He didn’t understand. How could he forgive what didn’t make any sense?
He hadn’t understood how his parents could lie to him for so long, or how Felix could keep the truth from him after he’d found out, but he was starting to, now. When love and family and everything was so fragile, people did what they had to in order to keep it together. He wouldn’t have understood that at seventeen, when Felix learned the truth.
But he didn’t think he would ever understand how Tori could walk away from the connection between them, when he was offering to change his whole life, his whole existence for her. How she could hear him say he loved her, and have it mean nothing.
Maybe he should have told her about the last time he’d said that to a woman, only to have her turn round and humiliate him. Maybe then she’d realise how much it meant to him.
Or maybe not. His first love had ended in embarrassment. Hers had ended in death. She wasn’t likely to cut him much slack for that.
And anyway, she was the one who had left. Maybe she should be running back and begging him for forgiveness.
‘You could go after her, you realise,’ Felix said after a moment. ‘It’s not like you don’t know where she is.’
‘It’s also not as if she gave me any indication at all that she wanted me to follow her,’ Jasper pointed out. ‘I told her I loved her—’
‘No, you told a party full of strangers you loved her, mostly to make our father feel guilty.’
Our father. That still sounded strange.
‘It doesn’t matter. She said love isn’t enough.’ But it was all he had to give.
The realisation had been a slow one, creeping in between snow falls and frozen rivers, silent in the muffled winter landscape. Eight years ago when they’d met, she’d been a challenge. Five years ago, when they’d first spent the night together, she’d been a refuge. Two weeks ago, when they’d been stranded together at the Moorside, she’d still been a mystery—but one he was piecing together the clues to make sense of. By the time she’d kissed him at the Christmas market, she’d been all he could think about. She’d become a friend, then something more, something deeper, something he was scared to name unless it escaped again.
He’d barely known he was falling until he was all in. Like slipping on ice.
Yes, that was a perfect description for how falling in love with Tori Edwards felt. As if his feet had gone from under him and he was flat on his back on the hard, icy ground wondering what the hell just happened.
‘She said something else, before you got to the cottage. Something that made about as much sense as all of that did.’ Felix’s brows knitted together as he obviously tried to remember it word for word. ‘She said she’d been here before. That you were just saying you loved her to try and get her to stay, or make her feel guilty or something.’
‘She thought I was only proclaiming love in the most embarrassing way possible to make her feel bad?’ Jasper’s brain caught up with the rest of what Felix had said. ‘Wait. She said she’d been here before?’
‘That’s what she said.’
Yes. She’d said that to him, too, but he hadn’t realised the significance of it until now. He’d assumed she was talking about the first time they’d slept together, just before he’d left the country. But what if she wasn’t?
Because she hadn’t been here with him before. This was all different, this time. He’d definitely never told her he loved her before. And, given what else he knew about her love life and relationship history, that left him only one possible candidate.
‘Tyler.’
‘Who?’ Felix asked.
‘Her ex-boyfriend. The son of her sort-of foster parents. He died, before she came here. But I’m starting to think there was more to that story than she told me.’ He’d known that—or sensed it at least—before. But he hadn’t imagined it could be something big enough to derail everything between them.
‘Isn’t there always?’
‘Maybe I just wasn’t asking the right questions.’ And maybe he needed to.
No more secrets. That was what he’d promised himself when he came back here. He just hadn’t anticipated the challenge that was Tori Edwards and her defensive walls.
Jasper sprang to his feet, and Felix followed. ‘You’re going to go see her?’
‘I’m going to go see her.’
‘Hang on, then.’ Felix fished a key from his pocket and let himself into Tori’s cottage.
‘Wait, why do you have a key to her cottage?’ Jasper called from the doorstep, reluctant to go inside without Tori’s permission even though she wasn’t there.
‘She wanted me to water her Christmas tree,’ Felix yelled back.
‘Of course she did.’
Felix re-emerged moments later with a parcel wrapped in Christmas paper; one Jasper recognised. It was the one Henry had given him for Tori when they’d left the Moorside, just a couple of weeks ago now.
‘It’s Christmas Day. She’ll want this,’ Felix said.
Jasper nodded, and took the parcel from him. ‘I’ll deliver it. Make my excuses with the parents for Christmas dinner?’
‘Of course. Just be careful on the roads,’ Felix said. ‘There’s more snow forecast. And I don’t want to lose a brother when I only just got him back.’
‘Neither do I.’ Jasper flashed him a grin, then ran for his four-by-four, parked up in the garage by the house.
It was time to put an end to all the secrets. It was time to bring Tori home again.
* * *
Tori stared at the door in front of her, willing herself to open it.
She’d been back at the Moorside for three days now. It was time.
She just still didn’t quite feel ready.
Aunt Liz and Uncle Henry had looked about as surprised as she’d expected when she’d appeared on their doorstep three nights ago. For all they’d asked her to come back for Christmas, it was clear they hadn’t actually expected that she would. Still, Liz had made up her room for her, and Henry had fed her dinner—‘Anything but pie?’ she’d asked, at which question he’d given her a knowing look—and she’d settled back into life at the Moorside as if she’d never left.
Well, almost.
‘Are you going to go in?’ Henry’s voice behind her made her jump. ‘Only, our turkey will be ready in six hours, and I’d hate for you to miss it because you’re busy staring at a door.’
Not just any door. Tyler’s door.
Henry sank down against the wall to sit beside her on the floor, their legs stretched out across the hallway ahead of them. The pub was still open, for all that it was Christmas Day, but all the lunches were cooked and being served. Another couple of hours and all that would be left was mopping up the last of the drinkers before sending them home to their families and having their own, very late, Christmas dinner.
‘He loved you so much, you know,’ Henry said. ‘He’d want you to move on and be happy, if that’s what this is about.’
‘It’s not.’ Tori considered. ‘Well, not entirely.’
Yes, she felt guilty about moving on and leaving Tyler behind, but then, she’d been feeling that guilt since long before he’d died. Weirdly, she didn’t feel as if she was betraying Tyler with Jasper. If anything, she felt she was betraying Jasper, by clinging onto Tyler’s memory.
She’d done a lot of thinking over the last three days, and one thing was crystal clear to her. If she wanted to move on—with Jasper, or with anyone—she needed to put Tyler’s ghost to rest.
And the only way she’d been able to come up with to do that was by telling the truth.
‘Did he ever talk to you, about me leaving for university?’ Tori asked. She’d never spoken with Tyler’s parents about what had happened before she’d left, or after. But suddenly, she wondered if they knew anyway. They’d loved their son deeply, but they’d never
claimed he was perfect. None of them were.
All of them needed forgiveness, she realised now. But the dead couldn’t give it.
‘He didn’t want you to go, I know that,’ Henry admitted. ‘But I told him then, if you truly love her, son, you have to let her go. She has great things in her and she has to go and achieve them. She’ll come back when she’s ready, but not if we hold on too tight.’
Tori looked away from the door and stared at the man who had chosen to be her uncle, even when blood didn’t make him one. ‘You told him that?’
‘Yep. Bet he didn’t listen though.’ He shook his head. ‘I loved that boy more than my own life, and it kills me every day that he’s gone. But he never listened to a word of advice his whole life.’
‘He...he begged me not to go. Told me if I truly loved him, I’d stay. That leaving would break him. He said...he said he was scared he’d do something stupid if I wasn’t there.’ Henry’s expression hardened at her words, but she pressed on. She needed to say this. Needed to get it all out, at last. No more secrets. ‘I told him I had to go—that if I gave up this opportunity I’d never forgive myself. I thought we could carry on together anyway; you remember, I came back every weekend that first term to see him.’
‘I remember.’ Henry’s voice was dark. He already knew how the story ended, of course. ‘Liz was worried. She thought you should be spending more time making new friends at university.’
‘Every time I came back it got harder. Tyler...he seemed more and more unstable. Accusing me of cheating on him. Of laughing at him, when I was away. He kept telling me that if I went back to university without him he didn’t know what he’d do. That he wouldn’t be responsible for what happened.’ The implication had been clear. Whatever stupid thing Tyler did without her there to stop him would be her fault. Her responsibility.
‘And then he went out, got drunk, and tried to drive home.’ Henry rubbed a hand across his wrinkled brow, looking older and more tired than Tori had ever imagined he could look. Then he stretched out his arm and wrapped it around her shoulder, pulling her close against him as they both stared at Tyler’s bedroom door, and remembered the boy they had lost.
‘He was an idiot,’ Henry said after a moment. ‘And that wasn’t your fault, not for a moment. I... I’m angry with him now, and I’d have been furious with him then if I’d known what was going on. But at least I know now. And I can tell you what happened to Tyler wasn’t your fault. Not in any way, shape or form.’
‘But if I hadn’t gone—’
‘Then maybe it would have happened later, or differently, or not at all. But it still wouldn’t have been your fault. He made his choices and some of them were terrible ones, and he paid the price for that. He should never have tried to make you carry that blame.’
‘We both made choices,’ Tori pointed out. ‘I chose to leave him behind, even though I knew it could be the end of our relationship.’ It hurt to admit that; that she’d chosen her own ambition and future over the boy who was supposed to be the love of her life.
‘You were only eighteen,’ Henry replied. ‘And you made the right choice. You couldn’t mortgage your whole future for a teenage relationship that probably wouldn’t last anyway. And if it was meant to be, it would have been. If it was meant to be he would have supported you every step of the way. I’m ashamed that he didn’t.’
Tori lowered her head as she shook it, too overcome to find words, her eyes burning with unshed tears.
‘This is why you didn’t come back here after the funeral, isn’t it?’ Henry said. ‘Why you stayed away so long. I always wondered... Liz said it probably just hurt too much to be here with all the memories, but I suspected it must have been something more.’
‘I thought you’d blame me, if you knew the truth. I blamed me.’ She took a shuddering breath. ‘I thought you’d hate me, and it hurt so much I couldn’t face it.’
In all honesty, it still hurt. Maybe her first visit back to the Moorside in the snow and the dark had started to soothe some of the pain, but the guilt still hung on.
‘You’re our family, every bit as much as Tyler was, even if it is by love, not blood.’ Henry hugged her tighter. ‘We could never do anything but love you, the same way we’ll always love Tyler, even if we don’t agree with his choices. But in your case, you made the right choice going. Staying away...that choice I’m less keen on.’
‘So you are mad at me?’
‘No. I missed you.’ Henry sighed. ‘Maybe I’m not saying this right. What I mean is... Vicky, Liz and I will always forgive you and always love you, even if we don’t agree with you. You’re family and you will always have a home here.’
That was all it took to send her over the edge. The tears cascaded over her cheeks as she buried her head against Henry’s chest, her body shaking with sobs as he held her. As if the guilt and the self-loathing were leaving her in the flood of tears. Washing her soul clean.
She was truly home again, at last.
It took a while for her to regain her composure. But when she did, she wiped her eyes, kissed Henry on the cheek, and straightened her back as she stood again, ready to enter Tyler’s room at last.
It was time to say goodbye, for the last time.
And then she had a new life to say hello to, she hoped.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
FELIX HADN’T BEEN kidding about the snow.
Thick, heavy flakes landed on his windscreen faster than his wipers could clear them, and Jasper peered through the glass at a world turning whiter by the moment. The air swirled and rushed with snow, whipped up by a wild wind that whistled down the valleys and around the rocks of the moors.
Somewhere up ahead was the Moorside Inn and the woman he loved.
Now he just had to get to her. And not crash on the way.
A shiver went through him at the thought. From what she’d said, he knew he couldn’t be far from where Tyler had died. The last thing Tori needed was another man to mourn.
He slowed the car to a crawl. Maybe it would take him longer, but he’d get there in one piece, at least.
He was just picking out the landmarks that he knew led to the Moorside Inn when he saw the blue flashing lights. Easing onto the brakes, he slowed a good distance away from them, glad that the date—Christmas Day—meant the roads were mostly clear. Unfastening his seat belt, he pulled the hood of his coat over his head and ducked out of the car to find out what was happening.
‘Tree down in the road, sir.’ Was that the same young policeman who’d visited the Moorside last time? Jasper had a feeling it might be. The last few weeks seemed to be coming full circle. Squinting through the snow, he could see the heavy, old tree trunk spanning the whole width of the road. A set of headlights on the other side showed that his wasn’t the only Christmas Day not going to plan.
‘Going to be closed until they clear it,’ the police officer continued. ‘You might want to turn round and go back the way you came, if you can make it through the snow.’
Jasper looked back down the road he’d just travelled, and saw the weather closing in behind him. But more than that, he saw all the distance and pain and anger that had filled his last five years. The lack of forgiveness, the burning sense of injustice eating away at him.
He didn’t want to go that way.
‘I’ll park up and keep going on foot,’ he said.
‘I know an inn you can shelter at for the night. If you like.’
He knew that voice. He loved that voice.
Jasper spun to find Tori leaning against the fallen tree, a bright red hat pulled down low over her dark hair, and a hopeful smile on her face.
He’d never seen anything so beautiful.
‘That would be wonderful,’ he said, stepping closer. ‘Any chance it serves steak and ale pie?’ He could almost take her in his arms, but he still wasn’t completely sure that was what sh
e wanted. Although the fact that she was here, in the snow, on this road...had she been trying to reach him, too? He hoped so. But either way, the next move had to be hers.
‘It might. But it’s Christmas Day so, mostly turkey and trimmings, I think.’ She took a step too, and suddenly she was so close he could see the snowflakes landing on her eyelashes. She blinked them away, and met his gaze, and he knew.
He knew that he had to convince this woman to give him a chance. Maybe she’d never be able to love him, and he’d have to let her go. But if there was any chance she might want to stay in his life for always...he had to try.
‘Tori, I... I’m sorry. For everything. I’ve learned a lot about forgiveness recently—most of it from you, in a roundabout way. You were right, about so many things. I’ve talked a lot with Felix, and with my parents, especially since you left. And while I’m still not all the way there, I’m trying, really, I am. And I hope that you—’
He broke off as she placed an icy hand against his cheek. Then she stretched up on tiptoe and pressed her cold lips to his. ‘Yes,’ she murmured, barely pulling away at all. ‘Yes to all of it. Now come on. Let’s get out of the cold.’
* * *
Henry and Liz barely even looked surprised at all this time when she turned up with Jasper in tow, his car parked out of the way on the side of the road to worry about later. They had more important things to deal with now.
‘Here for the turkey, I suppose?’ Henry asked Jasper, holding out a hand for him to shake.
‘Not just the turkey,’ Jasper replied, smiling down at her. Tori tried not to blush, but from Liz’s soppy smile she was pretty sure she’d failed.
She’d talked to her aunt, too, after she’d made her peace with Tyler, talking to him as if he’d never left his childhood bedroom. Maybe he hadn’t, in essence. But when she’d closed the door behind her for the last time, she knew she, at least, had pulled whatever part of her heart that had stayed in the past with him fully into the future. Liz had hugged her tight and told her that she should listen to her uncle. Tori was family, and that was the end of the matter.
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