Blaze (Virtues & Lies 3)

Fleur: I love you.

The smile he put on my face with his call doesn’t diminish the entire time I’m in the hairdresser’s chair. My belly knots with excitement for tonight.

The dark cloud that’s been following me since the day we landed back in London doesn’t disappear, but I’m determined not to let it ruin our evening.

An hour and a half later, I’m leaving the salon with my short hair styled in a lightly tousled bob. The ends hang softly to my jaw. It feels light and better than ever. While I get into the security-driven saloon waiting for me on the curb, I give it a soft tug. Just to make sure that I’m not going to be missing out on anything.

“You look cute,” Arabella says as she stows her phone into her handbag.

“Thanks. I figured since you’re growing yours out again, I’d balance it out and go back to short and manageable.”

“I’m tempted to cut it if I’m honest, even if Christopher likes it long. I think manageable is going to be something I’ll need soon.” She looks up at me, biting her lip as if she’s done or said something she shouldn’t.

“Is the club renovation keeping you that busy?”

Arabella looks down at her lap and then back at me. “No.” She shakes her head while her hands splay over her belly. “I think I’ll need to take it easy this time.”

“Really?”

“It’s early days, but I needed to tell someone. I’m excited and terrified. A part of me feels terrible to be so happy about it when…”

“Oh Bella, it’s okay to move forward. You haven’t forgotten her, and you never will.” Taking one of her hands, I thread my fingers with hers. “Casper is right. When you have so much love to give, it’s a sin not to share it. That’s all you’re doing. You’re sharing

the love you have.”

The hand she’s holding over her belly clutches over our twinned fingers. “Don’t ever tell him he’s right. He’s big-headed as it is.”

“No more than Christopher.”

“It’s why I’ll never admit it to him,” she laughs. It’s the first laugh I’ve heard since that night that sounds truly happy.

When the car pulls up outside my gated childhood home, we both sit, looking at it.

“I don’t know what to do with it.”

“You have time to decide. We’re only packing away the things that matter to you, so you can take them with you.”

Once the security has made sure that we’re good to go in, I get out of the car, wondering how many more real happy memories I have left here.

We’re procrastinating in the kitchen. Arabella’s devouring all the red and purple Starbursts while I pick out the orange ones.

“Makes sense why you weren’t drinking at the ballet,” I muse, putting my feet up on one of the boxes we’ve put together. “How’s Christopher taking it?”

“Christopher is already planning all the ways he can hold me hostage at home. And I can’t blame him. I think if he could, he’d send me to Spain until all this is over.”

“It’ll be over soon.” My sigh has me standing to get to work.

We walked straight into the kitchen to set up the boxes and have sat for the last hour eating sweets and gossiping about our own lives.

Oh how things have changed.

“It has to be,” Arabella murmurs while following me down the hall to the small library at the back of the house. “I don’t want to bring another child into this.”

“I think Grace is oblivious to it all.”

We’re walking into the room when my phone starts going off in the kitchen.

“I think it’s a sign we should order a takeaway and leave this for another day,” Arabella calls after me as I head back to get my phone.