Chapter 43
The group was still buzzing from the trip to see the dolphins, Millie especially so as she flicked through the photos she’d taken, laughing as she showed one with the dolphin arcing through the air beside the boat to her mum.
The sheer joy radiating from the kids was making Hannah grin as they made their way along the dock system to reboard the Ballygowan.
Her own phone buzzed for her attention, and she pulled it free of her pocket.
‘It’s Ian,’ she said as she took the call. They’d only spoken a few hours before – he was doing well, out of hospital and happy to be home. It had surprised Hannah how relieved she had felt for him.
Chatting about stuff back home, how much he was looking forward to her return, it had gone some way towards softening her fears about what she would face once she got back.
Somehow, the thought that they would deal with it together, sort it all out and begin to think about how to move forwards felt good.
And logical. Nothing was a given, not yet.
And letting Louis slip out of her heart was going to be a fight.
Telling him it was over was easy compared to dealing with the feelings she’d developed for him.
But it had seemed to be the only decision she could make, the only chance she had to sort her life out.
She pressed the phone to her ear and said her hellos to Ian, her grin turning to a frown when there was no reply.
‘Ian?’ she repeated, louder this time, earning a look of concern from Ruth. ‘He’s not replying…’
‘Is something wrong?’ Ruth asked.
‘Ian, are you OK? Can you hear me?’
With no reply, all Hannah could do was listen for clues. There was ambient noise, rustling and then an indistinct voice.
‘Anything?’ Ruth said.
Hannah shook her head. She was about to give up, end the call and phone back when the voices became more distinct. Voices, plural. One was Ian; the other was female.
Maybe Ian had phoned by accident – butt-dialled her or something when whoever she could hear had arrived.
She knew he had people coming in to help him recuperate.
But then the rustling gave way to a clearer listening environment, as though a covering had been pulled away from the phone, a sheet perhaps.
Hannah couldn’t make sense of what she was listening to, not at first. Then she stilled, Ruth and the kids stopping with her in surprise as other people spilled past them like a river around a cluster of rocks as she realised what she was listening to.
It couldn’t be… There was no way… Except there was nothing else it could be, no room for doubt after a while. She was listening to Ian having sex with someone.
‘Ian? What’s going on? I can hear you…’
The analytical side of her brain wanted to know how he was managing it with a broken leg, plus damaged ribs and shoulder; the rest of her shuddered away from wanting the details.
Either way it was clear she wasn’t mistaken, her certainty compounded when suddenly everything went quiet and Ian’s breathless voice came clear through the handset, directly into her brain.
‘Shit… Hello?’
He sounded as shocked as she felt. ‘Hello, Ian. I’m here. You phoned me.’
‘No, I didn’t – I didn’t mean to… I…’
‘I don’t suppose you did. Not what I was expecting to hear when I picked up your call, if I’m being honest.’
‘No – it’s not… What do you think you heard?’
There was more rustling of material, or maybe shifting of people, as Hannah shook her head.
‘Are you going to make me say it out loud, Ian? After everything you promised, I’m hearing you—’ A wave of nausea flooded over her, and Hannah turned away, the hand holding her phone dropping to her side.
By the time she put the phone back to her ear, Ian was partway through an excuse.
‘Don’t. Please, don’t. I don’t deserve any more of your lies, Ian. Just be honest with me, once and for all.’
A long moment of time passed before Ian sighed, resignation in his voice.
‘I thought it would work. I love you, Hannah – nothing about that has changed. But I met Melissa a while ago and, I don’t know, we just couldn’t ignore what we were feeling.
It was a compulsion, an itch that absolutely had to be scratched. ’
‘Wow. That sounds lovely. So why don’t you just be with Melissa?’
‘She’s married. They have a little boy. She doesn’t want to wreck her child’s home life.’
Hannah’s eyebrows, already arched, did their best to lose themselves in her hairline.
‘How thoughtful of her. But she’s happy to wreck mine?’
There was a huge pause, a silence which felt to Hannah like a reckoning, a final hammer dropping.
‘You were hoping I would accept it as a mistake, and wouldn’t look any further, weren’t you? That I’d believe your feelings for me were genuine and then you could carry on shagging her even after we got married?’
‘The thing is I love you so much, Hannah. I always have. I couldn’t bear the thought of losing you.’
‘Wow. And somehow you thought this would be a good compromise?’
‘We could have had everything we wanted; none of that would have changed…’
‘Apart from the fact you’d be living a complete lie, that is?’
‘But I love you. That’s what makes all this so difficult for me.’
‘Difficult for you? You unbelievably awful fucker,’ Hannah said, aware her words had caught Ruth and Millie off guard, while Nathan smirked in embarrassment.
‘You low-life piece of shit. How stupid am I? I should have known. Well, Ian, you and Melissa can ride off into the sunset for all I care. Or be there for her whenever she gets itchy and needs to be scratched…’ Hannah’s voice oozed with the disgust she could no longer hold at bay.
‘But whatever you need to do, leave me the fuck out of it, will you?’
She ended the call before he could hear her sob, then ran blindly away from Ruth and the kids, needing to be alone, staring into the middle distance as she tried to make sense of what had just happened.