‘Whathas happened before?’
‘Us.’
He stares at her. ‘I’m pretty sure I’d remember if we’d slept together before now, Liss.’ She can hear it, the attempt to lighten things, as he’s so good at doing.
‘That’s not what I mean.’
‘Whatdoyou mean?’ He pulls a hand through his hair, exasperated.
She tries to find the words – opens and closes her mouth a few times, watches the way his brow creases further, trying to figure her out. But she can’t do it. If he doesn’t already see it, doesn’t remember, there is no way he’ll believe her. It will sound crazy, she knows that. Because itiscrazy.
But that doesn’t mean it’s not true.
Punishment. She thinks it again, even if Saskia told her the universe doesn’t work like this. But why else? In each life, she is responsible for the death of a sibling. In each life, she falls in love with Ash. In each life, she loses him.
Why else would this be happening?
He’s already looking at her like he’s more than a little alarmed, and she wonders if he might, finally, decide she’s more hassle than she’s worth and leave her. And that would be for the best, wouldn’t it? Because that’s what needs to happen. Because she’s realised, this time, before it’s too late. Because that’s what she needed to learn. The universe, trying to tell her something. Each time they fall in love, it only ends in tragedy. So that only leaves one answer, doesn’t it?
She takes a breath, squares her shoulders and finally looks him right in the eye. ‘We can’t be together, Ash.’
He’s still holding her clothes out to her as he scans her face, searching for answers. ‘Did you have a … an anxiety attack or something? Let’s go up to the house and—’
‘No.’
‘No? No you didn’t or no you won’t go to the house?’
‘Both. Either.’ She takes her clothes from him, puts them on, the sand coarse against her sticky skin. ‘We …’ She pauses as she pulls her top over her head. ‘It’s not going to end well if we keep going down this road.’
‘Whatroad?’ He’s losing patience, she can tell. Good. That will make it easier.
‘Us.’ She gestures between them. ‘If we keep doing … whatever it is we’re doing.’
What would have happened if she hadn’t figured this out? Would they have repeated the loop? Fall in love, choose each other. Only to pay for it with their lives.
It won’t happen, she tells herself firmly. The future isn’t set in stone – and now she has the chance to change it.
‘What, and you just know that, do you?’ His anger, even subtle as it is, spikes the air. ‘You’ve had an epiphany in the middle of the night?’
She bends down to pick up her shoes, hesitates before straightening. ‘You know when I asked you,’ she begins tentatively, ‘if you believed in past lives?’
‘What the hell does that have to do with anything?’
And there it is – her answer. She closes her eyes, breathes in the smell of the sea. He might not feel it the way she does, but it’s affecting him regardless. He’s only drawn to her because of who they were to each other in the past. And it’s why he is the way he is, isn’t it? Of course he wants to take risks, experience new things, enjoy things while they last, because some part of him must remember just how short life can be.
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispers. ‘I can’t do this.’
She moves to step away, but he grabs her arm. ‘Can’t dowhat, Lissa? You’re making no sense.’
She shakes her head again. She won’t do it. She won’t continue down the path she’s on with him. She thinks of what Saskia said at the tarot reading.
It’s only by making a different choice to the one you’ve made in the past that you can get to where you need to be for your future.
Well this is it, isn’t it?Thisis the different choice she needs to make in order to stop the past repeating itself.
She yanks her arm from his grip, and he lets her go. The sand is rough under her feet as she walks away from him.
She hears her name called behind her. ‘Lissa!’
