A Summer Fling (32 page)

‘I think you’re doing the right thing,’ encouraged Niki.

Curtains were twitching across the road. Paul wished the police would hurry up. His mother would be mortified if she came out to find this spectacle at her front door. But she wasn’t coming out and he was scared stiff at what he would find when he got inside the house. These were his parents after all and, even though he knew what his dad thought about him, he would have fought tooth and nail to save him from getting hurt by anyone. He had visions of a man with a gun at his mum’s head telling his dad to get rid of the people at the door. Was the ‘Mum doesn’t work any more’ line a clue to tell him that they weren’t all right really? All sorts of awful, insane explanations were flashing through his mind. He tried talking through the letterbox again.

‘Dad, let me in. Is Mum OK?’

There was no answer.

Paul tried to climb over the solid wooden gate, but it was too high even when he dragged over the compost bin to stand on as Niki held it firmly in place for him, and it was too heavily locked from the inside to crash open with his shoulder. He could just see over into the back garden but there were no clues there as to what was going on inside the house; nothing disturbed, no broken glass. The three of them stood around listening, not sure of what to do in the ten minutes until a police car rounded the corner.

A corpulent police sergeant and a younger male constable emerged from their car. Paul filled them in on the few details he had to hand. The sergeant checked for himself that the front door was locked and the gate could not be accessed. He called through the letterbox and rang the bell but there was no response. He made the decision on what to do then quickly.

‘Best get the number one key ready,’ he said, in the manner of a man who had been here many times before. The constable immediately went to the car boot where the large door ram was kept. He put on the protective helmet, goggles and gloves stored alongside it as the sergeant rapped hard on the door and called through the letterbox again.

‘Mr Beamish. It’s the police. Can you please open this door now, sir?’

There was no response. The sergeant pulled out a steel ASP baton and flicked it down so it extended in readiness. Then he nodded to the constable and stepped aside. The constable crashed the ram next to the keyhole and the whole building seemed to vibrate with the intense noise it made. The door swung instantly open into a house so quiet it could have been deserted. The sergeant quickly checked the lounge for activity, then stepped cautiously forward to the kitchen door at the end of the hallway. He pushed it open, called out both Gordon and Grace’s names again and then, holding the ASP firmly in a position that was ready both for defence or attack, he moved forward, the young constable at his heels, Paul and Niki close behind, despite being urged to stay back.

But the sight that greeted them was the most surreal part of it all. Gordon was sitting at the table drinking a mug of tea and reading a magazine, and underneath that same table was a barely conscious Grace, her arms tied in front of her to one of the thick wooden legs. Niki doubled-back down the passage and out of the house. He knew there was a surgery up the road. Grace needed a doctor, if not an ambulance, and quickly, that much was obvious.

Gordon looked up at the people who had suddenly poured into his kitchen. His eyes scanned them and stopped at the young constable. He pulled himself up onto his slippered feet.

‘What do you want?’

‘Come on, sir,’ said the sergeant as he saw Gordon’s fist begin to shape. Whatever he’d expected to find, it wasn’t this, thought the policeman. He quickly assessed the situation and grabbed the arm of the man he had thought he had come in to rescue and twisted him around whilst reciting his rights. Only when the cuffs slid on his wrists did Gordon start struggling, as if he had come back to the real world and realized what was happening to him, but he was no match for the big sergeant who pulled him easily out of the room as he muttered, ‘What’s going on? What do you think you’re doing? Get off me! Grace! Grace!’

Paul and Christie sank to their knees around Grace and while they untied her, the constable spoke down his radio asking for another unit to come and take Gordon down to the station. Grace cried out at the sweet pain of being able to move her arms. Then Niki barged in with a doctor from the nearby surgery, who introduced himself to the constable as Dr Mackay and said that he knew Mrs Beamish because she was one of his patients. Paul and Christie moved away to give him space to tend to Grace. She was in a terrible state. Limp, bruised, her clothes in damp and suspicious disarray and her muscles crippled from being in one position for so long. Niki left the room, instinctively aware that Grace wouldn’t want to be seen like that by anyone she barely knew, least of all a male.

‘You need an ambulance,’ said Dr Mackay, pulling out his mobile phone.

‘I don’t need an ambulance,’ croaked Grace. ‘I just want some water.’

Paul and Christie helped Grace gently to her feet and she immediately fell backwards onto a chair.

‘You’re going to hospital now,’ said the doctor in a soft but no-nonsense Irish brogue, putting his phone back into his pocket. He rubbed at her cold, stiff, aching hands. Grace doubted the blood would ever flow back properly into them.

‘Dear God, woman, how long have you been like this?’

‘What day is it?’ Grace asked. Her whole body throbbed. She could barely think.

‘It’s Tuesday morning, love,’ said Christie, lifting a glass of water to her lips.

‘Since yesterday then,’ said Grace breathlessly, gulping greedily at the drink. She had lost a whole night. ‘Yesterday afternoon.’ As soon as the water hit her stomach, she retched and Christie grabbed a towel and held it to her mouth.

‘Mum, I’ll get you some things for hospital,’ said Paul softly. He was wiping his eyes. The panic that anything could have happened to his father had turned in on itself and become something he couldn’t even define.
His own father
. He couldn’t absorb any of it. He just wanted to concentrate on his mum for now. He didn’t want to think about his father.

‘No, Paul, I don’t want to—’

‘You’re going, Mum. That’s an end to it.’

‘I’ll come and help you,’ said Christie.

Grace pulled her clothes tighter around her, aware they were torn in places.

Paul shook his head. It was as if he had been lifted out of this world and put in another where nothing made sense.

‘The ambulance is here,’ called Niki from the hallway. He couldn’t equate the smiling, elegant lady holding the hand of her jolly little grandson with the poor, pitiable, half-dressed creature he had just seen. He wanted to smash his fist into the perfectly plastered white wall behind him. How could a man do that to such a lovely woman? His own wife?

The ambulanceman and the doctor started to lead Grace gently outside but her legs were so stiff that she had to surrender to the wheelchair they had brought out for her.

Paul was answering the young constable’s questions but wanted to break off to go with his mother.

‘Stay, Paul, help the police,’ said Grace.

‘You can’t go by yourself, Mum.’

‘Christie, will you come?’ It was pure instinct. She wanted a woman with her. A friend. She wanted Christie Somers.

‘Do you want me to come, love?’ Christie came rushing forward.

‘Please,’ said Grace.

‘I’ll follow on in my car,’ said Christie. ‘Niki, will you let the girls at the office know I shan’t be back today?’

‘Of course I will,’ said Niki.

‘I’ll be there as soon as I can, tell Mum that,’ Paul called to Christie. The police would be at the house for a while and he would need to sort out the front door which was shattered. At least he could do these practical things for her, so she had one task less to worry about. He had to keep his mind busy before it exploded.

The second unit had arrived to take Gordon to the police station. A van with a caged facility in the back which horrified him when he was put in it. ‘I’m not an animal,’ he said with disgust.

But first, the ambulance drove slowly away, followed by Christie in her car. Even Niki was shivering as he made the call to the girls in the office.

In the hospital, Grace allowed her bruised face to be photographed, despite repeating that she didn’t want to press charges. But apparently that might not be her decision, said the policeman who came to take a statement. He very kindly and expertly explained that the incident had not been a simple domestic. Dictated and read back to her, her statement sounded like some poor soul’s story out of a downmarket magazine, not her own. She was ashamed that friends and neighbours and strangers had seen her in that state. Despite everything, Grace hadn’t volunteered the information that she had been drugged as well. She didn’t want to sully Gordon’s name with his children any more than he had done himself, but then a nurse took blood tests and Grace realized that the full extent of her husband’s control would probably come to light anyway.

When Laura arrived, she burst into tears at the sight of her mother’s injuries. Like Paul, her emotions were ricocheting between anger and relief, confusion and hatred.

‘You can’t go back to that house. You must come and stay with Joe and me.’

‘I shan’t go back, no, don’t worry,’ said Grace. ‘But I’m not coming to move in with you. I’m going to stay with Christie for a while.’

Her son and daughter protested gently but, much as Grace loved them, she wanted the generous, uncomplicated company of Christie Somers. She didn’t know why she would turn to a woman she barely knew really, but she was in no state to question her own logic. She just went with the flow of what her mind was saying she needed at this time. She didn’t want to be a constant reminder to her children of what their father had done. They were hurting enough as it was. Paul was feeling terribly guilty that he hadn’t done more to keep his mother safe from his father’s meltdown. Grace could see that he was torturing himself about it.

‘How could you have predicted this, son?’ She had cuddled him tightly into her neck as if he were still a little boy, and she knew that every time her children looked at her as she healed, they would suffer a fresh wave of pain. So, when Christie asked her in the hospital if she would like to stay with her and Niki, she had accepted with gratitude.

‘Don’t tell Sarah yet,’ said Grace to her children.

‘She’ll have to know!’ said Paul.

‘No, don’t, Paul. She’s got enough on her plate with her pregnancy. Protect her as much as you can.’

‘You just think about yourself, Mum,’ said Laura. She loved this woman so much it half-killed her to see her lying on a hospital trolley with wounds her own father had caused. She had cried a lot after he had thrown her out of his house, but had still been prepared to forgive him, because he
was
her father after all. Now, after this, she never wanted to see him again.

‘Are you all right?’ said Christie, turning to Grace in the car as she pulled up at the top of her drive, then she immediately reprimanded herself. ‘No, of course you’re not all right. What a bloody stupid question.’

‘You’re very kind,’ said Grace, managing a smile. ‘I didn’t want to sleep in hospital, Christie.’ Her face ached when she talked, her shoulders ached, all of her body ached. She wanted to sink into a bath up to her nose and wash away the memory of Gordon clumsily trying to dry her. She felt totally violated. She doubted there was enough soap in the world to rid herself of the feel of Gordon’s hands on her.

Christie helped Grace out of the car, linked her arm and led her carefully into the beautiful old house. It had been advertised as a ‘gentleman’s residence’ when Christie’s father bought it many years ago, and there would never be a more apt description of it. Standing in its own generous grounds and affording the most fabulous views over the surrounding countryside, West House had a soothing, relaxed air about it. As soon as Grace stepped into it, she could feel the protection of its big safe walls.

Christie pushed Grace down gently into a large, soft chair by a set of French windows.

‘Now you just sit there and I’ll get us a cuppa.’

Grace let the quiet rush over her. Three days ago, her world was a very different place. Now here she was in a strange house and her husband was in a prison cell. The thought of Gordon’s breakdown brought with it no feelings of sympathy. He wasn’t an ill man not in control of himself. It was his selfishness that had smashed her family apart. He had seen them all as extensions of himself with no right to their own will. She should have left him long ago, when the children had moved out, then they would have been spared this hurt and confusion. She should have left when they thought he was merely a nasty old goat, then they would never have had to see this . . . this monster he had become.

Christie arrived with an old-fashioned tray of tea with a nice teapot and china cups and a plate of chocolate biscuits. A tea that was made to comfort.

‘We have a choice of four spare rooms, but I think the Rose Room would be the prettiest. It’s en-suite so you’ll be private and at the back of the house so it’ll be lovely and quiet. I expect you want a big bubble bath. There’s a heap of my softest towels waiting on the bed for you.’

It was then that an animal-like noise of distress came from Grace’s throat and as Christie moved forward to comfort her, Grace clutched at her and cried and cried and cried.

Understandably, Grace was not at work the next morning. Dawn, Anna and Raychel rushed forward as one when Christie came through the door to ask about her. Intuition, again, had told her that she should disclose to these women what had happened to Grace. Her secret would be safe with them. They were her friends now and, being in the know, would be armed to fend off any gossip or questions being circulated.

‘She’s fragile,’ said Christie. ‘I don’t think she slept very well last night, but at least she was sleeping peacefully when I left this morning.’

‘I can’t believe it,’ said Dawn. ‘It’s like something in a film. What a psycho!’