The Piano Man Project Page 0,94

he’d die of frostbite.

‘A letter?’ he said, completely failing to pull off the casual tone he’d aimed for because of his ramrod-straight shoulders. ‘What kind of letter?’

‘Well, it’s a brown envelope with your name and address written on the front in bold, black writing,’ Honey said, turning it over in her hands. ‘if I had to guess I’d say it’s a man’s handwriting, and by the feel of it it’s probably a birthday card?’

‘Miss Marple’s granddaughter is back in the building,’ Hal muttered.

Honey ignored his barbed comment.

‘Should I open it?’ she asked.

Hal didn’t reply right away. His heavy sigh was the only sound in the quiet room, and he rolled his shoulders and cricked his neck to the side like a boxer limbering up for a fight.

‘It’ll be from my brother,’ he said, grinding the heels of his palms against his jaw. ‘He’s the only one who has this address.’

Was that so bad? Honey wondered silently. A birthday card from his brother? From Hal’s reaction, the answer was most probably yes.

‘Just open it,’ Hal said, so quietly that Honey felt the need to double check.

‘You’re sure you want me to?’

He didn’t reply. Honey looked at him, feeling his simmering anxiety and hoping that the letter turned out to be nothing after all. Dragging her gaze away from him and back to the envelope, Honey slid her finger under an open edge and ripped it carefully.

As predicted, it was a birthday card, heavy and cream, and again as predicted, the front said ‘brother’ in embossed gunmetal letters. It definitely wasn’t the kind of card Honey would have found in the corner shop; it screamed money and understated elegance.

‘Well?’ Hal ground out, still facing the floor.

‘Well,’ Honey began, ‘it’s, umm, it’s a birthday card saying “brother”, so you guessed right there.’

‘Inside?’

She hadn’t opened it yet, and in truth, she was frightened to. Hal had arrived in her life as if he’d been dropped from outer space. No family or friends intruded into the bubble, and it had allowed Honey to get to know him in isolation as a man, rather than as a son, a friend, or as someone’s brother. The arrival of the card served to highlight that she didn’t really know him well at all, and that there were people out there who did. With unsure fingers, she cleared her throat and opened the card.

It wasn’t just a birthday card. There was a second, smaller envelope nestled inside the card, and written across it in cerise ink was just his name. Hal. The writing was different to that on the previous envelope, very distinctly feminine. Honey’s heart sank. This wasn’t just a birthday card after all, or a minor intrusion. It was a letter; it was two worlds colliding. Hal’s old life and his new life about to intersect.

‘What does it say?’ he asked, his anxiety coming through as impatience.

Honey forced her eyes to read the writing in the card.

Honey and Hal sat in silence for a few seconds after she stopped reading. The unopened letter burned in her hand. Part of her ached to know what lay inside, and another part of her wanted to run a thousand miles. This was not her business, and Hal was not her boyfriend. Was he still Imogen’s boyfriend, officially? It was another question that she didn’t have an answer for, and now was definitely not the right time to ask it.

‘Fucking Damien.’

Hal spoke at last, and the despair in his voice made Honey’s heart ache for him.

‘He sounds nice,’ Honey ventured, wondering how such a plain adjective could be applied to any relative of Hal’s. It certainly wasn’t a word that ever came to mind about the man himself.

Hal laughed harshly.

‘What the fuck am I supposed to do with her letter?’

Honey knew exactly what Hal meant. They were in the most awkward of positions. Half an hour back they were having sex, and now she needed to read him a letter from his ex-girlfriend. Was it a love letter? A Dear John letter, maybe?

Either way, it was going to be the most personal of letters, and she was the last person on earth who should read it to him. But then she was also the only person on earth who could, so they found themselves on uncharted territory.

‘I’ll read it to you.’ The words left Honey’s mouth before she’d had time to consider the implications. Purposely so, because if she let herself think about it, she wouldn’t have the courage to read