The White House - Book 6, The Porth Kerensa Series

Chapter Nineteen

The harsh sound of James’ alarm clock cut, sharply, through Elise’s dream of a little brown haired boy walking along the harbour, holding her husband’s hand and eating an ice cream. She opened her eyes, resentful at the intrusion, yet also grateful that she hadn’t woken up on the attic floor. James fumbled for the clock and ended the shrill noise with a mumbled curse to accompany it. 

Elise stretched from the curled up position she’d slept in and recalled long ago nights that James had slept wrapped around her; both of them naked and pressed close. Now they were sleeping back to back, with a huge space between them and both wearing nightclothes. With every day that passed he was getting further and further away from her and she didn’t know how to stop the distance growing.

“Sorry if I woke you,” he said, getting out of bed and putting his dressing gown on.

“It’s fine,” she murmured. “I’ll get up and make you breakfast, if you’d like?”

“I’m not hungry.”

Elise sat up and switched the bedside lamp on. “James, please tell me how I can make things better between us. I know you don’t trust me and I understand that, but I can’t keep going through every day wondering if today will be the day you’ll leave me. It’s not fair.”

Wearily, he rubbed his hand across his eyes and sat on the edge of the bed. “I know it’s not fair, Elise, but neither were the months of madness I had to watch you endure. I’m not trying to start an argument; I’m just being honest with you about how I feel and right now the only thing I really feel is…”

“Anger,” she said, finishing his sentence for him.

“I can’t talk about this right now,” he said, sighing. “I have to go work. I can’t talk about us or what we’re going to do.”

“It’s a Saturday, why are you going to work?”

“I mentioned last night that I had to go in today and sort out revision classes for the year 11s and I’m taking Monday off in return, but you were a bit tipsy to say the least.”

He stood up and hurried from the room without looking at her, for he couldn’t bear to see the hurt and rejection on her lovely face. He knew he still loved her, but like Sleeping Beauty, his love was trapped behind a thicket of vicious thorns sharp enough to cut them to shreds. He’d had enough of the pain they inflicted on each other. He wasn’t sure either of them could take much more.

He stared at himself in the bathroom mirror and sighed, deeply. There were bags under his eyes, his forehead was wrinkled in consternation and his hair looked greyer. The weeks of disturbed sleep finding Elise in the attic and the nightmares that plagued him every night, were beginning to show on his face and he wished they’d never moved to Cornwall. He should have let Elise slip, quietly, from his life, sold the house and given her half the money to do what she fucking wanted with it, he thought, venomously. 

He should have let her go months ago.

But how could he ever live without her?

His need for her trapped him…and that made him angrier than anything else.

      ******

Elise was sitting at the dining table, nursing a cup of coffee, when Val finally came downstairs. Val got herself a mug too and sat next to her. “Thanks for letting me have a lie in, Lise.”

“I figured you’d probably appreciate it after the amount of wine you drank last night.”

Val scowled then smiled. “It was a good evening…you and James really are the most fabulous hosts. You two are legendary on the party scene, you know. People still talk about the wonderful social occasions celebrated at your gaff.”