Where the Memories Lie

 

Where the Memories Lie ‘No!’ Anna cried, tears streaming down her cheeks, which were rapidly turning red, her shoulders shaking up and down with the weight of her sobs as she gulped for air.

 

‘Mum, he’s still alive, right?’ Charlotte said disbelievingly to Nadia. ‘Right?’

 

I pulled Anna to me so her head rested on my shoulder and smoothed a hand over her forehead repeatedly, a gesture that had always relaxed her when she was younger and couldn’t sleep. ‘I’m sorry, darling. I know how much you loved him. But no one could survive that fall. He’s gone, sweetheart. And he’s not suffering anymore.’

 

Nadia reached for Charlotte but she buried her head in Lucas’s chest.

 

‘Well,’ Chris slurred, his eyes glassy. ‘At least things can’t get any worse.’

 

But he was wrong about that. Things were about to get a whole lot worse.

 

179

 

 

 

 

 

Chapter Twenty

 

 

It felt like a lifetime later when I slipped under the cotton sheet in bed. Ethan lay on his back, hands laced together behind his head, staring at the ceiling. He hadn’t cried yet but it looked like the tears weren’t far off. The room felt oppressive, and not just because the heat from the summer day was trapped inside. The weight of Ethan’s grief, of mine, too, lay heavy and stifling in the air.

 

‘Is Anna asleep now?’ he said as I turned and nestled into his chest. He brought one arm around me. His heart beat in a steady rhythm against my cheek.

 

‘Finally. She kept asking me all sorts of questions about what happened. I was trying to explain that maybe this was kinder to Tom in the long run. And that he’s not in pain anymore and will always be in our hearts and memories, even though he’s no longer physically here anymore.’

 

‘And how did that go?’ He blinked rapidly.

 

‘Not too well.’

 

‘This is the first time someone close to her has died. It’s bound to be confusing for her.’

 

Where the Memories Lie ‘I know. But now she’s angry and upset with me because she didn’t get to say goodbye to him. She wanted to see him after the heart attack but I didn’t think it was a good idea just yet. And ? oh, God, we haven’t even told her the whole story still. Imagine how she’s going to react then.’ He didn’t reply, so I said, ‘Chris is still asleep on the sofa.’

 

‘Passed out, more like. He was so drunk.’

 

‘I took his shoes off and left him there.’ I stroked my fingers lightly along Ethan’s flat stomach muscles, tracing a line over his hip bone.

 

He twisted a lock of my long hair round and round his finger.

 

‘I can’t stop thinking about everything. I’m so confused. If Katie dying was an accident, like Tom said, then why didn’t he just call the police when it happened? Why not confess to it at the time instead of covering it up? And then the next minute he said he had to do it, which makes it seem like it wasn’t an accident at all. I mean, there must’ve been other people working on site when he was renovating the barn. Chris was working here as one of the builders at the time, wasn’t he? And there would’ve been electricians, plumbers. Maybe Tom knew something about the murder but he didn’t actually do it. Well, he must’ve known something, otherwise he wouldn’t know where she was buried, would he? But I keep hoping that he wasn’t directly involved. Although, I suppose—’

 

He pressed a fingertip to my lips and rolled sideways so he was angled over me, forearms taking his weight. ‘Don’t. Just stop. For just a few moments I don’t want to think about it. I don’t want to hear about it.’ His brown eyes looked almost black in the darkness of the room. They glistened as they roved my face.

 

Before I could agree to stop talking, he’d crashed his lips against mine, his tongue desperately delving inside my mouth 181

 

Sibel Hodge