Epilogue

The Vicar’s Knickers Again

 

 

Eleven o’clock on New Year’s Eve and Cass walked hand-in-hand along the beach with Hal. Above them the stars spangled the cold, high sky, and at the end of the bay … what was that? It was as if she could see stars glimmering amongst the scrub; reflected in the water, the little beach hut was all lit up with fairy lights, twinkling ahead of her in the darkness.

‘Oh Hal! It’s beautiful!’

‘I wanted to do something special,’ he said. ‘The tide’s coming in, we had to come now or we wouldn’t have made it in time. As soon as the water comes in we’ll be the only ones here, just you and me. Ready to see in the New Year together.’

He helped her up the steps towards the beach hut, and he opened the door. A little oil-filled heater warmed the hut, and more fairy lights decorated and lit the inside. Hal struck a match to light scented candles all around her while Cass sat on the edge of the fold-down bed which Hal had covered with warm, furry throws. She sat down gingerly, running her hand along the soft fur, feeling every single strand against her skin. He poured her a glass of champagne.

‘Here, let’s drink. To the future. To us.’ She raised her glass and drank to him, her teeth chattering slightly against the edge of the glass. Tonight was the night, but she was tense. What if she was doing the wrong thing? What if it hurt? What if she was a disappointment and Hal didn’t enjoy it? What if it was a sin? How would he feel if she changed her mind and said no?

‘You’re scared, aren’t you?’ he said softly. ‘Cass, I’m not going to do anything you don’t want me to, I promise. If you just want to talk that’s fine. If you don’t want to do anything else now, I’ll wait for you to be ready. Even if it means we have to wait until we’re married.’

‘Married?’

Had she really just heard what he said? It was mad - totally mad.

 ‘Don’t you think that’s a bit premature? I mean, we’ve hardly known each other five minutes and we don’t know …’

‘I’m not saying we should get married tomorrow or anything - just saying, sex or no sex, I want to see how things go. This time, with you, I want things to be different. I’d prefer it if there was sex, obviously,’ he said with a grin, catching hold of her cold hands between his warm ones, ‘but if that’s too much to ask then it’s fine. I’ll wait. I want all of you, body and soul. If you’re not ready to give me both, then I won’t have one without the other.’

Love is patient.

‘I am scared,’ she admitted. ‘I want this … but at the same time … it’s a big step, Hal.’

‘But is it a sin?’ He had asked her this before, and this time she knew the answer.

‘No, Hal. Love isn’t a sin; love is from God.’ She reached over and stroked the side of his face, willing him to lean forwards and kiss her again. He didn’t, but looked straight at her.

Love is kind.

‘Love?’ he picked up her word, with a lift of his eyebrow and a grin.

‘I don’t mean … I don’t want you to feel that you have to ….’ She didn’t want him to feel pressured; she didn’t want him to say anything to her unless he was ready.

‘That’s all I wanted to hear!’ Hal said with a smile, moving back in towards her. ‘And there’s something I want to tell you. I’ve felt like a stone inside for a very long time, Cass. Since Rob died. But now, it’s different. I feel like I’m alive again, because of you. I fell in love with you in the darkness that night when we talked to each other, and you didn’t care who I was and what I had done. When it wasn’t about sex, it was about truth and trust. I didn’t think back then that someone like you would be interested in someone like me … I’m damaged goods Cass, and I don’t deserve to be loved by someone like you.  But something feels different - new and special and pure, and because you trust me, I’m going to trust myself.’

Love never fails.

And now he kissed her lips, very, very gently and every part of her body began to fizz.

Was it the right thing? What would Jesus do?

Well, if she was honest, Cass thought Jesus would abstain, but Cass wasn’t Jesus, she was only human. She pulled Hal closer, kissed him deeply, and it felt like coming home.

‘What should we do now?’ she whispered in between kisses that were growing in intensity and hunger. ‘What do you want me to do? How should I …’

‘Perhaps we should start by taking your coat off?’ he suggested with a grin, helping her to remove the warm fleece-lined coat he had bought for her in Ormsborough the previous day. She stood before him, conscious of his eyes being drawn to the silver cross and chain that hung in the neckline of her black velvet top. For a moment he was silent, just looking. It began to unnerve her.

‘Now what? Do you want me to – ‘she began.

‘Stop talking!’ he replied, as he pulled her gently back down again onto the furs. ‘I know what I’m doing, so relax!’

No words were necessary as his lips travelled down to her neck and he slipped the velvet top from her shoulders, removed the silver cross and placed it carefully to one side on the shelf above the bed. Then deftly he unhooked her bra and moved his kisses down to her naked breasts, where he lingered for a good long while until her breath began to come in sharp bursts of anticipation and her body began to arch with desire for him. Then, as the first fireworks of the New Year began to soar into the sky above the bay, he knelt on the floor before her and he eased her skirt up above her hips. She closed her eyes and gave a soft whimper as she leaned backwards and slowly, slowly; Hal removed the vicar’s knickers.

 

The End.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Acknowledgements

 

I’d like to thank everyone who has helped me write this book – some of whom didn’t even know they were helping!

First and foremost I’d like to thank my husband Ben who gave me the time and space I needed, supported me all the way and believed in me – even when I didn’t believe in myself. I couldn’t have done it without him. I’d also like to think Daniel and Phoebe who don’t seem to be too embarrassed about Mum writing a book.

I’d like to thank my “guinea pig” readers – Cath Turnbull, who has been reading things I have written for over 30 years, and Sally Calder and Jennifer Young who haven’t known me quite that long. They all gave me excellent pointers. I’d also like to thank my online “Buddies” who have supported my work on “The vicar’s knickers” all the way through.

The Romantic Novelists’ Association New Writers Scheme has given me the boost that I needed to get this novel written, and the advice of my anonymous readers has been invaluable. I’d also like to thank everyone at Manatee Books for their faith in my work and their help with all these new experiences.

Finally I’d like to thank everyone who has answered odd questions from me over the last few years. Any errors are due to me asking the wrong questions, not you giving the wrong answers – and now you know WHY I was asking!

 

About the Author

 

Liz has always surrounded herself with books. As a child, she was always to be found with her head in one and she still has a bookcase full of her childhood favourites to this day. (As a thirteen-year-old she read The Lord of the Rings twelve times in a row, cover to cover!) All this reading led, unsurprisingly, to a degree in English Literature, (and another book-case full of books) and then a job as a cataloguer of early printed books for a major university library. This meant spending hours sitting in a beautiful, ancient building looking at antique leather-bound tomes – although as so many of them turned out to be rather boring volumes of sermons she wasn’t tempted to read them! She went on to train others to catalogue books and her earliest attempts at writing anything as an adult consisted of instructions on how to work out the correct form of an author’s name to use in a library catalogue.

Children (and then cats and chickens) interrupted her bibliographic career, and having given up library work Liz found herself doing more reading, and increasingly she found herself enjoying novels by writers like Trisha Ashley, Katie Fforde, Milly Johnson and Lucy Diamond. Inspired by their example, she started writing fiction and hasn’t stopped since, joining the Romantic Novelists’ Association’s wonderful New Writers’ Scheme to try to learn how to write novels properly in 2015.  She has also attempted writing some short stories, with one The Second Princess winning a competition in Writing Magazine, which led her to think that maybe publication wasn’t a pipe dream after all.

Liz owes everything to her tolerant and long-suffering husband Ben and her tolerant and long-suffering children, but very little to the cats who are neither tolerant nor long-suffering and keep sitting on the computer keyboard and messing up her manuscript if she forgets to feed them on time.

When not reading or writing Liz is often to be found on stage (or behind it) with her local amateur dramatic society, drinking tea, or visiting one of the several North Yorkshire seaside villages which were the inspiration for the fictional Rawscar, the setting for her debut novel The Little Church by the Sea.