Zach looked as if he hadn’t moved since my last visit. Sitting down, shades on, thighs spread, soaking up the sun. The only difference: Tanya sat beside him cross-legged on the dry ground, as if someone had taken a pair of shears to her hair and tipped a pot of Dulux over what was left. ‘Lady in Red’ sprang to mind. As soon as she spotted me, she unfurled, lithe-limbed, and threw her arms around me in a hug. Sandalwood and sweat, incense and ingenuousness. Goodness knew what she saw in my brother. “Zach told me,” she whispered in my ear. “So sorry.” Drawing away, she asked after my parents even though she’d never met them. Probably never would.
I trotted out a neutral ‘as well as can be expected’ reply.
Much to my amazement, Zach had managed to prise himself out of his seat, stagger to his feet and engage in normal social niceties.
“Hi,” he said watchfully. Sizing me up.
“Is there somewhere we can go and talk, Zach?”
Catching on, Tanya said she needed to check on an ailing chicken.
“Sure, I —”
“Darling Molly,” a smooth educated voice, tidal in its delivery, one instantly recognisable, boomed over our heads. We did a collective turn and watched as Chancer bounded down the steps of what had once been a Romany caravan. He carried more weight than I remembered, the buttons of his white, open-neck shirt, which hung loose outside his jeans, competing with flesh and gravity. Fuller-faced too, a little dissolute around the eyes, he looked as though he’d returned from an all-night party. Before I knew it, I was grabbed and spun off my feet. Startled, I briefly forgot that I was in mourning. So had he, it seemed.
“Chancer, for God’s sake,” I struggled.
“Mad Molly,” he said, quite delighted and squeezing hard enough to wind me. Nobody ever spoke to me the way Chancer did.
Inches from his sun-tanned face, I couldn’t help but gaze at his extraordinary deep blue eyes, his jaw, not quite so sculpted and defined. Must have been several years, at least, since we’d last met. He’d acquired laughter lines that did nothing to detract from his good looks. My blood sprinted.
Placing me carefully down, he rested his hands on my shoulders, looked into my eyes. For a second it was simply he and I and nobody else. “I’m so very sorry about your sad news. Poor Scarlet.”
“Thanks. It’s appreciated.”
“And poor Zach,” he said, glancing over in my brother’s direction to which Zach nodded dutifully back. “How are your Ma and Pa? Pretty broken up, I guess. Will you send my warmest best wishes and condolences?”
“I will.” I realised that any chance I had of speaking to my brother in private had been ground into the dust under Chancer’s size nine’s.
“Did he tell you about me and Edie?” Chancer jerked his head in Zach’s direction again.
I acknowledged my brother with a smile. “He did. It’s a great shame.”
“Yeah, well,” he said, downcast, as though it wasn’t his idea, but Edie’s to split. “Bad business.” Chancer dropped down onto the grass, my cue to sit next to him. Zach, meanwhile, had taken up his favourite position. All very Zen.
I had no intention of discussing Scarlet’s death or the break-up of Chancer’s marriage. Divorce is akin to suicide. The more couples bicker and bitch, the less likely they are to follow through. It’s the ones that suddenly announce: ‘It’s over’ who mean it. Similarly, successful suicides rarely leave a clue of intention until it’s too late, which upped the odds of pre-meditated murder, I realised darkly. Was this Scarlet’s legacy, that I would forever associate her with the taking of a man’s life?
We sat in stony, gloomy silence. Conversation, when it broke through, was stilted and sporadic and, to me, meaningless. What did you talk about at a time like this? I lay back, closed my eyes. Sun-pennies danced in the sunlight. Stalking the silence, I willed for Chancer to go.
Maddeningly, the boys wound up discussing Chancer’s job.
“My recent bonuses won’t count for much, not after Edie has cleaned me out.”
“You could always transfer funds into my account,” Zach said cheerily.
“You don’t have an account,” I said. I wouldn’t be surprised if Zach reached his fiftieth birthday without ever having a payslip. Zach huffed loudly in protest, but that was all.
“Not a bad idea.” The reflective way in which Chancer spoke briefly made me unsure whether or not he was serious. Silence kicked in once more. For God’s sake, Chancer, leave.
“Mum and Dad okay?” Zach said eventually.
“They’d be better if you came home. Don’t you think he should, Chancer?” Which I admit was low. In the absence of a response, I cocked an eye open. Zach’s stare could melt a polar icecap.
Chancer wore a ‘What do I know?’ expression on his face. Male solidarity for you. We fell silent again, the heat having a soporific effect on everyone, bar me. I itched to get my brother alone.
“Anyone fancy a drink?” Chancer said.
“Tap water or tap water,” Zach snorted.
“Nah, I’ve got a bottled of chilled wine in the car.”
“Flip me, a car with a fridge. Didn’t spot it,” I said, casting about.
Chancer jerked his head in the direction of the entrance to the site. “Wouldn’t dream of driving my beamer down that pot-holed piece of crap. Left it at the top of the road.”
“Like the car, like the man. Go on, then.” It was the moment I’d been waiting for.
The second Chancer was out of sight I jacked myself up on an elbow and twisted round to face my big brother.
“Why did you lie about Scarlet’s visit?” While I was direct, my tone was neither accusing nor challenging. That approach wouldn’t work. Nailing Zach was akin to taming smoke.
“Don’t know what you mean.”
“Last time we spoke you said you hadn’t seen her for months. Fliss says Scarlet saw you weeks ago.”
“Did I? Must have slipped my mind.” His left leg fidgeted, and he itched both his arms below the elbows. Classic Zach under pressure. He used to do it all the time when he was wasted.
“Well, now it’s slipped back in, why did she come?”
“To see me.” His voice was heavy with sarcasm. “Or is that so surprising?”
I stuck my tongue out in response. “How was she?”
“Seemed fine.”
“Nothing odd?” Nothing that indicated what she was about to do?
“Like I said, she was good.”
“What did you talk about?”
“Don’t really remember.” He scratched his head, making a pretence of trying to recall.
“Did you know she was having an affair?”
“Ah,” he drawled knowingly.
“You did?” I sat up straight. The air suddenly compressed with thick and poisonous heat. I swear my ears popped. “Did she mention a name?”
Zach’s eyes thinned. His lips moved, like he was attempting to locate a piece of information from his brain and flush it out through his mouth.
“A guy called Charlie Binns?”
My brother is a proficient squiggler when it comes to telling the truth but even I could tell he hadn’t a clue. “What about Richard Bowen?”
“Richard who?”
“The guy she killed.”
Zach jumped to his feet. It would be fair to say I’d not seen my brother react with speed like that in the thick end of twenty years. “Why do you have to load everything?”
“Load?”
“Emotionally. You make it sound as if she murdered him.”
“If she was having an affair with the guy, she might have meant to.”
“That’s complete crap.” He was loud and agitated. At this rate Chancer would hear from several fields away.
“Zach, I didn’t mean it to come out like that.”
“Yes, you did.” A bubble of spit balled at the side of his mouth.
“For goodness’ sake, calm down.”
“Then don’t make such crazy allegations.”
“The police are on to it. They’re examining her phone and computer records. If you’d taken your head out of your backside and come home, it wouldn’t come as such a shock.”
He slung off his sunglasses and threw them onto the grass. Sparks of rage flashed behind his eyes. “Don’t you dare,” he growled.
Peripherally, I caught sight of Tanya strolling back. From the concerned expression, she’d heard the noise and loss of volume control. Zach couldn’t care less.
“Why can’t you stop meddling?”
“Now, you look here.” My turn to jump to my feet and raise my voice.
“Fuck’s sake, stop interfering in things you don’t understand.” Zach’s full lips wrapped around and spat out every word. His eyes were everywhere but on me.
“All right, guys?” Tanya said with forced jollity, looking from me to Zach.
“I’m going to take a shower.” He grunted something derogatory under his breath, then, kicking up dust with his bare feet, stalked off.