Always You

Always You
Erin Kaye

A pair of star-crossed lovers offer each other a second chance at life and love. But will they have the courage to take it?An emotive and uplifting tale, guaranteed to pull at the heart strings. Perfect for fans of Jo Jo Moyes and Hilary Boyd’s Thursdays In The Park.If only they could rewrite their past…It’s 1992 and Sarah is in love with Cahal, a boy from the wrong side of the tracks. As they plan to graduate from university, all seems set for their happily ever after.Fast forward to 2012 and something’s gone wrong. Cahal is out of the picture and Sarah is divorced from Ian by whom she’s had two children. What happened? As Cahal walks back into Sarah’s life, can they do things differently this time?

ERIN KAYE

Always You

To my big brother, Jim

Contents

Cover (#u2ebf2195-6675-5357-b40e-940b37666666)

Title page (#ue9dd3e43-06aa-58af-aa12-875ddaa0d165)

Dedication (#u025253e6-b7c9-5dd3-ba5f-1e35d1126a1b)

Chapter 1 1992

Chapter 2 2012

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Backads (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Also by Erin Kaye (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher

Chapter 1 1992 (#u44183b38-286c-5f6d-bb12-cfa7ddfd8d21)

‘So, have you told your father about us yet?’ Cahal lay on his back, head propped up by two pillows, staring at a patch of green mould on the ceiling. A chipped saucer, full of ash, balanced precariously on his athletic chest.

‘Have you told yours?’ said Sarah, tracing her finger around the whorl of thick, black hair that surrounded his left nipple. The room smelt of cigarette smoke, stale beer and sex – the smell of sin. Golden February sunshine filtered through the thin floral curtains and ‘Goodnight Girl’ by Wet Wet Wet played quietly on the radio. The laughter of high school kids on their lunch break floated up from the street below.

‘Yep.’ He brought the stub of a roll-up to his lips, pinched between nicotine-yellow finger and thumb. His chest rose as he inhaled, stilled, then deflated slowly as a plume of grey smoke escaped from the corner of his mouth.

Sarah propped herself up on her elbow, and pulled the slightly musty duvet around her naked, shivering shoulders. She tucked a lock of long, blonde hair behind her ear. ‘What did they say?’

He stubbed the cigarette out on the saucer with a faint fizzing sound and carefully placed the saucer atop the bedside table. ‘Not much.’

‘Oh,’ she said, disappointed, and sank back down on the bed again.

He rolled onto his side and the well-defined muscles beneath his pale skin flexed. ‘Don’t take it personally. They aren’t that interested in anything I do.’ But though he smiled, his eyes, the same blue-green colour of the sea in Portstewart bay outside, were sad.

Sarah frowned. ‘Not like my Dad. He rang the flat the other day, you know, asking me what mark I got in that psychology paper. He’s always ringing me. Or if not him, Aunt Vi. I wish we didn’t have that phone. You manage perfectly well here without one. He insists that I come home every weekend. You’d think I was twelve, not a grown adult.’

He cocked his head in reply and was quiet for a few moments. Sarah waited, used to the way he always thought before he spoke, a trait that lent everything he said an air of authority. ‘I wouldn’t knock it. At least he cares about you.’

‘He cares too much,’ grumbled Sarah. ‘He didn’t want me to leave Ballyfergus. He wanted me to go to Queen’s in Belfast and live at home.’

A pause. ‘So why didn’t you?’

‘I had to get away. Living in that house was suffocating. I had to attend church twice on a Sunday and my father always had to know exactly where I was, and who I was with. My aunt was even worse. And if I was ever late, oh, what a carry-on. You’d have thought Jack the Ripper was on the loose.’

He grinned lopsidedly, a dimple appearing in his left cheek, and revealed the crooked tooth in his lower left jaw that would’ve been an imperfection in anyone else. He placed a hand, rough and hot, on her hip. ‘So you escaped?’

‘Something like that.’