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‘Sophie…’
‘Scarlet. Just make sure it goes. It’s packed and sealed. It only needs a signature. I have to get to the hospital.’
Tears sprang into Sophie’s eyes and trickled down her pale cheeks. Her shallow breathing induced a dizzy spell causing her to pause at the door to draw oxygen into her screaming lungs. An icy drench of panic rose up her arms, leaving goosebumps in its wake.
‘Look, Sophie, you can’t drive all the way up to Cheltenham by yourself – you’re in no fit state. I’ll drive you.’
‘Scarlet…’
‘What use will you be to your aunt if you end up in the same hospital after an RTA? Give me your keys!’ Scarlet brandished her palm and the expression on her face brooked no further argument.
Sophie realised that her objections were only serving to delay her journey. Any further refusals would only extend the time until she arrived at her aunt’s bedside.
‘Okay. Flora, if you can’t find Lizzie, willyoustay until the courier arrives to collect the gown? All you have to do is fill out the documents and get a receipt.’
‘Sure, Sophie. I hope your aunt’s going to be okay.’
Sophie could not recall much of the journey to Cheltenham Hospital. Scarlet drove swiftly, the car’s headlights tunnelling two piercing beams through the London streets, strangely devoid of their daily bustle on that late March evening, the clientele of the busy bars ignorant of the curling veins of turmoil swirling around Sophie’s ragged brain. Raindrops splattered sporadically on the windscreen, the blades flicking them away like irritating flies. The amber glow of the streetlamps cast their mellow light into the inky black puddles gathered in the gutters and across the rooftops.
She couldn’t lose Aunt Claire! Especially as she’d already lost her parents. God couldn’t be that cruel, surely?
Silence pervaded the vehicle whilst Scarlet concentrated on handling the unfamiliar controls of the Mini Cooper and delivering Sophie to the hospital as quickly as possible, her own features pinched and sombre in the half-light. Anyway, what words were there to ease the pain?
At last Scarlet pulled into the deserted hospital car park. Sophie glimpsed the stout figure of Claire’s best friend on the stone steps leading to the entrance hall, clearly keeping an anxious lookout for their arrival. Sophie leapt from the car, grateful for Delia’s foresight – it meant she would not have to wander the neon-bleached corridors, going through the rigmarole of repeated questions to locate her aunt.
‘Delia? Where’s—’
‘Oh, Sophie, I’m so, so sorry, my love. So very, very sorry.’
Tears streamed down Delia’s powdery, wrinkled face, her pale blue eyes gentle as she hooked her arm threw Sophie’s elbow.
‘Delia?’ Sophie’s voice trembled.
‘Come on. Seb and Dominic are just in here,’ and she steered Sophie into a tiny, fluorescent-bright room just off the entrance-hall corridor.
As soon as the door swung back, Seb leapt out of the brown plastic chair and took Sophie into his arms. Over his shoulder, Sophie swung her horrified stare from Dominic to Delia as icy fingers of dread curled around her heart and squeezed.
‘No… no… no…’
‘I’m so sorry, Soph. Mum passed away twenty minutes ago during surgery. Heart attack. They did everything they could…’
‘No…’
Chapter Four
A soft breeze laced with the fragrance of spring wove its way through the village of Somersby. Shafts of early April sunshine spliced through the leaden clouds clothing the church with a mantle of golden light. It was a picturesque venue, and it was no surprise that St Peter’s parish church, complete with rose-entangled lychgate, was regularly chosen as the venue for much happier occasions.
But no ivory ribbons rippled on the gateposts that morning.
How could life dispense such cruelty?Sophie wondered as she dabbed away the tears from her cheeks with the scrap of embroidered cotton Delia had given her that morning. First the Director of Fate had snatched her parents, leaving her an orphan, and now he had seen fit to take her beloved Aunt Claire as well.
Seb and Dominic were her only real family now – her only remaining link to her life in the Cotswolds. She laced her arms through theirs as they thanked the vicar for the very moving eulogy he had delivered to a packed congregation. Claire had been a popular resident of the village of Somersby, a committee member of the WI as well as a regular church attendee, and the Reverend Aubrey knew her well. There had been genuine sadness in his words of comfort.
The mourners spilled out of the church and meandered their way down the path towards the village green where a snake ofblack limousines waited. Those closest to Claire had been invited to join the family in a toast to her life at her home in Cranbury a few miles away.
Sophie had known Noah would be at the funeral to pay his respects to his best friend’s mother and the person who had taken his girlfriend under her loving wing when she was only ten years old. Her aunt had possessed an infinite capacity to love and had extended her affection to Noah, the boy who had loved her niece for as long as she could remember. But Sophie hadn’t anticipated the depth of emotion she would experience when she set eyes on him for the first time in four long years as he loitered on the worn-out steps of the church with his parents whilst they chatted to the vicar.
Her first reaction was to turn and run, but how could she?
