Chapter 49
NOW
Late August
Saturday
I let the icy water wash over my feet. It stung my skin, but I didn’t move.
My thoughts drifted back to Malta. None of this would have happened if I’d just stayed there. Blackwater Stables… Charlotte… Ryan… They would all have been better off.
And so would I.
‘Hey.’
Ben’s voice drew me back from my thoughts.
I turned, squinting in the afternoon sun as I watched him cross the sand towards me, hands shoved into the pockets of his jeans.
‘I tried your flat, and then the hotel. One of your colleagues said you might be here,’ Ben said, almost apologetically.
‘Did they tell you what happened?’
Ben nodded. ‘I can’t believe they actually arrested you.’
‘It was only a matter of time, right?’ I said with shrug.
‘I’m sorry I wasn’t around.’
I shrugged again.
‘They charged me,’ I said quietly.
Ben’s expression tightened. ‘With what?’
‘Fraud.’ I swallowed. ‘And I’m still under investigation for murder.’
‘M—murder?’ Ben stared at me.
I nodded slowly. ‘They released me on bail for the fraud. But—’ my voice broke ‘—they really think I killed Charlotte.’
‘I can’t believe it.’ He shook his head. ‘How could they think that?’
‘Harcourt,’ I said, his name leaving a bitter taste in my mouth. ‘He embellished what he told us yesterday. Added my name into everything.’
Ben’s jaw dropped as he stared at me. ‘Why would he do that?’
I shook my head. ‘I don’t know. It doesn’t make sense. None of it makes sense.’
‘How are you holding up?’
I met his gaze.
‘I’m not.’
Ben nodded, as he bit his lower lip.
‘I’m sorry I left the way I did yesterday.’ He dragged a hand across his face. ‘I shouldn’t have done that.’
‘You were angry,’ I said flatly. I understood that.
‘With Ryan, yes.’
I shook my head. ‘With both of us.’
‘No,’ Ben said firmly, as he waded into the surf. ‘I wasn’t angry at you.’
‘Your trainers are getting wet,’ I pointed out.
‘I don’t care,’ Ben said, without flinching. ‘I was annoyed with Ryan for everything that happened two years ago – the way they got rid of me, the fear that caused me. But I was frustrated with him for you too.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you don’t seem to be able to be angry at him for yourself.’
I rolled my eyes and padded out of the water.
‘I’m serious, Kirsty,’ Ben insisted as he followed me. ‘It’s like you don’t hear the way he speaks to you.’
‘And how’s that?’ I asked, pivoting back to face him.
‘The same way Janine speaks to you.’
I froze as his words hit. Puffing out a breath, I lowered myself to the sand, my legs suddenly feeling shaky.
‘Tell me something,’ Ben said, as he sat beside me. ‘Does Ryan make you happy? Not just occasionally, or potentially,’ he stipulated. ‘But really happy?’
I opened my mouth, but the answer didn’t come as easily as I’d expected. ‘I… I’m not sure,’ I admitted reluctantly. ‘I mean, he does make me happy. But…’ I licked my lips. ‘He also makes me feel off balance. Like I don’t know where I stand.’
Ben didn’t react. Didn’t move.
‘I’m a lot,’ I added quickly. ‘I know I am. I can’t blame him for getting frustrated and overwhelmed.’
‘Are you different to when he first met you?’ Ben asked curiously.
‘Well, no. I’ve always been a lot.’
‘So that’s not new to him?’
I shook my head. ‘I guess not.’
‘And, for the record, I don’t think you’re a lot. You’ve been dealing with a lot. But that’s not the same thing.’
I shook my head, lowering my gaze. ‘No, it’s Ryan that’s had it tough. His family. The stables. Me.’
‘You’re healing from what your own family put you through.’
I snorted. ‘That’s ridiculous.’ Yet, even as I said it, I couldn’t help but wonder if there was an element of truth to it.
‘From what I’ve seen, it’s unrelenting. The criticism, the dismissals…’
‘They’re just looking out for me. Protecting me. It’s what family does.’
‘Or maybe they are holding you back. Keeping you in your place. The place they think you should be.’
‘They wouldn’t do that,’ I said, but my voice wavered.
Would they?
‘You felt like you needed Ryan, because they made you feel like you weren’t good enough on your own. That you weren’t strong enough. That you couldn’t cope.’
I kicked at the sand.
‘But look at what you have accomplished, Kirsty.’
‘Getting arrested is hardly an accomplishment.’
‘I’m not talking about that. None of that is on you. You built a life for yourself, first in Malta, then here.’
‘Ryan was with me in Malta.’
Ben shrugged, conceding that point. ‘But he wasn’t with you here.’
I couldn’t dispute that one.
‘Charlotte thought I stayed in Swanage to be close to Ryan, hoping to win him back,’ I said.
‘Did you?’
I paused. ‘Maybe on some level. I mean, he did come back, didn’t he?’
‘Only to leave you again.’
I exhaled. He had a point.
‘Yesterday, after you’d left, he said I was manipulative.’ I swallowed. ‘Like Charlotte.’ The words caught in my throat.
Ben scoffed. ‘That’s ridiculous.’ He shook his head. ‘For a start, you are nothing like her. And secondly,’ he gave me a small smile, ‘I don’t even think you’d know how to be manipulative if you tried.’
I didn’t respond. I just sat there, letting his words settle around me. They felt warm and reassuring.
And yet a flicker of doubt still lingered.
Ryan thought I was manipulative. Ryan, who knew me better than anyone.
‘Why did you want to marry him?’ Ben asked.
‘Why wait when you know what you want?’
‘Did you know?’
I hesitated. ‘I thought I did.’
I rubbed my thumb against the empty space on my ring finger. ‘But maybe what I really wanted was…’ I shook my head, searching for what it was. That intangible sense of something that I couldn’t quite grasp. ‘Safety,’ I said finally.
The realisation hit me hard.
That’s what it was. What I wanted. What I’d always wanted.
Safety. Certainty. A place that I belonged.
‘The highs. The lows. The inconsistency. It would all have been bearable if I knew he would always come back…’ I stopped as I realised what I’d said.
‘I needed that sense of belonging,’ I said quietly. ‘When I was with him, it was the first time I felt like I was accepted. Like I was wanted.’
Ben lifted my chin, till my gaze met his.
‘But does he still make you feel like that?’
I shook my head. ‘No.’ I took a deep breath, my shoulders rising and falling.
‘When we were living at the stables, I felt like I was balancing on the edge between hope and doubt. Every high came with a low. Every promise with a retraction. Everything was so uncertain. I never quite knew which version of him I would get at any moment.’
‘Why would you want that again?’
‘Because it wasn’t always like that. He wasn’t always like that.’
‘And that was enough?’
‘It was everything.’
At least it had been.