The stroking stopped, and I opened my eyes to find Dominic brushing a strand of hair from my cheek.
“Then someone like him is a fool,” he said.
I watched his lips as he leaned toward me. His fingers traced through my hair to the back of my head. We paused with our faces an inch apart.
“We shouldn’t,” he said. “But you’re just so...” His lips brushed against mine, and he drew back, and the sudden movement drew a cold draft between us where the warmth of his chest had just been. I put one hand behind his head and pulled him back down toward me.
It had been a long time since I’d done this. I thought of Alex as we kissed, at first.We could have...But this wasn’t Alex. This was someone who wanted me, who really wanted me right now. The deeper I kissed him, the deeper he kissed me; and the faster I tugged at his clothes, the faster he tugged at mine.
And I didn’t mind that he wasn’t Alex anymore. I was only aware of the flames and the shadows, and his unfamiliar body against mine. I focused on the moment, with no thoughts of thebarriers that ought to separate us, and no consideration of the consequences. We wanted each other. We needed each other.
“Don’t go,” I said, as he rolled off me afterward.
He kept his back to me, putting a distance between us even while our bodies were still cooling. The fire had dwindled to flakes of ash. He dragged the curtains apart with a harsh clatter of metal hoops, and rubbed at the condensation on the glass. His hair took on a silvery tint in the moonlight.
“When is the next blue moon?” I asked from the sofa.
He shook his head. His shoulders were hunched. I wrapped my arms tighter around my knees.
A scuffling sound in the hall made us both jump, and I snatched my cardigan from the floor and drew it up to my chin. Dominic stalked to the door, but his posture relaxed as he peered into the hall.
“Nothing there.” He turned to face me for a moment, his eyes dark in the shadows. “We can’t let this happen again, Laura.”
I swallowed. “I know.”
“Are you—?” He indicated my abdomen, frowning.
My heart bumped painfully against my chest wall. “God, yes. I’m on the pill.”
“Good.”
He left then, the stairs creaking rhythmically as he climbed. A door clunked shut above. I curled up on the sofa, stroking the palm of one hand with the thumb of the other, my eyes wide open and dry. The chill of the sea trickled through invisible gaps around the window frame, and the blue moon gazed down unblinkingly at the dead fire and my shivering skin.
15
Seraphine
ISTUMBLE ASI cross the road to my car. A sharp pain stabs at my temple, and the metal of the door handle is too bright for my eyes, too hot for my hands. I touch my fingertips to my throat, surprised to find nothing physical restricting my breathing. Helen Luckhurst bustles over the road toward me.
“Seraphine? Are you all right?”
I pretend I haven’t heard her and brave the scorching metal, diving into my car and slamming the door between us.
I crawl along the lane to Summerbourne in second gear. Michael stands at his front gate and lifts a hand in vague greeting. I swerve up onto the grass just after the cottages and stare at him in my rearview mirror. Edwin thinks Michael was there that morning, when my mother was posing with that single baby for the photograph. I climb out and walk back to his cottage.
“Morning,” Michael says, his eyes narrowing as I place my hand on the gate.
“Good morning, Mr. Harris. Do you remember me? I’m Seraphine Mayes.”
He squints at me.
“You used to call me and my brother the Summerbourne sprites,” I say.
His eyes widen slightly, and he looks back over his shoulder and calls out, “Joel! Joel!”
For a long moment nothing happens, and I wonder what on earth I am doing here, upsetting this old man. He was such a figure of authority in my childhood, such a fascinating source of facts and stories that I could cry now at how rapidly his dementia has progressed recently, at the confusion on his face as he looks at me. But then Joel ducks out of the cottage doorway. He has smudges of dirt on his T-shirt, and a shine of sweat on his forehead, and he’s not smiling.
“Seraphine.” There’s an edge to his voice, and out of nowhere I am engulfed in a wave of regret so overwhelming I can’t draw breath. I have pushed Joel away for so long that we act like distant acquaintances, and yet if I could choose one person in the world at this very moment to be by my side—to beonmy side—I would choose him. But it’s too late. I tear my gaze from his face, and focus on the grass by my feet, willing air into my lungs.
