The Girl on the Cliff Read Online Free PDF Page A

over?
    ‘Goddammit!’ Matt hurled the cell phone across the room, watching the battery splay out of the back of it. Yes, he understood how devastated she was about the miscarriage, but surely that was no reason to cut
him
out of her life too? Perhaps he should just get on a plane and go to her in Ireland. But what if she wouldn’t see him? What if he made it worse?
    Matt stood up, coming to an instant decision. As he marched towards his laptop, he knew anything was better than the uncertainty he was suffering just now. Even if Grania told him point-blank it was all over, it had to be preferable to being in the dark.
    Matt logged on and started exploring flights between New York and Dublin. As he did so, the intercom buzzed.He ignored it. He wasn’t expecting any visitors and certainly wouldn’t welcome any either. It continued to buzz insistently until, out of sheer irritation, Matt walked across the sitting room and pressed the answerphone. ‘Who is it?’
    ‘Hi, hon, just passing by, thought I’d check in to make sure you’re OK.’
    Matt pressed the entry button immediately. ‘Sorry, Charley, come up.’ He left the door ajar, and went back to his perusal of flights. Charley was one of the few people he could stomach seeing. A childhood friend, she’d moved off his radar – along with many of his old buddies – when he and Grania had gotten together. Grania had felt uncomfortable with his old Connecticut group, so he’d given them a wide berth for her sake. A few days ago, Charley had called out of the blue and said she’d heard from his folks that Grania had disappeared back to Ireland. She’d come across town and taken him for a pizza. It had been good to see her.
    A few minutes later, a pair of arms snaked around his shoulders and Charley planted a soft kiss on his cheek. A bottle of red wine was deposited on the desk next to his laptop.
    ‘Thought you might need this. Shall I get us a couple of glasses?’
    ‘That would be just great. Thanks, Charley.’ Matt continued to compare and contrast timings and costs as Charley uncorked the wine and poured it into two glasses.
    ‘What are you looking at?’ she asked as she threw off her boots and curled her long legs beneath her on the sofa.
    ‘Flights to Ireland. If Grania’s not coming back here, I gotta go to her.’
    Charley raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow. ‘You think that’s sensible?’
    ‘What the hell else am I meant to do? Hang around here, going half out of my mind while I try to figure out the problem, and hitting a blank wall time and again?’
    Charley threw back her mane of glossy dark hair and took a sip of wine. ‘But what if she just needs some space? To get over … well, you know. You might make things worse, Matty. Has Grania said she wanted to see you?’
    ‘Hell, no! I just called her and she asked me to stop contacting her.’ Matt rose from the laptop, took a large slug of his wine and joined Charley on the sofa. ‘Maybe you’re right,’ he sighed. ‘Perhaps I should give her some more time and eventually she’ll come to her senses. Losing the baby was such a blow to her. You know how eager Mom and Dad were for the next generation to make an appearance. Dad hardly did much to hide his disappointment when he tipped up at the hospital after the miscarriage.’
    ‘I can imagine.’ Charley rolled her eyes. ‘Subtlety was never one of your dad’s qualities, now was it? Not that he’s ever offended me, but then you guys have been like family, so I’m used to him. But I suppose to an outsider like Grania it might have been hard for her to cope with.’
    ‘Yes.’ Matt rested his elbows on his knees and put his head in his hands. ‘Maybe I just didn’t do enough to protect her. I know how uncomfortable she’s always been about the difference in our backgrounds.’
    ‘Matty, honey, really – you couldn’t have done more.You even put me in the garbage can when Grania came along.’
    Matt looked at her and