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“What’s going on here, then?” he asks, the trace of a smile on his lips. “I have to say that finding you two ladies gossiping in the garden when I got home was not what I expected.”
His tone is light, but he’s not fooling me. He’s not fooling me anymore. I open my mouth to speak, but I find that I don’t have the words. I have nowhere to start.
“Rachel? Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” He relinquishes A
“What on earth’s wrong with you? Are you drunk?” he asks, but I can see in his eyes that he knows I’m sober and I’m betting that for once he wishes I wasn’t. I slip my hand into the back pocket of my jeans—my phone is there, hard and compact and comforting, only I wish I’d had the sense to make the call already. No matter whether they believed me or not, if I’d told them I was with A
Tom is now just a couple of feet away from me—he’s just inside the door and I’m just outside it.
“I saw you,” I say at last, and I feel euphoria, fleeting but unmistakable, when I say the words out loud. “You think I don’t remember anything, but I do. I saw you. After you hit me, you left me there, in the underpass . . .”
He starts to laugh, but I can see it now and I wonder how I never read him this easily before. There’s panic in his eyes. He shoots a glance at A
“What are you talking about?”
“In the underpass. On the day Megan Hipwell went missing . . .”
“Oh, bullshit,” he says, waving a hand at me. “I did not hit you. You fell.” He reaches for A
“You got into the car with her. I watched you go.” He’s still smiling, but there’s no longer any conviction there, and I don’t know whether I’m imagining it, but he looks a little paler to me now. He relaxes his grip on A
Tom passes his hand over his mouth and leans back against the kitchen counter, folding his arms across his chest. “You saw me get into the car with who?”
“With Megan.”
“Oh, right!” He starts laughing again, a loud, forced roar. “Last time we talked about this, you told me you saw me get into the car with A
A
Tom drops to his knees at her side. “Of course she isn’t sure. She’s making this up—she does it all the time. Sweetheart, please. Why don’t you go upstairs for a bit, OK? I’ll talk this through with Rachel. And this time”—he glances up at me—“I promise I’ll make sure she won’t bother us anymore.”
A
For a second, no one says a thing. A
“A
“I found the phone, Tom,” she says, her voice so small, she’s almost inaudible. “So please, don’t. Don’t lie. Just don’t lie to me.”
The child starts to grizzle and moan. Very gently, Tom takes her from A
“Where is it?” Tom says, turning to face us, the laughter gone from his face. “The phone, A
“I don’t know anything about a phone,” I tell him, wishing that A
Tom ignores me. “A
A
“Where is it?”
“I threw it away,” she says. “Over the fence. By the track.”
“Good girl. Good girl,” he says distractedly. He’s trying to figure things out, work out where to go from here. He glances at me and then looks away. For just a moment, he looks beaten.
He turns to A
“At first, it was over at her place,” he says. “But she was so paranoid about Scott finding out. So we started meeting at the Swan. It was . . . Well, you remember what it was like, don’t you, A
He shifts his daughter from one arm to the other, allowing her to rest against his shoulder. “You think I’m being cruel, but I’m not. I’m telling the truth. That’s what you want, isn’t it, A
A
Tom gives a loud sigh. “It’s a relief, if I’m honest.” He’s talking to me, looking at me directly. “You have no idea how exhausting it is, coping with people like you. And, fuck, I tried. I tried so hard to help you. To help both of you. You’re both . . . I mean, I loved you both, I really did, but you can both be incredibly weak.”
“Fuck you, Tom,” A
I look at her and realize how well suited they are, A
Tom goes to her side and says soothingly, “I’m sorry, darling. That was unfair of me.” She brushes him away and he looks over at me. “I did my best, you know. I was a good husband to you, Rach. I put up with a lot—your drinking and your depression. I put up with all that for a long time before I threw in the towel.”
“You lied to me,” I say. “You told me everything was my fault. You made me believe that I was worthless. You watched me suffer, you—”
He shrugs. “Do you have any idea how boring you became, Rachel? How ugly? Too sad to get out of bed in the morning, too tired to take a shower or wash your fucking hair? Jesus. It’s no wonder I lost patience, is it? It’s no wonder I had to look for ways to amuse myself. You’ve no one to blame but yourself.”
His expression changes from contempt to concern as he turns to talk to his wife. “A
“You . . .” A
Tom puts his hand on her shoulder and squeezes it. “What, love?”
“You had her looking after Evie,” she spits. “Were you screwing her while she was working here? While she was looking after our child?”