The Real Katie Lavender (25 page)

‘How exactly?’

‘If you’d had your eye on the ball you would have known what Neil was up to.’

‘And what’s your excuse for not knowing what Stirling was up to thirty years ago?’

Gina sucked in her breath. ‘That’s different. We’d only been married a few years.’ Immediately she regretted what she’d said, it sounded as if she was defending Stirling, and nothing could be further from her mind.

‘It may have taken place just a couple of years into your marriage,’ Pen came back at her, ‘but you still have to ask yourself why he did it. At least I know why, as you put it, Neil looked elsewhere, and I have to say it’s none of your business. Perhaps you should consider the adage that people in glass houses really shouldn’t throw stones.’

At that, and seeing that at last Pen was showing she had some fight in her, Gina couldn’t resist playing her trump card. A trump card that would hurt as no other could. ‘At least I gave my husband children. Unlike you.’

Pen stared at her steadily. ‘I think you’d better go now,’ she said.

‘Don’t worry, I wouldn’t dream of staying a second longer. I’m just glad that at last we’ve been honest with each other.’

‘I had no idea you despised me so thoroughly, Gina. You should have got this off your chest years ago.’

‘You’re right, I should have, but for the sake of the family, I kept quiet.’

‘You don’t think that for the sake of the family, during this particularly difficult time, it wouldn’t have been better to continue with the pretence that you liked me?’

‘I’ve had enough of pretending. And I’d seriously advise
you
to stop pretending you’re some kind of middle-aged Pollyanna and acquaint yourself with the real world. You’re on your own now, Pen. There’s no more good old Neil to protect you. It’s time to stand on your own two feet. Unless, of course, you’re planning to replace Neil with Lloyd and rely on him for everything. But how soon before he grows sick of your stifling dependence on him and ends up hating you?’

‘Please go, Gina. I’ll tell Stirling you called in to see him. Can I pass a message on?’

‘Don’t bother. He’ll be hearing from my solicitor soon enough.’

Alone in the garden, Pen closed her eyes. Her body was stiff and ached with the effort of trying not to shake. Gina was just being irrational, she told herself. She’s furious with Stirling. Lashing out at the first and easiest target. She didn’t mean what she said. Of course she didn’t.

As if it was now safe to do so, Pen opened her eyes. She let out the breath she’d been holding in and wrapped her arms tightly around her body. All her life she had taken every possible step she could to avoid conflict of any sort. She hated arguments and disagreements. She had witnessed too many with her warring parents when she’d been a child. Their eventual divorce had come as a relief to her; naively she’d imagined that the fighting would then be over with. But she’d been wrong. They had kept up the arguments, most of which revolved around whose turn it was
not
to have her for the school holidays. Their busy schedules – her father had been a diplomat and her mother had been what could only be described as a socialite with a ferociously busy diary – had dictated that she attend boarding school. She hadn’t minded a bit, she had loved school; it was the holidays she had dreaded, knowing that she would be the cause of yet more conflict and hostility. She had done her best to be as unobtrusive a child as she could, and it was a habit she had taken on through to adulthood, always wanting to keep the peace, never to be the cause of a disagreement or get involved in one.

But with Gina just now, she had come as close as she’d ever come to a full-blown fight, not just to rant and rave, but to cause actual bodily harm to her sister-in-law. At every accusation Gina had made, she’d had to force herself with superhuman strength not to react. Had she given in to her feelings, she would have lost all control.

The knowledge of that frightened her. It made her realize that her emotions were balanced on a knife edge. One more push, and who knew what she might be capable of.

‘I’d say the day was an unqualified success. What do you think?’

Brighton was behind them now and they were on the A23 heading towards Horsham. Lloyd had known when they’d set off this morning that Cecily was keen for him to approve of his newly discovered cousin. He was about to reply when Cecily said, ‘I wanted you to meet the real Katie as soon as possible, because I wanted to nip in the bud any preconceived ideas you might have been forming about her, given that with their pernicious and pejorative tosh, Gina and co. are branding her as some sort of devil child. Especially Rosco.’

‘Since when have any of my opinions coincided with Rosco’s?’

‘I know that, but I’m on a mission to ensure the poor girl is given a fair chance. As any right-thinking person would agree, the circumstances of her birth are no fault of hers. So what did you think of her? You seemed to be getting along very well. She was understandably a little on edge when we arrived, but that’s no wonder, since she would have known you would be putting her under the microscope.’

Lloyd thought of the obvious bond he’d witnessed between his grandmother and Katie, how surprisingly natural they’d been around each other. But he knew of old that if Cecily took to a person, she would develop an instant and easy rapport with them; there would be no standing on ceremony with her.

In contrast, there had been an initial guardedness from Katie towards him, but gradually she had relaxed and been funny and quick-witted. Yet at the same time, there was a serious and sensitive side to her. When she had offered him her condolences regarding his father, her words had been frank and sincere and said without any hint of awkwardness on her part. He had respected her for that. Too frequently of late when people spoke to him of his loss – was there a more inadequate word for what he was going through? – he’d been subjected to stultifying embarrassment or insulting artifice.

‘I think she makes an excellent addition to the family, Granza,’ he said, choosing his words with care. ‘It should be fun having her around, although Rosco is likely to make her life hell and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.’

‘You don’t think she’s more than capable of taking care of herself? And Rosco? Just as you do?’

He nodded. ‘Fair point.’

‘You like her, then?’

‘I believe we’ve established that.’ He turned and smiled at his grandmother. ‘I’m officially a fan. She’s great. Really great.’

‘Good. I’m glad. Because I have every intention of us seeing a lot more of her.’

‘No complaints from me on that score.’

Rosco couldn’t believe what he was hearing. What the hell was his father playing at? Going to Oxford to meet Uncle Neil’s mistress? Was he mad?

It was becoming rapidly clear to him that certain elements of the family were losing their grip on reality and were deliberately – if not downright maliciously – pulling in the wrong direction, and to the detriment of those around them. Which included Cecily and Lloyd getting all chummy with the product of Dad’s affair. How did they think Gina was supposed to cope with that? It beggared belief. Looking at the highly agitated state of his mother as she sat knocking back a second gin and tonic in the conservatory with Scarlet, who was drinking some kind of lemon and ginger concoction, he wished Dad was here to see the damage he was inflicting.

Rosco didn’t think he would ever come to terms with his father’s infidelity and the grotesquely cavalier way he’d told them about it. It still sickened him to recall the expression on his father’s face that day of the funeral; it was as if he had taken malevolent delight in shocking them with the announcement. In that moment, Dad had turned into a stranger.

Increasingly Rosco was becoming concerned that his brother’s death might have affected Dad more than they had originally thought. What if it was making him unwell?
Mentally
unwell? And what if he wasn’t in a fit state to make important decisions at work? What then? Rosco knew the answer, and if it was necessary, he would take that step to safeguard the company. There could be no woolly behaviour or illogical uncertainty; too much was at stake. They had to be seen to be totally back in control, a united front with nothing to hide. There had been enough whispering and gossiping going on in the last month amongst the staff, not just in relation to Neil, but now about Stirling and his marriage. As yet nobody seemed to know about Katie Lavender, and Rosco hoped it would remain that way. For the sake of appearances, he made damned sure that whenever anyone was around them, he and Dad appeared to be in perfect harmony. But when they were alone, it was a stretch for him to be civil to his father. His father knew it, too.

He went over to the wine rack and picked out a bottle of red wine. As he uncorked it, he listened to Scarlet through the open doors between the kitchen and conservatory; she was talking about the child she was carrying and all the stress this situation was putting on it. He rolled his eyes. The baby would know stress all right when it was born. Having a mother like Scarlet would not be an easy ride. Always trying to put herself at the centre of any drama, she was about as consistent and reliable as the weather. She could happily claim black was white one day and then swear with breathtaking conviction that she’d said no such thing the following day.

At the moment, of course, she was baby-centric, and unless a thing related directly to her and her baby she wasn’t interested. But the Dad and Katie Lavender situation was very much of interest to her. She had been stunned to learn of their half-sister and swore she would never accept her as such.

When it came to Mum divorcing Dad, Rosco knew that his sister was secretly against the idea. Oh yes, she wanted Dad to be punished for what he’d done to them, but deep down Scarlet – the poster girl for Daddy’s girls the world over – loved him and didn’t want their parents to split up. Neither did Rosco. He knew what would happen if they did go through with it. Scarlet would have given birth by then and would have turned into the Mumzilla from Hell, and he would be left to shoulder the burden of taking care of their mother. The slightest problem and he would be expected to deal with it. It had happened to a friend of his – during the divorce and thereafter the friend’s mother practically lost all ability to think or do anything for herself. Rosco didn’t want that for his mother. Or for himself. A far worse scenario would be if Gina married again. If that happened, they’d have a stranger meddling in their affairs, and that was something Rosco would never countenance.

These were two very good reasons why he needed to get Scarlet on side; he needed her to start thinking clearly and to stop stirring up their mother by going on and on about how awful Dad had been. With her help he believed he could bring about a reconciliation between their parents, as well as a way to get rid of Katie Lavender from their lives for good. He was all for his mother showing her anger and disgust at what Dad had done, but she could turn this to her advantage if she used her head. All it would take was a simple ultimatum and Dad would be brought back into line. And three cheers to that, he thought, raising his wine glass in the air.

On the B4009 and heading towards Watlington, Stirling was stuck in traffic – ahead of him there was a set of temporary lights and a sign for roadworks. With Fauré’s Requiem playing on the car’s CD player, he felt boundless and detached from all that was going on around him. He was tempted to pull over, close his eyes and give in to the feeling of unexpected calm he was experiencing.

It was the first time since Neil’s death that he hadn’t felt like his heart was racing or that he was continuously swimming against the tide with a heavy load on his back. Sleep had become a rarity for him, and most mornings he woke exhausted, as though he hadn’t slept at all, his head fuzzy, his legs and arms leaden. It was a monumental effort to drag himself out of bed, but then once he was up and showered, his mind became a maelstrom of anxious activity and his body was flooded with adrenalin. It was an exhausting state to be in.

But with the top back on his car, the sun shining down on him, the music soaring, he felt so relaxed he could almost believe he didn’t have a care in the world. The thought was so ludicrous he wanted to laugh out loud. He couldn’t help but wonder if this was a sign he was on the brink of losing his mind. But given the choice, he’d rather be happily out of his mind than sane and consciously having to endure another day of this nightmare.

He pondered why he was feeling this lightness of spirit. It was possible that Simone had something to do with it. Being with her had made him feel connected to Neil in a way that no one else did, not Pen, not Lloyd, not even Cecily. She had told him how she and Neil had met, how initially it had been nothing more than a relaxed and easy friendship, neither one of them knowingly pushing it to be anything else.

That was how it had been for Stirling with Katie’s mother, Fay. A natural friendship had developed between them from the first day she had started working for him. A clichéd affair with his secretary could not have been further from his thoughts, and he’d been shocked rigid when he realized that his feelings for her were tipping into something dangerously inappropriate. He tried to alter his behaviour towards her, to put some distance between them. He considered asking her to leave, planning in his head how he would go about it, but when it came to it, he couldn’t go through with the plan; the thought of never seeing her again was too much, and so he found himself crossing the line he never thought he would.

At no stage did Fay make a move on him; it was, as Simone had described the situation with her and Neil, a natural coming together of two people intensely and profoundly attracted to each other. When something as strong as that happened, when love was involved, all sense of right and wrong no longer existed. For that brief time with Fay he was happier than he’d ever been; she’d made him feel something he hadn’t known he could feel.

He couldn’t say that he’d ever been unhappy in his marriage to Gina, and he was convinced that had he not met Fay, he would never have strayed, but Fay had been that special one-in-a-million woman who had had the power to completely change his life.