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  The brandy warms my throat but little else. I lean forward in my seat, my fingers laced around the glass, and tell Amy about Sam and Toby and Toby’s dead mother, whose name I realise I don’t even know. She listens carefully without interrupting, the sound of her little breaths beside me reassuring me. Her gown has fallen open a little at the front, exposing her knee and thigh, and I glance at it now and again, wondering what it would feel like, what Sam felt when he was with Toby’s mum.

  ‘Oh hun,’ Amy says, leaning forward to look into my eyes. She puts a hand on my leg and I feel its warmth through my jeans. ‘What a terrible thing to happen. For all of you. You must be feeling awful.’

  I nod silently, and stare down at Amy’s hand.

  She leans closer and now I can smell faint traces of her perfume, mixed with the clean fabric smell of her pyjamas. ‘You know you can stay with me, Will, love. Don’t you? As long as you need.’

  I do know that. I knew that even before I left the house earlier, before I left Sam. I’ve known it for years. And as we sit by the warming aga, our breath mingling in front of us, the warmth of her hand on my leg, I can acknowledge to myself why I’m here.

  I turn slightly in my seat towards her and our faces are suddenly very close. I can feel each of her exhalations on my cheek. Her hand on my leg shifts slightly, moving slowly up, and her breath is coming a little faster through parted lips. She licks them but doesn’t move her gaze from mine, then shifts an inch closer to me on the bench. Tentatively, I raise a hand and gently brush a stray strand of hair away from her face, and she sucks in a breath. I let my hand drop to her shoulder and down her arm, and she closes her eyes. Gently, I pull her towards me and she moves easily, willingly, offering her face up to mine. I bend my head very slightly and our lips are millimetres apart. Hers are soft and welcoming, her breath still sweet and toothpaste-minty, her body warm and fragrant. I duck lower and our lips just brush together.

  She opens her eyes and kind of snaps up. ‘Hey, hey, what are we doing? Seriously, dude, what the fuck? This isn’t what you want, is it?’

  I jerk back, shaking my head. ‘No. I … I don’t know what I’m … Amy, I’m so sorry …’

  She stands up and laces her fingers behind her head, walking away. ‘Holy mother of Harry …’

  I stand also. ‘I thought … I don’t know, I thought you … wanted me to …’

  ‘Oh no, don’t you make this my fault, William Henley. Uh-uh, no way.’

  ‘Oh God. Oh God, I’m a mess, Ames. I’m sorry, honestly, I don’t know what happened …’

  ‘Well I do.’ She turns round suddenly, her expression fierce. ‘You know damn well how I feel about you. You’ve known it for years.’ I hang my head. She’s right. ‘So it’s no fucking coincidence that you come straight to my door the bloody second you find out your fella slept with a lady. Is it?’

  ‘Amy …’

  ‘Shut the fuck up.’

  ‘Right.’

  She folds her arms and regards me savagely, like a teacher. Then unfolds them, shakes her head, and her expression softens. ‘Will, what the fuck are you doing?’

  ‘I—’

  ‘That was rhetorical, shit-for-brains. I told you not to talk.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘I mean, seriously, why aren’t you with Sam right now?’

  ‘I tr—’ She raises one finger and I clamp my lips shut.

  ‘That guy adores you. And you adore him. You two are like … I don’t know, peaches and cream.’ She wrinkles her nose, then shakes her head. ‘No, not peaches and cream. You’re like peaches and peaches. You’re the same. You belong together. He’s yours and you’re his, what the fuck is all this “I’m leaving him” shit you’ve been spouting?’

  I wait a few seconds, but it seems she genuinely wants an answer this time. ‘He lied to me, Amy. For two years. How can I get over that?’

  She’s shaking her head. ‘Get over what? That the poor kid was so terrified of losing you, he tried to cover up the single most important event in his life?’

  ‘No—’

  ‘That he was probably tortured for two years keeping it from you?’

  ‘But—’

  ‘That finally the guy was sure enough of you to ask you to marry him, and at that moment, that second most important event in his life, he chose to tell you about the other one?’

  I open my mouth to object, but no sound comes.

  ‘And now, the second that sweet, loving guy needs you more than he ever has before – a traumatic, upsetting, difficult time – mere moments after you agree to be his and he to be yours forever, you sacrifice him to the god of pride? Or whatever it is.’

  ‘It’s not pride to expect the man you love more than any other person in the world to be honest with you.’

  She nods, eyebrows up. ‘Oh, right, sure, OK then. That seems fair. So, of course you’ve told him all about me?’

  ‘What do you mean, told him about you? You know him. He knows you. You’re friends.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s right, we are. I’m his friend because I’m your friend and he’s your boyfriend. You introduced us, way back when.’

  ‘Exactly. So, yes, I told him a bit about you, and then I introduced him to you.’ I shrug, but she’s not letting it go.

  ‘And you told him all about me?’

  I roll my eyes. ‘Oh, Christ, if you’re talking about our one drunken fumble when we were teenagers, then no, I haven’t told him. Why would I, it was years ago?’

  She says nothing, just nods. And peers at me.

  ‘It’s completely different …’

  Nods. Peers.

  ‘He had a child, for fuck’s sake …’

  ‘And you still see me, sometimes twice in a week.’

  ‘It’s not the same …’

  ‘And I’m in love with you. Did you tell him that?’ She narrows her eyes.

  ‘I was going to …’

  Eyebrow.

  ‘I was just waiting for the right …’

  Folds arms.

  ‘I …’ I can’t think of a thing to say.

  ‘Close your mouth, William, you look like a fish.’

  *

  I’m very glad I only took a single sip of the brandy. Amy gives me a hug and some gloves and shoves me back out onto the street. There’s a teensy bit of ice starting to form on the windscreen, but there’s enough space to see through safely, and with the heater on it clears before I get to the bypass.

  The hospital in our little town is a walk-in centre for minor injuries, and a day-surgery. No point going there. It’s past five by the time I arrive at the Queen Victoria Royal Infirmary in the next town over. Madly, I worry for a second that it’ll be closed at five a.m., but of course it isn’t. Mentally I slap my head – it’s a hospital, idiot, it doesn’t keep office hours.

  I pay and display, then run into the main entrance. The woman on the front desk – Anne, according to her badge – looks grey and bloodshot, but she perks up when she sees me and starts smoothing her hair and pressing her lips together. She gives me a welcoming smile, which brings out sweet dimples in her cheeks. I manage to muster up a smile, albeit a worried one.

  ‘Hi Anne. How’s it going? Coming to the end of your shift?’

  ‘Just started, actually. Why, do I look like I’ve been up all night? Cheeky!’

  ‘Oh, no, no, nothing like that. I just thought, because of the time, you know …’

  ‘Hey don’t worry, I’m kidding. Can I help you at all?’

  ‘Oh, God, yes, you can. Thank you. My friend’s son was brought in, probably during the night, possibly before midnight so might be down as admitted yesterday. Would you be able to tell me where he is?’

  ‘I’ll have a look. What’s his name?’

  ‘Um, Toby … Flynn?’

  She looks up sharply. ‘Are you sure?’

  For a nanosecond I consider making something up, but Anne has a lovely face and is staring at me so earnestly, so in the end I tell her everythi
ng. The engagement, the phone call, Sam’s revelation. Her face changes repeatedly as she listens, from disappointment when I mention Sam, to joy, to shock, to bemused outrage.

  ‘You left the ring on the stairs? You cold so-and-so.’

  ‘OK, I know, I wasn’t thinking straight. Can you help me?’

  She shakes her head. ‘I can’t really, I’m afraid. You’re not family are you, so you don’t get to be there.’ She leans forward. ‘But if Toby is under eighteen, he’ll be in the Children’s ward – that’s Albert. First floor, left out of the lifts.’

  ‘Oh my God, Anne, I could kiss you. Thank you so much.’

  She flushes pink immediately, and puts a hand on her hair again. ‘You’re welcome, Will.’ As I take off at a run, she calls after me, ‘Good luck!’

  The door to Albert Ward is locked and has a keypad on the wall next to it, requiring a code. Under the keypad is a button with the word PRESS on it, so I do. I don’t hear a bell or anything, but after a few moments a soft-shoed nurse arrives at the door and opens it.

  ‘Thanks,’ I say, and start to move past, but he blocks my path.

  ‘Can I help you?’ he asks.

  Oh God. He must be the bouncer. And my name’s definitely not down. ‘I’ve come to visit Toby … Flynn,’ I tell him.

  He shakes his head. ‘Sorry, we don’t have anyone here called Toby Flynn.’

  ‘But you do have a Toby, right?’

  ‘Are you family?’

  ‘No. Well, yes. I suppose so. Kind of.’ I think for a moment. ‘I’m kind of his stepfather.’

  The nurse eyes me up. ‘But you don’t know his name?’

  Frustration is bubbling up inside me, threatening to explode in a scalding adrenalin cloud, but I damp it down. ‘Look, the thing is, I’m engaged to Toby’s dad. At least I was. We just got engaged tonight. I think Sam was going to tell me about Toby but then he didn’t and then he got a call saying Toby’s mum had been killed and he rushed off and now …’ I stop and realise suddenly the enormity of everything that’s happened, and how appallingly I’ve reacted and how much my darling Sam needs me right now. What kind of boyfriend am I, to behave like that, in these most dreadful of circumstances? I close my eyes and feel my whole body cringe with shame, and with longing. I’m yearning for Sam, to hold him, to make him feel safe. Because if I’m not feeling safe at the moment, I’m bloody sure that he isn’t either. He must be going through hell, hearing that news about his child’s mother out of the blue, dealing with her family, seeing his little boy hurt, knowing what this will mean for Toby, growing up without his mum. It’s horrific. And I’ve been nothing but selfish. For the second time tonight, I hang my head. I’m the worst person in the world.

  ‘We do have a Toby,’ the nurse says now, kindly. ‘I can’t let you in. But do you want me to get his dad to come out to you?’

  I look up at this miracle before me, and see a halo of light around his head from the strip light behind him. ‘Oh my God. Would you do that? That would be absolutely fantastic. Thank you so much …’ I glance at his name, ‘… Aaron. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate that.’

  ‘OK. Wait here.’

  ‘Yep.’

  He smiles at me sympathetically, and lets the door close softly behind him. Then checks it several times by pulling then pushing it, to make absolutely sure I can’t get in.

  Two minutes or what feels like two years later, it opens again, and there in the hushed, darkened, middle-of-the-night hospital corridor is my beloved Sam. I want to wrap my arms around him immediately, hold him tight and tell him how sorry I am, what a dick I’ve been and beg him to forgive me. But his face is drawn with worry and sleeplessness, his expression is apprehensive, his eyes are swollen and red. He sniffs and rubs his cheek, then blinks several times. ‘I wondered if it was going to be you,’ he says, coming right through the door and closing it. ‘The nurse said there was a distraught man out here wanting to see me.’ He smiles weakly. ‘I didn’t think it could be my dad.’

  ‘How’s Toby?’ I ask, as gently as I can. Sam brightens a little, pleased that I’ve asked. Which makes me very glad I did.

  ‘He’s OK. He’s asleep. Obviously he doesn’t know about his mum yet.’ He looks down and shakes his head. ‘It’s absolutely terrible to think he won’t remember her.’

  ‘What was her name?’

  He looks up sharply. ‘Why?’

  I take a step forward. ‘Because she was – she is – important. She will always be important.’

  He inhales deeply through his nose, and as he exhales he seems to sag a bit, as if a massive weight of tension is leaving him. ‘Sarah. Sarah Miller.’

  ‘So is he Toby Miller?’

  Sam nods. ‘Although now …’ He squeezes his eyes shut and a single tear rolls out of each one. He clears his throat and quickly brushes them away. ‘Sorry.’

  Watching him go through this is shredding my heart. ‘Sorry? Oh, God, Sam, you’ve got nothing to be …’ He closes his eyes and sways a bit, so quickly I step forward and put my arms around him. As tired as I am, I feel his utter exhaustion as he almost collapses into me. ‘Oh Sammy, I’m so, so sorry.’

  ‘No, I’m sorry …’ His voice is muffled against my shoulder.

  ‘Oh, don’t. Please. I’ve been appallingly selfish and vile and unsympathetic and no kind of fiancé at all, and all I want is for you to forgive me.’

  He leans back a little to meet my eyes, and I see his cheeks are wet again. Then he nods. ‘I will.’

  ‘Oh thank God.’

  ‘And will you forgive me?’ he asks me eventually, stepping back and looking at me keenly. ‘For keeping Toby a secret? For bending the truth about Samaritans? For not telling you about Sarah?’

  I shake my head, and his face falls. He steps back a little, but I step too and close the gap again. ‘Sam, there’s nothing to forgive. I wish you had told me, but I understand why you didn’t. And if you had, I would have gone with you to visit him.’

  His face lights up. ‘Would you? Really?’

  ‘Course I would. I’m his stepdad, aren’t I? I want to make sure the little tyke grows up right.’

  ‘Seriously? I mean, you understand what you’re saying?’

  I nod. ‘Well, let me make sure I’ve got this right. You’re his dad, right? So presumably he’ll be coming to live with you now?’

  Sam nods slowly. ‘You said “coming”.’

  ‘Yeah. I did.’ I step back a little now, and take hold of both his hands. ‘I mean, if that’s OK? You know, if you still want to … you know. Marry me.’

  A fat laugh escapes him, and he sniffs and rubs his nose. ‘Oh my God. Oh my God. I thought … I thought I was going to have to do this on my own.’ He closes his eyes for a second and releases a heavy breath, then opens them and gazes at me. ‘Of course I still want to marry you, you toad. As long as you promise never to react like that again when you find out I’ve been lying to you for two years.’

  I shake my head with a smile. ‘I’ll try not to.’

  ‘That’s good enough for me.’

  I’m already holding his hands, and quickly I kneel down before him. ‘Samuel Flynn …’

  Instantly, he’s kneeling too. ‘William Henley …’

  *

  A few moments later, the ward door opens again and Aaron the nurse finds two men on their knees on the cold, hard floor, arms wrapped around each other, each one with red-rimmed watery eyes. He takes in the scene in silence for a few moments, then nods decisively. ‘OK,’ he says, ‘I believe you. You can come in.’

  If you liked An Unforgettable Proposal, why not try…

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  About the Author

  Beth Thomas wrote her first book at the age of six. It was a short social commentary about ethnicity and fear of being different, incorporating magic, travel, adventure and ultimately, murder. The death at the end was an unexpected shock and came about as she had no idea how else to end the
story. She thinks she’s improved since then, and hope that now her endings are a little more planned and satisfying. She lives in Kent with her family.

  MARNIE RICHES

  The Love Potion

  The Vengeful One

  Copyright

  Avon

  An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

  1 London Bridge Street

  London SE1 9GF

  www.harpercollins.co.uk

  First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins 2015

  Copyright © Marnie Riches 2015

  Marnie Riches asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

  Ebook Edition © February 2015 ISBN: 9780008135065

  Version: 2015–01–23

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  The Love Potion

  About the Author

  The Love Potion

  The card featuring a lovelorn teddy and hand-scrawled limerick had promised, if not a day of heady romance, then at least fond attentiveness outside working hours. He had propped it on his pillow so that it was three inches from her face when she opened her eyes. A red paper blur. Same routine every year. As Valentine’s Days went, based on experience, she anticipated that it would be, at best, satisfactory.

  Thunderous little feet approaching represented a threat. ‘Ooh! A letter for Dillon, Mummy!’ The glee in his voice betrayed his six-year-old’s violent intentions.