Chapter 2

Early the next morning, while Lucas was still asleep, I left the flat with a flask of soup.

Our marriage had been falling apart for months, but I still went to St. Clement's Hospital. Margaret — Lucas's mother — had been there for the better part of half a year with severe kidney failure, and I'd barely left her side. I told myself this was the last time. One final act of loyalty. A way to close out twelve years.

When I pushed open the ward door, Margaret was already talking about me to the woman in the next bed.

"She's been my entire lifeline through this. Honestly, better than a daughter."

She lit up when she saw me. She patted the chair beside her and told me to sit, to rest.

I ladled out the broth I'd spent all night making and handed it to her.

"Drink it while it's hot. Lucas had a fever last night — I should check on him after this."

She was lifting the bowl to her lips when her mobile rang. It was propped on the tray table, showing a FaceTime call. The contact name read: Benny.

Margaret's hands were sticky with broth. She nodded toward the phone.

"Could you answer that, love? That'll be Lucas's cousin."

I didn't think. I reached over and swiped to accept.

The face on the screen stopped me cold.

I recognised her immediately.

Six months ago. The sofa. Lucas's uniform.

Bianca Whitmore.

She was holding a boy — maybe three years old — against her hip. The boy grinned at the camera and called out: "Grandma! Look what Dad bought me!"

Bianca shifted the child on her hip and pulled a face at the screen.

"Margaret, Lucas came over last night and had too much to drink, so I let him sleep in. Did she lose it again when he was late?"

The ward went dead quiet.

Margaret flinched so hard the bowl slipped. Scalding broth soaked through the bedding.

"Sylvia — oh, Sylvia, let me explain —"

She reached for the phone, but I'd already stepped back. I stood with the screen in my hand and stared at the boy's face. He had Lucas's jaw. His nose. That same slight crease at the bridge.

"His cousin," I said. "That's what you called her."

There was a pause. Margaret let out a long breath, and something shifted in her expression — the performance dropped.

She took my hand and spoke gently, with the tone of someone delivering difficult but necessary news.

"Don't be hard on Lucas for keeping this from you. Bianca's been there for four years. She's never once asked for anything formal."

Four years.

Something in my chest split open.

This hadn't been a drunk mistake six months ago. This had been four years.

Margaret patted my hand. "You're like my own daughter. I care about you. But you have to think about Lucas too."

"You've been through something terrible. I understand that. But because of it — ten days can go by without you letting him near you. He's a healthy man, Sylvia. You can't expect him to live like a monk."

"Bianca's agreed that the boy will call you auntie. You'd still be Lucas's wife. His proper wife. She'll never interfere. Doesn't that work for everyone?"

...

My legs gave out. I sat down heavily in the chair behind me.

Everything she said after that blurred together.

Four years.

Every rescue deployment, Lucas would stay on the phone with me all night — he knew I got scared in the dark, that his voice was the only thing that helped me sleep. Once, when he was trapped in a disaster zone, he risked his life to find a backup battery so he could spend the whole night keeping me calm.

And through all of it, Bianca was there. The boy was there.

While he was soothing me through the phone, whispering that I was safe, he was lying in bed next to another family.

The sheer absurdity of it swallowed me whole.

I stood up. I didn't look at Margaret again.

I walked out of the ward.

If everyone else's idea of happiness didn't have a place for me in it, then the title of wife — I could let it go.