by Bowes, K T
Hana reached out for Heather’s hand, trying to keep the old pain from her voice. “After Vik, my first husband died, I discovered he’d been having an affair with someone from his work. He was a church deacon and it was...” Hana searched for the word, “catastrophic. It made me doubt everything, especially my faith. I don’t think I’ve ever been so utterly desperate. I denied it for years and let his sainted memory live on as a lie. It was when I met Logan I faced up to the truth.”
Heather let out a slight, audible gasp, “I’m so sorry.”
Hana smiled. “You’re only the third person I’ve ever told that to.” She looked shy and intensely beautiful.
The depth of her deep green eyes and the honesty she found there struck Heather and she whispered, “I won’t tell,” and crossed her hands over her chest in a childish cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-die action. “You’re so brave,” Heather said, “keeping that to yourself. It would have smashed your church to pieces.”
“I know,” said Hana, “and everyone else who knew and loved Vik.”
Heather nodded and opened her mouth to reply, but Hana’s attention strayed elsewhere. A tall, handsome man strode through the glass doors from the post room. He was olive skinned and carried himself well in his formal work clothes. His trousers were expensively cut and a pair of pointed black cowboy boots peeked out from underneath his pants. His fitted white shirt looked neatly pressed and he oozed confidence. He saw the car seat on the table and his silvery-grey eyes raked the seats nearby. His eyes landed on Hana and his face softened into a smile. Bashfulness crept into his demeanour and he made a beeline for her, skirting the many rounded tables. The man stood a head taller than Hana and as she rose with a smile, she pushed her arms around his waist and slipped her hands into the rear pockets of his pants. “Hey gorgeous,” he smiled and kissed the top of Hana’s head. “I didn’t expect to see you up here.”
They were caught up in each other and as Logan’s lips sought Hana’s, she pulled away, feeling uncomfortable. “Sorry, Heather, meet my husband Logan Du Rose.”
Hana said his name with such pride and affection, Heather saw his shoulders lift perceptibly. He dipped his tall frame forwards and offered her his hand. “Nice to meet you, Heather. I understand you’re in the bunker with the weirdoes.”
Heather looked confused and Hana slapped her husband playfully. “Don’t be mean!”
Logan laughed and it was a pleasant sound. He gave Hana a kiss on her lips that caused Heather to look away in embarrassment, then leaned over his daughter. “I’m desperate to touch her, but I don’t want to wake her either,” he groaned, his brow knitted in conflict. He satisfied himself with fingering the dark tuft of hair on her head, stroking it with tenderness. Then with a wink at Hana he left, lengthy strides taking him across the room. He looked back at his wife once and with a smouldering look, he was gone.
“I think I’m ready to go back now,” Heather smiled. “It’s been helpful talking to you.”
Thankful for the spring in the other woman’s step, Hana said, “Just don’t judge them too harshly. Make suggestions but don’t take over; Sheila’s lovely, but she’s also the boss. I’d put things back the way they were and let them find their own way around you.”
“Thank you,” replied Heather, “I’ll do that.” She gave Hana an unexpected hug and left the staffroom.
On the way through the front doors, Hana heard her name called and turned in confusion Angus leaned against the doorframe into his personal secretary’s office watching her. “Do you have a minute?” he asked.
Hana glanced at the baby and nodded.
“Please take a seat,” Angus said in his office. Hana put the car seat with the sleeping baby into the chair next to her, rocking her on the rails underneath the seat as she stirred. “An interesting invention,” the school principal commented, watching the car seat pitch forward and back.
“Definitely,” replied Hana, “I wish they’d been around twenty six years ago when Bodie wouldn’t stay asleep.”
“Perish the thought.” Angus smirked at the thought of the six-foot-uniformed-policeman lying in a rocking car seat. Hana read his mind and smiled in agreement.
Angus called through to his assistant for some tea. She stomped off to make it and Hana looked at the devilment in the principal’s face, knowing the woman wouldn’t consider Hana deserving of such luxuries. “You did that on purpose,” Hana smirked. “Why do you wind her up so much?”
“She listens at doors.” Angus steepled his fingers together under his chin. “And now she can’t. How are things?” he asked, tipping his bifocals further down his nose to observe her over the top.
“Ok,” Hana replied guardedly, aware of Angus’s predilection for finding out information without the other person realising.
“I must apologise for the unfortunate state of the staff accommodation. I confess, I haven’t visited those units for years.” He looked through the narrow window, silent for a moment. “My dear wife and I undertook the renovations more than a decade ago now. It’s not somewhere I would usually venture unless invited.”
Hana’s eyes grew wide, grasping Angus’ meaning. “Oh. So after my hissy fit, Logan dragged you over there?” Hana bowed her head. “I didn’t realise you and Iris renovated them.”
Angus shrugged. “Yes. She put hours into making the curtains and choosing paint. I hadn’t realised how poor they’d become. I apologise.”
Iris died the same year as Vik. Hana’s mind wandered and Angus brought her back with a well-timed clearing of his throat. “Do you think Logan can sort it out for me?” he asked and Hana knitted her brow in confusion.
“He’s not good with decorating and stuff,” she hedged, “he lets me sort out colours and furnishings, although there was a time when he came back with the wallpaper and paint for our bedroom...” she trailed off as Angus raised his eyebrow. “That’s not what you mean is it?” Hana said.
Angus shook his head and remained silent, peering at her over his glasses. Hana grew tired with the guessing game at the same moment Phoenix stretched her little arms above her head and bent her body outwards in a graceful arc, her legs retracting upwards into her baby suit. Hana turned to Angus. “I’m sorry, but you need to level with me if you need my help, because this child is gonna blow!”
Chapter 8
The personal assistant used her backside to open the principal’s door, backing into the room with her tea tray resting high on her ample bosom. An awful stench hit her nostrils even before she could turn around and the principal stood by the open window gagging and taking enormous gulps of air. She clattered the tray onto his desk and waved, not daring to open her mouth in case the smell inadvertently got swallowed.
“Oopsie!” From the floor behind the principal’s desk, the severe woman observed a red, curly head bobbing up and down, talking to someone on the carpet. Curiosity got the better of the assistant and she held her breath to peer over. That Du Rose man’s wife and child grovelled on the carpet, the infant’s bottom pink and bare. Its mother was changing a hideous nappy. What resembled beef stew was splattered on the inside of a discarded disposable. Hana looked up and winced. “Sorry, she always does this when I have a takeaway. I think there must be something in it that doesn’t agree with her; I haven’t worked out what.”
The assistant bustled from the room, catching her employer muttering under his breath, “I’m dying.”
In her office, she wielded an aerosol room spray to mask the stink and pulled faces of disgust at the receptionist.
Hana folded the dirty nappy up and put it inside a scented nappy sack. “I’ll take it home,” she said, slipping it into the change bag next to her.
“Heavens no!” cried Angus. “Get rid of it!” He seized the sack and threw it into the fire which the assistant lit at interval for him.
The principal’s office was on the sheltered side of the main building and permanently grey and cold. Overshadowed by other taller parts of the school with a narrow apert
ure onto the sports field, it received little sunlight and suffered from an unfortunate case of damp. The package smouldered in the grate as the nappy sack melted itself onto the logs and dripped like blue snot. The white nappy turned brown as it burned.
Hana looked up at the principal from her kneeling position. “I really wouldn’t have done that.”
Half an hour later, Hana and Angus wandered around the staff unit. They inspected the work of the contractors who climbed up ladders wielding paint brushes and rollers. “What a transformation!” Hana exclaimed. The musty furniture sat on the road stacked high, including the awful double bed and its noxious mattress. “Are you doing next door too?”
Angus nodded. “Might as well do the semi-detached units at the same time.” He peered at the newly painted ceiling as another truck arrived. Grown men crawled over the kitchenette, ripping out the cupboards.
Hana gaped at Angus. “You’re doing the kitchen as well?”
He nodded and smiled. “Your husband helped me pick out furniture and kitchen units yesterday,” he said, “from catalogues.”
“Oh.” Hana winced. “You know he has expensive taste, don’t you?” She peered at the principal as his colour faded and patted him on the arm. “I’m sure it’ll be fine, you agreed a price.”
Angus gulped. “I didn’t see prices.”
Hana screwed up her face. “He’ll have a plan. Don’t worry.”
Phoenix jumped in panic at the banging and hammering from the kitchenette so Hana and Angus moved outside to talk, the baby clutching hold of Hana’s hair. “Let me hold her?” Angus asked, his voice wistful. Surprised, Hana handed the child over. “My Iris wanted children, but they never came along,” he told Phoenix, his voice low. “You’d have liked her.”
Phoenix adored Logan and picked up the maleness of Angus, settling into his arms with a sigh. They walked back to the main building, chatting. “So,” Angus asked as they reached the steps up to the reception, “do you think Logan can help us?”
Hana sighed and considered Angus’ explanation. The boarding house finances were a mess. “It sounds dreadful,” she said.
“I know.” Angus kicked at a loose stone, sending it skittering onto the soccer pitch. “It’s ceased to be viable as a business and if it hasn’t picked up by the end of the year, St Bart’s is in danger of closing.”
“You have no idea why the previous manager quit without notice?” Hana asked. “Do you think he was embezzling money?”
“I’ve been over them so many times.” Angus’ Scots lilt sounded tired. “It looks legitimate but there’s no money. Yet the accounts balance. It makes no sense.”
“Could you put the price up for boarders?”
“Not until next year now, but even then, how high do I put it? The new manager arrives in a few weeks, but I hoped Logan might stick around and help him sort it out. The accounts are with the auditors and I’m not looking forward to meeting them next week.” He sighed.
“You think someone’s stealing?” Hana asked, lowering her voice to pass a class of younger boys.
Angus nodded and gritted his teeth. “Yes.”
“Logan’s good with money,” Hana conceded. “He has enough of it.” She recalled the awkward conversation when she discovered her English-teacher-husband was a multi-millionaire. Angus’ face looked hopeful and Hana’s shoulders drooped as she listened to the banging and crashing coming from the staff unit. “Maybe we could live at home and he could travel?”
“I’d rather he was here.” Angus studied Hana as he handed the baby back, sensing her conflict. “He has to be on site to catch whatever’s happening.”
“I don’t know,” Hana shrugged in defeat. “We’ll do what Logan decides.”
Angus nodded and smiled with approval at her deference to her husband and they walked up the steps and back into the reception. Peter North sat reading a woman’s magazine in the waiting area and Hana heard Angus hiss through his teeth. “Please, no!”
Pete leapt to his feet accompanied by the sound of ripping paper as he clutched a magazine by the flimsy cover. A photograph of a scantily clad actress slithered to the ground, disfigured by the twisting of the staples in the centrefold. “Just the man!” Pete exclaimed, hurrying after the principal.
“I’ll just grab the car seat,” Hana said, shoved out of the way as Pete bowled into the assistant’s office behind Angus. The sports teacher clutched the remains of the magazine in his pudgy fingers. The torn edges of a photograph poked from his trouser pocket from where he indulged the habit of sabotaging the visitors’ reading material. Hana frowned at him and nodded towards the photo. Pete poked it further in and Rachel Hunter’s pretty face distorted as it disappeared into the bowels of his pocket.
“Any urgent calls?” Angus begged his assistant as the three adults stood over her desk. “Anyone I have to call back this second?”
The woman smiled from a face plastered with makeup and exacted her revenge for the tea order earlier. Angus pulled a face and opened his office door. The nappy, which he cavalierly threw onto the fire an hour ago had smouldered to nothing, but its pressure cooked contents filled the airwaves in the small room. “Ugh!” Angus retched.
Hana and the assistant were for once in unison as they clapped hands over their mouths and noses. Angus looked sick as he walked into the solid wall of cooked baby excrement, stopping dead so Pete ran straight into the back of him with a grunt. As the chairman of the board of trustees arrived in reception for a scheduled meeting with the art teacher, Peter North yelled in his biggest sports teacher voice, “Flamin’ hell! Someone’s been cooking shite in ‘ere!”
Chapter 9
Hana left Angus and Pete to get rid of the nappy smell. “I told you not to put it on the fire,” she snorted at Angus’ horrified face. “I need to go. Phoe’s due a feed and I can’t get my boobs out in here, can I?”
Angus looked horrified but Pete looked hopeful. Hana shook her head and left. She headed for the Honda as the car seat grew heavy in her arms, the sun glinting off the red highlights in her hair. “You should be lighter after that nappy,” Hana grumbled to her daughter.
A low wall bordered the visitors’ car park, decorated with ceramic tiles made by decades of leavers and cemented to the brick. They were colourful and bright, dancing and reflecting in the cheerful sunlight. Hana belted the car seat into the passenger side and Phoenix waved her little arms and opened and closed her mouth. “Funny girl,” Hana told her. “You like riding in the car, don’t you?” She kissed the soft forehead and closed the door, moving around the vehicle to the driver’s side.
A man waited between her car and the sleek black Mercedes next to it, leaning his smartly suited backside against the wall. Hana started in fright. “Sorry,” she said, backing out for him to move out of her way. He looked relaxed, his weight casually resting on one leg with his arms folded, but he didn’t move.
Phoenix squeaked in the car and blew bubbles to herself. Hana waited, sensing a wave of unease as the man observed her with frightening intensity. His calm gaze strayed into the vehicle, across the steering wheel at the helpless baby in the passenger seat. “Nice baby,” he said with a smirk.
Hana’s maternal instinct kicked in and she pressed the key fob, activating the central locking. The man smiled coldly but continued his watching vigil.
The male’s dark business suit seemed incongruous with his behaviour, fooling the alarm bells in Hana’s brain. He wore black, shiny shoes which looked expensive and his blonde hair was neatly cut into an office style. Hana wondered if she misunderstood. Perhaps he was deaf or ill and couldn’t get off the wall. She stepped into the gap. “Do you need help?”
He smiled, revealing even, white teeth. As soon as the SUV’s shielded Hana from view, the man seized her arm and dragged her into him. He spun her bodily so her back pressed against the Honda, gripping her forearms hard enough to keep them by her sides. Last year’s nasty elbow break registered pain. A stretching, dragging sensation began whe
re the muscles and tendons were still tender. Hana inhaled and tried not to panic. The man was a similar height, pushing himself into her until they were nose to nose. His breath smelled of mints and her brain soothed it would be ok; he couldn’t hurt her in a school car park surrounded by six hundred boys.
The man was a paradox. Nothing about him was unpleasant, apart from his behaviour. He looked plausible and in other circumstances, Hana would not have feared him. He held her gaze, looking into her eyes, his coal brown irises intense and shot through with striking hazel specs. Then he spoke, his eyes soft as he smiled again. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, Mrs Du Rose.”
He said her name as though it tasted nasty on his tongue and Hana’s eyes grew wide with the realisation he knew her. She peered at him harder. “Who are you?”
He looked amused at the question, poking his tongue into his cheek while he decided whether to enlighten her or not. Squinting against the sunshine caused laugh lines to appear at the outer corners of his eyes. “I’m Michael Laval.” He cocked his head to gauge her reaction.
Hana shook her head and pressed herself harder into the side of her car. The metal flexed underneath her. “No, you’re not,” she said confused. “He’s in prison. And he’s...old.”
The man let out a snort of derision, “I’ll take that as a compliment. But I believe you’re referring to my father.”
A gasp escaped Hana’s lips and he laughed. “Logan was right all along,” she stammered. “That night a few months ago when the cops used him as bait, he was convinced they expected someone else to show.”
“They did!” Laval grinned, enjoying her discomfort. “Father’s a low-grade criminal, nasty enough to have your husband bound and thrown into the lake to drown, but not high enough up the food chain for his arrest to mean a round of drinks. I hear the detectives were a little flat after the big night. What did they call it? Operation Waltz?”