Fleur pulled her phone out of her bag.
‘Hello?’ she snapped into the mouthpiece, watching Peter Hudson scuttle back through the crowd towards his wife. Bastard. Fleur wondered if Mary had any idea what kind of man she was married to. Outside, the fireworks were cracking and rattling and hissing into the night sky. She could hear the ‘oohs’ and ‘ahhs’ from the guests from where she was standing inside the tent. Apparently Mary was keen to see them too and was making for the exit.
‘We must have got cut off before,’ Frank was saying into Fleur’s ear. ‘The signal’s still not great. How’s it going?’
Fleur really wasn’t in the mood for small talk. ‘Look, thanks for ringing, Frank, but now is really not a good time. It’s not that I’m not pleased to hear from you,’ she began, still with her eye on Peter’s back. ‘But, like I said, I’m right in the middle of my sister’s party and I can barely hear you above the fireworks.’
Right on cue, there was a loud bang from outside.
‘I know, that’s why I’m calling.’
‘Well, it’s very kind but—’
‘No wait – don’t hang up on me. I just wanted to check the address.’
‘The address?’
‘Yeah. I miss you. I was thinking of surprising you, maybe sending some flowers or something.’
‘Not much of surprise now then.’ She smiled and managed to stop herself from telling him that she hated flowers, that this really wasn’t the time to send her anything, and that she had left Rose’s address on the pad by the phone in the house for him. Because after all, wasn’t this what she wanted? Someone who cared about her, someone who did nice things for her? Maybe Frank really did care after all.
‘About what I said—’ she began.
He laughed. ‘Which bit? Was it when you said bugger off or that you never wanted to see me again?’
She winced. ‘Did I really say that?’
‘Not exactly but a man can take a hint.’
‘Frank . . .’ Her voice softened.
‘Don’t you worry about me, chook, I’ve got the skin of a rhino. Now about your sister’s address,’ he was saying.
‘That’s really sweet, Frank, but—’
‘But nothing, Fleur, just tell me the bloody address, will you?’
‘Isaac’s Cottage, Mill Lane, Crowbridge.’
‘Okay, I’ve got that.’
‘What about the rest of it?’ she protested.
‘No, that was the bit I wanted to check.’ And then it was him who hung up. Fleur shook her head. Maybe he’d lost his nerve. As she looked around her she felt a great wave of homesickness – not for Crowbridge or for the past and all those tangled might-have-beens and old resentments, but for Cairns and the restaurant and the guys she worked with and her house out at Palm Cove and for Frank, dear old Frank with his big belly laugh and great big heart and the fact that he wasn’t taken in by all that woman of the world crap. And for a moment she longed not for the past, but for the future she had been building for herself. All these years she had been pining to come home, and she suddenly realised that she had been home all the time.
*
Megan had made her way around to the front of her grandparents’ cottage, trying very hard not to attract attention to herself. She was grateful for the fireworks which seemed to have drawn everyone’s attention skywards. While everyone else ooh -ed and aaah -ed, she wandered casually down the drive and ambled out into the road, as if she was just taking the air and enjoying the crashes and bangs and waterfalls of brightly coloured sparks shooting up into the darkening sky from the bottom of the garden. Most people at the party were around the back of the house, drinking and talking and entranced by the fireworks, so they didn’t see her leave, and those who did didn’t say a word.
As soon as she was clear of the garden, Megan slipped her hands into her pockets and hurried off towards the village. Above her the streetlights were beginning to glow with a soft yellow light, coronas of brightness in the gloom.
Head down, Megan was on a mission; she didn’t really know what was going on with Hannah or her mum and dad, but she felt that her sister was in big trouble and she was worried about her. She had never seen her dad and mum so angry, and although she wasn’t exactly sure what she was going to do when she found Hannah, Megan knew that she had to try something. Her plan was to go back to their house first and see if Hannah was there. If not she’d try the recreation ground and then finally Sadie’s house.
Beyond the streetlights the darkness was thickening and creeping closer. Megan hated the dark. The fireworks were making it worse, the gaudy flashes lighting up the lane as bright as day before plunging everywhere back deep down into darkness. She wasn’t altogether sure exactly where Sadie lived. She knew it was somewhere on Moongate Lane, but she really was hoping that she wouldn’t have to go there and find it. If she was lucky Hannah would have crept home by now and be watching TV or be upstairs listening to music; although there was a part of her that intuitively knew that Hannah had gone home with Sadie.
Moongate Lane was on the edge of the village behind the allotments. There weren’t that many houses up there, but past the wood yard and the barns was a straggle of cottages, inhabited by hippies and people with big hairy dogs and lots of babies. There weren’t many streetlights, Megan knew, because once she and her mum had gone up there to collect some wicker cloches for the walled garden from a man who made them. He lived at the far end of the lane where it petered out into a single unmade track.
He had had dreadlocks and said that he recycled everything, which Megan knew was supposed to be a really good idea, but he hadn’t struck her as really good at all, just dirty with funny clothes and a kitchen full of jam jars and plastic bottles. He had given her mum a mug of tea made with leaves out of the garden – which didn’t seem right at all.
There had been kittens in his hedge but not the kind you could pick up and love, even if they did look cute. They were the kind that hissed and bit and clawed you if you came too close, only he hadn’t told her that until it was too late and a ginger one had scratched her and bitten her arm. She had had to go to the doctor and have an injection.
Megan put her head down and carried on walking, trying hard not to think about the man or the kittens or the big dogs or how much she hated the dark.
But, just as she got to the corner, someone further up the road called out her name.
Startled, Megan was about to run back to the cottage when she recognised the loping gait of Hannah’s friend, Simon, whom she had seen with Sadie and Tucker earlier. He hurried across the road to meet her.
‘Hi,’ he said, breathlessly. ‘I don’t suppose you’ve seen Hannah about, have you?’
Megan shook her head. ‘No. I thought she was probably with you and Sadie and that other boy.’
‘Is she with Sadie?’ he asked, sounding surprised.
‘How would I know?’ snapped Megan. ‘I was just coming out to look for her.’
Simon laughed. ‘Whoa there, I was only asking. She’s not at the party then?’
Megan looked him up and down; boys could be such drips at times. ‘No . . .’ she said slowly in case there was some chance that he couldn’t keep up. ‘That’s why I’m going to look for her.’
He nodded but didn’t move.
‘You can come and look for her with me if you like, I’m going back to our house and then the Rec and then Sadie’s house,’ she said with a confidence that she didn’t feel, as if the plan was rock solid, all the while thinking about the dark shadows, high hedges and wild cats up on Moongate Lane.
She could see Simon weighing the options and after a few more seconds of waiting, she sighed and said, ‘Please yourself.’ And with that, Megan stuffed her hands back in her pockets and started off up the street, hoping that Simon might follow her.
‘So they’re definitely not at the party then?’ he said to her back.
‘What?’
‘Sadie and Tucker; they were going to crash the party and I thought . . .’ The words dried up, and when she turned back, Megan could see even in the half light that Simon was blushing furiously. ‘I thought I’d better not, just in case, well, you know . . .’
‘No, I don’t know,’ snapped Megan. ‘Why do people always say that? I hate people who say you know. What is it I’m supposed to know?’
She wondered if Simon was always this drippy or if it was just because he fancied her sister. He stared at her and then shifted his weight from foot to foot under her gaze. She guessed from his expression that Simon didn’t have a little sister or he’d have known they don’t take much in the way of crap.
‘Okay. The thing is, I really like your sister and I didn’t want to crash the party because I didn’t want your mum and dad to think I was a total dork.’
Bit late for that, thought Megan. Fancying people obviously did something weird to your brain.
‘Well, she’s not there now,’ said Megan primly, moving off.
‘Have you been to Sadie’s before?’
Megan shook her head. ‘No. Have you?’
He nodded. ‘Yeah, a few times.’
‘Well, in that case you can show me where it is,’ said Megan briskly, job done.
‘Do you think they might have gone back to your house?’
Megan shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I failed my psychic entrance exam for Hogwarts.’
Simon flinched. ‘Are you always this prickly?’
Megan looked at him and raised an eyebrow by way of a reply.
‘What I mean is, if it were me, I wouldn’t take Sadie back to my place if my mum and dad were out – you don’t know what she might do.’
Megan sighed. ‘Okay, I see what you’re saying but I still don’t know for sure. There’s no one at our house, so they might have gone there. It’s worth a look.’
Simon nodded. ‘Okay, and if she’s not there, then we try the Rec?’
‘That was my plan,’ said Megan briskly.
At which point Simon nodded. ‘Okay,’ he said, and fell into step alongside her. Megan wondered if all boys behaved like this when they fancied you and how interesting it might be to have a tame one all of your own.
*
In the garden behind the marquee, the night had darkened fast, the navy-black sky a perfect backdrop for the final round of fireworks. God alone knew how much Liz had paid for them, but they were most definitely spectacular. They had drawn almost everyone out of the marquee and onto the lawn and now, as a grand finale, Catherine wheels and a pair of fantastic firework fountains lit the fuse that ignited dozens of little flashing, fizzing, sparkling fireworks spelling out the words, ‘Happy Anniversary Rose and Jack,’ in glittering Technicolor. People cheered and clapped as the pyrotechnic good wishes burst into life.
A little way along the path, under a pergola picked out in the glow of the fairy lights that he had hung earlier, Sam stood cradling a glass. He had had way too much to drink. He knew that because when he tried to focus on the tiny pinpoints of light, they fractured into shards, the fireworks refracting and reflecting in the bulbs only making matters worse.
He’d spent a lot of the evening thinking as well as drinking; he couldn’t believe Suzie would carry on behind his back, not with Matt . . . not with anyone, if he was honest. It wasn’t the kind of woman she was, it was not in her nature and there was nothing, no real hard evidence to make him believe that what Liz had said was true – except perhaps for his own terrible sense of guilt. Perhaps him behaving the way he did had changed her. Perhaps he had driven her into the arms of another man.
He winced at the image of him gathering Matt up by the neck like some Neanderthal. God, that wasn’t the kind of man he was, what had he been thinking of? Himself, his conscience snapped back. Him and his ego and his outrage and his hurt and his pride.
He had been neglecting Suzie of late, that was the problem. Maybe neglect was too big a word but it was the only one Sam’s vodka-addled brain could come up with that came anywhere close to what had been going on. Things had been tough at work for the last couple of years, but he knew that that wasn’t really the problem. If anything, it had been his excuse for not helping out, because Sam knew in his heart that he hadn’t been supporting her, he hadn’t been there for her at all. And so over the course of the last few years the house had become her problem, the girls had become her problem, the dogs, the cats, the cars, the garden, the shopping, the day-to-day management of their busy, noisy, stress-filled lives – all her problem.
And where had he been? Sulking. Sam belched and then hiccupped. It was true, he couldn’t deny it. The vodka had given him an amazing clarity of mind, if not vision, that truly surprised him.
He had been feeling neglected and resentful for a while now and he knew he had been taking it out on Suzie; he just hadn’t wanted to admit it to anyone, least of all himself. One of the initial reasons had been her going off to college, and although that was back when Megan started school full time, he knew damn well that was when the rot had set in.
Since then a little worm had been slowly eating away at his brain, one tiny bite at a time. Having the children early meant that up until now he had always been the breadwinner in the family; Suzie and the girls had needed him. Knowing that gave him a sense of pride and purpose, but there was a bit of him that was anxious that perhaps one day, one dark day, one day soon, Suzie wouldn’t need him any more.
The rational man in him could see how it would be nice to have more money coming in, to have a wife who was happy with a fulfilling job, but that rational man’s knuckle-dragging counterpart couldn’t help but look ahead to a time when he would become superfluous to requirements, and Suzie would decide that she could live without him. Given the way he had behaved recently, who could blame her?
The alcohol allowed him to consider with detachment the things he had been ashamed to admit to himself until now. When exactly had he turned into a pantomime version of his father, all moody and grumpy and uncommunicative, the things he had loathed most?
When she’d finished college Suzie had started working part time, fitting in everything around him and the girls. She had taken on designing, hands-on gardening, maintenance, and that had grown and grown until finally one day there had been the walled garden. The walled garden, her baby.
In his head Sam had planned to say ‘her job’, but he knew that the garden was just so much more than that to Suzie. It was a passion, a calling and it was fantastic that she had made such a success of it. He could see how much she loved it and there was a big part of Sam that was proud and delighted for her – but there was also a part of him that was horribly, horribly jealous. Not just of the hours she put in but of the joy the whole thing gave her. He was envious of how much she loved what she did. And how awful was that?
Having the garden project also meant that for the first time in years Suzie wasn’t always home when he got in from work, and often when she was she was preoccupied, or on the phone, or busy planning. People rang up and dropped by and wanted to see her. He had to cook supper and do more around the house, and even though he didn’t mind doing any of those things, the truth was he felt neglected. While he felt petty and childish for feeling like that, another part of him felt that she had taken her eye off the ball. The ball being him, and it was hard to talk rationally when one of you was sulking.
He also knew that thinking like that made him sound like a dinosaur, and now, on top of all the stuff with Suzie and the garden, there was Hannah. He shook his head in despair.
He was getting more and more unsettled by the way Hannah was behaving. Was it his fault? Or Suzie’s? Was their daughter picking up on what was going on between them? Was this her way of crying for attention and if it was, why the hell couldn’t he handle it better? God, he was supposed to be the grown-up here.
Once upon a time, in what now seemed like the dim and distant past, he and the girls had got on brilliantly. He remembered sitting at the kitchen table having Hovis moments with them after work, eating supper, chatting about the day, helping them with their homework, giggling together. Looking around those faces, at Suzie and the girls, Sam remembered thinking that his life was complete, a joy, something that they had built between them that made his heart sing.
Now if it sang it was mostly thrash metal or something nasty by a band with a swear word in the title. The previous week he’d come home from work to find Suzie was out at a meeting. The dogs hadn’t been fed or walked and were eating out the kitchen bin. Megan had been at the kitchen table with her iPod on, totally oblivious to his arrival, eating peanut butter sandwiches, fishing it straight from the jar onto the bread without worrying about cutting up the bread or putting it on a plate. There was a great smear of peanut butter across the tabletop which suggested this was not her first attempt. Hannah had been up in her room playing music so loud that the plates were rattling on the dresser downstairs and, short of joining Megan in her peanut butter fest, there was nothing to eat, despite Suzie having asked Hannah to put supper (which she had made before she left for work) in the oven to reheat.
When Sam had gone upstairs to ask Hannah to turn down the music and give him a hand, she had told him to get out her room. When he refused she had stormed out herself, telling him he was a Nazi. Megan caved in and gave a hand although, as she quite reasonably pointed out, it was hardly fair because she always picked up the lion’s share of the work since Hannah had turned into a screaming troll.
Despite the truth behind this statement, Sam had shouted at her and sent her to her room, which meant that by the time Suzie came in no one was speaking to anyone else, supper was burnt and one of the dogs had crapped on the kitchen floor. And what had Sam done then? Rally round, help her clean up? Nip out to get a takeaway? No, he had let her take over while he went upstairs to check his email.
Oh yes, he could quite see why Suzie might leave him.
On the whole, Megan was still fine, peanut butter and outrage notwithstanding, but he didn’t understand what was happening to Hannah at all. It was as if she had turned into someone else. For the first time since the girls had been babies he felt totally at a loss and frustrated by parenthood. If he asked Hannah to do something, she whined or snapped at him or stormed off in a huff, or burst into tears. Now, from his alcohol-fuelled high ground, he could see that he had passed the buck there too, complaining to Suzie because Hannah had behaved badly towards him, and accusing Suzie of taking Hannah’s side.
Sam took another long pull on his drink. Only that very evening, hadn’t he said in a sullen, little-boy voice, ‘Oh that’s it, take her side, why don’t you?’
He winced.
God, wasn’t he meant to be the grown-up here – just how adult did that sound? And here Sam was threatening to punch out Suzie’s friends like some teenage thug.
Actually, he thought, draining the glass down to the icy dregs, he wouldn’t blame Suzie if she was having an affair. Who in their right mind would want to share their life with a miserable, self-pitying, whining man-child?
Sam stared deep into the ice nuggets, and the fairy lights and fireworks reflected there. He really needed another drink.
*
It was practically dark when Sadie, Hannah and Tucker got to Sadie’s house. There were lights on and music playing and people spilling out of the doorway into the garden and the lane beyond that. There were people hunched around a firepit on the lawn, sharing a cigarette, passing it backwards and forwards, and others drinking and laughing and dancing.
As Sadie opened the garden gate, a woman came running out of the house across the yard, giggling furiously and shrieking.
‘Don’t you dare, don’t you . . . You bastard,’ she yelled, hitching up her skirt and racing barefoot out onto the tangled grass, leaping over and ducking between the groups of people. She was being closely pursued by a man with dreadlocks, who was carrying a yellow plastic bucket in his hands, a cigarette clenched firmly between his teeth.
The woman swerved first left and now right to avoid him, before finally running for cover behind a little stand of old apple trees – not that it did her any good. The two of them feinted back and forth, bobbing and weaving, her shrieking and laughing, him grinning but determined. She kept it up, this game of trying to avoid him, but in the end the man was too quick for her. As the woman twisted the wrong way, he whooped triumphantly and threw the contents of the bucket over her. There wasn’t that much water in it but it was enough to soak her tee-shirt and make her scream in protest. And then all of sudden the roles were reversed and the woman was chasing the man, squealing like a banshee, till at the doorway he turned again and, grabbing hold of her, hot and panting and laughing, he kissed her hard, bending her over, kissing her mouth and her neck and her shoulders, looking for all the world as if he was trying to eat her alive.
‘I thought you said your mum was going out,’ said Tucker.
‘Me too,’ said Sadie, taking another swig from the bottle she was carrying.
*
Back at the marquee, people were slowly drifting back inside after the fireworks. While the guests had been outside the staff had cleared away more of the tables and set chairs around the sides of the marquee.
The band was playing. Jack and Rose had made straight for the dance floor, arm in arm, looking every inch like a couple in love, despite all the ups and downs of life together. As soon as people started to dance the band upped the tempo a notch, playing something summery and light.
Suzie smiled; her parents looked as if they were having a great time. Liz meanwhile was heading for the door. Suzie’s smile deepened as she noticed that Liz was carrying two glasses and had a bottle of champagne tucked under one arm. Probably her man was about to arrive or perhaps he was already there, Suzie thought, watching the way Liz was hurrying. She knew how Liz hated people to be late; she wouldn’t be best pleased that the new man had missed supper. But maybe she had finally got it right. She certainly looked like a woman on a mission.
Sam was nowhere in sight. Suzie let her gaze work around the inside of the marquee, moving from face to face and group to group as she tried to spot him in the crowd. He couldn’t be far away surely? Unless of course he had gone home or gone looking for Hannah. Maybe he was still outside. As she was about to go out, Suzie heard someone call her name and turned.
‘Suzie?’ It was Matt beckoning to her from the kitchen. ‘Have you got a minute?’
‘Hi, how’s it going?’ she said. ‘The food was absolutely fabulous, we’ve had nothing but compliments.’
‘Great, but actually it’s not the food I’m worried about. I’ve been trying to find you. Have you seen Sam recently?’
Suzie shook her head. ‘No, I’m looking for him now. Why, what’s the matter?’
Matt stepped closer so they wouldn’t be overheard. ‘Sam tried to lay me out.’
Suzie’s first reaction was to laugh. ‘You are joking. I know he’s had a couple but—’
‘But nothing,’ said Matt. ‘He’s had a lot more than a couple, Suzie. You really need to talk to him.’ He paused. ‘Sam thinks we’re having an affair. For God’s sake, find him and put him out of his misery, will you, before he does something he regrets?’
Suzie stared at him. ‘An affair? Are you serious?’
‘That’s what the man said.’ Matt pulled a face. ‘Oh come on. Don’t look like that. I’m hurt. I mean, why not? I’m not that bad, am I?’
Suzie smiled and shook her head.
‘And another thing . . .’ he hesitated.
‘What?’
‘Hannah’s friends, you know, the ones who crashed the party?’
Suzie nodded, feeling her heart sink. ‘What about them? What have they done?’
‘Nothing major. They grabbed a couple of bottles of booze and buggered off. I ran after them but . . .’
Suzie groaned. ‘But you couldn’t catch them?’
‘Unfortunately not, I’m not as quick as I used to be.’ Matt put his hand on her arm. ‘It’s all right, it was nothing really, just a couple of bottles of the first thing they came to by the looks of it. I mean, we’ve all done it, maybe not quite like that, but I thought you should know that Hannah went with them.’
Suzie stared at him. ‘Hannah stole booze?’
He shook his head. ‘No, it was the other two but she was there and she ran off with them.’
‘Oh, Matt,’ sighed Suzie. ‘It feels like my whole life is falling apart . . . What am I going to do?’
‘Go and talk to Sam.’
‘And what about Hannah?’
‘She’ll be fine; she’s just busy being a teenager.’
‘And Sam?’ she asked.
Matt laughed. ‘Midlife crisis? Second childhood? Go and talk to him. Set him straight before he comes back for me.’ He smiled. ‘I paid a lot of money for these veneers.’
*
Tucking the bottle of champagne up under her arm and taking a firm grip of the two glasses she had taken from one of the waitresses, Liz headed outside into the warm dark evening air. Sometimes you just have to strike while the iron is hot.
As she made her way into the shadows, she spotted Suzie over by the kitchen area deep in conversation with Matt, which as far as Liz was concerned was more or less perfect.
Outside people were wandering around the gardens, catching up with old friends, drinking and talking in low voices, while the music rolled out into the darkness, filling in the spaces between the words. The night air was heavy with the scent of roses and honeysuckle.
Liz made her way around the different groups, making small talk here, sharing a joke there, even signing a couple more autographs. All the time she was being adored by the hoi polloi, she kept an eye out for Sam. He had to be around somewhere. Eventually she found him sitting in the shadows on a bench by the summerhouse, well away from the rest of the revellers. He was leaning forward, apparently deep in thought with his head down, forearms resting on his thighs, hands cradling an empty glass.
‘Well, hello there, stranger,’ she said, her tone an artful mixture of concern and seduction. ‘Penny for them?’
He glanced up at her. ‘What do you want? Come over to gloat, have you?’
‘Oh, come off it, Sam. You know I’m not like that. I was just getting a bit of fresh air and catching up with people. It’s all bit airless in the marquee. Do you fancy some company?’
He glanced up at her. ‘Do I look like I want company?’
She decided to ignore that and sat down alongside him. ‘I brought champagne.’
‘Oh well, that’s good of you,’ he said. ‘What are we going to celebrate? The end of my marriage? Presumably you heard about me having it out with Matt?’
Liz stared at him, and felt her stomach lurch. So it was true?
‘Really? No . . . Oh, Sam. Are you serious? I’m so sorry . . . I didn’t think when I said . . .’ She grabbed back the breath and the words, stopping right on the very edge of the abyss before admitting she had simply been making mischief. Instead she said hastily, ‘What did Suzie tell you? I mean, did she tell you she’s been seeing Matt?’
He stared at her. ‘I thought you knew all about it? She hasn’t said anything to me yet but that’s mainly because I haven’t spoken to her about it. I mean, what can I say? What can she say? I talked to Matt though. He denied anything was going on between them, but then again, he’s hardly going to own up, is he? Not even man enough to tell me straight out. Slimy bastard.’
Liz waited to see if there was any more and when it became obvious that there wasn’t, she handed him a champagne flute. ‘There you go,’ she said, topping up his glass. ‘How about we drink a toast to slimy bastards everywhere?’
Sam set his empty tumbler down on the grass and looked at her. ‘Did I miss something?’
‘My Mr Right.’
‘Slimy bastard?’
Liz nodded, surprised to feel her eyes prickle with tears. ‘Hole in one. Give that man a coconut.’
‘But I thought from what Suzie said that this was it,’ said Sam. ‘The big one – Mr Right. Wedding bells and all that jazz.’
‘Me too,’ said Liz.
‘And wasn’t he coming down to meet the family tonight?’ Sam continued, his expression implying he was having to search around for the thoughts.
‘Uh-huh, although the emphasis there should be on was. He rang while everyone was getting themselves settled in to tell me that he wouldn’t be coming after all because something had come up.’
‘Something important?’ asked Sam.
‘A twenty-two-year-old lingerie model.’
‘Ah,’ said Sam with a nod.
Liz smiled ruefully. ‘You know what they say, lucky at cards, unlucky in love.’
Sam frowned. He had obviously had a lot more to drink than Liz had first thought. ‘I didn’t know you played cards,’ he said.
‘It’s an old saying.’
Sam looked none the wiser. ‘About what?’ he asked, brain obviously taking a while to catch up. He took another swig of champagne.
‘About life,’ she said. ‘I’m lucky in life but not in love.’
Sam gave a miserable sigh. ‘Right. Not so long ago I used to think that I was lucky in both.’
This wasn’t exactly how Liz had imagined their conversation going. She moved in a little closer so they were sitting shoulder to shoulder. ‘I’m really sorry that things have turned out this way,’ she whispered, taking his hand. ‘You’re a very special man, you know that, don’t you?’
As their fingers touched Sam looked up at her. He looked surprised and slightly muddled, as if he couldn’t quite believe what was happening. He had such lovely eyes and he was so close now that she could feel his breath on her cheek. Liz swallowed hard, wondering what was going to happen next and if she had the nerve for it. After all, it was she who had started the ball rolling, and he was Suzie’s husband – but then hadn’t he just said that it was over between the two of them?
The problem was that, even as she thought it, Liz couldn’t quite believe it. Suzie wasn’t the type to be carrying on with anyone, particularly not Matt. He was way too smooth and gorgeous for someone like Suzie, surely? Although maybe that was it, maybe that was the attraction. Matt liked non-threatening women who didn’t hog the limelight or the bathroom mirror. You never could tell, and even if it was true about Matt and Suzie, how much worse would it be when people found out about Liz and Sam? After all these years. She smiled as her imagination dropped into overdrive. She could practically see the front of Heat magazine now:
‘“I always loved him but he was forbidden fruit,” Starmaker ’s top presenter tells us about her years of inner torment as she finally marries the man of her dreams.’ Or, ‘Sisters in tragic love triangle.’
Not quite true because she had never properly fancied Sam but it was good headline fodder – and people eventually got over those kind of things. Liz was imagining the repercussions and weighing up how awful Christmas would be versus the column inches she’d get and the news coverage, when she suddenly became aware that Sam was staring at her. She wondered if she had been speaking out loud. His eyes were a little glazed and very slightly out of focus but he was most definitely staring at her.
Was this a bridge too far, or was it fate that had finally brought them together after all these years? Liz considered the thought for a moment. A bit of cliché, all that ‘bridge too far’ and ‘fate’ stuff, and she would have to think about how to phrase it for the tabloids so that it didn’t sound sordid. She was thinking something along the lines of ‘igniting a fire that had been smouldering untended and unintended in the background for years’. Waiting or smouldering? And could you marry your own brother-in-law? Or did they consider that incest? It would probably be worth looking up . . .
She was still thinking when Sam leant in a little closer and, for one heart-stopping moment, Liz thought that he was going to kiss her.
Instead he belched quietly and then said, ‘Sorry about that. I was going to ask you how long have you known about this thing with Matt and Suzie? I don’t understand why you didn’t say something before. Why now? You know, I feel such a fool for not seeing it – is she going to leave me, Liz? Is that what this is about? Is she going? Is that why you said something?’
As he spoke a great big tear rolled down his cheek. ‘I know I haven’t been there for her just recently. And she’s needed me, what with the garden and the extra work and the girls and cooking supper and everything. What are the girls going to say – do they know? God, Liz, I really love her. I really, really do. Do you think it’s too late to get her back?’ He let out a thick miserable sob. ‘Oh God, what have I done?’
Liz stared at him in amazement and before she could help herself said, ‘Never mind about what you’ve done, Sam, what has Suzie done?’
He looked up at her words, his eyes ever so slightly crossed. ‘Exactly. What has she done? I mean, what has she definitely, definitely done? I’ve been sitting here thinking about it. What do I know for certain ? I’m not talking about the things that my mind is making up just because I want to be the one up here on the moral high ground but the real things. You tell me – what has she done, Liz ?’
Liz hesitated. Sam really was an awful lot drunker than he looked.
‘Maybe Matt was telling the truth, you know?’ he continued, his words crashing randomly into each other. ‘Maybe there really isn’t anything going on between the two of them. I don’t know that much about Matt but he always seemed like a reasonable sort of guy really – bit of a wanker maybe, but not a wife stealer if you know what I mean. Maybe I’m reading this all wrong. You know, in all the years I’ve been with Suzie I’ve never thought for one single solitary moment, not ever, that she was the sort of woman who would cheat on me. Not once . . . so why now? What do you think, Liz? What do you think? You’re her sister, for God’s sake. I need to think . . .’
Liz stayed schtum. She was slightly concerned by the journey his alcohol-fuelled brain was making. She wondered how long it would be before Sam came full circle and realised that the seeds of doubt that he had been so carefully tending were the ones that she had planted.