arms round his neck as they moved softly to the music, the city lights winking beneath them, the sea dark and sleek beneath the night sky.
They moved away from the doors, away from the lights, the music diffusing through the thick walls as the guests caroused without them. They wouldn’t be missed for a while yet; there were so many people here, far more than he cared to count.
He closed his eyes, feeling the gentle sway of her body against his, the strictures of her corset beneath his fingers. Her skin smelled of gardenia and orange blossom. ‘Are you having fun?’ she murmured, her voice low and sweet against his ear.
‘Best day of my life.’
She pulled back to look at him, knowing it was a lie. He looked down into those eyes again. Smiling and questioning all at once; always.
‘Too many people,’ he conceded, giving a conciliatory shrug.
‘I know. I wish it could always be like this,’ she murmured, sliding in closer to him again, her breath warm against his neck. ‘This moment.’
He closed his eyes, wishing the same, as they danced in the moonlight, cheek to cheek.
Chapter Sixteen
Her eyes opened but did not see, a vestige of her troubled dreams hovering, then landing on her again. He had been lying on his back, on a bed, and she had been staring down at him, as if she were a spider on the ceiling. His arms had been folded behind his head, and he was stretched out in just his favourite jeans, tanned, relaxed, a soft smile on his lips as though listening to music, light brown hair splayed on the pillow. She watched his foot tap, his eyes closing for long moments but then opening again and fastening directly upon her, as though watching her back, knowing she was there. He looked so quiet, so happy. It had been . . . soothing, seeing him like that, how he had really been before the cancer achieved critical mass, a new image to overlay her last memories of him and the usual dreams, where he was whittled back to sinew and bone, green-tinged, hairless . . .
She had allowed herself to believe, in the dream, that there was a happy ending, but no matter how much she tried to keep her gaze on his face – the curve of his lips, the first bloom of stubble – she saw the water seeping across the floor, making it shine. Slippery. She refused to look, to acknowledge it, but then it began inching up the walls, getting deeper and deeper, and soon it was trickling over the mattress where he lay. She tried to speak, to tell him he was getting wet, but she couldn’t speak, couldn’t get him to hear her, and he made no sign of having noticed the creeping danger as the water gradually traced around his shape, then over it, closing over his legs, his chest, his arms, his face . . . submerging him.
It was the sight of him, underwater, staring back at her, refusing to move or do anything to save himself, that had made her wake up, she realized now, and she pressed a hand to her throat; it was still tingling from her shout. Too late to help.
Heart pounding, she curled back under the sheets, the unfamiliar sounds of the melancholic house coming to her ear – footsteps on the terrace outside her window, the swoosh of a window opening, a whistle in the pipes . . . From the blade of light escaping past the solid shutters and drawing a line across the floor, she could tell it was another beautiful day. But her spirits still sank at the prospect of spending it here.
Dreams about Jack always tokened a bad day, she knew that. Experience was a hard master, and she breathed deeply for a few moments, trying to articulate her affirmations for why she should get out of bed: it was it was a beautiful day. A beautiful summer’s day on a stunning private island in the Swedish archipelago. She was in one of the most beautiful places on earth. She was alive. She had so much to be thankful for –
A sudden sound, something smashing, made her gasp and look at the far wall.
And Linus. She had Linus to look after.
She threw the sheets back and leapt out of bed, darting out of her door and peering in through his. ‘Okay, buddy?’ she asked, trying not to look wild-eyed, but the