Upstairs in the bathroom, she ran a deep, hot bath, and added a liberal amount of the bath oil Katie had given her for her birthday, breathing in its heady fragrance with enjoyment.
Securing her curls on top of her head with an elasticated silky band which had originally belonged to Katie, she sank blissfully into the water.
Less than five miles away, Silas stared moodily into his driving mirror. What the hell was he doing driving around aimlessly like this when the only place he really wanted to be was at home with Hazel?
Stopping abruptly, and checking the empty road, he swung the car round. Hazel might not want to be with him, but he certainly wanted to be with her…needed to be with her.
* * *
DOWNSTAIRS the phone rang. Hazel heard it but ignored it, but when it continued to ring all her maternal instincts were activated and she clambered out of the bath, telling herself that it probably wasn’t Katie telephoning her at all, and that even if she was it didn’t necessarily mean that there was something wrong.
Nevertheless she reached for a towel, and then cursed mildly under her breath, remembering that she had left the clean towels neatly folded in the kitchen.
In her father’s day the very last thing she would have been able to do was what she was doing now, which was hurrying downstairs, naked and damp, grateful for the warmth of the house’s central heating and reflecting that there were after all some advantages to living on one’s own.
&nb
sp; As she picked up the receiver in the hallway, she told herself that one day soon she really must buy herself a modern remote control phone which she could take into the bathroom with her.
‘Ma.’
‘Katie, it is you. What’s wrong? Is—?’
‘Nothing’s wrong. Heavens, you do panic. I’ve got a free period and I thought I’d give you a ring. I haven’t disturbed anything important, have I?’
‘I was in the bath,’ Hazel told her, ‘and right now I’m standing in the hall, dripping water all over the place.’
‘Mm… I take it that you’re all alone then, and that there’s no Silas there to appreciate the view,’ Katie teased her.
‘Silas has gone out for the day,’ Hazel told her repressively. ‘Is everything all right, Katie?’
‘Everything’s fine. As a matter of fact, I rang because I was worried about you. Is everything OK with you and Silas? I mean, are the two of you getting on all right?’
‘Yes, yes we’re getting on fine,’ Hazel told her, frowning as she thought she heard the sound of a car drawing up outside.
‘Katie, I’m going to have to go. I think someone’s outside—’ she began. Before she could replace the receiver, Katie called out urgently, ‘Hang on a sec, Ma. I think I’ll be coming home for Christmas on about the twentieth.’
Hazel froze as she heard the kitchen door open. She had locked it when she came in, she knew she had, and besides she didn’t know anyone who would just walk in without knocking, apart from Silas, and he…and he…
Her jaw dropped as the hall door opened and Silas walked through it.
For the space of a heartbeat, they both stood looking at one another, and Hazel had never felt more vulnerable, nor more of a fool in her entire life. Humiliatingly, Silas seemed to be deliberately avoiding looking directly at her, and no wonder, she thought wretchedly, as she said jerkily to Katie, ‘Yes, yes, that’s fine, Katie. I must go. I…’
Silas mercifully had gone back into the kitchen. Why on earth hadn’t she gone and got a towel instead of coming downstairs like that? Why hadn’t she…what? Guessed that he would come back?
She had just replaced the receiver and was about to go upstairs when the kitchen door opened again. She froze where she stood.
‘Here, I’ve brought you this,’ Silas told her quietly.
He was holding out a clean towel to her, one of the ones she had earlier removed from the dryer and folded prior to taking them upstairs.
‘Thanks,’ she responded tightly, reaching for it, without daring to look at him, but somehow it slipped from her fingers and as both of them moved forward together to pick it up, Hazel felt herself start to tremble when Silas’s fingers brushed against hers. She straightened up abruptly, and then winced as something tugged sharply at her hair.
‘Hang on,’ she heard Silas saying above her in a muffled voice. ‘You seem to have got caught. You’ll have to move a little closer to me,’ he told her as she tried to move and realised that her hair had managed to entwine itself around one of his shirt buttons as they had both reached down for the towel.
There was nothing she could do other than stand there, every inch of her bare skin burning with mortification and embarrassment, as Silas painstakingly unravelled the snarled-up curl from around his button.
It seemed to take forever, and, even though she knew that his gaze was fixed on his task, Hazel was agonisingly conscious of her nudity.