Jack, however, wasn’t keen to be deflected. “Why wouldn’t you talk about it? Flora, this is huge. I want you to feel you can tell me anything and I’m worried you didn’t feel able to tell me this.”

She stopped walking. Depth. Honesty. That was what she wanted.

On impulse she fumbled in her bag and pulled out the photograph she carried with her everywhere. “This is my mother.”

He took the photograph from her, studying it closely. “You look like her. You have the same smile.”

“We were similar in many ways.”

“You’ve never shown me this before.”

“I’ve never shown anyone. You’re the first.”

“I—” His voice was roughened. “I’m glad you shared it with me.” He handed the photo back. “Do you want to share the rest? What happened?”

She never had before, but with Jack she wanted to share. She wanted him to really know her and how could he do that if she wasn’t honest? “We were at the beach. My mother loved to swim.” She wasn’t sure how to tell the story because it wasn’t one she’d told before. “She liked the feeling of weightlessness and freedom. She left me on the sand with a book. There was a family close by who said they’d watch me. I’ll be five minutes, she said, just five minutes.” The words started to come more easily. “She went into the water and swam out. She paused once to give me a wave, and then carried on swimming. That was the last time I saw her alive. They found her body the next day washed up on the next beach. They think she must have been caught in a riptide. That’s it really. For the time she was missing, I stayed with her friend and then the friend called my aunt and she came to get me.”

Jack rubbed his fingers across his forehead, opened his mouth to speak and then shook his head and pulled her into his arms. “Flora—” He held her tightly, pressing her against him in an effort to provide all the security she’d lost that day. “I’m sorry. So sorry.”

Her cheek was pressed against his shirt. She loved the way it felt, being held like this. “It was a long time ago. I don’t usually talk about. I never talk about it.”

“I’m glad you talked about it with me. I want to know. I want to know all of it.”

She could have stayed like this forever, but there were things she knew she had to say. “You don’t talk about Becca.”

“I talk about her all the time.”

“Only in relation to the girls.” She lifted her head and looked at him, trying to see the things he wasn’t saying. “You don’t tell me how you’re feeling.”