Page 105 of The Summer Swap

“I hope so. I intend to.” She paused. “Are you going to tell Winston all this?”

“Definitely. No more secrets. I plan on calling him when we get back from our walk. I’m hoping he might visit on the weekend.” Cecilia gave some thought to her daughter’s situation. “What are your plans? Where are you going to live? Or are you going to ask Theo to leave?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t exactly plan any of this. I didn’t give it any thought at all. Leaving was an impulse.” They strolled closer to the water’s edge. “But I don’t regret it. I’m sad, but I have to accept that Theo and I need different things. He isn’t able to give me what I want. And I don’t think he’s interested in trying. Maybe we’ve just grown apart. Or maybe I’ve changed, and he hasn’t. I don’t know, and I don’t suppose it really matters now.”

Cecilia noticed the tall male figure, hovering uncertainly at the edge of the dunes.

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” She touched her daughter’s arm. “You have a visitor. He’s here.”

“Who is here?”

“Theo.”

“Theo?” Kristen turned her head. Her eyes widened. “No, that’s not possible.”

“Why isn’t it possible?”

“Because he’s supposed to be working. And nothing comes between Theo and his work. Also I didn’t tell him where I was going. How can he be here? Why would he be here?” Kristen looked panicked.

“I assume he’s here because he wants to talk to you. And given that he’s driven all the way here, and presumably abandoned work in order to do it, you should probably at least listen to what he has to say.” And Cecilia hoped with all her heart that the man would say the right thing. “Keep an open mind, Kristen. If there is one thing I learned from all those years with your father, it’s that a bump in the track doesn’t have to derail the train. Whatever you decide is best for you, you have my support. But listen to him first. Take him down to the beach. Sea air and the view always makes things clearer somehow.”

She had a feeling that it was going to take more than a breeze and a beach to fix the dents in her daughter’s marriage, but it was a start.

22

Kristen

Kristen walked back across the sand to the cottage. She felt nervous and on edge.

She hadn’t anticipated Theo turning up here. She didn’t know how she felt about that. She wasn’t ready. She hadn’t thought through what she would say when she saw him next.

She had no idea what she wanted.

She’d been so angry the night she’d left, but the heat had cooled and left only sadness.

She wasn’t capable of hiding her feelings. She was sad, and she knew the sadness showed. And maybe that was all right. The years they’d spent together would have been diminished if she hadn’t felt sad. Overall, they’d been good years.

She lifted her hand and scraped her hair back from her face. Her usually carefully styled hair was windblown and tangled. She wasn’t wearing a scrap of makeup. Her flip-flops were dangling from her fingers and her skirt flapped against her legs in the breeze. Maybe this was what it came down to. Them being their most basic selves, devoid of artifice.

“Theo.” She kept her voice steady. “What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be working.”

“I found someone to cover for me.”

Her mouth almost fell open. He’d asked someone to cover for him? She couldn’t think of a time when he’d done that. “Why?”

“Because I needed to see you. To talk to you.”

“How did you find me?”

“I tracked your phone. Don’t be angry. It’s the first and only time in our marriage that I’ve done such a thing and if you want me to leave right away then I will.”

“Why didn’t you just call and ask where I was?”

“I was afraid you wouldn’t answer. I was afraid you wouldn’t want to speak to me.” He took a breath. “And I wouldn’t have blamed you if that was the case.”

He seemed nervous around her. Theo, the calmest most in control person she knew, was nervous to be talking to her. His hair was ruffled and a couple of buttons on his shirt were undone, as if he’d dressed in a hurry and hadn’t bother glancing in a mirror.

“You could have come after you’d finished work.”

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