Instead he poured coffee in delicate china cups, adding milk to Abby’s, taking his black with a sugar.
She’d donned her cashmere dressing gown and had her hair pulled back in a ponytail when he turned and handed her the cup and saucer. She sipped at it as he sipped at his. Then he sat in one of the chairs. Abby began to move to the other one but he caught her wrist, leaned to the side, deposited his cup and saucer on the tray and carefully pulled her in his lap so as to not spill her coffee.
She held her body stiff, not a thing like the warm and pliant Abby who snuggled close to him two nights before.
Cash knew, instantly, even after her avowals of love in front of her husband, his family and even her fucking cat, that this conversation was not going to go as he’d hoped.
“What do we need to talk about?” she asked guardedly, keeping her eyes on her cup as she sipped again.
“Our future,” he replied and at his words she choked and spluttered.
When she got herself under control, her eyes moved to his.
He watched her breathe looking like this wasn’t an easy, natural task
Finally she whispered, “Yes, I agree. We need to talk about our future.”
“You start,” Cash demanded, wanting to hear what he was up against right away so he could tear it apart, explain the way it actually was, take her straight back to bed and fuck her so hard she’d still feel him inside her on Thursday.
Maybe Friday.
She didn’t argue as he expected.
She nodded, leaned forward, put her cup and saucer on the tray and sat back, folding her hands in her lap and continuing to hold her body stiffly.
Then her eyes turned to his. “I’m sorry I fell in love with you.”
Cash felt his lips part in surprise.
That, of all things, he did not expect to hear.
She had these last weeks, apologised for a number of bizarre things but this was by far and away the most bizarre.
“Sorry?” he asked.
She waved her hand in the air and repeated, “I’m sorry I fell in love with you. I wasn’t going to tell you but I didn’t want you to believe Vivianna. It was stupid, I should have let you believe what she was saying but I didn’t want you to. I don’t know why.”
“Abby –” he began but she talked over him.
“Jenny told me last night about your talk.” When he opened his mouth, she waved her hand in the air again and said, “It’s okay. I’m okay with it. I mean, I’m not, like, at all, but I have to be, don’t I?” She didn’t let him answer and went on. “I like what we have. No, I love what we have and I’d be really happy to stay this way for as long as you want. But Jenny reminded me I’m kind of weird in that I get attached, as in really attached, and she’s right.” She took a deep breath and Cash thought he had his chance to speak but she got there before him. “Even though, you know, I love you and everything, I think it’s best if we just move on. End it. Now. I don’t want it to be messy for you and I’m sure you don’t want that either. I mean, it’s better for you this way, trust me.”
Cash’s arms moved around her and he pulled her closer to his chest, deeper into his lap.
She didn’t notice this and kept right on talking. “And I’m being kind of selfish. I don’t want it to be messy either and I don’t want to get more attached, if you know what I mean.”
He tried to cut in. “Abby –”
He failed as she rattled on. “So a clean break now would be good. I mean, not good but better for all concerned. You’ve got your castle and Alistair got what he deserved and Vivianna is in hell so all’s well in The World of Cash. Which will make me feel a bit, you know, more okay with everything, knowing it’s all good for you.”
She stopped on a sharp breath that hitched in the middle and he realised she was close to tears, her body stiff and tight. Her eyes not meeting his were bright and she was, lastly but most importantly, completely full of shit with this whole act.
He wanted to laugh.
He didn’t.
He also wanted to kiss her.
Something else he didn’t do.
Instead, he said softly, “Darling, look at me.”
Her gaze came to his face but not to his eyes.
“Look at me, Abby,” he repeated.
He watched her teeth clench then her eyes lifted to his.
When their eyes caught, he asked, “Are you finished?”
She bit her lip, he felt his own lips twitch then she nodded and said, “I think so.”
“Good, I’m talking now,” he declared.
Her eyes went funny, guarded and surprised and something else, something he couldn’t read.
“Oh… kay,” she replied hesitantly.
Cash didn’t delay.
“I’m in love with you,” he announced and her mouth dropped open but he went on. “We’re not over. We’re never going to be over. There isn’t going to be an end. This is it, you and me, in Penmort, you wearing diamonds and silk and having coffee delivered to our bedroom every morning.”
“Cash –” she whispered, eyes wide, face pale, expressions clashing between shock and awe.
“I’m not done,” Cash stated and pressed on, “I know you still love Ben. I’m not going to pretend I like it but I will try to live with it.”
“Cash –”
“Abby, stop interrupting me.”
“Okay,” she whispered and he felt her body start to soften in his arms and he knew he was getting somewhere.
“You were right last night, it’s early. We’ll take some time, learn more about each other. Not much but we’ll do it. Then we’ll get married, have children and live happily ever after, if you don’t annoy me too much.” She gasped but he ignored it and continued. “I’ve spoken to Nicola this morning and she and her daughters are going to give us a few months. They’ll stay in Bath then move back here. I’m sure you’ll agree they’ll be welcome here for as long as they wish to stay.”
“Of course,” Abby mumbled.
Cash kept going. “I want you to know I’m not only fine with you becoming more attached to me, I want it and you’re going to give it to me. I want you so attached you can’t imagine a life without me. I don’t give a fuck if that’s selfish, that’s what I want because, Abby, you must know, I already can’t imagine life without you.”
He stopped talking and watched as the brightness in her eyes became wetness shimmering at their edges. One tear dropped to her cheek and slid down her face.
Cash watched its progress.
Finally she whispered, “Are you done?”
Cash’s eyes went from her lone tear back to hers.
“Yes,” he replied.
She was still whispering, nearly breathless, when she asked, “Are you sure, about what you said?”
“Yes,” he answered instantly.
“I thought –” Her breath caught audibly, it sounded painful and Cash drew her yielding body closer, tucking her deep into the protective fold of his arms as another tear slid down her cheek. She sucked in air, her hands coming up to rest on his chest and with visible effort she continued. “I thought it was stupid to hope.”
“Hope for what?” he asked softly even though he knew the answer.
She didn’t give him that answer instead she whispered, “I thought it was selfish.”
“What was selfish, darling?”
“To have something so good, so wonderful, with Ben.” His body grew tight but her hand moved to rest on his face and she admitted, “It was stupid to hope, selfish to want something even better, something that felt magical, something I thought I had with you.”
An overwhelming sense of triumph coursed through him and Cash again wanted to kiss her. This time it felt like a need rather than a desire.
Instead he confirmed decisively, “You have it.”
Her face came close.
She rested her forehead against his, her nose alongside his, her eyes open and looking deeply into his, she whispered, “I kn
ow.”
It was then Cash surged out of the chair. Taking her with him, he carried her to bed.
There, he fucked her so hard it was likely she still felt him inside her on Thursday.
However, he’d never know, since he fucked her Wednesday night as well as every night in between.
And some mornings besides.
Epilogue
Edith’s Mental Snapshots
“It’s too early,” Abby, pacing the waiting room in severe agitation, announced for the seventeenth time.
Cash’s eyes went from the papers in his hands to his wife.
He knew it was the seventeenth time because after she’d said it five times in the car on the way to hospital, he’d started counting.
“Abigail, calm down,” Mrs. Truman, sitting and knitting in a chair next to Cash, demanded imperiously.
Abby whirled on Mrs. Truman, narrowed her eyes and planted her hands on her hips.
“Calm?” she asked in a deceptively light tone.
“Yes, dear, calm,” Mrs. Truman answered, her voice gentling, “let nature take its course.”
“Nature,” Abby declared, her voice beginning to tremble, exposing her not-very-controlled fear, “demands a gestation period of nine months. Jenny’s baby has only had seven.”
This wasn’t, Cash knew, exactly true.
Jenny’s baby had seven and three-quarter months of gestation.
Cash’s eyes swept Abby’s body in her form-fitting, very elegant, demurely sexy, plum-coloured dress complimented by rich suede, charcoal grey, spike-heeled boots.
She was also wearing the diamond bracelet he’d given her which she wore daily, a modest (but not too modest) diamond pendant hung from a delicate platinum chain and lay in the indentation of her throat and double-diamond drop earrings hung from her ears.
The necklace he’d bought her in France during their first holiday together on the Riviera. The earrings he’d given her during a dinner they’d shared when she’d been on a business trip with him in Rome six months previously.
Cash should probably diversify into giving her different precious jewels but he found he liked her wearing his diamonds.
His eyes stopped at her boots and distractedly he wished, as usual (however at that present time most especially, considering his wife’s condition), that she wouldn’t wear those fucking high heels.
He let go of this wish, knowing it was in vain and finally his gaze moved up and settled on the small, but becoming more noticeable by the day, baby bump at her belly.
Cash, after copious amounts of research once Abby told him she was pregnant, knew the extra three weeks Abby wasn’t declaring of Jenny’s pregnancy meant a great deal to the outcome of that afternoon’s events.
Cash also knew that for the first time in decades Abby and Jenny’s relationship had turned on its head.
Jenny’s pregnancy had been difficult from the start. She’d been tremendously ill in the beginning, incapacitated with morning sickness, crippling migraines and terrified by intermittent cramping and spotting.
These symptoms lasted well into the second trimester and there were two very legitimate scares when she’d stopped spotting and started bleeding.
Both times it was Abby who rushed her to the hospital.
Absolute bed rest was prescribed during the last trimester. This was, under Abby’s edict and Nicola’s urging both firm and forceful which brought about Kieran’s acceptance, happened at Penmort and was accompanied by Abby’s and Nicola’s near constant companionship. It was also a strategy that obviously didn’t work.
Jenny had gone into labour four hours ago.
Even though labour had begun at Penmort, Kieran had called Cash to ask for him to return from his Saturday morning in his new office in Exeter instead of telling Abby this news.
This was a kindness for which Cash was grateful. Cash didn’t want Abby anywhere near the steering wheel of a car in her present state.
As Cash watched his wife, his mind wandered over the last several months.
Jenny had been used to taking care of Abby through her many dramas. Abby had been used to being taken care of. This change in the state of affairs had altered their relationship in a way Cash didn’t quite understand.
Women, he decided some time ago, were baffling to the point where it was futile for a man even to attempt to comprehend.
So he didn’t.
What he did understand was that Jenny was a strong and capable woman who didn’t like having to be taken care of. Cash had grown to admire this greatly.
Abby, on the other hand, was beside herself with glee that she had an opportunity to pay Jenny back for all her care and attention. And this she did with an enthusiasm akin to religion.
They clashed frequently more than likely because Jenny was frightened and trying to hide it and Abby even more so.
Cash and Kieran steered well clear. They often found themselves together, in the beginning in Kieran’s office in his home, in the end in the billiards room at Penmort drinking whisky and letting their wives (more often than not loudly, in another room) sort through their relationship turmoil.
Abby was not beside herself with glee at the circumstances. For seven and three-quarter months she had been functioning on adrenalin and very slim hope and not succeeding by any stretch of the imagination at keeping her fear at bay.
His wife unfortunately had been conditioned to the fact that if something bad could happen, it would.
“Darling,” Cash called, putting aside his papers and making an effort at controlling her fear, an effort he knew was doomed to fail but he made it all the same, “sit down.”
“No,” was her swift, sharp retort.
Mrs. Truman chuckled.
Cash tried not to smile.
At that moment Nicola walked in bearing a cardboard tray of gourmet coffees.
“Any news?” she asked.
“No,” Abby repeated just as swiftly and sharply and Nicola’s eyes flew to Cash.
Cash gave a short shake of his head and Nicola pressed her lips together.
She handed out the coffees she’d gone to a local shop to purchase after Mrs. Truman declared that hospital coffee would simply not do and approached Abby, putting her hand on Abby’s arm.
“My dear, you really must try to relax. You’re not doing your own baby any favours by getting upset,” Nicola advised.
“How do you propose I do that, Nicci? She’s my best friend!” Abby ended on a cry.
Cash watched Nicola’s hand squeeze Abby’s arm comfortingly.
It still amused him that Abby called Nicola “Nicci”. Nicola was not a Nicci. However, Nicola didn’t seem to mind in the slightest.
Over the last several months Nicola’s daughters had moved out of the castle one-by-one. They’d all had jobs since Cash had been reunited with the family, Fenella’s part-time. However Fenella found a new, higher paid, full-time job in Plymouth and was the first to go. Suzanne had received a promotion and a transfer to Bristol. She was the second to leave and was renting Abby’s long since fully restored grandmother’s home in Clevedon, an idea Cash had suggested to Abby, which she’d adored, thrilled to have a “family member” residing in her beloved home. Honor moved out only the month before. She was now sharing a flat in Exeter with her boyfriend.
Cash decided they did this because they were free, finally, to leave their mother and live their lives because Nicola was now safe.
Coming to this understanding caused Cash no small amount of guilt that for a year he had entirely misread the Fitzhugh women. He had been so wrapped up in his retribution against Alistair that he had not caught on to what was happening and moved far more swiftly to end their mistreatment.
Although he shared this with Abby, who urged him to let go of his blame (which he did not), he did not share it with the others nor, at his request, did Abby.
He would, as was his nature, demonstrate his remorse by making certain Nicola Fitzhugh was safe, protected and happy for the rest o
f her days.
Nicola had taken a part-time job in a local shop but she had, Cash knew, no intention of leaving the castle. It had finally become her home, something which Cash made clear and Abby made clearer. But also she seemed intent on raining love and affection on Cash and Abby, the kind Cash never had and Abby had lost.
He decided this was likely her way of paying for what Alistair had stolen from Cash, a responsibility she did not bear but assumed all the same.
Cash also decided she just simply loved Abby.
As this fit in with his plan, he let Nicola continue her endeavours unhindered.
Abby and Nicola had offered Penmort to the National Trust, opening it to the public for six months of the year on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons and alternating weekends.
Cash had not liked this decision and had only been cursorily involved in it.
He found, somewhat to his annoyance, but mostly to his amusement, that his wife and aunt regularly teamed up to steamroll him with some rather bizarre capers. These capers, Cash knew, were likely always instigated by Abby and she simply took Nicola along for the ride.
However Cash also knew Nicola was having the time of her life.
Therefore he didn’t resist.
Much.
He found to his surprise that he not only didn’t mind his home being open to the public, he liked it. The castle was so popular due to its beauty, history and the “myth” of Vivianna made stronger by the many reports of her appearance at the anniversary dinner, some of which were printed in newspapers and magazines, that the National Trust had to do viewings by appointment only. That meant his family was not overwhelmed with visitors. Anyone who came had a genuine desire to see the property and were thus utterly respectful. He enjoyed their interest, his legacy was rather extraordinary and he found he liked sharing it.
When he confided this to Abby she didn’t say she told him so but she gave him a look that said it.
Cash looked to the door as Suzanne sauntered in looking stylish in a tailored, black, wool overcoat.