The Lie of Love (8 page)

‘I hope so too,’ Amanda said.
‘I’m banking on there being leftovers to take home.’

‘There’d better not be or we
haven’t done our jobs properly,’ Julia laughed.  ‘Failure is not a word I
am familiar with when it comes to fundraising and if we don’t sell every last
cake, every last homemade jar of chutney or bottle of wine then I’m taking to
the streets to sell it there.’

‘I am so grateful that everyone I
meet is this supportive,’ Darcy replied earnestly.  She felt it keenly at
moments like this – the debt she owed so many people already and would continue
to owe them for the rest of her life. ‘I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you for
your kindness.’

‘We’ll say no more about that,’
Julia smiled. ‘I’m only doing what a good Christian girl should do and seeing a
family transformed will be reward enough.’

‘Well… thank you doesn’t seem
anywhere near big enough a sentiment, but…’ Darcy felt the heat of blurred
tears in her eyes and she wiped them quickly away. Amanda reached over and pulled
her into a hug.

‘Don’t be silly. You and your
family deserve a break. Too many awful people in this world get exactly what
they want where good families suffer. Now dry your eyes and get ready to face
your public otherwise they’ll think you’re crying because your cakes are so
bad.’

Darcy laughed through her tears.
‘We wouldn’t want that, would we?  Go on, I’m good now,’ she added,
rubbing a sleeve across her eyes, ‘you can open the doors.’

Julia took up a huge bunch of
keys and made her way to a set of heavy double doors, the woodwork thick with
decades of paint.  As she unlocked and threw them open to let in a bright
wedge of sunlight but little else, Darcy frowned.

‘God, I hope someone actually
comes to this otherwise you may get a lot more leftovers than you bargained
for.’

‘They will,’ Amanda said in an
encouraging voice. ‘People like to be fashionably late. Besides, we have a
board up in town as well as posters in The Sugar Cube so with a bit of luck
some inquisitive holidaymakers will see those too and make their way up for a
nose around.’

As if to prove the truth of her
prediction, as she spoke a group of silver haired ladies wandered into the
hall, making a beeline for the shelves of glass-jarred produce.

‘What did I tell you?’ Amanda
said with a satisfied smile. ‘You need to have more faith, Darcy.’

‘I suppose I do. But sometimes I
still can’t quite believe that people are so willing to get involved in all
this – give up their time and money to help a family they hardly know or have never
met.’

‘You would do it,’ Amanda said.

Darcy nodded. ‘I’d like to think
so.’

‘Where’s the difference then?’

Darcy smiled. ‘You’re right. I
just feel like I have a debt I’ll never be able to pay off.’

‘Just remember me in your will,’
Amanda laughed. She glanced across at the door where a woman with a toddler in
a pushchair came in, heading towards the cakes as the little boy jiggled about
in his straps, obviously desperate to flee the confines of his carriage. ‘Look
sharp, we’ve got more customers.’

Before Darcy had another chance
to dwell on the uncertainties that seemed to plague her every waking hour these
days, two hours had flown by. The church hall had gradually filled with the
sounds of chatter as the pocket in her apron where she kept her change grew
heavier with the increasingly limited opportunities she had to deposit it into
the cash box.  It was immensely satisfying to see her cakes disappearing
fast and approving smiles from the people who ate them there and then. And just
when Darcy was beginning to relax and enjoy herself, a familiar figure ambled
into the hall.  He headed straight for the preserves stall where Julia was
busy reading out the ingredients of some chutney to a short-sighted old man.
 

Darcy felt the breath catch in
her throat, a sudden acute consciousness of her every move, of how her hair
looked, of whether the subtle curve of what
Ged
affectionately called her
leftover baby belly
showed in the top she was
wearing, of whether her make-up had slid off in the heat as much as she feared
it had.  She knew that it was an irrational, even stupid reaction to his
appearance, but it was like someone else was driving her body whenever he was
near. She watched as Julia looked up with a broad smile for her son.

‘Oh good,’ Julia said, ‘you can
help out here while I get a cup of tea; I’m absolutely parched.’

Without waiting for his reply,
Julia dashed off towards where the vicar’s wife was standing sentry next to a
huge metal tea urn and a pile of gleaming white stoneware.  Looking slightly
bemused, Harry took himself behind the table and stood next to the cashbox,
hands in his pockets as he watched the customers browsing the jars of jams and
pickles. Then he looked up and shot a blazing smile in Darcy’s direction that
made her legs suddenly weak.  She tried to smile back, but what she
returned was more like a pained grimace. Damn this boy – she didn’t want to
feel like this about him and she certainly had no right to.  She was
grateful beyond belief when someone stood in her
eyeline
to ask the price of an entire box of lemon cupcakes.

When she looked up again, Julia
was back at her post and Harry was striding towards them with two cups.

‘Mum thought you needed a cup of
tea,’ he said, his bright gaze resting on Darcy for just a little too long. Or
was that her imagination?

‘That’s sweet of her,’ Amanda
said, taking a cup from him. ‘I was getting desperate here.’

‘Thanks,’ Darcy said, not
trusting herself to say anything more as he handed her the other drink.

‘You look like you’re doing really
well today.’ Harry sunk his hands into his pockets and glanced around with a
nonchalance that Darcy wished she could feel too. His attention came back to
Darcy, and then onto the cakes spread before them. ‘You baked these?’

She nodded.

‘Wow, they look amazing. I bet
you can really cook. I bet you’re good at loads of stuff.’

Fighting the heat she could feel
spreading from her neck, Darcy looked down at the cakes with a self-conscious
laugh. ‘I can bake ok but I wouldn’t say I’m much good at anything else.’

‘That’s not what I’ve heard.’

‘What?’ Darcy looked up to see
him hold her in a fearless gaze. He wasn’t laughing, only watching her
intently.

‘Mum tells me you can turn your
hand to pretty much anything. She’s super impressed by the way you’ve pulled
all this charity stuff together and she says you’re the most determined person
she’s ever met.’

For a moment, Darcy was lost for
words, but this time it wasn’t anything to do Harry’s proximity. She had never
considered herself a determined person before and certainly didn’t see herself
as someone who could turn her hand to anything. Was that really how Julia saw
her? Was that how others saw her too?  If she wasn’t so doubtful about the
truth of his statement she would have allowed the warm glow of pleasure that
wanted to spread through her at the thought of it.

‘To be honest, Amanda has done
most of it,’ Darcy said, glancing across at her friend, who turned her
attention to them with the mention of her name.

‘What was that, sweetie?’ Amanda
asked with a dazzling smile for Harry.

‘I said most of this charity
stuff was done by you,’ Darcy said.

‘Nonsense,
darling.
I’ve just been moral support because you thought that you
couldn’t do it all. When you really look at it, almost everything has been done
by you… ably supported by myself and Julia, I’ll admit.’ Amanda’s smiled turned
into a half-frown. ‘You don’t ever give yourself enough credit for anything,’
she added. 

‘Well, I think it’s pretty
amazing,’ Harry said, looking at Darcy again as if she was the only person in
the room.

‘Then I’m sure you’ll want to buy
some cakes,’ Amanda cut in, clearly oblivious to the tension that suddenly
crackled in the air as he studied Darcy. Or was that in Darcy’s imagination
too? Did she see chemistry where there was none?  Did that mean she wanted
there to be chemistry, despite what she told herself?

‘You don’t have to buy them,’
Darcy said, ‘of course you don’t. You get them for free; it’s the least I can
do for all your help.’

‘I’ll take some of those…’ he pointed
at a tray of rocky road cut into generous squares, ‘but I insist on paying for
them.’

‘Please…’ Darcy hurried to put as
many as she could fit into a paper bag together. ‘I couldn’t possibly… please
take them as my gift…’

‘Ok. Thank you then.’ As he took
them from her it seemed to Darcy that he made a point of his hand touching hers
and resting there, flesh on flesh, for much longer than it needed to exchange ownership
of the bag. She couldn’t fight the thrill that raced down her spine, straight
to her guts to set off that wild tingling again.  Struggling to push the
feeling from her mind and reclaim her thoughts, she smiled weakly. ‘You’re more
than welcome.’

‘I’ll think of you when I enjoy
these later,’ he said, leaning in and lowering his voice with a smouldering
look. Darcy glanced across at Amanda but she was busy chatting to the vicar’s
wife who had come over during a brief lull in the hot drinks trade. 

‘I hope you like them,’ Darcy
replied, not knowing what else to say. Was he really flirting with her? Or did
he talk like that to everyone?  She had always liked to think she could
read people and that she knew flirting when she saw it, but to have it directed
at her by someone who could so obviously have almost any girl he wanted –
girl
being the operative word, not a woman who was almost old enough to be his
mother? She couldn’t be reading the situation right, surely? Her judgement was
clouded by the strange effect he had on her; that could be the only
explanation. Besides, she was married and he was the son of a woman who was
fast becoming a good friend. 
Whether he was flirting or
not, she couldn’t let it become anything else.

‘I’m sure I will,’ he grinned,
his voice at a more natural level again, the supercharged moment seemingly gone
as quickly as it had come.  ‘I might even stuff these right now and come
back for more.’

‘You’ll be sick if you’re not
careful, Harry…’ Julia’s voice seemed to come from nowhere – Darcy hadn’t even
notice her cross the room from her own stall to theirs. She was suddenly
gripped by a cold fear that Julia had seen the exchange between her and Harry,
but she seemed so relaxed and unconcerned that Darcy realised, with a rush of
relief, that
she couldn’t have done.  ‘I need some
change if you have a little over here,’ Julia added.

‘You’ve seen me eat way more cake
than this in one go and come back for more,’ Harry laughed.

‘Just don’t think I’m going to be
nursing your stomach ache later on,’ his mother replied in a brisk tone. Darcy
gave her a handful of change she had pulled from her apron pocket and Julia was
across the room again without another word. Harry looked at Darcy with an
impish grin.

‘If I get stomach ache later, I
think it’s only right it’s nursed by the woman who gave it to me.’

Darcy’s mouth dropped open this
time, but before she had the appropriate reply in her head, he was waving a
casual hand and making his way to the doors. ‘Later, Mum,’ he shouted.

Julia waved
in return, and then he was gone.

After a restless night, Darcy woke to
Ged
tossing the free newspaper onto the pillow beside
her.

‘Your story is in,’ he said as he
wandered from the room again, fiddling with the top button of his work shirt.

Darcy rubbed her eyes and
snatched up the paper, flicking the pages to find the photo of her, Sophie and
Jake the photographer had taken in their front garden a few days before.

She found
it, accompanied by the headline:

SOPHIE’S WISH TO TAKE FIRST
STEPS: Local mum in 45K charity bid
to make her daughter’s dreams of
walking come true.

Darcy smiled. It was a lovely photo of the three of them.
She and Jake had been asked to group around Sophie in her wheelchair and kiss
her on either cheek.  Darcy had thought it seemed a bit cheesy at the
time, but now, as she looked at it, she realised that the photographer might
just be a master of manipulation. Sophie looked adorable and just on the right
side of needy and appealing without looking pathetic, while Jake and Darcy
looked loving and dedicated. It was bound to pull at heartstrings, and in her cynical
mind, that was exactly what Darcy wanted the article to achieve.  She only
wished that
Ged
would have
put his prejudices aside and taken part in the photo shoot too.

Reaching
over to the bedside table for her phone, she tapped out a quick text to Amanda. 
Her friend’s reply didn’t take long to come back:

I’ve just seen it.
Looks fabulous.
X

It did look fabulous, Darcy
agreed silently as she looked again. But local newspaper star or not, she had a
family to get ready for the day. Yawning, she clambered out of bed and grabbed
a dressing gown from the hook on the door.

Jake and Sophie’s beds were both already empty when Darcy
went to wake them for school. She arrived in the kitchen to find
Ged
putting bread in the toaster
and the kids sitting at the table, both yawning and staring silently into
space.

‘My children look very sleepy
this morning,’ Darcy said with a smile. ‘A sure sign I wasn’t here to put them to
bed, and that Daddy might have been fibbing slightly when he told me they had
gone to bed on time.’

‘Well…’
Ged
replied without turning around, ‘if mummy had been here instead of getting
drunk with Amanda, she would have been able to put the kids to bed on time
instead of leaving poor daddy to do it.’