Tammy had sent her message two hours previously, after spending a restless night struggling with her thoughts. She still hadn’t had a reply from Ruan, although maybe she shouldn’t even expect one. She wouldn’t blame him if he was ignoring her messages.
She perched on a rock at the back of the beach, hugging her knees with her arms while the waves edged closer to her message.
Her emotions had shifted from hopeful to doubtful to nervous and now to despair.
Ruan was rarely without his phone – unless he was kitesurfing. That was a possibility.
Her spirits lifted and then sank again as an extra powerful wave surged up the beach to within metres of her creation. She’d retreated to the rocks and made herself as inconspicuous as possible, not wanting to talk to anyone about the message or even own it as hers. It was early evening and a few of the dog walkers were out for a stroll, one of them sniffing at a piece of seaweed in the centre of her design.
She pulled her baseball cap lower and pretended to lookat her phone again so that the owner wouldn’t connect the creation with her.
Still no response from Ruan.
Another wave rolled up the beach, its frilly tendrils almost kissing the edge of the design.
Another few minutes and it would be washed away. Ruan wasn’t going to come.
She had to accept that her last rejection had been the final straw.
Tammy rose from her position and walked towards the design. Her efforts had been futile.
Two waves in succession raced up the sands and covered the bottom half of her design. When they retreated, the sand was washed clean. Ten seconds later, another breaker thundered in and erased the rest. Where her message had been, there was now only glistening wet sand and sea foam.
With tears rolling down her cheeks, she turned away, shoved her hands in her pockets and trudged down the beach.
Nothing lasted forever. She should have known that.
CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO
‘Tammy!’
Over the roar of the waves, she caught her name borne on the breeze. From the town end of the beach, a man in a dark suit sprinted across the sand to where she stood with her rake.
‘Tammy!’
‘Ruan?’ she murmured, transfixed by the running figure, his feet splashing through shallow pools, droplets spraying up around him.
She was frozen to the spot as he kept on running towards her.
He doubled up, sucking in breaths. ‘M-my G-God,’ he said between breaths. ‘I’m n-not as fit as I thought I w-as.’
Tammy could have told him differently. His hair was tousled by the wind, his tanned face taut with effort. When he straightened up, her heart squeezed at the sight of this tall, gorgeous man wearing the most ridiculous outfit ever for running along a Cornish beach.
‘Your shoes are soaked,’ she said in a kind of stupefied wonder.
‘Are they?’ He glanced down in amazement at the smart black brogues. ‘You’re right, but I don’t care. Your messageonly just came through on the hands free while I was stuck in the bloody traffic. I left my phone in the office while I had a pasty in town and forgot it was on silent after my meetings.’
‘A pasty?’ Tammy echoed.
‘Yeah. I’d had no lunch and Tammy – I’m sorry I missed it and I’m so late.’
‘You’re not late. Well, you are late, but—’ She turned around. ‘I did a design on the beach and I wanted you to read it but the tide has come in and it’s gone.’
He groaned. ‘Argh, no. I am so sorry. What did it say?’
‘It said …’ She hesitated. ‘It said something I need to say and couldn’t so I wrote it in the sand.’
Ruan looked at her with an expression of joy that made her heart soar. ‘You can tell me now. Face to face.’ He put his hands on her shoulders. ‘Say it out loud or I’ll never know.’
