“Because I’m so full of anger, I’m angry that someone as beautiful as you must be taken from this world while others who don’t deserve to live are allowed to stay.” He closed his eyes. “I am bitter, Christy, that I must live the rest of my life without you, you, the person who has touched my heart more than anyone ever has.” He opened his eyes and looked into hers. “I have loved you much more than is good for me, and now I am going to pay the price for it.”
“One can never love too much, Kent. It is love that makes us human. It is what separates us from the animals.” Her green eyes were still locked onto his brown ones. “I don’t regret falling in love with you. How could I? It was my love for you and yours for me that gave my life purpose. It was that same love that created our daughter. Whenever you look at Talitha you will see our love for each other.”
He didn’t answer. She suspected the strain of organizing the birthday party and worry over her rapidly deteriorating condition had left him exhausted and emotional. There would never really be any way she could console him, and she knew that if she were in his position she would be feeling just as fearful and frantic about losing him as he was about losing her.
“Make love to me,” she whispered.
She detected a look of horror in his eyes. “I’m not some animal that would deliberately hurt his wife for his sexual gratification,” he said firmly.
“You will not hurt me if you are gentle, Kent.”
“No, Christy, you are not up to it.”
“I have so missed our lovemaking these past four weeks. I want us to be close tonight.”
“You are too fragile. I might hurt you.”
“You have never hurt me before. Please, Kent,” she implored him, “make love to me.”
He surrendered to her wish, and she had never felt so completely loved and in love as she did when his body melted into hers.
Afterwards, she rested her head on his chest and listened to his heartbeat as she had done so many times before. With his strong arms around her she felt an overwhelming sense of contentment as she stared blissfully off into the darkness of their bedroom.
♥
Kent woke up suddenly. As the cold and rigid body of his dead wife clung to him he uttered a grief-stricken cry. That which he had feared for so long had finally come to pass.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Kent was in a complete daze throughout the day of the funeral. His brain was so numbed with grief that he never really took in the service. It was like he was on the outside looking in at a macabre ritual where his wife’s name was repeatedly mentioned but her face never seen.
He knew something was badly wrong. For the first time in six years Christy was not sitting beside him, her small soft hand warmly clutching his big one, making him feel loved and secure. It was the strangest feeling. A part of him was missing, and he had no idea how to get it back.
Talitha had sat between her Daddy and Papa, understanding that something terrible had happened to her Mummy but not really comprehending that she was never coming back. Kent held her little hand in his unable to offer her any more support than that.
Jack sat silently through the service staring intently at the highly polished coffin. He had retreated once more into himself, and there was no telling if he would ever come out again.
Days turned into weeks turned into months, and when Talitha asked when her Mummy was coming back Kent explained as gently as he could why she couldn’t.
Jack only came alive when he was around his granddaughter. He did what he could to take Christy’s place in her life, and to his credit he handled most of a mother’s duties admirably. The bond between Talitha and her Papa grew stronger by the day.
Kent cried himself to sleep every night in the bed he had shared with his darling, his hand stretched out to touch the spot where she had slept beside him. He would wake to a gloominess that nothing could shift, and a dread of facing the day that threatened to stop his heavy heart from beating in his chest forever.
There were so many things that reminded him of her. Each time he bought Talitha an ice cream and heard his daughter say, “Mummy used to buy me ice creams,” or he saw a pod of dolphins out in the bay. Whenever an old movie came on television, or he saw a picture of a castle, so many, so many things brought her to mind, and he cried at every one of them.
Christmas came around again, and for Talitha’s sake he forced himself to watch the video Jack had shot the Christmas before. Talitha was ecstatic to see her Mummy again, and even Jack smiled his way through it. But Kent felt a tightness grip him around his heart, seeing her smiling face, and hearing her sweet voice just reinforced how much he had lost.
When the anniversary of her birthday came around he marveled at how he had managed to survive a year without her. He had learnt to get up in the morning and carry on, but the dull ache in his heart was still there, always threatening to bring him to tears and draining him of his will to live.
He picked a red rose from the garden. It was from a bush he had bought Christy shortly after they had married. She had nurtured and loved it with a passion that only she could have, always saying it was so special because he had given it to her.
He drove in silence to the cemetery with Jack in the seat beside him and Talitha in the back. “You take Talitha on ahead,” he said to the old man. “I want to be alone with her when I give her the rose.”
Jack just nodded, and Kent watched them as they walked hand in hand to Christy’s grave and placed some flowers Talitha had picked against the headstone. The little girl placed her hand against the smooth marble as her grandfather said a short prayer, and then they turned and made their way back to the car.
Kent slowly made his way to where his wife lay. Then squatting down he lovingly ran his fingers over the inscription. “Happy birthday, My Darling,” he said, placing a miniature of the Taj Mahal on her grave. “I wish I could give you the real thing, but I’m afraid this will have to do.”
He sat down on the grass beside her. “I have missed you so much,” he said, not trying to check the tears that were coming to his eyes. “I wish we could spend this day together. I would have spoiled you rotten, and you would have done your gangster impersonations for me, and we would have laughed and had the time of our lives.” He sighed deeply. “It is hardest at night. I miss hearing you breathing beside me. I miss you snuggling under my arm. I miss waking up and seeing your pretty face on the pillow beside me, and then the kiss you would give me. I miss you so much, Christy, I wish you were still here.”
As a shadow fell across the headstone Kent turned his head to see what had caused it.
“Hello, Kent.”
“Jocelyn,” he said in surprise. “What are you doing here?”
“Christy sent me,” she said, and then sat down opposite him.
“Christy…?”
“When she was alive she asked me to meet you here at six fifteen in the morning on this very date.”
His confused brain tried to take what she had said in. “Why would she have told you to do that?”
“Because she knew how much I still love you.”
He looked at her blankly. “I don’t understand.”
“This has been a very difficult thing for me to do, Kent,” she said quietly. “I would not have done it if Christy had not encouraged me to.”
“This isn’t making any sense to me, Jocelyn.”
“Please give me a chance to say what’s on my mind before you say anything else,” she pleaded, “otherwise I’ll lose my nerve.”
He looked at her expectantly. “Okay.”
“Christy phoned me about the time she knew she wasn’t going to pull through. She wanted to speak to me about you and me.” She paused just long enough for him to take it in. “She told me that you still have feelings for me and that she wanted me to look after you after she was gone.”
It was all starting to become clear to him now. Christy had organized his future for him. When they were on the battlements of the
castle in Ireland she had asked whether he still loved Jocelyn, and he said he would be lying if he told her he didn’t. She was matchmaking from beyond the grave. She didn’t want him to be alone for the rest of his life.
“She knew I couldn’t have a child of my own,” Jocelyn continued, “and she wanted a mother for Talitha. Her hope was that Talitha and I would form a bond if you and I got married.” She hung her head in embarrassment. “I know this all seems rather callous of me to turn up on the anniversary of your wife’s birthday, but Christy felt it was the only way to get you to consider it.”
So Christy had planned it down to the last detail. He would marry Jocelyn who would take care of him and ease the pain of his broken heart. She would be a mother to Talitha who would never be second best in her sight because she would never have children of her own, and she would get along with Jack because the old fellow had been so taken with her on the night she had come to dinner. Yes, she had planned it to perfection, except for the most important detail.
Kent got to his feet and waited for Jocelyn to do the same. “I’m sorry that she has done this to you,” he said sincerely.
“That sounds ominous.”
“You were my first love, Jocelyn,” he said sincerely. “There will always be a special place in my heart for you. But we can’t ever be the way Christy planned for us to be.”
“I realize you need more time,” she said desperately. “You can take all the time you need. I will wait until you are ready.”
He turned his head and looked down at the headstone. “Our tale is one of eternal love.” He looked back at Jocelyn. “Once you’ve had what she and I have had nothing less could ever satisfy.”
Her face fell. “So it is no then?”
He nodded. “I will never remarry.”
“I wish you all the best, Kent,” she said shakily. “I will never forget you.”
“Nor will I forget you.” He watched her walk forlornly across the cemetery to her car.
“Happy birthday, My Darling,” he said, placing the rose gently on top of the headstone, and then with reluctance he left her and walked the short distance back to the car.
Opening the door he slipped in behind the wheel and turning to look at his daughter smiled at her for the first time in a year. He turned back to look at his father-in-law. “Jack, let’s take our little girl for ice cream.”
THE END
Thank you for reading, ALL THE KING’S HORSES. I hope you enjoyed it.
You may like to try my other romance novel: THE MISJUDGED MAN.
Keep an eye out for more of my novels to be published in 2015.
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