Читать книгу Christmas At Pemberley - Katie Oliver - Страница 32

Chapter 25

‘Where are you going?’ Penelope asked her daughter as she came down the stairs late that afternoon. She eyed Caitlin’s woollen cap and the coat she was buttoning up. ‘You can’t mean to go outside in this weather.’

Caitlin shrugged. ‘Why can’t I? It’s only snow, after all, and I’m in desperate need of a walk. I’m going stir crazy inside this place.’

‘It’s nearly time for dinner,’ her mother pointed out. ‘Stay in, and have a drink with me. I’ve barely had a chance to talk to you since you got home.’

But you had plenty of time to lecture me, Caitlin thought uncharitably. ‘That’s hardly my fault.’

‘Please, darling. I don’t want to argue, I haven’t the energy for it. Come into the drawing room and tell me what you’ve been up to.’

What shall we talk about first? Caitlin wondered. Will I confess that I’ve slept with my married lit professor? Or admit I got booted from uni because of him?

‘All right, Mum,’ she sighed, and shed her coat with bad grace. ‘I’ll stay and have a drink with you.’

‘Don’t sound so enthused. Where’s Jeremy, by the way?’

‘Studying. Or reading. That’s all he ever does.’

They were just going into the sitting room when Lady Campbell breezed through the baize door that led to the kitchen. ‘Oh, there you are, Caitlin. I’ve been looking for you. You have a telephone call.’

‘I do? Who’d be calling me here?’ Caitlin wondered, puzzled. ‘All my friends have my mobile number.’

‘I’m sure I don’t know. Mrs Neeson took the call. You can pick it up in the hall.’

‘Thanks, Gram. Sorry, Mum,’ she apologized, secretly relieved by the interruption. ‘I’ll be right back.’

She hurried across the entrance hall as her mother disappeared into the drawing room and went to the phone on the hallway table. ‘Hello? This is Caitlin Campbell.’

‘Caitlin?’ a familiar male voice enquired. ‘I’m glad I caught you at home.’

Her fingers tightened on the receiver. She couldn’t believe it, couldn’t believe his nerve. ‘Niall! Why did you call me here?’

‘Well, I must say, that’s not exactly the response I was hoping for,’ he replied. ‘I called because we need to talk.’

‘We said everything we needed to say before I left Edinburgh. I lost my place at university because of you,. My parents are still furious.’

He hesitated. ‘You didn’t tell them about us, did you?’

‘No! Of course I didn’t. But Gram knows,’ she added. ‘She’s very smart, my gram. She figured it out. She wanted to have you sacked, but I talked her out of it.’

‘Thank you for that.’ He let out a pent-up breath. ‘I’m sorry for the whole mess, truly. More sorry than you know. I’ve had a word with a couple of key people, and I’m reasonably certain I can get you reinstated...provided we agree not to see one another other again.’

‘Oh, trust me ‒ that won’t be a problem.’

‘Cait, darling,’ he chided, ‘don’t be like that. I miss you terribly…’

‘Yes, I’m sure you do.’ Her words were acid. ‘You miss having me at your beck and call. You miss having someone to make your tea and toast. You miss having me in your bed…’

‘I do miss that,’ he admitted, unperturbed by her accusations. ‘All of it. I won’t lie. But more importantly, I miss you. I’ve left Miriam, you know.’

There was a brief, charged silence as Caitlin absorbed this bit of information. ‘That doesn’t mean anything. Married people separate and get back together all the time.’

‘I’ve also filed for divorce.’

She sank down onto the cushioned bench in the hallway. ‘I don’t believe you.’

‘I’ll show you the paperwork if you like. But to do that, I’d have to see you again.’

‘That’s impossible.’ Although she spoke firmly, the certainty had left her voice. ‘I’m back home, at Draemar. And I don’t want to see you again. I...I can’t.’

‘Why?’

‘Because it hurts too much, Niall!’

She thought of all the times he’d promised to take her to dinner, or away for the weekend, and called at the last minute to cancel. She thought of the meals she’d cooked for him in her tiny Chalmers Street kitchen, roast beef or chicken with lashings of gravy from a packet, grown cold and unappetizing by the time he finally slipped away from his wife.

He was always sorry, so very sorry; and she’d relent, and forgive him, and let him in. They’d have the most amazing sex, and she’d lie in his arms afterwards and think that really, she was very lucky, and she should be happy to settle for whatever scraps of his life he gave her.

‘I’m tired of sneaking around,’ she said now. ‘I’m tired of the broken promises and the last-minute cancellations. I just,’ she paused to blink back tears ‘I just can’t do it any longer.’

And before he could protest, or persuade her to give him another chance, she choked out a goodbye, and rang off.

‘Caitlin!’ Her mother stood waiting in the drawing room doorway. ‘Are you coming in?’

Caitlin blinked back her tears and stood up. ‘Yes. Sorry, I just finished my call. It took a bit longer than I thought.’

‘Who was it?’ Penelope enquired as her daughter crossed the hall to join her. ‘One of your university friends?’

‘Yes,’ Caitlin said, and managed a smile. ‘No one important.’