A Place in the Country (14 page)

She didn't want to know all this … she pushed back her chair, picked up the pan of soup and carried it over to the stove. This scene couldn't be real. What he'd said could not be real. He had no right to be telling her his troubles. He should not be here, in this new home she had created. He did not belong in her Place in the Country. Yet he
was
Issy's father, and the financial scandal was going to break in the news, and of course he wanted his daughter to believe in him, despite the fact he seemed not to have thought of her in months.

Angry, she said, “Forget your own troubles for a minute. Why haven't you taken care of Issy? What's
wrong
with you?”

“It's simple. I couldn't get my hands on the money. Someone plundered my accounts.”

She remembered Gayle Lee warning her not to interfere in their business and said, “I'm betting I know who.”

James's face sagged. He looked haggard, a man at the end of his financial rope. Her heart melted just a little. “Of course you'll go to see Issy,” she said.

He shook his head. “I can't face her. Later, when things work out and she can believe in me again. I
am
innocent, you must know that, Caroline.”

Of course he must be innocent. He was still James. That's why she was letting him stand here, talk it out with her.

“The fraud squad will be looking for me,” he was saying. “There'll be a big scandal. I want you to tell Issy it will be all right.”

He walked over and put his hands on her shoulders. She gazed up into his eyes. Electricity sparked between them, the way it always had, and her body responded the way it always used to.

She stepped quickly back, told him she was sorry for his trouble, she hoped it would all work out.

He said, “Caroline, it's important you believe me.”

“I do,” she said. “Of course I do.” And maybe she did. “And I promise I'll tell Issy that too, though I think it's a pity you can't tell her yourself.”

She poured him another glass of wine, told him he could sleep on the sofa—she certainly wasn't going to put him in their daughter's room. Then she put the coffee on the timer for morning and said goodnight.

She turned her back on him and walked up the stairs to her room and locked the door. She leaned against it, wondering how this could have happened. He couldn't come back into her life, just like that.

She got undressed, got into bed and drew the white cotton duvet up over her head and cried until her pillow was soaked through. The tears were not because she wanted James back. They were for grief because she no longer loved him.

When she got up the next morning, he was gone.

 

chapter 30

She didn't even stop
to work out the time difference, she called Mark in Hong Kong anyway. “James was here last night. Waiting for me outside the barn, in the rain.”

There was a silence, then Mark said, “Wait a minute you're telling me
James
came to see you? Did he come to see
Issy
?”

“He didn't want to see her. He told me he's in financial trouble, said his accounts had been plundered, some sort of Ponzi scheme, stealing money that should have been invested.”

“Wait just a minute,” Mark said again. “
James
told you he was in
financial
trouble?”

“He said he'd come specially to tell me so I could explain to Issy that he was innocent. Before the fraud squad came and got him, was actually what he said. Before the scandal hit the world media.”

“Listen, I believe I know where every cent is in my and James's business,” Mark said. “Remember, when I saw you, I told you there were some discrepancies, but they'd seemed to right themselves. But James was also running his own business, another world entirely.”

“You mean with Gayle Lee Chen.”

“Exactly. I always believed it wasn't quite right, there's an underworld connection there, but James is so straight up, naive even…”

“He's also under that woman's spell.”

“I'll get hold of him right away, find out what's happening. I'll do my best to protect him, Caroline, for your sake, but if he's guilty there's not much I can do. Or would want to.”

She said, “James is a fool, he's weak, self-indulgent, but I'll never believe he's a thief.”

She called Maggie, who had just dropped the girls off at school, told her what had happened. Maggie said she should get back to the pub immediately, they needed to talk. She would have coffee ready by the time she got there.

“Oh, Mags,” Caroline said when the two of them were finally settled at the kitchen table, a mug in one hand, sticky-bun in the other. “The worst thing of all is, I can't tell Issy her father was here and that he didn't want to see her. How could I allow him to do that, I failed her, again.” Tears rolled into her coffee.

“You must
never
tell her he was here,” Maggie said. “This wasn't your doing, it was James. That man is so full of himself, he couldn't even face his child after what he's done.”

“Maggie!” Caroline stared at her, stunned. “You don't think James
did it
?”

“Why else would he have the fraud squad on his tail? Now he expects you to make that all right with his daughter. She's having enough trouble coping with him deserting her without this.”

Caroline couldn't even face the sticky-bun, and it was her favorite, straight out of the oven from Wright's Bakers down the street. “Mark doesn't think there's any money missing from his business. He says James is involved with Gayle Lee Chen.”

“The Asian bitch.” Maggie knew the story and recognized a whore when she heard about one.

“So, what do I do now?”

“We'll just have to wait and see what happens. Meanwhile, we'll carry on as normal, and you won't say one single word to Issy.”

Caroline guessed she was right. She thought for a minute, then said, “Mags, it's finally over. Me and James. At least,
me,
anyway.”

“Hallelujah! I knew. I saw it in your eyes when you said his name.”

“I lost the spark.”

“And did he?”

Caroline thought about the hot look James had given her, the way he'd spoken about the time they met and their first love. And she wondered.

 

chapter 31

James Evans flew back
to Hong Kong and went straight to the Peninsula Hotel, where he called Mark and arranged to meet on the boat out at Lantau.

The island of Lantau could be reached via two stone bridges connecting it to Hong Kong, or by train or ferry. James took the ferry then a blue taxi, the only kind permitted on the island. He paid the driver, overtipping lavishly the way he always did, then stood, a hand over his eyes watching the cab disappear as though it was the last gasp of civilization as he knew it.

As always, he was immaculate in a white polo shirt and khakis with a bright red canvas belt some woman he'd met and wooed had bought for him. Women came and went in his life, always had. Except for Caroline. And Gayle Lee. And now Melanie. He carried a small Hermès shopping bag. If it were not for the frown between his brows and the hand stuffed uncharacteristically in his pockets as he walked toward the boat, you would have never guessed anything at all was wrong in James Evans's life.

Mark's boat was an immaculate thirty-eight-foot Hunter. Her black sails were neatly furled, her black hull freshly painted, her polished teak deck without so much as a single scratch.

Mark held the boat steady against the jetty as James leaped up the little gangway. James never climbed—he always
leaped,
always full of an all-consuming energy.

He followed Mark down the couple of steps into the cabin and flung himself onto the banquette, leaning back against the cushions, craning his neck to peer out of the porthole.

“Don't worry.” Mark shoveled ice into a tumbler, topping it with Tanqueray and a spritz of soda. James had not changed his drinking habits since they were at business school together. He said, “I didn't call the police.”

“Well, you wouldn't would you.” James took the glass, raised it in a mock toast. “To better times, old buddy.” He set the Hermès shopper on the banquette next to him and slumped forward, elbows on his knees, glass clutched in both hands. He said, “I want you to know I never robbed you. It was my business partner Gayle Lee. The Chinese gangsters she works for put pressure on her. I still don't understand why. Anyhow, she knew from my business records how to access my accounts. She told me she replaced it before any damage was done.”

Mark laughed. “Have you never met Ms. Chen's underworld friends? The ones whose money she gave to you to be laundered? I'm guessing she took it and used it to finance her own grand lifestyle, the old Madoff pyramid trick, keep on paying them big dividends until someone calls you on it.”

James was staring into his glass as though looking at icebergs in the North Pole.

Mark said, “You fucked me, James, I could have gone down in flames, still can if the truth ever comes out. You almost ruined me … and for no reason other than your infatuation…”

“Infatuation? You don't fuckin' get it,” James said. “You never will. I loved her, Gayle Lee. She brought something special into my life. She fuckin'
consumed
me,” he added despairingly. “I would have done anything she wanted, no questions asked.”

“She'll destroy you. She's already destroyed your family. You're her scapegoat, only you're too dumb to acknowledge it. That bitch doesn't love you, she owns you. And she's
using
you.”

James got up and prowled the cabin.

“And what about the other woman?” Mark said. “The one you're keeping in an apartment in Macao?”

James groaned. He went and poured himself another gin. “Melanie's different.” He stared unseeing out of the porthole. “She's the one I'm leaving Gayle for. She's from a different world, she's innocent, she makes me laugh again, makes me feel young. She'll help me, unlike…”

“Unlike Caroline.”

James glanced at him. “You know everything don't you? You always did, Mark, that was your problem. You've always played the innocent. Now I wonder exactly how innocent you are? Maybe you and Gayle Lee were in cahoots, maybe
you
helped her get her hands on the money…” He downed the drink and pushed his way out.

“Where d'you think you're going?” Mark demanded.

“To get pissed.”

He slammed unsteadily up the steps. He'd been drinking on the plane and had also hit the Peninsula bar before he'd even gotten as far as the boat. He swayed down the narrow little gangway, forgetting all about the Hermès bag with the present he'd bought for Gayle Lee, to sweeten the goodbye. She'd always liked Hermès.

*   *   *

Early the following morning,
the Hong Kong Police Department received a call from Mark Santos, summoning them to his boat. He was waiting on deck and led Lieutenant Huang down to the cabin where James Evans was slumped on the banquette. A colorful Hermès scarf was wrapped around his head. There was a small round hole in it where the bullet had entered. Blood from the exit wound drenched the cushions behind him. His sightless eyes stared up at the ceiling and there was a gun in his right hand.

“He was my friend as well as my business partner,” Mark Santos was saying to Lieutenant Huang. “He came to tell me last night he was in big financial trouble. I offered to help but he said he would work it out. I believe there was also a woman involved, maybe a couple of women—and you know how much trouble that always causes. He'd recently lost his wife in divorce too and lost custody of his daughter. Obviously, it all became too much for him. He wasn't the James I knew. I'm afraid he just lost spirit for life, the will to go on.”

Lieutenant Huang's shrewd eyes met his.

“James just gave up,” Mark told him, meeting his gaze.

 

chapter 32

“There's a man
from Hong Kong says he wants to speak with you,” Winter-White Sarah said, tucking Little Billy under her other arm so she could pass Jesus the phone.

He looked at her, puzzled. “The
husband
?”

“Name of Mark Santos.”

Puzzled, he took the phone.

“Mr. Gonzalez? I met you at the pub, that night with Caroline.”

“I remember, of course.”

“This is the hardest call I've ever had to make, and I'm making it to you because I can't tell Caroline cold, over the phone. You and Maggie are her friends and she's going to need you.”

Jesus got the feeling he knew what was coming. “It's the husband?”

“The husband is dead.” There was another long silence while Jesus took that in. “It gets worse. He shot himself.”

Jesus crossed himself. “That's bad. Really bad.”

Sarah, who had put Little Billy down in his carry-cot to sleep, glanced up alarmed.

Mark was saying, “I can't tell Caroline this over the phone. She'll need you and Maggie there.”

“How could he do this to her?” Jesus was suddenly angry.

“I believe he saw no way out of his financial trouble.”

Mark's tone became abrupt, and Jesus thought it was as though now he'd told him it was all his problem, and he'd have to deal with it.

“Maggie will tell her,” he said. “We will be with her when she tells Issy. She will call you for the…”

“Details,” Mark finished his sentence.

Jesus put down the phone and went in search of Maggie.

He found her in the bedroom. She could tell from his shocked face something was seriously wrong.

“It's not the girls,” he quickly reassured her. He went and sat on the bed and she sat next to him. “It's Caroline's husband,” he said. “He shot himself.”