For Life Read online

  For Life

  D Gourlay

  CONTENTS

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Epilogue

  True love stories never have endings…

  There are no end credits that role by, or forever afters that leave it just as that, unexplained. No, true love stories repeat themselves over and over again. True love stories are about loving, hurting, fighting, separating, meeting anew, and loving again; over and over and over again.

  And some say that even the grave can’t stop a true love story.

  -Richard Bach

  For Life Copyright © 2019 by Dominique Gourlay. All Rights Reserved.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.

  Cover image credit © Ruslan1117

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  D Gourlay

  Visit my website

  Facebook.com/d.gourlay.writer

  First Printing: March 2019

  ISBN- 9781796828061

  Dedication

  To everyone who has waited patiently for this book, thank you; and to the few who have waited impatiently, thank you also!

  I can’t begin to thank everyone enough for their support and love, and I hope you enjoy this book as much as I enjoyed writing it.

  If anyone ever tells you that you can’t do something, or laughs at your dreams, turn around, slam the door in their face, and go and do it anyway!

  Sarah and Tarin, thank you so much for proof reading. You've been superstars and I wouldn't have got this far without you.

  Prologue

  “Two Macallan, neat please.” Seb has finally managed to get the attention of the woman behind the bar, and she starts to pour our drinks. “So how’s Scott doing?” He turns to ask me.

  “He’s great. He’s finally stepped up and is taking charge with the business a bit more, which means Suze is in a slightly better mood, well some of the time anyway.” He laughs at me and takes our drinks from the blonde bartender, throwing a coy smile in her direction. She blushes softly and walks away. “You’ve not changed at all then I see?” I laugh at him.

  “Hey, if there’s a beautiful woman in front of me, I’m obviously going to have a try. We can’t all be emotionally dead inside like you!” He winks at me as he lifts his glass, and I tap mine against his.

  “It’s so good to see you.” I say once I have taken a sip of my drink. I put my glass on the bar and absentmindedly run my fingers around the rim of the glass.

  “It has been a while hasn’t it, and I’m sorry for that, I really am.” Gone is Seb’s cheeky grin, his face suddenly falls and looks solemn.

  “It’s hardly your fault.” I try to smile at him, but the memories of how we are here come creeping back into my mind. We both sit in silence for a while.

  “I met someone.” I finally say.

  “I know.”

  “You know?”

  “Of course I know, I know everything. Just because you can’t see me doesn’t mean I’m not around. I have to keep an eye on my big brother to check he isn’t getting himself into any trouble!” He smiles at me.

  “So, what do you think of her?” I ask nervously.

  “She’s amazing, fuck knows how you managed to land someone like her!” He laughs and takes another sip of his whiskey. “Even with all her drama, I reckon she’s totally worth it.”

  “She is. Totally worth it. I thought Mum had completely fucked up my chances of ever trusting any woman, but- I don’t know. She is prefect.” I turn to lift my drink to my lips while I remember every detail of Rachel’s face. Her beautiful smile, her swirling blue eyes.

  “If she is so perfect, then what are you doing here buddy?” Seb’s eyes are staring deep into mine, and I can feel the pain radiating from him. “You can go back, you can fight. I never had this chance. My life was snatched away from me so suddenly, but you can fight this. You have to fight Taddy.”

  I’m suddenly aware that everyone at the bar has disappeared. It’s just Seb and I, and I can’t get a handle on what I’m feeling. I’m back with my brother, I’ve missed him so much, and I’d give anything to spend more time with him. But I can’t leave Rachel, I love her so much, and we have the rest of our lives together.

  “I don’t want to lose you again.” I whisper as tears start to flood my eyes.

  “You haven’t lost me. I’m still there, always, okay, not always, nobody needs to see what you two kinky fuckers get up to in the bedroom!” His laugh trickles through me and brings a smile to my face. “But I’m never going to leave you, I will wait for you until it is actually your time to join me here. And then I can laugh at you, because you will be all old and grey and wrinkly, and I will still be this young beautiful specimen of a man!” We both laugh and he throws his arms around me. I pull him tight into me, and we embrace for a long while.

  He pulls back, grabs my face in his hands and looks straight into me. “You have to go back. Fight Tad, you can do this. Go and live your life, and live mine for me too. Do everything we said we would. Go and be a Dad, to Ami, and to the nephew I won’t get to meet. Tell him about his amazing Uncle Seb, about all the adventures we got up to when we were kids. Love that woman until it hurts, and then love her some more. Live Tad. Live.”

  Chapter One

  Rachel

  The coffee in the polystyrene cup in front of me is probably stone cold by now. I’ve been waiting in this room for hours. I can’t get the last few hours to stop repeating over and over in my head, the gun, the blood, the police and my Tad. My beautiful Tad laying on the floor, being worked on by four paramedics, before being whisked away in an ambulance.

  “Rachel, I’m sorry to have kept you waiting for so long.” DCI Robins suddenly walks through the door with another police officer and sits at the table in front of me. I lower my head and resume my stare at the table and I hear a click from somewhere in the room. “I’ve just got off the phone with the hospital. Mr. Turner was taken straight in for surgery. They have removed the bullet, but it perforated an intestine, which meant the contents leaked into him. They are cleaning him out, and have started him on high dose antibiotics to try to make sure he doesn’t get an infection. He isn’t out of the woods yet, but they are confident he should be out of surgery and recovering soon.”

  I hear what Robins is saying to me, but his words are met by numbness. I can’t feel anything. I just know I need to get to that hospital. I need to be there for Tad.

  “Can we just do this quickly so I can go to him please?” I say without looking up from the table.

  “Okay. I just want to run through what happened. Peters is in custody waiting to be questioned. Can you just tell me briefly what happened?”

  “I was upstairs and heard a bang. I went down and heard talking from the kitchen, and when I walked into the kitche
n I saw Theo, Ted, whatever the hell his name is pointing a gun at Tad. When he saw me, he turned the gun to me, and said something about wanting Tad to lose me like he had lost everything. Then Tad jumped in front of me just as Theo fired the gun. Tad got hit and fell on the floor. I went to try to help him but Theo started screaming at me to stay back, he tried to fire the gun again, but something must have gone wrong. He couldn’t get it to work, so instead he just lunged at me.” The words are tumbling out of my mouth as I remember what happened, but I don’t recognise the voice coming out of me. “He pulled me off of Tad and threw me to the floor, then he started trying to strangle me. I was trying but I couldn’t get him off of me. I thought I was going to die.” My voice stays completely monotone, emotionless. I can’t feel a thing. “Suddenly there was a bang, and Theo collapsed on top of me, then I saw Tad had managed to pull himself up and had hit him on the back of the head with a big pan. But then he collapsed again, that’s when I called the ambulance.”

  “Was Mr. Turner still awake when you called the ambulance?” Robins asks.

  “Barely. He told me to tie up Theo so he couldn’t escape, but then he was drifting in and out of consciousness.”

  “So that’s when you put cable ties around Peters’ ankles and wrists?” I nod, still staring intently at the table in front of me. “And when did he come round?” He asks.

  “Only when the ambulance turned up and there was a load of noise being made.” I recall.

  “Okay. And just to clarify, we are talking about Ted Peters?”

  “Well I knew him as Theo Peters…” I look at Robins for the first time since he walked in the room. The deep black circles under his concerned looking eyes tell me that he must have been up all night dealing with this.

  “It seems that he goes by different names, his birth name is Theodore Peters, which he shortens to Theo Peters when dealing with personal things, but the business name he used was Ted Castle, which is how Mr. Turner knew him. I suppose it would explain why neither yourself nor Mr. Turner realised he was in either of your lives in any way.”

  “He said that he wanted to sleep with me, or make me fall in love with him to steal me away from Tad. He just wanted to hurt him, revenge. Why would he then suddenly decide he wanted me dead instead?” I can’t make sense of it. Making Tad pay by stealing me from him is insane in itself, but it’s not murder.

  “It would seem that his soon to be ex-wife has started a new relationship, quite publicly and it must have tipped him over the edge.”

  We sit in silence for a few minutes while Robins makes some notes in the folder in front of him.

  “We can leave this now Rachel. I know you must be anxious to get to the hospital. If you just take a seat outside, I will have someone take you there now.” He smiles at me and my eyes start to burn. I weakly smile back before following him out of the room and taking a seat.

  ♦ ♦ ♦

  I think it’s the smell of hospitals that makes me feel so uneasy. They just smell too clean; it’s hard to explain. To me it’s the smell of death covered over with disinfectant.

  Walking along the overly bright corridor, half sprinting to try to keep up with the nurse who was rushing me to Tad’s bedside is all a blur now. She was talking to me the whole way round the hospital, I’m guessing about Tad, and what had happened in his surgery, how he was recovering, that sort of thing. But I couldn’t concentrate on anything. That excessively clean, bleach filled smell was making me feel sick to my stomach.

  Her voice just seemed to get swallowed in the silence of the numerous empty corridors we walked through. The only sound I clearly remember is that of a cry. Cry may be an understatement. It was more a wail. Just a sound of pure pain. I’m not sure if it was from a patient, or loved one, but it sent a shiver down my spine and set my mind into overdrive about what I would find when I got to Tad’s room.

  Now, I am sitting in a cold, bright room, filled with various beeps and alarms, staring at the man I love, laying lifeless. He is attached to a multitude of wires and tubes, and somehow, my big, strong Tad just looks small. It’s breaking me.

  The surgeon who operated on him said that midway through the surgery, there was a complication and they lost him for a moment. They managed to bring him back, and the rest of the surgery went without a hitch. He is still on a massive dose of antibiotics to kill any remaining infection, but he should recover well.

  Now it’s just a waiting game for him to wake up, but every minute that passes seems to last an age.

  “Coffee Rach?” I turn to see Scott holding out a paper cup of coffee he must have got from the machine in the hallway.

  “Oh, thanks Scott.” I take the hot cup from him and return his kind smile. “I didn’t even realise you’d left the room.”

  “You seemed pretty lost in thought, so I thought I’d give you a minute with him. No change I take it?”

  I shake my head as I take a sip of the burning hot, bitter coffee. Instinctively, my whole face screws up in disgust at this foul attempt at coffee. I look over and see Scott pulling a similar face and can’t help but let a small laugh out.

  “This is absolutely not worth the fifty pence I paid for it!” He laughs and I hear a spluttering coming from in front of me. I turn around so fast boiling hot coffee spills all over my legs, I’m aware of the burning sensation creeping over my lap, but I couldn’t care less right now. Tad is moving. His eyes are open!

  “Tad, Tad, babe, can you hear me?” I practically throw my coffee cup on the floor by my feet and stand as close as I can to him. His eyes find mine and seem to focus, as a broad smile lights up his face from behind his oxygen mask.

  Chapter Two

  Tad

  Nine months later

  As I’m watching Rachel flipping pancakes onto plates for us all to eat for breakfast, I can’t help but grin like a mad man.

  “Ami, breakfast.” Rachel calls to her. She puts a plate of steaming hot pancakes in front of me, covered in fruit and yoghurt.

  “Thank you baby.” I say as I pull her close for a kiss. A year on and I still feel a spark somewhere inside of me every single time I get to kiss this beautiful woman.

  “Eeww!” We hear from behind us. “Do you two have to do that?!” Ami says in mock disgust as she hops into the kitchen.

  “Sorry baby!” Rachel laughs as she goes to get Ami’s breakfast. “Now quickly eat your breakfast or you’re going to be late for school.”

  Ami starts tucking into her breakfast and Rachel sits at the stool next to me with just a cup of coffee.

  “You not eating babe?” I ask as I grab Rachel’s hand.

  “Not feeling great this morning, I’ll pick at something later.” She flicks her hair out of her eyes as she turns to look at me and her beautiful smile just makes my heart skip.

  “What’s up?” I wrap my fingers around hers and resist the urge to throw her down on the breakfast bar.

  “Just didn’t sleep very well, I’m okay.” She assures me as she squeezes my hand.

  “Well, how about we give Mum a break and I take you to school this morning Aims?”

  “Yeah okay.” She says without looking interested at all, until a split second later when she throws her head up, “Can we go on the-”

  “Don’t you even finish that sentence!” Rachel interrupts.

  “But-”

  “There is not a chance in hell I am letting you on a motorbike Ami.”

  Ami rolls her eyes at Rachel and turns to look at me. “Tad, tell her!” She pleads with me.

  “I’m not even allowed on the bike anymore Aims!” I laugh as I stand and ruffle her hair. “Come on, go clean your teeth and I’ll grab your shoes.”

  She sighs as she stands and mutters “spoilsport” under her breath as she walks past Rach.

  “Well I’m sorry if I’d like to not add any extra danger into our already drama filled lives!” Rachel calls after her as she walks out of the kitchen.

  “Yeah yeah…” is all we hear as she starts
running up the stairs. I can’t help but laugh at the similarities between the two of them.

  “What?” Rach asks.

  “She is so like you!”

  “Seatbelt on?” I look over to check Ami is strapped in before I pull out of the driveway.

  “Can I put the radio on?” Ami asks me.

  “Of course you can.” She starts pushing buttons and a song starts playing on the radio that she starts nodding her head along to. After the song comes a news bulletin.

  “And now for today’s news. Kevin Blackford, former police and crime commissioner of Sussex will today be sentenced after a long court case. Blackford stands accused of-” I quickly press a button and change the radio station over to another one.

  Shit, what do I say?

  I look over at Ami who is staring at her hands in her lap.

  “Hey, you ok?” She nods without looking up. I pull up on a road not far from school and shut the engine off. “You know, it’s okay to miss him?” She looks up at me with a confused look on her face. “He is your dad after all. I know he did some pretty evil things, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t love you. Some people are just a little bit muddled up in their heads.” I’m not really sure if I’m making things better or worse, but I can’t let her go off to school without trying to help.

  “I used to miss him, a little bit. But I don’t anymore. He wasn’t really a very good Dad. Mum did everything for me, and now Mum has you and she is happy.” She smiles at me and I see so much of Rachel in her.

  “You know, you have me too right? I know I’m not your Dad, and I won’t ever try to be, but I want you to know I’m always here for you and I love you.”

  “I love you too Tad.” She leans over and gives me a very quick hug before grabbing her bag from her feet and opening the door. I get out of my door and lock the car before we walk towards her school.