‘Yeah? Right. What you wearing, Eves?’
‘Dunno. White dress. How funny!’ She burst into peals of laughter. Adam tightened his grip on her arm.
Evie’s mother looked up briefly, her eyes flickering between the pair of them.
‘Make an odd couple, you do,’ she said. ‘Can’t believe she caught you.’
‘Caught me?’
‘You being a vicar and her – not.’
‘We are in love, Mrs Witts. You can count on my being the best husband to her you could ever wish for.’
‘Can I now? You’ll need a bloody tight rein, vicar, if you don’t mind my saying.’
The blood rushed to his groin. A tight rein on Evie. Her luscious body, wound around with thin leather straps, her breasts round and prominent, her bottom framed by the shiny bonds. He, with his hand on the leash, leading her across the lawn. I have to keep you like this, my love, so that your wicked impulses cannot be indulged. I have to hold you in check. Why had she had to say that?
‘Oi, ma,’ objected Evie. ‘I’ll be a brilliant vicar’s wife. Do all that baking and flower-arranging and visiting the sick and whatnot. Just watch me.’
Her mother turned back to the eggs.
‘Yeah,’ she said listlessly. ‘When’s the big day then?’
‘After the Harvest Festival,’ said Adam. ‘The weekend after.’
‘Course it is, love,’ she said. ‘Course it is.’
‘Your mother is a strange woman,’ commented Adam, entering the wedding date into the church ledger.
‘Funny, coming from you,’ snorted Evie. She twirled around the altar steps, her heels tip-tapping on the old, cold stone. ‘They don’t come a lot stranger than the Reverend Adam Flint. Should I call you Reverend? What does it mean? Am I meant to revere you?’
He looked over at her.
‘Don’t do that.’ She had her palms down on the altar cloth, as if she were contemplating climbing aboard.
‘Why not?’
He took her by the arm and marched her swiftly into the nave.
‘Do we really need to have a chat about respecting the sacred character of the church?’ he asked, shaking his head. ‘My church?’
‘Your church? Ain’t it God’s?’
‘Evie, this will never work if you can’t learn to control your impulses. You don’t have to voice every single thing that comes into your head, and neither do you have to do everything your body tells you to.’
She put her head to one side, coquettish, irresistible.
‘Aw, where’s the fun in that?’ she said. She put out a finger and prodded at his chest, moving it down towards his stomach. ‘I thought you liked my impulses. Like, right now, I’ve got this really strong impulse to touch you.’
‘This is the house of God,’ he whispered.
‘He ain’t in. Nobody can see us.’
She put her hand on his waist and stood on tiptoe, brushing her nose against his.
‘Give us a kiss.’
The scent of her, its warmth and spice, was a drug, confounding his senses. You could kiss a woman in church, couldn’t you? You may now kiss the bride. It didn’t break any rules.