Miranda's Mount (13 page)

Jago returned to the table with a glass tumbler, steam rising from the surface in wispy tendrils. Miranda sniffed the air and smelled spices and rum.

‘Here, have some grog. You look cold, but, dare I say it, slightly less ready to kill me.’

Miranda kept her eyes ahead. She would not look down at her dress. It really had grown chilly in the garden. She took the glass from him, muttered a ‘thanks’ and gulped down a glug of punch. ‘Oww!’

‘Here.’ Jago handed her his beer. ‘Cool your tongue on that.’

She swilled her scorched mouth with cold beer.

‘Better?’ he asked.

She
swallowed the beer and blew on the punch as the alcoholic steam fill her nostrils. ‘Mmm.’

‘Good. I’d hate you to have a burnt tongue on my account.’

Miranda ignored him and pretended to take an interest in a woman across the garden who seemed to have just noticed Jago’s presence. Dressed in some kind of Roman toga with her hair piled on her head, she smiled coquettishly at Jago and mouthed a ‘Hello, darling.’ Jago lifted a hand to her, twitched his lips in a half-smile then turned back to Miranda. The toga woman glared at Miranda as if she was something nasty stuck to the sole of her gladiator sandal.

‘Is Toga Girl one of your fan club?’ Miranda asked, immediately hating herself for sounding as if she cared.

He raised an eyebrow. Bastard. He knew she was jealous. He knew Toga Woman was jealous too. That made Miranda the same as her. Arghh.

‘Toga Girl, as you call her, is an old school friend on holiday down here but I’m liable to bump into someone who knows me anywhere. I can’t hide away even if my visit here is only going to be a short one.’

‘But by appearing in public,’ she began, rather pleased with her image of him moving among his people like a monarch, ‘you must be dodging questions about your plans all the time.’

He sighed briefly. ‘I don’t like it but the pain will be of short duration.’ He frowned and hesitated then said quietly, ‘As short as I can possibly make it. I don’t want to make anyone suffer longer than they have to.’ He stared at his pint for a few seconds.

‘What’s the matter?’ asked Miranda as the silence lengthened and Jago seemed to be searching for an answer in the bottom of the glass.

‘This place brings back too many memories, I suppose.’ He gave a short laugh. ‘Now drink your grog.’

She sensed she’d touched a nerve. There was something he didn’t want to talk about but she wasn’t going to let him off the hook. ‘Do you miss Australia? People say you were a surf instructor over there.’

He laughed without any real amusement. ‘Is that what they call it?’

‘Ronnie did.’

‘Really? Are
you sure she didn’t say I was a sponging parasite and a layabout?’

Miranda considered lying then saw his eyes, drilling into her. ‘Those too.’

‘Both are probably accurate. I left uni and bummed around, picking grapes, working in bars. I ended up at Bells Beach learning to surf, then I got a job as an instructor.’

But ten years, Miranda thought, ten years of bumming around and riding waves. Surely that couldn’t cover the whole of his absence from home.

‘And?’

He smiled, bitter as acid. ‘And nothing.’

Miranda couldn’t conceal her surprise at his sudden change of subject but she had reached the stage where it was hard to conceal her feelings at all. After the earlier drinks, the hot rum punch had tipped her over from ever so slightly defensive to ever so slightly pissed. Maybe it wasn’t the punch but being with Jago, talking to him and almost empathising with him. Whatever the cause, her inhibitions were melting fast. ‘I don’t believe you.’

‘And nothing
I want to talk about. Are there not things that have happened to you that you don’t want to rake over?’

She stopped, glass to her lips. Her past? Running away from home. Putting herself through university. Working in the vacations in country house teashops, cleaning loos, as a gardener’s labourer. Anywhere quiet and isolated with a sense of history that she didn’t have. Then the Mount. ‘I suppose so,’ she said, refusing to reveal any detail, no matter how pissed she was.

‘And do you want to bare your soul to me?’

‘No.’

‘What about your family?’

‘We’re estranged.’

‘Estranged? Now there’s a word.’

‘I don’t have any contact with them,’ she said. How much it hurt to admit even that much. She felt like he’d taken wire wool to a raw graze. Was that how he felt about her questions?

‘You never talk about them,’ he said.

‘How do you know I don’t?’

‘My mother says you’ve never been back to see them and you don’t mention them. She thought it was unusual but not her place to pry. I, on the other hand, have no manners.’

‘I’ve already worked that out, Jago.’

He smiled. ‘So having established I’m a rude bastard, tell me about your family. What happened?’

Should she tell him? That her father left before she was even born and that she hadn’t been part of her mum’s plans, period? And that, one day, her mother had done something that there was no coming back from. ‘I thought it was better if I just left.’ The glow from the rum punch had disappeared into the cool night air. She shivered. She’d already said more to Jago about her family than she ever had to anyone and she’d reached her limit. The combination of alcohol and his questions made her feel like crying. Why didn’t he leave her alone?

‘It was a long
time ago and very far away. You must know how it feels, after you left the Mount for Australia.’

‘To an extent, but I wouldn’t say I was “estranged” from my mother. Contrary to popular belief, we have kept in touch. Not that regularly, but enough for her to know I’ve been safe and well. She came over to Australia a few years ago, in fact when …’ He stopped and, to her horror, reached out and touched her hand. She couldn’t cope with his sympathy, she might cry. ‘Whatever happened must have been pretty bad for you to stay away for all these years and never go back …’ He hesitated.

She felt the hot sting of tears in her eyes, the moisture on her lashes. His touch had made her question the past thirteen years, the past thirty even. She couldn’t face that now, not from him. ‘Don’t tell me I should try to contact my mother.’

‘I didn’t say that, Miranda.’

‘I know but …’ That’s what he was thinking, Miranda knew, or maybe, a small voice added, that’s what she’d wondered herself at times. She crushed the notion immediately, both in his mind and her own. ‘Nothing will have changed, even if I did try to go back. You won’t change how you feel about selling the Mount will you?’ she asked, rubbing her hand across her eyes, ashamed of her tears.

‘No. I won’t and I’m sorry for upsetting you. You’re probably right and I really should mind my own business. Here.’

She caught her breath. He
reached out and rubbed a thumb gently under each eye. ‘No clean white handkerchief like a gentleman should have,’ he said. ‘Only a grubby thumb.’

‘You’re making things worse,’ she said, trying to smile but feeling full to the very brim. One more gentle word, one more probe of the wounds, however tentative, and she would tip right over the edge. Be a bastard again, she wanted to say to him. Be an arrogant boy not a complex man she couldn’t fathom out and was finding difficult to hate in the way she needed to.

Her relief when Jago changed the subject was like falling onto a giant bank of cotton wool, when you’d expected to crash onto rocks. ‘Now, referring to my earlier misdemeanours with the fags,’ he said, ‘if you’re not going to take up my willingness to be chastised, I could suggest another way of me doing penance. I heard that you’re looking for really bad people to put in the stocks.’

This was good. Not only the prospect of Jago going in the stocks but the levity and the banter after the emotional stuff she found impossible to deal with. Having escaped with her life, she now felt recklessly happy. Or was it the rum punch? ‘I like the sound of that,’ she said.

‘I knew you’d approve of people throwing rotten veg at me.’

‘Only wet sponges. I hope there won’t be any tomatoes. But I thought you’d never agree to take a turn in the stocks.’

‘I may be selling the
place but I’m not devoid of a sense of humour.’ His eyes glinted wickedly. ‘I might even be persuaded into a costume for the Festival.’

‘What sort?’

He laughed, at her not with her, but so gently that she tingled all over.

‘Spongebob Squarepants. What do you think? I thought of Blackbeard. A wicked pirate would be appropriate in the circumstances, wouldn’t it?’

She shifted her bottom on the bench. ‘I really hadn’t thought about it.’

‘What about you? Who are you going to be?’

‘I’ll probably just wear my uniform,’ she said, staying as far away as possible from her helpless virgin fantasy.

‘Over my dead body, you will.’ His bare knee brushed hers under the table as he leaned forwards. His dark eyes gleamed wickedly, inviting her in deeper. Miranda wanted him to pull her face against his and snog her, tongues, and all in full view of everyone in the pub. She wanted to hear the gasps of jealous outrage from the Toga Woman and the thuds as Jago’s fan club hit the flagstones. She wanted to be dragged off to one of the Pilchard’s creaky old bedrooms, clutch the iron bedstead until her knuckles whitened and scream as he thrust inside her.

His voice, sexy and amused, slid into her consciousness. ‘More grog?’

‘Mm … yes, please.’

As he disappeared into the bar,
Miranda was confronted by the Mount looming ahead of her in the twilight, surrounded by a sea as silver grey and smooth as mercury. She might be physically on dry land, but she had a horrible feeling she was already way out of her depth with Jago.

Miranda was wrapped
in Jago’s sweatshirt. Funny, she didn’t remember him wearing one at the pub. Even funnier – ha ha ha – she didn’t give a toss! She also didn’t remember how his arm had crept around her shoulders but she cared about that because it felt warm and strong and very right.

The sky was now inky blue, the lights shining in the village and beyond from the cottages that scrambled up the hillside until they stopped at the edge of the moorland. A few lights also winked on the yachts in the harbour, swinging gently from side to side as the masts rocked in the night breeze. However, the lane from the pub to the water’s edge was dark and silent. There was no one about. Why would there be? It was almost midnight.

Miranda vaguely remembered a conversation with Karen about a room for the night and her giggling. She heard the bolts on the door of the Pilchard locking behind her and felt Jago holding her hand as they walked down the steep lane towards the sea. The Mount seemed to float above her, its battlements and towers silhouetted against the moon, a few lights still strung along the distant quayside like fireflies tangled in a net.

Oh, how
romantic. She giggled again now and Jago’s arm tightened around her shoulders. ‘You can stop laughing, my lady, and start working out where the hell we’re going to get a boat from at this time of night?’

She blinked into the darkness at the myriad boats bobbing up and down in the harbour. ‘We could use that,’ she said, pointing at a rowing boat tied up near the end of the slip-way.

‘That one belongs to the rowing gig club.’

‘So? They won’t mind. We could have it back in the morning before they find out.’

‘Tide’ll be out by morning.’

Miranda considered for a moment, although she was way past the stage of considering anything and onto the stage where jumping off a cliff sounded rational. ‘You’re right; bugger the gig club, our need is greater than theirs.’

Jago climbed down the steps into the boat and held out his hand to her. Miranda looked down at the stone steps, slippery with weed. She stood on the top one and held out her hands. ‘I feel like Louisa Musgrove. Whee!’ She wobbled deliberately and made as if to leap into the boat.

‘For God’s sake, no. Be careful!’

‘Only joking but I had you going, didn’t I?’

His face, pale in the moonlight, stared up at her. ‘Just get in the boat, wench.’

‘How
dare you call me a wench?’

‘Because I’m his lordship. Now, come here.’

Taking Jago’s outstretched hand, she let him help her down into the boat and sat on the thwart. Jago clambered back up to the quay, untied the boat and sat opposite her. He took the oars in both hands and pulled away from the harbour wall, grunting with effort.

Miranda giggled. ‘Put your back into it, St Merryn.’

‘How dare you speak to me like that? I’m the captain and I’m in charge.’

Miranda wagged her finger at him, insanely happy. ‘I think not. You’re incapaciiattated. I’m the one who’s driving.’

The harbour wall glided by them and they were out in the bay, with the Mount ahead of them. ‘I think you mean rowing,’ said Jago.

‘Driving, rowing. What-evahh,’ said Miranda.

‘If you’re going to be criticise the skipper, you can take over.’

‘I could do better.’

‘OK then.’ Jago let go of the oars and tried to stand up. The boat swayed precariously.

Miranda let out a squeal. ‘Whoaa! Sit down, St Merryn.’

He plonked back down and she had to grab the sides for support.

He gathered the oars in his hands again. ‘You know,’ he said. ‘If this was the Navy, I’d have you thrown on the brig for insubordination.’

The boat wobbled as Miranda gave him a cheeky salute. ‘Do you know what Winston Churchill said about the Navy?’

‘Funnily enough, no.’

‘He said,’ Miranda declared, ‘that the Navy was “nothing but rum, sodomy and the lash”.’

There
was a pause. Miranda saw Jago’s eyes sparkle wickedly. ‘Well, we’ve had the rum, but if you fancy trying the other two, I’m willing to oblige.’

Oh er. Her skin burned like hot coals. Even in the half-light, even with the boat swaying and her swaying too, she recognised her trembly feeling as pure lust. Filthy thoughts rampaged through her mind, fantasies she’d never dare acknowledge and that, even through a groggy haze, both scared her and drove her wild.

‘I think we should get a move on while the moon’s out.’