Chapter One: Back Again

This is set after Lost Son, possibley a year. Tim had 'died'. The reference Kate makes to the beach is when Kate was not coping well with his death. She go drunk and when to the beach with her gun. Thankfully Delko found her, Kate had passed out from the booze gun in hand.

Kate's also infurated because she suddenly realizes what has happened. Tim had betrayed her in the same way she betrayed him in the beginning. This storyline had far to go. It was going to be about Tim wooing Kate and her tryin to fight off her feelings and in the end realizng it didn't matter what he'd done.

I know reposting this is a bit of a cheat, but i sets the scene for the next chapter!

The sun was shining down on us, its warming touch bathing my skin as I stared straight ahead unable to think, feel or even speak. I was dreaming, I had to be. My mind was playing cruel tricks on me.

He was standing there, one hand in his jeans pocket. The sun highlighting the lighter browns in his ebony hair and casting his five o'clock shadow just right. He was broader now, more muscular. The black and white striped shirt clung to his firm muscle tone reminding me of everything I'd been missing over the past three years and more. His chocolate coloured eyes were studying me profusely, with a longing I hadn't seen in a long time.

I had gone insane. I was seeing the impossible.

All those extra hours I'd been doing, taking care of Daniel and then the UC on the side had broken my mind, because I was seeing the dead and this could not be real.

My hand was clasped to my mouth and there was lump in my throat at the emotions aching in my chest.

I'd watched his casket lowered into the ground. His degrading body was six feet under and had been for over two years now.

"Is this a dream?" the words slipped from my lips, I hadn't even thought them, they had simply appeared.

I'd had this dream before under so many different situations and settings, and I always woke up alone in bed, my hand straying to his pillow, always surprised to find it cold and the bed empty.

"This isn't a dream Kate." His voice still sounded the same, deep and rich.

This had to be a dream but my mind had started working again, it was rationalising and putting the pieces together like a jigsaw and the picture that appeared wasn't pretty. I could taste the bitterness in the back of my throat.

What he'd done to me, what he'd done to his own son.

I could see it all now, from the closed casket to Daniel's pleas that he could still see his father sometimes in the night.

Tim was stepping towards me, his hand out imploring.

I had played this moment over and over in my head, and it always ended the same. I ran into his arms and held onto him for dear life. We'd kiss and make up, and I wouldn't care where he'd been or what he'd done, just that he was alive and that was all that mattered.

Immense rage was running through my body and I couldn't control it, because my grief was still raw. That night on the beach was still in my mind and I hated him for driving me to it.

He'd almost left his child an orphan that night and he didn't even know it.

My jaw was tightening and I could feel the fury that was running through my veins taking over. We needed to talk and there were so many things to say but I couldn't not right now, because I was scared if I took that step towards him right now, I might actually murder him myself.

So instead I did the one thing I'd never dreamed of doing. I turned my back on him and I walked away.