This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
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Published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2006 1
Copyright © Annie Groves 2006
Annie Groves asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
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Ebook Edition JANUARY 2009 ISBN: 9780007279500
Version: 2017-09-12
I would like to thank the following:
All those at HarperCollins who helped to make publication of this book possible
Teresa Chris, my agent
Yvonne Holland
My fellow members of the RNA
Tony, who, as always, contributed to this book with driving and research help
And perhaps, most especially, to all those who endured the reality of World War Two.
ONE
‘No! Don’t.’
‘Aw, what’s up with yer?’
‘It’s not right, that’s what,’ Molly announced, keeping her arms folded tightly over her chest to prevent Johnny from making a fresh attempt to touch her breasts. It was a warm July evening and they had decided to walk home from the cinema on Lime Street to Edge Hill, the small tight-knit community of streets clustered together in a part of the Liverpool that didn’t belong to the dockside but wasn’t part of the new garden suburbs like Wavertree either. A few yards ahead of them, she could see June, Molly’s elder sister, locked in the arms of her fiancé, Frank.
‘Aw, come on, Molly, just one kiss,’ Johnny persisted cajolingly. ‘Look at your June. She knows how to treat a chap.’
Molly didn’t really want to look at June because June was with Frank, and just thinking about her sister’s boyfriend always made Molly’s heart ache painfully and her skin flush. But Frank was June’s. And the only smiles he ever gave to Molly were kind and older-brotherly. Agreeing to go out with Johnny was the best way Molly could think of to stop herself from thinking about Frank. Frank belonged to June, and that was that.
‘Come on, Molly, give us a kiss,’ Johnny coaxed. ‘There’s nowt wrong in it. Look at your June and Frank.’
Molly tensed. There it was again – that pain she had no right to have. She had been struggling all evening to evade Johnny’s amorous advances, and the eagerness she could hear in his voice now, as he pressed closer to her, made her feel wretchedly miserable and uncomfortable. What was wrong with her? Johnny was a good-looking lad, tall with thick dark hair. But his bold gaze and knowing smile intimidated Molly. Instinctively she knew that Frank would not make a girl feel uncomfortable when she was with him; neither would he start pressing her for intimacies she wasn’t ready to give. Unhappiness clogged her throat and tears burned at the back of her eyes.
June and Frank were oblivious to Molly’s plight. Not that June would have had much sympathy with her, Molly knew. It was June who had insisted on her going out with Johnny in the first place – he was a friend of Frank’s and an evening out all together meant June could see Frank and keep an eye on her younger sister at the same time. Like every girl in the country who was walking out with a lad who had just received his call-up papers for the now obligatory six months’ military training, June was anxious to spend time with Frank whilst she still could.
‘June and Frank are engaged,’ was all Molly could think of to say to Johnny to justify her own refusal, her voice slightly breathless as she wriggled away from his embrace.
‘Well, me and you are as good as – leastways we would be if I had me way,’ Johnny told her.
She stared at him with a mixture of dismay and shock. ‘You can’t say that,’ she objected. ‘We aren’t even walking out proper. And besides …’ She looked towards her sister and Frank.