23. Twenty-Three

Twenty-Three

T he drive back home takes place in silence. I stare out of the passenger window with my head swimming. I'm in no mood for chit-chat. Dread hangs like a noose around my neck as my conversation with Barbara plays on repeat in my brain.

He's not told me everything. Again. And I know it's something big, something bad, something he knows I'll be upset about; otherwise, he would have told me already.

As soon as we arrive back home, I dump my clutch bag on the bedside table, head straight for the walk-in wardrobe, and unzip my dress. My mood has plummeted, and I really don't feel like being dressed up in all this finery, which he bought.

"You're quiet. Are you okay?"

I slip the Chanel dress back onto its hanger. I barely said two words to him during the thirty-minute car journey home. I can't say I'm fine because I'm not, and I can't lie because that will make me just as bad as him.

I stare at my clothes hanging on the rail as my mind chugs along. "What haven't you told me?"

"What do you mean?"

"I asked you point-blank if there was anything you hadn't told me about your past, and you told me there wasn't." I turn to face him and look him dead in the eye. "But there is, isn't there?"

His gaze drops to the floor as he retreats into the bedroom. His silence confirms my worst fears.

"What is it?" I demand, going after him.

He unties the black bow tie from around his neck and chucks it onto the bed, and then he peels off his jacket. He frowns, and I can see him trying to work out how I know.

"Your mum let something slip, about how you'd made bad decisions in the past but paid the price for them. She wouldn't tell me the details and said I needed to ask you."

He continues to undress, unbuttoning his shirt while staring at the bed rather than me, which only enrages me further.

"Well? I'm asking you."

He pulls off his shirt and flings it onto the bed.

"You've lied to me. Again."

He rakes his fingers through his hair, still avoiding my gaze. "There's a reason for it."

"There's always a reason," I shoot back. "Usually, it's because you're too much of a coward to be honest with me."

"I can't lose you." His voice bounces off the walls as he rockets from calm to explosive in five seconds.

I shrink down onto the edge of the bed, momentarily stunned at the sudden outburst. He's worried I'm going to leave him once I find out. My stomach turns over with anxiety.

"What the hell is it?"

His spine stiffens with tension as he drags a hand down his face. "It's difficult."

"There's something in everyone's past that they wish wasn't there. A blot, or several, in the copybook of our lives. We can't go back and change or erase it, but we can learn to live with it – we must because it makes us who we are. I want to be with you, but it's hard for me when one minute, I think I know you, and the next minute, I feel as if you're a stranger."

He swallows, and his eyes remain fixed on the floor. The fact that he hasn't looked at me for an age has me worried.

"You won't understand."

"Try me," I demand.

He heaves a sigh and paces over to the French windows, standing with his back to me. His head drops as he jams his hands into his pockets, looking like a man defeated. "After Dad died, I was drinking heavily all the time. I didn't really know how to cope. On the day of his memorial, I got absolutely wasted and thought it would be a good idea to take my car out for a drive. I went too fast around a bend on one of the country lanes. Lost control. Hit another car head-on." Silence fills the bedroom as he shakes his head in remorse. "I went to prison. Did nine months. It was the worst time of my life."

I feel sick. "Like what happened to Dad." Memories of losing him, which are always bubbling just below the surface, rush back. "What … what happened to the other driver?"

Seconds tick by before he replies, and I already know the answer.

"He died instantly. They said I was lucky to be alive."

I stare down at my hands in my lap as I try and work out how I feel at this perverse twist of fate. "You took an innocent man's life. Like the lad who took Dad's because he thought it would be a good idea to be totally bloody irresponsible one night and race around in a vehicle he couldn't control." I hang my head in my hands. I can barely say the words. "You killed someone."

Out of the edge of my vision, I see him turn round to face me, and there's a desperate note to his voice when he speaks, "It was a terrible, tragic accident."

Years of anger rear its ugly head at his lame justification, and the words fire out of my mouth like bullets from a gun. "Yes, it was terrible. Terrible for that man's poor family. Just like it was a terrible accident that killed Dad. It doesn't make it any better."

Silence stretches out across the room between us. An age passes before he speaks, and when he does, I barely recognise him. "Can you understand why I struggled to tell you?"

I jump to my feet in rage and glare at him. "Don't try and use what happened to Dad as an excuse for not telling me about this. That's even more of a reason why you should have been honest with me. Do you know how many nights I cried myself to sleep after he died, wishing it had been the other person who had died instead?" Tears prick in my eyes. "And you're that lad, aren't you? The guy you killed had a family he never saw again, kids he's never seen grow up. And you …" Tears stream down my face as I angrily jab my finger at him. "You took that all away from them because of your own fucking selfishness."

Dark, wounded eyes stare back at me. "Do you think I don't realise that? Do you think I don't think about that guy and his family every day?"

I cut my eyes at him. "Oh, that's really decent of you."

"Sophie, please."

I rack my brain. How could I have not heard about this? Art's a successful businessman from a wealthy family. The press love raking up dirt on people like him. This would have been front-page news. It's so close to what happened to Dad. I would have definitely remembered reading about it.

"Why wasn't this all over the papers?"

He looks awkward. "My PR guy at the time … he thought it would be best if we shut the story down …" He doesn't finish the sentence. He doesn't need to.

"Because it would have been bad for business, and can't have that, can we?" I snap.

This is a total mindfuck, and I need some time to think. "I can't be around you right now."

I angrily dash the tears from my cheeks with the back of my hand and hurry to the wardrobe, hastily pulling on my blue jeans and black T-shirt and grabbing my overnight bag from off the top shelf.

"What are you doing?"

I ignore the frantic edge to his voice as I pull clothes from hangers and open the drawer with my paperwork – birth certificate, passport – and hesitate. Am I going to Ibiza? I guess I am. I put the passport in my handbag. It feels like a big, serious decision, but I don't have time to think about this. I can't remember what time Lucy's flight is, but I need to get going.

"You can't leave."

Something inside me snaps, and I fly round at him. "Watch me."

"We promised no more running."

"We also promised no more lies, but look what's happened."

"We need to talk about this. We can't do that if you fuck off."

I'm furious. Even now, he's trying to control the situation. "Don't you dare try to make me feel bad after what you just told me. Yesterday, you were talking about the future and kids. What a total fucking joke. How can you even think about those things when there's still so much I don't even know about you?"

"There isn't."

"Yes, there bloody is!" I snap. "What about your stab wound that I can't ask you about and that bloody sordid club you used to go to, which you're so reluctant to talk about?" I glare at him, incensed. "You still don't get it, do you? You're constantly lying to me by omission. I can't be with someone who can't be honest with me. I can't live a lie …"

"You're not. I've told you why I didn't tell you about the car accident …"

I close the zipper of the holdall. I'm in no mood for listening to any more of his bullshit. "I'm not sure this is right," I blurt.

"What do you mean?"

"You and me. Whether we're right together."

He shakes his head slightly in disbelief. "You're pissed off. You don't mean this."

Right now, I want to hurt him like he's hurt me. My grip tightens on the holdall, and the words keep flying. "Maybe it's all moving too fast. Maybe we should take some time out."

Anger dances in his eyes. "I'm not taking any time out, and I don't fucking want to slow anything down, and neither do you."

"I don't know what I want anymore. The more I learn about you, the more I'm pushed away."

His tall, broad frame fills the doorway, blocking my escape route. I fix him with a look.

"Get out of my way."

"No."

I'm determined not to waver. "Move," I demand.

He shakes his head.

Now, he's really pissing me off.

"Get out of my way!" I yell.

"If you think I'm letting you walk out of here, then you're wrong." His volume matches mine, but I'm not shrinking back this time. He looks like a man who fears he's about to lose it all, but he should have thought about that before lying to me again.

I push myself forward determinedly, so I'm half-in, half-out of the door, as far as he'll let me. I'm not staying here. He's not keeping me cooped up while he tries to talk me round or seduce me. I need to get out.

"For us to be together, I need all of you, not half of you, and the problem is, I don't think you're ready to give all of yourself to anyone."

Before he has a chance to react, I bring my leg up and knee him in the balls. He folds in half like a pack of cards, clasping his privates and groaning, providing me with the perfect opportunity to escape.