No Way to Say Goodbye - Anna McPartlin [104]
Sam hoped that Ivan was right. He was painfully aware that sometimes it took more than a car crash to hit bottom.
Ivan headed into his hotel room so that he could talk to Norma, who was spending her first night back in Kenmare alone but was happy watching over her sleeping children. He phoned Sienna and left a message on her voicemail since she was most likely asleep – either that or she was pissed off that he was housing his ex-wife.
Sam and Mary stayed in the late-night bar, neither wishing to be alone.
“When we were kids Penny was terrified of the dark,” Mary said.
“Yeah?” Sam encouraged her.
“She was convinced it would swallow her,” she remembered. “She could get in trouble for this,” she added.
“She’ll be fine.”
“You shouldn’t have to deal with it. I’m sorry. I should never have asked you to come.”
“I want to be here.”
“Why?”
“You’re here.”
“Jesus,” she sighed, “some day soon you’ll get sense and then we’ll both be very disappointed.”
“Not a chance.”
“Tart!” She got up. “Goodnight.”
He watched her walk away.
Some time after eight a.m. Penny was finally seen by a doctor. The long wait had sobered her so a surgeon could repair the damage to her face. Three hours later she lay on cold steel under glaring lights and beside buzzing machines. The anaesthetist slipped a needle into her arm, and in her head Phil Collins sang “Against All Odds” on repeat.
When Penny woke her nose had been set, her lip, cheek and forehead were stitched and she had the mother of all hangovers. Her teeth were sharp in her mouth and as she ran her tongue over them she discovered that the four front ones were badly damaged. She dreaded looking in the mirror, having felt the bandages on her cheek and forehead. Her nose felt bigger than her entire head. She cried because she’d remembered Mary and Adam’s gasp at the sight of her and guessed she’d been disfigured. She cried because she had watched a beautiful animal die a slow and terrible death. She cried because she really had wanted to stop drinking but she couldn’t.
It was just after nine when Adam made his way to his own front door. He wasn’t sure what he would say to his wife. At least the kids were at school. Maybe he’d be lucky and she’d be out. Maybe she hadn’t noticed he’d been out all night. She was often asleep when he got home from the restaurant, and on delivery days he’d be up and out of the house before the alarm rang. He was too tired for an argument. He hoped that the separate lives they’d been living since his arrival to Cork would work in his favour.
Unfortunately for him this was not to be. As soon as he opened the door he saw suitcases packed at the foot of the stairs. Alina was on the upstairs landing. She made her way downstairs to meet him in the hall.
“Are you going somewhere?” he asked.
“No,” she said. “You are.”
“Alina!”
“I don’t want to hear it, Adam.”
“Alina –”
“Leave.”
“No.”
“Leave.”
“I can explain.”
“I don’t care.”
“It’s not what you think.”
“You were out all night, Adam.”
“I know, but –”
“You were with her,” she said.
“Yes, but it’s not what you think.”
She walked away from him and into the kitchen.
He followed her. “She was in trouble. She needed me.”
Alina fought the urge to shove his head through the glass patio door. “Our marriage is over,” she said.
“Just like that?” He was shocked.
“You’ve got your wish, Adam. You’re free.”
“And the kids?”
“They’ve settled in Cork. We’re happy here. We’ll stay and you can go back to Kenmare. You win.”
“I never wanted this.”
“Yes, Adam, you did.”
“Why now?”
“Because I can’t stop hating you. I wanted to for the kids’ sake but