Love and Devotion (61 page)

Immediately after telling Harvey McKendrick what she’d thought of him, she had decided that only a walk in the punishing cold would make her feel better. She had come across Will clearing the snow from the bench at the end of his garden. It had seemed an odd thing to be doing, seeing as a fresh fall of snow was now coming down. When he saw her, he’d stopped what he was doing and, without a word, had started walking beside her in unnerving silence. She could feel his sadness reach out to her. Several minutes passed before she asked him how he was.

‘I’ve been better,’ he replied. ‘How about you? I saw punches being thrown over at the McKendricks’. Was there a problem with the sherry? Not dry enough, perhaps?’

She stopped walking and looked at him. ‘I’ve missed you, Will.’

‘I’ve missed you too.’ The snow was falling faster and heavier now; swollen flakes of it were forming a thick layer on their clothes. He glanced up at the sky and catching sight of the vulnerable paleness of his skin above his scarf she felt an urge to kiss his neck. ‘We need to make a decision,’ he said, stamping his feet in the cold. ‘We either brave this snowstorm or we turn for home.’

‘I don’t want to go home. Not yet.’

‘Then come back to my place. I could do with the company.’

‘Even my company?’

He wiped away a snowflake that had settled on her eyelashes. ‘I told you, I’ve missed you.’

They hurried back the way they’d just come, kicked off their boots at the kitchen door and shook the snow from their clothes. He offered her a glass of wine, but she declined, not trusting herself to drink any alcohol and stay in control of her emotions.

While Will threw some logs onto the fire and she knelt in front of it gratefully she saw that there wasn’t a trace of Christmas in the sitting room: no tree, no cards, not a single festive knick-knack. Exactly as she would have predicted.

‘How’s Gemma?’ she asked when he was settled in the armchair nearest her.

‘Difficult to say.’

‘Did she tell you I spoke to her before Christmas?’

‘No.’

‘I gave her my mobile number, in case she wanted to talk to someone, other than family.’

‘That was kind of you.’

‘I know how it feels to be the surviving daughter - the daughter who gets overlooked in favour of the one who’s died.’

He visibly bristled. ‘She isn’t being overlooked. I’d never do that to Gemma.’

‘Good. Because it’s the worst thing that can happen to her.’

‘I’ll keep your advice in mind,’ he replied coolly. He stretched his legs out in front of him and rested his feet on the hearth. She could see from his expression as he stared into the fire that she’d rattled him, and he’d taken her comment as a criticism. She was just about to apologise when he said, ‘Tell me about the fisticuffs. What was that all about?’

She sighed. ‘It’s complicated.’

‘Life is.’

‘Mine especially.’ She turned slightly so that she was sideways on to the fire and facing him, her chin resting on her drawn-up knees. ‘I realised this morning that I’ve been deliberately played with. For months I’ve been fed a pack of lies. I’ve been manipulated in a way you wouldn’t believe. And I hate myself for having been so naive, for not being astute enough to realise what was going on. I seem to have a singular lack of talent for reading between the lines.’

‘Would I be right in thinking that your old friend Dominic, the one on the receiving end of the punches being swung, is at the bottom of this?’

She nodded. And then she told him the whole unedifying story, the lies, the secrets, the betrayals. She poured everything out: how she’d grown up with a love-hate relationship towards Dominic, how she’d worshipped him yet despised him. Finally she told Will about Miles and how their friendship had begun to change when she moved back home. ‘I suddenly saw him in a different light,’ she explained.

‘No longer as a friend but as a potential boyfriend? A lover?’

‘Yes. It suddenly seemed the perfect answer. Almost as though this was what Felicity might have wanted for us; you know, two people who had been really close to her coming together to bring up her children.’

‘But Dominic had other ideas?’

‘It looks as if he couldn’t bear for anyone else to find happiness if he couldn’t. So he deliberately set out to scotch whatever feelings Miles and I were beginning to have for each other.’

‘But all you had to do was confront Miles about his alleged affair with your sister. Why didn’t you?’

‘With hindsight it seems madness that I didn’t, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I felt angry with him for a while, and ... you probably won’t understand this, because you don’t know our history, but believing him to be in love with Felicity made me feel second best. And of course I believed Dominic when he said that unless I had proof, his brother would probably deny the affair.’

‘So instead of questioning Miles, you went on the hunt for evidence?’

She nodded. ‘I kept going through Felicity’s emails looking for something that would give Miles away, while all the time keeping him at arm’s length.’

‘Meanwhile I came along. I might be jumping to conclusions, but did I become part of what you were going through?’

Ashamed, she turned and looked into the flickering flames. ‘On top of being ditched by my last boyfriend because I now came with two non-negotiable complications, and feeling second best, I felt horribly rejected. Pathetically, I needed to prove to myself that I was attractive, a person in my own right. Does any of that make sense to you?’

‘Yes,’ he said.

She could see the hurt in his eyes, though, and it pained her. ‘I’m sorry. I soon realised I’d got myself into a situation that was all wrong. I was getting too fond of you and I hated myself for having used you to bolster my stupid ego. You deserved better. You’re the nicest, kindest, funniest, most generous and straightforward man I’ve ever met and I shall always regret the way I treated you.’

‘I’d have made do with just being the sexiest man you’ve ever met.’

She gave him a tentative smile. ‘That’s a given. And before you ask, there was no faking on my part. Every moment we spent in bed together was genuine.’

He briefly closed his eyes. ‘What more could a guy ask for?’ He suddenly looked and sounded extremely tired.

Bored of talking about her own troubles, she said, ‘So how have you been? And no glossing over anything. The truth.’

‘Bloody awful is the truth. I feel detached from the outside world, as though it’s not really happening.’ He let out his breath. ‘I don’t think I’m handling this at all well, if I’m honest.’

‘There’s a lot of rubbish spoken about being stoically resilient and hanging in there. We’re all different and have to handle things at our own pace. For what it’s worth, I reckon you’re not doing too badly. Have you been into work much?’

‘Once or twice. To prove I can still do it, and to please Jarvis. Some mornings I wake up feeling like I’m made of glass; one bump and I’ll fracture into a thousand pieces. When does it start to get better?’

‘I can’t answer that. But some day soon you’ll catch yourself thinking about something else, and then you’ll feel as guilty as hell because you’ll think it’s wrong to be happy. Or even distracted.’

She’d left him a short while later, sensing that he’d had enough company and wanted to be alone. ‘No need to see me out,’ she’d said. ‘I know the way.’ She’d squeezed his hand and closed the front door quietly after her.

She may have escaped the immediate aftermath of her public confrontation with Dominic for those few hours she’d been with Will, but it was waiting for her when she got home. As indeed it had been ever since. Two days on and her father was in bed suffering from mental exhaustion, as the doctor had described his condition; she and her parents would never be welcome at the McKendricks’ again - Eileen said this might well turn out to be a blessing - and there was still Miles to talk to.

There was also Dominic to deal with. She hadn’t finished with him yet. Not by a long way. Which was why she’d hurried Joel with his packing; she’d arranged to meet Dominic later that evening. Unbelievably he hadn’t got the first train back to Cambridge, and even more unbelievably, he was staying with Miles in Maywood. He’d phoned her that morning to say that he wanted to talk to her. She’d told him he had lousy timing, but she’d agreed anyway to meet him at the wine bar in Maywood.

He was waiting for her at the same table they had used the night she’d thrown her drink in his face. He looked dreadful. Bruised and battered, his nose was swollen, his right eye blackened, his top lip sporting a couple of stitches. She felt moved by the sight of him but reminded herself that he deserved every bit of the pain he was experiencing.

‘I can’t even say you should see the other guy,’ he quipped when she sat down and he indicated the glass of wine he’d already bought her. ‘I risked a glass of Pinot Grigio for you,’ he added.

‘Thanks.’ She took off her jacket, but kept her scarf on. Odds on she’d lose her temper with him before long and would want to leave in a hurry. ‘You look awful,’ she said matter-of-factly.

‘But perhaps not as bad as I’d have turned out if you’d got your hands on me.’

‘You’re right; you could have wound up dead with Felicity.’

He took a mouthful of wine. ‘I’m impressed; you said that without a hint of remorse.’

‘What can I say? I’ve learned at the feet of the master.’

‘Okay,’ he said in a bored voice, ‘it’s official, I’m a monster. Can we move on?’

‘Yes, but on my terms. For starters, I want to know exactly what was going on inside that twisted mind of yours when you made me suspect Miles was Felicity’s lover. Did it give you some kind of sick pleasure knowing that you were playing God with our lives?’

‘You know me; I get my pleasure any which way I can.’

She drummed her fingers on the table impatiently. ‘Look, I get the whole sexually ambiguous thing, that you’re capable of shagging your own shadow if the wind is blowing in the right direction, but why the double-bluff games? Why pretend you were gay when you’re clearly not?’

‘Why, do you fancy your chances with me now? Now that you know I could find you attractive after all? That I could be as equally aroused by your body as I could with that guy over there?’ He tipped his head towards an attractive, dark-haired man at the bar.

‘Just tell me what I want to know.’

He smiled. ‘I’m unnerving you, aren’t I? That’s the great thing about a strong sexuality; it delivers such a powerful punch. You see, Hat, I’ve always known I could have had you in bed any time I wanted.’

His arrogance made her want to get up and leave right away, but she had to stay, to know everything that had gone through his mind and brought them to this moment. ‘So why didn’t you
have
me,’ she asked, ‘as you so delicately put it?’

‘I don’t know. It’s a mystery that’s puzzled me for some time. Perhaps I was leaving the best till last.’

She snorted. ‘Rubbish! It’s because your so-called prowess never really worked on me. I’m the one person who could see through you.’

‘But not entirely.’

‘True,’ she conceded, knowing that would always annoy her. ‘But answer my question. Why pretend you were gay?’

‘Queer. Straight. Gay. Bi. They’re all just words. I’m me. This is the way I am.’

‘You’re not answering my question.’

‘Okay. It was part of the subterfuge. A game Felicity liked to play. I could openly kiss her in front of Jeff and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do about it. Gay men are notorious for flirting with women; it’s practically
de rigueur.’

‘But you professed to be gay before Jeff came into Felicity’s life.’

‘True. I guess I hadn’t made up my mind just where I stood until she got serious about another man. I was shattered when she told me she was going to marry Jeff. I could have killed them both. I asked her to marry me instead but she said no, that like Maude, the only woman Yeats ever really loved, she wanted to have my love for the rest of her life. She believed that marriage would kill what we had.’ He paused to take another mouthful of wine. ‘If you were more literate, you’d know exactly what I’m talking about.’

‘Pardon me for being such an ignorant oik.’

‘You’re forgiven.’

‘So why all the secrecy in your emails? You went to extraordinary lengths.’

‘Again it was what Felicity wanted. She got a thrill out of creating a special world in which only the two of us existed. She loved secrets. She particularly enjoyed the idea of us pretending to everyone else that it was only men I was into; it heightened the bond between us, you could say. She knew I was devoted to her and would do anything for her. For her part, she loved the power she had over me. So long as she was in the world I could only ever be truly happy when I was with her. There was a wildness about her that only I saw.’

‘You make her sound like that crazy piece from
Wuthering
Heights.’