she wanted to forget it, but she knew that it was placed on the scale with every judgement made about her, good or bad, “doing well for a kid from Leith”, or “successful researcher but not quite one of us.”

Colin’s hand reached over to cup her chin, very slowly and gently drawing her face back toward him. Apart from their brief kiss, he had never touched her, and the contact now felt dangerously intimate, as if he could see through her bright career to the insecurities underneath. She didn’t pull away, but after her eyes searched his face briefly she found herself looking down at her boots.

Gently he released her and she inadvertently took a step backwards, trying to shake off the heaviness which she had added to their otherwise light-hearted interactions. When she glanced up again, she found his eyes on her with a look that she hadn’t seen before, stripped of its usual nonchalance and teasing. Two intense eyes watching her with real concern and tenderness.

She didn’t want his pity. She felt her pride surge as she faced him squarely. “I’ll meet you in your circle,” she said brusquely. “If that’s what you want.
If they’ll let me in.”

He kept watching her silently. Finally he spoke. “You don’t have to,
Fiona,” he said softly. “You’d probably find us a dull lot anyway, the superficial, idle rich.”

“There are idle poor, too,” she said, trying to make a conciliatory gesture in his direction. “And those of us who try to escape it all in our history books and poetry, to see the romance in it all.”

“Ah, romance,” he said with a smile that started to make things feel right again. “If that’s where you like to escape to, please allow me to offer my services.”

She smiled gratefully at him. His bantering tone was back and now she appreciated his off-hand manner and the way it kept things from growing too awkward. Still she was aware of something new in his regard toward her and it made her keen to keep walking.