by Fiona Harper
He wanted stability for Jas and as much as she thought he liked her, she guessed he would back away now, hunker down and protect his daughter. And she wouldn’t blame him one bit. If she could escape all this, she would.
‘What are you doing …? Never mind.’ He held a hand out and she used it to steady herself as she descended the ladder. He looked unusually pale and serious, his mouth a thin line. Her heart began to stammer.
‘What is it? Is everything okay?’ she asked.
‘No! Everything is not bloody okay!’ He pulled away from her, then marched to the door.
‘Ben!’
He pulled a folded newspaper from his back pocket. ‘It’s Megan. She’s outdone herself this time and I am so, so, sorry … I could happily throttle her!’
‘Ben?’
‘I just went into the newsagents this morning and … well, there it was … and the whole village staring …’
She tried to get eye contact but he was talking to himself, reliving some memory, more than he was talking to her. ‘Ben!’
‘And we were trying to keep it secret, for the kids …’
She grabbed him by the shoulder. ‘Ben!’
He stopped mid-sentence and stared at her.
‘I know.’
He blinked, then looked down at the paper in his hands.
‘Toby’s agent sent me an email. He has a press agency that deals with all his cuttings …’ She shrugged and gave him what she hoped was an encouraging smile. ‘Seems the cat is out of the bag.’
The frown lines on his forehead deepened. ‘How can you be so blasé about it? Don’t you know what she said about you … about me? Don’t you know how she made it sound?’
Yes, she knew. She knew Megan had told the papers that she and Ben were on the verge of a reconciliation when nasty old Louise had slunk up and stolen her man away. People would believe it. Even after it had come out that Toby had been unfaithful, the public had forgiven him and, somehow, there seemed to be an undercurrent of opinion that it had been her fault. She was too cold, too remote. Couldn’t give him what he needed. Never mind that she’d given and given and given, and it still hadn’t been enough.
Well, they were right about that. What Toby really needed was a good kick in the pants. And she’d have loved to have been the one to dish it out, but she wasn’t about to generate even more column inches by doing so. She only cared about the smudged print on the paper if it affected how Ben felt, whether it was going to change things between them. Anything else was irrelevant.
‘Forget it,’ she said.
He stared at the paper again, then hurled it into the nearest stall. ‘I can’t!’
Louise thought back to her first really awful press story. It had hurt, cut deep. Nowadays she just usually ignored them. But Ben wasn’t used to this. In one fell swoop, his ordered, stable little universe had been set on its head.
Silently, she walked over to him and put her arms round him. He was shaking with rage. She kissed him gently on the cheek, on the nose, on the lips, until he wound his arms round her and kissed her back.
It didn’t matter what anyone else thought. He’d understand that eventually.
‘Ben,’ she whispered in his ear. ‘It doesn’t matter. I don’t care.’
He pulled back and his frown deepened. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘Do? Nothing.’
‘Nothing.’ He repeated the word as if he didn’t understand its meaning. ‘What do you mean “nothing”?
She shrugged. ‘As far as the press is concerned, we just don’t comment. Any response from us will just keep the story running.’
‘But I don’t want people to think those things about you. It’s not the truth!’
She silenced him with a kiss. He was so sweet for being worried about her, rather than fuming on his own behalf. ‘The reporters don’t care about truth. They care about the story—what’s juiciest, what’s going to sell more papers. The people who read that trash might think I’m a man-eating witch, but I don’t care. What we think matters—what we believe about ourselves.’
‘That doesn’t seem fair.’
‘But that’s how it is and we’ve just got to deal with it.’ She exhaled long and hard. ‘You might want to take Jas away for a few days, just in case people turn up wanting an interview or a picture. You’ve seen for yourself what some of them can be like.’
He nodded. ‘I could ring up my sister in Exeter. She’s back home now and could certainly have us until Jas starts school again, but you’ll be here … all on your own.’
She took him by the hand and they walked out into the bright winter morning, the sun so low in the sky it hadn’t risen above the tops of the bare trees. ‘This isn’t nice, but it’s ‘normal’ in my world. I can deal with this—I have done for more than a decade. It’s Jas who matters at the moment.’
He nodded. ‘She’s with a friend in the village right now. I’d better go and tell her we’re off on an impromptu visit to Aunty Tammy’s.’
Much as he’d like to wring Megan’s neck right that very second, there were some important issues they needed to discuss. He jabbed at the doorbell of her flat for a third time and left his thumb on the button so it rang loud and long.
Nothing. And any calls he made to her mobile were going straight through to voicemail.
Why? Why had she done this? Had she not thought what sort of effect this would have on Jasmine?
No, of course she hadn’t. Megan always thought of herself first and everyone else second. It had been her decision to end their marriage, her decision to leave Jasmine with him—saying she needed to learn to be a whole person herself before she could be a truly devoted mother—and now that he’d finally picked himself up and was moving on with his life, she was trying to sabotage that too.
Perhaps it was just as well he hadn’t caught up with her, he thought as he climbed into his car and slammed the door. Choosing to hurt Louise had been cowardly; she was an easy target.
He put the car into gear and made the thirty-minute drive back to Lower Hadwell. By the time he got back to his cottage it was almost two o’clock and he was supposed to be packing to go to his sister’s before picking Jasmine up at three. It wasn’t until he’d parked his car and walked round to the front of his cottage that he noticed the figure on his doorstep. Megan was sat on the low step, her face buried in her knees, drawing in jerky breaths.
Uh-oh. That damsel-in-distress thing inside him kicked to life again, robbing him of the nice head of anger he’d got going. How messed up must she be to think that selling her story to the papers would cause anything but a headache? For everyone—including her.
She stopped sniffing when she heard him walking towards her and raised her head to look at him. Her eyes were pink and her face was blotchy and puffy. He might feel sorry for her, but that didn’t mean he was going to let her off the hook completely.
‘Why, Megan?’
Her face crumpled, then she sniffed loudly again and wiped her nose with a crushed tissue. ‘I spent the last two years following my heart, trying to work out what would make me happy, what would make me feel like a whole person …’ She patted her palm against her chest.
Ben put his hands in his pockets. ‘Well, maybe you did the right thing in leaving me. You obviously weren’t happy, living here with me and Jasmine.’
She shook her head and rearranged the almost disintegrated tissue so she could use it for one last blow. ‘No, I was happy—sort of. But it wasn’t enough. I wanted more.’ She fixed him with her clear, blue eyes. ‘Only, I don’t seem to be able to work out what more is.’
Welcome to the human race, honey.
He nearly always had a small packet of tissues in his pocket—required kit with a child in tow. He fished a packet out of his jacket and offered them to Megan, but her eyes were glazed and she was staring off into the distance.
‘And then I realised—oh, about a month ago—that not only was I not any happier than I had been when we w
ere together, but that I was less happy. The grass truly wasn’t greener on the other side of the fence.’ Spotting the tissues, she reached up and but instead of taking them from him, she clasped on to his hand. ‘You’re a good man, Ben. And I was too blind to see that.’
She looked at him with large blue eyes and her breath caught in her throat. Oh, no. He had a feeling he knew what was coming next and he willed her not to say it. He pulled his hand away and stuffed the packet of tissues into her fingers.
‘Megan, we can’t go back. You don’t love me that way any more, not really. And I don’t want to be with you by default, because you can’t find anything or anyone you like better. I deserve more too.’
She pressed her lips together and nodded and a fresh batch of tears ran down her face. She squeezed his hand. ‘Yes, you do. And I’m sorry for what I did. I suppose I got into a real state because I was …’ she struggled getting the next word out ‘… jealous.’ She gave him a weak smile. ‘It was pretty obvious, you know. The pair if you couldn’t keep your eyes off each other. Just … don’t let her hurt you, Ben. I see that same ache in her that I have inside me.’
No. Megan was wrong about that. Louise was stronger than she was. But he wasn’t going to stand on his own doorstep and discuss that right now. He reached for Megan’s hand and pulled her up to stand.
Sometimes his ex-wife could seem like a force of nature—a cyclone—twisting her way through other people’s lives and leaving destruction in her wake but, right now, she looked more like a frightened child.
He put his arms around her and gave her a brotherly hug. ‘We both deserve more, Meg. Don’t you forget that.’
She nodded and kissed him softly on the cheek. ‘Thanks, Ben. Jasmine is lucky to have a dad like you. And, I think—’ she paused to take a shuddering sniff ‘—she ought to stay with you for the time being. I reckon I have a few things to sort out first.’
Relief washed through him. That had to be the most mature and sensible decision Megan had made in a long time. Perhaps there was hope for her yet.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
With Ben away, Louise spent more time working her way through Laura’s diary. She made good on her plans to divorce Alex, and Louise wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Mainly, she was just sad for both of them.
Maybe it was the diary, or maybe it was the relentless grey of the winter that made her feel this way, but Louise felt bleak and empty. Maybe it was just that reading about Laura and Alex’s split and the resulting fallout was too close to home, especially as her solicitor had let her know just before Christmas that the finalising of her divorce should happen in the new year sometime.
Or maybe she was just missing Ben.
She felt better when he was around—like there wasn’t a hole inside, one that gnawed at its own edges, trying to increase its perimeter.
It would be better when he was back from his sister’s. She would start to feel herself again. Maybe she would even feel more like the version of herself she was in her daydreams, the woman who was perfect for Ben, who didn’t have a past that kept knocking down their attempts to build something more than friendship.
So, when Laura’s divorce made her feel too maudlin, sometimes she skipped and skimmed the entries. She really didn’t need the details, did she? She was living it herself.
But then, one evening, an entry made her stop dead in her tracks:
3rd March, 1956
I’ve just received the most awful, awful news. Jean Blake killed herself last night. I was walking past the news stand on my way into town to lunch with a friend and I saw the headline.
I felt so sick I couldn’t even buy a copy, but when I arrived at the Savoy, it was all Brenda could talk about. How shocking it was, how sudden. How devastated poor, poor Dominic must be … (Not that she actually knows him.) And the poor, precious child, only just a toddler, now left without a mother. How could a woman leave a child like that? What must have driven her to it?
I sank down in my seat and ate my lunch, nodding and murmuring in all the right places. Even though I’ve had no contact with Dominic or Jean in almost two years, I had the horrible feeling I could answer Brenda’s questions.
What had driven poor, unstable Jean Blake to take her own life?
I had the horrible feeling the answer might be that I had.
How feelings and fact line up, I don’t know, because it shouldn’t be that way, shouldn’t be that way at all. I was the one left alone and grieving. She won, she had him. He chose her.
But then I thought maybe he didn’t choose her. Maybe Jean had worked out that he chose the child, Caroline, instead. I’ve always wondered whether Jean got pregnant to keep him with her, because Dominic had always said they’d decided to wait a few years, until his hectic work schedule calmed down, but it had happened early. Maybe Jean woke up one day and realised she’d made herself a prison.
I feel wretched, even though I did the right thing. And then, underneath that sticky, heavy guilt is something else …
Something warmer, like the sun coming out, and I despise myself for feeling this way.
Part of me is happy.
Even though a husband has lost his wife, even though a child has lost her mother. Am I monster? Or am I merely human—and all that means: weak, broken, selfish?
Because, once the initial shock has worn off, all I can think of is that Dominic is now free and our time will come soon.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Louise frowned when she heard the knocker on the front door rap four times in sharp succession. The journalists roaming the Lower Hadwell area at present had not yet had the front to march up to her door and ask for a comment, but that didn’t mean one foolhardy soul wouldn’t try. She walked quickly and silently across the hall and entered the study, where she could get a better view of whoever it was at the door.
Making sure she was in the shadows as much as she could, she leaned in close to the window and squinted.
No middle-aged newshound with a beer belly, this one. It was a woman. She had her hand up to shield her eyes while she tried to peer the wrong way through the spyhole. And stylish too. She was wearing a pencil skirt and really cute boots and her long blonde hair was caught in a loose ponytail that curled into loose ringlets down her back.
It was only when she grimaced in frustration and stood up to rap the knocker a second time that Louise realised this was no journalist. There was a reason why those boots were so cute—it was Tara.
Louise knocked on the study window to get her attention and Tara whipped round so fast on those heels she almost lost her balance. When she saw Louise her eyes widened, and then she shouted, ‘Open the bloody door, Lou! It’s freezing out here!’
Louise was too shocked to do anything but comply. When she opened the glossy black front door, Tara had recovered herself. ‘Surprise!’ she said, grinning and throwing her arms wide, reminding Louise of a hostess on an old-fashioned glitzy game show.
When Louise didn’t move, her mouth still slightly open, Tara stepped over the threshold and air-kissed her as if they’d lunched together last Thursday. ‘You’ve been moaning for ages that I should visit,’ she said brightly, ‘and I thought you might be feeling a bit miserable over Christmas—I heard about Toby and Lapland …’
‘Thanks,’ Louise said quietly, pleased but slightly nonplussed. This was stunningly thoughtful behaviour for her friend. ‘Welcome to Whitehaven.’
Tara took a quick and critical survey of the entrance hall. ‘Love what you’ve done with the place,’ she said, nodding. ‘Very … homey.’
Louise glanced at the pale aubergine walls and off-white paintwork, the comfy tapestried armchair that sat in the corner near the hat and umbrella stand. It wasn’t all silver-patterned wallpaper and mirrored furnishings, like Tara’s London pad, so she supposed in comparison it did look rather rustic.
‘Come through to the kitchen,’ she said, ‘I’ve just finished a batch of white chocolate brownies.’
&
nbsp; ‘Oh, Lord,’ Tara moaned, as she followed Louise down the passageway. ‘I’m not sure I’m as happy about piling on the pounds as you obviously are, but maybe you need the extra padding in a draughty old house like this.’
Louise rolled her eyes while Tara couldn’t see her. Whitehaven definitely wasn’t draughty. The workmen who’d been in before Christmas had replaced all the windows and made sure of that. But Tara could be very fixed in her ideas. If she’d decided Whitehaven was chilly, she’d be feeling phantom draughts for the duration of her visit.
‘So … to what do I owe the pleasure?’ she asked Tara as she put the kettle on the Aga, and motioned for her to take a seat at the old oak table in the centre of the room. ‘Not that I’m not pleased to see you, you understand …’
Tara blinked away her question and gave her a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. ‘Like I said, I decided to check up on you, make sure you were okay.’
Louise smiled back. ‘That’s very kind of you.’ But she’d seen that same smile on the other woman a hundred times before. It was the one Tara wore when she lied through her teeth during interviews. Louise wasn’t going to push it, though. Tara wouldn’t be able to sit on her real reason for coming long; her habit for brutal honesty would make sure of that.
‘So, are you okay?’ Tara asked, leaning forward a little, and for the first time showing a hint of genuine concern.
Louise rested back in her chair and looked at the ceiling while she considered her friend’s question. Christmas had been a bit of a roller coaster, to be sure, but when she checked deep down inside herself, she discovered she was feeling more than okay.
She smiled at Tara, properly this time. ‘Yes, I really am. I’m missing Jack, of course, but life is …’ she wouldn’t exactly call it ‘good’ at the moment, but it was improving ‘… getting better.’
Tara nodded. She didn’t look convinced. ‘And what about that story in the papers the other day? Please tell me it’s just the usual load of rubbish, cobbled together from a few tiny grains of truth.’