Page 118 of Modern Romance Collection March 2025 (1-4)

No longer share Rose’s life.

He staggered to his bedroom and through to the dressing room.

The dressing table at which he’d watched the Rose he’d fallen in love with all those years ago come back to life just a day ago had been cleared of the beauty products she didn’t need but adored using.

He opened its drawers. All empty…except for the pencil that rolled out of its hiding place at the back of the top right drawer when he started closing it.

Rose’s eyeliner.

He slumped onto the dressing table chair and picked the eyeliner up.

Just to touch it was enough to rip the fissure that had been steadily growing in his heart wide open. Holding the eyeliner tightly to his chest, he opened his lungs to expel all his agony in a roar before he slumped over the table and bawled like a child.

* * *

The girls were settled in their double cot, holding hands and on the cusp of falling asleep.

Rose crept out of the room and crossed the landing to the bathroom.

Even though the cramps that had been gripping her on the flight back to England had told her what was coming, she still found herself shaking to have started her period.

Shaking and then sobbing.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Roseclosedthenursery door until it was slightly ajar and blew out a long breath of air. A week since returning to Devon and she still had trouble breathing properly.

Downstairs, she curled up on the sofa in the living room and switched the TV on with the remote.

Her phone buzzed.

Her heart jumped.

It jumped at all her messages and alerts.

She pulled it out of her cardigan pocket and held her breath as she swiped it, then slumped when it wasn’t Diaz’s name on the screen. It was Rosaria.

He’s on his way. Should land by late afternoon. Wish me luck!

She wrote back an equally jaunty reply.

Good luck!

Reply sent, she grabbed a cushion, held it tight to her belly and closed her eyes. She wished the girls were awake so she could cuddle them.

Knowing Diaz was flying across the Atlantic only made the distance between them feel wider, and not just because the physical distance between them was widening.

A whole week without him.

She supposed it was natural that she would miss him after being in his near-constant company since the girls were born.

The emptiness of the house didn’t feel natural though.

She supposed the emptiness would soon start to feel so natural she wouldn’t even notice it.

She didn’t think she would ever stop noticing the gaping wound in her heart. Not until it healed, which so far it showed no signs of doing. It was a different kind of wound from the wound Diaz had inflicted when he’d abandoned her but the pain from it hurt with equal intensity. And was getting worse, not better.

At least she had the girls. They were as happy back in Devon as they’d been at home in Spain. Happy to be in their new nursery rather than sharing their mummy’s old room.

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