My mother’s eyebrows rise as she turns to look at me.
‘Um – yes,’ I say, flushing a little. ‘Everything’s fine, thanks. How are you?’
He nods enthusiastically, his plump cheeks shaking with the movement. ‘Yeah, great. Hannah is expecting a little one. We’re really excited.’
‘Oh.’ I look back at the sulky face of his girlfriend. ‘That’s lovely news. Congratulations. When is it due?’
‘In March.’ Adam smiles at me. ‘I can’t wait to be a dad.’
For a moment I have a flash of myself standing here, next to Adam, pregnant and looking forward to life spent bringing up a baby in the village where I grew up. I’m flooded with relief that I’ve found a different path. It’s right for Adam and Hannah, but it’s not right for me.
‘That’s fantastic. Good luck. See you around, Adam,’ I say, and my mother and I walk on together, heading after my father and brothers in the distance.
‘A man in London?’ says my mother in an inquisitive voice. ‘I think you’ve got some explaining to do.’ She gives me a sideways look. ‘And if that ring is a fake, I’m Audrey Hepburn!’
I laugh. ‘Don’t worry, I’m going to tell you everything!’
‘I should hope so. I’ve noticed you’ve got a different air about you.’ She gives me a keen look that has a touch of wistfulness in it. ‘You’ve changed, Beth.’
‘You’ll hear all about it. I was just waiting for the time to be right, that’s all. While the boys are washing up, we can sit down by the fire and I’ll spill the beans.’ Just then my phone buzzes into life. I pull it out, sure that it’s a Christmas greeting from Dominic. He should be up by now and sharing his Christmas morning with Georgie, or with his cousins, or wherever they’ve ended up. I wonder what he’s doing right now, whether he’s opening presents or sipping a glass of champagne over breakfast.
The message on my phone reads:
Dear Beth, I’m sorry to give you this news today of all days. but I thought you should know that Mark’s been taken into hospital. He’s seriously ill. Please call me. Caroline.
My father tries to persuade me not to drive, but I won’t listen.
‘I have to get to Mark,’ I say stubbornly when he attempts to talk me out of it.
‘You’re upset. You shouldn’t get behind the wheel, you’re very likely to have an accident if you drive in a state like this.’
‘Your father’s right,’ my mother chimes in, agitated. ‘You mustn’t go, Beth, I won’t allow it. There’s nothing you can do for Mark anyway!’
‘I can be there for him,’ I say, determined. ‘He’s done so much for me. You can’t forbid me, I’m not a child.’
‘I can forbid you from taking the car!’ declares my mother and we scowl at each other.
Jeremy heaves a big sigh and gets to his feet. ‘I can drive her,’ he says in his languid way. ‘I don’t mind.’
‘But you’ve been drinking,’ my mother says anxiously. ‘We all have!’
Jeremy makes a face. ‘I had a couple of glasses of wine over lunch but that was hours ago. I was saving myself up for the pub tonight. But I guess I can take Beth back to London if she has to get there.’
I’m washed over with a wave of relief. ‘Oh thank you, Jeremy! I owe you.’
‘You certainly do,’ he says but with a smile. ‘Come on, then, we’d better get going. The roads will probably be all right as it’s Christmas Day.’
I run upstairs to get my things.
The journey back to London takes just under two and half hours, which is very good going. Jeremy makes my mother’s small runabout car zoom down the motorway at speeds it probably didn’t know it was capable of. I’m agitated, watching the miles disappear with what seems like agonising slowness beneath our wheels. It seems to take forever to get back to the city but at last, in the darkness of the evening, we make our way along the roads that lead into the heart of London. I direct my brother through the intricacies of east London and into the centre, where we finally pull up at the Princess Charlotte hospital.
‘Thank you, Jeremy,’ I say, giving him a grateful look. ‘I really appreciate this.’
‘You’re welcome,’ he says. ‘Do you want me to wait?’
I shake my head. ‘Not unless you want to. I don’t know when I’ll be going back home. I want to stay with Mark while I can. I can get a taxi home later.’
‘Okay, sis. I’ll take a walk, stretch my legs and have a coffee and then head home.’ He grins. ‘I might make it back in time for the lock-in!’
Inside the hospital the mood is subdued. There aren’t many staff around and there is the sense that Christmas is happening somewhere else and everybody would like to be there more than here. I check my phone but there are no messages. I texted Caroline to let her know I was coming but there’s been no answer from her.
The nurse at the desk looks solemn when I tell her that I’ve come to see Mark. ‘He’s in intensive care,’ she tells me. ‘You can visit, but not for long.’
‘What’s wrong with him?’ I ask, frightened. ‘Is he going to be all right?’
‘I’m afraid his infection has developed into pneumonia. He’s fighting it as well as he can, but the fact that he is so weak already isn’t helping.’ She looks at me with sympathetic eyes. ‘I’m sorry.’
Sorry? Why is she sorry already? He’s still alive, isn’t he? ‘What are his chances?’ I ask with a shaking voice.
The pause before she answers me is the worst thing of all. ‘We’re doing our best for him but I’m afraid that he’s already so weak, he has very little left to fight with. I don’t want to worry you, but things can move very quickly in these cases. Come with me, I’ll take you to him.’
Caroline is sitting at Mark’s bedside. He’s a tiny frail figure, nothing like the dapper, energetic man I once knew, and he’s lying asleep in his huge bed, hooked up to monitors and drips, an oxygen mask over his face and a pump hissing in and out as it delivers the air to his lungs. He looks very ill.
‘Caroline?’ I say gently as I approach. She jumps and looks at me.
‘Oh, Beth.’ Her eyes fill with tears and her face grows even pinker. ‘I was going to tell you not to spoil your family Christmas and to stay with them, but I couldn’t. I’m glad you’re here.’
I go over and hug her, putting my arms around her broad back and trying to comfort her as best I can. I’m scared when she starts to sob. Caroline is so calm and capable – if she’s crying, what does that mean for Mark?
‘What do the doctors say?’ I ask, trying to soothe her.
She sniffs and takes out a handkerchief to wipe her eyes. ‘They say they’re doing all they can but it’s out of their hands. The next twenty-four hours are critical. He’s so weak already, you see! The cancer . . . they’re not even sure now that the tumour they took out was the primary source. It might still be there somewhere, slowly killing him. Beth, I don’t know how he can fight the pneumonia as well!’ She sobs again into her handkerchief.
I gaze over at Mark’s frail body surrounded by machines. ‘He can do it,’ I whisper. ‘I know he can. And he’s getting the best possible care. ‘
‘I know, I know.’ She looks up at me, her eyes pink and watery. ‘All we can do now is hope and pray.’
I sit with Caroline at Mark’s bedside for a while, and then she goes off to get some tea and go to the ladies. I’m alone with Mark, feeling helpless. All I can do is speak to him and let him know that I’m here, that I believe in him and that he will get better.
‘Mark,’ I say, leaning towards him. I wonder if he can hear me over the noise of the machines and the rhythmic hiss of the oxygen pump. ‘Mark, it’s Beth. I’m with you. I’m willing you to get through this and get better. Do you hear me, Mark? You have to get better! We all need you so much.’ I want to hold his hand but I daren’t touch him. His hand, thin and grey, has lines inserted into the back of it and I don’t want to disturb anything. ‘I love my Christmas present, thank you so much. It’s b
eautiful. I’ll treasure it so much. I’m so looking forward to us working together next year. We’ll have so much fun. And we won’t be dancing to Andrei’s tune any more.’ I gulp back a lump in my throat when I remember what Anna told me. Poor, innocent, honest Mark. He’s been duped by Andrei into laundering money for him. His own upright nature has led him into trouble because he trusted Andrei to be the kind of person that he, Mark, is. I try to imagine Mark in court, fighting to clear his name, but it makes me so terribly sad, I can’t bear to think of it. Is this what the future holds for Mark? I wish I had the power to make it different, but it’s out of my hands now. The truth about Andrei is out.
‘Oh Mark,’ I whisper. ‘I’m so sorry. I feel like I brought all this on you. I didn’t mean to. I’d do anything to make it turn out some other way. Please, please, get well again, so we can fight this together.’
There’s a kind of sigh that I think for a moment comes from Mark, and then I think that it must be the pump and the hiss of oxygen. The beeps and chirrups from the machinery go on and Mark continues to lie there, silent, unconscious, fighting for his life.
I’m woken from a sleep by a nurse. I come to feeling dazed and bewildered by my surroundings. Where am I? Then I remember. I’m here in the hospital and I went to sleep for a while on the chairs in the waiting room while Caroline kept watch over Mark. Later she’s going to sleep on the trundle bed in his room while I sit by his side.
‘What is it?’ I say, shaking my head to clear the sleep away.
‘Please come at once,’ the nurse says, her face grave, and I’m instantly awake and on my feet, my stomach twisting with fear as I follow her along the corridor to Mark’s room. We go in. There are two more nurses by Mark’s bedside, attending to the machines and the drips, muttering numbers and statistics to one another. Caroline is there, leaning over Mark and clutching his hand.
‘Oh, Mark,’ she sobs. ‘Please don’t leave me. Please.’
I turn to the nurse. ‘Is it . . .?’
She gives me a sad look. ‘I’m afraid he’s losing his battle. There’s very little we can do now.’
‘No!’ I cry out. I won’t let this happen. Mark can’t die, he can’t! ‘Where are the doctors? Can’t you operate? Give him more drugs? Do something!’
‘The consultant has been here. There’s nothing more we can do but make him as comfortable as we can.’ She puts a hand on my arm. ‘He’s not in any pain. He’s very peaceful.’
I glance at Mark. How can she say that? His breathing is laboured and torturous, his chest shuddering with every rise and fall. The noise is the worst thing I’ve ever heard as his infected lungs struggle for breath.
I go to Caroline. She turns to me, tears streaming down her face. ‘We’re losing him, Beth. He’s leaving us.’
‘No . . . Oh Caroline, no!’ Grief wells up in me like a swollen stream bursting its banks, unstoppable, flowing through me. Tears pour from my eyes as a nurse instructs another to increase the morphine.
We hug each other, sobbing, and then, quite suddenly, we both become calmer. We are still weeping but the hysteria that was threatening to overwhelm us leaves us and the room becomes full of strange serenity. We both look down at Mark and as I stare at him, it seems as though his face changes even though he’s still wearing the oxygen mask. His forehead seems to smooth, his face relaxes and the strain seems to leave it.
‘Miss Palliser.’ A nurse is at Caroline’s side, a gentle hand on her arm. ‘There’s nothing more we can do. Shall we stop the oxygen pump?’
Caroline bites her lip. She can’t speak but she nods. The machine is switched off and there is a sense of relief as the rhythmic hiss comes to a stop. The room is quiet as the nurse lifts off Mark’s mask, except for the slow rattling breath that he draws in, now unaided.
It’s so wonderful to see his face again, without the mask on it. It’s still thin and frail but he looks untroubled now, as though he’s no longer fighting but preparing to sleep. He looks younger again, more like the old Mark, my smiling, charming friend.
He lets out a slow gravelly breath. It’s a long minute before he takes another that is exhaled even more slowly. We wait, Caroline’s hand tight over mine, for him to take a breath and at last he does – a short soft breath that finally leaves him on a long gentle sigh.
There is no more. I know that with that last breath, Mark is released from his struggle. He’s gone. I hear a low sob from Caroline and I bow my head.
Goodbye, dear Mark. Goodbye.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The flat is cold and dark when I arrive there in the early hours of the morning. My phone is dead. It’s long since run out of power and I haven’t charged it.
I’m curiously calm as I sit down on the sofa and plug my phone in. So it’s over. There will be a million things to think about soon, but before then I can only think over and over of my friend and the fact that he’s gone.
My phone flickers into life and starts charging up. After a while, messages and missed call notifications start arriving too. My mother has called several times, and I’ve missed a call from Laura as well. But there are several missed calls from Dominic and a series of messages, first wishing me a happy Christmas and then growing in agitation as I don’t reply.
Where are you, Beth? I’m seriously worried. Call me or I’ll be on the first plane out of here and coming to find you.
I check my watch. That was sent two hours ago. I quickly send a reply:
I’m so sorry. I’ve been in the hospital with Mark. He’s dead. I need you so much. Call me when you can. X x x
Then I huddle down on the sofa with a blanket over me, even though my bed is only down the hall. Somehow this seems like the right thing to do. I cry quietly, thinking of my friend, and at last I fall into an exhausted sleep, my phone in my hand so that when Dominic calls me, I’ll be able to answer right away.
I wake suddenly to the sound of knocking on the door. I’m confused again – why am I on the sofa in my clothes in the daytime? I look at my watch. It’s almost midday. What time did I go to sleep?
The pounding on the door sounds again, and I get up to answer it. I pull it open, blinking, and the next moment I’m engulfed in a huge hug, lifted off my feet with its force and pulled against a strong chest.
‘Beth, I’m so sorry. Oh Christ, I’m sorry.’
Dominic’s voice is in my ear, his arms are around me, his body is giving me the comfort I’ve craved so much over the last terrible hours. We stand for a long time, locked in our embrace, unable to say anything else to one another. I want to weep but I’m all cried out. It occurs to me that I must look a sight with swollen eyes and mussed-up hair but I know Dominic doesn’t care and neither do I. I need him so much at this moment and it’s a relief to lead him through to the sitting room and sit down with him, still pressed tight to him, his strong arm around me.
‘How did you get here?’ I ask, wonderingly. ‘You were in New York!’
‘When you didn’t answer I decided to get on a plane.’
‘On Christmas Day? How did you get a flight?’
He shrugs. ‘I chartered a plane. You can do anything if you really need to. And I had to find you and I’m glad I did.’ He holds my hands tightly. ‘Poor Mark. Can you tell me about it?’
I start to tell him the whole story and even though I thought I was cried out, I can’t help weeping as I describe those last hours in the hospital and how Mark took his final breath as I watched.
‘I saw his spirit go,’ I say, wiping my eyes with a tissue. ‘I just knew that he’d gone and that what was left behind wasn’t Mark.’
‘Hush,’ murmurs Dominic, his lips pressed against my hair. ‘He’s at peace now. Nothing can hurt him.’
‘I suppose that’s true,’ I say wretchedly. I lift my eyes to Dominic’s brown ones with their look of tender sympathy. ‘Andrei can’t do anything to him now.’
Dominic shakes his head. ‘No. I suppose Mark can still be investigated, but he’ll never know wh
at Andrei was prepared to do to him, and how he was used.’
‘That’s the only good thing to come out of all of this.’ I sigh.
‘And what will happen to you now?’
‘Me?’
‘Your job with Mark.’
I blink. ‘Oh my goodness, I don’t know. I haven’t thought . . . It seems too soon. I have no idea what arrangements Mark will have made.’
Dominic hugs me again. ‘Don’t worry about that now. We’ll find out in due course.’
I inhale the delicious scent of his body as my nose presses against the softness of his jumper. ‘Did you really leave your Christmas just for me?’
‘Of course. Although no one was surprised, to be honest. I have a reputation for hot-headedness. I was sorry to leave Georgie but I didn’t much mind leaving Aunt Florence and the deadly dull cousins.’ He puts his hand under my chin and tilts my head up. ‘Listen, why don’t you come back with me? I promised Georgie I’d go with her to the New Year ball at some fancy house. Let’s go there together.’
I draw in a startled breath. New Year in New York with Dominic? It sounds amazing. ‘But,’ I say, ‘what about my family? I’m supposed to be at home with them. And what about Caroline? I don’t want to leave her.’
‘There’s nothing you can do at the moment,’ Dominic says. ‘Caroline will need you in a few days, when you’ve both recovered from the shock and you have to start sorting out the business. But nothing will happen now till after the new year, I promise. And as for your family – let’s go and see them now. I’ll come with you. I want to meet your parents anyway and now seems like a good time. I can ask for their permission to whisk you away to New York.’
I think about this for a second. It feels wrong to consider enjoying myself with everything that’s happened. ‘I don’t know . . . it feels disloyal to Mark.’
‘Mark always told you to grasp opportunities and enjoy yourself. He wouldn’t want you to mope. He’d be telling you that life is short and to seize it while you can.’ Dominic gives me a sweet smile and I feel sure he’s right.
Promises After Dark (After Dark Book 3) Page 23