‘Tech start-ups. I invest early, then cash out.’
‘Nice.’
‘Yeah, it’s high-risk, but high reward.’
‘Still, you must be doing all right to afford this.’ I indicate the room with my chin.
He shrugs. ‘I built this from the nest egg I’d put aside forour future. After thirty years, I finally got over you. So I decided to get out of Edinburgh and use the money. And here you are, looking pretty much exactly like the Sadie standing in my kitchen the day we broke up. Different hair’—he reaches out and briefly touches my cheek—‘but same beautiful face.’
We lock eyes, my light blue to his dark blue; and I feel a gentle tug on my cold, desiccated heart—just a small one, not enough to kick-start it or anything. But Tim and Iweregood together at the beginning. We had fun. Until he started getting too serious. Like now. I mean, what is he talking about? Thirty years to get over me. That can’t be right.
I lick my lips nervously and shift along the couch a little.
‘But surely, you’ve had other relationships since me?’
‘Not really. No one ever compared to you, my mysterious Sadie. There was always something different about you. It’s why I fell in love with you ...amstill in love with you.’
I puff out my cheeks, digesting this. Fuck. I knew it was a bad idea to come here. It’smyfault Tim’s turned into an off-grid hermit. Even worse, this amazing house was built with moneymeant for usand possibly where I would be living now if I’d ended up marrying him.
‘Of course, I had my suspicions back then that you weren’t completely ... human,’ he continues.
‘Did you?’ I sip my tea, glad that he’s bringing up the subject finally. Ugh, this tea is foul. What I really need is something more nutritious. I eye Tim’s tanned firm neck with only the barest trace of sagging skin. Now if I could get my fangs into that for a minute ...
‘Yeah, I woke up one night to discover you feeding from me. At the time, when I told my brother you might be a vampire, Malcolm said I was being ridiculous. But seeing you here now, looking like a fresh-faced twenty-something, it confirms I was right all along. It’s a consolation that I wasn’t crazy at least.’
‘Why didn’t you say something?’ I ask incredulously.
‘I didn’t know how to broach the subject. Didn’t want to drive you away. In the end, I did anyway.’
‘It wasn’t your fault.’
Tim takes the cup from me and places it on the glass coffee table. He grasps my cold hands in his warm ones. ‘No, Sadie. I should have fought harder for you that day,’ he says earnestly. ‘I was angry. I’m sorry. I thought it best to let things cool off, but I waited too long. By the time I went to contact you, to see if you wanted to give it another go, your flat had different owners.’ He shakes his head. ‘That was a bad day.’
I extract one of my hands and place it on the back of his. ‘Don’t worry, it’s all in the past now,’ I say gently. Perhaps Ishould wipe his memory of this visit, if it’s too hard seeing me again.
‘Is it, though?’ he insists. ‘I still feel the same.’
I pat his hand idly. ‘Tim, be reasonable. You know what I am. It could never work.’And besides, there’s Elliott.But I don’t mention him. Tim is obviously a bit nuts, and he might crack completely if he knows there’s another man in the picture.
‘Yes, I know what you are,’ he says patiently. ‘But I don’t care. I’m sick of living in limbo without you. I want you to do what I should’ve asked you to do in the first place.’
‘What’s that?’ I ask nervously.
Tim smiles. ‘Turn me, of course, so we can be together again.’
Chapter 23
Elliott | Highlands, present day
Lucy returns with my clean bucket and places it on the floor next to me.
‘Really sorry about that,’ I apologise again. I hope she had some rubber gloves at least, but as her hands are dripping wet and glowing pink with cold, it looks like that’s a no.
She nods, straightens, and heads towards the door.
Growing desperate about my future well-being, I attempt to override her enthralled state.
‘Lucy, look at me!’
