Fractured (21 page)

‘Jimmy very kindly gave up his day off to take me into London. I had a lot of things I needed to sort out and he offered to take me.’

Matt raised his gaze to meet Jimmy’s over the roof of the car that stood between them.

‘And his night, of course. He gave up his night too.’

I could see where this was going and I didn’t like it one little bit. So far, Jimmy hadn’t risen to the bait, but I could feel the testosterone-infused tension eddying around me like a miniature tornado.

‘It was too late to come back last night, so we found a hotel and stayed in town. Dad knew what our plans were.’

Matt nodded, and I wondered what his reaction had been when he had arrived here and learnt from my father that Jimmy and I had been away together overnight.

‘We were lucky to find somewhere that had two rooms available at such short notice,’ I supplied, clumsily attempting to let Matt know that everything had been above board. I was babbling, I could hear that even to my own ears. And I was also annoyed at my compulsion to explain our movements, knowing all the time that as my fiancé, Matt was perfectly entitled to ask where I had been. I was also embarrassed at the need to lie.

‘It
was
all perfectly respectable,’ I assured Matt, moving away from Jimmy’s car and turning to walk up the path.

‘I’m sure it was,’ replied Matt, and while his words implied he had never doubted it for a minute, the look he gave Jimmy said something different entirely. ‘You not coming in?’ he asked, as Jimmy walked towards him, passing over my small overnight bag. I stopped then, halfway to door; I had assumed they were both following me inside.

‘No, not this time. I’ve got some things I have to do. And I’m sure you want to spend some time alone with Rachel. She has a lot to tell you.’

I felt the betraying colour begin to warm my cheeks. Don’t blush, don’t blush, oh please, God, don’t let me blush.

Matt looked from Jimmy to me, the suspicion on his face only just managing to masquerade as curiosity.

‘About the magazine,’ Jimmy provided, already half back into the car. ‘G’bye, Rachel.’

I wanted to run to him then, to launch into his arms and beg him not to go. Ridiculous. Completely and utterly ridiculous. And of course I did nothing of the sort, my feet remaining rooted to the path as though fixed there in cement. But I didn’t like the permanent tone of Jimmy’s goodbye: I didn’t like it at all.

As Matt walked past the open driver’s door to join me on the path, Jimmy’s hand reached out to stall him. His voice was low, and he probably never intended me to hear what he had to say, but the street was suddenly quiet and I clearly heard his low entreaty.

‘Take good care of her, Matt. She’s had quite a tough twenty-four hours.’

To say my father looked relieved to see me walk through the door was an understatement. And although I knew that a large part of that was due to his natural instinct to worry about me, I realised too that an even greater part was that the burden of entertaining a less-than-good-humoured Matt could now be handed over to me. I correctly guessed it had been a pretty tough several hours since his arrival while they awaited our return.

‘He’s been pacing up and down the living room like a caged lion,’ whispered Dad as we stood together in the welcoming kitchen, making a fresh round of teas and some toast. I wasn’t really hungry but it had been a welcome excuse to escape to the kitchen and find out what exactly had happened when Matt had turned up and found us gone.

‘Sorry you had to deal with that. I don’t know what he’s so wound up about.’

My dad stopped placing mugs and spoons on the tray and turned to give me a long appraising look. No words, just a look.

‘What?’ I asked, playing dumb. ‘What?’

My attempt at nonchalance was ruined by the warm flush that suffused my cheeks. And the more my dad continued to stare at me in that knowing parental fashion, the hotter they grew. I don’t know what he knew exactly, or guessed, but I don’t think he was that far off the mark.

‘Just be careful, Rachel, or someone will get hurt.’ And then he softened the entreaty by wrapping his arm around me and pulling me tight to his side. ‘And I don’t want it to be you.’

By the time the tea and toast were consumed, a little good humour seemed to have been restored and naturally enough they both wanted to hear about everything that had happened in London. It took quite a while to regale the entire account of the last twenty-four hours, obviously omitting all that had occurred the previous evening from my narrative. I was pretty certain no one in the room wanted to hear that sorry tale – especially me.

There was a long pause when I eventually finished, while they both absorbed what I had told them.

‘So do you remember everything now?’ pressed Matt hopefully.

‘No, not really. Well, not at all, if I’m being totally honest. But at least now I guess I know what
hasn’t
happened.’

The disappointment on Matt’s face was obvious, and I couldn’t help but think that some of it was aimed at me personally, rather than the situation. It was almost as if he suspected that I just wasn’t trying hard enough to remember: and that if I put a little more effort into it, everything would come flooding back.

‘Never mind, love,’ supplied Dad, reaching over to squeeze my hand reassuringly. ‘It’s still early days yet. At least now you have somewhere positive to start from when you meet the amnesia guy this week.’

‘Yeah, that’s what Jimmy said.’

Matt’s face stiffened in irritation at the name, but fortunately he let the comment pass unchallenged.

‘And in the meantime, I’ve sorted out anything I could find around here from the last five years that could help you remember.’

He sounded so delighted that it was hard to suppress a groan when several hefty-looking albums and a box of selected memorabilia were produced from the side of the settee and laid onto the coffee table before me.

‘Now, I’ve just got to go into town for a while, so you two can browse through these. I’m sure Matt will be able to answer any questions you have – probably far better than me. I don’t suppose you tell me the half of what’s really going on in your life!’

Considering recent events, that was probably just as well.

I was several pages into the first album when the front door clicked shut at my father’s departure. Moving closer to my side on the settee, Matt gently removed the album from my hands and slid his arms about me, drawing me towards him.

‘Let’s leave the old photos for now, huh? I think I can find a much better way of helping you to remember.’

And before I could say anything to stop him, or even consider if I wanted to stop him at all, his mouth was on mine, powerfully and persuasively commanding me to respond. And after a moment of immobility, I did. Perhaps this was the very thing I needed to jolt my memory back. Maybe it wasn’t just in fairy tales that the prince could kiss the sleeping princess back to life. And Matt, with his sexy good looks and masterful self-confidence, was accomplished enough to elicit a response from a shop mannequin – let alone the woman who’d been on the receiving end of those kisses for the past seven years.

And as his lips moved in sync with mine and his hands travelled possessively up and down my back, suddenly I
did
remember. I remembered how deeply I had fallen in love with him as a teenager; how much he had meant to me back then. I remembered him, as women do the world over, in the way they never forget their first love. But I also remembered how I’d brutally severed him from my life when Jimmy died, cutting away all vestiges of memory of our relationship. And what I remembered most of all, was that while ending things with Matt had caused me pain, it had been insignificant weighed up against the incomparable agony of my grief. And if it
did
transpire that those events had only ever existed in my imagination – and the evidence for that was now pretty compelling – well, you didn’t need a degree in psychology to work out the message my subconscious had been trying to get across.

I didn’t push him away from me, but my lack of response eventually filtered through.

‘Rachel?’ he murmured into my ear, pausing to nip gently upon my neck, making me shiver in spite of myself. He drew back to survey my face, his own a clear portrait of passion and desire.

‘Too much for now? Do you want me to stop?’

I nodded silently, and thankfully he understood. I could see the effort it took him to regain his composure and I felt horribly guilty at having led him on, knowing all the while that this was probably something I shouldn’t be doing. I wondered if this was exactly how Jimmy had felt the night before. The thread that wound the tapestry of our lives together suddenly seemed heavily laced in irony.

‘Maybe we could just look through the stuff Dad left out?’ I suggested lamely.

‘If that’s what you want,’ he agreed, but added in a soft vow, ‘But don’t think I’m giving up on you that easily.’

I’m certain he meant it as a pledge of things to come, so why couldn’t I shake the feeling his words sounded more like a threat than a promise?

Three albums and several hours later I was no closer to remembering anything and I was totally bored with looking at pictures of me with people I never knew, in places I had never been. Although Matt could supply a large proportion of the missing data, a whole host of photographs taken during my university days remained a mystery.

‘Looks like I had a good time,’ I proclaimed, plucking a photograph from the pile, which captured me with my arms flung around the shoulders of several friends, beer bottles in hand, all smiling broadly, and somewhat drunkenly, at the camera.

‘Uni was good,’ Matt proclaimed, then breached my defences by leaning over and planting a kiss upon my lips. ‘But now is better.’

You couldn’t help but admire the man’s unshakeable confidence. Still, I didn’t want things to progress any further down that road, so I quickly stumbled down a conversational side-track.

‘And we managed to survive the long-distance relationship thing?’

Was there something that flashed quickly through his eyes, some small hesitation?

‘Well, we’re still together, so we must have done something right.’

There
was
something there in his voice that didn’t sound quite so sure, and this was confirmed when he tried to divert me with a little side-tracking of his own.

‘And now we are engaged,’ he declared, undeniable satisfaction in his voice.

‘And now we are engaged,’ I echoed, my own voice full of another emotion entirely.

‘Are you sure you don’t want to join us, Tony? You’re more than welcome.’

The words were polite enough, and I wondered if my dad could hear that the sentiment wasn’t entirely heartfelt. I saw the twinkle in my father’s eye and knew he understood perfectly.

‘No, no, you two run along and enjoy yourselves. You don’t want me tagging along and ruining your dinner. And besides, I have to make up the spare room for Matt.’

Touché, Dad, excellently done.

Matt said nothing until we were safely inside the leather cocoon of his car.

‘So I’m to be banished to the spare room again, am I?’

I tried not to smile but I could feel my quivering lips beginning to betray me.

‘I’m sure he thinks we’re still teenagers,’ he complained, softly gunning the engine with unnecessary vigour before pulling away from the kerb. ‘He’s still got that old “not under my roof” thing going on. What does he think we get up to in London?’

As I actually didn’t
know
what we got up to in London, I thought it best not to respond.

‘Anyway,’ said Matt, turning to me with an irreverent wink and a grin, ‘I still remember which of the floorboards in the hall creak, so just remember to leave your door unlatched.’

I laughed nervously, not sure if he was joking, but made a mental note to secure my door when we got back.

We had a surprisingly good time that evening, all things considered. Once away from the house and my father’s watchful eye, Matt seemed more himself, or the self I remembered from years gone by. He was attentive and charming, and it was impossible to ignore the envious glances directed towards me from several females in the pub-restaurant where we had chosen to eat.

‘That’s something I had happily forgotten,’ I informed him, after yet another very obvious
what-does-he-see-in-her
appraisal.

Matt must have seen the look the woman had given me but he dismissed it with a shrug.

‘Don’t let it worry you.’

‘It doesn’t worry me, it’s just annoying, that’s all. And rude.’

He got to his feet then. ‘I’m just going to see where they’ve got to with the bill.’ But before leaving he dropped a light kiss on my head. ‘Just remember, I’ve only got eyes for you.’

Less than two minutes later, something happened to make me wonder just how true that statement actually was.

I could still see him crossing the restaurant in the direction of the bar when a small humming sound erupted from the edge of the table. Matt’s mobile phone lay beside our empty plates, its slim shape vibrating persistently against the crockery to indicate an incoming call. I glanced up to summon him back but some instinct made me check the phone first. On the small square screen the caller’s identity was displayed in bold green neon like a billboard. I could read it quite clearly upside down, but nevertheless swivelled the phone with my index finger until it faced me the right way up. Cathy. Five harmless letters, but something about them rang a warning bell that had nothing to do with the incoming call.

What was Cathy doing calling Matt? The phone was still ringing with urgent insistence. Should I answer it? Undecided, I allowed my hand to creep towards the small device, but some instinct stayed me from taking the call. Several diners from nearby tables had turned around at the ringing, the sound clearly interrupting their evening. I met their gazes with an apologetic smile but still didn’t answer the phone. Eventually it stopped.

A minute or two later Matt returned, carrying my coat. Now was the time to tell him about the missed call. To ask why Cathy, who he claimed he hadn’t seen in years until the night of my accident, was phoning him on his mobile phone, the number of which I clearly recalled him saying was only given out to his closest friends and family.