by Penny Smith
She came down from the bedroom wearing a long dress in muted pink tones and a cream cardigan.
Ben looked her over critically. ‘Very nice, Mum. But are you going out in those?’
She glanced down. ‘Of course I’m not, you ugly middle-class tosser,’ she said, haughtily, and went to take off her slippers.
While she was out of the room, Ben phoned Katie. ‘All sorted?’ he asked quickly.
‘Fine. Dad’s on his way here,’ she said gaily. ‘We’re on the finishing touches, then we’ll be leaving. How are you going to get her in there without you?’
‘Leave me to do my job, and you get on with yours,’ he said, and clicked the phone off as Lynda arrived back in the sitting room.
‘Better?’ she asked, raising her eyebrows.
‘Perfect,’ he said. ‘Shall we go?’
Jack, at that moment, was driving down the country roads, keeping a weather eye out for rabbits and badgers. He was wearing his favourite green corduroy trousers and a checked shirt, smart casual, as he had been instructed.
‘Oh, and could you park further down the lane?’ Bob had asked. ‘Just that I’ve got to rearrange things in the drive, and could do without having to move cars. Is that OK? Got to go,’ he had added quickly, before Jack offered to help out.
As Jack turned down the lane towards the house, he noticed a slightly steamed up Land Rover near a gate. Strange, he thought, as he continued towards the Old Coach House. It had looked a bit like Bob’s.
He parked, and got out the bottle of wine he had bought in town that morning. He had decided to go for quality and not quantity. A 1989 Pauillac, and some chocolates from a delicatessen.
He approached the house. It felt oddly deserted. He was about to ring the bell when he noticed that the door was ajar. ‘Helloooo,’ he called, as he pushed it open. A Mozart piano concerto he vaguely recognized was playing as he went through to the kitchen. And in front of him a table had been beautifully laid for two, with a card addressed to him propped up against one of the wine glasses.
He opened it. There were just four words.
He turned as Lynda came silently through from the front door.
She saw the table and him standing there, as though he was waiting for her. Saw him as though for the first time, and fell into his arms.
‘I’m sorry, too,’ he said, slightly confusingly.
Although she suddenly understood as she opened her own card and found SORRY. I LOVE YOU written inside.
‘Should we phone them, do you think?’ she asked later, as they sipped their wine and debated whether they were too full to do justice to the strawberries and cream that were sitting, already prepared, in the fridge.
‘Do it the young person’s way,’ he said, leaning back expansively. ‘Text them.’
‘What shall I write?’
“‘Mission accomplished”?’ he asked, smiling lovingly at his wife as she came round to the back of his chair and dropped a kiss on his head.
Siobhan Stamp was having the worst Saturday of her entire life. Her carefully laid plan had completely unravelled. Her computer nerd, despite the–to him–vast sum of money she had paid him to keep quiet, had sung like a canary the moment that the police had got involved. He had meekly handed over his meticulously detailed diary of events, and her protestations of innocence had not been believed.
She had tried flirting with the attractive police officer, to no avail, and had finally confessed all. Suddenly, in the cold light of a police station, it started to sound remarkably petty, even to her ears. Although it really had been an almost perfect stitch-up. Adam Snobby Williams having to pay a huge wodge of cash for the pleasure of watching his girlfriend shafted in more ways than one…and unable to reveal it because his company had rung the voting line thousands and thousands of times.
As Jack was ‘tarting up’ the strawberries (‘A little bit of black pepper and balsamic vinegar would improve the flavour no end…’), Siobhan was trying to paint herself as a wronged woman. ‘It was a victimless crime of passion,’ she was explaining, crossing her legs and giving the detective an eyeful of frothy lingerie.
And, suddenly, she noticed the gleam in his eye. Excellent, she thought, giving him the benefit of a full-wattage smile. Never mind what her mother used to say about the gleam in a man’s eye being just the sun shining through a hole in his head–she had recognized that look. It was what she thrived on. She wondered if, after all, she would get away with it.
On Sunday morning, while Jack and Lynda were waking up in their marital bed, Bob and Katie were tangled in a duvet in Hawes.
‘What a night.’ She sighed, stretching one arm up and rumpling his hair.
‘Mmm. Almost as good as the day I discovered an old copy of Penthouse in the hedge when I was eleven,’ he said, grasping her hand and kissing the palm.
‘I knew it was going to be a momentous one,’ she said, laying her head on his chest with a sigh. And Mum and Dad are back together–despite you doubting Thomases saying it wouldn’t work.’
‘Doubting Thomasum.’
‘Doubting Thomasii.’
‘Doubting Thomasamus.’
‘Are they the ones with the really big flowers?’
‘Enormous,’ Bob pronounced, his eyes crinkling attractively as he smiled down at her.
‘I’ve missed this rubbish-speak,’ she said.
‘So have I,’ he said, pulling up the duvet to cover her shoulders. ‘It’s like slipping into a warm bath.’
‘Like pulling on a pair of suede underpants.’ She laughed. ‘Like being stroked with a fan made entirely of boneless cats.’
‘Talking of which,’ he said, ‘I notice Caligula’s looking smug. I have a horrible feeling that your dad fed him leftovers last night.’
‘Oh, he’ll be fine. Maybe you should lubricate him to make sure that he doesn’t get stretch marks.’
‘Does your dad often suffer with stretch marks?’
She giggled. ‘You know, I think Ben’s going to get it together with Tanya. She seems very keen. And so does he.’
‘Is that all right with you?’
‘More than all right. Fan-bloody-tastic’
‘To use a tiny tmesis,’ he said.
‘You remembered,’ she said, snuggling onto his chest hair and blowing it gently so that it went up her nose.
‘You must have said it a million times.’
‘I know. Miss Didactic,’ she said. ‘Hey,’ she sat up suddenly, ‘do you think if you had a dinosaur who liked teaching, he’d be called a Pterodidactyl?’
‘Like the one-eyed dinosaur, D’yerthinkhesaurus?’
‘The one-eyed deer?’
‘No idea.’
‘We could be here all day,’ she said.
‘What a lovely thought,’ he said, ‘staying here all day with occasional forays down to the kitchen for toast.’
The smile he gave her chased all thoughts of toast away, and at the next break in proceedings, it was time for lunch.
‘You happy?’ he asked her, watching her pad about the bedroom in his favourite old blue shirt, trying to find something to tie up her hair.
She came to sit beside him as he lay propped up on the pillows. ‘I couldn’t be happier,’ she said.
‘Couldn’t you?’ he asked seriously.
‘Meaning?’
‘Is there anything in the world that I could do to make you the happiest girl in the world?’
‘Truly?’ she asked huskily, her heart beating quite hard.
‘Really,’ he said, taking her hand.
A small gust of wind rattled the window pane as they sat in stillness.
‘In that case,’ she said, her voice deep with passion, ‘would you mind lending me a pair of socks? My feet are freezing.’
Also by Penny Smith
Coming Up Next
Copyright
First published in Great Britain in 2009 by
Fourth Estate
An imprint of HarperCollins Publi
shers
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Copyright © Penny Smith Enterprises Ltd 2009
The right of Penny Smith to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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EPub Edition 2009 ISBN: 9780007335701
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