Lost Innocence (48 page)

‘I’ll give her a call later,’ Robert replied. ‘And you have my number, so if you want to chat, any time…’

‘Thank you. I hope you have a good holiday.’

Robert’s smile was wry as he hugged his nephew, then turned to start down the path. He wasn’t sure if he’d done any good in coming here, but it had felt important for him to try and keep a channel open between his stepdaughter and nephew, and he was reasonably confident he’d succeeded, even though he himself had ended up feeling more torn than ever. In his heart he knew that if it went to the wire he’d support Annabelle, but he was praying to God it wouldn’t come to that, because the mere thought of turning his back on Nat was almost as bad as how he’d feel if he turned it on her.

After closing the door Nat went back upstairs to his room, his head crowding with thoughts of Annabelle and the times they used to spend together before their parents had stopped visiting one another. They’d been really close then, and he supposed he’d meant it when he’d said he wanted to marry her when they were older, because as young as they both were, he wasn’t going to deny that she’d been his first love. Or his first crush, anyway. In spite of her age she’d have had sex with him then, any time he wanted, or so she’d said, and that was just what had happened that Saturday night. She’d wanted to have sex, and he’d tried to get away, but she wouldn’t let him go, and then everything had got out of hand, and now
she was accusing him of rape and that
wasn’t
what had happened at all.

Slamming the bedroom door behind him, he threw himself down on the bed and tried to push her out of his mind, but images of how she’d looked that night, laughing and teasing, shouting, sobbing and then laughing again with tears and blood on her cheeks, kept flashing before him like a grisly film. She knew what had happened, they both did, and it wasn’t rape, so why was she doing this?

Putting on some music in an effort to blot out everything else, he lay down on his bed and picked up his mobile phone. Though he scrolled to her number he wouldn’t risk trying it, because if she reported him he’d be arrested and taken into custody until the trial. The mere idea of that dredged an icy wave of dread all the way through him, and as though to escape it he jerked himself up from the bed to kill the music. Then, scrolling on through his numbers, he stopped at Summer’s, and without giving himself any time to think he pressed to connect. Though he still had no clear idea of how he was going to tell her what had happened, he knew he had to take his uncle’s advice and stop stalling, and the sooner he got it over with the better.

‘Nat, hi,’ she said happily when she heard his voice. ‘At last. Where have you been? Why haven’t you…’

‘Summer, listen, there’s something I have to tell you.’

‘Oh my God. You
have
met someone else,’ she cried.

‘No. No, not at all, well, not the way you’re thinking.’ He took a breath. ‘It’s just that well, Annabelle…’

‘No! Don’t tell me it’s her, I won’t be able to stand it.’

Desperate to get it out now, he said, ‘She’s accused me of raping her, and the police arrested me, but it’s not true, Summer. I didn’t force her, she was coming on to me the way she does. You’ve seen how she is, and well, it wasn’t rape. I swear it.’

For an excruciatingly long moment there was nothing more than a stunned silence at the other end, then she said, ‘So what you’re saying is that you had sex with your cousin Annabelle?’

‘Yes, but not the way you’re thinking. I mean, it wasn’t rape, but it didn’t mean anything either.’

‘Do you know what,’ she said, ‘it’s not the rape that bothers me – I mean, it does, of course, but at least it wouldn’t have been an act of love. The fact that you’re saying it wasn’t rape, though, means you had sex with her because you wanted to.’

‘No! It was spur of the moment…I just said, it didn’t mean anything…’

‘But you had sex with her! Do you realise what that tells me? It tells me you got excited by her, and if someone like that turns you on, Nathan, then all I can say is good luck to you, because if you’re that shallow, then tramps like her are all you deserve.’

As the line went dead Nat threw down his phone and dropped his head in his hands. It was as though his entire world was falling apart, and he didn’t know how to make it stop. He thought about his mother and how badly he was letting her down, when all he wanted was to be a strength and support to her. Instead, he’d brought her this, and as each day, each hour, passed he was becoming more terrified than ever of how far it might go, and what needed to be done to stop it.

Chapter Twenty

As August drifted on the world seemed to adopt a surreal sort of quality for Alicia, with the sun continuing to blaze as though time had become snagged on the hottest day of the year, while life moved forward in its usual impervious way. Since Robert had taken his family to France it had been possible to venture up to the high street, but unless they were going to the shop, they rarely did. It was better to continue keeping a low profile, they’d decided, that way Nat wouldn’t have to encounter people’s spitefulness and prejudice, nor would Alicia and Darcie have to suffer the intolerable experience of watching him endure it. Though some of her neighbour’s behaviour was shocking and offensive in the extreme, Alicia refused to challenge them, because it would do nothing to help Nat if she got into some kind of showdown, nor was it likely to change their minds. She simply had to be thankful that they wouldn’t be on the jury when the time came, a thought that in itself caused her heart to churn with dread.

Though they were in regular contact with Jolyon, so knew that he and Oliver were working hard preparing the defence papers, Nat almost never discussed what was happening, and Alicia didn’t try to make him. He’d never mentioned Craig’s affair either, but it was there between them, like a barrier they could see through, but didn’t know how to cross. She tried once or twice, but as soon as he realised where she was going he put up a hand and walked away.

It was hard to find the right way to handle this, when she knew he must have so many questions and confusions, but even if he were prepared to discuss them, she wasn’t sure what she could tell him that might give him a better
understanding of his father’s behaviour. After the horrible showdown with Sabrina Alicia’s own doubts and insecurities had resurfaced with a vengeance, and she didn’t want Nat to sense them. Knowing she was still suffering over his father’s betrayal would be sure to make his own bewilderment and disillusion even harder to bear.

So she could only watch him withdrawing more deeply into himself, particularly after Jolyon’s calls, when she knew that he was wondering why they hadn’t managed to get the case thrown out yet. There was little, or nothing, she could say to alleviate their fears. They simply had to live through this now, pretending to themselves, and the rest of the world, that everything was going to work out just fine, when in truth they were becoming increasingly terrified that it might not.

It wasn’t until ten days after Nat’s first court appearance that Alicia saw Cameron Mitchell again, though he’d rung a few times to find out how she was and to let her know he was there if she needed to escape for a while. Though she’d have dearly loved to spend a few hours talking about art, or house-hunting, or anything at all that didn’t concern the upcoming trial, she was too afraid of how Nat and Darcie would react if she took him up on his offer. Besides, it wouldn’t be fair to leave them, when the world had become a pressure cooker for them too, and no one was offering them an escape.

‘I was wondering,’ Cameron said when he called one evening, ‘if you were at all intrigued to know what my idea is concerning your shop – or perhaps you’ve forgotten I mentioned I’d had one.’

‘Actually, I do remember,’ she admitted, ‘but I didn’t like to ask in case it might seem …I don’t know, pushy I suppose.’

He gave a laugh. ‘I think that’s the last thing anyone could accuse you of being,’ he told her. ‘Anyway, I’m keen to run this idea past you, but before I do, it’s important that I see your work. I’ve checked online, but couldn’t find anything.’

‘That’s because Nat’s still in the process of designing a new website for me, but I’d love to show you what I have. I’m not sure it’ll be quite to your taste though, and considering
how famously outspoken you are when it comes to talent, or lack of it, I’m afraid my sensibilities might not be able to take it.’

‘OK, if I promise not to give you a hard time, no matter what I think, will you set a day for me to come over?’

After searching in vain for an objection that wouldn’t entail telling him how set against him her children were, she said, ‘OK, but if you don’t like what I’m doing, how will that fit with your idea?’

‘Very easily, but I’ll be able to explain better once I’ve seen it – and, for the record, I’m sure it’ll be right up my street.’

Not anywhere near as convinced herself, since she’d checked out his gallery online so knew his tastes ran more to abstract and postmodernism than to the offbeat kind of figurative style that was hers, she said, ‘Nat and Darcie are going to a horse show with Rachel on Tuesday, so if you’re free then…’

‘Give me a time and I’ll be there,’ he told her. ‘Oh, and I have some property brochures I’m hoping you’ll glance over while I’m sizing up your sculptures, if you wouldn’t mind.’

‘I’d be happy to,’ she told him, and after confirming the date and time again she rang off and stood thinking about the arrangement, and how she was going to break it to Nat and Darcie.

In the end, she wandered out to the garden where they were playing badminton using the worn racquets and shuttlecocks they’d unearthed while clearing the playroom-cum-study. Since Nat and Simon had transported some of her equipment from the shop by now, the space had begun to resemble a temporary studio, but before she attempted to start work again she wanted to sort through her mother’s little cubbyhole of a study in order to turn it into a store.

As she watched them play, she was trying not to focus too much on Nat, knowing he would sense it and immediately withdraw, the way he always did lately when he felt her eyes on him. Fortunately he wasn’t the same with Darcie, because they seemed as close as ever, if not closer.

‘I didn’t see you there,’ Darcie called out. ‘Fancy a game? You can be on my side and help me thrash him, because he keeps beating me.’

‘You’re the one who told me to stop letting you win,’ Nat reminded her, belting the shuttlecock over the net.

‘That was too fast,’ Darcie complained as she missed it. ‘Come on, Mum, save me from complete annihilation. There’s another racquet on the table.’

Going to fetch it, Alicia took up position on Darcie’s side of the makeshift court, and twenty minutes later, after much grunting, running, voluble protesting and cheering, Nat was rolling his eyes at the pathetic performance of the female opposition.

Laughing, as he went off to hose himself down in the shower, Alicia flopped into a deckchair, attempting to fan herself with her racquet, while Darcie lay spreadeagled on the grass getting her breath back. A few clouds were starting to gather, casting a bulbous shadow over the house, but it was still warm and the feeling of cool grass prickling softly between her toes was as refreshing as the thought of an ice-cold drink, which she was trying to summon the energy to go and get.

‘Mum?’ Darcie said, turning her head to squint up at her mother.

‘Mm?’ Alicia responded, idly batting away a fly.

‘I keep trying to work out why Annabelle’s doing this. I mean, she always used to be dead keen on Nat, so why’s she saying he hurt her when everyone knows he’d never hurt anyone?’

Loving her unfailing loyalty, and wishing there was a way to take the confusion from her heart with a few simple words, Alicia sighed as she said, ‘I don’t know, sweetheart.’ She didn’t want to explain to Darcie all the possible complications of Annabelle’s motives, or to try to imagine what might be going on in the girl’s mind when she could only guess what it must have been like for her after Sabrina’s break-up with Craig. ‘I wish I did.’

‘He had sex with her though, didn’t he?’ Darcie said. ‘Or this wouldn’t be happening?’

‘I’m afraid so,’ Alicia replied, keeping her eyes closed so
Darcie wouldn’t see the frustration and anger she felt on top of all the concern.

‘Una says Annabelle’s got a bit of a reputation for going with boys,’ Darcie went on, ‘even though she’s only fifteen.’

Alicia sighed again. ‘Yes, I’ve heard that too,’ she said, ‘and if it’s true, which it seems to be, it’s a great pity Nat didn’t control himself a little better – and that Annabelle doesn’t value herself more highly than to sleep around with anyone.’

‘Except Nat’s not just anyone.’

‘No, but that’s not the point. It was wrong of him to have sex with a girl who’s underage, and who’s not even his girlfriend.’

‘Because it’s important to be in a special relationship before you do anything like that?’

‘Exactly. And over sixteen. I’m not sure Nat actually realised she was still only fifteen, but it doesn’t make a difference. She is, and now he’s in terrible trouble because of it.’

Hearing Nat rattling about in the kitchen Darcie let the matter rest there, and when he came out with three glasses of blackcurrant squash, Alicia avoided his eyes as he passed her one, so he wouldn’t see how disappointed and angry she was with him for having got himself into this mess.

‘Oh yeah,’ Darcie said, shifting round to prop her head on Nat’s chest as he lay down on the grass beside her, ‘who was that on the phone just now? No one for me, I suppose?’

Alicia swallowed some squash. She didn’t want to lie, but she was afraid that any mention of Cameron would start making them feel protective towards their father and end up causing another kind of friction that they just didn’t need right now. However, in the end, because she didn’t want to start hiding things from them, she said, ‘Actually, it was Cameron Mitchell. He wants to take a look at my work.’ She tried not to sound defensive as she went on, ‘I’m sure he’ll hate it, but if he doesn’t, who knows, he might be willing to help me try to sell it.’ She wouldn’t add how much they needed the money, because they really didn’t need to know how little there was left in the pot now.