For All Our Tomorrows Read Free

she’d given him an instruction but he briskly responded that he’d been about to do just that, and would she please hurry up.
    Sara had been little more than eighteen when she’d married Hugh Marrack, flattered by his interest and charmed by his maturity and good looks. He rowed on the gigs, sailed, swam, was athletic and strong, a risk taker and, at thirty, had seemed like a god to her. She had loved his tall leanness, that shock of blonde hair he would sweep back from a high forehead with the flick of one hand; the classically straight nose, the blue-grey eyes and the way they would gaze at her in a slightly perplexed fashion, as if not quite able to believe his good fortune. She’d adored his patient, old fashioned courtship of her, and had been impressed by the good solid future that he’d planned for them by taking on the management of the inn.  
    She’d become pregnant with Jenny within months of their marriage, quickly followed by Drew. Two children was enough, Hugh had decided, and there’d been no more since.
    Some of the fizz had gone out of their sex life as a result, certainly so far as Sara was concerned. Hugh too seemed less interested, since he instigated love making less often these days, which she thought rather sad. But then they both worked long hours and if sometimes she felt a tinge of disappointment with her lot, that she’d perhaps been a mite hasty in marrying so young, and that life hadn’t turned out quite as she’d hoped, Sara blamed herself for having too many romantic notions.
    Or she blamed the war, which had dominated their lives for so long and seemed to go on for ever. But what could she do about that? Nothing, except endure, like everyone else.
    Hugh was a member of the lifeboat crew, and also carried responsibilities with regard to the coastguard service, so was very often unavailable when there was work to be done. Even when he wasn’t out on training and doing ‘his missions’ as he liked to call them, he was busy with paperwork in the little office up in the eaves. His time, he told her, was far too important to waste on mundane tasks, which she supposed was true.  
    So here she was, seven years later, still only in her mid-twenties, minding her children, feeding her husband and doing a hundred and one jobs each and every day. She served behind the bar, baked the pasties, did the cleaning, the endless washing and ironing, as well as catering for occasional bed and breakfast guests. Sara even cleaned out the beer pipes, as she’d done this morning, although not very well.
    Not that she ever complained. Hugh was a very private man, liable to sulks and dark moods if she should ever object to the workload or claim that he was neglecting her.
    And he was a good husband in other ways, caring and solicitous, perhaps too much so at times, almost suffocating. Sara frowned as she wiped down the bar counter, filled with a rush of guilt for viewing his assiduous attention in such a light.
    Perhaps she craved a little too much freedom. Maybe the fault was hers. After all, as he repeatedly informed her, he always had her best interests at heart.
    As he was telling her now.
    ‘You’ve got that glazed expression in your eyes again, Sara. I do hope you’re paying attention. I can’t stand about here all day explaining things your own commonsense should tell you. I have more serious work to do. Do you understand?’
    ‘Yes, Hugh. Of course, darling.’
    She saw him soften, as he so often did when she addressed him thus. He came to her then and slid an arm about her slender waist. ‘My God, no wonder I’m jealous of anyone else coming near you. Have you any idea how ravishing you look with that silver haze of soft curls framing your enchanting little face, and those large, adorable green eyes.’
    Sara giggled. ‘Don’t exaggerate, they’re more grey than green, and my hair is a mess.’
    He slid one hand down the length of her thigh and, pulling up her skirt, slid it between her