A Rip in the Veil (46 page)
“Bad night?” Joan, her sister-in-law, asked next morning.
Alex yawned and handed over Mark into Joan’s waiting arms.
“I couldn’t sleep.” She nodded a good morning to their housekeeper, Mrs Gordon, but shook her head at the bowl of porridge. Her insides were clenched tight around a pebble of nagging concern, and just the thought of food made her queasy.
With each passing day, Alex grew more nervous, making both Joan and Mrs Gordon jumpy as well. He should be back by now, and Alex spent far too many hours with her eyes glued to the lane. When she finally heard the sound of horses, she dropped the basket she was carrying, bunched up her skirts, and flew up the lane to meet him.
She saw Samson riderless and turned, bewildered, to Simon. Her heart came to a screeching halt before it started up again, and she moved towards the horse, her hands stretched out to touch the man who wasn’t there.
“Matthew?” Her eyes nailed themselves to Simon’s and the expression she saw in them turned the air in her lungs to lead, a dragging weight that threatened to suffocate her. He was dead, her Matthew was dead, and oh my God, how was she to go on without him? “Matthew?” she repeated, hoping that there was another explanation for the haunted look on Simon’s face.
“Ah, Alex,” Simon said in a choked voice. “I’m so sorry, lass.”
She shook her head; she didn’t want him to be sorry, please don’t let him be sorry. The household congregated around them; Joan and Mrs Gordon, Rosie with Mark in arms as well as Sam, Gavin and Robbie. She didn’t see them, she saw only the empty saddle where Matthew should have been, and all she wanted was to die.
“What?” She cleared her thickening throat. “What has happened to him, where is he?” Simon dismounted and Alex flew at him.
“Answer me! Where’s my husband? Why isn’t he here, with you?”
“He’s gone,” Simon said, grabbing at her flailing arms. “Dearest Lord, he’s gone.” He began to cry. Alex was taken over by a slow seeping cold, a thickening of her blood that began at her feet and worked itself upwards.
“No!” She tore herself free from Simon’s hands. “No! No!” She wheeled and fled, because maybe if she ran fast enough and far enough, none of this would be true.
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Copyright Notice
Published in 2014 by the author
using SilverWood Books Empowered Publishing®
Second Edition
SilverWood Books
30 Queen Charlotte Street, Bristol, BS1 4HJ
Copyright © Anna Belfrage 2014
The right of Anna Belfrage to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the copyright holder.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
ISBN 978-1-78132-167-6 (paperback)
ISBN 978-1-78132-168-3 (ebook)
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