Chapter Thirty-Six

Griff

‘Griff. Come in.’ Imogen retreated from the door. ‘We weren’t expecting you.’

‘I’m sorry. I wasn’t aware I had to make an appointment to see my father.’ Griff strode past her and into the living room. The green chair was empty. ‘Where’s Dad?’ He doubled back into the hall to find Imogen with a foot on the first stair.

‘He’s in his bedroom. I was giving him a treatment.’

‘What sort of treatment?’

Imogen laughed. ‘You’re serious today. I was giving him a massage if you must know. Would you like one? You seem tense.’

Griff relaxed his jaw and studied Imogen, trying to determine whether or not she was flirting with him. He’d assumed her tactile nature was part of who she was, but in the conversation he’d had with Evie, it became apparent Imogen used all the artillery in her arsenal to win her battles.

In hindsight, it was obvious he’d been played a little – the kiss to the mouth, the leg brushes, the hand rub – and Imogen had admitted to having a schoolgirl crush on him, but no harm had been done. What Griff didn’t understand was why Imogen resorted to such tactics to secure his friendship. Unless, as Evie had said, Imogen thought they could be something more. ‘When you’re done, can we talk?’

‘Of course.’ Imogen climbed three steps, stopped and peered at Griff through the open balustrades. She smiled. ‘I’ll look forward to it.’

He waited for her to leave before spinning round and making his way through the living room to the kitchen. ‘That didn’t go to plan,’ he said, opening the rear door. He shrugged off his jacket, threw it on the counter, and loosened his shirt collar.

He wasn’t looking forward to their talk one bit.

He breathed in the soothing scents of his father’s garden. Lavender. It was known for its relaxing properties. It was one of Marilyn’s favourite plants. She’d dry out the flowers and make potpourri, or stitch them into palm-sized sachets to put in her clothes drawers. No wonder Logan kept the plant in his garden. He’d enjoy having sweet memories of his wife blown to him on a breeze.

Griff rolled back his sleeves. The south-facing garden was quite the suntrap, and the afternoon April sun was making no effort to escape.

Stepping over the door bar, he unreeled a foot of hose from its rack and gave it a tug. It didn’t yield. ‘Something else to fix.’ This was exactly the sort of problem he needed to get on top of. These were the jobs he could do that would help Evie to help his dad. Using brute force, Griff freed enough pipe to reach the shrubs at the back of the garden. ‘Someone’s got to take care of you,’ he said, thinking how thirsty the ground was. ‘It’s not like you can ask for help.’

Logan had. He’d asked for Evie’s help, but such was the gravity of the question, she’d not been at liberty to discuss it with Griff. By rights, Griff should have been furious with Logan, but Evie asked him to be kind and to understand his father’s reasons for privacy.

He did understand, but that wasn’t going to stop him trying to talk his father round. There was a chance, now he was on board with the care plan, and with him and Evie working on getting back together, that his father would think differently about life. By pitching in and supporting one another, they’d prove to Logan he wasn’t a burden; that looking after him was a privilege. They’d take trips out as a family of five; organise late days, when Logan could have lazy, lie-in mornings; spend whole days with him, rather than just mealtimes, and always show they’ve listened to him. If after that he still insisted he’d had enough of this world, then … Then what?

Griff jumped as from behind a hand touched his bicep.

‘I love to see a man working.’ Imogen used Griff’s arm as a pole and swung round to stand in front of him. ‘There’s something very primal about it.’

‘I’m watering lavender, Imogen, not hunting stag.’

‘Still.’ She let go and stepped back, making a show of admiring his efforts. ‘A girl’s got to get her kicks where she can.’

There was no mistaking that flirt. Completing his task, Griff tidied away the hose, wiped a cobweb from the seat of the nearest of four metal chairs, and sat down. ‘What’s my father up to?’

Imogen repeated Griff’s actions with the chair next to his. ‘He’s sleeping. What can I say? I’m good at my job. You should let me work on you.’

Interesting choice of words. ‘Evie thinks you already have. Why did you tell her we’ve slept together?’

‘She said that?’

Imogen’s sheer indignation might have fooled Griff if his faith in Evie was anything but absolute.

She continued: ‘I have no idea. Unless …’ She covered her mouth with her hand. ‘No. Ignore me.’

He’d bite. Keep her talking. Braid a rope from her string of lies. ‘What?’

‘Well, with me helping here, she can’t use this as a convenient bolthole any more. Perhaps she’s finding other ways of keeping you at arm’s length.’

‘I don’t play games, Imogen. You should know that by now.’

‘I’m not playing games.’ She sat forward, bowed her head, and put a hand on Griff’s knee. ‘Evie and I had a long chat yesterday and she doesn’t want you in her life.’ She looked up, her too-blue eyes doing a fair job of imitating sincerity. ‘Don’t you think it’s time you faced facts? Your marriage is over.’

‘Excuse me?’ This was laughable. And shocking. Griff was astonished at the blatant nature of Imogen’s lies, but until he understood her act, he’d refrain from applauding. ‘Why are you here, Imogen? The real reason.’

She reclined, crossed her legs, leaving her high-heeled foot touching Griff’s ankle, and folded her arms. ‘To take care of your father.’

‘No. Not that.’ Griff waved an index finger at her. ‘You have to stop lying now.’

She dropped her shoulders, sighed and bounced her foot up and down. It knocked the end of Griff’s trouser leg. He tucked his feet under his chair.

‘Okay.’ Keeping one arm across her body, she unhooked the other and rubbed her cheek. ‘When I saw you that day in that mad woman’s craft shop, I was thrown back into my old life – a life of love and family and friendship. A life I lost and would give anything to have back.’ She settled both arms on her stomach. ‘And then you and I got chatting in the pub, and I realised we’d both had a rough ride. Kieran’s death has left us both damaged.’

Her words sounded genuine, but her body was telling a different story. She was compact, tight, holding everything in. Griff remained silent, listening and observing.

‘We were two lost souls,’ she said. ‘I was searching for closure and you were looking for forgiveness. It seemed to me we were each other’s solution.’ She returned to her bowed head pose. ‘When I met Logan and he started talking about my father, I felt like I’d come home. It was so wonderful being part of something again. But it’s not just that.’ She looked up. ‘I’m here for you.’

So Evie was right. ‘Look, Imogen—’

‘Don’t say anything.’ She was off her chair, leaning over Griff, with a hand on each of his arms. ‘Evie doesn’t love you. Don’t be fooled by those innocent, green eyes. You talk about me playing games, but she’s a master. She’s toying with you. Keeping you hanging on until she finds something better.’

Griff scraped his chair back over the slabs, thinking Imogen would let go, but she lost her balance, toppled and fell further into him. Her orange perfume, once provocative, now sickly and toxic, permeated his pores and coated his tongue.

Imogen’s mouth brushed his ear. ‘She told me how you feel about me.’

‘Will you stop with the lies, Imogen?’ Griff flicked his arms away from his body, and Imogen lost her grip.

She stood up and withdrew to the lawn.

‘What lies, Griff? The one about your self-harming daughter, or the one about your suicidal father? Or maybe you meant the big fat lie about how I lost everything after my brother died. How about the lie, Griff Hendry, the hero?’

‘I’ve never thought of myself as that.’ It wasn’t a title Griff felt he deserved. It was the media’s doing. They’d given him the label the day he’d pulled a drunken man from the harbour. ‘I don’t understand what’s going on,’ he said, vacating his seat and pacing the breadth of the garden. ‘Tell me what this is about.’ He came to a standstill at the garage wall, scrunched his eyes shut, and pressed his fingers into his temples.

‘This is about you having everything, and me having nothing,’ Imogen said, her voice travelling through the air. ‘How unfair life is. How easy it is to destroy a person.’

As Griff spun round, he opened his eyes and immediately squinted. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust.

Imogen had crossed to the patio and was standing in front of the rear door.

‘Kieran’s death destroyed me,’ she said. ‘I thought, given time, I could forgive you. That if I spent long enough away from you, the hate would stop gnawing at my insides, and I could live a half-normal life. Moving to Glastonbury with Mum helped for a while, but then the selfish woman wrapped her car around a tree and I was alone, left covering a mortgage I couldn’t afford, on a house that held no real memories. There was nothing of Kieran there. Everything I knew about him was back here. That’s when I decided to come home. It took me two years to sell that awful house. I used the equity to put a month’s money down on a flat, and secure a business premises in Dorchester. It was my new start.’ She shook her head.

‘But on my opening day, it wasn’t my story the local press was covering. It was yours. You and your heroic record with the coastguard.’ She turned her back to Griff and spread out her arms. ‘And smack bang in the middle of the paper, staring out at me, was your smug face.’ She swung round and glared at him. ‘I knew then the gnawing wouldn’t stop. At least, not until you understood what it was to lose everything. So I set out to find you.’

‘To what? Wreck my life?’ With his head pounding from the verbal hammering, Griff returned to the security of a garden chair. He clamped his hands behind his neck, closed his eyes, and focused on his breathing. If he remained quiet, perhaps Imogen would do the same.

‘It didn’t take me long to track you down, not with your celebrity status,’ she said. ‘It was just a matter of time before we ran into one another on the beach.’

Griff’s eyes burst open and he threw himself upright. ‘You engineered that meeting?’

Imogen laughed. ‘Honey’s not even my dog. Can’t stand the creature. I borrow her from a woman who rents space at my clinic. Did you like how I’d etched my number onto the dirty mutt’s tag? It’s all in the detail. It certainly sucked you in.’ She laughed again, and then joined Griff at the seats, positioning hers inches away from his feet. ‘You’re lucky it was only your dog injured in the accident.’

‘Don’t you dare bring Ozzy into this.’ Griff leapt up and stormed towards the kitchen. His chair crashed to the floor. ‘If it hadn’t been for Honey, he’d still be here.’

He regretted his words as soon as they’d been aired.

‘And if it hadn’t been for you, Kieran would still be here.’ Imogen was right behind, poking his back.

The soles of Griff’s shoes scratched on the stone as he reeled and grabbed Imogen’s hand. ‘This has gone far enough.’

She yanked herself free. ‘I’m nowhere near done. I’m going to make sure you have nothing left. No job, no home, no family. The dog dying was a bonus and you’ve already lost your home. I thought breaking you and Evie up would prove easier, but I can deal with that. Tess … I could turn her against you with not much more than a wink, and as for Logan … He’s begging me to put him out of his misery.’

Griff slammed his fist on the kitchen window ledge. ‘Enough!’ In less than five minutes since being exposed for lying, Imogen was a seething mass of hatred, jealousy and revenge. Her spiteful words upset Griff, and her wicked threats unnerved him, but there was no way he’d let her hurt his family. ‘You stay away from Tess, you don’t talk to Evie, and you don’t as much as look at my father. When we go inside, you’ll give me your key for this house, gather your belongings, and leave.’ Griff stood clear of the doorway.

‘No. That’s not going to happen. Your father wants me here. I can do the one thing for him the rest of you won’t.’ Imogen folded her arms and refused to move. ‘How does it feel to know you can’t save your own father?’

She was pressing all of Griff’s buttons, riling him, provoking him into biting back, but recent events had taught him there were times when you had to let things go. ‘Give it up, Imogen,’ he said, tired with her games. ‘Go home.’

He headed indoors, and Imogen followed.

‘Do you think you can talk your father round? That he’ll listen to you? I wouldn’t count on it,’ she said. ‘Experience has taught me Hendry men never listen to anyone but themselves. You didn’t listen to Kieran when he begged you not to jump off that bloody rock, did you?’

‘When he begged me not to jump? Oh, Imogen.’ She’d hit a new low with that statement. ‘I get how angry you are, how much you miss Kieran and your parents, I even accept I’m the person you want to lash out at, but don’t twist the facts to justify your actions.’ Crossing from the kitchen to the living room, Griff indicated for Imogen to enter the hall.

‘I’m not twisting anything,’ she said, shoving the door shut, and barring Griff’s exit.

‘Fine. Reinventing them.’ Griff perched on the green chair. ‘If it helps you sleep at night, I can live with that, but I won’t lie if I’m asked what happened. I bear the guilt of not stopping Kieran. Of not saving him. I won’t add the weight of deceit, too.’

‘Saving him?’ Imogen shook her head. ‘He saved you. He lost his life doing so. He begged you not to jump, but you didn’t listen. You went ahead anyway, and you got into trouble—’

‘No. That’s not what happened.’ Although Griff had interrupted, he spoke softly. Confusion was forming in Imogen’s eyes, and it seemed to be questioning what she was saying. ‘Who told you this?’ Griff asked, leading her to the sofa and sitting her down.

‘My mum. She said Kieran had been a true hero that day.’

No wonder the Joliffes had insisted on Griff staying away. He was the only one who would have set Imogen straight. ‘Look, I don’t know why she said that, maybe because you were so young, maybe because she didn’t want you thinking badly of Kieran, I don’t know, but it’s wrong. I could show you the newspaper reports from the time if that would help. I have them at home.’ They were packed in a plastic bag and hidden away in a storage box that had been pushed to the furthest corner of the loft. ‘Kieran was going to jump regardless of anything I said to him. And while I live my life convinced I could have done more, I don’t actually know what would have stopped him. I went in after him, but …’ Keeping a close eye on Imogen, Griff stepped back and sat on the edge of the coffee table. It was now clear to him she’d lived most of her life believing he was the cause of her brother’s death. In her mind, that made Griff responsible for the breakdown of her parents’ marriage, and the loss of her mother. He couldn’t excuse Imogen’s behaviour – she’d set out to play God with his world – but he could understand it.

‘Why should I believe you?’ she said, her voice barely a whisper. ‘You could be saying that just to get me out of your life.’

‘Until you started wielding threats, I didn’t want you out of my life. I’ve spent twenty-four years hoping you’d be a part of it.’ Griff scraped his fingers through his hair, sighed and looked at Imogen. ‘Like I said, I have press cuttings at home if you’d like to see them.’

His offer was not acknowledged, so Griff said nothing more. He was thankful for the break in the storm. A lot of information had been exchanged, which he and Imogen had to absorb. She had a huge task ahead of her, coming to terms with the truth. That was not to be underestimated.

After a few minutes of silent contemplation, she stirred.

‘So it really was the other way round?’ She clasped a cushion to her breast. ‘Kieran went in first and you tried to save him?’

‘Yeah.’ Griff rubbed at the ache in his ankle. ‘I’ve spent my life trying to save him.’

‘He wasn’t the hero?’

‘He was a sixteen-year-old lad, Imy, doing what lads do.’

‘But he wasn’t a hero.’ With great care, she returned the cushion to its proper place, teased it into position, and laid her palm flat on the sofa. ‘Logan likes them just so.’

Without another word, she picked up her handbag from the floor, reached inside and pulled out a key.

She passed it to Griff on her way to the hall.

‘I’ll walk you out,’ he said.

He watched as she climbed into her car, leaned on the steering wheel and buried her head in her arms. Her shoulders jogged up and down.

‘Oh, Imogen,’ Griff said as the click of the door latch echoed round the hall. ‘I hope you find what you’re looking for.’

He waited at the bottom of the stairs while the dust settled and while he worked out what to say to Logan, then, after a deliberate, slow, step by step journey, he arrived on the landing and tapped on his father’s door. ‘Hey, Dad. Are you awake?’ He crept in.

Logan, propped up with the head end of his bed raised, opened his eyes. ‘Griff. I was hoping you’d call in.’ He smiled. There was genuine warmth behind it, but its energy level was low. ‘Sit.’

Griff pulled the white wicker chair next to the bed and did as he was told. ‘Dad, we need to talk.’ He steepled his fingers together and put the tips to his mouth. ‘I’ll get straight to the point. I know everything. I know about your living will and I know you have an exit plan.’

‘An exit plan. I like that name.’ Logan looked at Griff. ‘You’re not angry?’

‘No. I’m ashamed of myself for not being the one you or Evie could turn to.’ He pulled Logan’s duvet tidy. ‘I wish I was a better person. I’m working on it. I’m learning to listen.’ Something Griff had failed to do with Marilyn and was desperate to rectify with his father.

Logan’s trembling hand slid out from under the duvet, and Griff covered it with his. How large his hands were now compared to his father’s.

‘If I could have gone with your mother, I would have,’ Logan said. ‘She was the love of my life. But I was destined to remain, and there are many reasons I’m glad I did. I’ve been part of a wonderful family, I’ve become a granddad twice, I’ve come to know Evie, a beautiful, caring woman who’d move the earth if you asked her, and you’ve come back to me.’

‘I never stopped loving you.’ Griff closed his eyes and squeezed the bridge of his nose. Water dispersed across his fingertips. ‘I should have shown you.’

‘You’re showing me now.’

Griff blinked open his eyes, and nodded. ‘But I wasted six years. Years we’ll never get back.’

‘I can’t deny I’ve had better.’ The skin around Logan’s mouth crinkled. ‘But I had faith in you. I knew we’d be all right.’

‘But you’re not, are you, Dad?’ Griff cast his gaze over Logan’s diminutive frame. ‘There’s nothing of you.’ There’d been nothing left of Marilyn in her final days. No flesh on her bones.

‘I live with pain,’ said Logan. ‘It’s what it does to a person. It burns from the inside, and stops me breathing, and walking, and talking. Day in, day out, I’m stuck in that wretched green chair waiting for someone to come to the house. Anyone. I pray the postman will stop with a large parcel just so I can speak to a human being. I can go weeks without seeing anyone other than Evie, and while I love her with all my heart, she’s your wife, not mine.’ He laid back and closed his eyes. ‘I’m sorry for the pressure I put on your marriage. She loves you very much. Don’t blow it.’

‘I promise.’ This was beginning to sound like the last farewell. Griff held his father’s hand a little tighter.

Logan opened his eyes and smiled. There was more strength to it than the last. ‘Do you understand why I can’t be here any more? Why it’s time to go?’

Griff swallowed down the rising ball of emotion. ‘I’ve only just got you back.’

‘And that’s why I can go. You don’t need me any more. It’s time for me to be with Marilyn.’ Logan tugged at Griff’s hand, and Griff leaned in. ‘And you don’t need to worry. Everything is in order. Imogen knows what to do.’

‘Dad?’ Griff hesitated, hating the fact he was the bearer of bad news. He looked at his father, small, fragile, full of anticipation. ‘Imogen’s not going to help you.’

‘She’s not? But she agreed. She said she understands.’ Logan retracted his hand, and rallied himself into a sitting position. ‘Imogen,’ he shouted.

‘She’s not here. She’s gone.’

‘Gone where? What did you say to her?’

‘Nothing. I promise.’ As far as Griff was concerned, there was no value in providing an explanation of Imogen’s conduct. Logan believed she was the answer to his prayers, and that she’d consented to helping him for his benefit. Only hurt would come from revealing her true purpose. ‘I think the reality of the situation hit home.’ It wasn’t a lie. ‘I don’t believe we’ll see her again.’

Logan collapsed onto his pillow, his head shaking and his eyes brimming with tears. ‘Who will save me now?’