I was silent for a moment, thinking about his words. He was worried for me because I’d been a mess after that summer, even through the first months of training and beyond I’d gone to sleep thinking about Claire and waking up imagining she was next to me. My comrades thought I was sullen and moody, almost lost in my own world, unless we were training and physically active. Then I had managed to let her go. Since being home and a civilian again, I’d remembered her and whatever we’d had, I wanted back. “You know that’s not going to happen,” I said. “If I’ve not moved on from her in thirteen years, I’m unlikely to now.”
“So, what you’re saying is that if you don’t have her, you’re not going to settle with anyone else?”
“Yes.” I thought for a second. “No. If it doesn’t work out this time, if she ghosts me again then I will make myself move on. She’s told me she needs to explain why she stopped contact with me, but not yet.”
Nick nodded. “I get that. It must be something big.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I think it’s going to be something that blows my mind.” I felt my stomach churn, the slight echo of anxiety in my chest. I had my suspicions, but that was all they were. There was no use in thinking about it until she told me, otherwise I’d just torment myself. “Fancy a beer?”
“Yeah,” Nick said. “Why not?”
Chapter Ten
Claire
“He should probably be a model,” Katie said, her eyes flickering over to her – our – bodyguard, Denico. “With that body and that bone structure he’d make a killing on the catwalk. Maybe I could see if he’s interested. I could link him up with my agent.”
We were sitting outside a bar next to the river, still in Oxford, although the plethora of shopping bags suggested we’d spent a weekend in Manhattan. Katie had categorically said she didn’t want to go back to her home after it had been raided and she needed more clothes than what she’d originally packed, so we’d taken the opportunity to ditch the O’Hara brothers and bruise the plastic, eventually ending up needing something fizzy and alcoholic. “I’m pretty sure given what his careers included so far, he’d prefer to stay under the radar.” She was right, Denico was gorgeous and rather than not be noticed he seemed to prefer to hide in plain sight, several girls already eyeing him up as he sat a few feet away, checking his phone and drinking a juice.
Katie sighed. “Probably. How did I end up married to a man who looked nothing like Denico?”
Or Nick, I thought, having seen the way she’d looked at him a couple of time this morning. “How did you end up married to a man who was shorter than you and resembles a pit bull chewing a wasps’ nest with the wasps still in it?”
Katie topped up our glasses from the bottle of prosecco we’d ordered and smiled thoughtfully. “I honestly don’t know. Well, I’m starting to, I guess.”
The sun was warm on my face and the alcohol had made me drowsy. I wanted to make the most of the day as tomorrow I’d be back in London, needing to tie up a few lose ends on other files and speak to my colleagues who would be taking on some of the workload. Then I’d come back here, to talk Katie through the mediation and set out our battle plan. My adrenaline simmered at the thought, there was very little I enjoyed more than the thrill of the fight, trying to get what I believed my client was entitled to. “Talk me through meeting him.”
“He was charming and intelligent. We met at a ball, a charity fundraiser where the seats cost stupid amounts and you got the opportunity to place bids for far more money than you’d spend on things like spa days and experiences. We were sat next to each other. He was charming and polite and asked me questions about me, not about my job or who I’d met, like so many other men,” she said as my glass of fizz went down all too easily. “I’d just split from a boyfriend who’d been obsessed with himself and I’d been nothing more than a status symbol hanging off his arm, so my confidence was low. I was easy pickings.”
“What happened after?”
“He didn’t ask for my number and I didn’t really think much else about him. He was older than me, smaller and I didn’t really know who he was. Two weeks later I bumped into him at the opening of a restaurant in Highbury and he mentioned it had been fate that had brought us back together and asked if he could take me out. Our first date was dinner in Paris. We flew there and back in an evening,” she said, a wry smile manipulating her lips.
“When did you fall in love with him?” I said, needing to know the answer. I had never felt the feelings I had for Killian for anyone else. I thought myself in love with him, but part of me reasoned that it was just puppy love that had never gone away as I’d never let myself get so involved with anyone else. Killian had been the ember that I’d never let lose its glow.
Katie gestured to the waiter for another bottle. “I didn’t. He just made me think I did. I can see that now.”
“How?”
She gave a sarcastic laugh. “He groomed me. I was charmed by him; he was attentive and interested; he brought me gifts that were thoughtful and sent me flowers. He surprised me with dates, taking me to interesting places and restaurants that weren’t pretentious or somewhere just to be seen. I spent more and more of my time with him, and less with anyone else. I didn’t listen to what my friends were saying, that they’d heard he had a temper, that he was involved with criminal activity and organised crime. I chose to believe the Dean Lacey he showed me and when he proposed after just a few months it was too easy to say yes. He promised me time and funding for my charities and a chance to step away from the glare of the media so I could put my time into somethinggood. And then he started to change, but I had no one else. My friends were pissed off with me because I’d ignored them and he’d spent time telling me how my friends weren’t good enough, they were jealous, that I had him now… all the shit you’d associate with a manipulative, controlling abuser. But you don’t see it when you’re with them.”
“Do you think he loved you?”
She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. I don’t think he’s capable of feeling love so probably no. I was useful for him and easy to manipulate into the sort of relationship that he wanted. I was naïve and relatively innocent. What about you? Have you ever been in love?”
I remembered walking through Oxford, hand in hand, hoping no one who knew my brothers would see us; I remembered talking until it was dawn, the urge to touch him almost overwhelming in its strength; I remembered waking up with him curled around me, his arms encasing me and never having felt so safe. He made my heart beat and my lungs expand and when I sent him away I think I failed to live.
“Yes,” I said. “I’ve been in love.”
“With Killian?”
“Yes,” I said.I still am. Then I looked at her as she topped up her glass. “You’re drinking. But…”
She took a large drink, clearly almost half of the glass. “I’m not pregnant. My period started yesterday evening.”
“Are you sure it’s your period?”
She nodded. “I’m pretty sure. I’m seeing the doctor tomorrow and yeah, I know it might be a miscarriage but I could’ve missed a period with stress. I’ve never been hugely regular.”
