Five Years of Marriage to Mr. Bradford novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: Leonard's POV: Nine O'Clock

Leonard's POV

I stood at the window of the green-door flat until the car left Fiona's street.

It was a quarter past six, and I had not slept.

I had watched Leah's light burn all night, and I had watched Imogen's cane go up the steps and come down again an hour later, and I had not gone over.

Leah had told me to go home.

It was the first thing she had asked of me in five years, and I had obeyed it.

At half past six, the car came back.

It stopped at my door.

I heard the driver's door, and the cane on the stairs, and the key in my lock.

She had a key.

I had given her the spare in Philadelphia, in case of the hospital, and had not thought of it since.

Imogen stepped into the room in her cream coat and sat in my only armchair without taking it off.

"You look dreadful," she said. "Did she hurt you? You have a split lip."

"What did you say to her?"

"What I had to. I've offered her a way out of this that leaves everyone standing."

"Which is?"

"That you drove."

I did not move.

I had known she would say it, and I had known it for seven years, and still the sound of it in my own rented kitchen made the floor shift.

"I did not drive," I said.

"You told your mother yourself, the next morning. 'It was my car, it was my fault.' I only took you at your word."

"You were driving."

"Was I?" She tilted her head. "Who will say so? The card? Where is the card, Len?"

My hand went to my pocket.

The wallet was not there.

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