Page 4 of The Magic of Provence (A Year in France #3)

There was a disconcerting moment, just before Fi opened her eyes again, where she had absolutely no idea where she was. She drew in a breath and held it and stayed very, very still.

She could hear voices and it made her think she was still dreaming because she knew those voices as well as her own. Laura, her beautiful, determined, bossy older sister. And Ellie – the baby. The gentle, happy little soul that everybody loved.

Fi could only ever remember being in the middle. Overshadowed enough to feel invisible sometimes. Never able to shine quite brightly enough to be really seen most of the time. But she’d always been loved – all of the time.

‘What time is it?’ Fi didn’t realise she’d spoken aloud until she heard Ellie’s response.

‘Oh… you’re awake . We were getting worried about you.’

Laura was beside Ellie. They both looked as though they wanted to hug her but were unsure of whether she would welcome it.

She would welcome it, Fi thought. But she couldn’t blame them for being unsure when she’d avoided getting too close for so long.

She’d pushed her family away. Or dragged herself away from them .

The difference was immaterial because the result had been the same.

The inheritance of this property, the new connections to France that had been created and the reasons to reconnect with each other had become strong enough to lead Fi to take the first tentative steps to get past a well-established barrier but they hadn’t taken her far enough to be safely inside a solid family circle yet.

Maybe, when they knew why she was here, they wouldn’t want her to be inside it.

It was hard to swallow because her mouth was so dry. ‘How long have I been asleep?’

‘Almost all day. It’s after three o’clock.’

‘ What ?’ Fi sat up so fast it made her dizzy. She tried to push her hair back from her face but her fingers caught in the tangle of corkscrew curls and she winced. ‘Oh, my God,’ she muttered. ‘I need to… to…’ She couldn’t quite catch what seemed so urgent because her head was still spinning.

It was then that she noticed Ellie’s little dog was lying on the sofa beside her. She reached out to lay a hand on his back, instinctively seeking the comfort of touching an animal.

‘Let me get you a cup of tea,’ Ellie said. ‘I’ve got plenty of time. Julien’s going to pick Theo up from school and Bonnie’s sound asleep upstairs for now.’

‘And Noah’s taken Lili to the office with him for the afternoon,’ Laura added. ‘I could run you a bath while you’re having that cup of tea. Mam’s flight is due to land about 6p.m. but I’ll have to leave in good time because you never know how bad the traffic’s going to be.’

Fi’s thoughts snapped back into clarity. This was what was so urgent.

‘I can’t stay,’ she said. ‘I can’t be here when Mam arrives.’

‘Why not?’ Laura asked.

‘Where would you go?’ Ellie sounded bewildered.

‘I don’t know…’

Fi’s voice wavered and she covered her face with her hands.

She felt the little dog move away and the cushions of the sofa dip as Laura sat beside her and put a hand on her arm.

Through a gap in her fingers she could see Ellie kneeling on the floor in front of her and then she felt the touch of her hands on her knees.

The physical connection between the three sisters created a bond that felt like a lifeline.

‘What is it, Fi?’ Ellie asked, a desperate note in her voice. ‘What’s happened?’

‘I hit someone,’ Fi blurted. ‘On the head. With a shovel.’ She gulped in some more air. ‘I tried to kill him… just like Dada did to that man…’

Not that he’d used a shovel. Gordon Gilchrist had used his own forehead and delivered a Glasgow kiss that had been close enough to being fatal to brand him as a murderer in his absence.

There was a moment’s silence. Her sisters understood.

They’d all tried so hard to protect their mother when they were children even though they didn’t understand why their world had been turned inside out.

There had been an unspoken agreement that part of that protection was to never talk about it.

They could understand why Fi didn’t want to be the one to open that can of worms so brutally now, but what they didn’t understand was why history was repeating itself.

She could feel their fear that she was also going to vanish from their lives forever.

They knew how much that would hurt all of them, especially their mother.

‘Was he badly hurt?’ Laura asked.

‘No. He got up very quickly. But he told me if I was still on the property in fifteen minutes he was going to call the police and get me charged with assault.’

‘Why?’ Ellie asked quietly. ‘You must have had a reason to hit him.’

‘I thought he was going to… to hurt me…’

Fi knew her sisters could feel that she was shaking. She caught the look that passed between Laura and Ellie.

‘Has someone hurt you before, Fi?’ Laura asked gently. Her voice sounded calm. Controlled. She’d always been so good at being in charge.

Fi could feel it happening. The breach happening in the dam that had been so solid until now.

She could almost see the hairline crack appearing in the huge wall of emotional concrete she’d used to bury things that could have so easily destroyed her.

She could feel the weight of what was behind that dam – the countless tears that had never been allowed to fall – until this morning.

But those tears had been spilling over the top of the dam.

This crack, if it got any bigger, could release so much more it might be enough to drown her.

She didn’t want it to happen.

It felt like failure.

But there was a part of her that did want it to happen. Because she was so tired. And that dam hadn’t been simply to protect herself. It had been supposed to protect her family – not to become so wide it felt like her family was in a place she had no passport to visit.

As she found herself nodding slowly, it felt like she was doing more than responding to Laura’s careful question. It felt like a kind of surrender. The crack was getting bigger – and maybe it was supposed to be happening.

There was a slightly harsher note in Laura’s voice now.

‘A man?’

Fi swallowed past the sudden constriction in her throat and nodded again.

The silence was shocked this time.

‘Dear Lord, Fi…’ Ellie whispered. ‘Did he rape you?’

Fi didn’t need to nod. She knew they could see the truth all too clearly in her face. They could probably sense it in the wave of shame and fear that was rolling out from somewhere very deep inside her.

‘Was it the same man?’ Laura sounded fierce now. As if she was ready to find a shovel and go after him herself.

Fi shook her head. ‘No… it happened a long time ago. A very long time.’

Ellie’s indrawn breath was a gasp. ‘Was it why you left home? And went so far away?’

Again, Fi shook her head. ‘No. It was in my second year at uni.’

Another meaningful look passed between Ellie and Laura. Fi could actually feel them sharing memories. Joining the dots.

‘Does this have something to do with why you dropped out of vet school?’ Laura asked quietly.

‘Yes.’ The word was no more than a whisper.

‘And why you avoided coming home for so long?’ Ellie’s words were thick with tears. ‘Oh, Fi … why didn’t you tell us then?’

‘I couldn’t. I wanted to but…’ She shook her head. ‘I just… couldn’t.’

‘Why not ?’

Fi ducked her head. ‘I was too ashamed.’

Laura’s breath escaped in an outraged huff. ‘What the hell did you have to be ashamed of?’

Too many things, Fi thought.

But she couldn’t keep the truth hidden any longer. Too much of it had already escaped, so they might as well know the worst of it. Or at least part of the worst of it.

‘Because it was my fault that it happened.’

There was a beat of… what was it… disbelief? Outrage, even?

‘I wanted him to be attracted to me,’ Fi confessed. ‘I wanted to be like everybody else and to get over how stupidly shy I’d always been. I wanted… him .’ Her inward breath became a gulp. ‘I thought I was in love with him.’

‘You wanted a lover,’ Ellie said quietly. ‘Not a rapist .’

‘Fiona?’ Laura’s quiet voice broke a short silence.

‘Aye?’ Fi’s response to Laura was wary. She knew this was serious if her full name was being used. She also knew she had no choice but to make eye contact with her sister.

‘Listen to me. It was…’ Laura pulled in a quick breath and her next words came out slowly and deliberately. Quietly vehement. ‘…Not. Your. Fault.’

Ellie was nodding, tears streaming down her face.

And then they were both hugging Fi. Until she felt she couldn’t breathe and it was too much.

Any physical touch from a human was an intrusion into her personal space that made her hover close to that fight-or-flight button that would release all the adrenaline she might need.

These were her sisters and she knew perfectly well that she was safe, but she still needed the buffer zone of at least a little physical space. She had to wriggle free.

They understood. Instantly.

Ellie sat back, rubbing her nose and sniffing. Laura got to her feet.

‘I’m going to make us all a cup of tea,’ she said. ‘And then you’re going to tell us the whole story, Fi, because there’s no way we’re going to let you believe, ever, ever again, that it was, in any way, your fault.’

* * *

Fi didn’t tell them quite the whole story.

She left out the bits that would have hurt them. Like the freedom she’d felt when she’d gone far enough away from home that she was no longer just one of the ‘Gilchrist lassies’.

The middle one.

The pony-mad one.

The chubby one – with the hair like a wire pot scourer, poor bairn.