The Great Escape
A Week Later – Friday
‘HERE YOU GO.’ ABBIE offered me a glass of cold wine, condensation still trickling down the sides of it, as I sat on the deck at the front of my parents’ cottage and stared out over the beach towards the sea.
A week here hadn’t healed me, but it had gone a long way towards giving me perspective. Sleeping with the sound of the ocean breaking on the shore, seagulls waking me up early in the morning, brisk jogs along the beach in the sun, and time spent idling in Dolphin Bay had done me the world of good. Tasting freshly-made ice cream and picking up supplies from the local farm shop and delicatessen to prepare some tasty home-cooked meals had also helped lift my spirits. Of course, Abbie had too. That girl never failed to make me laugh when I needed it. She’d handled all of the calls to rearrange my clients, giving me another week up here if I needed it. And while I knew she needed to get back, I had to admit that I did need that extra time.
‘Thanks,’ I smiled as I took the glass from her. She lowered herself onto the cushioned bench next to me, a bottle of water in her hand. ‘Bet you wish you had one of these right now,’ I said as I tapped her bottle with my glass.
‘You have no idea,’ she groaned, twisting off the plastic bottle top. ‘And I wish I could stay longer, I’d forgotten how peaceful it is here. It’s good for the soul.’
‘It is,’ I agreed.
The cottage was out on the edge of the small town, with no immediate neighbours. A walk along the beach to the left took you around the edge of the bay onto the long coastline of Wales that faced Ireland and the east coast of America. Taking a right meant we could walk into the town, which sat in a horseshoe around the central harbour. Over on the other side of the harbour, to the right of the lifeboat station, were a row of brightly coloured beach huts, one of which was owned by my parents. It was great to have it there when we wanted to be in the thick of things. Abbie and I had spent a few afternoons there, sitting in our deckchairs with a non-alcoholic fruit punch and ice-lollies as we talked and watched the world go by.
The bay itself was set into a dip in the hills, which were covered with an undulating patchwork of fields, all owned by the Owens family. It was bordered by a thick tree line that sheltered the bay from the unsuspecting traffic of the main road up in the distance. It had been a deliberate ploy by the Dolphiners, as the locals liked to call themselves, not to make the bay’s presence obvious. There was nothing worse than a small community being invaded by loads of tourists every summer. I was accepted here as a virtual local, as this cottage had been owned by my grandfather, who used to be a trawlerman when fishing was the main industry of the town. By all accounts, he hadn’t been impressed when Dad left home to go and seek his fortunes elsewhere.
We sat side by side drinking as we just admired the view, the sun casting its rays of light onto the gently moving water.
‘Thanks, Abbie, for knowing I needed this.’
‘I’m a great friend, aren’t I?’
‘You are,’ I laughed, shoulder bumping her.
‘Just promise me you’ll always remember that, even when you’re mad at me.’
‘Why would I be mad at you?’ I asked, tearing my gaze off the water to eye her curiously.
‘No reason I can think of, unless of course you count the fact that I finished the cookies that were supposed to last you into next week.’
‘Abbie Davis!’ I scolded. She grinned at me and set her empty bottle down, then held out her arms.
‘Come on, lever me up. You can come with me to make sure I take the right lane out of the town, then you can walk back along the beach.’
‘There’s only one way out, up that valley,’ I pointed as I stood up.
‘That’s what you think. I’m telling you, I tried getting home once and ended up God knows where. It took me forever to find my way home. Come on, I’d like to get back before it gets dark,’ she said, waggling her outstretched hands at me. I grabbed them and pulled her up, staggering backwards as she stumbled forward.
‘Steady, Miller will kill me if you fall over.’
‘I’m like a ball. I don’t fall, I just roll.’
‘Ok, I packed the car already, did you check you have everything?’ I asked, feeling emotional at the thought of her leaving.
‘I didn’t bring much, and if I’ve forgotten anything, you can bring it home with you next Sunday.’
I nodded and locked the cottage door, then held her hand as we took the steps up the side of the cottage to the small parking area set further up the hill behind us, Abbie panting every step of the way.
‘You know you need to get back together with Weston, I was banking on him being my personal trainer and whipping me back into shape once I’ve popped this sprog out.’
‘Miller’s not enough of a gym buff to help you?’ I scoffed as we got into her car.
‘He’s too busy with work, and don’t tell him I told you, but he’s deflated down to a four pack. Before we know it, he’ll have a stomach my size.’
‘But you’ll still love him, right?’ I asked as she started her engine.
‘Well, duh, of course. I promised not to leave him the day we got engaged and you don’t go back on a promise.’
‘I did,’ I said quietly, the guilt eating away at me as Abbie crawled along the single-track lane.
‘You ran. He did something he shouldn’t have done and because of your history with lies, you ran. Until you tell him it’s over, that’s not leaving, Georgie. That’s taking a time out. Are you saying that you’ve made the decision, that you’re going to tell him that you’ve broken your promise then?’
‘I’m not sure what I’m going to tell him. That’s the reason for another week of deep consideration all on my own.’
‘You saved your new mobile number in my phone, right?’
‘Yes, but I also put the cottage landline in if you need me, as the mobile signal here isn’t great.’
‘The cottage has a landline?’ she spluttered, as she took her eyes off the road to give me a shocked look.
‘Yes,’ I said slowly, sure I’d mentioned that when she kept going out to speak to Miller outside. I’d assumed she just wanted privacy. ‘Broadband too.’
‘Next you’ll be telling me it’s hooked up to the TV and I could have been watching my favourite shows instead of playing board games by the fire.’
‘What’s wrong with board games? We had fun.’
‘Next time, I call shotgun on watching TV,’ she grizzled, making me giggle. I guided her into the town and along the harbour road, then she turned right at the corner of the best fish and chip shop in all of Wales and pulled over onto the parking bays at the side of The Green Dragon pub. ‘So, keep in touch, won’t you?’
‘Are you crying?’ I asked as she held out her arms for a last hug. ‘I’m not going off backpacking for months on end. It’s a week on my own, an hour from home.’
‘I’m emotional. I’m leaving my best friend, I’m pregnant, and I need more sugar. Don’t upset me by not giving me a hug and not staying in contact.’
‘I’d never refuse Abbie hugs,’ I stated sincerely, leaning over to return it. ‘They’ve got me through some tough times, especially this week.’
‘They’ll always be here for you, through the good and the bad,’ she sniffed.
‘Likewise. Come on, I don’t want you to start blubbering or I won’t be happy letting you drive off. Are you sure Miller won’t mind picking me up next Sunday?’
‘I’ll bribe him with sex.’
I laughed and we exchanged another hug and kiss before I waved her off. I wrapped my arms around myself and quickly wiped a tear from my eye as I waited until she’d disappeared from view. I patted my pockets and grinned when I felt some loose change, which meant I could stop at the chip shop to order a portion. The smell was making my mouth water.
‘Eating in, Georgie?’ asked Bill.
‘No, I’m going to walk home and eat them on the deck with a glass of wine as I watch the sun set.’
‘Sounds like a plan,’ he nodded. ‘Salt and vinegar?’
‘Both please, heavy on the salt.’
He wrapped them up tightly in newspaper, then handed them over. ‘Don’t be a stranger, it’s been too long since we saw you up here.’
‘It really has been too long,’ I agreed. I’d forgotten how much I loved it up here. It was just the mortification of bumping into Dai Owens again that had put me off coming back. ‘See you soon, Bill.’
I skipped out and headed across the road to walk along the harbour wall path, returning the friendly greetings of everyone who knew me as I went. Within five minutes, I was down on the soft powdery sand, breathing in the fresh salty air as I followed the edge of the bay back to the cottage. With the remains of the day’s sun on my face, a gentle breeze lifting and dropping my loose hair, I almost felt like I was as free as those seagulls squawking up above me. I pulled off my flip-flops and put them in one hand, my chip package tucked under my arm, and put my head down to check where I was walking. It wasn’t uncommon to find the odd bit of jagged glass sticking up out of the sand. In fact, I had a scar on the sole of my foot from where I’d cut it open on some when I was little. An excited bark up ahead forced me to look back up, shielding my eyes from the glare of the sun.
‘Bertie?’ My stomach rolled with a mixture of emotions as I saw a small grey blur moving towards me at speed. I squinted over at the cottage and sighed to see Weston sitting on the wooden steps that led up to the deck, his feet on the sand as he watched me approaching. ‘No, Abbie, what did you do?’ I moaned, the reason for her “promise not to get mad at me” request becoming all too clear.
‘Baby boy, what are you doing here?’ I asked Bertie as I crouched and set my flip-flops and chips down. I caught him in my arms and couldn’t help but laugh at his enthusiastic greeting of me, like he’d missed me as much as I had him. I kissed him repeatedly, then let out a heavy sigh as I knew the conversation I’d been dreading next week was now inevitable. ‘So, he brought you with him thinking he could butter me up again, right?’
Bertie cocked his head and let out a whine as he gave me his perfected “love me” puppy dog eyes. I’d assumed that my anger with Weston would have hardened my heart forever, but I felt it soften as Bertie and I gazed at each other.
‘Don’t you dare teach that look to your uncle, as I’m not ready to forgive him. I’m not sure if I even want to forgive him, and a look like that from his beautiful blue eyes would make me cave.’
Bertie grunted and nuzzled my breast with his wet nose, making me shake my head. I licked my dry lips as I snuck a quick glance over to the cottage, to see Weston hadn’t moved. He was just watching me, waiting for me. Did he feel as anxious and nervous as I did at the thought of seeing him again? My mind raced with all of the arguments I’d had with myself, and Abbie, this last week. I was devastated that despite knowing lies were my one deal breaker, he’d done just that. But it didn’t take away from the fact that I was still deeply in love with him, and that I was just as sure that he was in love with me. Technically, while he had lied, they weren’t over something that was completely unforgivable, unlike Greg cheating on me. But did I risk letting him believe that he could get away with lying to me again? Potentially an even worse lie?
‘Come on then. As he’s blocking my one and only entrance to the cottage and I don’t fancy spending the night out here in the dark, we’d better face the music,’ I told Bertie as I tucked him under one arm and managed to scoop up my chips and flip-flops.
I began a painfully slow walk back to the cottage, trying to look anywhere but at him, but my eyes were too curious, too eager to see his face again. A face that was etched into my memories forever, no matter what happened between us. Our gaze locked, a frisson of awareness of how badly I was attracted to him running down my spine. He quickly stood up and ran his hands through his hair. He looked awful. I mean, he was still handsome, he’d always be the most handsome man I’d ever seen, but he obviously hadn’t shaved all week as he was sporting a scruffy beard and was bearing deep, dark circles under his eyes.
‘Georgie,’ he breathed, my name sounding like a plea as it left his lips.
‘What are you doing here, Weston?’
‘I came for you.’
‘Then you had a wasted journey, as you’ll be leaving right now without me,’ I said, as coldly as I possibly could. However, inside my body was reawakening, heat spreading through my veins as fast as the sun was setting behind me. I set my chips and flip-flops down on the top step, kissed Bertie, and pushed him back at Weston. He quickly grabbed him and held him tightly, despite Bertie’s whines. ‘Just because you wooed me once with a fake puppy doesn’t mean it will work again.’
‘He’s not fake. Nothing about our relationship was fake, Georgie. I just made a stupid decision on the spur of the moment.’
‘A stupid decision is seeing a “No Entry” sign, ignoring it, and carrying on driving. You lied to me, and not just about Bertie, a dog who doesn’t even exist.’ I tried to keep my voice calm and level, when in reality I wanted to yell at him, slap or punch him, or quite possibly bury him in the sand and leave him there for the carnivorous seagulls to pick over his sun-scorched bones. Crikey, I’d been reading way too much of Charlie’s work, her prose was rubbing off on me.
‘He does exist. He may be Bouncer when he’s with my brother, but with us, he was, he is, Bertie.’ He clipped the leash in his hand to Bertie’s collar, set him down, and put the loop of the lead over the carved finial of the bannister that bordered most of the deck, then glanced up at me as he pointed to him. ‘Look at him. He’s still the dog you loved, the dog I nearly died trying to save. He’s as much a part of our relationship as you or me.’
‘Except we no longer have a relationship, Weston. That’s what happens when it’s founded on lies.’
‘I screwed up, I admit it,’ he stated earnestly as he threw his arms out wide. ‘You made it perfectly clear that you didn’t want any complications in a relationship. If I’d been honest and said I was a five-hour drive away, you’d have written me off, Georgie. You said you wanted easy, I tried to make it easy.’
‘By lying to me?’ I couldn’t keep the hurt out of my voice as I felt the sting of tears in my eyes. I thought I’d cried all the tears humanly possible this last week. Where did they come from?
‘I can’t take it back, Georgie. I tried so many times to tell you, but each time I did, there was something that took your attention away and ruined the moment.’
‘So now it’s my fault? You’re telling me that in a thirteen-month relationship, I ruined every single opportunity for you to say “Hey, Georgie, I lied to you. This dog doesn’t belong to me and I actually live on the other side of the country.” See, that took me all of ten seconds to say.’
‘I never said it was your fault,’ he groaned as he scruffed up his hair and blew out a hard breath. I turned and faced the sea, watching it pull the sun down into its depths. I couldn’t keep my nerve while I was looking at his tired and defeated blue eyes, or those strong and sexy biceps of his, bared by his t-shirt, flexing every time he moved. ‘I was wrong. I lied about where I live, but not who I am, or what I do, or what you mean to me. I pretended Bertie was mine as I knew you’d fall in love with him and I hoped that would help you fall in love with me. And there’s one final lie I’m going to admit to telling, and though my promises might not hold much weight with you right now, it’s the last one that I told you.’
‘I don’t know if I can handle hearing that I was so stupid to believe yet something else, Weston,’ I whispered, giving myself a hug as I sniffed back some tears.
‘I never thought you were stupid. That title belongs solely to me. This lie won’t hurt you, Georgie. I said it to protect you, because I knew at that moment if I was honest with you, you’d have got up and run from me.’
‘Weston, stop, please,’ I pleaded, closing my eyes and wishing I could close my ears as his velvety voice stimulated them, reminding me of all the lovely things he’d whispered to me at night while we were wrapped so tightly around each other, or those moments we just lay in each other’s arms in the morning.
‘I told you that I hadn’t fallen in love with you when I took you to lunch at The Mytton. That was the biggest of the three lies I told you, because the moment I heard you talking to yourself in the car, giving yourself a pep talk, was the moment I knew I wasn’t going to fall in love with you. I knew that I’d already fallen.’
‘Weston, stop,’ I moaned, my chest rattling as I willed the tears not to fall.
‘I fell so hard and so fast, Georgie, and it scared me. I didn’t expect to find myself needing you as much as I did in such a short space of time. I tried to hold back how I really felt, to not put any pressure on you. That day Abbie was ill in bed and we sat with her, she mentioned love. I saw your reaction, so I had to force myself to react the same way and disappeared to give you space in case you panicked and ended things. I was in love with you then. I’m still in love with you. I always will be, I don’t have any other choice, Georgie. You’re it, you’re the one that comes along once in a lifetime and I don’t want to lose you. I need to know what it will take for you to forgive me. This last week without you, imagining how you must be feeling, was hell.’
‘You can’t imagine, it was worse than hell,’ I choked. I hissed and pulled away when he reached out with his fingers to skim my cheek. ‘Don’t touch me.’
‘You said you didn’t want secrets, Georgie, and I’ve kept them, but I won’t anymore, not if it means you’ll leave me. You want to know what I’ve kept buried inside, what makes me break out into a cold sweat, what can set off panic attacks or make me wake up in strange places with no idea how I got there?’ he asked, his voice cracking with the effort of vocalising what he saw as his greatest weakness.
‘No,’ I said as I shook my head violently. He’d said he’d never share. I didn’t want to be the woman who forced him to share. I didn’t want to risk him hating me for making him confront his deepest fears, as if that happened, there was never going to be any chance for us.
‘I was team leader. It was my job to … I swept an alleyway in Helmand Province, where we were searching for insurgents. Christ … it’s like I’m back there right now, I can feel the heat, how my lips are cracked and covered in dust. I can smell the donkey and camel crap on the dirt track.’ His voice was gruff and full of emotion that made my heart soften further. ‘I thought it was clear, so I … I signalled to my team … I told them it was ok to move forward and … Jesus,’ he exhaled sharply, and I winced as I heard him practicing the breathing technique he’d taught me.
‘I don’t want to know, Weston, I don’t need to know.’
‘But I need to tell you, Georgie, I need to,’ he shouted, losing his cool for the first time since I’d met him. I closed my eyes and hugged myself harder, hating to hear the pain in his voice. And it wasn’t just pain I could hear, taste, and feel. It was the loneliness in his voice at never being able to share whatever it was that tortured him, that forced him to leave a job he loved, ruined his last relationship, and made him wake up in a panic some of the rare nights we spent together. ‘I need to tell someone who won’t just nod their head, write things on a piece of damn paper, and tell me a bottle of pills will solve it all. I need to tell someone why I’m so screwed up, I’d do pretty much anything to hang on to the girl I love, the girl that gives me more peace than I’ve had since I made that mistake.
‘And right now, I can feel you slipping through my fingers like grains of sand through an hourglass, and that scares me more than anything I faced over there. You’ll probably wonder how you could have loved a guy like me in a minute. Because I know you loved me, Georgie, even if you don’t now. Captain Weston Argent, hard on the outside and as weak as a damn sickly kitten on the inside. Do you … do you know how many … how many men died that day because I made one stupid mistake? Because I missed that landmine? Do you?’
‘Stop, Weston, don’t do this to yourself,’ I cried as my face creased up, failing miserably to stop the force of the tears that began their relentless journey down my cheeks as I took on some of his pain.
‘Five men, Georgie,’ he whispered between gasps for air. ‘Five men,’ he repeated loudly. ‘I … I … held my best friend Gavin in my arms and watched the blood pouring out of a gaping hole where his thigh used to be as he painfully died of shock and blood loss. I can feel his warm blood all over me, Georgie, smell that metallic tang. I see the light extinguishing in his eyes nearly every time I fall asleep. So if … if you’re going to leave me, then you leave me with your eyes wide open about who I really am. I never wanted any secrets between us. Never. Christ, I can’t breathe, G … Georgie … I … I can’t breathe,’ he panted, each gasp for air ripping me apart from the inside out, just how I imagined stepping on that landmine would do. It was so painful to know what he’d endured and what he’d taken on himself for something that wasn’t even in his control.
I heard a thud and spun around, desperately wiping the tears off my face, to find him curled up in a ball on the wood floor. He was clawing at his t-shirt collar as he started to hyperventilate, and Bertie began to howl in distress. I dropped to my knees and reached behind Weston to search the back pockets of his shorts. I extracted his penknife and flicked the blade out. Working quickly but carefully, I sliced through his t-shirt from his taut stomach all the way up to his neck and peeled it back to free him from the feeling of being smothered by the material.
‘In through the nose, out through the mouth. In through the nose, out through the mouth,’ I repeated over and over as I sat down and gently pulled his head onto my lap, while Bertie whimpered behind us, as distressed as we both were. I continued repeating my instructions as I rubbed Weston’s back with one hand and ran my fingertips through his hair, gently massaging his scalp. ‘That’s it, in through the nose and out through the mouth. You’re safe here, nothing can hurt you.’ Except for me, it seemed. Had me walking away, taking a time out to consider our relationship, really done this to him?
‘Georgie,’ he croaked, his eyes frantically roving over my face as they adjusted to the encroaching darkness.
‘I’m here. Keep breathing like you taught me. You’re having a panic attack. I’m not going anywhere. And you listen to me and you listen good. You’re not weak. There’s nothing weak about signing up to serve your country or risking your life every single time you step into hostile territory to try and make the world a safer place for all of us. All of us who live in blissful oblivion as to just how bad things are, or how many lives are lost in the call of duty. You didn’t plant that mine. You may have made one mistake under stressful conditions, but think of all the lives you’ve probably saved by putting yourself in harm’s way every day. Abbie makes a mistake and someone ends up paying a bit more on their tax bill, I make a mistake and Portia ends up with a lopsided bouffant, but no one dies. I can’t even begin to imagine the pressures anyone in the forces feels when they have the lives of countless humans in their hands every day.’
‘I need someone … to forgive me, Georgie. I need forgiveness,’ he sobbed, breaking my heart to see how ripped up he still was over it. ‘And Gavin’s family … they refused to see me. I couldn’t even go to his burial.’
‘They were grieving, Weston. I’m sure they regret that decision now. You don’t need their forgiveness, you want it,’ I said softly, channelling Daphne’s sage advice. ‘What you really need is to forgive yourself. You’re a good man, Weston Argent. I wouldn’t have fallen in love with you so hard if you weren’t.’
‘You … still … love me?’ he asked, his breathing starting to regulate as I stroked his hair.
‘I’ll always love you, handsome.’ I offered him a sad smile and bent down to kiss his forehead.
‘Does that mean … that you forgive me?’ he asked, hope in his voice and his eyes.
‘Weston,’ I breathed, feeling my stomach knot. ‘Now isn’t the time for that conversation. Just like you questioned whether it was Bertie I wanted to see more of or you, if I tell you that I forgive you now, you’ll always wonder if it’s because I felt sorry for you after you shared your secret and not because I meant it. If I forgive you, I need to do it in my own time without feeling pressured.’
‘I didn’t come here planning to make … you feel sorry for me, or by using this to try and win you around.’
‘I kind of guessed that, because as a seduction technique, it really sucks,’ I smiled, wiping my face on my t-shirt.
‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered, holding my gaze as I continued to comfort him.
‘So am I.’
I woke up feeling like my head had been split by an axe and was greeted by a wet and sloppy kiss from Bertie.
‘Oh, baby boy, I missed you so much.’ I laughed as I hugged him and nuzzled into his neck. ‘Where’s Weston?’ I asked him.
We’d fallen asleep fully clothed, well me anyway. Weston had ditched the tattered remains of his t-shirt before curling up on the bed with me, his head on my chest as I’d held him and made sure he didn’t have another panic attack before he fell into a deep sleep.
Bertie barked and looked towards the door that led out to the open-plan kitchen-diner-lounge at the front of the cottage. I got up and put him down on the floor and watched him trot over to sit by the door, cocking his head as if he was telling me to hurry up. I headed to the Jack and Jill bathroom, which linked the two bedrooms at the back of the cottage. Mum and Dad had gutted the place and remodelled it with the best of everything, making sure the bi-fold doors that spanned the front of the cottage afforded a one hundred and eighty degree view of the headland, ocean, and bay. I grabbed my toothbrush and the toothpaste, trying to avoid looking at my pale face, with its obvious symptoms of a night of tears and fretful sleep etched into it. Instead, I took out my frustration at my predicament on my teeth, until they were squeaky clean and my mouth felt minty fresh.
‘Come on then, Bertie, let’s see what he’s doing,’ I suggested, as I opened the bedroom door and stepped into the sunlight-filled room.
‘Morning.’ Weston smiled tentatively as he held my gaze from where he was leaning back against the galley-style kitchen that spanned the left wall.
‘Morning,’ I replied, lifting my head to sniff the air as my tummy growled.
‘I’ve made coffee, but you’re seriously low on food. In fact, the only thing I could find was your chips, so I put them in the oven to warm up. They should be ready now.’
‘Great, thanks.’ I gave him a quick smile, my mind racing as I tried to think how on earth we were going to handle things. ‘Do you think it’s safe to open the doors, or will Bertie run for the water?’
‘I think it’s safe to say that he’s scared of water for life. Steve even has trouble giving him a bath.’
‘Right, Steve and Jane, your brother and sister-in-law?’
‘Hmmm,’ he confirmed.
‘Do they know what you told me last night?’
‘No,’ he responded quickly. ‘Only you and my therapist.’
I flipped the locks and slowly drew back the glass doors, the scent of the sea immediately filling the room. Bertie scuttled out and sat on the top step, his face turned up to the sun as his little tail wagged. I rubbed his head and went back inside to scoop up my coffee. Weston slid the plate of hot chips onto the small white-washed dining table. I sat down and pulled my feet up onto the chair, then sipped my coffee and grabbed a chip as Weston sat opposite me.
‘Urgh, these chips are salted.’ He screwed up his face as he swallowed his mouthful.
‘Mmmm-hmmm,’ I nodded, reaching for the sea salt cellar and deliberately grinding more on them as I held his gaze. He narrowed his eyes at me.
‘So, you’re not in a sharing mood then.’
‘You know how I love salt on my food. Why don’t you take some money out of my purse and go and get yourself something. I’ll be going shopping to restock my cupboards later.’
‘I have no shirt.’
‘It’s a hot, sunny day. You’ll get more looks if you go shopping with a shirt on.’
‘So first it’s reminding me you don’t share, now you’re implying no one will find my physique attractive. What next, I get back to find you’ve stolen my car and left me here?’
‘I’m too honest to steal a car. I’ll be here.’
‘You’re not going to forgive me, are you?’ he asked quietly.
‘I need more time alone to think and come to a decision, Weston. Which is where the whole “you leaving me in peace while you go and get some breakfast” comes into it. And don’t even think of telling me you need to leave at three o’clock,’ I warned, holding up my hand.
‘Actually, two would be ideal as I’m an hour further away,’ he retorted. ‘But I cleared my schedule for the week, hoping we could work this out.’
‘Great, a whole week for me to get over your deceit,’ I said, heavy on the sarcasm as I flashed him an unimpressed look.
‘I think I’ll go and give you some space. When you said you might not forgive me, I accepted that I might not deserve it. But I didn’t expect you to turn into someone who seems to be taking delight in taunting me.’ He snatched his wallet off the table and stalked out, calling for Bertie to follow him.
‘God damn it,’ I moaned, throwing a chip across the room in frustration. I didn’t want to be that person either, but I was so angry with him and he was the only person I could take that anger out on. I put the chips out on the deck for the seagulls to fight over, inhaled my coffee, and headed inside for a shower, hoping to clear my head.
When I saw that he wasn’t back yet, I grabbed a bottle of water and headed outside. I pulled the doors shut and locked them, slipping the key under the mat as I figured it would be the first place he’d look when he got back. I stretched on the steps and jogged on the spot for a minute before setting my watch and heading out for a run. I took the beach towards the headland and ran down the side of the ocean, the fresh air blowing away the cobwebs as my ponytail swung in the breeze.
It was an hour and a half later when I felt ready to return, and I spotted him sitting on the top step again, the doors to the cottage pulled back. Bertie spotted me and started barking as he ran to greet me and circled around me as we made our way back.
‘Seriously? Under the mat here too?’ Weston scolded in an unamused tone.
‘I’ve got Jim the handyman coming to fit an external key safe tomorrow. I’m sorry for being a bitch earlier,’ I huffed as I plopped down beside him and drained the last few drops from my bottle of water.
‘I don’t think anyone could ever accuse you of being a bitch, Georgie. It just wasn’t you, and I hate that my behaviour made you react like that. We’re both hurting over this, regardless of the fact that it was my fault.’
‘I know,’ I nodded, setting my empty bottle down. Bertie nosed it out of the way before plonking himself down between us with a grunt.
‘So where do we go from here? Repeatedly saying I’m sorry, however sincere I am, isn’t going to make what happened go away.’
‘Honestly?’ I held his gaze and he nodded. I swallowed hard and looked down at Bertie, fondling his ear. ‘I’d like you to go home, sooner than later, so I don’t worry about you driving such a long way in the dark when you’re tired and upset.’
‘So that’s it? We’re over?’ he gasped. ‘You promised me, Georgie. You promised you wouldn’t leave, just like I did. Don’t do this.’
‘Weston,’ I whispered, moving my hand from Bertie’s ear to capture Weston’s hand as it flew up to rake through his hair. I tangled my fingers with his and squeezed hard as I looked up at him. ‘As Abbie very wisely said, until I tell you in no uncertain terms that our relationship is over, it’s not leaving, it’s having a time out. And I still need a time out.’
‘What if I give you time and you focus on all of the bad and forget the good?’
‘There’s a lot of good, I’ll never forget the good, but that doesn’t mean that the bad isn’t more prominent in my mind right now. What you did might seem small and inconsequential to you, but to me it isn’t. If I forgive you for lying now, how can I trust that you won’t lie again?’
‘Because my lies were only ever to win you, Georgie, never to deceive you.’
‘I hear that. And I want you to know how much it means to me that you shared what you did last night, after swearing you wouldn’t. You’ll never know how touched I am that you trusted me enough to do that, and I only hope that it helps you and doesn’t make matters worse. You said you needed to tell me, and I’m telling you now what I need. And that’s time to let what you’ve said sink in and to reach my decision.’ I leaned over and kissed his cheek, lingering as I breathed him in, closing my eyes for a moment. ‘I’m going to go and stock up on food. I think it’s best if you’re gone when I get back. I’ll be a while, so help yourself to a shower and some water for your trip home. Dad might have a spare t-shirt in the wardrobe in the other bedroom that you can take. Let me know when you’ve arrived home safely so I don’t worry.’
‘I’m assuming you have a new number, which I don’t have.’
‘You can email me.’ I stood up, his hand stretching up as he refused to let go.
‘A time out, right?’
‘A time out,’ I nodded. He sighed and kissed my fingertips, the bristles of his beard feeling rough and strange on my sensitive skin.
I backed away and swiped my purse off the coffee table. Gulping down a ball of mixed emotion, I avoided looking at him as I jogged along the decking, took the side steps at the far end, and powered away from him. I felt evil as I pictured the hurt look on his face as he’d hung on to my hand until the last moment.
Because I’d lied too. I’d already made my decision.