Love Reflection (Entwined Hearts #1) (21 page)

Two hours later and we’re sitting in Saul’s lounge with the television on and the heating up full blast. Soph has left for a shoot and Saul seems a bit distant.

“Do you want me to go?” I ask.

“What... oh, no.” He shakes his head. “Sorry, things playing on my mind.”

“You want to talk about it?” I ask.

“Well, there isn’t really much to say. I mean my mum is a bitch. I’m still not fully recovered, and apparently Dane, who Soph works or used to work with, is now firm friends with you both.”

“Saul!” I screech.

“What?”

“Saul,” I say smiling and twisting my head to look up at him through my eyelashes.

“Oh shit, Pea, don’t do this girlie crap on me. Just tell me what you want. It makes the process so much quicker,” he says grinning down at me.

I playfully slap his arm and say, “You have a thing for Soph?”

His grin disappears and he replies without hesitation. “No. Not at all.”

“Don’t try and lie to me, Saul James! I have known you since we were kiddies.”

“Nothing about my answer is going to change,” he states firmly.

I decide to let it go. I’ve always known there’s a spark between Saul and Soph, they just both always seemed hesitant to take it forward.

Of course, now Dane is on the scene too, who knows what’ll happen, especially as Soph has sworn off all men.

I wake up and rub my eyes disorientated, and quickly assess my surroundings. I realise I’m at Saul’s, on his sofa, lying in his lap. I look up to see him smiling down at me.

“Sorry Saul,” I say trying to sit up, he presses me down.

“Don’t worry, Pea, stay there, go back to sleep, you obviously need it. I’ll take you to the spare room when I’m ready for bed.”

“You can’t carry me,” I say loudly, so loudly that Saul winces at me.

“Sorry,” I whisper and he laughs.

“Pea, you weigh about nine stone wet, seriously, I got you.”

I stare up at him knowing there’s something I need to say, another blemish inside me that I want to clear.

“Saul, I’m sorry for the things I said the day of the accident.” He’s about to try and stop me, but I shake my head and hold out my hand to let him know I need to say this.

“For so long I blamed myself. If I hadn’t have had Con and Soph... well... I just don’t know whether I’d be here right now... if I’d even be alive,” I admit, partly to myself and I can see Saul clenching his teeth trying not to interrupt me. I take a deep breath and continue, “You know I lost the baby, we’ve talked about that during my visits to you. You know I haven’t told Con anything yet, but I’m going to. I want there to be a clean slate, so I can try and make us work. Anyway I’m getting off subject.” He smiles at me and it gives me renewed determination.

“I was angry with you that day, but only because I was trying to deflect the anger I felt toward myself. I didn’t see it at the time, but now everything is so clear. You mean the world to me. You have been there through everything and I wish we could choose our family because Saul, I would tie you to me forever.”

He brushes a strand of hair off my face and says, “You never have to worry about tying yourself to me, you’re in here.” He taps his chest over his heart. “I have loved you since you were a little girl. You’re my little sister no matter what happens or where the road takes us. I will always have your back, and just so you know, the minute I woke up from the coma, until the minute you walked into my hospital room, the nasty words I’d said to you haunted me, they were all I could hear. I’m glad you’re okay because baby girl if you were in heaven right now because of me, then I’d be heading to hell.” He strokes down the side of my face where tears are rolling down toward my ears.

Saul never really does soppy. I mean he does to Soph and me sometimes, but he’s usually the joker. It’s nice to see this side of him. I just wish it were for a different reason. I smile up at him.

“Love you, Saul.”

“Love you, Pea.”

I lean over to grab my phone.

“What are you doing?” he asks obviously confused.

“Texting Con goodnight. If I’m going to fall asleep on your lap again I better text him now or he’ll only worry.” He gives me a knowing smile and releases me so I can grab my phone. Once I settle back onto the sofa and onto his lap, I tap out my nightly text.

Me:
Laying in Saul’s lap falling asleep, thought I should text you.

Con:
Lucky fucker!

Me:
Well, I’m sure Saul will let you lay in his lap too, next time you see him.

Con:
Ha bloody ha, Pea.

Me:
Night Con. Miss you.

Con:
Miss you more, precious.

I wake in an illuminated blue room, as I prise my eyes apart I realise I’m still in Saul’s lap and I can hear his gentle breathing while he sleeps. I look at the television and notice the film has stopped and the DVD player has turned itself off, so now the television has a blue screen.

I can just see Saul’s clock on the wall and that it’s 9.20 a.m. Saul has blackout blinds in his flat, so it feels like it’s still the middle of the night looking around the darkened room. I don’t usually sleep this late either, my body must’ve really needed the rest.

I can feel my phone in my pocket, so I grab it and look to see if I have any messages, unfortunately the light from the phone, which is usually miniscule, is amplified because of the darkness and so I wake Saul.

“Pea?” he asks although his words are slightly slurry.

“Yeah, I’m here Saul. Do you want me to get your tablets?”

“No, no, that’s fine. I’ll get them in a moment,” he replies distractedly.

“What’s up?” I ask, whilst sitting myself up.

“Oh nothing, I just… I woke up thinking that I was back in the hospital. It threw me for a moment,” he says shaking his head.

“I’m going to take my meds and jump in the shower. I think I need to freshen up a bit. Can you put the coffee on for me? It might need a clean out seeing as I haven’t been here for a while,” he says smiling.

He wanders off to the bathroom and I go back to looking at my phone. I see I have a text from Dane.

Dane:
Still on for tonight, sunshine?

I feel bad that I was off with him yesterday. It’s not his fault Soph feels the way she does, and although I cannot believe for one moment that he didn’t notice her feelings were developing and couldn’t have done anything to soften the blow. I do realise they had an agreement and I also wonder if maybe his feelings became invested too, and he just didn’t know how to deal with them. I know from what I’ve learnt so far is that Dane is a straight talker, he’s not about leading people on in any way and although he is fierce, I don’t believe he would ever intentionally set out to hurt anyone, especially Soph. The main thing that I now see clearly and that I couldn’t yesterday, is that this isn’t my business. I will be here if either Soph or Dane ask me to be, and if I think their past relationship starts causing problems in the present, I may involve myself.

I look at my phone and tap out my reply.

Me:
Of course. 6pm right?

Dane:
6pm.

Still staring at the phone, I wonder if I did cause any damage between us yesterday, but then I dismiss the idea. I just replied to a text, I didn’t do anything to upset him.

There is another idea that occurs to me, seeing as he’s being so short with his texts, which is unlike him… maybe he’s nervous about what he’s going to tell me? What happens if it’s something I can’t get past?

I can’t think like that. I have to believe that people can see past mistakes, lies, deceit and errors in judgement. Because otherwise where do I stand with Con.

I think about him for a minute and my heart aches at his absence. So I send him a text I know he will get when he wakes.

Me:
I know you’re sleeping. I just want you to know that I’m thinking of you.

It surprises me when Evanescence’s ‘My Immortal’ starts singing to me and I jump in shock.

“Con,” I answer smiling.

“Hey precious.”

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Lying in bed.”

“Isn’t it the middle of the night?”

“Yeah,” he answers lazily.

“So you can’t sleep?”

“No,” he says.

“Okay… you could have just texted me. You shouldn’t be waking yourself up even more by talking to me.”

He’s quiet for a second then he sighs and replies. “Your voice… it’s home Pea, everything about you is home.”

It startles me. We have been texting a lot and occasionally speaking on the phone and although we’ve flirted and touched upon the elephant on the line - our relationship, what exactly it is and where it might be going - we haven’t said anything obvious outright. Anything that we can’t laugh our way out of, but this was it. The thing that we haven’t been talking about has now been brought to the forefront. I close my eyes and do something I should have done ages ago.

“You’re my home too, Con, I want you to come home to me.”

He says nothing and my heart starts beating faster.

“Con?”

Nothing.

“Con?”

Then I hear it… his quiet snoring, he’s fallen asleep on the line.

A couple of hours later and I’m at my old supermarket with Saul, stocking up. His fridge and cupboards were practically empty and the odd thing he did have needed to go in the bin. I’m surprised some of the items hadn’t grown legs and thrown themselves away. Of course, the lack of milk is something he didn’t think about until I was making coffee. He can, of course, drink it without milk… me… not so much.

So here we are, and Saul has a face on him like a grumpy toddler. In fact, it’s like walking around the shop with a grumpy toddler. He’s never liked the supermarket and usually orders online. Obviously being in hospital means he hasn’t been able to and it’s not something I’d think of doing for him.

“Ugh! I hate this fucking place, it’s always so busy!” he moans.

“That’s true, although it would be even busier if it were a weekend,” I say.

We walk a few more steps.

“Why do these women have a meeting in the middle of the aisle?” he asks confused and I just shrug my shoulders and smile.

Another few steps.

“Why does everyone walk so slowly?” I look up to him and see the mixture of confusion and annoyance cross his face and I laugh. He scowls at me, but I carry on laughing.

We finally finish our shopping and go back to his place and I make him rest, much to his annoyance and then make us both some lunch.

“Saul?” I say tentatively.

“Right here, babe,” he replies.

I bring our sandwiches over and sit opposite him. “I’m going to tell, Con.”

“I know, you’ve told me.”

He takes a bite of his sandwich and spits it out.

“Sorry babe, but what is this shit?”

“Ham salad, why?”

“I hope you put that in the shopping to take home because I won’t eat rabbit food, you know that.”

“Saul! You need to eat well, you’ve just come out of hospital.”

“Exactly, I need some real food,” he says while getting up and walking into the open plan kitchen, pulling out a frying pan and chucking some bacon straight into it.

“Saul! You can’t eat stuff like that.” He smirks at me. “Watch me, babe.”

I huff at him, but I know what he’s like. I tried to sneak in some healthy salad. I should have known better.

“So, you were saying about telling Con, but you’ve already decided that haven’t you?”

“Yeah, I know we chatted about it. I guess I was only thinking about the way I was going to tell him, you know, flying over to New York and planning a stay to win him back to do… well, anything. I didn’t think about the rest.”

He doesn’t say anything, he just waits for me to finish.

“I think it’s just sunk in that he may reject me. He might tell me he never wants to see me again. He might tell me he could never love me again.” I’m getting worked up now. I see Saul turn the heat down on the frying pan and he walks over and sits next to me and rubs my back.

“Chill babe, it’s fine. It will be fine.”

“But what if it’s not?” I screech at him.

“Listen Pea, Con has loved you… for forever. I’ve told you this. Yes, you have to tell him everything, throw it all out there. I can’t say how he will react. I don’t know,” he pauses while a frown passes over his face, then he looks at me again. “Pea, I know what kind of man Con is, and you know what kind of man Con is. Even if he doesn’t handle it well, you have to give him another chance. You have to fight to make it right. You just have to remember, sometimes we make the wrong decisions, sometimes we react the wrong way, you can’t turn back time so you have to move forward. Sometimes you have to convince the person you love to believe in something that you once didn’t believe in yourself,” he states and I’m not sure if he’s still talking about Con and I. Either way he’s made me feel better.

“Thanks Saul, I needed that.”

“Anytime,” he says and gives me a squeeze then goes back to his bacon. “Sorry babe, I’m hungry,” he says and winks at me.

I roll my eyes, but think about what he’s said. I have to fight for Con, I have to expect that he is, at the very least, going to be pissed at me and at the very worst going to be so hurt that he can’t even be near me anymore. But I have to try, then I have to try some more. Because I’m nowhere without him being there next to me. I’m incomplete without him. I know that now.

A few hours later and I’m about to head home after having lunch and watching ‘Die Hard’ with Saul. As I’m getting ready to leave a thought occurs to me and I want to question him about it.

“Saul?”

“Still right here, babe,” he says with a grin.

“What’s the deal with you and Soph?” I ask and his grin vanishes and his mouth instead morphs into a thin line.

“No deal,” is all he replies.

“Saul, this is me you’re talking too, remember? You’ve been my friend since we were five. You have picked me up when I’ve fallen and brushed my knees off. I’ve told girlfriends you don’t want to be with them anymore and taken lots of abuse because of it. You know me, and I know you
and
Soph. Something is there. I can’t work it out, but it’s something. Now spill!”

He sighs and looks up at the ceiling. For a minute, I don’t think he’s going to say anything but then he almost whispers, “You know how you feel?” And I look at him confused until he continues, “She’s my Con, Pea, she’s my Con.”

I feel like my heart just broke at the pain I can hear in his voice and I also feel like it rejoiced with the idea that my two best friends might find love with each other.