‘Do you think she’s a happy girl?’ I asked and she looked at me cagily.
‘She’d be happier if she could see,’ she retorted.
‘I didn’t mean that, Chloe.’
‘Yeah, well, I’m not going to share her secrets with you.’
Here we go again. ‘Ah, so you really are that close. I’m glad.’
‘Whatever,’ she said and turned away to go to sleep again. And that was the end of that. If Luke had had a tough time raising Jess on his own, I realised that my battle was still an ongoing one, and would be for a very long time.
By the time we landed in Heathrow I could barely keep my eyes open, and when Alice, who was as fresh as a daisy, offered to help us get our bags to the train, I almost wept with relief.
It was still, what with transfers and all, another eight hours to our front door, and I was dreading it, because, let’s face it, I wouldn’t be able to sleep this leg of the journey either while having to keep an eye on the children. In a city like London, a mother’s work was never done.
If I was an absolute wreck now, I could imagine what I would be like by the time I got these two home. All I wanted to do was pass out, but it was up to me to get them home safe.
As we were spilling out of Arrivals, me holding Ben upright, along with three holdalls around my neck and my clothes pulled every which way but the right way along with my hair, Alice stopped in her tracks.
‘Oh my bloody God!’ she swore.
‘What? What did you forget?’
But she just looked ahead and I followed the direction of her gaze. It took me a while to recognise him, with his dark mop of curls shortened and clean-shaven face. I was so shocked I didn’t even have the strength to speak at a normal volume, and it came out as a croaked whisper. ‘Jack…? What are you doing here?’
The kids suddenly recovered and clung to him as he in turn enveloped them in his arms. ‘Hey, you guys! Did you have a good time?’
‘Awesome!’ Ben cried and Chloe laughed. ‘That’s what they say in LA, and they say it, like, all the time!’
His eyes met mine, almost apologetically, his long dark lashes fanning his tanned cheeks. ‘I figured you’d be exhausted so I thought I’d meet you. Huge congratulations again, by the way.’
I moved to hug him, but I was weighed down by all the bags hanging from me. ‘You’re my hero,’ I gushed. ‘I can’t believe you did this!’
‘I can,’ Alice said, jangling her keys, in a hurry to get home herself now, seeing as the ballast had been passed to him. ‘So as you’re in excellent hands, I’ll just let you get on with it. Congratulations again, doll, and I’ll call you tomorrow. Kids, it’s been… interesting. I didn’t think I’d like you so much.’
Chloe and Ben laughed and waved as she tottered off, then turned again. ‘Don’t forget you need to update your website now!’
Website? It was the last thing on my mind.
‘Right,’ Jack said, lifting all of my bags from around my neck. ‘Let’s get you three home. You must be knackered to the bone!’
‘Not too bad,’ I said and then yawned. ‘I still can’t believe you’re here! I thought I was hallucinating!’
He slid me a happy grin. ‘The exit’s this way.’
This was so Jack, going all the way for other people. Everyone in town loved him to bits, and it wasn’t hard to see why. He was completely selfless. I simply didn’t understand that silly cow who had dumped him.
Once we were in his SUV, it started to rain. ‘Welcome back to Kernow summers,’ he quipped, then turned to Chloe in the back seat. ‘Honey, there’s a basket in the back with drinks and snacks. Would you mind?’
‘Ooh, thanks, Jack!’ she cried, twisting to retrieve the bounty.
‘And there’s hot coffee for you and some baps and muffins and stuff,’ he said to me.
‘Coffee’s fine, thanks, Jack. You’ve thought of everything. If you knew how to cook you’d be perfect marriage material.’
Again, he slanted me a funny look. He looked so different, without his beard, and there were dimples I never even knew existed.
‘You look… amazing,’ I said in earnest and his eyes swung to mine in a shy grin before they went back to the road.
‘So do you. But then, you always do.’
‘Liar,’ I chuckled as I took two travel mugs from Chloe and rested them in the receptacles and stretched out luxuriously. This might not be a BMW convertible, but it was roomy and solid and just as comfortable, if not more. It was already home.
‘Chloe, Ben, mind you don’t spill anything,’ I cautioned. I wasn’t that deliriously exhausted that I’d forgotten my manners.
But I did fall asleep, and when I came to, I knew I’d slept because I had that funny taste in my mouth. Inside the vehicle, it had become quiet as Chloe and Ben had finally fallen asleep too.
‘Sorry, I passed out,’ I said, rubbing my eyes. ‘I’m not much in the way of company, am I?’
‘You’re fine,’ Jack whispered.
I stifled a yawn. ‘You don’t need to whisper, they’re out for the count.’
‘Seems so,’ he agreed.
The rain was coming down in sheets now, but his driving was steady, without the bursts of energy of Luke’s sports car, so I lay happy in the knowledge we would get home safe and dry with Jack.
It was like being inside an unbreakable cocoon – warm, safe and quiet. I pictured having to face the same journey with Lottie The Shitty Car and suddenly shivered in horror. She’d have abandoned us on the A30 without a second thought.
‘Cold?’ he said softly, reaching for the heating. ‘There are a couple of throws in the back.’
I shook my head dreamily. ‘I’m fine, thank you, Jack. It was so kind of you to drive to
