Falling for You (25 page)

OK, concentrate.

“What did he have to say?”

“Oh, he pretended to be shocked”—Kate sounded scornful—“but he was over the moon, you could tell. Interviewed me in the pub, then raced off to the hospital to see Dad. You can't blame him, I suppose. He's a journalist. All this business has brightened up his boring documentary no end.”

Estelle bit her lip. This was probably true. She couldn't blame Will if he was secretly delighted with the way things had turned out, for the sake of the documentary, if nothing else.

“Mum? Norris really misses you.”

“Does he?” Estelle managed a wobbly smile. How completely ridiculous. Norris wasn't even their dog.

“I miss you too,” said Kate.

“Oh, darling…” Overwhelmed, Estelle's hand flew to her throat.

Sounding embarrassed, Kate said, “Bet you never thought you'd hear me say that.”

Estelle put the phone down and had a little cry. Her life was changing so fast, she couldn't begin to get to grips with it. For now, like an alcoholic, all she could do was take things one day at a time. Like today. It was lunchtime, the weather was beautiful, and she was going to go out for a couple of hours.
No
more
cushions
had been Will's parting shot as he'd left for work. OK, but she could buy food for dinner tonight. Roast lamb, Estelle decided as she headed for the shower. Will had always loved her roast dinners. A gorgeous leg of lamb, lots of fresh vegetables, crunchy roast potatoes with garlic…

Then glorious sex, probably.

Followed by Belgian chocolate truffle ice cream
, Estelle thought happily.

Then more sex.

* * *

“Hi! Can I give you a hand with those?”

It was two o'clock. Juggling her house key, handbag, and four bulging shopping bags, Estelle started at the sound of the friendly voice behind her. She knew London was where you went if you wanted to get mugged in broad daylight, but this voice really didn't sound as if it belonged to a mugger. For a start, it was female and quite posh. Secondly, Estelle discovered as she turned around, its owner was less than five feet tall.

She was wearing smart clothes, Estelle couldn't help noticing. Surely someone in a neat white shirt and well-cut black pencil skirt wouldn't kick you to the ground and make off with your groceries.

“It's OK. I don't bite!” The girl, who was probably in her early thirties, said gaily, “Here, you do the door, and I'll make sure your bags don't topple over. That happened to me last week and I smashed a bottle of Pinot Grigio—I was so cross!”

Eventually Estelle managed to get the key fitted into the unfamiliar lock. As a red bus came trundling up the road, she nodded at it and said, “Is that the one you're waiting for?”

The girl beamed. “I wasn't waiting for a bus. Actually, I was waiting for you. You're Estelle, aren't you? Let me say hello properly.” Grabbing Estelle's temporarily free hand, she shook it with enthusiasm. “I'm Lucy Banks.”

Blankly, Estelle said, “And?”

“Well, the thing is, I'd love to have a chat with you. You see, I work for the
Daily
Mail
.”

“Oh. Right.” Feeling suddenly sorry for Juliet—this was the last thing she needed right now—Estelle said politely, “I'm sorry, but I don't really want to talk about what my husband did. I'd rather just keep out of it, if you don't mind.” As she said this, it belatedly occurred to her to wonder how this girl had known she'd be here.

“That's completely understandable,” said Lucy, nodding sympathetically. “But this isn't actually anything to do with your husband. Not directly, at least. You see, this is about what Will Gifford's been up to.”

“Up to?
Will?
” Estelle was by this time thoroughly confused.

Gently, Lucy said, “Why don't we sit down and have a chat?”

Unwilling to invite the journalist into Will's apartment, Estelle took her to a garden square a couple of streets away. There on a wooden bench beneath a sycamore tree, with a tiny tape recorder whirring away on the seat between them, she learned from Lucy that a woman had contacted the
Daily
Mail
's offices this morning after seeing the photograph of Will and Estelle in the local paper and reading the accompanying piece.

“Ever heard of Magnus Jonsson?” asked Lucy.

“The record producer.” Estelle nodded rapidly, her fevered imagination conjuring up any number of bizarre images—Will was Magnus Jonsson's son, or his lover…

“Did you ever see the documentary Will made about Magnus?”

“No.”

“Well, that's not surprising,” said Lucy, “considering it never aired.”

“Why not?” asked Estelle, because this was clearly what she was supposed to ask.

“Because it never got finished. Because Magnus and Will had a bit of a falling out.” Lucy paused. “Because Magnus found out that Will was sleeping with his wife.”

There was a high-pitched humming noise in Estelle's ears. She really hoped she wasn't the one making it. A short distance away, on the grass, two small children were battling over a bag of bread crusts, sending pigeons up into the trees.

“So you see, you're not the first,” Lucy said sympathetically. “Magnus was a workaholic, away a lot of the time. Moira was lonely; she felt neglected. Then Will came along and she found his attentions so flattering, it didn't take long for her to succumb. Will told her he loved her. From the sound of things, he has quite a way about him. I can imagine it would be hard to resist.”

Miserably, Estelle said, “What happened?”

“Magnus came home unexpectedly one day and caught them. Have you noticed a bump on Will's nose?”

Estelle nodded. How many times in the last couple of days had she kissed that bump?

“That's where Magnus broke it,” said Lucy. “He went berserk—well, who can blame him? He loved his wife.”

“Go on.” Estelle gazed down at her fingers, twisted together in her lap.

“Moira left Magnus and went to live with Will. They spent a couple of weeks together at his apartment, then a month in the Caribbean. Moira paid for that. She thought they'd be together forever—she was absolutely besotted with him—but soon after they arrived back in London, Will ended it. Moira was devastated. Magnus took her back, but the marriage didn't survive. They divorced a year later. When Moira read in the local paper that Will was up to his old tricks again, she felt she had to do something. She's a nice lady,” Lucy concluded earnestly. “She isn't motivated by spite. She doesn't want you to make the same mistake she did and give up on a perfectly good marriage for the sake of someone like Will.”

Estelle said stubbornly, “Maybe she had a perfectly good marriage. I don't. Look, so what are you saying, that Will's nothing but a con man?”

“Not a con man.” Lucy proceeded with care. “
Not
exactly.
I'm sure he does care for you very much, in his own way. But we've done a bit of digging around and he does seem to make a habit of persuading lonely women to fall for him, then fairly rapidly losing interest in them. Usually after they've spent a bit of money on him, I have to say.” She paused. “According to the receptionist at Carousel Productions, one of last year's conquests bought him a brand-new BMW.”

“He doesn't have a BMW.” Estelle was numb.

“I know. But it's how he funded his trip to Australia. Finished with the woman,” said Lucy with a grimace, “and promptly sold the car.”

Estelle swallowed. She felt as if she were trapped on a fairground ride, being spun around and around and not allowed to get off.

“So I was an easy target, is that it? I'm sorry, I can't believe this. Will told me he loved me.”

Next to her on the bench, Lucy took a slim notepad from her bag, then flipped through it until she found the page she was looking for.

“Did he tell you he'd never felt like this about anyone before?” she asked, and Estelle felt the palms of her clasped hands break out in a sweat.

She couldn't speak.

“Does he tell you that you're the one he's been waiting for his whole life?”

There was a lump the size of a horse chestnut in Estelle's throat.

“Does he call you the other half of his soul?” Lucy persisted, her French-manicured finger moving slowly on down the list. “Does he talk about the poem you'll have engraved on your joint headstone when you're both gone? Does he have nicknames for each of your elbows? Is he—”

“Stop!” Unable to bear it a moment longer, Estelle buried her face in her trembling hands. “Oh God,” she wailed. “Please, just
stop
.”

* * *

“You're back!” exclaimed Will. “Are you OK? When I saw the food on the floor I thought maybe you'd been kidnapped by aliens.”

He hadn't been home long himself. The shopping bags of food Estelle had unceremoniously dumped before going with Lucy to the garden square were still there on the kitchen floor. The Belgian chocolate truffle ice cream had melted, seeping like treacle across the tiles. Estelle stood and gazed down at the mess, as well and truly ruined as her own life.

“Something is wrong.” Will looked wary, like a guilty man opening his front door to find a policeman on the doorstep.

“Smile,” Estelle told him. “You're going to be in the
Daily
Mail
tomorrow.”

“The
Mail
. Oh God, Oliver'll go ape. He might pull out of the documentary.”

“Well, it'll be a real shame if that happens,” said Estelle. “
Again.
”

Now Will looked like the guilty man discovering that the policeman had proof of his crime.

“Moira Jonsson saw the piece in the local paper this morning.” Had it really only been this morning? It felt like months ago.

“Moira Jonsson.” Will shook his head. “She's just jealous. We were together for a while, then we broke up. She never got over it.”

“You were making a film about her husband!” Her voice rising, Estelle shouted, “All the things you told me, you'd already told her. And it's not just the two of us either.”

“Who told you this?” Will's eyes narrowed.

“A journalist.”

“Oh, come on, now you're being naive. They'll make up
anything
—”

“Not this time,” yelled Estelle. “Apparently there are quite a few older married women around whose elbows have nicknames!”

Trapped, Will said, “So? It's not against the law.”

“Yesterday,” Estelle said shakily, “you brought a bag of travel brochures back here. We spent half the evening talking about going away on vacation. You kept saying you'd love to go to the Caribbean, remember? Because you'd never been there before.”

From the look on Will's face, he knew what was coming next. “OK, so maybe I have.
Once.
” Sulkily he said, “But it wasn't much of a vacation, let me tell you, with Moira clinging to me like a leech the whole time.”

“She probably felt she was entitled to be clingy, seeing as she paid for the entire trip. Tell me,” said Estelle, “is it all a deliberate ploy? Do you do it to spice up your documentaries, make them more interesting for the viewers?”

“
No
.”

Estelle had already guessed as much. After all, Magnus Jonsson had pulled out of filming; his documentary had ended up not getting made.

“So it's just that we're available, is it? Lonely, neglected wives, grateful for the attention. Oops, I almost forgot—lonely, neglected,
wealthy
women.”

Giving it one last go, Will said desperately, “It isn't like that. I'd never sleep with someone unless I cared about them. The money isn't important.”

“Nice try,” said Estelle. “Very convincing.” Cuttingly she added, “But I'm still not going to buy you a brand-new BMW.”

His eyes flickered with guilt and she knew it was all over.

“Where are you going?” Will asked as she stalked past him.

Reaching the hallway, Estelle glimpsed her reflection in the mirror on the wall—the mirror that she had bought and hung there yesterday to brighten up the narrow space. She looked exactly what she was: a foolish forty-five-year-old woman who should have known better and was now living to regret it.

“To pack my things,” she told Will, discovering that she didn't even have the energy to cry. “After that, I don't know.”

“I don't know what to do anymore,” said Kate. “I don't even know what to think. I just…oh God, I don't know…give up.”

“It's like the world's gone mad,” Nuala suggested helpfully. Using the tongs to transfer a cherry Danish from the glass cabinet to a paper bag, she added, “Like waking up and looking out of your window and seeing that the grass is purple.”

Maddy, who was about to set off with the morning's deliveries, asked, “Have you spoken to Estelle this morning?”

“Like wildebeest stampeding down Main Street,” said Nuala.

“She hasn't been in touch.” Kate shook her head helplessly. “It's just unbelievable. My mother's run off with a boy toy who's only out for what he can get. My father's at the hospital with his ex-mistress. They have a son together, I've got a half brother I never knew I had, and he doesn't even
know
who his father is because he's lying there in a coma.”

“Orangutans swinging from the trees, the Taj Mahal where the war memorial used to be,” said Nuala. “Flying saucers whizzing through the sky.”

“Just ignore her,” said Maddy.

“Sorry. That'll be eighty pence.” Nuala handed the bag to Kate. “But wouldn't it be weird if that
did
happen?”

Maddy rolled her eyes in despair. “And I have to live with her,” she told Kate.

“What about Sophie?” Along with the rest of the town, Kate knew that Sophie had been prescribed a course of antibiotics as a precautionary measure. “Is she OK?”

Maddy smiled, touched by her concern. “She's absolutely fine.”

Marcella turned up as Kate was leaving. Marcella had a ten o'clock appointment at the hospital's prenatal unit, and she was hitching a lift into Bath with Maddy.

“Got everything?” asked Marcella as Maddy loaded the iceboxes into the car along with a bag containing clean clothes for Juliet.

“I've got everything. Have you got everything?”

Smugly, Marcella held up her pink raffia basket. “Prenatal notes. Spare panties. Urine sample. What more could a woman need?”

The basket was heavier than that. Pulling it open and surveying the contents, Maddy said, “Pickled gherkins, a pomegranate, two orange Kit Kats, and a tube of tomato puree, by the look of it.”

“Don't curl your lip at me like that,” Marcella protested. “I have a blood sugar level to think of. It doesn't do to get peckish.”

* * *

Having dropped Marcella off first, Maddy parked the car and made her way over to the intensive therapy unit. There was a family, distraught and sobbing, in the waiting room. When Juliet emerged from the unit, Maddy hugged her hard, then asked, “Shall we go outside?”

They found a bench in a patch of sunlight between two buildings. Shaking her head, Juliet said wonderingly, “I'd almost forgotten how it feels to be in the sun.”

She looked exhausted.

Maddy asked, “How's Tiff?”

“Still alive. Still in a coma. They did another brain scan yesterday.” From somewhere, Juliet dredged up a smile.

“Thank Sophie for the cards, will you? They're beautiful. How is she?”

“Good. Missing Tiff.” Maddy hated having to ask, but it was only fair they should know. “Has Oliver seen the paper this morning?”

“The
Mai
l
? Yes. Poor Oliver.” Juliet shook her head. “Poor Estelle too. What a hideous mess.”

Fiddling with her car keys, Maddy said, “I'm actually feeling sorry for Kate. And I never thought I'd hear myself saying that.”

“I feel like it's all my fault.” There was anguish in Juliet's eyes. “Maybe Tiff being ill is my punishment for getting involved with Oliver in the first place.”

“That's not true,” said Maddy. “You know it isn't.”

“Oh God, I'm so tired I don't know
what
to think anymore.” Checking her watch, Juliet gathered up the bag of clean clothes. “Thanks for these, anyway. Say hello to Jake, and give Sophie a big kiss from me.”

They headed back to the ICU. As they approached the corridor, they both heard the sound of hysterical sobbing behind the closed door to the waiting room.

“What's happening in there?” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Maddy regretted them.

“It's Donna's family. Donna was in a hit-and-run yesterday.” Juliet kept her voice under control. “She's eighteen. The doctors have just told them she's brain-dead.”

Maddy closed her eyes.

“Anyway,” Juliet went on, “how are things with you? Are you still missing Kerr?”

Maddy instantly felt smaller than she'd ever felt before.
Yes
, she was missing Kerr—of course she was—but compared with everyone else's problems, hers was laughably insignificant.

“Don't worry about me.” Giving Juliet another hug, choking back tears at the thought of Tiff lying helplessly in his hospital bed, she said, “Ring me if there's anything else you need. And give my love to Tiff. We're all praying for him.”

She actually was too. Despite never having prayed before.

“Thanks.” Juliet wiped her own brimming eyes. “Me too.”

Maddy returned to the hospital at twelve thirty after finishing her deliveries. Marcella, waiting for her outside the main entrance, thought how pale and drawn she looked. Supermodels might aim for stick-thin limbs and hollowed cheeks, but Maddy looked better with a bit more weight on her. There was an air of defeat about her too. She hadn't said anything, but Marcella knew why this was.

Well, there was nothing she could do about that. But she could certainly do her best, as a mother, to cheer Maddy up.

“Lunch,” Marcella declared as she climbed into the passenger seat of the Saab. “My treat.”

“I'm fine.” Maddy shook her head. “You don't have to do that.”

“Rubbish. Look at you, skinny as a broomstick! You need feeding up, and Nuala can manage without you for another hour. We'll go to Quincey's,” Marcella announced, because this was one of Maddy's favorite places to eat. “And sit outside like proper sophisticated ladies who lunch.”

When Marcella was in this kind of mood, Maddy knew there was no point trying to argue with her. Within ten minutes, the car had been parked and she and Marcella were sitting at a table for two on the broad pavement outside Quincey's wine bar with two orange juices, two giant menus, and—forever-ravenous Marcella—a vast bowl of olives. The moment they'd finished ordering, Marcella reached down and began delving into the pink raffia basket at her feet.

This was when Maddy, her attention wandering, gazed across the road and saw who was seated in the window of the restaurant opposite.

The sensation was akin to a giant syringe shooting a gallon of adrenaline into her bottom. Sitting bolt upright as if she'd been hit with an electric shock, Maddy stared first at Kerr, in profile to her, then at the glossy brunette sharing his table.

Oh Lord, this was too much.

“Here we are,” Marcella gaily announced, waving a small, curling piece of paper.

For a moment Maddy wondered if she'd hired a private detective and was now presenting her with evidence that Kerr had found himself another woman.

“Take it,” Marcella urged. “It won't bite you. Can't bite you,” she added with a grin. “It doesn't have any teeth yet.”

Kerr was sitting less than twenty feet away and Maddy was having to behave as if everything were normal. She wasn't even sure she could remember how to breathe.

“Are you OK?” asked Marcella.

“Sorry, sorry.” Guiltily Maddy grabbed the photograph and gazed at the funny little broad bean with legs that was destined to become her stepsister or stepbrother.

“That's his heart,” Marcella proudly pointed out, “and look, that's his bladder!”

“Wow, his bladder.” Willing herself to concentrate, Maddy did her best to keep her hands steady.

Without much success.

“You're trembling.” Marcella looked concerned. “Darling, are you sure you're all right?”

“I'm fine.” Glancing over the road, Maddy saw that Kerr and the brunette had finished their meal and were preparing to leave the restaurant. “Um, you said he. Is it a boy?”

“They always call them he,” Marcella explained. “I don't want to know whether it's going to be a boy or a girl. It's because you haven't been eating properly,” she scolded, taking hold of Maddy's hand and giving it an admonitory squeeze. “That's why you've gone all shaky. When our food gets here, you're going to eat everything on your plate.”

The door of the restaurant opened, and Kerr and his female companion stepped out into the street. Terrified that Marcella might turn around and spot him, Maddy hastily pointed in the opposite direction and said, “Ooh look, there's that actor you like, the one from
Casualt
y
!”

Peering in vain through the crowd of tourists dawdling along, Marcella leaped to her feet for a better look. The sudden movement, coupled with the brightness of her acid-yellow shift dress, captured Kerr's attention. Turning his head, he focused first on Marcella before his gaze shifted to Maddy.

“Where?” demanded Marcella, desperate to get a glimpse of her favorite actor. “I can't see him!”

Maddy was unable to speak. She couldn't stop staring at Kerr.

“What's he wearing?” Marcella called out, by now hopping up and down.

What was he wearing? Dark blue suit. Bottle-green shirt. Polished black shoes. Probably his usual aftershave, but from this distance it was impossible to tell. And still he hadn't moved. What must the brunette be thinking?

More to the point, who was she?

“Well, I give up,” Marcella announced, plonking herself back down with a sigh of disappointment. Then she brightened. “Oh, I know what else I've got to show you!”

As if in slow motion, Maddy realized what was about to happen. She could read Kerr's intentions in his dark eyes, knew that he'd reached a decision. He was about to come over and confront Marcella, make her understand that enough was enough, that she wasn't being fair. Oh God. Maddy felt herself go hot and cold all over. He really did mean to go through with it.

“How about this?” Marcella, who'd been delving into her straw basket once more, assumed the air of a conjuror triumphantly producing a rabbit from a hat. “Ta-da,” she cried, waggling a tiny hand-smocked baby's outfit on a white hanger. “Isn't it fab? Look at the little cardigan and the bonnet with the birds on it. They were selling them in the prenatal unit to raise funds for a new scanner. And how about these little leggings? Aren't they just adorable?” Her eyes alight with joy, Marcella danced the outfit up and down on its hanger. “I know I said I wouldn't buy anything yet, but I just couldn't resist it.”

Across the street, Kerr had seen it too. The sight of Marcella proudly waving the baby clothes stopped him in his tracks, reminding him why he and Maddy had stopped seeing each other in the first place. For a fraction of a second their eyes locked again, silently acknowledging that it couldn't happen.

“They had the most gorgeous little striped bootees as well,” Marcella confided. “I wanted to buy all of them! Will you look at the work that's gone into that embroidery?”

Feeling as if her heart was about to crack in two, Maddy leaned across the table and dutifully admired the workmanship. Out of the very corner of her eye, she saw Kerr and the brunette moving off down the street.

There really wasn't a lot of point in torturing herself further, wondering who the very pretty brunette was and what she was doing having lunch with Kerr.

It's nothing to do with me
, Maddy thought resignedly.
He's gone and that's that.

“Hooray.” Marcella abruptly whisked away the baby outfit as a waitress approached with their plates. “Food's here. About time too!”