The Accidental Bride Read Online Free PDF Page B

said fiercely, gripping the hand that held hers, twisting it a little, and kissing it in return. ‘Just someone with … stuff on his mind, that’s all.’ She rubbed her cheek against the back of his hand, loving the silk of his skin.
    ‘Yes.’
    The single word hung in the air, heavy with all the other words, the ones he didn’t, perhaps couldn’t, say. Should she force the issue? Ask the questions she normally resisted? She hated being a nag, hated pushing him. It seemed so ungrateful when he was so kind and wonderful, giving her gifts, both material, and of himself, with his mind and heart and body.
    ‘I told you that you should ask things, didn’t I?’
    He had done, back at Dalethwaite, before she’d moved in. He’d said she could ask him anything, and he’d try to answer. Should she go for it now, in these wee small hours that weren’t really like real life, in the light of day?
    ‘Why can’t you sleep with anyone else, John?’
    There, she’d asked, but not the other great sleep-related question that bugged her.
    Did you used to sleep like a baby with Clara, before all the bad stuff happened and changed you for ever? Before you took the fall for her, and went to prison when she should have been the one to go?
    ‘Is it the accident? Or prison? Or something else?’
    Despite his words to the contrary, he didn’t seem to be able to answer, and while she waited, the night and the garden held its breath.
    He was a coward, and he knew it. He should just tell her. It would be such a relief, to at least get this one thing clear. The trouble was, he didn’t fully understand it himself, despite years and thousands of pounds of therapy. He’d spent so many years not thinking about the reasons he could only sleep alone. It was only loving Lizzie that had compelled him to re-examine this issue.
    But she was waiting, waiting. She deserved some kind of explanation. After all, what man in his right mind would avoid sleeping next to this beautiful, compassionate young woman? Even with no sex on the agenda, just being at her side was a thing of wonder. He could want her again in a second, but sharing her blanket and her warmth was enough for the moment. It made him strong.
    ‘It’s a bit of both. A muddle really,’ he began, impatient with his own prevarication. How long could a man who was supposed to be astute and grown up go on being a craven and adolescent idiot? ‘Not clear cut.’ He sighed, and tweaked the blanket tighter around them. ‘People always think that X leads to Y, in a simple cause and effect, but I’ve never found anything in life to be like that. If you’ve got X, Y and Z, you might get nothing, or the answer to the Universe.’
    ‘That’s forty-two,’ she said, rubbing her face against his shoulder.
    ‘Quite possibly.’ He smiled, recognising the reference to
The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
. ‘But in my case, it’s been a mix of the car accident, prison, maybe even a bit of natural insomnia. All jumbled together. All meaning I can’t relax and let my guard right down properly. Something inside me’s afraid to sleep … even with you.’
    ‘So, what happened, then?’ she asked in a low, steadyvoice. Not a bossy voice, but one he couldn’t deny, or resist. ‘I sort of get the car smash element, I think.’ She turned to him, her eyes gleaming in the low light. ‘You feel that if you had stayed awake as Clara drove, you could have averted what happened. I get that. It makes sense. Your subconscious keeps on telling you that you have to stay awake and “protect” the other person, somehow? Is that it?’
    He’d been through all this with various therapists. She’d pinpointed it easily, though. ‘Yes, that’s part of it.’ In some ways, the easiest part; in some ways, not.
    ‘But the rest? Can you talk about it? It’s OK if you can’t, but maybe it’ll help if you share?’
    Why not? Why not share? It didn’t make him a bad person, what’d happened. He supposed