Chapter 39
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Lily tried to let Flynn sleep, but his arm was draped across a particularly bruised part of her hip, and her attempt at deep breathing wasn’t dulling the pain of it.
“Sorry,” he muttered when she removed his arm. “Was I hurting you?”
“It’s okay,” she insisted. “Your hand was pressing on a bruise, but it’s fine.”
“Let me check…” When he lifted the covers, the cool air made goosebumps erupt over her naked skin.
“Flynn!” She pulled the duvet back over herself.
“You look good to me,” he said playfully.
She raised her head for him to slip his arm under and then settled herself at his collarbone. “I wish we could just stay in bed all day.”
“Me too.” His previous relaxed state vanished as he turned his wrist to check his watch. “I should get to the station.”
“Could you maybe spare half an hour?” she asked with her best flirty smile. Surely he could give her a quick repeat of last night’s activities before he left.
“I wish,” he said. “I need to shower and get to work. Hopefully, I won’t be too late tonight though.”
“Okay,” she said, ignoring the disappointment and focusing on the view of his naked backside as he headed for the shower.
While he got ready for work, she moved to the kitchen and made a pot of coffee.
“I need to ask you something?” she said, handing him a mug when he joined her.
“Go on.”
She sipped her coffee, searching for the right words. “I was wondering what happens now about your job.”
“How do you mean?”
She twisted her lips to one side. “I know this sounds insensitive, but there’s a job opening now, isn’t there? Can you stay?”
He stared at her for one long moment. “There’s an opening for a sergeant. I’m not a sergeant.”
“I know you said you didn’t want to be a sergeant, but you also said in theory you could.”
“One day. But not now. I’m not qualified to be a sergeant. I’d have to take exams. There’s a whole process.”
“What about PC Hill? Can’t he take the sergeant job and you take his job?”
“No,” he said impatiently.
“Why not?”
“Because PC Hill doesn’t want to be a sergeant.” He set his mug down heavily. “There’s a new sergeant arriving on Wednesday.”
It took her a moment to remember what day it was. Monday. “That’s fast.”
“Yeah.”
“So you’re still leaving?”
He nodded.
“On Saturday?”
“I’ve changed the flight to Monday. There’ll be a memorial service for the sergeant on Sunday, and I want to be here for that, but as of Friday I officially don’t work here any more. I’m down for a shift in London next Thursday.”
She felt sick. “Next Thursday?”
He nodded again.
“So, a week from now you’ll be back in London?”
“I have tried to speak to you about this,” he said. “You never wanted to discuss it.”
“No, I didn’t.” She still didn’t. “I kept hoping something would change, and you’d be able to stay.” She watched him intently as he reached for his coffee again. The nausea she’d previously felt was replaced by fiery anger. “Would you have stayed if it had been a possibility?”
His features scrunched up. “What?”
“Sometimes, it feels as though you want to go. You’re so calm about it – as though it’s fine with you.”
With a frustrated growl, he paced the small room. “I don’t want to go. If I had a choice, of course I’d stay. But I’ve never had a choice.”
“You do have a choice,” she snapped. “You could just stay.”
“Without a job?”
She nodded while her windpipe constricted. “Stay here with me.”
“You know I can’t,” he said sadly.
Tears filled her eyes and dripped down her cheeks. “I know, but I thought I’d ask anyway … because I really don’t think long-distance relationships work.”
“Ours will.” He stared into his coffee. “And it’s only temporary, anyway.”
“Do you really think a job will magically become available here?”
“Not magically, no! But Sergeant Proctor did a lot of groundwork. I really think eventually it will be deemed necessary to have another officer here. And when that decision is made, I’ll be first in line for the job.”
“I think you’re being na?ve,” she said fiercely. “I know what will happen. You’re all fired up now, but once you get back to London, you’ll forget about your life here.”
He inhaled a deep breath. Opening his mouth, he started to speak, then clamped his mouth shut again as his eyes sparked with irritation.
When he walked out of the kitchen, she expected to hear the front door close behind him, but as far as she could tell he didn’t leave the flat. After five minutes of silence, she wandered to the living room and found him on the couch with his head in his hands.
“There is another option,” he said, turning his head in her direction. “You could come to London with me.”
Her tear ducts sprang into action again. “I can’t…”
“Not forever,” he said calmly. “Just until I get a job here again, then we’ll come back together.”
“If I come to London with you, it will end up being permanent.”
He shook his head. “I really think I can get my job back here. We just need to be patient.”
For a moment, she actually considered going to London.
But then she glanced out of the window at the stretch of golden sand and the stunning expanse of sea, which had looked dark and brooding yesterday, but was enticingly turquoise today.
Seagulls squawked as they sailed on the wind.
She thought of the ice cream machines, and all she’d learned about making ice cream.
Her mind conjured the chatter and laughter in the shop while people indulged in the treats she’d made.
For the first time in her life, she had a job that she loved, and she had friends…
“This is my home,” she said, as she sat beside Flynn.
“We’d come back.” He wiped tears from her cheeks. “I promise you.”
“There’s nothing for me in London. You’d be working long hours, and I’d be twiddling my thumbs.”
“You could find a job.”
“I have a job here.” She nudged his hand from her face and drew away.
“I don’t want to leave. You won’t stay. Maybe that should tell us everything we need to know about where this relationship is headed.
Neither of us will put the relationship above our jobs.
” She lifted her shoulders in a shrug. “If I go with you, I’ll end up resenting you, the same as you’d resent me if you stayed here without a job. ”
“But I’m not choosing my job over you,” he said. “I’m only trying to find a temporary solution while we figure things out.”
“I think we need to be realistic,” she said. “A long-distance relationship will only drag things out. We’ll just end up arguing on the phone until we can’t even be bothered to call each other any more.”
“That’s not true.”
“A clean break will be easier in the long run,” she said, wondering if they were her own words or her uncle’s. She was fairly sure he’d drummed them into her whenever they moved to a new city and she’d been desperate to stay in touch with her friends. “It might be for the best,” she whispered.
He stayed quiet for so long she thought she might have convinced him.
“I have to go to work,” he said eventually. “But I can tell you now that if you want a clean break from me… you’re going to be sorely disappointed. You might give up on us because things get hard, but I won’t.”
More tears spilled down her cheeks, and she tasted the salt of them as they ran over her lips. “I just don’t want you to leave,” she said.
Shifting in front of her, he kissed her softly. “We’ll figure this out. I promise.”
The sureness of his voice might have convinced her. Except she genuinely couldn’t see how their relationship would survive them living hundreds of miles apart.