Swept off Her Feet Read online

  “Why? We’re more or less the same size. If you breathe in.”

  “No, I mean I don’t think the courier will be able to get through. Not for a few days, anyway.”

  Alice snorted. “Oh, come on, you’re just outside Berwick, not in the Orkneys!”

  “Hello? We’re snowed in. Hasn’t it been on the news yet? Mhairi says it could be days until the roads get cleared. Are you okay?” I added. Her breath had whistled in with a very sharp, possibly sweary noise. “In some respects, I guess you couldn’t have got here by Thursday . . .”

  My voice trailed off. A figure was striding up the path toward the lodge. A man. A broad-shouldered, capable-looking man in a flat farmer’s cap. I squinted.

  Oh no.

  “Alice, Fraser’s coming up the path,” I squeaked. “I bet he’s looking for me! What did you tell him?”

  “Nothing! I panicked. I thought you could come up with an explanation.”

  “What? Are you mad?” I ducked down behind the window. “What am I supposed to say?”

  “You’re the one with the insanely overactive imagination! Tell him I’ve broken my leg. Or I’ve got swine flu. Just anything that would stop me dancing at the weekend. But don’t hurt his feelings. Don’t tell him I’ve run off with my assistant or anything that might . . . upset him.”

  There was a wobble in her voice. It sounded as if Alice was close to tears.

  “Fine, okay,” I said. “But you have to buy all those teddy bears and whatever photograph frames Max still has in the shop tomorrow. I need my commission. And you have to make it up to Fraser.”

  “Deal,” said Alice as Fraser started to knock on the door. He spotted me crouching by Robert’s coat and changed his knock into a confused wave.

  I pocketed my phone, stood up, and opened the door. “Hello, Fraser!”

  “Evie!” he said, leaning to kiss me on the cheek. “Just the woman I was looking for.”

  I inspected his guileless face for signs of Alice’s phone message. If he was gutted at being stood up by his girlfriend on the eve of the Most Romantic Night of the Year, he wasn’t showing it. Fraser’s manners really were full coverage.

  “You were looking for me down here?” I asked, confused.

  “No, been up to the house. Mhairi said you’d headed—Ah, Robert! I see you’ve got other people answering your door for you now! Taking the laird thing seriously, are we?”

  “Tradesmen round the back, if you’ve come about the wine, Graham,” retorted Robert cheerfully.

  It was the casual rudeness that spoke of a long, long British male friendship.

  “Kettle’s on,” he continued. “Come in and tell me how I can fill up our entire cellar with your cheapest plonk, so there’s no room for any of my dad’s Kettlesheer Gold.”

  “Actually, it was Evie I wanted a word with.” Fraser smiled at me, but now I looked closer, his eyes were worried.

  Robert huffed and motioned him in. “That’s all I seem to hear these days. Get in, you’re letting the heat out.”

  Somewhat awkwardly, given the narrow hall, the three of us walked in formation back to the kitchen, where Robert seemed to sense that Fraser wanted a private word, and excused himself, padding out of the room in his socks like a panther.

  “Um, it’s a bit awkward, Evie, so I’ll come straight out with it,” said Fraser. “I’ve just had a very strange message from Alice about this weekend. She says she can’t come, but that you’ll be taking her place. Is that right? Have I misunderstood?”

  I cleared my throat. “Yes. I mean, no, you haven’t misunderstood.”

  Fraser bit his lip manfully. “I see. That’s marvelous, of course, that you’re coming, lovely to have you and all that, but . . .” He drew in a breath, let it out, drew it in again, then blurted out, “Is something wrong? Is she ill? Busy? I’ve tried calling her back, but her phone goes straight to voice mail.”

  Bloody Alice, I thought as Fraser looked at me, expecting a satisfactory explanation for Alice’s vagueness. This was beyond out-of-character for someone who kept a GPS chip in her handbag in case of unexpected abduction by a cabdriver.

  “I hope it’s nothing I’ve done,” he added. “I don’t think we’ve fallen out.”

  “God, no!” I almost hugged him, he looked so worried. “No, it’s nothing to do with you.”

  “Have you spoken to her?” He leaped on my apparent knowledge of the situation like a cat onto a doddery mouse. “I mean, if it’s a private matter, then obviously I don’t want to pry, but . . .”

  Pry? About his own girlfriend of over two years? Fraser was really looking forward to seeing her, the mad fool. He deserved a good excuse. The trouble was, my mind had gone blank.

  “She’s . . .”

  Ill? Busy?

  Fraser looked at me expectantly as I juggled the possibilities. I was making this sound even worse than it was. Fraser’s face was braced for Bad News, and now Robert had wandered back in.

  “What’s going on?” he asked. “Everything okay?”

  “Alice can’t make it, she’s snowed in!” I blurted out.

  Robert looked incredulous. “Snowed in? There’s no snow down in London. I’ve just been speaking to—”

  “No, I didn’t mean snowed in. We’re snowed in. I meant, she’s snowed under. Snowed under with work.” My face was heating up.

  “Is that all? Oh, Alice always overreacts. It’s only Wednesday,” Fraser pointed out, clearly relieved that she wasn’t sprawled under a bus. Or under another man. “She’ll be finished by tonight. She doesn’t have to come tomorrow, we just thought it would be nice to get an extra practice in.” He made little giddyap motions. “Maybe even go for a ride. Alice was saying she’s never been on a horse.”

  God. Alice micromanaging a horse. It didn’t bear thinking about.

  “Ring her back and tell her to get a later train,” Fraser went on. “I’ll check the times on my phone. We’ll get her back from the station somehow.”

  Robert gave me a look so cynical it went straight through my head and out the other side, leaving hot prickles in its wake. “Should I give her a call?” he inquired. “See if there’s anything my assistant can help with?”

  It had to be something to do with him, I decided. Either he knew something about her and might tell Fraser, or she and Robert had had some dodgy business falling-out, or maybe they’d argued over exactly how nice Fraser was, but there was something grim in Robert’s face right now, and I knew it was to do with Alice.

  “No!” My brain lurched into gear without warning and my mouth started moving of its own accord. “I mean, she’s snowed under . . . because she’s sprained her ankle. Trying to move a packing case in high heels, you know what she’s like, so hands-on if people aren’t chucking things away fast enough. . . .”

  “It’s not one of those cold feet sprains, is it?” asked Robert. I glared at him.

  “Technical term,” he explained. “You lose all sensation in your toes. It can be a problem for dancers, I hear—”

  “She didn’t go into detail,” I interrupted as Fraser’s brow furrowed. “She can’t walk on it. But the good news is that she’s asked me to stand in!” I glanced between the two men. “I mean, not good news as such, but good news that your table plans won’t be wrecked. Alice was very worried about that—she didn’t want to spoil the ball.”

  “But you hate dancing!” Robert feigned extreme concern, but his eyes had a mischievous gleam, though his face was straight. “What was that you were saying to me on Monday? When you nearly dislocated my shoulder outside the—”

  “Oh no!” I flapped my hands. I knew I shouldn’t have been so open with him. I hadn’t had him down as a repeater. “No . . . I was just . . . exaggerating. As I said to you, I’d love to go to the ball. The history, the spectacle . . . and so on.”

  “But you’ll be dancing in it,” said Robert.

  “Yes, I will.” I swallowed. “I will indeed. So I’d better get some instruction from someone
who knows what they’re doing. And I hear, Fraser, that you’re just the man for such a challenge!”

  “It won’t be a challenge,” said Fraser gamely. “I’m sure you’ll be fine. We can just bring the practice forward. How about tonight? Robert? Are you and Catriona doing anything? And, Evie, you must come down and stay with us, if the McAndrews have guests arriving.”

  “That’s really kind, Fraser,” I said. “I’ll ask Ingrid.”

  “But what about your plans for Valentine’s Day?” Robert inquired. “Didn’t you say you had a busy weekend ahead?”

  I wasn’t sure I had, actually. Or had I? “I’ll just have to cancel,” I said airily. “Treat ’em mean and all that.”

  “How funny, that’s what Alice says,” said Fraser. “ ‘Treat them mean, keep them clean.’ It’s her motto.”

  “One of many,” I said, and helped myself to some cold toast.

  Sixteen

  Sheila took the news of Alice’s unexpected defection with more grace than most hostesses would, faced with the prospect of a total novice in their midst.

  I thought I saw her face tighten when Fraser walked me back through the snow and informed his mother that she had three days to teach me six reels; but then again, it was pretty chilly in the Kettlesheer dining room, where she and Ingrid were sitting in hats and quilted jackets, polishing silver cutlery and listening to reports of ten-foot snowmen in Hawick.

  “Poor Alice. It’s maybe as well,” she said when I stammered out a version of “the news” that I hoped matched the one I’d just given Fraser. “A dance floor’s no place for a weak ankle.” She glanced down at mine, evidently assessing them for strength.

  “I thought Evie could come along tonight for the practice,” said Fraser. “Duncan and Ingrid were coming over anyway, weren’t you?”

  “Oh, thanks,” said Ingrid. “I was hoping we might have been let off.”

  “Mum never lets anyone off reeling practice,” said Fraser.

  “Not while Janet Learmont’s marking you on a scale of ten, no,” said Sheila, serenely polishing a steak knife.

  And so, that evening, I found myself bumping along the estate backroad to the Grahams’ farm. I was in the back of Robert’s Land Rover with Ingrid while Duncan bellowed over his shoulder about the interesting “wet dog” notes in a carrot brandy, and Robert kept his eyes fixed firmly on the whited-out road ahead.

  Catriona was already installed on the Grahams’ sofa when we arrived, listening with rapt attention to Dougie’s account of some catastrophe at the last point-to-point steeplechase. Her Jack Russell was parked on her knee in standby mode. Dougie’s girlfriend, Kirstie, was perched next to her, texting and chewing her long red braid, and by the door with a bowl of Pringles was Sheila’s husband, Kenneth, who looked as if he couldn’t wait to get back into the lambing shed.

  Sheila plied everyone with large slugs from the bottle Duncan had brought along (which coincidentally looked as if it had been brewed from actual slugs), and announced that no one would get any supper until I’d learned the Eightsome reel. Cries of “Ten minutes, then!” ensued, mainly from Fraser. I hoped very much that the others had concealed a chocolate bar or two about their persons because, knowing my capacity for instruction better than they did, supper could be a long way off yet.

  Fraser and Dougie shoved the furniture back against the walls, Catriona stowed her own and the Grahams’ various dogs in the kitchen, and then Sheila hustled everyone into the resulting space, and so began my reeling career.

  “The Eightsome. It’s really very simple,” she said.

  “I bet it’s not,” I muttered to Fraser, who was standing next to me, bending his knees in a Dad-like manner as if he couldn’t wait to get started. “If I had a pound for every time someone’s told me that just before I’ve caused a major pileup, I’d have enough cash to buy . . .”

  Catriona and Dougie were spinning round behind me as I spoke, and I ran out of words as Catriona finished up with a delicate reverse twiddle maneuver. She was excellent. Even Dougie was skillful, and he looked like he was more at home on a tractor than a dance floor.

  “To buy new shoes?” suggested Fraser.

  “And buy everyone a very stiff drink,” I said glumly.

  “Cheer up!” He put a reassuring arm around me. “I’ve got great faith in you.”

  That made me feel about thirty percent worse than I already did.

  Sheila flexed her fingers. “Come on, Duncan, Ingrid. Let’s have you here, opposite Evie and Fraser. And Kirstie, Douglas, you there. And Robert and Catriona, excellent. Now, you’re going to start by holding hands and going round in a circle for a count of eight.”

  Douglas spun Catriona back to Robert with a flourish and an irritating curtsy from her, and took my hand. We all shuffled into a sort of circle and marched round while Sheila counted like Irene Cara in Fame, but without the big stick.

  “Six, seven, eight. And now back the other way. . . .”

  Fraser’s hand was strong and I could feel him steering me as best he could without making me feel stupid. I tried to fix the steps in my head, but suddenly he’d scooped one arm round my waist and was swinging me into the middle of the room.

  “Whoa!” I gasped, but no one took any notice. Instead, Kirstie opposite caught my flailing hand and steered me round as firmly as Fraser, while Sheila carried on instructing from the side.

  “And now we form a cartwheel, girls’ right hands in the middle, two, three, four . . .”

  I was facing the wrong way, baffled. Fraser steered me back, and then suddenly the men were in the middle and the girls were wheeling around outside.

  “Seven, eight. And now you set twice to your partners—Evie, dear, setting means hopping from one foot to the other,” called Sheila. “Keep counting.”

  Fraser was doing a sort of casual sway from side to side that I tried to copy. He gave me an encouraging thumbs-up, which I knew wasn’t warranted: a glimpse in the mirror over the fireplace confirmed that my setting looked like someone desperately queuing for the loo in Starbucks after four venti lattes.

  “And now the men will turn their partners—Fraser, gently, please!”

  “We’ll work up to that,” said Fraser, and took the crook of my arm as if I were a little old lady, moving me round as slowly as possible while everyone else did the spinning-top thing.

  I had to admit it: the spinning-top thing looked amazing when the girls let the boys turn their wrists inside out and around, twirling them so fast their hair flicked—even in this sitting room, with no music, there was a controlled wildness about it. Add fiddles, skirts, champagne, candlelight …

  My wrists clicked as Fraser tried, unsuccessfully, to spin me round, and instead got himself caught on my bracelet. There was an ominous ripping noise and we were suddenly in a compromising tangle, my back pressed right against his chest, his arms partly around me.

  “My fault! My fault!” he said, untangling the catch from his sweater. “Don’t move!”

  “Can Alice spin properly?” I asked, trying not to notice the solidity of Fraser’s chest behind me. We were almost hugging, his arm around my chest. Luckily, Kirstie flashed past in a flurry of long skirt and made my heart sink in a different way. Kirstie had a nose stud and still danced like a Celtic princess.

  “Eventually,” said Fraser. “I mean, yes! She’s an excellent spinner! There! Free!”

  Poor Fraser. I was going to let him down so badly. And he’d be wearing a set of evening clothes I’d be bound to tangle myself up on. What if I caught him by the kilt? What if I got stuck in his sporran?

  “Fraser, be honest,” I hissed. “You reckon I can learn to do that before the weekend?”

  “Of course,” he said, but there was more than a hint of good manners in his expression.

  I glanced over to where Robert and Catriona were waiting for Sheila’s next instructions. Douglas and Kirstie were doing extra spins for fun, and Catriona seemed to be twisting Robert’s arm to do the same, but he
wasn’t playing. He was checking his phone.

  “And now we weave round in a circle, ladies clockwise, men counterclockwise, offering left arm, then right arm, then left arm . . .”

  I was lost for a second, but then the rest of the circle caught up with me and I found myself being shoved and pulled round and back to where I’d started. I barely had to do a thing; it was like being stuck in a pinball machine.

  “Now then, that’s the only hard part,” said Sheila. “Next we put the first lady into the circle. Who wants to go first?”

  Catriona stepped forward without waiting to be asked, and looked up from under her lashes at Robert, who shoved his phone reluctantly into his back pocket. “Some ladies would take that phone of yours and stand on it,” she said. “I hope your sporran doesn’t have a mobile-phone pocket!”

  “There will be no sporran, Cat,” he said, “because there will be no kilt.”

  She wagged her finger playfully at him. “Or will there?”

  I saw a blankness enter his face, a shutting-down. Max did it at auctions or when someone brought something valuable into the shop. Robert was closing himself off.

  Catriona dropped the playfulness and put her hands on her slim hips. “But you have to! It’s traditional! You have your own tartan! I’ll be wearing my sash!”

  Robert’s gaze traveled over her shoulder, and he caught me watching the pair of them. I looked away, because his eyes weren’t quite so unreadable anymore. They were clearly saying Shut the hell up.

  Sheila’s voice broke through the tension. “Now, we all circle round again while the lady in the middle does her party piece for eight bars.”

  “Party piece?” I repeated. God. Could this get any worse? “What? Like . . . impressions?”

  “Whatever you like, so long as it doesn’t involve profanity or nudity,” said Sheila. “The committee is very strict on that score, although the Young Farmers aren’t.”

  “And no push-ups, please,” said Kirstie, nudging Douglas. She had a pretty Scottish accent. “They’re sooo boring.”