Canada Square (Love in London #3) (13 page)

I've done stupid things before, but today I've reached new heights. There doesn’t seem to be a way to make things right.

13

“Did Digger say anything to you?” Alex is agitated, stalking up and down the living room like a caged animal, barking out questions. “Did he touch you?”

I shake my head. “He didn't get a chance. I told you, Alex. I ran before he could get close.”

Lara is watching both of us, Max sitting on her lap. Her mouth is twisted into a worried frown.

“He's gone too fucking far, I'm going to kill him.” Alex stops, hands fisted by his hips. “I can't believe Mum let it come to this.”

“It's not her fault,” I protest. “She didn't know he was going to turn up at work. None of us did.”

“She should have fucking told you,” Alex shouts, his face red. “She's letting you walk into danger without warning you.”

“What do you mean?” I ask. He's talking in circles. “What should she have told me?”

He stops in front of me, reaching out for my shoulders. His expression softens when he sees the anxiety written on my face. “Amy, babe, there's nothing for you to worry about. I'll sort this.”

He'll sort it? Sort what? “Are you going to pay him?”

“Money doesn't talk to psychos like him. There's only one thing he understands.”

“Alex, stop it.” Lara's voice is light, but there's steel in it.

“You can't reason with an arsehole like him. He only understands violence, Lara. I can talk to him until I go blue in the face, and he'll still be stalking her.”

“So what are you going to do?” Fear uncoils in my belly. “Hit him?”

Alex doesn't answer, grabbing his coat and slinging it on. “I'm going out.”

“Out where?” I grab his arm, but he shakes me off easily. “Alex, where are you going?”

“To see Digger,” he mutters, heading for the door. “He won't bother you again.”

* * *

Lara wakes me with a shake of my shoulder, and when I sit up and unfurl my legs she hands me a cup of steaming sweet tea. Blinking the sleep from my eyes, I take a mouthful, the hot liquid warming me from the inside out.

“Is Alex back?” I feel disoriented; I don't remember going to sleep. It's as if I fell pretty much where Alex left me, the mixture of adrenaline and shock forming a lethal cocktail in my bloodstream.

“He went to your mum's,” she tells me. “I think Andie went over there, too.”

I bring my gaze up to meet hers. “Is he okay?”

Lara nods. “He didn't find Digger. Apparently he wasn't in any of his old haunts.” She takes a sip of tea. “Alex wants you to stay here, I'll make up the sofa.”

“I haven’t got my things here.” My voice is still heavy with sleep. A weariness takes over my body. “I need to go home.”

“Amy, it isn't safe. Alex wants to look after you. Just stay for tonight and tomorrow we'll make a plan.”

“What kind of plan?” I ask. “Who is he anyway? Nobody would be going this crazy about a loan shark.”

Lara looks down at her mug. Her voice is soft. “No they wouldn't.”

“Then who is he? Why's he following me?”

Max cries softly from their bedroom. We stop talking, but he manages to calm himself, his sobs thinning out to silence.

“He's not a nice man, that's all I really know. You'll have to ask Alex about the rest.”

“But nobody will tell me,” I say, frustrated. “I'm so sick of people treating me like I'm some kind of special snowflake. First Alex then Callum...”

“What's Callum done?” Lara leans forward, clasping her hands together. I remember our previous conversation, the one where I confessed that I liked him. That seems like such a weak word for how I feel.

“He kissed me.” If I close my eyes I can still feel the pressure of his lips against mine. The way his tongue pushed inside, claiming me when I was already his.
God
.

“He did?” She looks surprised. “How, why? What happened?”

She listens while I run through the events of the day. Silent and unjudging. I start to cry and she gently takes my half-empty teacup and places it on the table.

“You've fallen for him,” she whispers.

I don't bother to correct her, because she's right. I've fallen for him, hook, line and sinker. The problem is, I think I've shattered on impact.

* * *

Alex arrives home a few minutes after eleven. Though his hair is dishevelled, a brief scan of his face reveals no bruises or cuts, no signs of an altercation.

“Baby.” My mum follows him in, and she seeks me out immediately. She runs across their small living room, scooping me up into a hug. “I'm so, so sorry.” Her voice breaks on her apology, and when I look at her I'm shocked to see a tear rolling down her cheek.

“Why are you sorry? It's not your fault some psycho's stalking me.” I'm almost flippant when I say it, though the fear remains.

“We should sit down,” she suggests. I notice Alex and Lara have made themselves scarce, closing their bedroom door softly behind them. It makes me feel nervous.

“What's going on?” I twist to look at her, but Mum refuses to meet my gaze. Though she's still holding my hand, it's as if she's building a barrier around herself.

“First of all, I want you to know I only ever wanted to protect you. If I'd have thought for one minute he'd show his face again, I never would have told you what I did.”

“Told me what?” My voice is clipped, mainly because I'm so sick of being kept in the dark.

“Told you about Digger.” She still isn't looking at me. “Told you...”

“For goodness sake, Mum, just spit it out.”

“Told you about your dad. There, are you happy now?”

“What about my dad?”

I think I know where this is going. All these secrets and lies, they've been festering for years and I've been wilfully ignoring them. In spite of all evidence to the contrary, I'm not an idiot. My lungs contract as I wait for her to answer.

“Your dad didn't die in Iraq. He isn't dead at all. But as far as I was concerned he was dead to us, and I never expected to see him again.”

“That guy... Digger. He's my dad?” I lean back from her, snatching my hand from hers. Nausea mixes with anger as I realise I'm the last person to know.

That my dad isn't dead.

“I didn't want you to find out like this,” she whispers. “I begged him to stay away. But he keeps insisting on seeing you, he reckons he's better, but I don't know.”

It's like reading a novel when half the pages are torn out. I'm getting the gist of the plot but the motivation remains a mystery. “Why did you tell me he's dead?” I bite my lip, remembering all those times I wished I had a dad. Seeing other kids at the park with their fathers, lingering in the card shop every June, staring at greetings I could never purchase.

All this time he's been alive? There's a man out there carrying half my DNA and I never even knew it.

“I ran away from him,” I whisper. “I ran away because you told me he's a bad man. I turned my back on my dad.”

Mum sits back, rubbing her face with the palms of her hands. Her week-old manicure is starting to chip, bright red lacquer peeling away to reveal yellowing nails. “He is a bad man. That's why I told you...” Her voice cracks. “You should stay away from him, Amy. We all should.”

The door to Alex and Lara's bedroom cracks open and Alex looks out, catching my eye. “You all right?” he silently mouths. I shake my head.

Is it all right to lie to your daughter for more than twenty years?

Is it okay to pretend her father's dead?

Alex leans on the doorjamb, face soft with concern. He always hates it when Mum and I row.

“Why is he bad?” I swing my eyes back to Mum. She still won't look back at me. She pulls her pink fluffy cardigan tightly across her chest, as if there's a chill in the room.

“Start from the beginning,” Alex suggests, pushing himself off the doorway and walking into the living room. He collapses into the armchair opposite, crossing his ankles as he rests his feet on the coffee table. There's a twitch in the corner of his cheek, as if he's clenching his jaw too hard, and I know he's desperate to make this all go away. He was like this when I was a frightened kid, standing up for me when challenged. Though part of me still longs to be hiding behind my brother while Doctor Who is on the T.V., I know I can't let him do this any more. It's time to stand on my own two feet.

Finally, Mum looks up. “I met your dad in a pub I was working in. It was just after Operation Desert Storm. He was heading to Iraq, and I was lonely and sad.” Her eyes flicker over to Alex. “We hit it off right away.”

In my mind I'm picturing my mum twenty three years ago, flirting across the bar with a short-haired soldier. The image is so vivid I can hear her tinkling laugh as he knocks back a pint.

“What happened next?”

“I thought it was a fling. We only spent a few weeks together before he shipped out. But somehow he found my address and started writing to me, and I wrote back.” She pulls at the sleeves of her cardigan. “I found out I was pregnant with you that Christmas. You were a little surprise for all of us. One minute I was pouring brandy over the pudding, the next I had my head down the toilet.”

“Uncle Les reckoned you'd drunk too much Babycham,” Alex remarks. “He let us watch James Bond while Mum crawled into bed.”

“Did you tell him about me?” I ask.

“I sent him a letter. I wasn't sure how he'd react but he was delighted. He wrote back with a whole list of plans. He wanted us to get married and adopt Alex and Andie. It all sounded too good to be true.”

Alex laughs, short and harsh. “You can say that again.”

Mum shoots him a nasty look. “He sent me some money and told me to spend it on baby things. It was enough to kit out a little nursery for you.”

Her words are making me emotional, and there's a lump in my throat the size of a rock. I imagine her with a baby bump, buying a cot and pram, her face glowing from hormones. It could all have been so different, I could have had a mum and a dad who loved me. We could have been a normal family, so what the hell went wrong?

She's staring into the distance, locked inside her memories. Her voice takes on a wistful edge. “You were born six months later. Uncle Les managed to let Digger know, and he was allowed home to see you. I've never seen somebody so in love. You took to him right away, and as soon as he picked you up you'd stop crying, your face quiet and serious. I was a bit jealous, I think, but when he got down on one knee and proposed, I was so excited.”

“He flew back to Iraq, but by that time it was clear that things were calming down. A few weeks before he was due to come back he was travelling in a convoy, heading towards Kuwait. They drove over a land mine.”

I can't breathe, I can barely think.

“They managed to pull him from the wreckage, said it was a miracle he survived. Nearly everybody else was killed, including his best friend.”

“He was injured?” I ask. I barely recognise my own voice.

“They rushed him to an army hospital. His ribs were broken as well as both his legs, and there was a piece of shrapnel embedded in the side of his face. He had five operations before they were able to stabilise him, and it wasn't until two months after that he was well enough to be flown home.”

“I remember you going to see him,” Alex says. “You took Amy with you.”

“He was in a bad way. It wasn't just the physical injuries, though they were bad enough. He was closed off emotionally. He barely looked at you, and didn't talk for the three hours we were there. That was the first time he really scared me.”

“Why?”

She winces. “Because when you started crying he shouted at you to shut up.”

The way she says it sends a shiver down my spine. “What happened next?”

“Eventually he was discharged, and with his legs it was clear his career in the army was over. He had no job, no home, and no family to speak of. So...”

“He moved in with us.”

She nods. “But he was different, you know. Intolerant. He'd shout at Alex for kicking a ball too loudly against the garden wall, and tell Andie she was stupid when she asked for help with her homework. I suppose now they’d diagnose him with PTSD, but he refused to get any help. And I thought...” She falters. “I thought I could heal him.”

It's the story of her life. She thinks a man will change just for her. Sometimes they do, but the transformation is only ever superficial. She's perpetually disappointed in love.

“It got to the point where Alex and Andie were scared to come home from school. I lost my job because I didn't like leaving you all alone with him, and that made things worse because we had no money at all. Then one night I went to Andie's parents evening. It was only for half an hour, and I put you to bed before I left, so I didn't think there'd be any trouble. But you'd started teething, and you got all grizzly, enough to wind him up.”

It feels like my skin is burning all over. I don't want to hear the next part of her story, yet I'm helpless to stop it.

“I could hear you screaming from halfway up the road. Andie and I started to run, and we met Alex on our way to the house. He was crying and his cheek was puffy and red as if he'd been slapped, but he wouldn't tell me what happened. Just begged me to come and save you.”