Krisztina played the song. It was a lament made of eight notes, repeated. It was an empty melody. It sounded elemental too; it made Krisztina think of the snow falling beyond the window and across Budapest. She wondered if it was snowing in England. Alice__ mother would be here again later, all the way from London. There was so much grief. They were mourning her little girl before she had gone. Without realising she heard these words making themselves part of the song. She played what she could, her head down, her face solemn and determined. She went back to the start, and felt the world falling away, the tears drying on her face. She heard the words coming, falling like the luminous snow. After a few minutes she looked across what seemed like a huge divide to Alice on the bed and faltered. In the house of the body, the lights were being extinguished, one by one. The floors were now bare, the walls unadorned, all sound hollow and lost; all that remained was the ghost of what was, the glimmer of the melody, the tune, the song of a life lived and lost in three minutes.

Look, I know you__e a guy__ __amn straight._ __nd there__ some man rule that you__e got to be all macho__ __ule number three, actually._ Both of her eyebrows shot up. __ould you just let me finish before I make you cry and break rule number three.

Dani had threatened to kill him. This must be the way she planned to do it. Her dark hair was down around her shoulders and she was wearing earrings that glittered in the sunlight. The purple dress she had on showed off her toned legs and hugged her curves. The supply of oxygen to his brain cut off, and he was pretty sure his heart had stopped a couple of beats ago.

I do love you. I love you so much I can hardly breathe, and I don__ know how we__l work everything out, but I want to. I__e never wanted anything more.

In all fairness, darlin_, I should probably warn you that this ain__ my first rodeo.

Well, I go wherever the ring takes me. Not because I__ a gold digger or anything; it__ more of a Lord of the Rings thing. This ring gives me powers. Though I__ totally going to lose it when my hair falls out and I start calling it __y precious.