‘God, I miss you, Micky,’ she whispers, wanting nothing more than a hug from him. She knows he’d rationalise everything that’s happened in the last twenty-four hours – convince her that Tom would understand her strange reaction if she explained, that the bones would turn out to be a thousand years old or more, that business wouldn’t be affected at all, and she’d get a great write-up in the local paper because there simply wasn’t any other story to tell.
‘Oh!’ Mel stops suddenly, tea sloshing over the side of her mug. ‘Can I help you?’
Angus is bent over her desk in the small room, riffling through a folder – an accounts folder. Mel had recently brought all the paperwork up to date, poring over old ledgers and files, entering figures into a spreadsheet before printing it all out to reconcile with the bank. It was a mess, but she’d made good progress doing a couple of hours each evening after Kate had gone to bed.
Angus freezes, his hands mid-turn of a page.
He looks sideways at Mel, licking his lips nervously. He clears his throat. ‘Ah… I realise this doesn’t look good,’ he says, his voice wavering, giving a nervous smile.
‘No, you’re right. It doesn’t look good at all. What are you doing snooping through my paperwork?’
Mel sees that Angus is trying to think up an excuse, the way his eyes flick about the office, his jaw lightly twitching.
‘I thought you were outside talking to the police,’ he says.
‘I think you should be talking to the police,’ Mel retorts, coming closer and putting her tea on the desk. She grabs the file off him and snaps it closed. ‘Why are you in here? This is confidential.’
‘It was the girl who works here. She told me I could look.’
‘Nikki?’ Mel says, frowning. ‘When?’
‘Literally just now. I wanted information on room rates, and she said I could help myself.’
‘Nikki told you to come into my office just now?’
‘Absolutely.’ Angus shoves his hands in his jeans pockets. ‘This very second. You must have just passed her in reception.’
‘Then Nikki must have a twin sister,’ Mel says. ‘Or you’re lying.’
‘I swear—’
‘I sent Nikki home at least an hour ago.’
‘That other girl who works here, then… I’m not good with names.’
‘There is no other girl who works here,’ Mel replies. ‘Unless you mean Rose, who wouldn’t appreciate being called a girl. And she’s not here either. You’re not doing a good job of convincing me, Mr Spencer. Now, why don’t you tell me why you’re really looking at my private documents?’
‘All I can do is apologise,’ Angus says earnestly. ‘I… I was… um… I was checking to see what room rates you usually charge. I felt the price was a little high, that’s all. And… and it turns out I was right. I’m being overcharged by twenty pounds.’ He points at the closed file.
Mel stares at him, narrowing her eyes, her head filled with memories of Billy’s lies.
‘I don’t believe you,’ she says, calling his bluff.
For a moment, Mel thinks she catches the flicker of something behind his eyes – remorse even, perhaps regret. It’s what Billy would do – make her feel sorry for him.
But that was then, and this is now.
‘Room rates are printed on the leaflet in all the rooms and on our new website and Facebook page,’ Mel says defiantly. ‘If you thought you were being overcharged, you should have spoken to me. You didn’t need to snoop in here. What are you really doing in my office, Mr Spencer? You’d better tell me the truth. I have PC Gordon’s mobile number and I’m happy to call her to have a word with you, if you’d prefer.’
Angus stares at her blankly. Then he closes his eyes briefly, sighs and covers his face. When he drops his hands, his expression has changed completely. His eyes are heavy, pleading, earnest and… and almost kind-looking, Mel thinks, refusing to be taken in.
‘OK, I confess. I… I was trying to find out about you. Anything I could.’
‘About me?’ Mel says, her tone changing too. ‘Why?’
‘Because I’m your brother.’
Thirty-Six
Mel drops down into her office chair, not taking her eyes off Angus. Her mind can’t assimilate and process what he’s just told her. She’s far from a daytime drinker, but right now she’d give anything for a stiff Scotch.
‘My… my brother?’ she asks, not even recognising the sound of her own voice.
Angus nods, slowly lowering himself into the chair on the other side of the desk.
‘But…’ Mel has no idea what to say. She can’t deny that she doesn’t have any brothers, or even sisters, because she simply doesn’t know.
‘It’s crazy, I know. And I understand you’re in shock,’ Angus says, a tinge of excitement to his voice. ‘I’ve been searching for you… well, for a while now.’
‘A while?’ Mel says, thinking she’s never going to be able to form a coherent sentence again.
Angus nods.
‘Before I broke the news to you, I was trying to find out for certain that you were who I thought you were. I didn’t want to deliver a bombshell like that if I was wrong. And now I’m in no doubt. Melanie Isobel Douglas, you are my long-lost sister.’ Angus leans forward, forearms resting on his knees, his hands clasped together and his face eager. ‘And I’m so very pleased to meet you.’
‘Wow,’ Mel says, pushing back in her chair, staring at him. If she’d ever imagined what her brother might look like, which she hadn’t, Angus is about as far from anything she would have dreamt up for a sibling. ‘I… I’m finding this a bit difficult to take in.’ She studies his face, wondering if she can see similarities between them.
For a start, is he older or younger than her? It’s hard to tell, she thinks. It could be either. His ears aren’t dissimilar to hers, she supposes – rather too small and one set slightly higher than the other. His hair – well, it’s a different shade to hers entirely, but she supposes it could have been less mousy as a child. But his jaw and chin are different to hers – more masculine, of course, though his jowls already seem to be sagging and he doesn’t have her dimple.
‘How… I mean where… why…?’ Mel starts again. ‘What I’m trying to say is, how did you find me? And why did you want to? And are you… well, are you completely certain?’
‘It’s a long story,’ Angus admits. ‘But in short, I was adopted soon after I was born. I never knew my real family. Didn’t even know my mother’s name or anything about her. She… she abandoned me as a baby.’ He looks at the floor.
Mel stares at him, dumbfounded. Abandoned by his mother… Something stirs inside her – a thread of familiarity. The vaguest hint of a warmth that she’s never felt before. It makes her want to hurl herself at him, hug him close, breathe him in – the scent and feel of someone made of the same genetic material as her. She nods, desperate to say Me too, me too! but decides against it. Giving too much away wouldn’t be wise. And besides, she’s always sworn she didn’t want anything to do with her biological family.
Trash…
‘I’m really sorry to hear that,’ Mel says. But at least you had an adopted family, she wants to add. Unlike me, who was passed from one children’s home to another, foster parent after foster parent, being rejected, handed round like a piece of left luggage. Literally.
‘It’s OK,’ Angus says. ‘I had a good childhood. My adopted parents were always very honest with me and told me about my background when I was in my early teens. When I turned eighteen, they encouraged me to find out about my biological parents if I wanted. But at the time, I didn’t. It’s only more recently, since my adopted parents passed away, that the urge has taken me. It wasn’t an easy task, I can assure you.’ A globule of spit forms in one corner of Angus’s mouth, frothing as his excitement grows. ‘I’m just so very glad to have found you, Melanie. I think…’ He grins, one bushy eyebrow rising above his glasses. ‘I think we kind of look similar, don’t you?’
Mel stares at him. ‘Maybe,’ she says. ‘Where did your – or our – mother abandon you? Where did your adopted parents live, and where did you grow up?’ She narrows her eyes, trying to size him up, not trusting him an inch – yet she doesn’t know why. Something about him is just… off.
‘I was left outside a police station in Taunton. Such a cliché,’ he says, rolling his eyes. ‘I know absolutely nothing about my mother, though. Well, not yet,’ he says with a twinkle in his eye. ‘I’m still searching for her.’
‘Taunton? That’s not too far from here, right?’ Mel’s heart begins to pound. If he’s close to finding his mother, then perhaps he’s close to finding her mother too. And if what he’s saying about where he was abandoned is true, and she’s inherited a hotel not far away from there… Mel shakes her head as her mind floods with possibilities. She wonders if they have the same father, too.
‘It’s in Somerset, but only the next county and less than an hour’s drive from here. How strange that you’ve been living here all this time. I wonder if we’ve passed each other before? Do you ever go to Taunton? That’s where I still live. The crazy thing is, I often come down to the beach here at Halebury or Lyme Regis. I bet we’ve been within spitting distance of each other at the very least.’
‘Stop!’ Mel says, suddenly feeling overwhelmed. ‘You’re jumping the gun here. I’m not from this area at all. Far from it. I’ve only been living here a few weeks. I’m… I’m from Birmingham. I’ve lived there all my life.’
The excited expression on Angus’s face falls away. ‘Oh,’ he says. ‘I see. That changes things a bit then. Though when you were adopted, perhaps you were moved from the area where you were born?’
‘I was never adopted,’ Mel says flatly. Apart from Michael, she’s never spoken to anyone about this in detail. She can’t decide if it’s cathartic telling a stranger, if he even is her brother, or foolish and reckless. He could be a con man, for all she knows, and has made all this up on the spot to avoid being caught snooping and stealing from her office. But then… he was abandoned too, she thinks, feeling confused. This detail alone is too similar to her own story. ‘I was in and out of children’s homes all my life, with stints at foster homes.’ Mel folds her arms.
‘If you were born in the south-west, like me, then how come you ended up in Birmingham? Or perhaps our mother moved up there after she gave me up. How old are you, and—’
‘No, stop,’ Mel says again. She pushes her fingers through her hair. ‘I don’t want this,’ she says. ‘I don’t want to hear any of it. It’s too much to take in, especially on top of everything else that’s happened in the last twenty-four hours.’
Mel drops forward, cradling her head in her hands. She screws up her eyes, wishing she could rewind time to when she was sitting under the trees with Tom, the firepit blazing, sipping a glass of prosecco.
She feels a warm hand on her shoulder and whips up her head.
‘I understand,’ Angus says kindly. ‘And I’m sorry to have upset you.’
Mel looks at him, seeing something in his eyes – something familiar, almost. And if she wasn’t always so mistrusting and suspicious, she’d say it looked a lot like honesty.
‘It’s OK,’ she says, standing up. ‘You didn’t know.’
Angus stands in front of her, slipping his hands into hers, clasping them together as he brings them up to his face.
‘I… I was…’ Mel begins, staring into his eyes. ‘I was abandoned on a train,’ she whispers, shuddering from the inside out. ‘It nearly kills me to admit it,’ she confesses. ‘I was found by the cleaner at the end of the line, which just happened to be Birmingham.’
She sees Angus’s eyes grow wide, his mind whirring behind them, joining the dots that she already has. He holds her hands tightly under his chin, their faces only inches apart.
‘That’s terrible,’ he says to her, his dark eyes boring into hers. ‘Even worse than being dumped at the police station. At least it was pretty much guaranteed I’d get found quickly. Who knows what could have happened to you? What if they hadn’t seen there was a baby inside the bag and—’
‘Please… don’t,’ Mel says and, for some reason, she finds herself reaching out and putting her forefinger over Angus’s lips. Over her brother’s lips. He pulls her closer – the embrace powerful, and it’s as they stare into each other’s eyes that Mel realises she never mentioned she was abandoned in a bag.
‘Hi, Mel—’ comes a cheery voice from the doorway. ‘Oh… I’m sorry… Guess I’ll come back later then,’ Tom says, clearing his throat awkwardly as he stares at the pair of them. ‘Or maybe not,’ he adds, raising his eyebrows. He gives Mel a brief glance, a confused look, before turning on his heels to leave.
Thirty-Seven
It had taken an awful lot of coaxing to get Kate into the car later that afternoon. Mel had sat on her bed for a good half hour, trying to get her to say something. She’d talked to her about what had happened the night before, encouraging her to say how she felt. And she’d chatted breezily about what to have for supper later, the weather, school – and then she’d suggested they go and get an ice cream together in the village.
But Kate had remained silent. She’d lain on her bed staring at the ceiling, not even reaching for her phone when it pinged several times. Mel could see that it was Chloe’s name on the screen, probably concerned for her friend.
‘Wow,’ Mel says, changing down to second gear as they approach the sea, staring out across the bay as it comes into sight. ‘I’ll never get tired of this view. We’re so lucky to have it right on our doorstep.’
On the way, she’d pulled up outside the ice cream shop in the village and nipped in for a cone each for them. She’d glanced around the little square of shops, wary of an encounter with Donald Bray as she walked past the newsagent back to the car, but thankfully there was no sign of him.
They’d sat in the car, staring out across the bay, Kate licking her cone in silence and, when they’d finished, Mel had driven west to the next town along the coast to explore. After everything that had happened – the bones, Kate not speaking, Angus claiming to be her brother, Tom walking in on them and clearly getting the wrong end of the stick, especially after she’d hit him – she’d needed to get out to clear her head.
‘Nothing like a bit of sea air, eh?’ Mel says, unclipping her seat belt. ‘Come on then, let’s get some of it into our lungs,’ she adds, patting Kate on the leg. Kate gets out of the car and follows Mel along the esplanade and down the ramp onto the shingle beach. The tide is at the midway mark and Mel leads the way down to the shore, her still-silent daughter following as they crunch along the pebbles.
‘What do you think about getting a dog, Kate?’ she asks, hoping that will elicit a response. ‘You can choose the breed. I reckon you’d go for…’ She makes a pondering noise, hoping Kate will engage, excited by the idea of a puppy. ‘I think you’d go for a springer spaniel or perhaps a cockapoo. Am I right?’
Kate stares out to sea, scuffing her feet through the stones. She doesn’t reply.
‘Wow, there are some amazing fossils, look. Did you know that this stretch of coastline is known for them? It’s not called the Jurassic Coast for nothing.’
Mel bends down and picks up a couple of shells and what looks like a fossil of some kind – a perfect spiral of ridges. She inspects them and holds them out to Kate. ‘They’re perfectly intact, look. For your collection, perhaps?’
Kate gives an idle look before taking them and shoving them in her pocket without saying a word. Mel sighs.
‘Love, why won’t you talk to me? I’m so worried about you.’ She gently takes her daughter by the shoulders, standing in front of her. ‘I know what happened is upsetting, but you can tell me absolutely anything, you know.’ I’m pretty unshockable, she wants to add but doesn’t.
Kate remains silent. Just breathes slowly, her eyes watery from tears as she stares out to sea, her pale hair billowing around her face in th
e onshore breeze.
‘OK. I understand you don’t want to,’ Mel says, hoping that taking the pressure off will help. ‘Let’s just walk instead.’ She takes hold of Kate’s hand and leads her off along the beach, the waves to their left gently licking up the shingle.
An hour later, after a bracing yet silent walk, they head back to the car, Mel’s pockets filled with more fossils for Kate to add to her collection. It’s after she’s driven across the bridge over the River Axe – the muddy estuary filling up with the incoming tide beneath them – that she spots the red van in her rear-view mirror, her heart thundering to catch up as it misses a few beats.
Keeping her cool, she heads a little further north, turning right onto the main road towards home. Mel glances behind her again. The red van is still there, though she can’t remember seeing it when they left Seaton. She tries to focus on the road ahead, but the sight of it looming behind her makes her swerve, clipping the verge with the left wheel. Kate whips up her head, looking across at her mum.
‘Sorry, love,’ she says, reassuring her as her eyes flick from the rear-view mirror to the road ahead and back again. She grips the wheel tightly. ‘Just me misjudging the bend,’ she adds, biting her lip as she gives another glance behind. The van is still there, at just enough distance so that she can’t see the face of the driver. She can’t even read the number plate properly, especially since it’s back to front, and she’s concerned about putting the car right into the hedge if she doesn’t concentrate.
A couple of miles later, Mel purposefully slows right down on a long stretch of straight road, where it would be easy for the van to overtake. But it doesn’t. Instead, it also slows, dropping back further. And when she speeds up, the van speeds up too.
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