‘You’re staying for a while, then?’ Chloe asked, holding Ruby’s chubby fingers in her hand. Ruby was transfixed by her, brown eyes wide and hands clutching at Chloe’s hair.

‘Yes,’ said Hannah. ‘If you’ll have us.’

Chloe wondered if it was possible to faint from happiness. Nothing could ever match the joy of having her family back with her. Not all the riches on earth. ‘Oh, I think I might be able to find room for you.’ She kissed Hannah’s cheek and Ruby’s forehead. ‘Come on, you must be knackered. I know I am. Let’s go home.’

Chapter Twenty-Nine

That evening, the Crow’s Nest rang with unfamiliar sounds. Squeals of laughter pierced the normal quiet as Ruby splashed in the bath. Chloe had resisted the urge to go in and see if Hannah needed help. Of course Hannah didn’t need help: she’d managed for a year now.

Once Ruby had been bathed and put to bed in the cot next to the bed in the spare room, Hannah and Chloe shared a takeout pizza and a bottle of wine. They’d spent the evening talking until they were hoarse, and there had been more than a few tears.

Once he’d heard Hannah was with her, Fraser had said he’d come straight down to Cornwall as soon as he landed back in the UK. He was relieved and delighted, naturally, but she was secretly glad he was stuck in Austria until Saturday. She needed this time alone with Hannah and Ruby. If that was selfish, she didn’t really care. Hannah needed some space herself, and dealing with one parent after so much time apart was probably more than enough.

After dinner, they finished the wine in the sitting room.

‘Did Jordan stop you from visiting us?’ Chloe asked, feeling a little more confident about asking difficult questions. She had to get to know her daughter all over again and vice versa.

‘Not physically … but he made it clear he’d rather I didn’t come home. At first I thought he was different from the other guys I’d met at uni. Cheeky, anarchic, funny … and even when I found out that he was loaded, I believed him when he said he wasn’t interested in the money or any of the “Surrey mafia” as he called them.’ Hannah screwed up her nose, as she often did when she felt awkward or embarrassed. ‘Sorry.’

‘You know what, Hannah? When I first married your father and moved to Surrey, that’s how I felt myself. It’s not easy being different. Welsh, I mean …’

Hannah giggled. Chloe hadn’t heard her do that in a very long time.