Thick as Thieves (The Greystone Family: Stolen Hearts #3)

Chapter 44

44

Xander

Devon

We move into Marshall’s farm. The old buzzard has totally played a hand and driven a very hard bargain on the rent. Marcus reckons we could rent Buckingham Palace cheaper than Marshall has charged us for this place. We have to redecorate it, and he has three out buildings he says need refurbishing—all part of this particular tenancy.

Of course, we only know one builder of old, disused buildings who also happens to be a top interior designer, or at least in charge of a team. Our challenge is to get her here. She knows we’re here. Jonno informed us that Marshall feigned total feebleness. Sunk into his pillows so well, even he thought he was properly poorly.

She caved. Oh, and the small revelation she’s an O’Clery. Yep, that would do it. I was retelling the tale to my dad, he’d been away for a month and we were catching up on FaceTime. He said he’d known when he saw her again in Scotland. She looks like Marshall's mother.

He also let out a breath, whistling through his teeth. “Wow, Xander, you are such a gold digger,” he teases me.

“What are you talking about? I’m a rockstar, Dad. Haven’t you heard about how much cash I have.” I’m bigging my part up.

“Not as much as she has,” he laughs.

“Marshall looks like he lives on poverty row. He has holes in his jeans, and not intentional ones,” I tell Dad in amazement.

“An old trick. I think people call it a discount suit. He likes to get a bargain, so dresses down. Mind you, then again, I think it just might be him.” We both laugh.

“Wait til Rowena Russell hears her favourite daughter-in-law is actually an O’Clery.” He sounds as giddy as a school boy at the development. “She’ll have a heart attack. No more ’Everett Parker’ to harp on. The O’Clery’s are like Irish royalty. Family’s been around for centuries. Rowena and her sisters tried to hook a brother, but none stuck. I bet she didn’t even recognise Marshall. He was always the quietest brother. Never got involved in the family politics, just stuck to the whisky business like his mother. She made it the brand it is today.” Dad is looking very impressed, he knows his whisky history.

“They seem the same with each other, but she’s openly calling him Dad and the kids call him Poppop.” My voice reflects the happiness I feel for this change of circumstances, but then I remember my situation and it goes as flat as a pancake. “She doesn’t come here. But the boys come. Valentina drops them off. Or Marshall. And the Purcells are staying there at Cornhill, obviously. Orla has had a baby girl so she’s staying in Yorkshire. The boys wanted to stay in Devon, so Bug dropped them and went home.”

“Seems like everyone is getting sorted out.” He’s watching my face as it changes to one full of disappointment that I—we—are not in that boat. “It'll take time, so just be patient,” he counsels.

“Well Marcus is getting fed up. Every time he goes to the pub, he’s looking for her. Every time we go to the Cottage to record, he’s scouring the fields for her tractor. He knows she’s working odds and sods on the farm.” My voice has become more monotone, all the light falling out of it.

“What about you son? How are you coping?” His voice is soft and caring. He’s clearly worried about me. I’m worried about myself.

“I want to shout at her to fucking listen, but I can’t. The twins are so like her. When they look at me in certain ways, I see her. I can smell her perfume on them. She is everyfuckingwhere here. People talk about something they did with her—farming, at the stables, picnics at the beach—and I have to nod as if I know. It kills me.” I try not to get tears in my eyes. Fuck, this is so hard.

He’s silent on the phone, then says, “I think you need to tell her. Get her over to look at those buildings before she starts to go backwards and forwards to London.”

“What if it’s a no? I don’t think I can hack it. This limbo is better than a no. At least we see and talk to her like this. She’s around. Still in our world, still conversing with us about the boys. We get invited to dinner with the twins. Marcus is always trying to wrangle other invites.”

“Do you?” He’s scrutinising my face.

“No. If she wants us, she’ll ask. But I text her a lot, and she asks me to go for the mornings sometimes. She knows I like to do that.” I stop talking. My heart rate has picked up as I think about when I see her in a morning. How the light lands on her face as the sun rises through the kitchen windows at Cornhill. How her smile lights up the dark nights on those occasions when I hang around until way after sunset if I’ve helped put the boys to bed.

“Fuck. I want so much more, its fucking killing me. I feel like I’m dying inside.” I’ve dropped my head to my chin. My heart is bleeding out.

“Tell her, Xander. One way or another, it needs sorting.” He wants action. A resolution, he clearly thinks I can’t take much more.

“I’ll think about it,” I tell him. I don’t want him steaming in, and spilling mine and his guts.

“I’ve started a sculpture. It’s made out of wire I found in the sheds we’re supposed to be renovating. Problem is, it keeps catching me. I look like a knife wound victim, covered in blood from the nicks.”

“What is it of?”

“A horse. I think I’ll give it to Evie for the stables or outside of the gates.”

“She’ll have to come and see that then, won’t she,” he says, the cunning old fox.

I nod, smiling. “She will.”

But she doesn’t, and August passes into September.

I’m hanging on by a thread. Marcus is hatching a plan, although nothing good ever comes of them. I need to act, and soon. My body is crying out for her touch, my heart dying without it, my mind and soul a jumbled mess.