Absent in the Spring (The Shakespeare Sisters 3)

‘It’s done.’ Cesca’s voice was thick and throaty, as though she’d been crying all night. ‘There you go.’ She slid one mug across the table to Lucy, cradling the other in her hands as she sat down opposite her.

They stared at each other for a moment, older and younger sister, with matching red eyes and blonde hair. Lucy frowned, feeling the skin above her eyebrows pucker, as she still searched for the words to make everything right.

But maybe they didn’t exist. Maybe there was no right to be made here. Just one woman, doing her best, making mistakes. Breaking her sisters’ hearts the way hers was broken.

‘I really am so sorry.’ Lucy looked down at her tea, seeing the faintest of reflections in the murky brown liquid. ‘I never wanted you to find out like this.’

‘You never wanted us to find out at all, did you?’

She brought her gaze up. ‘No, I didn’t.’

‘Why not?’

Lucy took a sip of her tea, feeling the hot liquid scald her tongue. It felt like a good kind of pain. ‘Because I didn’t want to hurt you any more than you were already hurting. You’d just lost your mum, I didn’t want to take her from you all over again.’

‘Our mum. She was our mum.’

Lucy nodded, confused. ‘Yes.’

‘She wasn’t just my mum. She was your mum.’ Cesca’s voice was vehement, as though she was trying to make an important point. ‘You lost her twice, too.’

Everything in that kitchen felt filled with emotion. Like a heavy rain cloud, reaching saturation point. Lucy could almost feel the downpour waiting to start.

And once it began, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to stop it.

‘But I was the eldest. It was my job to protect you.’

Cesca shook her head. ‘We should protect each other. It doesn’t all have to fall on you. You’re our sister, not our mother.’

‘It does. It always has. It felt like all my fault.’

‘No. No it wasn’t.’ Cesca shook her head vehemently. ‘You got hurt, too. And I hate to think of you being all alone with this knowledge for all these years. You must have felt so lonely.’

A fresh flood of tears pooled in Lucy’s eyes. She lifted her hand, wiping at them with her fingers. ‘I’m sorry, I’m not usually a crybaby like this.’

‘Maybe you should be,’ Cesca said, tipping her head to the side. ‘You can’t always be the strong one. Everybody needs carrying sometimes.’

For a moment Lucy’s thoughts were full of Lachlan, and the way he’d lifted her out of that bed in Glencarraig. He’d carried her as though she was as light as a feather-filled cushion, his strong arms flexing as he laid her down on his bed.

And for a few moments it had felt so good to be held.

She smiled weakly, tasting her tears as they moistened her lips. ‘I never wanted any of you to hurt the way I did. I wanted to take the pain for all of us.’

‘It doesn’t work that way. I should know, I tried to shelter myself from pain for long enough. But if you wrap someone in cotton wool you stop them from working out how to deal with the hurt. It’s like a child learning to walk – you know they’re going to stumble and scrape their legs, but you have to let them learn by their own mistakes. You can’t shield them from the tears and the blood, you can just be there to mop them up afterwards.’

Lucy sighed. ‘When did you get so clever?’ she asked, feeling a flush of pride for the woman her sister had turned out to be. ‘You’re so good with words. You should be a writer or something.’

Cesca laughed, and the kitchen suddenly seemed warmer. Lucy felt the muscles in her shoulders relax. ‘Will you tell me about Mum?’ Cesca asked. ‘I want to know exactly what happened.’

Lucy nodded. ‘Of course I will. But I need to try and get it all straight in my head.’ Was it strange that she felt some sort of relief at finally being able to talk things through with her sister? ‘And I’d like to tell Kitty and Juliet at the same time, if that’s okay? That’s if they’re willing to talk to me.’

‘They’ll talk to you. I spoke with Juliet earlier, she was worried about you. We all were. And Kitty wanted to jump on a plane to New York to give you a hug. It was me being all emotional and angry, and I shouldn’t have been.’ She shook her head. ‘I can’t believe you came straight back here.’

‘Can’t you? You’re my sister and you were hurt. I couldn’t stand to hear you cry and not be able to hug you.’

‘A hug sounds perfect just about now.’

Lucy was on her feet before Cesca finished her sentence. Her younger sister wrapped her arms around her, the two of them hugging the breath out of each other.