Flying on the wings of Dragons - Book 3, The Porth Kerensa Series

Chapter Thirteen

It is just gone 9pm when I arrive at London Victoria. I stand on the concourse of the big old station and stare around me like a bewildered out of towner. I have travelled through Victoria so many times in my life that I know it like the back of my hand, yet for the first time the noise, size and all the people paralyse me with dread. I glance at the entrance to the tube, though I have no intention of going anywhere near it ever again. Still I cannot help look at it and even smile slightly, for without it I would not have had my brief time with Joe.

     I can go north to Highbury, where I used to live to stay with Sue near my old home, maybe I could even ring Simon and go back to the flat. Or I can go south to Earlswood and stay with my mum. None of the choices appeal to me when all I really want to do is board the train back to Cornwall and Joe. But that is not an option anymore. The door has closed on that haven. I drag my cases through the station and I hail a black cab to take me to a hotel a few streets away from where I used to live.

     It is strange driving past the flat and I strain my neck to see in the window. There are lights on in the lounge, the bedroom and the bathroom but that does not surprise me. The rotting tree has been cut down though, and as the taxi driver sweeps past the house my daughter died in I almost lean forward and ask him to stop the cab to let me out. But this is not a movie and there is no happy ending for me and Simon. I don't want one anyway. How can he ever live up to what Joe gave me? How can I ever love Simon in any way at all, let alone the way I love Joe? I cannot share a half hearted life with the man I married all those years ago. I couldn't do it when I was shattered by grief and living in despair; there is no way I can do it now when I have been repaired and held and loved by Joe Bailey.

Sitting alone in an anonymous hotel room with no company except for the television I think of Joe alone in his cottage. I do not want to think of the look on his face when he came home and found me no longer there, or the things he might be thinking about me now, yet he will not leave my thoughts. The phone sits next to me and before I can stop myself I dial his number and listen to it ring his end. It only rings two times before he picks it up. My throat seizes up at his rasping hello.

     "Joe," I say quietly.

     He makes a strange noise which might be a muffled sob before he speaks, "Hey you." His voice so soft and sad brings tears to my eyes, and I hold the phone away from me for a second for I don't know what to say to him now. "Where are you, Lia?"

     "In London, staying in a hotel until I work out where I'm going to live."

     "Why did you leave me without saying goodbye? You didn't even leave me a note," he says. I know he is crying the same as me.

     "I left without saying goodbye because you would have made me stay," I whisper. "And a note seemed so trite. I couldn't think what to write."

     "I told you I'd never make you stay if you didn't want to."

     "I know, Joe."

     "The why the hell did you leave if you want to be here?"

     "Because I can't give you what you want."

     "I wish I'd said sorry for last night this morning but I left the house all riled up and never dreamt you'd take what I said to heart. For Gods sake woman I've been going out of my mind ever since I got home and found you gone. I'm going to drive to London and come and get you, and bring you home."

     My heart leaps and instantly plummets again. "No, Joe," I say even as my heart screams at me to shut up and let him come and get me. "I rang to say I'm sorry I left the way I did. I love you and I hope that you have everything you ever want in your life."