Chapter 13
12.45 p.m.
He removed the single sheet of paper from the envelope and his eyes bored into the words on the page for one final time. This was his contingency plan. Just in case the mother wasn’t as compliant as he expected the daughter to be. His breath came in erratic wheezes as he wrote just one word on the envelope. He let the ink dry and then he touched the name in the very centre, meticulously scribed in brown: EMMELINE.
His finger stayed there as her face appeared before him. Her hand touched his cheek. He watched her lips part, felt them kiss his hair, his ear, his neck. All her letters sat in front of him on the desk. Every copy of his own, too. He’d always kept copies of everything he wrote, so he could read their love story over and over. He still did. His palm reste
