by Karen Clarke
‘Thank God she’s gone.’ Liv reappeared, her face pale, hands in her coat pockets. ‘What did she say?’
‘It’s Dom,’ I said in a daze, jigging Finn’s pushchair. He’d stopped crying and was looking around with watery eyes. ‘She said he’s in a café on Victoria Street.’
‘Alone?’ Liv seemed oddly unsurprised. ‘She’s sure it was him?’
I nodded.
She looked at me for a moment, eyes searching my face. ‘Go on then.’
‘What?’
‘Go and talk to him,’ she said. ‘I’ll look after Finn – don’t worry.’
Once again, I found myself hurrying away from a concerned expression, and Liv did look concerned, more than I’d seen before.
It didn’t take long to find the café. It wasn’t quite the greasy spoon that Kim had described, but not the sort of place to meet her exacting standards with its steamed-up windows, laminated tables and English breakfast-style menu chalked on a board outside.
I hadn’t rehearsed what to say, simply focused on finding the place. Poking my head inside, I was glad I hadn’t bothered. There was no sign of Dom, just a table surrounded by tradesmen in overalls with mugs and empty plates in front of them, and a woman sitting alone in the corner. Kim had seen someone who resembled my husband; that was all.
Stepping back on the pavement, I glanced at my watch, my breath coming fast. If Kim had passed on her way to the soft-play centre, Dom could have been and gone by now.
As I dug around in my bag for my phone to call him, the woman emerged from the café, tucking a pink scarf into the neck of a navy coat. My heart seized.
‘Alicia?’ She had the sort of looks you couldn’t forget; a sheet of blonde hair spilling from under a black fedora, skin pulled taut over aristocratic cheekbones and intense, almond-shaped eyes. ‘What are you doing here?’
She’d frozen in the act of tying her coat belt around her tiny waist. ‘Sophy!’ Her voice was deeper than I remembered; husky, as though she’d been crying, though her irises were clear as she took me in. ‘I suppose you’re looking for Dom,’ she said casually. It was so unexpected, all I could do was stare, wondering whether I’d passed out again and was experiencing a nightmare. ‘I don’t know how you found out about us, but it’s probably better that you have.’ She pulled the strap of her soft, black tote bag onto her shoulder. ‘If I were you, I’d let him go without a fight. You can’t want to be with someone who doesn’t want to be with you.’
‘We have a baby.’ The words came out as a whisper, my body trembling as though I had a fever.
‘He knows I’ll be a good stepmother.’
Blood roared in my ears. ‘Leave him alone, Alicia.’
Her eyes blazed with sudden passion. ‘We’re in love.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘He’s realised he should have married me, but he feels sorry for you.’
‘Sophy?’ I turned to see Liv approaching, coat flapping as she thrust Finn’s pushchair along the narrow pavement. ‘What’s going on?’
I spun round to see Alicia striding away, head down as she turned the corner out of sight. ‘You were right.’ I looked back at Liv through a haze of tears. ‘Dom’s been cheating on me.’
Chapter 28
Liv
‘Who is she? Do you know her?’ I turned back to Sophy, whose teary eyes were fixed on the corner where the woman I’d seen with Dom in London had been moments earlier. ‘Sophy?’ I touched her arm, a small part of me wanting to comfort her.
She looked round at me, and moved away so my arm fell away. ‘I don’t know why I’m surprised,’ she said with a sniff. ‘It all makes sense doesn’t it?’ She grabbed the pushchair from me and gripped the handle. Without it I felt oddly exposed, as though she could see right through me. ‘I need to get back to the house,’ she said. ‘Wait for Dom.’
With that she took off, racing along the pavement, wiping her wet cheeks with her sleeve every few moments. I hurried along beside her, struggling to keep up.
‘Do you think she called social services?’ she said. ‘Sent the notes?’
‘Sophy, please, slow down a bit.’ I tried to catch my breath.
‘I mean what would she gain from that?’
‘Sophy, who is she? Do you know her?’ I said again, once we’d reached the house, and she’d stopped by the gate.
‘Alicia Bainbridge.’ She said the name like an insult. ‘She worked …’ She bit down on her lip as she looked up at the house, casting her eyes over the black Range Rover parked outside the house next to Dom’s car. ‘Oh God, I should have known she’d turn up,’ she whispered.
‘Elizabeth?’
She nodded as she moved her eyes to the silhouette of her mother-in-law in the window, a fleeting shadow of Dom appearing behind her for a moment.
‘It’ll be OK, Sophy. He’s bound to have an explanation.’
She turned to look at me. ‘He told me once Alicia had a bit of a thing for him, but it was a while ago,’ she continued. ‘He said it was nothing, that she would get over it. But now …’ She covered her mouth as though stifling a sob. ‘I don’t know what to say to him. I feel so angry, so stupid—’
‘Maybe there’s an explanation. Maybe it’s not what it looks like.’ I wasn’t sure I believed my words, but I knew I didn’t want it to be true, though I couldn’t explain why. Surely this was what I’d wanted all along, and yet … ‘Give him a chance to explain.’
She nodded. ‘I need to talk to him alone, find out what’s been going on.’
I took the hint. ‘OK. Fine. But as soon as you get inside tell that awful mother-in-law of yours to take a hike.’
A small smile flickered and died on her lips.
‘Are you sure you don’t want some moral support?’
She shook her head. ‘I need to do this by myself, but thanks, Liv.’
‘Of course, no worries.’ I moved forward, tempted to give her a hug, but changed my mind. ‘You know where I am if you need me, right?’
She nodded, took a deep breath, and pushed Finn up the path towards the front door. ‘And, Liv,’ she called without looking back, ‘please don’t say anything to anyone.’
As the door closed, Elizabeth moved away from the window, and I headed towards my Mini parked on the street. A couple in their sixties, wearing matching blue jackets, appeared with a white Labrador from a house opposite, and headed up The Avenue with uniform strides. I looked back at number seven, trying to imagine what was going on inside, and my curiosity got the better of me. I pulled up my hood, and hurried down the path that ran alongside the house. There was a gap in the wall where the gate didn’t latch properly. I pushed the gate open.
‘Can I help you?’ The female voice, high-pitched and aristocratic, came from an upstairs window of the house next door. Without looking up, I hurried away, back onto the street, bumping headlong into Kim.
‘Olivia,’ she said, as though I was exactly the person she wanted to see. ‘No Finn today?’
I glanced up at number seven. ‘Not today,’ I said, trying to manoeuvre past her, but she’d trapped me at the end of the pathway.
‘I don’t suppose you fancy a cup of tea at Indigo Cottage.’
‘Indigo Cottage?’
She laughed. ‘Sorry. I mean, do you fancy coming round to mine? I have nothing on and it would be nice to have the company.’
I wondered if she was lonely, or perhaps she wanted to show off her house; either way, I didn’t have anything else to do, and was curious where this woman lived. I smiled at a sleeping Dougie in his sling. Head pressed against Kim’s chest, dribble running down his chin, ‘Why not?’ I said with a shrug.
Chapter 29
Sophy
I hadn’t been surprised to see Elizabeth’s car parked outside the house. Deep down, I knew she would ignore my message and turn up anyway, because she wouldn’t miss an opportunity to see Finn. She must have been upset with Dom the night before, for asking his dad to take her home, and would no doubt be c
leaning and tidying, perhaps even cooking, keen to insert herself at the centre of our lives once more.
My heart thumped and my breathing was jerky as I parked Finn’s pushchair in the hall, wishing I’d thought to ask Liv to take him to the park. I didn’t want him absorbing a difficult atmosphere, but I couldn’t let my encounter with Alicia go unmentioned.
‘You’re back.’ Dom emerged from the living room wild-eyed, his hair rumpled, shirt half-untucked. I imagined him with Alicia, their lips locked, the pair of them wishing I’d disappear. He reached for Finn, visibly relaxing. ‘Where did you go?’
‘Where did you go?’ I half-turned so he couldn’t reach his son.
His eyebrows flicked together. ‘What?’
‘You heard me.’ Finn was sucking his finger, his eyes swooping from me to his father and I suddenly couldn’t bear to do this in front of him. Catching sight of Elizabeth hovering by the living room door, I marched towards her.
‘Would you mind giving Finn his lunch?
Finn lunged for his grandmother, hands clutching at the gold chain resting against her soft wool sweater. Unable to resist, she took him from me, her eyes straying to my face. ‘You still don’t look well.’ Her voice was sweet, but her eyes were hard, no doubt recalling me slumped in her stable the day before, my son freezing nearby. ‘Shall I make some coffee?’
I didn’t need caffeine; my blood was humming with the adrenaline that had fuelled my dash home from the café. ‘No thanks.’ I kept my voice sunny, mindful of that awful image of me on her phone. ‘I need a few minutes to talk to Dom in private.’ I stroked a reassuring hand over Finn’s soft curls, avoiding Elizabeth’s narrowed gaze. ‘We’ll be outside.’
‘Outside?’ She glanced at the window, where grey clouds hung low over the garden. ‘In this weather?’
‘It’s not that cold.’ There was a sheen of sweat on my upper lip, heat in my armpits. I felt as if I was unravelling, my hair tumbling out of its clip, my face flushed. ‘If you’ll excuse us.’
Before she could protest, I turned to Dom in the hallway, watching me with an unreadable expression. ‘Now,’ I said in a tone I couldn’t remember using with him before.
He moved to the front door, not bothering with a coat. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Not here.’
I led the way around the side of the house, where the only window belonged to the downstairs toilet. I checked it was closed, in case Elizabeth decided to eavesdrop.
‘Has something happened?’ Dom was rubbing his arms in their shirt sleeves, the chill more biting than I’d realised. ‘Where did you go this morning?’
‘I took Finn to the soft-play centre and bumped into Kim, who said she saw you in a café on Victoria Street.’ I rounded on him, fury burning through me. ‘I went to look for you and guess who I bumped into?’
Dom’s face paled as understanding dawned. ‘Sophy, I—’
‘How long has it been going on?’
‘It’s not what you think.’ He looked as if he was going to be sick. ‘You have to believe me, Sophy.’
‘You’re not denying you were with Alicia Bainbridge, then?’
‘No, but …’ He pressed his fingers to his mouth then let them drop. ‘Sophy, whatever she told you, we’re not having an affair.’
I made a sound of disbelief, recalling the light in her eyes as she said, We’re in love. ‘You would say that, wouldn’t you?’
‘Because it’s true.’
I couldn’t believe this was happening; that we were saying words like ‘affair’. A year ago, on my birthday, Dom had taken the day off and spent it pampering me. I was six months pregnant, still suffering bouts of sickness and hadn’t felt like going out, so he’d made me breakfast in bed, run a bath for me to soak in, massaged my feet while we watched back-to-back episodes of Outlander, and after my favourite dinner of cheesy mashed potatoes, he’d read aloud from my Philippa Gregory novel, putting on a silly voice for Edmund Tudor that had made me weak with laughter. All the while, he’d kept a hand on the curve of my belly and I’d imagined our baby listening to our voices. I’d felt cherished; certain of our future. Now, we were huddled outside our house, being buffeted by the wind, discussing his affair while his mother was inside, feeding our son.
I brushed aside strands of hair blowing over my face, the echo of Alicia’s words trailing a path of acid to my stomach. ‘Are you in love with her?’ I hadn’t been a good wife lately, had struggled to connect with my feelings for Dom, but they were still there, trapped beneath the surface. ‘Tell me the truth.’
He tipped his face to the darkening sky and shook his head. ‘Sophy, I swear on Finn’s life, I’m not having an affair with that woman.’
That brought me up short. Dom wouldn’t swear on our son’s life if it wasn’t true. It was an unspoken rule, somehow wrong – tempting fate. Only someone without a conscience would swear on their child’s life and not mean it.
‘She said you told her she’d make a good stepmother to Finn.’
‘Jesus Christ!’ He pushed his knuckles against his forehead before digging his phone from his trouser pocket. ‘She’s more delusional than I thought,’ he muttered, swiping the screen. ‘Look.’ He thrust his phone at me, just as his mother had done with hers the night before, pushing it under his nose so he could see me sprawled in her stables like a drunk. ‘Alicia’s been messaging me,’ he said. ‘It’s been going on for a while. I thought I could deal with it, without having to worry you on top of everything else.’
Tearing my eyes from his face, I looked at the string of messages. Words leapt out: I love you Dom, I know you feel the same x We both know you married the wrong woman x We can make it work, but you have to tell her x I’ll be the best stepmother. I won’t try to come between him and Sophy x I shuddered, seeing my name. I need to see you, let’s talk this through. I can come to St Albans again x
‘You haven’t replied,’ I said, starting to shiver.
‘Of course I haven’t.’ His face seemed pulled out of shape. ‘I didn’t want to encourage her.’
‘How does she have your number?’
‘She’s still in touch with a couple of colleagues at work, said I promised to give her a reference for a new job she’d applied for. I called her back and we met a couple of times in London because it seemed innocent, then.’
‘You knew she liked you.’
‘Not that much.’ He sounded bitter. ‘Something had happened since she left Apex, she was … different. Less together, somehow. She seemed convinced we’d had something special, that we were meant for each other.’
‘But you still went to see her.’ Something struck me. ‘I saw you once before, when I was in that café with Liv. Alicia too.’ I thought back to the flash of silky blonde hair. ‘I thought I was imagining things.’
‘She wanted to meet,’ Dom said, sound chastened. ‘I thought if we could sit down face to face and talk like adults for ten minutes, I could make her understand there was no future for us, that if I handled it carefully, she’d get the message and leave me alone.’
‘But she didn’t.’
His lips twisted into a humourless smile. ‘She thinks I’m staying with you out of some weird sense of loyalty.’ He said it as if he couldn’t believe it. ‘That all she has to do is wait and I’ll come to my senses and somehow we’ll be together.’
Alarm fluttered in my chest. ‘Dom, if this is true, you should go to the police.’
He shook his head. ‘She’s not dangerous, just … troubled.’
I dug my fingernails into my palms, willing myself to stay strong. ‘Why are you protecting her?’
‘I’m not.’ He took hold of my hands, unfurling my fingers. ‘I was trying to reason with her, Sophy.’ There were rings of exhaustion under his eyes. ‘I didn’t want to involve the police and risk escalating things.’
His words provoked a fresh shiver. I thought of the social worker. Was that Alicia’s doing? ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ But the answer was obvious,
even before he said it.
‘You’ve not been well.’ His hands were gentle, sliding up my arms. ‘I didn’t want you to worry when you’ve not been yourself.’ He rested his forehead on mine. ‘I’m so sorry you had to find out like this.’
I looked into his eyes, so close I could see the tiny black flecks around his pupils – the eyes that had looked into mine on our wedding day as he recited his vows, adding a few words of his own to make me smile – and wondered how I could have doubted him. ‘I’m sorry too.’ Guilt flooded in. Dom had been dealing with this alone while I’d been too tired, too engulfed in whatever was happening to me to notice, thinking his preoccupation was about work, that he was regretting marrying me. I shut my eyes, tears squeezing out.
‘Hey, don’t cry, please don’t cry.’ Dom stroked away my tears with his thumb. ‘I’m glad you know, if I’m honest. It’s been hard, keeping it from you.’
‘Do you think she took that photo of Isaac and me?’
He took a deep breath and nodded, letting me go as he pushed his phone back in his pocket. ‘She swears she didn’t, but I’m sure she thought if I saw you like that, with him, I’d leave you.’
‘That’s what Liv said.’
His shoulders tensed. ‘Liv knows?’
I nodded, wiping my face with the heels of my hands. ‘I needed someone to talk to, Dom, stuck here, feeling so awful all the time.’
‘You can talk to me …’ His words trailed off. ‘I suppose I haven’t been around much, but Mum—’
‘Please don’t say it.’ I held both hands up, warding off what I knew was coming. ‘I can’t confide in your mother, I’m sorry. We don’t have that kind of relationship.’
His expression changed into neutral. ‘You could, if you tried a bit harder.’
I shook my head. ‘I know you don’t believe me about the note—’
‘Sophy, please stop.’ He pointed towards the house. ‘She’s in there, taking care of our son.’
‘Yes, I’m aware of that,’ I said tightly. Biting back the urge to say more, I forced a calming breath. ‘What are you going to do now?’ I said. ‘About Alicia?’