Tanvi and Brijesh looked sheepishly at Shilpa. They were both sitting on the sofa in their dressing gowns. Tanvi had her legs draped over Brijesh and was playing with his glasses. Even more shocking was that Tanvi was wearing Shilpa’s new White Company grey towelling robe that she hadn’t yet worn.
‘What happened?’ Shilpa asked. She put her hand out to stop Tanvi from answering. She couldn’t do that to Brijesh. He looked mortified. ‘I know what happened,’ she said. The tightening in her chest took her by surprise. She had no feelings for Brijesh, yet it seemed like another rejection.
‘You won’t tell my mum, will you?’ he asked.
She shook her head. ‘What about Jason?’ she asked, turning towards Tanvi. ‘I thought you’d kissed and made up.’
‘I don’t think I love Jason,’ Tanvi said, removing her legs from Brijesh’s lap and straightening. She adjusted the gown around her and tightened the belt.
‘You don’t think,’ Brijesh said, meekly looking down at his bare feet. Never in a million years would Shilpa have put Tanvi with Brijesh. ‘I think I’ll take a shower,’ he said. He stood up and crept out of the room. Tanvi suppressed a giggle. They heard the bathroom door close.
‘What were you thinking?’ Shilpa asked. She headed to the kitchen with the idea of baking a rose-and-pistachio cake. She was tired of thinking about death and murder. At least she could relax a little now that Alison was not going to come after her with a knife. She would try and forget about Alison and Mason for a couple of hours and bake her neighbour a cake. It was time she paid Mrs Alden a visit.
She looked at Tanvi. The feeling of rejection had been fleeting. And at least Tanvi and Brijesh were providing some light-hearted distraction. She selected the ingredients she needed – the butter, eggs, sugar, flour, rose syrup and the chopped pistachios. Tanvi was quiet. She looked back at her friend, her ingredients now neatly assembled on the countertop. ‘You like him,’ she said.
‘I don’t know.’ Tanvi padded over to the coffee machine, slipped a capsule in and pressed the flashing button. Taking her mug of coffee, she perched on a bar stool at the island while Shilpa started to sift flour.
‘Don’t mess Brijesh around. He’s so innocent. And what about Jason?’
‘He’s going back to London today,’ Tanvi said, her hands around her coffee cup.
‘Does he know that you two are over, or is he going back filled with hope?’
‘Probably the latter,’ Tanvi mumbled.
‘Oh Tan, you’re going to have to tell him.’
‘I’m not sure I can trust him. I was excited to see him when he came here, but when we met, the spark seemed to have just disappeared. I don’t know. Our make-up seemed forced, and I was glad Brij was there to lighten the mood. We really hit it off.’ Tanvi stared into her coffee. ‘Which is surprising. He’s not my type at all.’
‘I’ve told you where I was,’ he said. ‘What more do you want?’ Steven Drew looked at his wife. She hadn’t been herself since Mason died. At first, she had been strong – the stoic woman she had always prided herself on being – but slowly the façade had fallen. Had she known what Mason was doing? She couldn’t have. But in the last week she had turned on Harriet for carrying on with Evan so soon after her fiancé’s death. She couldn’t understand how Harriet could move on so quickly.
Didn’t she know their daughter at all? He had no doubt that Margery would have done the same herself had she been in the same position thirty years ago. So why the change of heart now? Was it because it looked bad? His wife was sniffling into her handkerchief. She was a constant blubbering mess these days, and he couldn’t stand the sight of it.
‘Just pull yourself together,’ he snapped.
Margery looked towards the photo of Mason and Harriet hanging on the wall. ‘I suppose that should come down,’ she said, her hands shaking. ‘I can’t bear to look at it anymore. Plus, Harriet has some other plan, which I’m sure you know about.’
Evan was a breath of fresh air as far as Steven was concerned. He walked over to his study and was about to slam the door behind him when he saw Margery following him. He went over to his Chesterfield and sat down.
‘It just sounds a little odd, you leaving the engagement party like that and where you said you went. It doesn’t make sense,’ Margery said, facing away from Steven and looking intently at the bureau.
‘Are you calling me a liar?’
‘Why would you leave your daughter’s party, where there is plenty of expensive food, to go to a fast-food place for something to eat?’
Steven looked away. ‘There were so many people here enjoying our hospitality, and most of them are just leeches and social climbers. I wanted to get some space, and I like fried chicken.’
‘And you managed to get grease stains on your shirt, which is why you needed to change. You lied to the police. You said you were here the whole time.’
‘Because Margery, dear, it was irrelevant.’
‘I didn’t mention to the police that you had changed, but someone else may have.’
‘Nobody saw me,’ Steven said. ‘You changed too. I remember you wearing something completely different when I left compared to when I returned. You don’t see me questioning you about it.’
Margery seemed to have not heard his last remark. ‘And you’re sure that no one saw you because you were looking around to make sure that no one was following you? So you were deliberately being careful?’
Steven ignored her. He wasn’t going to get into this again.
His wife wrung her shaking hands. ‘You shouldn’t have bothered changing… All that blood. It wasn’t worth it,’ Margery said.
Steven stared at her, but she didn’t turn to look at him. ‘What?’ he asked.
‘You were the one to find Mason. You were covered in blood after changing. So really there was no need to change.’ Margery turned and stared at her hand which, Steven noticed, was firmly placed on the bureau.
‘If there’s something you want to say, dear, just say it.’
His wife’s moment of determination suddenly faded, and a tear rolled down her cheek. Steven didn’t know which was worse – her playing the emotionally unstable wife or the scheming one. He had seen both sides in their long history together. She had exhibited this same behaviour with the whole Finley debacle too. Perhaps she should have been an actress. He didn’t dare mention it. It was possibly another dream she had harboured until she married him and found herself a kept woman. She would have some resentment towards him, holding him responsible in some way or another. Looking at her hand pressed firmly on his bureau, he wondered just how much she knew. Perhaps she was keeping the information to use at a later date, or maybe she was just scared of what would happen if the truth was exposed. The latter suited him better.
Steven stood up and walked towards her, his arms outstretched.
‘We should have a dinner,’ Margery said, holding back the tears. ‘With Harriet too. There is much to discuss, and I’m fed up with all the lies. There are so many.’
Steven put his arms around his wife, and she buried her head in his chest. ‘Is that what you want?’ he asked. ‘For everything to be laid on the table, expose everything?’ His tone had softened, and he stroked her hair. He felt Margery sigh in between sobs. ‘Do you really think that would be wise?’
‘No,’ he heard his wife whisper. ‘No.’
‘What’s going on?’ Steven heard his daughter’s voice from the doorway.
‘Oh, Harriet,’ he said, pulling away from his wife and standing in front of her. ‘I didn’t hear you come in.’
‘Is everything okay?’ Harriet asked.
‘Fine,’ Margery said, stepping out from behind him. ‘Everything’s fine.’ Her eyes were red and filled with tears. There was no getting away from the fact that she had been crying, but Harriet wouldn’t ask why. ‘I was just saying to your father that it would be nice to have dinner together tomorrow tonight. Can you join us?’
Harriet nodded. ‘I was going to see Evan, but I can meet him after. Anyway, there are things that we need to discuss,’ she said.
‘That’s settled then,’ Margery said, walking past her husband and daughter towards the kitchen.