The Girl Who Came Back (14 page)

Sympathising with her adolescent angst, Jules pulled her into an embrace. ‘I don’t think anyone could forget you, my darling.’

‘Oh Mum, you would say that, but it might come as a shock to you to know that I’m not special to everyone else the way I am to you and Dad and the grannies.’

‘And Auntie Bridget and Uncle Danny, Auntie Ruthie and Uncle Connor, Auntie Terry and Finn, Uncle Pete, Bob and Cheryl …’

‘Mum stop, it’s not the same and you know it. They’ve known me all my life and I’ve only just met Joe.’

‘Do you have any plans to see him again before we leave?’

Daisy twinkled mischievously. ‘He’s invited us to his house tomorrow. They’ve got a pool, so we can swim.’

‘Did you tell him you have a beach?’

‘Mattie did, but it’s not a competition, Mum.’

‘Sorry.’

‘Mattie says she doesn’t think he has a girlfriend, but Oscar’s going to find out to make sure. Oh please don’t let him already have someone. I’ll just die if he has. But guess what, he’s really interested in loads of things the same as me, and we’re into all the same music. Oh yes, and he’s made films at school, not like we make, more kind of factual stuff, although we do them too, like our film about the moor, and the other one we did about the history of Kesterly. His dad’s a doctor, but that’s not what he wants to do when he’s older. He’s going to be a lawyer, he says, and he reckons it’s dead cool that I want to get into directing. Apparently there are some really good places in New York for that, he’s going to find out more about them for me.’

‘Wow,’ Jules laughed, ‘is there anything you haven’t discussed yet?’

Laughing too, Daisy threw her arms around her mother’s neck and carried on talking about Joe, repeating herself over and over the way she did when talking to Stephie, and clearly thrilling and rejoicing and swooning at all the new and wonderful sensations fizzing about inside her.

It was the evening after the announcement that Joe would be joining them at the lake, during a cocktail party at a neighbour’s house, that Esther introduced Jules to Nicholas, Joe’s father.

As Jules looked into the man’s unsettling dark eyes, a deeper, wiser, far more knowing version of Joe’s, she felt something shift in the normal calm of her demeanour. They shook hands and it was as though a quietly powerful charge was passing between them, fusing a connection that was both shocking and intriguing. She wasn’t sure she’d ever experienced anything like this before, and wasn’t entirely comfortable with it, but it would have appeared rude to move away.

‘Nicholas is a heart surgeon,’ Esther was telling her, and Jules almost embarrassed herself by saying, ‘Well, a man who can so obviously break them should be able to repair them.’

After Esther left them they talked for just a few minutes about where she was from, how infrequently he got to Europe, and how long he’d lived in Chicago, before moving on to mingle with the other guests. Though she didn’t look his way again, she continued to feel his presence, and wondered if he felt hers too.

‘It would seem,’ he said, coming to join her on the terrace later, ‘that my son’s fascination with your daughter has got him an invite to the lake.’

Jules was watching Daisy, sitting on the grass with Em’s children and Joe, sensing her attraction to the young lad as deeply as she was now sensing her own to the father.

She took a small sip of her Martini. He was so close he was almost touching her. She listened to the murmur of American voices around her and felt as though she was in a movie where the colours were blurred and the sound was hushed. Nothing about the setting seemed real, apart from him and her and what was happening between them.

Things like this weren’t supposed to happen when you were forty and happily married.

‘Do you think she feels the same way?’ he asked softly.

Jules understood the nuance of the question, and nodded.

‘I believe they’re arranging to get together again tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Do you have any objection?’

Keeping her eyes on Daisy, she took another sip of her drink. ‘Do you know where they’re planning to go?’

‘Somewhere we’re not invited, I’m sure.’ He smiled. ‘Do you have any plans yourself?’

Her breath caught as she felt the answer forming in ways that went beyond words.

They met at his home the following afternoon. She stayed for almost four hours making love with a man she didn’t know, had no intention of ever getting to know, but allowing him to do things to her that no one had ever done before. She was insatiable; she didn’t want it to stop. They hardly talked; words were of no interest; all that mattered were the acts of love that wasn’t love at all.

She couldn’t remember later how often she’d thought of Kian during those hours, if she’d even thought about him at all; she only knew that she couldn’t get him out of her mind afterwards. It was as though he was invisibly there, watching her, accusing her, berating her for the betrayal. She felt so ashamed it was making her want to claw and tear at her own skin as though to remove every last memory of Nicholas’s touch.

What had driven her? How could she have done it when she loved her husband so much she’d rather have died than do anything to hurt him? How was she going to face him with this guilt? How could she bear to see the hurt and bewilderment in his eyes, the shock, anger; his love turning to disgust and distrust? She felt so appalled and wretched, yet even as her conscience tormented her, her body, as though it had a life of its own, continued to thrill to the intensity of those stolen hours.

‘Is everything OK?’ Kian asked a few days later, as they began the three-hour drive to the lake. ‘You haven’t seemed yourself since I arrived.’

‘I’m fine,’ she assured him, reaching for his hand, ‘it’s just the heat of the city. I’ll be glad to get somewhere cooler.’

His eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror, where the grannies were dozing in the seats behind them and Daisy and Joe were playing something on a console at the far back.

Jules couldn’t look at the boy without feeling a terrible weight inside her. Thank God his father hadn’t accepted Esther’s invitation to join them too.

‘There’s plenty of room,’ Esther had told him down the phone, ‘and we’d love to have you along.’

Jules hadn’t been able to hear his reply.

‘Sure, I understand,’ Esther said in the end. ‘Be sure to send her my love. We can’t wait for the wedding.’ After putting the phone down she said to Jules, ‘He’s getting married at the end of next month to a very good friend of mine, Corinna Linus. It’s good to see him happy; his first wife’s death hit him hard.’

Jules realised that the tightness in her chest was far closer to jealousy than the relief she should have felt to learn he was involved with somebody else. She shut the emotion down quickly. It didn’t belong with her, had no place in her life at all. She wondered how hard he might be struggling with his own conscience, if it was anything like the way she was suffering with hers.

She’d made sure not to be there that morning when he’d come to drop Joe at Gray and Esther’s. If Kian were to see them together he’d know right away. She felt everyone would, which was why she never mentioned him, or listened particularly attentively if someone else did, in case she somehow gave herself away.

‘Our little girl’s besotted,’ Kian smiled as they stopped at a rest area to break the journey.

‘So’s he,’ Jules murmured, watching the youngsters following the grannies into the low, red-brick buildings to get snacks and cold drinks. Em’s kids were already inside with Esther and Gray.

Not ready to be alone with Kian, Jules pushed the car door open. ‘It’ll seem rude if we don’t go in too,’ she said.

‘You’re right,’ he agreed, and turning off the engine he followed her out into the blazing heat.

In the end, because she had to tell someone, Jules waited until she and Em were on one of their early-morning walks around the lake, a long way from the house, and confided everything that had happened.

Em’s shock was apparent, as was her sympathy for how hard Jules was being on herself. ‘Sometimes things get out of control,’ she tried to soothe, ‘I know, because it almost happened to me once.’

‘With Nicholas?’ Jules cried aghast.

‘No, not with Nicholas. It doesn’t matter who with, it was a long time ago, and I’ve put it out of my mind now, which is exactly what you must do.’

Sighing, Jules turned to gaze at the water where early swimmers, sailboats and skiers were shimmering like apparitions in the misty sunlight. ‘I want to,’ she said, ‘more than anything, but it means lying to Kian and I don’t know if I can do that.’

‘Listen to me,’ Em said firmly, ‘I promise you, no good will ever come from telling him. In fact, in my opinion, it’s the most selfish thing you could do. You’re the one who made the mistake, so you’re the one who has to live with it. Not him. He’s happy; he loves you more than his own life, so why the hell would you do anything to spoil that when you’ve got no intention of seeing Nicholas again …’ She stopped. ‘Please tell me you haven’t.’

‘God no,’ Jules exclaimed. ‘Do you think I’m crazy?’

Em eyed her warily. ‘Possibly, for doing it,’ she admitted. ‘Crazier still if you start trying to ease your conscience with a confession.’

‘I’ve never had secrets from Kian before.’

‘So, you have one now, and the reason you’re keeping it is for his sake, not yours. You can’t go destroying what you two have for something that doesn’t even mean anything. And what about Daisy? Have you thought about how it’s going to affect her if you decide to break her daddy’s heart?’

Jules continued to gaze at the water, feeling nothing but guilt, and the brutal truth of Em’s words.

‘The choice is yours, Jules,’ Em said softly. ‘You can either devastate the people you love most in the world, or you can put it out of your mind and start forgiving yourself.’

Jules almost smiled. ‘That’s not going to be easy.’

‘Maybe not, but let me tell you this, no one goes through life without doing at least one thing they regret, they wouldn’t be human if they did. So for God’s sake, put your family first and let your conscience get over itself – and now we need to change the subject, because Daisy and Joe are about twenty yards away.’

‘Hey Mum! Hey Auntie Em,’ Daisy called out as she and Joe jogged past in their trainers and luminous Lycra. ‘See you’re doing a great job of burning off all that wine you had last night.’

‘Thanks for the reminder,’ Jules retorted wryly. ‘Are you going to the café?’

‘That’s the plan,’ Joe told her. ‘See you there?’

‘Keep a table for us.’ Laughing as he suddenly scooped Daisy up and began running with her towards the water’s edge, she said, ‘Why, of all people, did it have to be his father?’

Em sighed sympathetically. ‘This is just a holiday romance. Trouble is, you thought you could have one too.’

With a sardonic smile Jules pressed a fist into Em’s arm. ‘You’re right. I have to keep this to myself,’ she said decisively. ‘I can see that now.’

‘Good.’

‘Thanks for listening.’

‘Isn’t that what friends are for? We’ll talk about it more later, if you like, but for now, call Kian and invite him to come and join us for coffee.’

Jules did, and her heart burned with painful emotions to hear the relief and eagerness in his voice. He had no idea why she’d been shutting him out these last few days, but this was sounding as though she might finally be letting him back in again, and she wanted to weep for how happy it was making him.

‘
HI, IT’S GOOD
to see you,’ Andee smiled, as Jules joined her in a window booth at the Seafront Café.

Jules’s nerves were tight, her head ached as she greeted Fliss, the café’s owner, and ordered a decaff Americano.

‘A latte for me,’ Andee told Fliss.

After jotting the order down Fliss said to Jules, ‘How are you, sweetie? Haven’t seen you in a while.’

‘I’m fine,’ Jules replied, knowing Fliss’s concern was real, though she was undoubtedly curious about what was behind this meeting with the ex-detective Andee Lawrence, particularly with Amelia Quentin’s release on the horizon.

Apart from another couple seated close to the counter Jules and Andee were the only customers inside the café; with the weather being so warm the tables on the pavement outside were full of tourists, in spite of the traffic fumes.

‘I’m guessing,’ Jules said, bracing herself, ‘that a date’s been set.’

Andee nodded. ‘It’s the twenty-ninth, the end of next week, a little earlier than I’d expected.’

Jules kept her eyes down as she struggled with how wretched this news was making her feel, how cheated and vengeful, frustrated, helpless, furious beyond any words. It would do no more good to try and express her feelings than it would to continue feeling them, so she attempted to stuff them back into the darkness they’d sprung from. ‘Do you have any idea,’ she said to Andee, ‘why she’s coming back here, why she’s even being allowed to?’

Andee shook her head. ‘I’m afraid not, but if you’re worried … If you’d like me to talk to someone … She won’t be allowed to come near you. It’ll be one of the conditions …’

Jules’s head came up. ‘Do you think I need protecting?’ she asked sharply.

Andee held her gaze.

Jules turned to the window, looking across the street at the crowded beach where a Punch and Judy show was under way, kids were riding donkeys, families were splashing about in the waves. Normal life, oblivion, except everyone had a story. Probably not one like hers. ‘I’ll be fine,’ she said quietly. After a while her eyes returned to Andee. ‘She can’t do any more to me than she already has.’

Andee sat back in her seat as Fliss delivered their coffees.

‘A couple of pastries on the house,’ Fliss announced. ‘You look like you could do with feeding up,’ she told Jules.

After she’d gone, seeming to sense that they needed to ease away from Amelia Quentin for a while, Andee said, ‘How’s your mother?’

Jules sipped her coffee and stared into it as she put it down again. ‘The same,’ she replied. ‘There, but not, if you know what I mean.’ She looked up. ‘How’s yours?’ she asked, struggling to remember what she knew of Andee’s mother.