by Imogen Clark
ALSO BY IMOGEN CLARK
Postcards From a Stranger
The Thing About Clare
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2019 by Imogen Clark
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by Lake Union Publishing, Seattle
www.apub.com
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Lake Union Publishing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-10: 1542044669
ISBN-13: 9781542044660
Cover design by Emma Rogers
CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PROLOGUE
‘The body of a woman has been found on the beach in Whitley Bay,’ the newsreader announced in a suitably sombre tone.
Grace Montgomery Smith was straightening the very many tasselled cushions that had been scattered across her drawing room floor like so much confetti. It was the housekeeper’s day off and as her children seemed incapable of tidying up as they went along, the task had fallen to her. They were going to have to learn, Grace thought as she plumped the feather innards back into shape, that most people had to clear up their own mess rather than rely on the staff to do it for them.
It took a couple of seconds for the words to cut through her endless internal monologue, but when they did Grace stopped short and focused her entire attention on the television screen, seemingly frozen in time.
‘The body has been identified as Mrs Melissa Allen, a long-standing resident of the town,’ the solemn newsreader continued. ‘She was found shortly after dawn by a dog walker. Mrs Allen worked in the King’s Head Hotel, not far from the beach. Police are not looking for anyone else in connection with the incident. Her family has been informed.’
Grace sat down heavily, all the air escaping from her lungs just as she needed it most, and squeezed the cushion she’d been holding so that there wasn’t a hair’s breadth between its rich, velvety nap and her twinset. Staring at the screen, she willed more details to come spilling out, but it seemed that that was all there was and the newsreader had moved on.
So Melissa was dead. After all these years. Grace could barely take it in. It seemed so unlikely, so random that she was struggling to make sense of it. She grappled with all the potential consequences, but she couldn’t get her thoughts to lie straight. For a moment she wondered if she might have misheard the name, or if there could be a second Melissa Allen in Whitley Bay. She hadn’t misheard, though. Just like one twin feels the misfortune of the other or a mother senses a danger that threatens her child, Grace knew that something had shifted.
And if it was true and Melissa really was dead, then that would change everything.
1
LEAH – NOW
The Allen family was running late. Again.
I had what felt like two minutes to get the kids dressed and out of the house, and tempers, mainly mine, were getting frayed. It really didn’t matter how early we got up on a Saturday. This always happened. Noah, my four-year-old, had his swimming lesson and Poppy had a netball match at school, but to look at them you’d think we had all the time in the world. Noah was still in his pyjamas but as he had his swimming goggles on he seemed to think he was more or less ready. There was no sign of Poppy.
I bellowed up the stairs at them. It was a tiny terraced house and there was no need to shout to be heard in any part of it, but it made me feel better.
‘Get down here now!’ I yelled. ‘We are going to be late!’
Nobody appeared.
I wasn’t sure why I got myself in such a steam about these things. The world wouldn’t end if the kids didn’t get to their activities on time, but I prided myself on never dropping a ball. I was doing this parenting thing on my own and there was no way I was going to let anyone say that I couldn’t cope. Not that there was anyone in my life who would care, but still. It was a personal challenge.
Noah appeared, dressed now but with no goggles. There was still no sign of Poppy.
‘Noah, where are your goggles?’ I asked him, exasperation oozing out of me like jam from a doughnut. ‘You had them a minute ago.’
Noah patted the top of his head, discovered them to be missing and then set off back up the narrow stairs at speed. I had no doubt that my next-door neighbours on both sides would also be enjoying hearing his little feet thundering around. There would be gentle, passive-aggressive complaints the next time I bumped into them, but I’d lived here longer than either of them so I didn’t care.
Poppy finally sauntered down the stairs showing absolutely no sign of the urgency that was making my heart race, but at least she was ready.
And then the doorbell rang.
‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ I muttered under my breath. I tried not to swear in front of Noah, knowing that anything I said in the sanctity of my own home would no doubt be repeated in the playground and then reported back to me via the officious school secretary, as evidence of my shoddy single parenting.
I assumed it was the postman whom I’d known since school and who wouldn’t even notice that I was screaming at the kids, but when I opened the door, mid-shout, it wasn’t him at all.
There was a woman standing on my doorstep. She looked about the same age as me, but was obviously far less frazzled. She was wearing a pale grey shirt that looked like it might be real silk, a baby-pink scarf twisted artfully around her neck and an expensive-looking pair of jeans. Classy. She had a large pair of sunglasses on, too, which held her highlighted hair away from her face. She didn’t come from round here, that much was obvious.
‘Oh!’ I said, totally thrown by the fact that she wasn’t the postman. ‘Sorry about the shouting. I was just . . . Can I help you?’
She just stood there staring at me for a moment, which was kind of disconcerting, but then she seemed to come back to herself.
‘I’m so sorry to disturb you,’ she began. Her voice was proper posh, like she ought to read the news or something. ‘This is all rather peculiar, I know, but I think I used to come here on family holidays when I was little. I was just passing and I wondered, well, I wond
ered if I might pop in for a moment. For old times’ sake?’
She gave a tremulous little smile but it faded from her lips as soon as she saw my expression. I so didn’t have time for this. We had to leave right now or Noah would miss his class all jumping into the pool together, which was his favourite part. Also, slinking in late would give the other mothers something else to bitch about behind my back, which I didn’t need. And anyway, she’d obviously got the wrong house.
‘Sorry,’ I said, my voice sounding snappier than I’d intended, ‘but I’m in a bit of a rush right now. And anyway, I think you’ve made a mistake. As far as I know, this house has never been a holiday home. Have you tried next door?’
The woman looked a little crestfallen and then slightly confused.
‘I must have the wrong road,’ she said. ‘These little houses all look the same, don’t they?’ Realising that pointing this out might cause offence, the woman’s hand shot up to her mouth and she blushed furiously. ‘God, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean . . .’ Then she bit her lip as a tiny but unmistakable giggle escaped. ‘I’m making a proper mess of this, aren’t I? Listen. Ignore me. I’ll try the next road along. Sorry again.’
By rights I should have been insulted. I mean, she’d already dissed my house and my street and I didn’t even know her name. But actually, I thought it was quite funny. Or I would have done if we hadn’t been in such a rush. Then the woman was backing down the path with her palms up, apologising to me as if her life depended on it.
‘No worries,’ I called after her. Then I added, ‘I hope you find it.’
And I really did, because she seemed a bit lost and it was obviously important to her, even though it was nothing to do with me.
Noah appeared at my side, his swimming goggles firmly back on his head.
‘Who was that, Mummy?’ he asked as the woman meandered down the road and towards the sea.
‘I have absolutely no idea,’ I said, closing the front door.
‘She was nice,’ said Noah, seeing straight to the heart of the matter with the intuition that only a four-year-old possesses.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘She was.’
2
CLIO – NOW
Clio sat in the café overlooking the sea, her cup of tea now cold on the Formica table in front of her. Outside the window the water lay like a sage-green bedspread, flat all the way to the point where it touched the mottled sky. A single boat bobbed for a moment and then set off towards the lighthouse, a flurry of seagulls in its wake.
The morning had not gone quite as planned. The woman who lived in the house had been friendly enough, despite Clio’s terrible timing, but she’d clearly had no idea what Clio had been talking about. She had probably moved in relatively recently and couldn’t be expected to know anything about the house’s history. And she hadn’t fallen for the ‘holiday home’ line which Clio had hoped might give her access to the inside.
Clio had the right place, though, of that she was certain. The address had been written in her father’s lavish script in the little notebook that the nurse had handed to her with all his belongings after he passed away.
On the table next to hers an old couple sat in companionable silence, she reading a cookery magazine and he absent-mindedly stirring his tea, the teaspoon chinking gently against the china. As she watched them, tears sprang to Clio’s eyes, hot and stinging. Why was life so unfair? Who decided which people got to enjoy their old age and which didn’t?
She tried to picture her own parents in similar poses, frail and twisted by age but still content in each other’s company, happily taking life at a slower pace. The thought brought with it a new rush of grief and Clio bowed her head so that those around her couldn’t witness her distress. Grief was so difficult to deal with after the initial shock had passed. Once the funeral was over and done with, you were simply expected to return to normal and not subject those around you to any outward displays of pain. That was how it felt to Clio, anyway.
She fumbled in her bag for a packet of tissues and wiped the tears away, blowing her nose quietly and running a finger under her eyelashes to catch any tell-tale make-up slips. Her father was gone, taken too soon, but that was something that she’d just have to learn to live with. She couldn’t fall apart every time she saw a couple who would celebrate more anniversaries together than her parents had.
In any event, knowing what she knew now, there were no guarantees that her parents’ marriage would have survived into their dotage. At least with her father no longer with them, the facts of the matter need never be revealed and their status quo could be preserved, like a fly in amber. Clio would protect her mother from her father’s mistakes and her family could keep all their memories intact without fear of them becoming tainted by the new truth.
So, Clio thought as she watched a foamy line of white horses approach the beach, what should she do next? The woman at the house had just been in a rush this morning. Maybe if Clio went back later, she might let her in for a quick look round. Hopefully, by going inside again after all those years, she could settle the confused memories she had of the place and then leave Whitley Bay and never come back.
Clio stood up and, nodding politely at the elderly couple, headed to the door.
‘Goodbye pet,’ said the lady at the counter. ‘See you again soon.’
I doubt it, thought Clio, but she smiled and waved at her as she left.
3
LEAH – NOW
I had just finished washing up after tea. Noah had dried the things that wouldn’t break and Poppy dried the rest and put them away. I liked that we were a little self-sufficient team of three, but it might have been nice to have a fourth member of the household to even things out between adults and kids. I was most definitely outnumbered. Still, I was probably better by myself, if the fathers of my children were representative of the rest of the male race, and I was used to doing things my way anyhow.
Me and the kids had planned a quiet evening of crap telly much like every other weekend and I ushered them through to the lounge whilst I got myself a celebratory glass of wine for getting to the end of another Saturday.
‘Mummy,’ shouted Noah from the other room.
‘Don’t shout,’ I shouted back. ‘I’ll be there in a tick.’
‘Mummy, that lady’s outside.’
‘Which lady?’ I asked, putting the wine bottle back in the fridge and wandering through to the front room.
‘That lady,’ said Noah, pointing out of the bay window.
It was the woman from that morning. She was leaning against the iron fence of the playground across the road and just staring at the house. And she looked like she was crying – not that she was making a song and dance about it, but I could tell by the hunch of her shoulders and the tissue in her hand that something had upset her.
I moved away from the window so she wouldn’t see us staring and sat down on the sofa between Poppy and Noah, snatching up the remote control and with it all the power.
‘Shall we watch . . . Casualty?’ It was a regular joke. I didn’t care what we watched, but I always made the kids think that I’d made this massive sacrifice for them so they owed me one. Poppy and Noah groaned, and I laughed and then passed the remote to Poppy. ‘It’s okay,’ I said in my best resigned tone. ‘You choose.’
I could see the woman from where I was sitting. She was still just standing over the road and staring into space. She looked like her world had just ended. Call me a soppy so-and-so but I can’t bear to see people upset and so before I had time to think about it, I was up and at the front door.
‘Are you okay?’ I called out to her.
The woman seemed to come round from wherever her thoughts had taken her and gave me a wide but not entirely convincing smile.
‘Me? God, yes. I’m perfectly fine. I’m just . . .’
You’re just standing in the street and staring at my house like some kind of nutter, I thought.
‘Do you want to come in for a drink o
r something?’ I heard myself say.
I don’t know why I did that. My super-soft heart, I suppose? But also, I remembered that little giggle from before and Noah’s intuitive appraisal of her. My gut was telling me that this woman was someone that I might get on with, given half a chance. She certainly seemed harmless enough, and anyway, what did I have to do except waste my evening watching shitty Saturday night TV with the kids?
The woman looked at me, hesitated for a moment, and then her face lit up and she smiled. It was a real smile that started in her eyes and then cascaded down her cheeks until she was grinning like a mad thing. Then she crossed the road, opened the little metal gate and walked up the path to where I was standing.
‘Are you sure?’ she asked when she got close enough. ‘I mean, for all you know I might be a psychopath.’
‘Are you a psychopath?’ I asked.
‘No,’ she replied.
‘Well, that’s all right then,’ I said, rolling my eyes and grinning at her. ‘Come in.’
‘Thank you so much,’ said the woman.
She had a really posh voice, with no trace of an accent. I sound quite posh too, or that’s what they always said at school anyway. I don’t have much of a north-east accent even though my mum spoke pure Geordie. But this woman had no accent at all. She sounded a lot like the Queen, in fact.
‘I’m Clio,’ she added. ‘Clio Montgomery Smith.’
She held out a hand. I wasn’t entirely sure what to do. I mean, it’s not like my mates ever shake hands, but I wasn’t brought up in a cave either, so I took her hand and shook it.
‘Bloody hell,’ I said. ‘That’s a mouthful. It must take you forever to fill in forms.’
Clio giggled again. It was a light sound that made her seem both mischievous and much younger than she looked.
‘I hold my parents completely to blame,’ she said. ‘I have a middle name, too, but if I tell you that you might not let me in.’
I was intrigued, but I wasn’t going to ask. ‘I’m just Leah,’ I said. ‘One name. Four letters. Simple.’
I thought I saw her eyebrows rise, just a little bit, like she thought there was something surprising about only having one name. Then she came inside, picking her way past Noah’s bike and the various school bags and pairs of trainers that were scattered across the hall floor. My house was hardly a palace – a small mid-terrace with a kitchen, a lounge and a bathroom downstairs and two and half bedrooms upstairs, but I’d decorated in light, fresh colours to make it seem bigger, and it was kind of tidy. Well, as tidy as it could be bearing in mind the lack of space and the children. I was proud of it, though. It might not be much, but it was all mine, or so I thought back then, and I loved it.