Pain gripped her, and a sense of wrongness. Followed by another wave of dark, deep pain...an ache that seared and burned.
‘Sarah? What’s wrong?’
Pull yourself together.
‘Nothing. Nothing’s wrong.’
Except her behaviour. This was a job—it was not an opportunity to flirt. It was all about a chance that she was taking for Jodie’s sake.
‘I’m fine. Just had a sudden dizzy spell. Probably hungry.’ She held up the sandwich. ‘I’ll eat this and I’ll be fine. But if it’s OK with you I need to get back soon. I want to spend some time with Jodie before we leave tomorrow.’
‘No problem. I’ll get your choices packed up and sent to Milan with us. I’ll pick you up tomorrow at three to take you to the airport.’
CHAPTER SIX
BY SUNDAY AFTERNOON Sarah wondered if it was all a dream, even as she zipped up her suitcase. How was it possible that she was going to Milan as a ‘promotional consultant’?
Jodie bounced on the bed and then came and sat on the suitcase, her green eyes bright from excitement and, Sarah suspected, from worry.
‘How many days till you come back?’
‘Five sleeps, sweetheart. But I’ll call every day to say goodnight and I’ll blow you a kiss all the way from Milan.’
‘And it will go through France and across the Channel and land on my cheek?’
‘That’s right.’
‘OK.’
Jodie jumped up and gave her a hug and Sarah felt love well up inside her. Love and a sudden question as to whether this really was a good idea.
Too late. This opportunity was too good to miss—and the fee alone would make a huge difference to Jodie’s future.
One last hug for Jodie and her mum and then, heading for the door, she could see Ben’s car waiting by the kerb. She turned for a last look at her daughter and a sudden zigzag of panic nearly skewered her to the spot. How could she leave her daughter? What if something awful happened? What if...?
As if reading her expression, her mum waved and made a shooing motion with her hands, and Sarah forced her legs to keep moving. Once in the car she scrunched herself into a corner and focused on breathing, grateful that Ben didn’t try to initiate conversation during their journey to the airport or their walk from a strangely sparse car park to...
A private jet.
Sarah’s footsteps came to a halt. ‘I... I assumed we’d be flying on a normal plane...a commercial flight.’
‘I part-own this with a few other businessmen.’
Of course he did.
Eyes wide, Sarah followed him aboard, showed her passport and looked round the luxurious interior. The whole place was more reminiscent of a hotel than a plane.
She sat down opposite him in a ridiculously comfortable chair and knew that this should be making her feel better, safer. But it didn’t. Anxiety churned her tummy as the roar of the engines indicated that the jet was about to take off and she wrapped her hands together in a death grip.
Ben’s deep voice rose above the vibrations. ‘Have you flown before?’
‘Not for years.’
Images began to stream through her mind as the jet took off, ascended up and up and then levelled off. Fourteen years before, when life had been normal. A family holiday. She’d been en route to Spain, sitting next to Imo, who had gazed with avid appreciation out of the window. Sarah, a little more cautious, had wondered what exactly kept the plane in the sky. Nerves aflutter, she’d stared straight ahead, trying to tell herself that the laws of physics meant it all worked and that there was nothing to worry about. Imo—her other half, the other part of her—had held her hand and chattered away about how much fun they would have.
But now Imo was gone, and without her normal life had disintegrated. Sarah had spiralled into a disastrous relationship, her parents’ marriage had fallen apart, and her dad now saw life through the bottom of a whisky bottle. The memory of the last time she’d seen him burned in her soul, and the vitriolic words he’d thrown at her still brought a bitter taste to her mouth. That was what loss did: it pounded normality and happiness into a gross distortion.
Panic and fear coalesced inside her, writhed and shuddered together, and she unclicked her seat belt, not sure what she would do next. Race to the cockpit and make the pilot reverse?