Ellie's Return (15 page)

Twenty-Six

Tom had got back the night before to find
Lola waiting for him at the kitchen table. She greeted him with the news that
he had been removed as a director of his own company. Lola had steeled herself
for the confrontation and was amazed at how calm he had been at the news. She
had decided to take action because she was sure that he and Ellie had been
together, and if they had swapped notes rather than just bodily fluids they
would know by now what she had done to them. When Ellie did not show up at
Lola’s event she suspected that she had gone somewhere with Tom, and then at
lunchtime that day she had got a call from her credit card company about some
unusual activity on a company card. It turned out that not only had Tom been
stupid enough to use her company card, entrusted to him for urgent jobs she
needed him to do, but he had used it to pay for a hotel that she recognised the
name of from when Ellie used to chirp on tediously about their favourite weekend
getaway. That was all Lola had needed to know to step up her own plan, and she
was ready to tell Tom that she would now be appointing someone else to manage
the business. He still owned a large proportion of it but if he had any sense
he would sign the agreement that she had offered him several times already. The
offer she was making to him was barely worth sneering at, since it was an offer
for about a quarter of the value of the property. This was exactly the kind of
eventuality that Tom had wanted to avoid, because the more control Lola had and
the more bloody-minded she was, the more the price would go down. He had been
angry at the very suggestion of such a ridiculous offer when she first made it,
and his emotion had changed a little every time through actually being able to
laugh about it, to how ridiculous it was, to resentment and he figured he must
have crossed the entire scale of emotions about this woman and her
manipulation, but today he had considered the offer and decided that if she
made it again on the same terms, he would accept it if he could sign and be
done with it right away.

Lola always had the papers to hand. She
had early on got an idea of the value of the properties and decided that even
at full price the portfolio was worth paying for. Tom was highly regarded
amongst all the people she knew so she rarely let on what she really thought of
him but even she had to agree that he had known his stuff when he amassed this
collection. He knew the strengths and weaknesses of it too, sometimes accumulating
properties that needed work or maintenance to offset the tax on the bigger and
more successful properties. She had tried to learn a lot early on, but when
things had broken down between them she had effectively ordered him to find out
what she needed to know about the properties but had known that he was the best
man for the job, so although she liked to appear to question everything he did,
she did not know better and tended not to contradict him on business matters.
She tended to sign what he asked when she asked, and to complain about it so
that he did not think she was a pushover, but she preferred him to manage
things and let her be in charge.
  
She thought that Tom must have been
smarter than he looked because he seemed to have seen the writing on the wall,
and had simply acknowledged the news and gone into the living room, from where
she would not expect him to emerge before the next morning. She knew that this
was a victory for her and a sad moment for him.
 
She had agreed to pay him a seven figure
sum so he was sitting pretty but it was less than a quarter of what he should
have got and he had surely only accepted it because Ellie had come back and
softened him up, so from that point of view her timing could hardly have been
better. All she would need to do was attach the correct appendix for the portfolio
of assets, which she could get sent over from Tom’s office tomorrow, and her
solicitor could take care of the rest.

 
By the next morning, Lola was
congratulating herself on having had such a good weekend. She felt that her
Friday evening had been a success because she had not only positioned herself
very much as she had intended in the business community, but she had several
appointments to make this week for consultations on homes and offices for
makeovers that she would be managing, and she had boasted about the quality of
the property portfolio she was acquiring and how she would be developing show
homes for her skills from amongst those properties. People seemed delighted to
trust her on the basis of her good taste alone, which they had seen in her
shops and catalogues and her website, as well as in each other’s homes. She was
in no doubt that her direction of travel was on an upward trajectory, and when
she heard Tom shuffling about in the living room she had a sinking feeling that
she sometimes got from the thought of sharing her house with a dead weight. She
consoled herself that at least he did not cost her anything since he was still
fairly well off, and even though that would not last very much longer at least
she would be able to get what she needed from him before another three years
was up.
 
She would be well rid of
him as part of that process, so he would more than have paid for himself by the
end of it.

Tom emerged then, looking slightly more
upbeat than usual. He did not greet her but he looked at her in a way that suggested
he was barely conscious of her as he breezed upstairs and she heard him going
through some cupboards. She needed to know about some papers he had asked her
to sign last week; she had already asked for explanations as many times as she
had told him not to foist things on her when she did not have time to read or
listen to understand what they were. She had left then and he had heard her
slam the door behind her. Tom always wondered why she was so unhappy in the
mornings. He was usually in a good mood until he thought of her or saw her.
 
Before she had been such a big part of
his life he was always quite chipper in the mornings, so it was always a
surprise when someone else was not, especially when they had so much going for
them. Tom had reasoned that perhaps she was not a very happy person at all, and
that was why she had perfected the look of happiness for other people. That
always lets you down though, there are people who will see you when you don’t
know when you are being watched and that’s when you give away the most about
yourself. Tom had seen Lola in that state so often that he saw the misery, the
frustration and the vindictiveness writ large in her every move. She never had
the charming breeziness that was Ellie’s default expression, and which he had
missed so much even when he thought he was angry with her.
 

He carried on emptying out the cupboards,
some clothes into suitcases, some into bin liners, then throwing each back into
the cupboards and closing the doors. He heard the front door again and froze;
he did not want her to know what he was doing. She called up the stairs to him
that her car would not start. He ignored her at first, as was customary, and
then when she called again he emerged before she could start up the stairs. She
told him that her car would not start, and she needed a lift into town. He
asked why she could not get a taxi and she replied impatiently that there was
somebody waiting there to see her about the arcade property and Charlotte had
not made the appointment for her in her diary and now she was being called in
urgently so he was already running late. If he didn’t mind pulling his finger
out just for once, that would be great. Tom said he would be down shortly, and
he finished dressing and grabbed his house keys and his car keys and put them
each in to the outside pockets of his overcoat.

As they made the journey into town, Tom
suggested that if her car was going to be out of action for any length of time
perhaps she could get a car rental. Did she have her driving licence with her?
Lola said it really did not matter right now; he could leave his car with her
and get a taxi back. Tom said he couldn’t do that, not today, but he would go
back and try to start her car if she would give him the key. Did she have her
licence? Lola was huffing impatiently and Tom snapped at her that rather than
complaining about the question, she could have answered it by now. She looked
in her purse and said no, she did not, and he asked if she had anything with her
address on it. She said impatiently again that she did not so when he asked
again she made a big display of taking things out of her bag and shoving them
in front of his face while he was driving and shouting that she did not have
anything with her name and address on. Tom said he would take her car keys and check
out the car and call someone out if need be.

As she was getting out he said that he had
left in such a hurry to drop Lola off that he had left his own house keys
inside. She said he could not have hers as they were with the shop keys. He was
becoming as impatient as her now, telling her that she would need to separate
them as he could not do anything to fix her car if he could not get back into
the house, as he did not have his mobile phone, or any money, so it would save
them both a lot of time if she would invest thirty seconds into giving him the
two keys.

Lola was spitting feathers now, and shouting
about how useless and incompetent he was as she took off the two house keys and
threw them down on the seat next to him, slammed the door and stormed off into
the arcade. He pulled away, and then turned the corner and pulled up again. He
took his mobile phone out of his inside pocket and made a call. He waited
patiently for the answer and then said,

“Hello, I’ve been an awful fool and lost
my keys. I’m going to need to get my locks changed. Yes, I have identification
on me, let me give you the address.”

Twenty-Seven

Claudia had woken up early and watched
what she thought was Ellie’s huddled sleeping form for a while before she
eventually got up, and trying not to make any noise had eventually realised
that Ellie was not asleep on the sofa, she had just left the duvet on top
without folding it. Looking upstairs she realised that Ellie had gone out but
coming back down she saw that her suitcase was still by the front door so she
clearly she would be back soon, as she would have to be at the airport early and
was already cutting it fine. It was already past the time when she should have
left when at last there was an urgent rapping at the front door, and she went
to answer it. It was Tom.

They looked at each other, unsure at first
how things were between them. When Tom spoke, it was to say he apologized for
bothering her, but did Claudia know where Ellie was? Claudia was glad he was
not more confrontational, but she was also not best pleased with him for
telling Ellie what had happened between them. She nodded at the suitcase and
said she should be back soon, and stood back to open the door for him. Tom was
not sure whether she would know that he had revealed their liaison to Ellie,
but she cleared that up quickly by thanking him sarcastically for it. Tom said
he was sorry; he had been upset at her not knowing things that he wanted her to
know. Claudia told him that if they learned to communicate better none of this
would ever have happened. Tom was cringing inside. His weakness of three years
ago had been masked to him by his frustration ever since, and he winced at the
idea that things had ever got so out of hand. In his mind, the weekend had been
a wake up call and he had already moved on, and this alone had made him realise
how long he had been making good his plans because when it came to the crunch
he was ready to go. He had moved on now, and he wanted Ellie to realise it, but
he needed to see her before she left because as long as she was still here he
could convince her that he was right to have asked her to wait just a little
longer, and if she went he did not know where to find her.

She would have to come back here because
her suitcase was here, but also because Claudia had realised since he had
arrived that Ellie had her car. The flight was due to leave in three hours and
it was going to be a close thing already. Tom was thinking that at least he
could drive her to the airport and they could talk on the way and once she knew
what he had decided she would understand and she could stay or he could go with
her, and the last three years would be a closed chapter. Come to think of it,
she had said that the airport she was flying back out from was not the one she
had arrived at, not that he knew which one that was either. Claudia interrupted
his thoughts to say she would have to get a postal address from Ellie, as she
only had an email address and a phone number, so it would be useful if he could
remind her to get that. Tom had barely acknowledged this interruption from his
reverie when his mobile phone rang. He had been rejecting calls from Lola’s
mobile phone all morning, but this number he did not recognise so he answered
it.
 

‘ Hi, is that Tom? It’s Charlotte, from
the shop, Lola’s shop.”

Tom took a moment to compute, then spoke.

‘Is it about Lola’s car?”

“No, its not. I just wanted to tell you, I
mean I don’t work there anymore, but you know Ellie, don’t you?”

Tom confirmed that he did, and that she
would be back with him soon.

“Its just that she was here this morning
and she left her car keys. I didn’t think she would want to go back in to look
for them but I couldn’t get an answer when I called from the shop. I tried as
many times as I could to call her but there was no answer and I had to leave. I
had your number, can I drop her car keys off with you?”

Tom felt himself sinking. Ellie must have
gone straight to the airport. He jumped up to grab her suitcase and went
through the pockets to see if he could find her passport or tickets. He remembered
now that she always carried her passport with her, she wouldn’t leave it in a
suitcase. If she had an e-ticket the passport was all she would need to board
the plane and the rest of her things could be abandoned or sent on.