The Butterfly Room

by Lucinda Riley

  ‘Sam, stop it! Please!’

  His hands were around her throat now and she felt herself being lifted up against the wall, her feet struggling for purchase.

  ‘Amy, just tell me where the money is, just tell me . . .’

  But she had no breath to speak, her eyes bulging and her mouth open as she desperately tried to take in precious oxygen. Her head was spinning and she knew she was about to black out.

  Then there was a shout from close by and the grip around her neck suddenly loosened. She slid down the wall to the floor, gulping in air hungrily. She blinked and looked up, the world swimming back into place. Above her stood Freddie Lennox, with Sam struggling in his arms.

  ‘Mummy, what’s happening?’

  Through blurred vision, Amy saw Jake standing with his arms around Sara at the door to the sitting room.

  ‘Darling, Mummy will come to you in a minute,’ she panted hoarsely.

  Freddie saw the children, then threw Sam to the floor and in a few long strides was beside them. He took Jake and Sara firmly by the hand, then returned to bend over Amy.

  ‘Can you stand, my dear?’

  ‘I think so.’ Amy tried but her legs wouldn’t obey.

  Sam stumbled towards them.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?!’ he slurred at Freddie.

  ‘Don’t you dare go near her,’ Freddie said icily. ‘Lay a hand on Amy or your children and I will dial 999 immediately. Right. Jake, you take Sara’s hand while I help Mummy to the car, okay?’

  ‘Amy, stop! Where are you going?’ Sam whined as Freddie ushered the children through the front door and half-carried Amy behind them.

  ‘Amy! I—!’

  Freddie pulled the door closed behind him and then guided them towards his car.

  ‘Now,’ he said once they were all settled inside. ‘Let’s get you to hospital, young lady.’

  Amy shook her head. ‘N-no, I’m fine. R-really. It’s just my legs – he threw boiling water at them,’ she managed, her teeth starting to chatter from shock.

  ‘Then we need to get you checked out,’ said Freddie firmly, starting the engine. ‘Okay, kids?’ He turned and saw two frightened pairs of eyes.

  ‘I think so,’ said Jake.

  ‘Good chap,’ he nodded as he pulled away from the kerb and Amy closed her eyes in utter relief.

  Chapter 34

  The landline rang just as Tammy was about to leave the shop the next night.

  ‘It’s Jane,’ said Meena. ‘She sounds odd.’

  ‘Okay.’ Tammy took the receiver. ‘Hi, Janey, are you okay?’

  ‘Sort of, but I need to talk to you urgently. Could you come over?’

  ‘Of course I can,’ Tammy agreed, even though she felt completely drained.

  ‘Thanks, Tam. Bye.’

  Tammy left the shop, then drove round to Gordon Place, hoping against hope that it wasn’t a miscarriage. She rang the bell with trepidation.

  The door was opened immediately. ‘Hi, lovely, thanks for coming.’

  Tammy thought that, for someone who’d just told her she was in deep trauma, Jane looked very relaxed.

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘Come through to the kitchen. Glass of wine?’ Jane offered.

  ‘Thanks.’ Tammy took it. ‘How’re you and the baby?’

  ‘We’re very good.’ Jane proudly smoothed down her shirt to reveal the smallest outline of a bump. ‘So, what are you doing for Christmas?’

  ‘Sewing.’ Tammy looked at her suspiciously. ‘Janey, what’s going on?’

  ‘Nothing, nothing at all, really . . .’

  The front door opened and shut. Tammy heard the sound of male voices approaching the kitchen and her heart began to thud slowly against her chest. ‘Janey, no . . . please!’ She glanced around the kitchen like a cornered animal seeking escape.

  ‘I think that it’s actually a very good price and you should advise your mother to take it,’ said Paul as he entered the kitchen.

  With Nick.

  Their eyes locked on each other. Then they both spoke at once.

  ‘Christ, Paul!’ raged Nick.

  ‘Thanks a million, Janey! I’m leaving.’ Tammy pushed past him, looked down and for the first time, registered a young girl of nine or ten who was holding Nick’s hand.

  ‘Well?’ said Paul. ‘Am I going to make the introductions, Nick, or will you?’

  Nick sighed resignedly. ‘Tammy, this is Clemmie. My daughter.’

  ‘Excuse me, everyone, but goodbye.’ Tammy pushed past them all and headed for the front door, the blood pumping so fast through her veins she felt dizzy. Once outside, she began running away from what she didn’t want to know, or to hear.

  ‘Who was that, Daddy? She’s very pretty,’ said Clemmie.

  ‘For God’s sake, man, get after her!’ urged Paul as he saw Nick staring after Tammy. ‘Don’t you think at the very least she deserves an explanation?’ Paul virtually pushed him out of the kitchen. ‘We’ll look after Clemmie here. Now GO!’

  Nick stepped outside onto the pavement and saw Tammy legging it along the road. He dawdled for a while, keeping her in sight, still uncertain; then he started to pick up speed. Paul was right. Tammy did deserve an explanation. Now that the cat was out of the bag, the least he could do was talk to her.

  Tammy ran blindly on, heading for Kensington Gardens, needing air and space around her. Entering the park, she sank onto the bench and screamed in frustration as Nick appeared beside her a few seconds later.

  ‘Please, go away!’

  ‘Tam, I understand you never want to set eyes on me again, and I’m sorry we were both set up so crudely. I swear it wasn’t my idea.’

  Her head was bowed and she could only see his shoes and the bottom of his jeans. She closed her eyes tightly, because she didn’t even want to see those.

  ‘Look, I’ll tell you what’s happened, then I’ll go,’ said Nick. ‘Okay, here it is: eleven years ago, I employed a young woman called Evie Newman in my shop in Southwold. She was eager and willing to learn. We got on very well, and even though I knew she had a long-term boyfriend, I . . . fell for her, but never once did she give me any indication that my feelings were reciprocated. Then we went on a buying trip to France. We went out to a bar and got outrageously drunk, and that night, we slept together. At the time, I thought it was all my dreams come true. I confessed my feelings to her and told her I loved her.’

  Nick began pacing backwards and forwards as he talked.

  ‘The next day we came home, me assuming it was the start of a wonderful, all-encompassing love affair, but she spent the next couple of weeks doing her best to avoid me. Then, a few weeks later, she told me she was pregnant. Brian, her boyfriend, had got a new job as a lecturer in Leicester and they were leaving Southwold.’

  Nick kicked a stone with his shoe and it scudded across the ground.

  ‘It’s difficult to explain the kind of love I felt for Evie to anyone. In retrospect, I’ve realised it wasn’t love in a healthy form, it was obsession. After she’d told me she was leaving, I realised I couldn’t live in a place that would hold a constant memory of her, so I sold up and moved to Australia. Can I sit down?’

  Tammy shrugged, and he sat down on the bench some distance away from her.

  ‘The next time I saw Evie was a couple of months ago when I went to visit my mother in Southwold. She’d written me a letter, you see. I went to her house and she explained why she’d decided to contact me. Are you still with me?’

  ‘Yup,’ Tammy whispered.

  ‘Well, the issue she’d written to me about was Clemmie. Evie told me that after they’d moved to Leicester, her relationship with Brian had run into problems, but she didn’t know why. Soon after Clemmie’s birth, Brian had confessed to her that he’d had a vasectomy five years before. He was a good fifteen years older than her, and he already had a divorce and two kids who lived with their mother behind him. In other words, he couldn’t possibly be Clemmie’s father. He’d thought
he’d be able to cope with Evie’s betrayal and bring Clemmie up as his own, but apparently, he couldn’t. So he moved out soon after and Clemmie grew up with no idea who her father was.’

  Nick studied Tammy’s face for a reaction. It was expressionless, so he continued.

  ‘Evie asked me that night in Southwold whether I’d be prepared to take a paternity test to prove I was definitely her father. So I took the test – to be honest with you, praying that it would be negative. I’d just met you – we were making plans for the future, I . . .’ Nick shook his head and sighed. ‘Anyway, the result was a positive match with Clemmie’s DNA. I am her biological father.’

  Tammy breathed in slowly, trying to keep calm. ‘Why weren’t you happy? You just said you loved Evie. Surely it was all your dreams come true?’

  ‘Once upon a time, it would have been, yes. But as I said, it was an obsession, not real love. Not like the love I feel for you. And besides . . .’

  ‘What?’ Tammy prompted him, just wanting to get this whole gut-wrenching nightmare over.

  ‘Evie’s dying of leukaemia. She asked me to take the paternity test so that it might be possible for Clemmie to have one natural parent at least. And a possible extended family when she was gone. That’s why she moved back to Southwold.’

  ‘Oh my God.’ Tammy stared at Nick in utter shock. ‘That is . . . dreadful.’

  ‘Yes, it is. She’s only thirty-one – the same age as you.’

  They both sat in silence for a while.

  ‘Nick,’ Tammy said softly. ‘I totally apologise for asking this after what you’ve just told me, but are you . . . with her again?’

  ‘No. I swear I’m not. I told her all about you, that I loved you and wanted a future with you.’

  ‘But . . .’ she eventually managed to gulp, ‘if Evie was well, would you want to be with her?’

  ‘Believe me, I’ve thought about that endlessly, Tammy. And the answer is no. I love you, whether or not Evie had reappeared in my life. You broke the spell. I’ve never been so happy, I swear, and then all this happened and I . . . I . . .’

  Nick put his head in his hands and Tammy saw his shoulders were shaking. Despite herself, her heart forced her hand to move towards his and she squeezed it gently.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Tammy, so sorry for this mess.’

  ‘Nick, why on earth didn’t you tell me sooner?’

  ‘Because I needed to be there for Evie, and also, have some time to get to know Clemmie, establish the relationship and find out whether it was going to work before I presented the situation to you. Also, as has been proved by what subsequently happened, I didn’t think you’d believe I wasn’t still having an affair with her mother. I honestly thought you’d leave me if you knew the truth. We haven’t known each other long. How could I ask you to cope with me visiting my ex-lover and my daughter on a regular basis?’

  ‘I saw your car outside her house the night Amy and I drove by.’

  ‘I know. Amy told me. I was there with Evie and Clemmie. I’ve spent most weekends with them. If it makes any difference, Evie said that when the time was right, she wanted to meet you.’

  ‘Why on earth would she want to meet me?’

  ‘Because,’ Nick sighed, ‘she knew the possibility was that you would become Clemmie’s stepmother one day.’

  ‘Right.’ The thought brought a lump to Tammy’s throat. ‘Well, it might have helped if you’d told me the facts instead of slinking around leaving me to come to the obvious conclusion. You didn’t trust in me, or my love, Nick,’ she whispered.

  ‘I know I didn’t, and I’m so, so sorry.’

  ‘So where have you been for the past two weeks?’ she asked him. ‘Paul said you’d moved out of Gordon Place.’

  ‘I have. I dumped my stuff at the new house in Battersea, then I took Clemmie out of school early and we flew to Verbier together to ski. We needed some time alone, not to mention Clemmie needing a little lightness in her life. She’s having to watch her mum fade away in front of her.’

  ‘It must be heartbreaking for her.’

  ‘It has been, yes. Evie found out she had leukaemia a couple of years back. Clemmie was pretty much her primary carer as she went through treatment. Then she was in remission for a year, but in June, it was back with a vengeance and Evie was given a terminal prognosis.’

  ‘So Clemmie knows her mum is going to die?’

  ‘She does, yes. She’s a lovely little girl, Tammy, and so incredibly brave. She’s heartbroken about her mum, of course. I can’t change that but at least I can be there for her, distract her while Evie . . .’ Nick gave a shrug. ‘Since we arrived back from Verbier, we’ve been choosing furniture for her bedroom at the house in Battersea. It’s important she feels she has a home.’

  ‘The home you asked me to live in with you a few weeks ago?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Tammy looked at him and sighed. ‘Wow, it’s a lot to take in. Were you ever going to tell me?’

  ‘I . . . don’t know. With the past literally exploding into the centre of my present, all I’ve been able to do is take it day by day. I had to be there for Clemmie, and I just didn’t know how to begin to explain it to you.’

  ‘I understand.’

  ‘Do you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Nick turned to her, his eyes wet with tears. He took the hand that lay on top of his and clasped it.

  ‘Thank you.’

  They sat like that for a long time, Tammy doing her best to compute what he’d told her.

  ‘Nick?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Please can you tell me now, honestly, if you still have feelings for Evie?’

  ‘I . . . care for her, Tammy, of course I do. She’s dying and she’s so young, and life is so cruel, but do I love her like I love you? No, I don’t.’

  ‘Honestly? Please, Nick, you have to be honest,’ she begged him.

  ‘Honestly.’ He turned to look at her once more and smiled. ‘And tonight, the way you’ve reacted to what I’ve told you, I love you even more. You’re beautiful, inside and out. Truly. The question is, whether you could cope with being with a man who, out of the blue, has suddenly acquired a nine-year-old daughter?’

  ‘I’ve never seriously thought about having kids,’ she admitted.

  ‘Ironically, nor had I until I met you,’ Nick smiled. ‘But now I have a ready-made one who isn’t yours by birth, and I’d totally understand if you felt you couldn’t cope. Clemmie’s going to need a lot of love in the months ahead. I’ll have to be there for her, Tammy.’

  ‘Of course you will.’

  ‘And it goes without saying that I’d love you to be there for her too.’

  ‘I . . . oh God, Nick, I just don’t know. I’m not sure I’m maternal and besides, Clemmie would probably hate me because I can never, ever be her real mum.’

  ‘I’m sure she wouldn’t, Tam. I promise you, she’s incredibly sweet-natured. Before you and I . . . broke up, I told her about you, that I hoped one day we’d get married. And she said she wanted to meet you.’

  ‘Did she really?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Tammy looked at him and knew she believed him. She also realised she was freezing.

  ‘Nick, I think I need some time to process everything you’ve told me.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I mean, I’d hate to walk into Clemmie’s life, then find out I couldn’t cope and walk out of it. Do you understand?’

  ‘Completely.’ Nick smiled at her weakly. ‘Please know that I love you and I want more than anything to make this work. But I’ll understand if you feel you can’t do it – that it’s just too much.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Tammy stood up and jabbed her hands into the pockets of her leather jacket to warm them up. ‘I’ll let you know as soon as I can. Bye, Nick.’

  ‘Bye.’

  Nick watched her walk off – her hair catching the light as she walked beneath a lamppost. He sent up a fervent prayer, then stood up
to return to his daughter.

  Chapter 35

  ‘Hello, Sam. I brought a cake round for the children.’

  Posy surveyed her son as he held open the door for her. He looked utterly dreadful. His eyes were red-rimmed, his skin pallid with a slight sheen of sweat on it, even though, as he led her inside, she felt the temperature of the house. It was freezing. Sam slumped back onto the sofa, the cushions at one end indicating he’d probably spent the night there. Beer bottles crowded like skittles on the coffee table and a half-empty bottle of whisky stood beside them.

  ‘Is Amy in?’

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Don’t ask me, Mum.’

  ‘The children?’ Posy asked.

  ‘With Amy. They left last night with that fancy-man of yours.’

  ‘Freddie?’

  ‘That’s the one.’

  ‘He’s hardly my fancy-man, Sam, and why on earth was he here?’

  ‘Search me.’

  ‘Are you trying to tell me that Amy has left you?’

  ‘Maybe, yes. I mean, look at me, and this.’ Sam waved his arm round the room. ‘Would you want to stay?’

  ‘Amy loves you, Sam. She’d never just walk out.’ Posy realised she was still holding the cake, and cleared some bottles away so she could put it down on the table. ‘Have you been drinking?’ she asked pointlessly.

  ‘Drowning my sorrows, more like.’

  ‘I’m going to put the kettle on, get you some coffee. Then you can tell me exactly what happened.’

  In the kitchen, Posy found a saucepan on the floor, congealed pasta oozing out of it like innards. The floor was still wet around it and Posy took a cloth to wipe it up. Then she scooped the pasta back into the saucepan and dumped the contents in the bin.

  ‘So, what has happened?’ she asked as she returned to the sitting room and put the coffee down in front of her son. ‘From the state of the kitchen, it looks like you two had a falling-out.’

  ‘Yeah, we did, and then she left with the kids.’

  ‘To stay where?’

  ‘Ask your fancy-man. He’s the one who took her and the kids away. Accused me of attacking her!’ Sam looked at his mother and tears filled his eyes. ‘You know I’d never do anything like that, Mum. It was just an argument.’