Chapter Text
The taxi pulls into a long, tree-lined curved gravel driveway, the house having been hidden from view until they round one final bend. Taggie sucks in a breath, nose practically pressed against the cool window, staring up at the grandest, most glorious house she’s ever seen. You couldn’t really even call it a house. This wasn’t even a mansion, it was an estate, like something you’d read about in the Jane Austen novels that her sister Caitlin loved so much. She pays the taxi driver and thanks him as he pulls her luggage out of the car.
Boots crunching across the gravel and hoisting her battered suitcases up the honey-coloured stone steps, she takes a deep breath before ringing the doorbell. From inside she hears the deep echoing clang of the bell, followed by a cacophonous riot of barking dogs - she can tell there must be several inside the house, all racing to the door. This guy can’t be that bad if he’s a dog lover, surely?
After a few moments the door is opened by a short, neat woman with grey hair, tied in a low chignon at the base of her neck. She is dressed in a simple uniform, covered by an apron and wears sensible but polished shoes, all of it giving her an air of quiet efficiency. Eyeing Taggie up and down with barely disguised, but not unkind scepticism, she asks ‘Miss O’Hara I presume?’
Lifting her chin slightly, she replies steadily, ‘that’s right, but please, call me Taggie.’
The woman steps aside and Taggie enters the cool interior of Penscombe - the Campbell-Black family estate seated amongst the lush, gently rolling hills of Rutshire. ‘I’m Mrs Bodkin, but you can call me Mrs B - everyone else does. I’m the housekeeper here and my husband is head groundsman. And these pack of devils,’ five, no, six dogs now surround the pair, tails wagging and begging for attention, ‘are Mr Campbell-Black’s pack.’ Taggie bends to give each of the animals a pat, feeling a twinge of regret at not having been brave enough to ask if she could bring her own beloved dog Gertrude with her, before following Mrs B through the halls toward the back of the estate. ‘Mr B will take your luggage up to your room, just leave it at the foot of the stairs - I’ll show you up later. For now though I’ll make us both a cup of tea and then you can meet the man himself - I’ll warn you now you though, he’s in a right temper today.’
Sitting at a round wooden table in a surprisingly cosy but light-filled kitchen, Taggie accepts the steaming mug of tea. Mrs B sits down and levels Taggie with a querying look. ‘The agency ensured you understand that your duties here will involve more than just the physical therapy? You will behave more as a live-in nurse. This will include assisting Mr C-B to dress and bathe, ensure his medications are taken appropriately and his general wellbeing is looked after. He barely tolerates the physical therapist attending to him, he won’t allow any more people fussing over him, that’s why you’re being paid at a higher rate.’
Nodding her agreement, she looks at Mrs Bodkin curiously - she’s done enough work for wealthy families to know if you want information, you ask the housekeeper. ‘Is he often in a temper? Mr Campbell-Black? I heard from the agency that they’ve had t-trouble finding someone to remain here long-term.’
Mrs B sighs the sigh of the long-suffering before explaining, ‘Mr Campbell-Black’s life was horses. You’re probably too young to remember, but he was a champion show jumper, he even won gold at the Olympics. After he retired he took up training. Horses are his life’s work…’ Eyes clouding with sadness, she adds, ‘he hasn’t even been out to the stables since the accident.’
Taggie lowers her eyes to her tea, considering. She knew that her patient was a wealthy man who had fallen from a horse, but beyond this she really wasn’t given much information about him beyond his injuries and the fact that he’d been flagged as ‘difficult.’
‘Right. Well, I’d like to meet him now.’
~~~ O ~~~
Mrs B walks Taggie up a curving flight of stairs. ‘Why hasn’t he been moved to a ground floor bedroom? Wouldn’t that be easier for everyone?’
The older woman looks back over her shoulder, eyebrow raised. ‘He wouldn’t hear of it. Flatly refused. He’s a stubborn, proud man. But you’re about to find that out for yourself.’
They walk down a long hallway, lined with oil paintings of horses, dogs, hunting scenes. Taggie feels as if she’s in an art gallery or a museum rather than someone’s home. They come to a large, heavy looking door, Mrs Bodkin rapping swiftly on the frame before turning the handle and stepping inside.
‘Mr C-B, your new physical therapist is here. Mr Campbell-Black, this is Agatha O’Hara, Miss O’Hara - Mr Campbell-Black. I’ll leave you to it.’
Taggie is staring, she knows she is. When she’d gotten the file (male, 42, ex-athlete), she’d expected a slightly-paunchy man, perhaps with a few greys, or a receding hairline. Instead, sitting at the window in the golden glow of the morning sunlight was without a doubt the most beautiful man she’d ever seen. He was tall and lean - despite his months of immobility he still appeared to be in excellent shape - with a full head of dark hair, slightly curled at the ends. She saw him in profile: a strong jawline and wide eyes with disgustingly long eye-lashes. Why do men always get the best lashes? He had a straight nose and a light spray of stubble across his chin. She was appalled to find herself uncharacteristically pondering what that stubble would feel like chafing against her thighs. Shaking her head to banish such unprofessional thoughts, she strides across the room toward him, hand outstretched. ‘Please, call me Taggie.’
He turns, openly looking her up and down, an arrogant curl to his lip. In a voice dripping with disdain he smirks, aristocratic accent like cut-glass. ‘God. Is this all they have left at the agency? Have you even finished your studies?’
Taggie lowers her hand, I see how it is. ‘I assure you Mr Campbell-Black, I’m a fully qualified physical therapist. I’m looking forward to w-working with you.’ She kicks herself for the stammer that creeps in when she’s nervous, angry, or in a new unknown environment. He makes an unimpressed noise in the back of his throat. In truth, he wasn’t far off the mark. At only 25 Taggie was one of the youngest and least experienced physical therapists on the agency’s books, but Mr Campbell-Black seemed to have a knack for scaring them all away - she really was their last option. ‘So. Mr Campbell-Black, where would you like to start today? Shall we get to know each other a little, or would you prefer to get straight into some mobility exercises?’
~~~ O ~~~
Rupert is sitting in his leather armchair looking out across the gently sloping valley when he sees the taxi roll into the driveway. Sighing to himself he knows this is the latest in a long line of increasingly useless physical therapists. The last one, Bruce, a sweaty Australian, had only lasted a week before packing his bags, calling Rupert an arrogant prick and disappearing into the sunset. He doesn’t understand the point of it, he wasn’t getting any better. He’d fallen from his horse; it wasn’t the first time, but on this occasion he’d landed hard on a low stone wall, damaging his spine. For a short but appallingly frightening period the doctors had thought he may be paralysed. Mercifully this wasn’t the case, but he was still having to learn to walk again and improvement seemed to have stalled.
Watching from his window he sees a young woman emerge from the car. She’s wearing a white t-shirt, blue jeans and…cowboy boots? She has pale, lightly freckled skin, long, wild brown hair, barely contained in her loose braid - were they flecks of copper he was seeing in the morning light? - and, from what he could see from this vantage point, eyes the size of a baby deer’s. Before-Accident-Rupert would have already been formulating a plan to bed the young woman, she was undoubtedly beautiful, but now he pushes those thoughts aside. No point thinking like that anymore - he was out to pasture.
A while later he hears a brisk tap at the door and braces himself for yet another barrage of overly chipper questions and the galling false-optimism that seems to come part and parcel with these medical types. Mrs B trundles into the room and introduces him to Miss O’Hara. He was right, her eyes were as large as a doe’s - there was an openness, a kindness in them - an innocence. She didn’t stand a chance. She’d be gone by the end the week - if not the day.
She’s walking towards him, hand outstretched, calling herself Taggie. What kind of a name is Taggie? She doesn’t seem phased by his questioning her age, instead swiftly moving on to ask whether he wants to get to know each other - why? - or get straight onto some exercises. ‘Let’s get straight onto the exercises, Miss O’Hara - we don’t need to waste time on chit chat.’
Seemingly unaffected again by his dismissive attitude - alright, I’ll have to try harder - she gives him a brisk nod, gesturing at the walker to the side of his chair. ‘Right. Up you get then. Let me see how you get out of the chair. I’d like to assess your posture and then we’ll move on to gait.’
‘Are you going to help me up?’ He asks coldly.
She cocks her head to the side, narrowing her eyes. ‘Why? Your file says you can walk, aided, for distances of up to 50 metres and can manage small sets of stairs - again aided. This means you’ve built up a decent amount of leg strength. Your core muscles would have been strong prior to the accident due to the nature of horse riding itself. I see no reason why you can’t get out of that chair yourself.’
~~~ O ~~~
Mr Campbell-Black pins Taggie with a cold glare, she tries not to let him see her gulp. ‘I see no reason why you can’t get out of that chair yourself.’
Voice positively dipped in sarcasm, he responds, ‘oh, well as long as you see no reason…’
She told herself before she took this job that she wouldn’t let this presumably entitled, over-privileged old man allow her to feel inferior - she may have been young but she was a damn good physical therapist. Training her own hard stare on him, she continues, ‘you either get up yourself, using the walker, or you stay there until you’re ready to try. I have literally all day - I get paid regardless.’ With that, she wanders to the large oak chest of drawers on the other side of the room and leans against it, examining the ends of her braid for split ends while she waits, in what she hopes is a nonchalant fashion.
She can see from beneath her lashes that her patient is glaring at her with his grey-blue eyes. She forces herself not to shiver at the sensation of being examined so closely, she feels strangely stripped bare by his piercing gaze. Eventually he huffs, ‘are you always so impertinent?’
A small smirk lifting the corner of her mouth, she replies, ‘are you always so argumentative?’
They stare at each other for a moment longer, neither willing to be the first to back down. Eventually Taggie reminds herself that she needs this job, this extremely well-paying job - she needs the money to help Caitlin with her schooling. Their parents weren’t the most financially responsible people in the world and so it often fell to Taggie to ensure the household expenses were taken care of, even if she no longer lived in that household.
Taking a breath, she softens her tone slightly. ‘Look, if you just try to get up yourself so that I can see where the main d-difficulty is, if you really can’t do it, then I’ll help you. Surely you can at least t-try?’
Looking frustrated, he snaps. ‘Why are you tripping over your words Miss O'Hara? If you’re going to be this bossy, surely you should at least sound more self-assured.’
Taggie stills. She hasn’t had anyone give her a hard time for her stammer for years, her mother Maud notwithstanding of course. She stares in silence for a moment, but realises she may be able to use this to her advantage. ‘Tripping over my words? I have a stammer - always have, it’s not s-something I can help. A lot like falling off a horse you know, no-one’s fault, it just is. It’s actually far better than it used to be when I was a child…You know why it’s better than it used to be?’
Mr Campbell-Black at least has the grace to look chastened by her words, and those that he must know are about to come. ‘It’s better than it used to be because I worked hard at it. It wasn’t going to improve by ignoring it, or hoping everyone else would do the work for me. Improvement takes work. It takes guts and hard graft. But if you’re too frightened to even try? Well then you can’t expect any of the - what is it now? Seven? physical therapists you’ve had come through these doors to have any real impact and I may as well just go back to London.’
There is a moment of silence. Taggie thinks she’s probably about to be sent packing - an absolute record, fired before she’d even started. To her surprise however, Mr Campbell-Black concedes in a quieter voice, ‘you’ve made your point.’
~~~ O ~~~
As soon as the words are out of his mouth Rupert regrets them. He’s arrogant, known to be sharp, acerbic even and he doesn’t suffer fools gladly, but he’s not a cruel man. He sees the hurt flicker across her face as soon as he ridicules her stammer, only brief but unmistakable. He doesn’t understand why, having only just met this woman, but there’s something about that brief flash of pain, of vulnerability, that makes him feel like a complete cad - he has an instinct that says she should be protected.
Surprising him though, she doesn’t shrink away from his words. Instead, he sees a steely resolve appear in her eyes as she tells him plainly how hard she’s worked to overcome the issue, how much effort it’s taken to improve. ‘You’ve made your point.’
Taking a breath, he shuffles closer to the edge of the seat. Pulling the walker - the bane of his existence and a source of constant humiliation - toward himself, he braces his arms and pushes himself up. He is halfway from his chair when pain pulls at his lower back and he collapses ungracefully back into the armchair. Jaw clenched, he shuffles again to the edge of the seat. Miss O'Hara watches him quietly, eyes free of judgement. Before he pushes himself up again, she offers softly, ‘widen your feet slightly, it will give you better balance.’
Doing as she suggests, he again braces himself on the walker and pushes himself up. This time he manages it, standing upright without too much pain, and only slightly overbalancing, righting himself without further incident. He usually finds the hollow praise of the doctors, nurses and physical therapists to be patronising at best, infuriating at worst. Miss O'Hara however simply gives him a brisk smile and nods once. ‘Good.’
~~~ O ~~~
Taggie is both pleased and relieved when Mr Campbell-Black manages to stand on his own, knowing that she may as well have packed her bags - well they weren’t even unpacked yet - had they not crossed this first hurdle successfully. She crosses the space toward him, ‘can you tell me where you feel the most pain, or discomfort?’
Despite the briefest flash of achievement in his eyes, his expression swiftly returns to one of piqued arrogance. ‘I landed on my spine, Miss O’Hara, would you care to hazard a guess as to where the discomfort may be?’
You. Need. This. Job.
She inhales deeply to steady herself. ‘Sir, you damaged your lumbar spine. Within the lumbar spine you have the vertebrae L1-L5. Depending on which vertebrae are damaged, and the severity of that damage, I would anticipate that you have reduced hip flexion, feelings of numbness and weakness in your legs, and possibly restricted movement in your feet. If the nerves are damaged or irritated, I’d expect you also have pain not only in your hips, but also radiating down your legs, at least on one side, if not both. Given how you’re currently standing, leaning your weight onto your left side slightly, I’d say that your pain is concentrated on your right.’ Keeping her chin high and refusing to break eye contact, she continues, ‘I’m extremely good at my job, Mr Campbell-Black, I don’t need to guess as to what you’re feeling. I know what your injuries are and how they effect each part of the body. What I can’t know though, is how this impacts you personally. Every individual is different and bears pain differently. If you won’t communicate with me clearly on what your body is doing and how it’s responding to movement and treatment, then I can’t tailor a plan to you and your recovery will only go so far. You have to play an active part in your own improvement.’ Breathing out through her nose to try to stifle her annoyance, ‘I am here solely to help you, so when I ask you a simple question, such as, where is your main area of discomfort, I expect you to show me the respect of answering me honestly and without hostility.’
Taggie can see the muscles in her patient’s jaw ticking. She has never been a confrontational person and she surprises herself by speaking so firmly with him - she holds her hands together so that he can’t see them shaking. There is some intuition telling her that this cantankerous man is simply frightened, and is using anger in an attempt to conceal it, lashing out at people so that they don’t get too close, or see how much he’s hurting. She guesses that given his status, he is a man used to having his own way, of wanting for nothing, never having to confront uncertainty. Mrs B told her he was an Olympic gold medalist, the highest achievement in the sporting world. For such a high flyer to now be struggling to rise from a chair, to be riddled with pain must be intensely distressing. Despite his attitude and the fact they’ve only just met, her heart aches for him.
~~~ O ~~~
Again Rupert is surprised at the firm, no-nonsense way in which this doe-eyed young woman responds to his peevishness. The other physical therapists who have passed through Penscombe over the last five months had all tried to treat him with over-enthusiasm, or false-hope. Behaving as if he was a child who should be shielded from the severity of his injury, or trying to cajole him into working with them with insincere brightness. Rupert couldn’t stand it. Each one of them was either sent packing by him, or left of their own accord after he brow-beat the over-eager chipperness right out of them. He had an inkling Miss O’Hara may be different. She didn’t seem over-awed by him - she was probably too young to even know who he was - and she certainly didn’t seem interested in pandering to his moods.
He hears a firm efficiency, mingled with genuine sincerity in her voice and responds, ‘the pain is in my right side, yes. It’s a dull ache in my lower back but then the pain in my right leg feels more like pins and needles, it’s sharp, almost burning and extends right down to my toes. I feel like I can’t stand up completely straight - it takes too much effort for my muscles to hold me upright. Sitting down for too long makes everything feel compacted but then standing up for too long sends shooting pains through my leg. The only real relief is when I lay down, but I can’t spend all day in bed, I’ll go mad.’
Nodding her understanding, again she simply moves on from their moment of friction. ‘Ok, let’s go for a walk. Just up and down the hallway. I want to see your gait - how you hold yourself and move etc.’ Rupert shuffles toward the door, the first steps always particularly tight after rising from being seated. Out in the hallway she stays behind him, he can feel her eyes on him, assessing his movements. ‘Talk me through what you’re feeling as you walk.’
Again Rupert feels the urge to respond acerbically. He swallows it down and answers directly. ‘My right leg feels significantly weaker than my left. It is harder to lift, it feels like it’s shuffling. I don’t feel balanced. The muscles in my lower back are incredibly tight and it makes it feel extremely tiring to stand up straight.’
‘Ok good, that’s helpful. Turn around and walk back toward me.’ Doing as he’s told, Rupert heads back down the hallway, this time with Miss O'Hara in front of him, walking backwards. From behind her there is a skittering noise as a streak of black fur races past her up the hallway and then back, stopping to hop from foot to foot excitedly in front of her. Laughing - Rupert noting the throaty sound and then immediately pushing it out of his mind - she squats down to scratch the lab behind his ear. ‘Who’s this handsome fellow?’
Smiling she looks up at Rupert and it takes him a moment to answer as he is thrown by the open, joyful look on her face. ‘This is Beaver, he’s the dog who tends to check in on me the most.’
~~~ O ~~~
Taggie notices the fond way Mr Campbell-Black’s eyes soften as they look at the gorgeous black Labrador at her feet. She thinks she sees a glimpse of who he may be without the pain and fear of his injury weighing on him. ‘I have a dog too, Gertrude, she’s a wiry little mutt really, but I love her to bits. My friend Daysee is looking after her for me at the moment.’
‘You could have bought her with you - there’s plenty of room for her to run around and I have six dogs, one more won’t hurt.’
Taggie smiles, feeling suddenly shy. ‘I didn’t know if that would be allowed, I didn’t like to ask.’
Mr Campbell-Black scoffs at this. ‘Give the address to Mr Bodkin, I’ll organise to have her bought here.’
Taggie blinks at this unexpected kindness, ‘th-thank you.’
When they return from their brief walk up and down the hall, Taggie runs Mr Campbell-Black through some range of motion exercises to assess his flexibility. They break for lunch before doing some strengthening work until he is becoming pale and sweaty with the strain. She looks toward the massage table that is set up near the window. ‘Right. If you want to take off everything except your briefs and lie face down, I’ll do some massage to release everything a bit before we call it a day.’
Mr Campbell-Black looks at her, his face unreadable for a moment. Taggie averts her eyes as he begins to remove his shirt. After a moment he clears his throat, ‘I need your help with my trousers, I can’t bend to remove them.’
Taggie swallows involuntarily. ‘Of course, sorry, I didn’t think.’ Squatting in front of him she helps him to remove each leg of the trousers and despite studiously avoiding looking at him, she still feels a blush bloom across her cheeks.
Once he is face down on the table, Taggie warms some muscle balm between her hands, beginning to work her thumbs from his neck and shoulders and down along his spine to his lower back. She’s normally able to switch off when she does this, focusing purely on the muscles beneath her hands and how they are behaving - where are the knots that need to be released? Where are the points of tension to be worked through? She never really sees the body when she is working - they are all simply interconnected muscles and tendons and it’s her job to ensure they are working to their best ability.
As she begins to work her thumbs into the muscles down Mr Campbell-Black’s spine however, she finds herself noticing how muscular the back of his shoulders are. How tanned his skin - despite presumably being housebound since the accident. She has visions of running her hands down his back from a different position, digging in her nails…She works lower, down to the base of his spine, noting his narrow hips and hoping he can’t tell how clammy her hands have suddenly become. She pulls the towel down to work on the knotted muscles in his glutes and realises she’s biting her lip at feeling the firmness of his backside beneath her hands.
As she works on a particularly nasty knot, Mr Campbell-Black lets out an involuntary groan and Taggie’s stomach flips at the gravelly sound of his voice. ‘S-sorry, was that too hard?’ She is alarmed to find her voice sounds overly high and reedy.
He lets out a long breath, his own voice slightly unsteady. ‘No, it’s okay you’re…quite good at that.’
A compliment? Surely not.
After the massage, Taggie helps him back to a seated position and assists him back into his trousers. Running an appraising eye around the vast bedroom, she asks, ‘are there any other vacant rooms on this floor? Of a similar size?’
Mr Campbell-Black looks at her quizzically. ‘Of course, why?’
‘I want to move all of this exercise equipment and the massage table into another room as soon as possible. You shouldn’t have it all set up in your bedroom.’
He looks at her, any progress made between them clearly gone as his expression shutters with impatience. ‘Why shouldn’t I? It’s my bedroom and it’s convenient.’
Taggie won’t back down. ‘It may be convenient, but right now you get no break from it. You need to separate the space that you rest with the space that you’re working to overcome the challenges that you’re facing. You need a break mentally as well as physically. Right now you’re going to bed staring at the equipment and then waking to it too. You don’t need the first thing you see in the morning to be a reminder of the challenges you’ve faced. And you should be able to go to sleep at night without staring at the obstacles you haven’t yet overcome.’
He looks utterly mutinous. ‘I thought you were a physical therapist? If I want actual therapy I’ll hire a shrink.’
Of course this man would scoff at mental wellness. Taggie cocks a brow at him. ‘I am a physical therapist. And yet you’re paying me to do the work of at least three medical professionals because you refuse to have a nurse or anyone else in to assist you. And yes, I do happen to think that your recovery will involve overcoming mental obstacles as well as physical ones - why make it harder for yourself by never having a break?’
The stare that Mr Campbell-Black directs at her is positively glacial. Pushing a button on his desk that she assumes is a bell, he bites out in a clipped tone, ‘I think we’re done for the day Miss O’Hara. Mrs Bodkin will show you to your room.’
She waits a beat. ‘Fine. But I’m asking Mr Bodkin to have the equipment moved whether you like it or not.’
‘You will not.’
Taggie speaks without allowing herself to think of the consequences, ‘I am. What are you going to do about it? Carry it all back in here?’
Shit.
He gapes at her in silence for a moment before letting out a shocked bark of a laugh. She lets out the breath she was holding and they stare awkwardly at each other for a few moments before there is a rap at the door. Mrs Bodkin enters to show Taggie the way to her quarters. Walking down the hallway, Taggie’s room not far from her patient’s in case she’s needed during the night, the housekeeper asks, ‘how did you go today?’
Taggie considers for a moment. ‘He’s temperamental certainly, my daddy would describe him as crum-curmudgeonly. I think I can work with him though…if he’ll let me.’
~~~ O ~~~
Rupert sinks into the chair at his desk to go over some papers - he never would have anticipated when he took over from his father that owning an estate would involve so much paperwork. Try as he does to concentrate, he finds that his mind continues to drift to thoughts of his curious new physical therapist. She looked so young and innocent, he had assumed immediately that she would be a pushover. That he could unnerve her and have her bolting out the door like all the rest and yet…she’d surprised him. Each barbed comment he’d made, she’d volleyed back at him like a Wimbledon champion. There was nothing false about the way she went about her work with him - none of the artifice that so frustrated him with the other therapists who’d darkened his doorstep. She had a steely resolve and he had the sense that she had worked extremely hard to get to where she was, something more to overcome than just her stammer perhaps.
She had looked just as shocked as he felt when she made the crack about him carrying the equipment back into his room. This was the first time anyone had dared to make light of his injuries and he was surprised to find that he didn’t hate it. In fact it was something of a relief to have someone refuse to walk on eggshells around him. He knew he was being unnecessarily difficult about moving the equipment and she’d called him out on it. She’d been sarcastic just like he was and it was a breath of fresh air.
His mind drifted further; in the space of one day Miss O’Hara had spoken to him softly, with determination, in frustration and also with sarcasm. Unthinkingly, he began to wonder what it would sound like to hear her speak more…intimately to him, the throaty laugh that had escaped her earlier surely a sign of sweeter possibilities. As soon as the thought enters his mind, he shuts it down. Before-Accident-Rupert could imagine things like that, would gladly imagine things like that. He’d have put plans in place to make his idle daydream become a reality as soon as possible. The Rupert of today though? He couldn’t. That part of his life was over and it didn’t bear thinking about. Better to simply push the thought away, ignore it. Stifle that daydream before it could take root and fester within him, an additional wound in his already damaged body.
~~~ O ~~~
Taggie looks around her bedroom and almost squeals. She’s never seen a room so large, so understated in its elegance. There are enormous arched windows along one wall, hung with soft curtains for privacy. In front of the window is a large desk, a brass lamp with a green glass shade set up for writing. The bed looks so inviting that Taggie can’t resist flopping down on her back, feet still dangling on the floor off the side.
What a strange day she’s had. Mr Campbell-Black was an enigma, that was for sure. She could understand why he’d been flagged as difficult, but surely the other physical therapists who had come before her could see that he was just a deeply frightened man? A man who had led an extremely active life and had now had the rug pulled out from under him. Yes, he was sarcastic and prickly, but there was something more there she was sure of it. She saw it in his eyes when he looked at his dog. She saw it when he realised he’d hurt her with his jibe about her stammer. She made the commitment to herself then and there that she would see this through, she wouldn’t let him drive her away.
After wandering through to the ensuite Taggie can’t resist running herself a bath, despite it being the middle of the afternoon. The tiny flat she rents in London only has a small shower that barely has enough space to bend over to shave her legs; here there is a huge clawfoot tub along one wall, and a large walk-in shower on the other. Walking to the vanity, she notices there are bath salts and bubble bath, along with lotions, shampoo and conditioner all ready and waiting to be enjoyed. Opening the bottle of bubble bath she breathes in the delicate scent of rosewater and sighs, already feeling herself relax.
After she emerges from the bath, fingers wrinkled and cheeks pink, she wraps herself in the fluffy white robe that was hanging on the back of the door - this is better than any hotel I’ve ever been in - and decides to check in with her sister. Dialling the number, someone from Caitlin’s dormitory finally picks up the phone. ‘Hi its Caitlin’s sister, can I speak with her p-please?’
Pulling her ear away from the receiver she hears the girl screech ‘CAAAIIIT IT’S YOUR SISTERRRR’ before the phone is eventually picked up again.
‘Tag! How are you? How’s the new job?’
Caitlin is nearly ten years younger than Taggie and, given their parents were never the very involved type, she’d spent most of their lives acting as her unofficial caregiver. She smiles when she hears the younger girl’s enthusiastic voice down the line. ‘It’s too early to tell yet, today was only my first day. The house is incredible though, you’d be so jealous of my bedroom and the bathroom, Cait - you’d die.’
Caitlin giggles, ‘oh don’t be horrid! You know I’m stuck in this dorm sharing a bathroom with all these other slags. Where exactly are you anyway?’
Taggie had had this job thrust at her so quickly that she hadn’t really passed on any of the details yet. ‘Um, I’m in Rutshire at a place called Penscombe - my client is a man called Mr Cam-’
‘YOU’RE WORKING FOR RUPERT CAMPBELL-BLACK?!’ Taggie feels like her eardrum nearly bursts at Caitlin’s eldritch shriek.
‘How do you know of Mr Campbell-Black?’
Caitlin lets out a noise of disbelief. ‘Taggie everyone knows of Rupert Campbell-Black, he’s only like, the most drop-dead gorgeous man in all of England. Oh my god Taggie, he’s going to ravish you! Everyone knows he’s the biggest rake in the country - he’s had all the most glamorous women - even royalty. I’d heard he’d had an accident - the women of England have been in mourning because he hasn’t been seen in public in months. Oh I’m so jealous Tag!’
Taggie is momentarily dumbfounded. ‘Really? I’ve never even heard of him.’
She hears Caitlin huff on the end of the line. ‘Of course you haven’t Taggie. Oh my god, what’s he like? Tell me everything.’
Taggie shakes her head fondly at her sister’s exuberance. ‘He’s…a bit grumpy to be honest. I mean, it’s not surprising, he’s had a really terrible accident. The doctor’s had thought he was paralysed but he isn’t. He has a long way to go though and I’m sure he’s in a huge amount of pain.’
Caitlin sounds entirely disinterested in Taggie’s description. ‘Has he hit on you yet? He will. Oh my god my sister is going to have sex with Rupert Campbell-Black!’
‘Caitlin! Of course I’m not, he’s a patient - I’m here to help him that’s all.’ Taggie can’t explain why her face burns at her sister’s suggestion.
After talking a while longer, they eventually say their goodbyes, Caitlin entirely unable to be convinced that Taggie’s stay at Penscombe will end in anything other than complete and total ravishment. Shaking her head, Taggie tries to ignore the strange feeling in her stomach caused by Caitlin’s words. So Mr Campbell-Black was a rake, a womaniser…he was certainly extremely attractive and she suspected he could be charming if he chose to be. She supposed that must be another reason why he was now so cantankerous - if he was used to being out, not only working with his horses but also having regular rendezvous with women all over the country, he must be feeling especially confined right now. Sighing, she heads down to the kitchen to find Mrs Bodkin and have some dinner before turning in for the evening to complete her notes from the day’s work.