CHAPTER ONE

       Seven years later

      ‘YOU’RE FAR TOO cynical about men, Cat.’

      ‘I don’t think that I am,’ Cat answered, ‘though admittedly I’d love to be proven wrong. But, no, I’m taking a full year off men.’

      Cat was busy packing. Just out of the shower she was wearing a dressing gown and her long, curly black hair was wrapped in a towel. As she pulled clothes out of her wardrobe she chatted to her close friend Gemma, who was lying on Cat’s bed and answering emails on her phone.

      They were two very busy women but they usually managed to catch up a couple of times a week, whether at the hospital canteen, a coffee shop or wine bar, or just a quick drop-in at the other’s home.

      This evening Cat was heading to Barcelona for an international emergency medicine conference, where she was going to be giving a talk the following morning. She had got off early from her shift at the hospital to pack and Gemma had popped around to finalise a few details for the following weekend. Gemma and Nigel’s twin boys, Rory and Marcus, were being christened and Cat was to be godmother to Rory.

      They were used to catching up on the run. Any plans they made were all too often cancelled at the last minute thanks to Cat’s position as an accident and emergency consultant and Gemma juggling being a mother to two eighteen-month-old boys as well as a full-time obstetrician.

      Their lives were similar in many ways and very different in others.

      ‘So you and Rick have definitely broken up?’ Gemma checked that Cat’s latest relationship was really over.

      ‘He’s been gone a month, so I’d say so!’

      ‘You’re not even going to think about it?’

      ‘Why would I consider moving to Yorkshire when I’m happy here?’

      ‘Because that’s what couples do.’

      ‘Oh, so if Nigel suddenly decided that he wanted to move to…’ Cat thought for a moment and then remembered that Nigel was taking French lessons. ‘If he wanted to move to France, you’re telling me that you’d go?’

      ‘Not without consideration,’ Gemma said. ‘Given that I’m the breadwinner there would have to be a good reason, but if Nigel really wanted to, then, of course, I’d give it some thought. Relationships are about compromise.’

      ‘And it’s always the woman who has to be the one to compromise,’ Cat said, but Gemma shook her head.

      ‘I don’t agree.’

      ‘You’ve never played the dating game in your thirties.’

      ‘Yes, I have—Nigel and I only married last year.’

      ‘Ah, but the two of you had been going out for ever before then. It’s different at our age, Gemma. Men might say that they don’t mind independent working women and, of course, they don’t—just as long as you’re home before them and have the dinner on.’

      ‘Rubbish!’ Gemma responded from her happily married vantage point. ‘Look at Nigel—I work, he gave up teaching and stays home and looks after the children, and the house and me…’

      ‘Yes.’ Cat smiled. ‘Well, you and Nigel are a very rare exception to my well-proven theory.’

      But Gemma suddenly had other things on her mind when she saw what Cat was about to add to her case. ‘Please don’t take them,’ Gemma said, referring to Cat’s running shoes. ‘They’re ugly.’

      ‘They’re practical,’ Cat said. ‘And they are also very comfortable. I’m hoping to squeeze in a little bit of sightseeing on Sunday afternoon once the conference wraps up. There’s a modern art museum, hopefully I’ll get some inspiration for this room…’

      She looked around at the disgusting beige walls and beige carpet and beige curtains and wished she knew what she wanted to do with the room.

      Gemma got off the bed and went to Cat’s wardrobe and took out some espadrilles.

      ‘Take these instead.’

      ‘For walking?’

      ‘Yes, Cat, for walking, not striding…’ She peered into her friend’s luggage. ‘Talk about shades of grey—that’s the saddest case I’ve ever seen. You’re going to Spain!’

      ‘I’m going to Spain for two nights to catch the end of a conference. I’m not going on a holiday. I shan’t even see the beach,’ Cat pointed out. ‘I wish that I was flying off for a holiday,’ she said, and then sat on the bed. ‘I hate July so much.’

      ‘I know you do.’

      It had been seven years since Thomas had died.

      She didn’t lug her grief around all the time but on days like today it hurt. Gemma smiled as her friend went into her bedside drawer and took out his photo. Cat kept it there; it was close enough that she could look at it any time and removed enough not to move her to tears. The drawer also meant she didn’t have to explain the most vital piece of her past to any lovers until she was ready to.

      She simply found it too painful.

      ‘Rick asked how likely I was to have another one like him,’ Cat admitted. It was what had really caused the end of her latest relationship. ‘I told him about Thomas and then I showed him his photo…’

      ‘He’s not a doctor, Cat,’ Gemma said. ‘It’s a normal question to ask. It’s one you’ve asked.’

      ‘I know that. It was more the way…’ She was so hypersensitive to people’s reactions when they saw her son but she smiled when Gemma spoke on.

      ‘I loved how he smiled if you touched his little feet,’ Gemma said, and her words confirmed to Cat that she was very blessed to have such a wonderful friend. ‘He’s so beautiful.’

      He was.

      Not to others perhaps but they had both seen his lovely eyes and felt his little fingers curve around theirs and they had felt his soft skin and heard his little cries.

      And this was the hard part.

      It was late July and she’d be away on those days.

      The day of Thomas’s birth and also the day that he had died.

      ‘Do I take his photo with me?’ Cat asked, and Gemma thought for a moment.

      ‘I don’t think you need his photo to remember him,’ she said.

      ‘But I feel guilty leaving him in the drawer.’

      ‘Leave him with me, then,’ Gemma said. ‘I’ll have a long gaze.’

      Yes, she had the very best friend in the world, Cat thought as she handed over her most precious possession, and because she was going to start crying Cat changed the subject. ‘Hey, did you have any luck tracking down that dress for the christening?’

      ‘Nope.’

      Gemma shook her head as she put the photo in her bag. ‘I knew that I should have just bought it when I saw it. It was perfect.’

      ‘It