I glanced across at him, feeling butterflies in my stomach. All too aware that he kept looking at me as he drove. ‘A problem?’ I asked him, now feeling anxious. Had something new happened with Ffion?
I could see a smile forming at the edge of his mouth. ‘Well, it’s not really your problem. It’s just that…’
‘Yes?’
His smile widened. ‘Remember what I said to you about being wary of getting involved?’ I nodded. ‘And how you said you knew how I felt?’
I nodded again. The car slowed as we approached the pub car park. The building itself was decorated with baskets of flowers, heavy with late summer blooms. He pulled on the handbrake and turned to look at me. I could feel a blush creep across my cheeks. Crazy. But real. And probably matching my lipstick. Me! In lipstick? He was looking at me intently now.
‘I’ve decided that being wary isn’t always the best policy. Being wary might just be my undoing.’
I held his gaze as I undid my seat belt. ‘How so?’
‘Because we’ve met up again after, what – seven years?’ I nodded. ‘And me being the way I am, chances are that unless I do something about it, it could be another seven years before we next meet. Emily’s eighteenth birthday party, most probably. Which means –’ he grinned again. ‘That we’ll both be none the wiser.’
I blinked at him. ‘None the wiser about what?’
He undid his own seat belt and twisted to face me. ‘About this.’
‘This?’
He pulled the keys from the ignition. ‘About me and you,’ he said softly. He looked shy himself now. Hesitant. Embarrassed.
I swallowed. ‘Us?’
He looked bashful. ‘Well, me, at any rate. I don’t know if there’s an “us” yet. It’s just that since seeing you again, Megan, I’ve been thinking.’
Was I hearing him right? My pulse raced. ‘Thinking what?’
He took a breath. ‘Thinking that if I don’t do something quick, we’ll never know, will we?’
‘Know what?’
‘Know whether it would work out between us.’
His eyes shone. The same twinkle he’d always had in his eye, undimmed by the passing of the years. Tom? Tom and me? Putting the thought into words felt scary. It wasn’t just Ffion and her problems I had had to let go of, I realised. I had all sorts of baggage of my own to lose as well. The fall-out from a failed marriage. My reluctance to trust a man again. But this man?
I returned his gaze now, conscious of a heat growing in my stomach. I’d always thought Tom was attractive. He was. But he’d been my sister’s husband, so it hadn’t even registered. And once things went wrong, I had almost despised him.
For so long. So many years. But I’d been wrong. And one thing was clear. I’d been thinking as well. Since seeing him again, I’d been thinking about him. He’d barely been out of my thoughts. And here he was telling me the feeling was mutual. Could this work out?
Sitting there looking into Tom’s eyes, my heart told me I’d just have to risk it. I couldn’t keep it chained up forever. We got out of the car and I waited while he locked it, my heart thumping wildly.
He walked round to join me. Though he now looked less certain, and anxious for my a n s w e r, he held out his hand, waiting for mine.
Slipping my hand into his felt as natural as breathing. I squeezed it, feeling suddenly light-headed. Even more so as he turned and put his other arm around me.
‘It may not work out,’ I said, as he dipped his head to kiss me.
His mouth was close to mine now. ‘But you’re willing to risk it?’
Ffion’s secret had caused all sorts of heartache, but something else too. A reawakening of my heart.
My kiss answered for me.
THE CORPSE’S TALE
BY KATHERINE JOHN
Dai Morgan has the body of a man and the mind of a child. He lived with his mother in the Mid Wales village of Llan, next door to bright, beautiful 19 year old Anna Harris. The vicar found Anna's naked, battered body in the c h u rchyard one morning. The police discovered Anna's bloodstained earring in Dai's pocket.
The judge gave Dai life.
After ten years in gaol Dai appealed against his sentence and was freed. Sergeants Trevor Joseph and Peter Collins are sent to Llan to reopen the case. But the villagers refuse to believe Dai innocent. The Llan police do not make mistakes or allow murderers to walk free.
Do they?
KATHERINE JOHN is the author of four crime novels and also writes as Catrin Collier for Orion. She lives with her family near Swansea, Wales.
ISBN 1905170319
Secrets Page 6