Lacybourne Manor Read online

  If she didn’t slow down, she’d likely kill him. And if she didn’t (or he didn’t) control her rampant benevolence, she’d kill them both.

  The sweet torture had started immediately after their morning at Lacybourne.

  Before he had learned about her, he had planned to catch up on work while her parents were in England. He wanted to give her some private time with her parents, therefore, he’d set up meetings in Manchester and Leeds the first week and the second, he was to be in London for an entire week of nearly back-to-back meetings he’d postponed since Sibyl.

  The first week they were in town, he attended only one dinner with her and her family. Claire had gone home the night after dinner at Lacybourne (or, as Sibyl described it, “The Dinner of Doom”) to return to her family. Phoebe and Mike had stayed on to spend some time with the people who they knew (as Colin told them) would soon be part of their extended family.

  Colin had arrived late at the Indian restaurant and they’d all been ensconced in a huge booth and tucking into their starter.

  The minute Colin arrived at the table, Mags or Phoebe would hear of Colin sitting anywhere but right beside Sibyl. As Sibyl was to the back at the very inside of the booth next to a window, Scarlett, Mike and Sibyl had to shift out so Colin could slide in. Once he was in, he was crushed against the wall with Sibyl practically in his lap. She’d ordered a starter for him and another upheaval was caused when everyone handed their plates around to each other.

  Forced to rest his arm along the back of the booth in order to accommodate himself and Sibyl in their spare space, he ate with one hand, his left. He had no problem with this, it left his right hand free to stroke the skin at the nape of Sibyl’s neck and feel her delicate shivers beneath his fingers.

  During dinner, the conversation was tangled, Scarlett, Mike and Mags in a fierce verbal battle of one-upmanship as to who could tell the most outrageous story (Mags won by a landslide). Not in the line of fire, Colin kept to himself, enjoying the feeling of Sibyl pressed contentedly against his side while, any time she’d want to share her humour with him, she looked over her raised shoulder, resting her chin against it as she prized him with one of her gorgeous smiles.

  Bertie, seated opposite him, noticed Colin’s absence from the conversation and took it upon himself to draw him into a private one of their own. At first a one-sided private conversation where Bertie explained to him (in detail) how he felt about what he described as the “Henry, the Second and Thomas Becket fiasco”. Colin eventually found himself drawn into Bertie’s passion for his subject and into a discussion about it, thinking Bertie was undoubtedly a popular professor considering both of these things.

  When they left the restaurant and arrived at their assorted cars, Mags said to Sibyl, “I’m guessing you want to spend the night at Lacybourne.” This was not so much a guess as a command when she produced (to Sibyl’s stunned glare) a small overnight bag that Sibyl obviously didn’t pack and knew nothing about. Mags handed it to her daughter with a meaningful look.

  Bertie sighed.

  Phoebe and Mike looked dumbstruck.

  Scarlett chuckled.

  Colin could have kissed her.

  Sibyl took the bag with a killing look at her mother and slid into the Mercedes.

  “I told you my mother was odd,” she announced when he reversed out of the parking spot.

  “I’m not complaining,” he pointed out, manoeuvring the car out of the lot.

  “You wouldn’t,” she grumbled, clearly embarrassed.

  “Would you like me to take you back to Brightrose?” he queried politely even though he had no bloody intention of doing any such thing.

  “No,” she mumbled.

  “Are you sure?” he couldn’t keep the smile out of his voice.

  She made an irate noise.

  “You have better sheets at Lacybourne,” she told him and he burst out laughing.

  He spent the rest of the week letting himself into Brightrose in the dead of night, calming an always excited Mallory and then sliding into bed beside her long after she went to sleep. Once there, she would snuggle against him or, more to the point, he pulled her into him. He usually left long before she or her family woke or just in time to give her grumpy morning face a kiss before leaving to get to work.

  Saturday and Sunday were days of revelation.

  Mike and Phoebe had gone home on Friday morning after exchanging addresses, phone numbers and e-mails with the Godwins.

  Saturday morning, Colin took Sibyl and her family to Bourton-on-the-Water and the morning passed in peaceful tranquillity (if you didn’t count Sibyl shouting like a drill sergeant at her lagging family and marching them into the newly discovered BMW).

  Then, late morning, Colin’s tranquillity fragmented. While in a fudge shop, Sibyl saw a young boy at the counter trying to buy a box of fudge and coming up short by twenty pence. Sibyl sidled up beside the boy and slid the twenty pence to the clerk. This not being a kind enough gesture, one Colin would never think of doing, she then handed the boy a two pound coin.

  “Don’t want to be caught short, again, do you?” she’d asked with a wink. Then she so bedazzled the boy with one of her winning smiles, he’d walked straight into a display of candy. The entire display (which was a foot taller than him) came crashing in a great clamour to the floor.

  Scooting him kindly on his way to his parents, Sibyl spent (with Mags and Scarlett) a quarter of an hour helping the clerk right the candy stand while chatting amiably and becoming the best of friends with the clerk in the process.

  As they walked the streets of Bourton, every person she passed who had a dog on a lead, no matter how grand or ugly the dog was (indeed, she lavished more affection on the ugly ones), she would stop the owner with a joyful cry and beg, “Can I pet your dog?” Unwilling, or more likely, unable to decline her friendly request and her sunny smile, the owners would acquiesce. She’d then crouch, ruffle the dog’s fur and accept sloppy kisses all over her face and hands. All the while she cooed at the dogs and she and the Godwins would engage the owners in friendly conversation about any subject that came to mind – the unseasonably warm weather, the beauty of Bourton, dogs and what they thought of the ever-increasing danger of the greenhouse effect.

  Then they’d stopped at a tea shop for cream teas on the way home. As they were all relaxing over their scones, clotted cream and jam, Sibyl was staring out the window with rapt attention. Moments later, without a word, she abruptly ran from the table and out into the sunny back garden. As she approached she startled a family who were lazing in the warm day at a picnic table. She was talking intently and gesturing carefully and then she herded them solicitously into the tea shop. To Colin’s stunned surprise, the family joined Colin and the Godwins for tea, crowding around a too small table, while they thanked Sibyl profusely for warning them of the beehive that nestled in the tree above their picnic table.

  Not done, Sibyl sought out the owners of the tea shop to inform them of the hive. Then she stood outside in the garden with the owners, Bertie and Mags, discussing (at length) what was to be done about the beehive while Colin sat with Scarlett, his legs stretched in front of him and crossed at the ankles, as he took in the scene. He was prepared, if necessary, to haul Sibyl, kicking and screaming (he had no doubt), to the car if she tried to climb a ladder and see to the hive herself.

  “Nothing to say?” Colin offered Scarlett her opening, not taking his eyes from Sibyl.

  “Not right now,” Scarlett answered, not taking her eyes from Colin.

  Sunday he went to work in the morning and at noon he left to meet Sibyl and the Godwins on the seafront. When he arrived he found Bertie seated on a blanket in the grass with the remains of what appeared to be a vegetarian picnic. Mags was five feet away, talking animatedly to two women who both had babies in prams. Colin took in Mags, her red hair not faded but streaked with comely shafts of white, wearing a bright, gauzy concoction that looked delicate enough to disintegrate at a hint of wind.<
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  After greeting Bertie, Colin asked, “Where are Sibyl and Scarlett?”

  Bertie tilted his head across the green and Colin saw both sisters (Sibyl wearing a tight-fitting, faded, oft-worn Grateful Dead t-shirt and her daringly torn jeans, Scarlett wearing a pair of black capri pants and an emerald green fitted, scoop-necked t-shirt) playing Frisbee with five men.

  Colin watched for precisely thirty-eight seconds (Bertie timed him). Then he saw one of the men semi-tackle Sibyl, wrapping his arms about her middle and whirling her away from the Frisbee she was trying to catch. Her deep laugh filled the air at what she thought was friendly frolicking and Colin knew was anything but.

  Without hesitation, Colin prowled toward them and Sibyl caught sight of him.

  “Colin!” she cried as she smiled and ran to him, skidding to a bare-footed halt inches away, her golden hair flying in an attractive mess about her shoulders. She touched him with a hand at his waist, hooking her thumb in a belt loop at the side of his jeans and leaned in to ask playfully, “Do you want to play Frisbee?” and she asked this as she pulled her heavy, gorgeous hair away from her face with her other hand.

  “No,” he stated shortly.

  Her face fell and he ignored it, dragged her against his body and kissed her hard on the lips.

  When he lifted his head, she stared up at him, stupefied.

  Then she breathed, “What was that for?”

  Colin looked about the green at five crestfallen male faces and Scarlett’s knowing one and said, “Just making things clear.”

  He dropped his arm, not waiting for her reply, turned and walked back to Bertie, settling down beside him on the grass, one leg stretched out, one knee bent, his wrist dangling on his knee.

  Bertie was silent for a moment and then said thoughtfully, “Welcome to my nightmare.”

  Colin’s eyes reluctantly left Sibyl, slid to her father and he asked, “I’m sorry?”

  Bertie again indicated his two daughters playing what was now a far more lackadaisical game of Frisbee and Colin glanced that way. Regardless if the men took Colin’s possessive gesture in the spirit it was intended and backed off entirely, that didn’t mean the magnificent sight of Sibyl and Scarlett racing around after a Frisbee wasn’t the height of entertainment for most of the men on the seafront.

  “I must say, Colin, I’m happy to have you around,” Bertie told him.

  “Why’s that?” Colin enquired, giving Sibyl’s father his full attention.

  “A problem shared is a problem halved, in my case, literally.”

  At his comment, Colin threw his head back and laughed, as did Bertie.

  When he’d controlled his hilarity, Colin told the older man with a hint of admiration, “I can’t imagine how you did it for all these years.”

  “I’ve lost three inches and all my hair, so count yourself warned,” Bertie stated then asked, “Do you have a plan?”

  “I’m taking it day by day,” Colin answered on a smile.

  Bertie nodded with approval. “That’s a good plan.”

  “What are you talking about?” Mags queried as she joined them.

  “Nothing,” Bertie replied after he accepted a swift, but rather ardent, kiss from his wife.

  “You were laughing,” Scarlett also sat with them and Colin looked up to see Sibyl drop to her knees beside him. She awarded him a flush-faced grin and then, to his deep satisfaction, she didn’t hesitate a moment before she settled on her back with her head on his outstretched thigh, her hair falling haphazardly all over his lap.

  “You must allow us our private little joke,” Bertie murmured.

  “About us girls? I don’t think so,” Scarlett parried.

  “Enough Scarlett,” Bertie warned.

  Sibyl shifted onto her side but didn’t lift her head.

  “You were joking about us?” she asked her father.

  “You joke about men all the time,” Bertie defended. Colin noted his tone was far less strict with his first born.

  “That’s true, men, as a whole, are our private little joke,” Scarlett confirmed cynically.

  “Scarlett! Be good.” It was Mags’s turn to chastise her daughter but it was clear she didn’t mean it and this was made clear by her blue eyes dancing wickedly.

  Sibyl moved again to her back and caught Colin’s eye. “You aren’t my joke,” she assured him, her eyes dancing but not like her mother’s, her eyes weren’t wicked but warm and sweet.

  “Colin isn’t anybody’s joke,” Scarlett declared, for the first time giving Colin an indication of her blessing and she collapsed on her side and popped a grape in her mouth.

  “With practice, you’ll learn to ignore her,” Sibyl confided to him and froze her sister with a glance.

  Colin leaned back on an elbow. He had Sibyl’s head on his leg, her hair spread across his lap, the sun was shining on them and she’d just indicated he’d be around long enough to learn to ignore her sister. He’d long since been ignoring Scarlett as well as the envious looks he was getting from most of the men in the vicinity, and had, for longer than he could remember, perfected the art of ignoring the looks from the women.

  Colin couldn’t call up even a hint of irritation because at that precise moment, all was right in Colin Morgan’s world.

  They went to Brightrose shortly after, Colin driving the lot of them and their picnic paraphernalia in the BMW as they’d walked to the seafront. While Mags cooked dinner, Bertie, Scarlett, Sibyl and Colin spent the rest of the afternoon playing Trivial Pursuit.

  Colin lost, soundly. Bertie knew everything about everything. Scarlett, a neurologist, also had an amazing knowledge of entertainment and sport. Sibyl’s subjects were history, art and literature and geography. The whole game, Bran spent tucked in Sibyl’s lap while Mallory lay by Colin, his head, when he was given the option, resting on Colin’s feet.

  Mags stepped out of the kitchen and announced that dinner would be ready in five minutes. At her announcement, Sibyl gave a panicked cry, dropped her cat and sped into the kitchen. After a great clamour, Mags came out of the kitchen again and announced with a grin that dinner would be in twenty-five minutes.

  Colin made Bertie and himself a gin and tonic and they settled on the couches while Scarlett went to help in the kitchen.

  “Sibyl says you have the dreams, just like she does,” Bertie noted.

  Colin had confided in Sibyl that he, too, was dreaming of Royce and Beatrice. This was confided in an effort to soften their eventual discussion about her time with Royce in the chalet. A discussion Colin still fully intended to have but only after she was more comfortable with him and in their relationship.

  “Yes,” he answered.

  Bertie leaned forward excitedly. “What’s it like, being back there, being in that time?”

  Colin regarded his soon-to-be-father-in-law, a medieval history professor who undoubtedly thought this of extraordinary interest, and answered honestly, “It isn’t like anything. I don’t pay attention to it. I only pay attention to Beatrice. My dreams aren’t like Sibyl’s, she’s participating, Royce knows there’s a difference in Beatrice when she’s with him. I’ve always known who I was when in the dream, why I’m there, because I knew where I was, who she was. I just experience it.”

  “Does it feel like a memory?” Bertie asked.

  Colin thought about it and had been thinking about it a great deal lately, mainly because of how Sibyl described her own dreams. She’d hinted that Royce had recognised her, knew who she was that afternoon in the chalet. This lent an added, unknown dimension to their meeting in the present time and, possibly, their kiss, a thought Colin did not particularly relish.

  “It’s too vivid to be just a dream, so yes, it must be a memory.”

  “Superb,” Bertie muttered.

  “Dinner in five minutes!” Scarlett called from the kitchen door.

  Mags set a bowl of what looked to be tofu, black beans and barley liberally mixed with onions and parsley, an enormous salad and a
bowl of spiced cous cous on the table. Sibyl slid a pair of succulent chicken breasts, rice pilaf and steamed broccoli in front of Colin and he realised what caused the delay in dinner. Sibyl had prepared a non-vegetarian option specifically for him.

  No one uttered a word about this considerate gesture likely because they were used to such gestures from Sibyl.

  Colin, however, was not.

  “I could have eaten the tofu,” he whispered to her as she settled in beside him at the round table.

  “Do you like tofu?” she asked with an engaging grin.

  “Not particularly,” he admitted, responding to her smile.

  She didn’t reply, just nodded her head as if that was that and accepted the bowl of cous cous from her sister.

  Later that evening, after Mags’s much more enticing raspberry pavlova, Colin made to leave as he had to wake even earlier than usual to catch his train to London and he didn’t want to disturb any of Sibyl’s family. When he made his move, Mags disappeared swiftly up the stairs.

  Sibyl was walking him to the door when Mags descended, carrying an overnight bag as well as canvas carrier bag.

  “I took the liberty to buy some bits and pieces you could keep at Lacybourne, baby,” she told her daughter with a challenging glance at Colin, to which he acceded without a hint of rancour, indeed, biting back a smile. “You don’t want to keep lugging things back and forth.”

  Sibyl opened her mouth to say something but Mags interrupted her with an admonishing tone. “We aren’t going to see Colin until Wednesday, you’re surely not going to allow him to leave town without an uninterrupted evening of privacy, are you?”

  Sibyl clamped her mouth shut.

  “Give her a good tumble, Colin,” Mags urged audaciously, pushing a stiff-with-humiliated-fury Sibyl out the door ahead of Colin. “She’ll need it to keep her in good spirits for the next couple of days.”