Their fingers had been entwined while they spoke. And she knew him well enough to know that he had thought this through, that what he was saying was right. Emilia was on her way home to be with her father. Sarah couldn’t be seen with him any more.
She held his hands in hers and kissed them. She kissed his forehead. She leant her cheek on his and held it there for as long as she could bear. She looked deep into his eyes, those eyes she had looked into so many times and seen herself.
She couldn’t see herself any more. He had shut her out. It was time for her to go, and he was preparing himself.
‘You’re the love of my life,’ she told him.
‘I’ll save you a place. Wherever I’m going,’ he said back. ‘I’ll be waiting for you.’
He gave a smile, and then he shut his eyes. It was his signal for her to go. She recognised that he couldn’t take any more. If she loved him, she had to leave him.
She drove home, staring at the road ahead. She felt nothing. She had shut down. It was the only way to cope. There was nothing in her that was able to deal with the horror of that final goodbye. She had wanted to climb into his bed and hold him forever. To die with him, if that were possible. Drift off into that final never-ending sleep with him in her arms.
She went to the folly when she got back. She curled up on the sofa with a cushion in her arms, folding herself into the smallest ball. There was a copy of Anna Karenina she had been reading. It was the last book Julius had given her. She tried to read it but the words were too small. She shut her eyes and prayed for sleep. She couldn’t bear to be awake. It was Dillon who found her, hours later, and shook her awake. She had looked up at him, wide-eyed, confused for a moment.
‘Are you all right?’ he asked, and she nodded, slowly. She had to be. She had no choice.
But now, here, in the kitchen, she embraced the grief when it finally hit. She put her head down and sobbed. Great big jagged sobs that threatened to choke her and take her very breath away. She could hear them, resounding round the kitchen: a primal keening, ungodly and harsh. She melted down into them until she almost became her own tears. In the midst of it all a small voice told her she was hysterical; that she needed to pull herself together.
But she’d waited a long time for this chance. The chance to purge herself of her grief. The chance to cry for the loss of her lover; her best friend. She wondered if she was wicked to hide behind Alice’s accident for the chance to have this outpouring. She wondered if Alice’s accident was a punishment for what she had done. Neither of these thoughts helped her regain control. On the contrary, she felt reason slipping further and further away. It was the sort of crying that would never stop.
Until she felt Ralph take hold of her arms. He took hold of her arms and shook her.
‘Sarah.’ His voice was firm but kind. ‘Sarah. You must stop this. This isn’t doing you any good at all. You or Alice.’
She juddered to a halt. He looked at her, concern in his eyes.
‘Listen to me. I’ve never told you how magnificent I think you are. How grateful I am for the way you stood by me. I wouldn’t have blamed you for walking away after everything I did. But you got us through that bloody awful time like the fighter you are. And you’re going to get us through this as well. Because you’re a brave and wonderful woman, Sarah.’
He trailed off, looking a bit embarrassed. Ralph wasn’t one for gushing speeches. He wasn’t sure where the words had come from. But he had meant them, of that there was no doubt.
Sarah shut her eyes and breathed in deeply. Her breaths were jagged but her sobs eventually stopped.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, but of course he had no idea what she was sorry for.
‘Come here,’ he said, and folded her into his arms. And although he wasn’t who she wanted him to be, she felt safe, and knew that he was going to be there for Alice, and that they would get through it, that she would be able to live without Julius …
And that she wasn’t going to cry again.
Ten