the little yacht harbour, to the pub where they’d had lunch nearly two and a half years ago, just before he’d kissed her for the first time and set the ball rolling.
He’d split up with Katie when he’d realised she was trying to get pregnant to stop him joining MFA, and Beth had been right there at the time, working alongside him in Theatre, intriguing him, tempting him—but when after a few weeks he’d asked her out she’d said no, holding him at arm’s length because she didn’t want a relationship.
Well, neither did he, not so soon after Katie, and maybe not for years, but that didn’t make him a monk, and after a week when everyone in the Midlands seemed hell-bent on injuring themselves and they’d been trapped together in Theatre for countless hours, the tension simmering between them had reached breaking point.
He’d needed to get away, get out of the city and away from Beth, but by sheer coincidence they’d both been scheduled for a long weekend off, so he’d put his cards on the table and asked her to go away with him. No strings, no commitment, no relationship, just a few days of adult fun by the seaside after the week from hell, and with any luck it’d get it out of his system.
If she’d said no it would have made life awkward, but frankly it had been awkward enough, so he’d had nothing to lose.
She hadn’t. To his astonishment she’d said yes, so he’d booked a room in a posh spa hotel in Yoxburgh and picked her up on the Saturday morning with a tingling sense of anticipation. They’d been too early to check in, so they’d driven down to the harbour, found the little pub and had lunch, then gone for a stroll along the riverbank to kill time.
And then he’d lifted her down off the stile and kissed her.
She hadn’t held him at arm’s length then, and they’d spent most of the next two days in bed having the hottest sex he’d ever had in his life.
He parked the car, slammed the door on his thoughts and headed into the pub with Beth.
‘It hasn’t changed at all,’ he murmured.
‘No. I doubt if it’s changed for decades. All part of its charm, I guess. So, what are we having?’
‘Fish and chips.’
She laughed at him. ‘Well, that’s healthy.’
‘I don’t care. You can have whatever you like, but after a day like today I need comfort food and calories.’
She gave a low chuckle, the sound running over his nerves like teasing fingertips, and his body leapt to life.
‘I might have the baked cod with a salad,’ she said, and then she tilted her head and looked at him. ‘How’s Jim? Any news?’
‘Yeah, he’s OK. They took out his left kidney, and he’s got an ex-fix on his leg, but he’s doing all right. He’s alive, anyway.’
‘Good. How about the RTC that held you up this evening?’
‘Well, they all made it, which is a relief. It’s never good to lose a patient on your first day.’
She chuckled again, and he gave her an answering smile, but hers faded and she studied him thoughtfully.
‘It was good working together again,’ she said, and he nodded slowly.
‘Yes. Yes, it was. I’d almost forgotten how intuitive we are together. It was like you knew what I’d want without me asking, but then you always could read my mind.’
‘Or maybe I’m just a good nurse and know my stuff.’
He arched a brow, and she pretended to scowl at him, her mouth puckering and making him want to kiss it.
He put his hands in the air, giving up the fight to hold back his smile. ‘Sorry, sorry. You are a good nurse. Best I’ve ever worked with. Is that better?’
‘Yes. Thank you.’ Her smile was back, playing around her mouth and softening her eyes, and for a moment he had an overwhelming urge to lean over and kiss her—
‘Fish and chips?’
He sat back, took a long, slow breath and looked up at their server.
‘Yeah, that’s mine.’ And in the nick of time…
‘Coffee? Unless you want to get back to your lovely new bed?’
He hesitated, then gave in, knowing it was foolish, knowing he was on a knife edge but unable to walk away.
‘It’ll keep another half hour. Coffee would be lovely.’ He cut the engine and followed her into her house. ‘Anything I can do?’
‘No, you’re fine, go and sit down, I’ll bring it through.’
So while she put the kettle on he wandered into the sitting room and closed the curtains, then sat down to wait for her, his eyes seeking out the little silver box as they always did, his heart heavy.
If they’d known before that weekend what was to follow, none of this would have happened, but of course they hadn’t. They’d spent the next two months together in blissful ignorance, and then in late January MFA had sent him on his first posting.
No strings, he’d said, so he’d had no contact with her, which had been fine because he’d been too busy to think about anything else, but then he’d come back on leave in early May, and he’d discovered she was pregnant.
It was his worst nightmare, the last thing he’d ever wanted to hear, and his first instinct was anger because he thought she’d done it on purpose, but then she told him their baby girl had such hugely complex congenital heart defects that she was unlikely to make it to term, and his world fell apart.
He was still reeling with shock when they lost her at twenty-seven weeks, the child he hadn’t even known about until the week before. The child he hadn’t wanted—or hadn’t known he wanted until it was too late. The child he would never have the chance to get to know because her little heart had given up the unequal struggle and stopped beating before he could meet her and tell her how much he loved her.
He’d spent two years trying to forget, but he knew now he never would.
He walked over to the little silver box and picked it up with infinite tenderness, nestling it in his palm, his other hand stroking it, needing to touch it, to touch her, to hold her again.
His poor, perfect, broken baby girl.
Why?
‘Ry?’
He put the heart down gently, as if not to wake her, and walked into Beth’s open arms.
‘I’m so sorry,’ he murmured gruffly, his voice a little ragged. ‘Why did it happen, Beth? Did they ever find out?’
‘No. They have no idea. They didn’t find anything in the tests—no chromosomal abnormalities, no genetic links, nothing to indicate it was anything other than a fault in her embryonic
