Total pages in book: 235
Estimated words: 227851 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1139(@200wpm)___ 911(@250wpm)___ 760(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 227851 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1139(@200wpm)___ 911(@250wpm)___ 760(@300wpm)
Fuck.
“Tell me what’s going on, motherfucker.”
I slam my laptop shut and stand abruptly. “Nothing is fucking up, John,” I yell, storming out. It takes everything in me not to put my fist in every wall I pass as I stalk through The Manor. Everything.
I go upstairs and walk into my suite. Look around. Back out again, heading past the stained-glass window into the new, unfinished wing. I stand on the threshold of the room I showed Ava on our first meeting. I see her standing in her lovely navy pencil dress looking like a deer in the headlights.
I was the headlights.
I see her on the floor sketching, looking like the wind had been taken out of her sails.
I stole that wind.
The last time she was here was just last week. A few days before our wedding. She stood in here and pinned her drawings to the wall, showed me the material she had in mind for the curtains, the soft furnishings, the lighting. We were making progress.
Now, like my marriage and my life, limbo.
I walk to the wall and pluck one of the drawings down, looking over it.
“Are you going to talk or am I going to beat it out of you?”
I glance over my shoulder and find John filling the doorway. “We’ve had words,” I say, at a loss. I can’t tell him what I’ve done. I can’t tell him Ava’s walked out on me.
He laughs under his breath, wandering in and joining me by the wall, looking over the drawing in my hand. “What about?”
“Something trivial.” I put the picture back on the wall, pressing into the Blu-Tack. “You know Ava and me,” I say robotically. “It’s fiery. We’ll be friends again later.”
I see him nodding mildly in my peripheral vision, humming. “You said you thought she was pregnant.”
I stare at the drawing. He spared me the interrogation on my wedding day. The time has come. “Still do.”
“It’s—”
“I don’t want to talk about it, John.” Don’t want to face my reality. And yet here I am, staring it in the face.
Loss.
He releases a sigh only a body like John’s is capable of releasing. “The end of month accounts need sending to the accountants.”
I look at him. “Have Sa—” His eyebrows rise. “Fucking hell.”
“I’ve tried to sort the files.” A shake of his head confirms he’s failed.
“I suppose I asked for it,” I say, knowing this is Sarah’s way of proving that I, indeed, cannot live without her. Or, at least, The Manor can’t. “I’ll take a look.”
John nods and leaves, pulling out his phone. Checking on Sarah. I go to the window and look out across the green landscape. I can’t stand this. The hollowness, the uncertainty. How much space, and for how long?
I try calling Ava again and get ignored. So I try Kate, desperate to get some reassurance. But Kate doesn’t answer either and that only heightens my worries, because Kate has always had my back, even when I’ve put a foot out of line. Which means Ava’s told her best friend what I’ve done. I’ve lost an ally.
I’m alone.
The excruciating sense of helplessness feels horribly familiar. I feel like I’m on the verge of losing everything.
Which will leave me a shell of a man all over again.
I tried to sort the files. I lasted five minutes before I tossed them aside and gave up, unable to concentrate. I sat in silence for twenty minutes, my mind circling, before I headed up to our suite. But it’s not always been ours. It was mine. The old me. Hence, the new bed for our wedding day. Biting my lip, I go back through to the extension and pull Ava’s drawings off the wall, snapping a picture with my phone and heading back down to my office. Maybe I’m being optimistic, but what else can I be? I attach the drawings to an email and get them over to the decorators. It’s something to do. Hope to cling on to. My wife doesn’t want to see me, and I can’t face telling my closest what’s happened.
Fuck, I miss her. I growl, fisting a hand full of hair, tugging. “What the fuck am I meant to do?” I yell, frustrated, snatching up my keys and heading out. I’ll beg, grovel, get on my knees. Whatever it takes. I’m going crazy, my mind circling, thinking of every scenario, best and worst. The worst is edging out in front. I feel sick.
Drew is getting out of his Merc when I emerge into the sunshine, slipping my shades on, more to hide my red-rimmed eyes than protect them from the sun. “What are you doing here?” I ask, looking at my watch.
He slams the door and passes me. “You were shut all weekend.”
“And where did you disappear to on Saturday?” He was there one minute, gone the next. I don’t get an answer, just a dismissive wave of his hand over his head. “No one’s here yet,” I call. What’s he going to do? Play on his own? I hear the sound of an engine and look up. A red Jaguar swings into a space and Natasha steps out.