Twelve Days The Beginning - By Jade Reyner Page 0,124

that she had bottled those times and kept them safe so that she could open them up and draw on them and remember how innocent life used to be before she became a grown up and made her own rather messy way in the world.

Dale’s car was already in the driveway when she pulled in and she had to force herself to cut the engine, get out and walk to the door. She had no idea what she would be faced with when she entered and she was absolutely terrified. If Dale even had a hint of a thought that she had been unfaithful then she wasn’t sure she would have the strength or resolve to live through his punishment. As she had left the office Cole had begged her to wait for him, to come home with him and leave Dale once and for all but she couldn’t do that. Even though she knew that things were over, she felt she owed it to Dale to be honest and up front rather than to run away and hide leaving everyone else to sort out the mess.

She had not seen Vaughn at all since he had left her in the car park. His car had still been there when she had left so she assumed that he was either still upstairs or in his office, waiting for the time when he could be with Olivia? Who knew what the truth was there but if he had cared about her at all, she would have thought he would have made some effort to contact her before she left and not left it to his ‘mistress’ to deliver the happy news of their assignation. Despite the hole that it left in her heart at the thought of him meeting Olivia, she recognised that it was probably for the best. She could get on with sorting out her life without worrying about his feelings and she knew that in reality she needed to focus single-mindedly on that.

The front door opened just as she was about to put her key in the lock and Dale stood there with a huge welcoming smile on his face and Elise immediately noted that he was sober.

“Hi, gorgeous!” he pulled her into an all-enveloping hug before closing the door behind her and relieving her of her coat and bag. “I’ve missed you so much. I couldn’t believe it when I called your office and they said you would be home early. I’ve been working so many hours recently that I managed to swing it to leave early tonight, thought we could have a cosy night together – catch up on the gossip, that sort of thing.”

Tentatively, Elise looked at Dale. She wasn’t used to him being this friendly and reasonable and although she knew that the lack of drink helped, part of her was nervous about what this sudden change in mood could mean. He had referred to calling her office but only in passing so she could only hope that, despite the other girl’s hatred, Olivia had not given out any details of the circumstances of her early return. Immediately she felt a wave of relief wash over her that she wasn’t going to have to deal with that particular battle tonight and she hugged Dale back, albeit a little half-heartedly.

He released her and manoeuvred her towards the lounge and as he did so, she became aware of a delicious aroma coming from the kitchen. Dale had cooked? He never cooked – ever.

“It’s only one of those two-person bags of Chinese.” He said as he obviously noted her glance towards the kitchen. “Thought you could do with a break from the cooking after your busy couple of days.”

Elise searched his words for any hint of sarcasm or irony but found none and began to finally relax, relieved that she didn’t have to cook and could just rest her weary legs and begin to make sense of everything that had happened.

As she entered the lounge though she stopped short shocked, unable to comprehend the transformation that had occurred since she had left on Thursday morning. Dale had moved some of the furniture around to allow space for a large artificial Christmas tree in the corner, which he had fully decorated with lights and baubles. He had even put some tinsel around the picture frames on the walls. Elise gasped, unable to formulate any words as she stared at the scene and then belatedly, she began to consider its