Grateful for the shadowy interior of the car and aware that they would be back at the flat within minutes, she said casually, ‘While you were upstairs with Lucy I got the impression that your mother was vetting me for the marriage market.’
He groaned and, taking his eyes off the road for a moment, scrutinised her face, searching for a guide to her feelings on the matter.
‘I’m sorry about that, Annabel,’ he said quietly. ‘She means well, but Mum is letting her anxieties about the future take over. I invited you to dine with us as a thank you for what you did for Lucy.’
So let’s get that straight, he seemed to be saying, and she had to admit she was just a bit disappointed. Was she so muted down and drab that he didn’t see anything attractive about her?
When he stopped the car in front of the flats she turned to him and said softly, ‘It’s been a lovely evening, Aaron. I’ve really enjoyed it. Thank you so much for inviting me.’
He observed her with an eyebrow raised questioningly.
‘What? In spite of having to listen to my problems and then having my mother follow them up with her broad hints about my solitary state? For all she knew, you might be married or already have someone in your life. Have you?’
His tone had been apologetic, but that last question had come like a bullet from a gun, as if her answer was going to matter.
‘No. I haven’t,’ she told him, not knowing whether to be annoyed or amused at the question. ‘I’m not married, engaged, in a partnership or anything else. Being alone has its advantages. I’m free to do whatever I please.’
‘But you haven’t always been alone, have you?’ he asked, amazed how relieved he was to know she was free.
‘No. I haven’t. But I am now.’
Aaron said no more. There was something in the tone of her voice that told him not to pursue it. Instead, he asked in a lighter tone. ‘Well? Are you going to ask me in?’
She smiled. ‘No. I’m not. I know you’re bursting to see the inside of my rabbit hutch, but I don’t think it would be a good idea.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you have some preconceived idea that it’s going to be dreadful.’
‘Right, then. I’d better be off. Have a nice weekend, Annabel,’ he said, adding with a boyish grin that was oddly appealing. ‘Keep taking the vitamins.’
As she was opening the passenger door of the car he leaned across and kissed her lightly on the cheek. As she gazed at him in surprise he said, ‘Just a kiss between friends. Nothing to do with the marriage market.’ And leaving her standing beside the door of the accommodation complex he drove off.
* * *
She’d seen another side to Aaron tonight, Annabel told herself as she lay on her hard single bed in the flat’s bedroom. The brisk mantle of efficiency that he wore at Barnaby’s had fallen from his shoulders and he’d let her see that he had his problems just like anyone else.
It was a terrible thing that had happened to his family. He and Mary had both suffered a double tragedy. Aaron had lost his wife and father and his mother her husband and daughter-in-law.
They’d been taken from them in a matter of minutes and he must have wished a thousand times that he’d never gone back to the hotel. But as they were both well aware, lots of people would do lots of things differently if they could see into the future.
If she’d known the misery she was letting herself in for when she’d been attracted by a lazy smile and an even lazier accent, she would have behaved differently. Husband-stealer she was not, and Randy had shown himself to be much less of a man than she’d thought he was when it had all come out.
It was strange how one man could deceive his wife without batting an eyelid and another should still be grieving for a woman who had died four long years ago.
Yet that was how it was. Aaron had made it painfully plain that he had no designs on her. To such an extent that she almost wished he had.
She sympathised with his mother’s efforts on his behalf but he shouldn’t be put in the humiliating position of advertising for a wife. It was a cold-blooded procedure and although he had barely touched her, something told her that when Aaron took a new wife, if he ever did, there would be nothing cold-blooded about it.
CHAPTER THREE
IF HE’D been light-hearted back there at the flats Aaron was not so as he drove home. Annabel wasn’t the only one thinking it had been an unsettling evening. He felt that they’d all behaved out of character except Lucy.
For his own part, his interest in the doctor who’d saved Lucy’s life had increased rather than diminished while she’d been their guest. He’d seen her in a new light. For one thing, she’d taken trouble with her appearance. He didn’t flatter himself that it had been on his account, but it had certainly registered, and for another, he’d admired the dignified brevity with which she’d described her family life while within the loving circle that was his.
Annabel had been like a flower opening up before his eyes and he hoped that she wouldn’t have closed up again when they met on the wards at Barnaby’s on Monday.
He’d had no intention of burdening her with his past and present griefs, but Lucy and his mother had set the ball rolling and he’d had to say something. Once he’d started it had been oddly comforting to be talking to an outsider who’d listened with sympathy and understanding, while making no demands on him.
And an ‘outsider’ Annabel must have certainly felt when he’d been so keen to emphasise that she’d been there merely in the role of someone to whom thanks were due. She must have thought him tactless and rude, though she’d shown no sign of it.
And then there’d been his mother! Sounding Annabel out and showing how anxious she was for him to find himself another wife, when he had no such intentions. It wasn’t like her. She was the kindest and most thoughtful of mortals. But something had got into her and they were going to have to talk it through.
All was silent as he let himself back into the house and as he stripped off and flung himself on top of the covers of his bed Annabel’s face kept coming to mind.
‘No. I haven’t got anyone in my life,’ she’d told him back there in the car, and he’d known immediately that that hadn’t always been the case. Had it been a past relationship that had taken the colour from her cheeks?
Whatever it was, he had a strong feeling that if he’d become more interested in her during the evening, his mother’s comments would have put the flattener on any stirrings Annabel might have been experiencing. If she gave him a wide berth on Monday morning, he wouldn’t be surprised...
* * *
But he was to see her again before Monday. On Saturday afternoon Aaron took Lucy into the town for some new shoes, and as they were leaving the shop he saw Annabel cross the road, looking in the window of an estate agent.
‘We meet again,’ he said from behind her a few seconds later, and she swung round in surprise.
‘Yes, we do,’ she agreed, adding with a special smile for Lucy, who was fishing her new shoes out of the bag for her to see, ‘You’ll be surprised to see that I’m looking at property.’
‘Yes. What has prompted that?’
She had a smile for him now and Aaron thought if she had been upset the night before it obviously hadn’t persisted.
‘What do you think?’ she replied. ‘Going back to the flat after spending the evening in your palatial residence.’
‘Really? So last night did