“There’s nothing wrong with me showing an interest in your life, Hannah.”
“Great. I take it that means you’ll be sponsoring me in the charity race.”
Janice seemed surprised Hannah had to ask. “Of course I’ll sponsor you.” She rose to her feet. “Right, I should get going. Those builders have been left to their own devices for long enough.”
“I’ll see you out,” Dorothy said.
Hannah scoffed. They were clearly about to have another conflab about Hannah’s non-existent love life.
Hannah wrapped her hands around her mug and raising it to her lips, took a sip. She reflected on the previous evening and the mixed messages she’d got from Gabe. One minute, he was flirting with her and talking about triple dates, something Hannah had to admit she found both scaryandheaven-sent. Then in the next, Gabe couldn’t seem to get out of there quickly enough.
Hannah took a deep breath and exhaled. She didn’t think she’d ever met such a contradictory man.
CHAPTER30
Gabe sat cross-legged at the foot of his mother’s grave. He picked at the tufts of grass next to his feet, which were already short, thanks to the care Gabe’s dad took looking after the plot.
Roger kept a simple push-along mower in the boot of his car especially for the job and he made sure to keep up a rotation of fresh flowers in the grave vase. Of course, there were paid groundsmen about the place, whose job it was to keep the cemetery looking respectable. But that didn’t stop Roger applying his own personal touch.
Setting out for a walk, Gabe hadn’t planned on visiting his mum, but as was usual when he had something on his mind, he’d gone into automatic pilot and found himself meandering along the cemetery pathways until suddenly he’d reached her final resting place.
Lifting his gaze, he stared at the headstone and not for the first time wished it was her sat opposite instead of a huge engraved slab of marble. He wanted to see her riant brown eyes glisten with curiosity and intelligence as she talked to him about life, art, history, or whatever she had on her mind.
He wanted to watch her laughter lines deepen as she threw her head back and guffawed uncontrollably at a joke only she understood. But more than anything, Gabe wanted to feel his mum’s arms around him and hear her comforting words of wisdom.
He could have talked to his dad, but rather than being a sounding board Roger was a man who sprang into action and not always with Gabe’s approval. The bouquet of flowers he’d sent to Hannah being a prime example.
“You’d like her, Mum,” Gabe said. “She’s funny and smart and I know you’ll call me shallow when I say this, but she’s beautiful too.” Picturing Hannah, he couldn’t help but sigh. “She’s the whole package, all right.”
“You’re quite a catch yourself,” he heard his mum say.
Gabe scoffed. Like most mums, his was biased. Even in death it seemed.
His smile faded. If his mum was sat on a cloud looking down on him, encouraging him during the good times and supporting him through the bad, she also knew the reason he was holding back.
“Talk to her, Gabe. Tell her how you feel.”
The previous evening played out in his head. “I almost did, Mum.” When Hannah had joked about everyone thinking they’d make a great couple, Gabe had been so close to admitting he thought that too.
“Then what stopped you?” his mum asked.
That was something Gabe himself had been questioning from the second he’d chickened out. “Who knows?”
He pictured his mum wearing the exact expression she’d always used whenever he had cause to be evasive. Lips pursed and brows raised, her eyes drilled into him.
Gabe relented. “Because the moment passed. Because she might not feel the same about me and I didn’t want to scare her away.” He fell silent for a moment. “Because she might feelexactlythe same and then I’d have to…” His voice trailed off.
“Explain?”
Gabe nodded.
“Sounds to me like you’re the one who’s frightened.”
Gabe let out a laugh. “Of course I bloody am.”
He could still feel the sudden panic he felt when he saw the nameKateflash up on his phone screen. He couldn’t believe after all that time her details were still on his contact list. Gabe chewed on the inside of his cheek, embarrassed by his own behaviour. “I lied to Hannah, Mum. I lied. And then I did a runner.”
Staring at her headstone, he wondered if his mum was as disappointed in her son, as her son was in himself.
