“You don’t?”
She shook her head. “I remember mum being unhappy. I also remember seeing dad watching her, looking absolutely torn apart as to what to do. Marie told me he tried to get her to accept help from doctors for her depression, but she refused. I don’t know if Max knows that.”
“Maybe you should talk to him about it.”
“Maybe I should. There’s probably a lot I need to talk to him about. And Jackson. And we all need to talk to Callum.” She gave a little sigh and her eyes brightened. “What’s that bird? The one we’ve probably just disturbed.”
I saw it fly off, recognised the flight pattern easily. “Skylark,” I said. “Do you want to take a break?”
“Yeah. I think so. It’s been a long time since I’ve walked as much as I have in the past couple of days,” she said, stretching out a leg.
“You live in London. And walk most places. Plus, you go to the gym,” I said, laughing at her discomfort.
“Yes, to all that, but it’s different walking here. The paths aren’t even, you don’t walk constantly in London, it’s stop-start all the time. And I have a gym membership. That doesn’t mean I go that often,” she said, eyeballing me.
I found a spot sheltered by a cairn of stones which acted as a natural windbreaker. The ground was fairly even, or as even as it was going to get and we were near to a narrow stream of running water that would be clean to drink. No one was around. The silence was high and massive, only broken by the faint rustling of the breeze through the bracken and the whistling of skylarks.
The rucksack was heavy; by no means anywhere close as to what I would have with me when we were on land with the Marines, but I’d packed enough stuff so that if we wanted to stay out all day on the moor, we could. This time was precious: when we returned to London we’d be consumed with our jobs and our families and our friends. Having time together like this was a luxury I was aware we had to make the most of.
Claire sat down on the blanket and accepted the coffee I poured from the flask. She was tense and preoccupied, so I kept my words to myself, not wanting to force her thoughts.
“Sit behind me,” she said, scooting forwards.
I straddled her back, providing her with my chest to use as a rest, which she did, sipping her coffee and watching the skylarks continue to dance.
“This is just the most beautiful place.”
“There are other places as beautiful, just in different ways,” I said, thinking of her in my bed. That was one of my favourite places.
“Today,” she said. “I needed to be somewhere like this today.”
I played with her hair with one of my hands, giving her contact. “Why today?”
She inhaled deeply. “It’s thirteen years and a week since I didn’t return your last message and started to ignore your phone calls.”
“You know it to the day?” I said, surprised. I was aware it was around this time of year that everything had ceased, but not to the date. I realised there was a more significant reason she remembered. “Tell me Claire. You can’t move forward until you’ve told me.”
“We went home for summer late; do you remember?”
I nodded. I did remember. We’d stayed right until the end of our housing leases. Claire had used the excuse she was starting to study for her second year, which was true as well, and I had said I wanted to make the most of being in Oxford and finding out a bit more about the MBA, which was becoming an option as I was seriously considering not leaving Claire. “We spent as much time together as possible.”
“We did.” Her hand gripped the top of mine and brought it to her waist. “When I got home I kept being sick. I was moody and emotional. My brothers teased me something awful, especially Callum.”
My brain analysed the memories I had of what her elder brothers had told me. If there’d been a serious illness I would’ve found out; there would’ve been no way the Callaghan’s wouldn’t have leaned on their friends if their sister was that sick.
Claire carried on, her voice level, as if she was reading a story from a book. “Marie found me one morning after I’d been violently sick. She brought a pregnancy test with her.”
It was at that point I felt myself freeze. My heart started to thump like a drum in my chest, a slow, heavy rhythm that I felt from my toes to the top of my head. The ability to move my hands or feet was lost and all I could do was hold her.
“You were pregnant?”
She gave a gentle laugh, one that must’ve taken years to perfect. “I was pregnant. I took two tests and both were positive. I was on the pill but I’d been taking antibiotics for the throat infection I’d picked up during my exams.”
I didn’t speak for several minutes, unable to do anything more than touch her and touch the side of her head with my lips. The thought of her being pregnant with my child was overwhelming; the strength she had possessed even more so.
“Has Marie been holding out from trying to murder me?” I eventually said.
Claire’s laugh this time was softer. “She never judged. We didn’t do anything wrong, Killian and she liked you. She still likes you. She’s wanted me to tell you this for years.”
