Page 78 of The Key to the Last House Before the Sea

‘Of course,’ huffed Valerie, shuffling her bare feet through the thick pile of the carpet. ‘I’m sorry if I disturbed you for nothing but I was so worried about her.’

‘I’m just glad she’s all right. You sounded so panicky when you rang and I panicked when you said you were thinking of taking her to hospital.’

‘I thought it might come to that because Lily seemed so unwell. But her temperature’s gone down since I called you and her breathing’s eased, thank goodness. It was awful earlier.’

‘Really?’ Nessa bit her lip as guilt and worry began to bubble up again.

‘Really. She was crying out for you and upset that you weren’t here.’

Nessa’s stomach turned over. Her poorly child had called for her and she’d been miles away.

‘I hope I did the right thing in calling you.’

‘Yes, of course.’ Nessa put her hand on Valerie’s arm. ‘Thank you. I’m glad you called and I was awake anyway, thinking of Lily.’

I’m a terrible mother, thought Nessa because she hadn’t been lying there thinking of Lily at all. She’d been thinking of Gabriel and wondering if she had the courage to invite him to join her. The courage to risk her heart, for a few hours in the arms of a man who would soon be leaving Heaven’s Cove. A man who planned to erase the Ghost Village.

Everything was so complicated. She’d lied and told him their kiss hadn’t meant anything, and perhaps it hadn’t to him. But feelings absent for so long had bubbled to the surface when he’d pressed his lips against hers – longing, desire, connection. She cared about the man she glimpsed beneath the business façade. She wanted to know that man better.

But then Valerie’s call had upset her so much, she’d forgotten he was in the cottage at all when she went hurtling down the stairs.

‘Will you stay?’ asked Valerie, concern etched across her face. ‘I’d rather you did in case Lily takes another turn for the worse. It’ll cheer her up so much if you’re here when she wakes up and you can have breakfast with her.I love looking after Lily but there are times when only a mother will do, don’t you think?’

Nessa nodded, her bad-mother guilt rocketing off the scale. ‘Definitely, and I’m so sorry you’ve had all this worry.’

‘That’s all right. Everything’s sorted now.’ Valerie smiled and opened the door to Jake’s old bedroom. ‘Here you go. You can stay in here. I always keep the bed made up in case Jacob pays us a flying visit.’

Chance would be a fine thing, thought Nessa, who, too wrung out to jib at sleeping in her ex’s bed, let Valerie lead her into the room.

‘How did you get here so quickly, by the way?’ Valerie asked, smoothing the duvet cover. ‘The car outside looks familiar but I can’t quite place it.’

‘It’s Gabriel’s,’ said Nessa, who was also too tired to come up with a convincing lie. ‘He called on me last night to check I was at the cottage and had to stay over because the storm was so bad.’ When Valerie’s eyebrows disappeared into her fringe, Nessa added: ‘He slept downstairs in the sleeping bag.’

‘I see. Well, how fortunate that he was there, in the circumstances.’

Without waiting for a reply, Valerie went out of the room, closing the door behind her.

Nessa put her hand into her jeans pocket and turned Gabriel’s car keys over and over in her fingers.

She was lying on the bed, on top of the covers, but she couldn’t sleep. Valerie probably wasn’t sleeping either, not with Alan’s deafening snores rumbling through the house. Though maybe she was used to them after thirty-five years together.

Nessa stared at the shadowy posters on the walls – Iron Maiden, Metallica, and a framed print of Che Guevara. Games figures from Jake’s teenage years stood on a bookcase under the window.

This room was a shrine, thought Nessa, wondering where the prodigal son was right now. Not worrying about his daughter; that was for sure.

With sleep still refusing to come, Nessa went to the window and sat on the sill. Down the narrow lane, she could glimpse the sea in the distance. The sky was beginning to lighten from black to navy blue, and the horizon was glowing with the first rays of the rising sun. Everything was washed clean by the storm, and it would be a beautiful day in Heaven’s Cove and the Ghost Village.

She pulled Gabriel’s car keys from her pocket and ran her fingers across the cold metal.

At least Valerie’s call had saved her heart, and her dignity. What if she’d invited Gabriel upstairs and he, after being reminded by his father of why he was there, had refused? Or worse, what if he’d accepted and had then left her, just as Jake had done?

She shivered. The drama of her dash through country lanes made their kiss last night seem unreal: a bizarre coming together that had never really happened.

Gabriel would soon be gone and he’d quickly forget her. Or perhaps she’d be remembered occasionally as the deluded woman who’d tried, unsuccessfully, to save the Ghost Village. Perhaps he’d rung his father already to report that her claim on the cottage was null and void: the difficult woman trying to ruin their plans hadn’t stayed thirty days and nights in the cottage, after all. She’d fallen at the last hurdle.

Nessa picked up her phone and sent Gabriel a brief text message: Lily’s OK. Thanks for car. Shall I return it to Driftwood House?

His reply came back almost immediately. Relieved Lily’s OK. Car at Driftwood is fine. Thanks.

Nessa stared at her phone, feeling irrationally disappointed. What had she expected him to say? He’d made no reference to what had happened between them, but then neither had she. And the confusion she felt about the whole affair was beginning to make her head ache.

She could beg Gabriel not to let on that she’d broken the rules of the lease, if he hadn’t already. But she wasn’t the begging type. And he owed her nothing. The kiss, to him, had meant nothing.

Nessa put down the phone and closed her eyes as the first rays of the rising sun shone through the window. She was so very tired.

Her eyes jerked open when her phone beeped, and breath caught in her throat when she glanced at the screen. The kiss had meant something to him after all.

It was a text from Gabriel that simply said: In case you were wondering, I won’t tell.

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