'Did you hear that, Mum?'
'Yes, Jason, I heard,' Cassie choked out. 'Now we really must be going. Nice to have seen you again, Dan,' she added stiffly and took her bag from him. 'Are you coming, Mum?'
Joan looked as if she'd been struck by lightning. 'Oh... Yes... Of course... Goodbye, Mr... er... Goodbye...'
Cassie took her mother's arm and helped her down the steps, not once looking back over her shoulder. Jason, as was his habit, skipped on ahead, shouting, 'Oh, boy! Oh, boy!' in a happy, excited voice.
Cassie kept a firm grip on herself as she walked away. But it wasn't easy. She was tempted to turn round, to run back, to beg Dan not to spoil what she had built up for herself and her son over the last nine years. He had no right, no right at all to come back into her life now and turn it upside-down again. She didn't need him. Jason didn't need him. Her son had never suffered from not having a father. And he would gain little from acquiring one now. Particularly one not married to his mother. Riversbend would be agog!
'Cassie.
'What?' she snapped, her angry thoughts having fuelled a short fuse. 'Sorry, Mum,' she added quickly. 'I'm still a bit...upset.'
'I don't blame you, love. It must have come as a big shock, seeing Dan McKay again, finding out he'd bought Strath-haven. Then having Jason burst in on you like he did.'
Cassie sighed. They were about to step on to the suspension bridge. Jason was up ahead in the centre, jumping up and down, enjoying the effect he was having. Not so his mother.
'Jason! For Pete's sake, stand still or move along. Do you want your Gran and myself to end up in the river?'
He looked up, not at all chastened. 'Sorry, Mum,' he shouted back, and ran on, which wasn't much of an improvement on using the bridge as a trampoline. It swooped and swayed under their feet.
'That boy!' Cassie complained.
'Perhaps he needs a father's hand,' her mother said softly.
Cassie's glance was sharp. 'And what do you mean by that?'
Her mother gave her one of those innocent 'Are you talking to me?' looks. 'Nothing... Nothing.'
'Oh, yes, you did! You think that just because Dan's handsome and rich I should try to get him to marry me, don't you?'
Joan shrugged. 'Weil, he doesn't exactly fit the mental picture I've had of him over the years. I imagined him as a shaggy-haired painting bum, with a three-day growth on his chin and not a cent to his name. Let's face it, Cassie, the Dan McKay I saw this afternoon has a lot going for him.'
'Oh, Mum! So Dan's successful and spruced up now. So what? That's all surface gloss. Don't be taken in by it. And give me credit for some pride. You know how deeply he hurt me!'
'Yes, Cassie, I do, but that was a long time ago, love. People make mistakes and life goes on.
Perhaps you ‑' She broke off and stopped abruptly. The bridge shuddered. 'Oh, dear... I just realised... I...I'd forgotten he was married.'
'His wife died a while back,' Cassie announced bluntly. 'Not that that makes any difference. And before you ask...no, he hasn't any other children.'
'Gran! Mum! Come on!'
'Coming, Jason,' Cassie called, and they walked on in agitated silence.
'What do you think he's going to do about Jason?' Joan said at last. 'I mean...it's quite obvious that he guessed. And who wouldn't? Why didn't you ever tell me about the eyes? There I was thinking they were a throwback to old Uncle Bart.'
'Do we have to keep talking about this, Mum?' Cassie said impatiently. 'I'd like to forget it.'
'It's a bit hard to forget the man when he's going to be living next door.'
'This isn't the city,' Cassie argued hotly. 'It's not as though we're at leaning-over-the-fence distance from each other. He's a good mile away.'
'Don't be ridiculous, Cassie. You know full well he isn't going to forget you. Or Jason. I saw the way he was looking at the boy. Hungry, that man. Hungry for love...'
Cassie felt a sick pang in the pit of her stomach. There were many types of hunger, she wanted to say to her mother. And it certainly wasn't love on Dan's mind. Possession might be closer to the mark.
'I might let him see Jason occasionally, but he needn't think he's going to tell all and sundry he's my son's father,' she said indignantly.
Her mother gave a dry laugh. 'And who's to stop him? Something tells me Dan McKay is not an easy man to handle. Once he's set his mind on something...'
Joan's words reminded Cassie of what Dan had said at the library door... 'I won't let it finish like this, Cassie.'
And that had been before he'd found out about his son! It was all too much for Cassie.
'Here, Mum,' she said, handing her mother the keys as they reached the other side of the river. 'You take the jeep and drive on up home with Jason. I want to see to the horses before it gets dark.'
'You and those horses!'
'I won't be long,' Cassie called as she walked away along the riverbank.
She dimly heard her mother grumble something about dying of starvation, but she kept walking. Actually, the horses didn't need attention. They'd been looked over, fed and watered that morning, but she desperately needed a few quiet moments away from her mother's probing, away from Jason's high-spirited chatter. And she needed time: time to soothe her chaotic nerves, time to think.