The Real Katie Lavender (41 page)

Rosco gripped his car keys, the knuckles of his hand white. ‘Are you being deliberately obtuse, Dad? Deliberately trying to make out you don’t have a clue what I’m angry about?’

‘You’ve always been the hot-headed member of the family, Rosco.’ Somehow Stirling managed to produce a light-hearted chuckle. ‘You’re angry quite often. It’s one of your less than endearing qualities. So what’s on your mind? A problem at work?’

They were standing in the middle of the kitchen now, and Rosco was looking at him in a way he’d never seen before. His mouth dry with dread, Stirling tried once more to lighten his son’s mood. ‘Are you sure I can’t tempt you to a beer? There’s some in the fridge. I think I’ll have one.’

Rosco shook his head. ‘Tell me about Simone Montrose,’ he said. ‘Tell me why you’ve been exchanging text messages, and why you’ve been visiting her in Oxford.’

The fear and dread increased and a rushing sound filled his ears. He played for time. He went over to the fridge and helped himself to a beer. He took the bottle over to the drawer where they kept the opener. He levered the top off. He went over to the other side of the kitchen, opened the cupboard under the sink and dropped the metal cap into the bin. At last he forced himself to turn and face his son. He leant back against the worktop, put the bottle to his mouth and took a long, calculating swallow, hoping the liquid would quell the queasy knot of panic in the pit of his stomach. ‘Have you been checking my mobile phone?’ he asked, doing his best to keep his voice steady and controlled, at the same time trying to remember the exact words he and Simone had exchanged. God, what a fool he’d been to keep the messages. He’d enjoyed rereading them. He’d been like a lovesick teenager, relishing the illicit excitement of their communication. But the texts hadn’t been explicit. He was sure of that.

‘Any reason why I shouldn’t?’ Rosco asked, switching his car keys from one hand to the other, then back again.

‘Lots of reasons. All to do with respecting another person’s privacy. I would never, under any circumstances, do something like that to you.’

‘You haven’t answered my question.’

‘I don’t think I have to.’

‘I’m not going to leave here until you do.’

Stirling shrugged. ‘Suit yourself.’ He took another long swallow of the beer. Outwardly he knew he was doing a reasonable job of appearing composed, just as an innocent man would, but internally he was a mess. His heart was beating fast and he could feel pools of sweat forming between his shoulder blades.

‘I’m serious, Dad. I know you’ve been seeing that woman. I want to know why. Why are you having an affair with a woman who your own brother had an affair with? Who’s next to have a go at her? Me? Is it my turn next? What is she, the family shag?’

Stirling fought hard to keep his anger in check. ‘How dare you,’ he said.

‘I dare because I don’t trust you any more. That stopped the day Katie Lavender popped up into our lives.’

‘You leave Katie out of this.’

‘The hell I will! Just how many affairs have you had over the years? How many other brothers and sisters do I have out there? Do you even know?’

‘Katie is the only child I’ve fathered outside of my marriage to your mother. It happened at a time in our lives when things weren’t going so well for us. I admit it was a mistake, but I can’t undo that. And I refuse to keep on justifying myself.’

‘And what about Simone Montrose? How do you explain her? Don’t even try to deny you’ve been to Oxford to see her. I know that you lied to us that Bank Holiday weekend when you disappeared for the day, when you said you were in the office. How do I know? Because
I
was in the office that day.’

Shaken at how simply he’d been caught out, Stirling said, ‘Why didn’t you say something at the time?’

‘I was curious. I wanted to know why you’d lied so blatantly and what it was you were hiding from us. I suspected a woman was at the bottom of it. I just never dreamt that you’d sink so low.’

‘So you decided to keep tabs on me, did you? What a devoted son you are.’

‘At least I’m honest. Unlike you.’

‘Except you’ve jumped entirely to the wrong conclusion. That’s the problem with being so hotheaded.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You assumed that I was in contact with Simone because I was having an affair with her. Whereas in fact I’ve been helping her.’

‘Helping her? How? And why?’

‘She’s fallen apart since Neil’s death. She loved him and has no one else to turn to. All I’m being is a shoulder for her to cry on. I felt I owed it to Neil. Whatever you think of him, he was my brother and I’ll always stand by him.’ Pressing his point home, Stirling thought he saw a flicker of doubt pass across his son’s face.

‘Why didn’t you tell us about her?’ Rosco asked.

‘I didn’t think it would go down well with you or your mother. And anyway, it wasn’t anyone else’s business. Are you sure you wouldn’t like that beer now?’ The internal shaking had lessened and his heart rate was slowing. Unbelievably, it looked as if he might get away with it. Thank God he’d always been able to improvise and think on his feet.

‘No,’ Rosco said. His tone was less aggressive, but there was still an edge to it. ‘There’s something else you’ve been hiding from us. Katie. You’ve been in touch with her all this time. Secretly emailing her, haven’t you?’

Stirling sighed. ‘Discreetly, Rosco. Not
secretly
. I could hardly talk openly about writing to her, could I? Not without starting yet another fight with your mother.’

‘If you really cared about Mum, you’d do as she wants and wouldn’t have anything more to do with that girl.’

‘How would you feel if you were in Katie’s shoes and I turned my back on you?’

Without hesitating, Rosco said, ‘I’d be angry and I’d resent you. I’d hate you.’

Stirling frowned. ‘And you think that’s a healthy state to be in?’

‘What the hell do I care how she feels? She means nothing to me. Do you know where she is right now, this very minute?’

‘No.’

‘She’s staying with Lloyd. And I don’t suppose for one moment she’ll be sleeping in the spare room. But then you know all about them, don’t you? Probably given them your blessing. No better way to ensure she gets her feet well and truly under the table.’

‘I knew she and Lloyd had hit it off, but I didn’t know she was here.’ Absurdly, given the circumstances, he felt slighted that Katie hadn’t let him know she was coming.

‘You’ve clearly figured out,’ Rosco went on, ‘that if they get serious about each other, we’ll be stuck with her in the family. But you know what, I don’t believe a word of what you said about being a shoulder to cry on for Simone Montrose. No man in your position would do that. Not unless he was getting sex into the bargain.’

Stirling felt his heart pick up speed again. ‘Don’t judge others by your own standards,’ he said.

‘I think my standards are pretty high, Dad, compared to yours. I’m not the one with a bastard child and a woman in Oxford who I’m screwing on a regular basis. A woman who just happens to be my dead brother’s mistress. It’s about as sordid as it gets, I’d say.’

‘Enough!’ Stirling shouted, banging his bottle of beer down on the work surface. ‘Enough. If you can’t be civil, get out. Just leave me alone.’

‘Touched a nerve, have I?’

‘I said
enough
.’

‘I’m not a child. You can’t tell me when to speak and when not to. You disgust me. You disgust me almost as much as your precious brother did. Well, I tell you this. You can have Katie in your life. She can take my place in the family, because as far as I’m concerned, I don’t want anything to do with it. And I don’t think Mum will either when I tell her about your trips to Oxford.’

‘It’ll be your word against mine.’

‘That’s right. And whose word do you think she’ll be more inclined to believe?’

Stirling shook his head in disbelief. ‘Why would you do that? Why would you be so malicious? Why would you deliberately hurt your own mother so cruelly?’

‘To protect her. To keep her from being hurt by you any more.’

‘Please, Rosco. Don’t. Don’t do it. I’m begging you, please.’ His voice cracked. It was all too much. He couldn’t keep the act up any longer. He didn’t have the strength. He took a deep breath and realized as his son stared back at him that he had wedged himself into a corner of the kitchen cupboards. Physically and mentally he felt trapped. ‘All I want is for things to be how they were,’ he said. ‘I want to put all the bad stuff behind us. I . . . I admit I’ve been a fool with Simone, but please believe me when I say it’s over and I want to make it up to your mother. I just don’t know how at the moment.’

Rosco continued to stare at him. ‘I’ll help you, Dad. All you have to do is get rid of Katie from our lives and your dirty secret stays strictly between us. But don’t you dare ever hurt Mum again. Do you understand?’

Unable to move, Stirling felt as if a heavy weight was crushing him, making it difficult for him to breathe. He began to panic, gulped for air. But still he couldn’t breathe. Shaking, a black terror ripped through him. It was in his stomach, his chest, his head, his hands. He was paralysed by it. The kitchen began to spin, and suddenly everything was slipping away from him and he was letting out a gut-wrenching cry. It was the cry of an animal howling in pain. And he
was
in pain. Huge convulsions of it racked his body as, dry-eyed, he sank slowly to his knees and wept.

Gina was driving home from the hospital. Every now and then she had to wipe her eyes with a tissue. Heaven only knew what she looked like. Her mascara would be shot. For the first time since Louisa-May had been born, she had been allowed to hold her. Gently cradling her grandchild had been poignantly evocative of Rosco’s birth and then Scarlet’s, and had reduced her to inexplicable tears.

If she was honest, she had approached grandparenthood with trepidation. Even reluctance. She had been happy for Scarlet when she had announced she was pregnant – happy because Scarlet was so ecstatic – but not happy at the prospect of becoming a grandmother. She had never been one of those women who went all gooey-eyed over babies and who, when they hit the menopause, started applying pressure to their offspring to repeat the process of procreation just so they could get their hands on a baby.

Not so long ago she had read a piece in a magazine written by a journalist about the same age as her, who’d said she was dragging her heels reluctantly towards becoming a grandmother because she was terrified she would suddenly wake up one morning ‘old and undesirable’ and have to swap her trademark high heels for sensible flat Ecco sandals.
I won’t be so much a style icon as a ‘Landslide Ahead’ warning sign
, the woman had written, summing up exactly how Gina had felt. Which was why each time she visited Scarlet in hospital, she made sure she wore her most stylish and flattering outfits, did her hair and applied full make-up. This evening she was wearing her favourite black Armani trouser suit with a silvery-grey silk blouse and pearls. One of the nurses had asked her if she’d just been somewhere special or was on her way out for dinner. In comparison, Charlie’s mother – Caroline and John were now back from Tuscany – had been wearing a mud-coloured corduroy skirt with the hem coming down at the back and a misshapen turtleneck sweater that was badly felted. Her thatch of coarse greying hair looked like she had tried cutting it herself, which she probably had, and with a pair of dog-hair trimmers.

Being as reluctant as she was to embrace this new phase in her life and, horror of horrors, turn into a version of Charlie’s mother, Gina hadn’t been prepared to feel such love for her grandchild. Holding Louisa-May this evening had been one of the most emotional experiences of her life. She had wanted to hug the child close, to wrap her in love, to pour every ounce of her love and protection into that small vulnerable body. Or had she, she wondered now, wanted to absorb the essence of what a newborn represented – a new beginning?

It was what she and Stirling needed: a fresh start. If only Stirling would see things from her point of view, that it was expecting too much of her to have a reminder near her that rubbed salt so excruciatingly into the raw wound of his betrayal. Why couldn’t he see that? She would forgive him for what he’d done if he would just get rid of that wretched girl from their lives. The only way she could move on was to pretend that Katie Lavender had never existed. Was that so very awful?

Home now, she brought the car to a stop and switched off the engine, surprised and pleased to see Rosco’s car parked alongside Stirling’s.

Her key poised to let herself in, the door flew open and she was nearly knocked off her feet by Rosco bursting out of the house. ‘You’re in a hurry,’ she remarked good-humouredly. ‘Where’s the fire?’ As soon as she’d uttered the words, she realized something was wrong. ‘What is it?’ she asked.

‘You’d better ask Dad.’ And then he was off, marching towards his car.

‘Rosco,’ she called after him. ‘Come back!’

‘Just ask Dad.’

She watched him get into his Range Rover. Drive carefully, she wanted to say as his headlamps lit up the driveway and he revved the powerful engine and took off much too fast.

The red tail-lights gone, she closed the door and went to look for Stirling. What on earth had been going on here?

She found him in the kitchen. On the floor, his knees drawn up to his chest, his head in his hands, he was emitting an ugly groaning sound. It was guttural. Like nothing she had ever heard before. Her first thought was that he and Rosco had had a fight and that Stirling was hurt. She threw down her handbag and keys and crossed the kitchen. She knelt on the floor in front of him. ‘Stirling, what is it? What’s wrong?’

His hands batted her away. ‘No,’ he said hoarsely, not looking at her. ‘Leave me alone. Just go.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not going anywhere.’ She grabbed his hands, held them firmly. ‘Talk to me. Did you and Rosco have a fight?’

He shook his head, tried to snatch his hands from hers. She held on tight.

‘Stirling. This is absurd. How can I help you if you won’t tell me what’s wrong? Are you hurt? Do I need to call for a doctor?’