You Can Trust Me (10 page)

With a sigh, I turn away and head downstairs. I need to leave. Now.

“Will?” I stand in the living room door for several long seconds before Will tears himself away from whatever program he is now watching to glance irritably at me. He does a double take when he sees how dressed up I am.

“Liv?” he says. “What's going on?”

“I have to go out.”

“What?”

“Hopefully I'll just be a couple of hours.”

Will looks so bewildered, I feel terrible, but his shock makes it even harder to explain what I'm doing. I turn and head for the front door.

Will follows me. “What the hell are you talking about?
Where
are you going? It's almost ten o'clock, for God's sake.”

I reach the front door. “Julia had a … meeting with someone called Shannon for ten thirty
P.M.
tonight,” I said. “I found it in her diary. I'm going to be there for when this Shannon turns up.” I open the door.

“Are you crazy?” Will strides over. “Why the hell do you want to do that?” He stands right beside me. “Whoever it is won't be there, anyway. They'll know Julia is dead.”

“Not necessarily,” I say. “And if they don't know, I can tell them.”

“But it's
late,
Liv.” Will's eyes are wild with shock. He gesticulates behind him, indicating the kids upstairs … the whole house. “You won't be back for ages. It's
mad
.”

“No, it's not,” I say. “Anyway, you're often out late yourself.”

“That's
work
. It's different.” Will snaps, “You shouldn't go alone, anyway. Not to a club. This ‘Shannon' could be anyone. It's not safe.”

“For God's sake. I'm thirty-eight,” I say. “And you can't come. You've got to stay with the kids. They're both asleep. They won't even know I'm gone.”

Will gapes at me, now completely at a loss for words.

“It'll be fine,” I say.

“No, Livy.” He finds his voice as I open the door. “This is crazy. You're becoming fixated on Julia's death. It's affecting Hannah.”

“What?”
I stare at him. Where the hell did that come from?

“It's the truth.” Will levels his gaze at me. I used to find that dark, intense gaze of his sexy. Now I'm just infuriated.

“I'm not fixated, and Hannah's just at a difficult age. Plus she's upset about Julia, which is perfectly natural.”

“It's more than that.”

“I don't think—”

“She's quieter than she used to be. Introverted. She hardly ever smiles. Her confidence is shot to pieces.”

“What?”
I don't recognize the picture he's painting. “That's ridiculous. Hannah's just starting to go through puberty. It's … it's more hormonal than anything.”

“I'm not going to argue about it.” Will rolls his eyes. “The point is, you can't just walk out at a minute's notice.”

“Why not? You do it all the time.” Properly furious now, I stomp away from the house and wrench open the Mini.

Will calls my cell phone before I've even driven to the end of the road, but I don't pick up and he doesn't leave a message. I'm seething over what he's said. For a start, he is totally wrong about Hannah. She's just acting out a lot at the moment. Julia's death hasn't made a big difference to that. And what colossal nerve, telling me I can't just walk away from the house when he does exactly the same thing whenever work demands it. Look at how he went to Geneva the other night.

I calm down as I drive through Exeter. The streets are virtually empty. It's weird to be going out this late and without Will. Once I did it all the time. Now I actually feel a little nervous—and not just because I'm about to meet a stranger.

Is it marriage and motherhood that have drained all my confidence?

Or is it just that I miss Julia?

I did go out a lot in my early twenties, but most of the time Julia was with me, steering a clear passage through all social waters, drawing me effortlessly along in her wake.

There's a queue at the next set of lights. As I wait for the red to turn green, I gaze at the Asian couple huddled in a doorway, poring over a phone together. They look so young, so hopeful, their lives in front of them. I lean my head against the car window, watching them as rain trickles down the glass.

My life is already almost half over, and I don't feel as if I've properly begun it yet. Apart from the children, what have I really achieved? Undergraduate honors in History and a few dull years in a law office don't add up to much. Once I dreamed of being an academic with a tenured professorship: authoring important papers, giving talks at glamorous conferences, and guiding graduates through MAs and PhDs, then going home to my handsome, loving husband and brood of bonny babies. I'd successfully juggle it all, and eager students like the girl I once was would look at me with admiration in their eyes, seeing me as a role model and an inspiration.

I reach Torquay and stop to let a group of young women in short skirts above bare, mottled legs cross the road ahead. It starts raining very lightly, but the girls don't seem to notice. A few moments later they have giggled and tottered their way past me, leaving empty sidewalks gleaming under the streetlamps.

*   *   *

The music is deafening. That's my first thought. The second is how long it has been since I set foot inside a nightclub. Aces High is designed in the shape of a diamond, with several themed rooms set around a large, square glass bar. It took less time than I was expecting to get here, so it's barely 10:20
P.M.,
and the whole club is practically empty. The bouncers and the girl in her
ACES HIGH
T-shirt stamped my hand without a second glance, but now I feel everyone is looking at me. The group of men at the glass bar certainly are. But then they're checking out everyone.

I wander out of the bar area and into the first themed room, feeling horribly self-conscious. Diamond Room is glittery, with high, tiny tables for standing around, and lit with artificial candles. It's empty. I pass through an arch into Club Room. It's gloomy and musty-smelling, all fake-wood paneling and black leather chairs. Like Diamond, it's completely deserted. I walk on, into Heart Room. Unlike the previous two spaces, Heart at least looks comfortable. Three or four pink sofas are arranged around a heart-shaped coffee table. Three young women with high heels and bare midriffs are giggling over a mobile phone. Two men stand at the door, watching them. No one gives me a second glance.

I check the time. Ten twenty-five. I walk into Spade Room. The walls are dark purple and hang with chains and masks. A long whip snakes down from the ceiling, into the corner of the room. There are no proper seats, just functional black-matted slabs on chrome bases. They look like torture tables. All very Red Room of Pain. I feel stupidly embarrassed. Two men are sitting in opposite corners. They both stare at me. I decide neither can possibly be Shannon and scurry away, back out to the light and bustle of the main bar. This is starting to fill up,—plenty of singles dotted between the groups—but a number of stools are still available. I perch on one at the far end, which gives a good view of the whole bar. At least out here, where it's busy, I feel less noticeable. I look around. Julia's phrase for the bar—
lean-meat market—
comes to mind. All the women are over-made up and underdressed, and some of them—the older ones, mostly—are also giving off an air of desperation that belies the grim smiles fixed to their faces. As for the men, they're as predatory and cold-eyed as they are unattractive. To me, at least. The muscular barman wanders over and I order a white wine—I'm driving, but one drink is fine; I need it to steady my nerves. The barman brings it over and lays it down on a small white circular napkin. He doesn't look at me. I drink the wine. More people arrive at the bar. Most of the girls are in pairs or groups. They are all dressed to the nines in low-cut tops and thigh-skimming skirts. They cast excited glances around them. Some of the men are in groups—hunting packs. Others pace the perimeter of the bar—lone wolves.

I shake myself. I'm being far too cynical. This is just mating and dating at its most naked and obvious. Of course the people here are looking at each other hopefully—it's a singles bar.

It's ten forty. Surely Shannon must be here by now? I'm cursing myself for not realizing that a bar was a hopeless place in which to identify a total stranger. Does that mean Julia had met Shannon before? What I don't understand is why she ever agreed to come here. She hated places like this. At least she always told me she did. I sip my wine, overwhelmed by the sense that I'm being watched. I look up. A middle-aged man across the bar is staring at me. I look away quickly. The last thing I need is to be propositioned.

The fear of getting hit on spurs me into action. Shannon clearly isn't going to arrive with a name badge hanging around his or her neck. And I've come too far to give up this easily. I hold up my glass and wave at the bartender. A minute later, he appears in front of me.

“Another wine?” he asks. He has undone the entire front of his shirt, and I can't help but stare at his six-pack as he speaks.

“Er, no, thanks!” I have to shout to be heard over the music—something tuneless with a heavy bass thump. “I was just wondering if you know anyone who comes here called Shannon?”

To my amazement, the barman nods. “Sure.” He jerks his thumb across the bar to where a round-faced, curly-haired young woman is sitting on a stool, legs neatly crossed.

As the bartender wanders away, I watch her, my heart drumming against my throat.
This
is Shannon. She's dressed less provocatively than most of the girls here. Her dress is skintight, but it comes down to her knees and there's no cleavage on show. As I watch, one man after another approaches her. Shannon flicks her gaze toward them for just a second, smiles, then mutters something. In the space of thirty seconds, she's fended off three of them.

Well, whoever she is, I'm impressed. I ease myself off my stool and walk around the bar toward her. There's no seat next to her, so I stand. Now that I'm closer, I can see she's really pretty in a soft, baby doll–type way. Big blue gray eyes and long, highlighted hair in soft curls.

“Are you Shannon?” I say. I'm gripping my wineglass tightly.

She nods, her eyes wary. “Yes,” she says. “Why?”

“What's your secret?” I ask, affecting a casual laugh. “For getting rid of the guys.”

She stares at me curiously. I guess it is a strange question to be asking in a singles bar. “I tell them the bartender's my boyfriend,” she says. “He's not really, just a mate. He's actually gay.”

I follow her gaze over to the muscular bartender. A beat passes. I take a deep breath. “You're here to meet Julia Dryden, aren't you?”

Shannon says nothing, but her eyes betray her recognition of Julia's name.

“I'm Julia's friend. I saw your name in her diary,” I gabble on. “I had to meet you, to find out—”

Shannon frowns. “Julia's not coming?” she says.

I bite my lip. So she doesn't know. Which means I have to tell her. And it's still hard to say the words, to face the truth. “Julia died,” I explain. The music blares out around me. Shannon's eyes widen. “She died two weeks ago. Please, I have to know what … why she was meeting you?”

Shannon looks horrified. She gets off her stool. “What happened to her?” she demands. “Who are you?”

I sense the people on either side of us staring, but I'm intent on stopping Shannon from backing away. I reach out for her arm, desperate. “I'm Livy Jackson. I was a good friend of Julia's. Please—”

“No.” Shannon wrenches her arm away. She takes a step back. “Why are you here?”

“I just want to find out why Julia was talking to you.” I'm close to tears now.

There is fear in Shannon's eyes. “How did you know about me meeting Julia?”

“I told you, I saw it in her diary.”

“I can't speak to you.”

“Why? Please, I—”

But Shannon has turned and is already weaving her way through the crowd. Considering her vertiginous heels, she's remarkably fast. I hurry after her. She rushes through Club Room. I'm right behind. There's a fire door I hadn't noticed before, in the corner. Shannon presses the bar. Darts outside. I race after her, but as I reach the fire door myself, a large hand slams it shut.

It's the barman.

“Sorry, madam,” he says with fake politeness, “but you don't seem to have paid for your drink.”

Shit.
I look down. I'm still carrying the glass of white wine in my hand. I set it down and fumble in my bag for my purse. I fish out a ten-pound note and shove it at the barkeep. He stands aside to let me leave. I rush past, through the entrance lobby and outside.

The air is cool on my face. I'm in a backstreet opposite the high walls of a multilevel parking garage. An empty plastic bag drifts along the tarmac. There's no sign of Shannon. I head for the brightly lit end of the cul-de-sac, where it opens onto the main road. It's dark and more than a little spooky, but I don't notice. I'm only intent on finding Shannon. I'm halfway along the alley, running toward the traffic noise and the light.

And then a figure appears at the end of the cul-de-sac, cutting me off from the road.

I stop dead. The light from the streetlamps beyond cast a halo around his fair hair. He is tall and young and his eyes are fixed on me. He walks toward me, and I see his face more clearly.

It's the man from the funeral. The man I assumed was Julia's Dirty Blond.

I look around, hoping to spot some kind of escape route … some open door … an exit.…

But there's nowhere to run.