A Lesson of Intensity: Season of Desire Part 2 (Seasons Quartet) Read online

  I realise that there’s a huge distance between us. All the intimacy we shared yesterday, the relationship we built up, is all gone. And that’s my fault. I wish so much I didn’t sabotage everything that matters to me. But I have a chance to put it right. In this situation, no one can jump on a plane and fly across the world because they’re offended. There’s no huge mansion to keep the warring factions apart. We’re together with nowhere else to go. We can’t hide from what’s gone wrong and we have to put it right, or coexist in miserable enmity.

  ‘Miles, I want…’ There’s that nervous fluttering in my stomach. I’ve said sorry before but this is a little different. ‘I want to apologise for the way I spoke to you earlier. It was awful and you must despise me for it. I know I shouldn’t throw my weight around and give orders, and behave so childishly, most of all to you when I owe you for saving my life. So… I’m sorry. I won’t do it again. Can you forgive me?’

  He takes all this in impassively.

  I watch him, anxious. Is he going to accept my apology or not? He probably doesn’t realise how rare it is for me to humble myself in front of someone else – especially not an employee.

  ‘Of course I forgive you,’ he says at last, his voice gruff. ‘Thank you, Freya. I appreciate it.’

  ‘Are we okay again then?’ I say, venturing a smile at him.

  He lets the corners of his mouth turn upwards a little, and something in the set line of his shoulders relaxes a little. ‘Yeah. Sure. Of course we are. Now – will it be stew again or do you fancy minestrone instead?’

  Despite my apology, the atmosphere is still a little awkward and we busy ourselves with activity to get over it. Miles brings in the logs he left near the door and sets them to dry, and we heat up an unidentifiable casserole for our midday meal, following it with a cup of instant black coffee. Miles talks a lot, telling me what he discovered on his recce earlier and what conclusions he’s drawn about how our rescue might be effected.

  I listen, taking comfort from the soft burr of his voice and the pleasure of having him near to me. His solid masculinity is reassuring, and the way my body constantly responds to his presence, my skin prickling and tingling whenever he gets close, is something I can’t help enjoying. I won’t be so stupid as to command him to give me pleasure again, but I can still take it even if he’s unaware that he’s giving it.

  When Miles speculates about the rescue attempts, I wonder what’s happening back at home. It’s a full day since I walked into that garage with Miles, and the car purred out to head down the mountain. The two of us have disappeared without trace as far as the outside world is concerned. Has anyone noticed? Does anyone care? I imagine Summer sending me a message and wondering why she hasn’t heard back. She’ll be looking at my networking feeds, to see what I’m saying about LA, and there’ll be nothing. Maybe Flora has sent emails and is surprised I haven’t replied.

  I imagine everyone going about their daily lives without worrying about me, oblivious to my plight. Then I catch myself up. It’s just self-pity talking. I know very well that my father will have been told within a very short time that I didn’t make the plane. The fact that Miles didn’t return will have alerted the house to something out of the ordinary, if nothing else. I can picture my father now, in a fury of panicked activity as he tries to find out where I am. The thought is comforting. I want him to care about me.

  I look over at Miles, who is drinking his coffee and leafing through the visitors’ book, trying to read in the glow from the fire.

  I wonder if someone is frantic with worry about him. He’s lost too, after all.

  I picture a beautiful woman with two young children. She’s walking around a kitchen, a phone clutched to one ear as she tries to feed a baby in a highchair and a toddler. She looks frightened, in utter turmoil because Miles hasn’t come home and she’s been told that he was last seen heading off down the mountain into an oncoming blizzard.

  I glance at his hand. His ring finger is bare. And, from his scruples in denying me this morning, I don’t think that he’s the kind of man to get as intimate with someone as he did with me if he were married. The picture of the beautiful wife disappears, and I feel obscurely relieved that she doesn’t exist. Instead, I see Pierre, our head of security, cursing Miles for obeying my orders and taking one of the boss’s expensive cars and his beloved daughter on a fool’s errand to almost certain death.

  Maybe he has even fewer people who care for him than I do.

  I think of my sisters, my family and my friends. In the long hours of the afternoon I wrap myself up in the sleeping bag, and lie down so that I can see the fire dancing, and let my mind wander. It’s ages since I’ve done this. I’m so frightened of being bored that life is a ceaseless round of travel. If I’m not on the move or out with friends, I’m on my phone or tablet or laptop, or I’m at the movies, or watching TV, or at the gym. Relaxing for me usually means lying on the deck of a yacht chatting with friends as we bake a golden tan into our skins, but it’s just a chance to plan more activity – more parties, more trips, more of everything.

  Here, there is nowhere I can possibly go. There’s nothing to do. I’m reliant entirely on myself – and on Miles. I look over at him. He’s finished reading the guest book and examining the creased old map he found in the bottom of the box. He’s leaning back against the hut wall, a sleeping bag draped around his shoulders, gazing moodily into the fire.

  What’s he thinking about?

  I want to ask, but I fear being too intrusive. I’ve made my apology but I can’t presume too much on it.

  It’s getting dark outside, I can tell, and I check my watch. It’s only three o’clock but the storm is vanquishing what light there is left on this winter afternoon. It’ll be black as night soon.

  From my prone position on the planks, I glance over at Miles and find his eyes upon me. His dark-blue gaze sends a thrill rippling through me, and I wonder how I’m going to survive being near him and not being able to touch him. I give an involuntary sigh and a tiny shiver.

  ‘Are you all right?’ he asks.

  I nod.

  ‘Anything troubling you?’

  I shake my head slowly but he’s not convinced because he says firmly, ‘It’s going to be all right. I promise. I’ve had a good scout outside and I’ve studied that old map. I think I can get us out of here once the weather improves. Even if we can’t rely on a rescue.’

  The mention of rescue makes me think of my father again, and instead of feeling comforted, I swoop down into a kind of bleakness. I wriggle deeper into my sleeping bag and stare into the flames that are licking around the charred remains of a log.

  Miles leans towards me. ‘Really, Freya – are you okay? You don’t seem full of your usual fire and spice.’

  ‘I’m fine,’ I reply in a low voice. I turn my head to face him. ‘Is your family going to notice that you’re missing?’

  ‘No doubt they’ll be informed. They live a long way from here, so my mother won’t have been expecting me back for dinner or anything like that.’ He laughs lightly. ‘It’s a long time since those days.’

  ‘So your mother is still alive?’

  ‘Aye. She’s in her sixties now but she’s in good health, as far as I know. Still running around after my pa and my brother, and looking after her grandkids. She’s never thought she should take some time for herself after all these years.’

  ‘Don’t you see her then?’

  ‘Not as much as I should. She’d like to see more of me, I know.’ He looks thoughtful. ‘I suppose she’ll be worried about me, if they’ve told her what’s happened. I’ll have to call her when we get out of here, make sure she knows I’m all right.’

  I can feel my emotions being dragged down into the darkness. This is partly why I keep so busy, why I keep on the move so much. So that I don’t have to think about the things that hurt me. I say in a low voice, ‘Sometimes I wonder what my life would be like if my mother hadn’t died. If I had someone who really care
d about me.’

  When Miles speaks again, his voice is softer. ‘Hey, your father cares about you. I’m sure he’s frantic with worry about you.’

  ‘You don’t understand how we live,’ I say, my tone bleaker than ever. ‘There seems to be so little holding us together since we lost my mother. It’s as though an explosion blew us all apart and we’ve never been able to get back together again. My father was always so busy and now he’s got a girlfriend, he’s got even less time for us.’

  ‘Wait a moment,’ Miles says, sitting up straighter. ‘I’ve not been working for your family for long, but I’ve noticed one thing: your father is obsessed with your security. He keeps tabs on you girls, all the time. Wherever you are. He’s going to be moving heaven and earth to get you back home safely, I guarantee it. I can only guess at what it’s like to lose your mother so young, but you’ve got to believe that your father cares about you.’

  I sigh again. ‘I’m not sure if all the watching and monitoring is because he cares – or because he’s afraid.’

  ‘Afraid of what?’

  I say nothing. I can’t talk about it.

  ‘He’s afraid of losing you,’ Miles says gently. He watches me for a moment and then says, ‘We’ll be all right. I’m going to get us out of here. I don’t intend ending my days in this hut, glad though I am to have found it. I’ve still got things I want to do.’

  I turn to look at him. ‘I don’t know much about you at all.’

  ‘Why should you?’

  ‘I’m interested.’

  His eyes flicker with dark amusement. ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes. I want to know about you. And we can’t sit here in silence for the entire time, can we?’ I sit up so I’m facing him. ‘Tell me about yourself.’

  ‘There isn’t all that much to tell,’ he says, but I sense that what he means is that there isn’t all that much he wants to reveal.

  ‘Well, where are you from?’

  ‘You can’t tell from the accent?’ He raises that right eyebrow at me again.

  ‘Scotland, obviously – but where in Scotland?’ I’m going to persist, damn it. I’m going to get him to tell me something.

  ‘I had no idea you were familiar with the geography of Scotland.’

  ‘There’s lots you don’t know about me,’ I return pertly. ‘As it happens, I’ve been to Scotland once or twice. I stayed near Inverness.’

  ‘Well, I’m not from there. I’m from a small village about ten miles from Edinburgh.’

  ‘I’ve been to Edinburgh too,’ I say quickly. ‘It’s beautiful.’

  ‘Aye. It’s fine.’ His accent strengthens the moment he mentions Scotland. ‘But I’ve not been back to Edinburgh for a long time. It’s probably quite different now.’

  ‘When did you leave?’

  He gives me a bemused look. ‘Are you seriously interested?’

  ‘Yes! Of course I am. Tell me. I want to know.’ I shuffle forward in my sleeping bag, leaning towards him and fixing him with an earnest look. ‘Please.’

  Miles looks almost suspicious, as though I’m playing some kind of trick on him but he says, ‘Okay then. If you must know, I left when I was a lad to go into the army. I was about nineteen and pretty desperate to escape. Home was all right, don’t get me wrong, but I needed to see the world. I was never going to be happy staying where I was and living a life like the one my pals were happy with. The army was my ticket out. I joined as a private and worked my way up to sergeant. It was tough but I loved it, and flourished too. Then my superior officer gave me an interesting talk – a word in my ear, if you like – and when the opportunity came to volunteer for the Special Forces, I took it. The recruitment process was the hardest thing I’d ever done but I was determined that they were going to select me. I did all the physical stuff even though it was gruelling – the runs weighted down with equipment, the river swims, the night missions – but the hardest thing was the interrogation. Thirty-six hours of it, to see if I had the mental toughness to survive being in enemy hands.’ A distant look comes into his eyes and I guess that he must be back in whatever place it was that they handed out the treatment he can’t forget. He shakes his head slightly and looks back to me. ‘But I survived it and I got in. And there I was in 22 Special Air Services Regiment.’ He smiles. ‘And lucky for us, I was assigned to the Mountain Troop, which meant I was trained in mountaineering, arctic survival and altitude techniques. I’ve been put through the toughest possible training in Germany and Norway, and climbed the most dangerous mountains in the world.’

  ‘Very handy,’ I say, smiling back. ‘And what happened then? After you’d joined the regiment?’

  He looks almost dreamy for a moment. ‘I loved it. I loved my mates, the camaraderie, the bond we all shared. I relished the challenges and pushing myself to the limit. The work was almost like a game to me, like a boys’ own comic, full of mad adventure and strange locations. Yeah… it was great…’

  ‘So why did you leave?’ I ask.

  His expression grows darker suddenly. ‘I got tired of it. Burnt out. I lost the joy in it, and once you do that, you risk getting scared and you can’t ever be scared. I didn’t want to go that way, so I left.’

  ‘Just like that? You simply got tired of it?’ I can’t help thinking there’s more to the story than he’s telling me. It’s obvious that he loved the SAS. Why did he give it all up?

  Miles sighs shortly. ‘If you must know, it was after a stint in Afghanistan. We were sent out there to deal with Taliban resistance in the mountains. I spent two years out there and by the end of that, I was finished. I’d had enough, simple as that.’

  ‘Why did you decide to become a bodyguard?’ I’m looking at him in a new light now. I knew he was strong but I had no idea how skilled and highly trained he actually is. This man has been in situations I can’t even imagine. It seems ridiculous that someone with his abilities spends his time looking after pampered girls like me and my sisters. My high-handed attitude towards him now seems even more unforgiveable than ever.

  Miles shrugs. ‘It seemed like a good stop-gap while I decide what I want from life. One of my mates did it and recommended it – easy work for very good money, with some travel and comfortable lodgings thrown in. Plenty of ex-servicemen go into security. We’ve been trained to be the best in the world, and people like your father need us for their protection. So… here I am.’

  ‘That’s it?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Your entire life told in about ten minutes?’ I make a face. ‘I don’t believe it. What about a wife or a girlfriend? What about family?’

  His face takes on a closed expression. ‘No wife, no girlfriend either right now. My family consists of my old ma and pa, still happily married after forty years, my brother and his wife and kids, a few cousins I used to see if I went back for Christmas, which wasn’t often. That’s plenty enough for me, thanks. I like to travel light.’

  There’s more to it, I know there is, but I can’t press him any longer. I’ve have a feeling I’ve gone far enough already and, as my new resolution is not to throw my weight around, I don’t think I can insist on it. Besides, he’s already told me how much he hates interrogation. So I decide on an unaccustomed path for me: I’ll bide my time. I’ll just have to be patient.

  After all, we’ve got all night.

  A delicious shiver judders over me at the thought of a night with Miles. I feel that certainty again, the sense that there’s a lot that Miles could show me… He knows what he’s doing, that’s for sure. I wonder about the women in his past – who they are, how many there are. I imagine him caressing a woman, driving himself hard inside her, kissing her mouth, breasts and shoulders. God, I wish it were me.

  Miles stands up suddenly and his form towers over me, appearing to fill the room. ‘That’s enough about me. I’m sure your stories are better than mine. Why don’t you tell me a bit about your life while I make us some coffee? Would you like some?’

  I nod and he fills th
e kettle and sets it over the fire to boil. He asks me a few questions about my life but I’m not in the mood for talking about myself. I’m interested in him but whenever I try to turn the subject back towards him, he dodges it. It feels as though we’re playing a subtle and complicated word game where the aim is to give away as little information as possible. In the end, over tins of black coffee, we chat about our favourite films instead. I expect Miles to like gory violent thrillers and martial arts pictures, but instead it turns out he loves film noir of the thirties and forties.

  ‘Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity,’ he says, wrapping his hands around his tin of coffee. ‘Now there was a dame. And anything with Jimmy Cagney. His charisma just leaps off the screen.’

  I’m impressed. ‘I don’t know much about early film. I love comedies – anything to make me laugh. But that’s more modern stuff.’

  He gives me a look of mock outrage. ‘Some of the funniest films ever were made in the thirties and forties!’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes!’ He laughs. ‘Cary Grant was one of the most gifted comic actors in film. As for Claudette Colbert, Carole Lombard…’

  ‘I’ve heard of Cary Grant, of course,’ I say tentatively.

  He slaps his forehead in pretend despair. ‘Oh my God, girl. There is a lot to teach you!’

  I gaze at him with wide eyes, hoping he can see my desire to be taught. He catches my expression and quickly turns back to his coffee.

  ‘Well, the good thing is how much you’ve got waiting for you to enjoy. I’ll make you a list of my favourites if you like.’

  ‘I would like that, very much,’ I say.

  ‘All right. It’s a deal. All I ask in return is that you tell me what you make of them. Okay?’

  ‘Okay.’ I smile at him.