Book Club Reads: 3-Book Collection: Yesterday’s Sun, The Sea Sisters, Someone to Watch Over Me. Amanda Brooke

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СКАЧАТЬ trying hard to hide her disappointment. She had mentioned her bump on the head, expecting that the doctor would send her off for an MRI, hoping that the aneurism might be an existing condition that could be treated and that she could then go on to have Libby, free from any risk. But he had given her only the basic health checks and so the risk remained. It seemed that the only thing Holly could do to avoid dying in childbirth was to avoid conceiving Libby. ‘Just as long as we get to spend the rest of our lives together.’

      ‘You don’t get rid of me that easy,’ Tom said, kissing the top of her head.

      ‘And you don’t get rid of me that easily either. Just don’t go getting all celebrity on me and running off with the first airhead you meet.’

      ‘You know I won’t do that,’ Tom assured her.

      ‘Yes, I know you won’t,’ Holly answered. The moondial had at least provided her with that certainty.

      ‘Anyway, I’ve got a long journey tomorrow,’ Tom said, raising his arms and yawning loudly. ‘Fancy an early night?’

      ‘Can I bring my popcorn?’ teased Holly.

      ‘As long as your crunching doesn’t keep me awake,’ Tom warned, still yawning enthusiastically.

      ‘Oh, it won’t be my crunching keeping you awake,’ countered Holly. She wiggled her eyebrows suggestively at Tom, a trick she had learnt from Billy.

      ‘Mrs Corrigan, I don’t know what you mean.’

      ‘Then let me explain further,’ promised Holly, climbing onto Tom’s knee. ‘I don’t think we need to go to bed to have an early night.’

      By the time Holly and Tom made it to their bedroom, the moonlight that had shone through the open window had faded and failed. Holly’s path lay firmly in the present.

       Chapter 7

      Jocelyn arrived at eleven o’clock prompt with a wicker basket full of hidden treasures. ‘I thought we might make the most of the Indian summer and have a little picnic, if you’re up to it?’ she challenged.

      ‘If I’m up to it? So what’s put a spring in your step?’ answered Holly, genuinely surprised.

      ‘Well, I believe I have your Tom to thank for persuading Patti to return to university.’

      ‘She’s decided to go back? Jocelyn, that’s fantastic news, but please don’t go giving Tom all the credit. I’m sure she would have made the same decision eventually,’ Holly assured her.

      Jocelyn had only recently returned from her visit to see her son and this was the first chance they’d had to catch up. Holly had been impatient to find out all there was to know about the moondial, but now the time was here, she was suddenly very nervous about bringing the subject up and she knew Jocelyn shared her reluctance.

      Holly had managed to call a truce on all the thoughts and theories that had plagued her ever since she had crossed paths with the moondial. She hadn’t found all the answers, she hadn’t even worked out all of the questions, but she still held out hope that the answers were in her grasp and, most importantly, that there may be a way to secure her future and Libby’s too. She wasn’t about to give up on her daughter just yet.

      But no matter how positive she was trying to be, she couldn’t dispel all her fears. Her experiences of the moondial had been to the extremes of bitter and sweet. For every ounce of hope it had revealed, it seemed to add a pound of pain. Jocelyn had already said there was a price to pay for changing the future and Holly wasn’t sure she was ready to hear the secrets that her friend had promised to reveal.

      ‘I hope you have something better in mind than the garden for our picnic,’ grimaced Holly. Although Holly had tried to keep the garden under control, if only so that Tom’s hard work wasn’t completely undone by another year’s summer growth, it was hardly the lush landscape she knew it could be and she still felt guilty about the state it was in every time Jocelyn visited.

      ‘I was thinking we’d take a trip to the ruins of Hardmonton Hall.’

      ‘Really? I didn’t know we could drive up there,’ asked Holly. To her shame, she had never visited the ruins close up and had seen no more than the crumbling walls that skirted the outside of the old estate boundaries and which lead right up to the gatehouse. Even then, the extent of the estate wasn’t as grand as it used to be with most of the land having been sold off, redeveloped or reclaimed for farming. Only the areas immediately surrounding the ruins had been left untouched.

      ‘We can’t drive up there,’ scolded Jocelyn. ‘Kids these days want to be ferried around everywhere. These joints of mine are feeling well oiled today and if I can make the trek, I’m sure you can.’

      ‘You want to show me where the moondial was originally sited, don’t you?’ Holly asked, and her stomach did a flip simply saying its name out loud.

      ‘It seems the ideal place to debate the pros and cons of time travel,’ chirped Jocelyn, but Holly sensed a tone of false bravado in her voice.

      ‘Well, what should I bring?’ asked Holly in a panic. She started to randomly open kitchen cupboards. ‘I’ve already made a pot of tea. There’s a flask here somewhere. Have you brought food? I’ve got some bits and pieces in the fridge. And cutlery. Have you got cutlery?’ Holly was gulping air at the end of every sentence as panic set in.

      ‘I’ve got a flask,’ soothed Jocelyn, ‘and enough food to feed an army.’ Holly went to say something else but Jocelyn stopped her. ‘And I’ve got a blanket and all the utensils we could possibly need.’

      ‘You’re sure?’ replied Holly meekly.

      Jocelyn took hold of Holly’s shaking hands to steady her. ‘We’re not about to carry out brain surgery here,’ she told her. ‘Just talk, that’s all. Just as much as both of us can bear.’

      ‘Maybe I should get changed,’ suggested Holly.

      Jocelyn sighed. ‘You’re fine as you are.’

      ‘Umbrella?’

      Jocelyn raised an eyebrow, silencing any further prevarication.

      ‘Let’s throw caution to the wind, shall we? Life’s all about taking risks,’ she told Holly.

      Holly and Jocelyn began their walk in silence as they followed the overgrown path that had once been an impressive drive leading up to the Hall. The disused road was hidden beneath years of decay and neglect. The only sound breaking the silence was the occasional snapping of twigs underfoot and sweet birdsong that brightened the morning in spite of the growing tension between the two women.

      The ancient trees that had guarded the approach to Hardmonton Hall loomed overhead, growing more dense as the women made their pilgrimage. The September sun glinted occasionally through the canopy and the dappled sunlight lit the way ahead for Holly and Jocelyn. Holly tried to enjoy the mixture of light and shadow and the contrast between the rotting vegetation underfoot and the sparkling greenery above. The leaves were yet to show the onset of autumn, but as the breeze whipped them into a frenzy Holly could hear their telltale death rattle.

      ‘So how was your visit СКАЧАТЬ