'Ladies and gentlemen welcome to Sicily. Please keep your seat belts fastened until the aircraft has come to a standstill.'

Laurel kept her eyes fixed on the book in her lap. She wasn't ready to look out of the window. Not yet. Too many memories waited there-memories she'd spent two years trying to erase.

The toddler in the row behind her yelled a protest and squirmed, smacking both his legs into the back of her seat with a force that jolted her forwards, but Laurel was aware of nothing except the hot ball of stress that burned at the base of her ribs. Normally reading soothed her but her eyes were recognising letters that her brain wouldn't compute. Even as part of her was wishing she'd packed a different book, another part of her knew it wouldn't have made a difference.

'You can let go of the seat now. We've landed.' The woman seated next to her touched her hand gently. 'My sister is a nervous flyer too.'

Laurel heard the quiet voice from somewhere in the distance and slowly turned her head. 'Nervous flyer?'

'It's nothing to be ashamed of. My sister once had a panic attack en route to Chicago. They had to sedate her. You've been gripping that seat since we took off from Heathrow. I said to my Bill, "That girl doesn't even know we're sitting next to her. And she hasn't once turned the page of that book." But we've landed now. It's over.'

Absorbing the startling truth that she hadn't turned the page once during the flight, Laurel stared at the woman blankly. Kind brown eyes looked back at her. The woman's expression was concerned and motherly.

Motherly?

Laurel was surprised she was even capable of recognising that expression, given that she'd never seen it b...