With no better place to be, Claudia rested her back against the flock of duck-down pillows she had spent the last ten minutes rearranging. She shuffled up the bed, then down again, dug her left shoulder into her nest, then did the same with the right, but to no avail. Unable to cure her restlessness, she distracted herself by smoothing out the creases on the white Egyptian cotton sheet that protected her from the heavy damask of the duvet cover. The strap of her silk chemise slipped down her arm. She pulled it up, almost snapping it.
Claudia didn’t understand why everyone was ganging up on her. She had made a few errors of judgement, but she had made up for it since. Why couldn’t she be left in peace? Other people made mistakes. Why did hers have to happen in the midst of a disaster that had to be brought up over and over again?
Justin was bemused by her moods and seemed to think the best way to deal with Claudia was to give her some distance. She couldn’t remember the last time he had worked from home. He was back to his old ways, leaving early and coming home late. He was living for his work instead of living for his wife.
Shoving an elbow into her pillow, Claudia realised she had never felt comfortable in this bed. She closed her eyes and willed herself someplace else, and Declan’s scruffy little flat above the bakery came to mind too easily. She had always felt at peace there. It was somewhere where she never had to pretend to be something other than what she was.
‘What if it could be like this for ever?’ Declan had once asked her, kissing her bare shoulder as she lay tangled in sheets that were thin and scratchy.
‘You have to go back to Ireland, for your kids,’ she reminded him. It had been part of the initial attraction. Declan would return home when the theatre project was signed off, and no one need ever be the wiser.
‘I’ll be home soon enough, but what if you came with me?’
‘My life is here.’
‘Is that so? Then tell me, who’s your best friend? Who knows your darkest secrets? It’s not the likes of Phillipa, that’s for sure. And it’s not Justin either.’
‘Don’t,’ she said. Her husband was the one subject that was barred from their pillow talk.
‘Can your relationship be so great if you can’t even be open with him about your past? There’s a reason we fit together so well,’ he whispered, sliding a hand beneath the covers.
Claudia had only told Declan about her mum because he had been droning on about how difficult his childhood had been. She had wanted to trump his absent father with an absent mother, and it had been liberating to talk about it. Declan had understood why she had felt the need to reimagine her past. He shared the sense of rejection and the shame too. He knew what it was like to feel not good enough.
Justin had no similar point of reference. His childhood had been blissfully uneventful and he would have been appalled by her tale of desertion and neglect. A dead mother and a father debilitated by grief had been far more palatable, for both of them.
Declan on the other hand, had embraced the imperfections in his life. He wasn’t afraid to mess up and had messed up spectacularly on occasion, but he carried on regardless. Claudia didn’t doubt that he would celebrate her mistakes too and, as his hand explored the subtle rise of her belly, she knew he had worked out that her latest was one they had made together.
‘Oh, my sweet Claudia,’ he said. ‘I promise you here and now, I’ll never leave you.’
Her life had felt uncomfortably crowded back then, so how had she ended up so alone? Where was Declan when she needed him? She consoled herself with the knowledge that their secret had died with him, although when Karin had first confronted her, there had been a moment when she thought she had been found out. She had worried for nothing. Declan’s loyalties had been with Claudia right to the end. It was unfortunate that not all her mistakes were dead and buried.
Stretching a hand across the damask, she picked up Amelia’s drawing. From Leanne’s swagger when she had handed it over, Claudia had expected it to reveal more than she would like, but it was a poorly executed sketch, with no detail.
Lifting the sheet of paper to examine the figure holding the child, Claudia allowed herself a brief twinge of guilt for taking credit where it wasn’t due. She had seen Amelia’s limp body and was surprised the paramedics gave her any chance at all. If it had been Claudia who had stumbled upon the girl, she would have left her where she found her. But it wasn’t Claudia making those decisions. It was the woman with the silver pendant and that damned key ring torch.
They should rename Leanne Pitman, Leanne Pitbull. Claudia hadn’t realised the reporter’s friend had died in the fire until Phillipa mentioned it. It made sense now why she had become so obsessed, but she had to give up eventually. Didn’t she?
Claudia felt tears prick her eyes as she stared at the drawing. Against the light from the window, she could see each pen stroke. She brought the paper closer. Not all the hearts surrounding her name were completely pink. One heart had lines inside that were the same shade of purple as the pen used to write Claudia’s name. Amelia had made a mistake and tried to cover it up. Claudia could make out three dark lines that formed a letter.
Glancing again at the pendant drawn in grey, Claudia made the link she hoped no one else would, not even Amelia. There was a reason the child had been misspelling Claudia with a K. It was the block initial hanging from the silver chain around the neck of her rescuer. Karin Gallagher still wore it. That might be a problem.