‘I love you, Georgie.’
Oh, thank God.
‘I love you too.’ She was smiling and tearful at the same time.
And then he opened his arms very wide and she walked straight into them.
They hugged hard for a moment and then she looked up at him and suddenly they were kissing.
And Georgie did not feel remotely second best.
EPILOGUE
POPPY – 30TH DECEMBER
‘Oh my goodness. I amreadyfor this sofa.’ Poppy sank down next to Declan and took the glass he was holding out to her. ‘Busy day.’
She’d done a full nine hours at the surgery and then picked Daniel up (her parents had been looking after him) and had dashed to the shop in Little Melting before coming home and giving him his bath and putting him to bed (her mum had very kindly given him dinner).
Declan pulled her right in against him and slapped a big kiss onto her cheek.
‘Mmm,’ she said, snuggling in.
‘New Year’s Eve again tomorrow,’ he observed. ‘A lot’s changed in a year.’
It had. Poppy was now working two days a week and was lovingit. Daniel was doing one day a week with a childminder and one with Poppy’s parents. And they’d managed to buy a small house in Melting and had moved in in October.
‘Not least this sofa.’ Poppy wasn’t just snuggling into Declan, she was snuggling into the sofa, too. They hadn’t been able to afford it until this month, and it had been delivered two daysago. They bothadoredhaving something other than the floor to sit on when they were watching TV.
As he pressed buttons on the remote, Declan said, ‘Soooo, how are you feeling about tomorrow evening?’
They were going to be meeting the same group as last year.
‘Good. Very good.’ Poppy was still ecstatic to be back on best-friend terms with Georgie. The few months where they hadn’t been speaking had been awful. ‘I’m just kind of?—’
‘Not wanting to read your secret out but you haven’t kept your resolutions?’
Poppy nodded. ‘Basically. Yep.’
‘I was sort of wondering if that might be the case for you. It is for me. I had a little suggestion.’
‘Yes?’ Poppy really hoped he was going to suggest what she wanted to hear.
‘Maybe just teensy little lies from both of us?’
‘I would beecstaticto lie our way through the evening.’
A little silence grew between them as the opening credits of the film they were watching began to roll.
Poppy wriggled herself round to look into his face. ‘Do you think it would be better if we shared our secrets, if we both feel able?’ She knewshecould.
‘Yep. I would like to do that if you would.’ He looked uncertain. But, thank heavens, he surely wouldn’t want to share it if it wastrulyawful. And, frankly, if it was, she kind of needed to know that he’d ever felt like however he’d felt.
‘Okay. You go first? Or I could?’
‘You go,’ Declan said.
‘Well,’ she said. ‘I wrote that I thought you were having an affair.’ She couldn’t really believe that they hadn’t told each other their secrets before.
