(2013) Four Widows Read Online Free PDF

out.”
    “Lori, please. I need to go.” His face showed spidery hairline cracks I’d never noticed before. “I’ll fly back whenever I can. There will be—”
    I cut him short with guillotine quickness. “I don’t want a long-distance relationship. We find it difficult enough to see each other between shifts and we live in the same house.”
    “What are you saying?”
    “I’m coming with you.” There it was–declaration of love at bob-sleigh speed. Heart ruling head as usual.
    “The magazine?”
    “Do you honestly think I would choose work over love?” I said, realising the moment the words were out that it sounded like a bitter accusation. “I couldn’t be here without you,” I added to soften the blow.
    At the time I liberally spread positive spin over the situation, ignoring whispered warnings inside my head: my husband was leaving London whether I liked it or not. And soon I would be lost in a haunted wilderness; using machete moves to clear a path.
    Decision done. Harrison made more of an effort. Edinburgh was sold to me on the basis that it had an international airport, castle, Harvey Nichols, and home thereabouts to Christopher Kane.
    There was no doubt the place had an abundance of charm and character. Discovering it over the raucous festive season got us off to a good start. It wasn’t such a geographical upheaval for Harrison because he had studied in Edinburgh 20 years ago. He was returning, whereas it was new to me.
    When I told him that I had accepted the position on Corset Magazine he seemed taken aback; startled at the speed at which I had nailed a new job. In truth, I was too.
    I’m guessing that when we drove up the M6 to Scotland’s capital he had his doubts about his reinvention. International airport and castle perhaps but while the place was big enough to get lost in, it wasn’t big enough for him to disappear. Cece was right; ain’t such a big city after all.
    To give him his credit, though, Harrison made the most of his new post and got down to business–not difficult considering when he was in the operating room it didn’t make a blind bit of difference where he was in the world. He was relentless. Soldier, surgeon, superhero, once you start saving the world, it is almost impossible to stop.
    My father had the same drive, more so; couldn’t live outside the operating room. When he retired at 67, depression started to leave marks on him like damp. We could see black patches on his humour and enthusiasm. He floundered without the lack of routine despite my mother’s efforts to fix schedules for them: people to see, places to do, cruises to go.
    The harder she worked at their itinerary, the bleaker he became. Drifting further and further from the elite surgeons’ club was the worst thing to ever happen to him. Within five months of officially hanging up his stethoscope, he dropped dead after breakfast.
    It was no different for Harrison–take away his consuming career and he faltered. Life in the operating room was living in the spotlight: the praise, the fans, even the failures.
    I knew I had made the right decision but that’s not to say there weren’t moments of melancholic regret over trading London in for Edinburgh, despite my mother’s best efforts to “whoop me up,” as my sister would say.
    Married life is about compromise. And, in our case, relocation. So I quit my job, put furniture into storage, rented out our first-floor flat in Barnsbury and packed suitcases and shoe boxes without facing up to worst fears: we were not leaving London, we were running away.
    Harrison made arrangements with his best friend fellow-doctor Ralph Brown for us to rent Ralph’s apartment while he was elsewhere in the world. We slotted into the new life without stopping to shop for fixtures and fittings–suspiciously quick I can confirm.
    Ralph and Harrison had been friends for 20 years since meeting at Edinburgh Medical School. “Bastard’s brilliant at whatever he does: property,