Chapter 50
Issy took a long sip of wine, enjoying the numbing effect as the alcohol infiltrated her bloodstream, anaesthetising her. She’d been waiting for Hugh for hours, dreading the inevitable confrontation, but impatient too.
Her head was spinning with all the things she’d learnt that day. Her thoughts kept circling back to Rosa. Why hadn’t Issy asked the question? The most important question of all. Did my father rape Anna?
The words had formed themselves in her mind, but when she opened her mouth to speak them, she’d lost her nerve.
Who was she protecting? Rosa? Maybe she didn’t ask so that Rosa didn’t have to admit that she’d concealed the rape of a young woman by a rich powerful man so that her boys could get an education she couldn’t afford.
Poor Rosa. She’d lived with the guilt of it for thirty years.
The shame of knowing she’d made that choice.
But that wasn’t really why Issy had avoided asking the question.
If she was honest with herself—which she rarely was, it struck her now—she didn’t want to know.
What if the answer was yes? What then? What would she do with that?
And what would it cost her? It was the same reason she couldn’t bring herself to confront her father.
When push came to shove, she was gutless.
Her phone lit up with a text message and she reached for it, glad to have a distraction from her self-loathing. It was from Nadia.
Babe! Can’t believe it’s taken me so long to send through this pic I took at your party. What a gorgeous family you have! Love to you and Hugh. Can’t wait for the wedding!
Issy studied the accompanying photo. Hugh stood in the centre surrounded by Ashworths, his arms around Malcolm and Spencer.
She was at one side of the group, severed from the rest of the family by the crack in her phone screen.
The photo was a month and a lifetime ago.
It felt like she was looking at a stranger.
Someone who thought the ground beneath her feet was solid, blissfully unaware of the fault lines that ran beneath her, invisible but dangerous.
Her heartbeat picked up as she heard the growl of Hugh’s 911 echo in the street below. She put the phone down and checked her reflection in the mirror by the door. The sound of his footsteps coming up the concrete staircase was followed by a knock.
‘Honey, I’m home!’
He gave her an ironic, dimpled smile when she opened the door. There were lines around his eyes which made him look hungover.
‘I thought you were coming back after lunch.’
‘I was, but I saw a mate and had a few beers at Icebergs.’ He pulled her towards him, pushing the strap off her shoulder and kissing her collarbone.
She moved away, straightening the strap, and went to the fridge. ‘Beer?’
‘Thanks.’
‘How was last night?’ she asked, taking the top off a Peroni.
Hugh shrugged. ‘Yeah, awesome.’ She passed him the beer and they sat on the sofa. He laughed. ‘Marshall went home with one of the waitresses.’
‘What about Carmen?’
‘Carmen?’ he replied, as though he didn’t understand the question. He took a swig of his beer. ‘Poor bloke, his life’ll be over once that bloody baby arrives.’
Issy felt herself frown.
He saw it. ‘What? You’re not going to tell Carmen, are you?’
She regained her composure and shrugged, hoping it came off as blasé and disinterested. Cool. ‘Of course not.’
She’d always been a cool girl—she’d inherited that trait from her mother.
The kind of girl who didn’t hassle her boyfriend.
Who didn’t make demands. The kind of girl who took things in her stride.
She didn’t get psycho about things. If you were a girl, you had two choices.
She’d learnt that early. You could be a cool girl or you could be a psycho.
That was the phrase Hugh used to describe his ex-girlfriends when he’d spoken about them, early in the relationship.
Calculated, cautionary tales, Issy suspected now, designed to inform her what sort of girl she needed to be.
‘You’re so damn cool,’ he’d say, when she waved away a change of plan, a late arrival, another boys’ weekend.
New Year’s Eve in Sydney with your brother? Sure, whatever.
Hugh was saying something about getting his car towed after he parked it in a clearway, but she wasn’t listening. She was watching him as he spoke, seeing him clearly for the first time.
‘… I ended up slinging the guy three hundred bucks to take the car off the tow truck.’ He drained the rest of his beer.
‘Good one,’ she said, sensing that was the desired response. ‘Another beer?’
‘Thanks.’ He handed her his empty bottle. She checked the time on the oven clock as she took another beer from the fridge. He’d been home for half an hour, and he hadn’t asked her a single question. Not one. Not, ‘How have you been?’ Not, ‘Did you have a good night?’ Not even, ‘Have you missed me?’
She walked back over to the lounge and put the beer down in front of him. When she sat down she watched him, studying him. He didn’t give a damn about her, it struck her now.
He met her gaze, frowned ever so slightly and lifted his beer towards her wine glass, which sat empty on the coffee table. ‘Cheers,’ he said.
She picked up the glass and clinked it against his, but said nothing.
‘What?’ he asked.
‘I did that DNA test.’ She watched his face, enjoying seeing his confusion at her defiance. He’d warned her against it.
He shook his head, raising his eyebrows. ‘What the hell did you do that for?’
‘Maybe I’m sick of lies. You want to know what the results told me?’ She held his gaze, daring him to ask.
‘What?’
‘Turns out I’m not an Ashworth.’ She didn’t know where the lie came from, but it came to her fully formed. ‘Mum must have had an affair, because my father’s a panel beater from Canberra. I spoke to him. He worked here in Hartwell at the hotel for a while, thirty-one years ago.’
He scowled. ‘What are you talking about?’
Issy just shrugged. Cool.
‘It has to be a mistake, it can’t be right.’
‘It’s not a mistake.’ She swallowed hard. ‘And I know about the cheating.’
His head snapped up. ‘What cheating? You mean Marshall?’
‘No.’ She met his small, dark eyes. ‘I mean you.’
Hugh’s expression was indignant disbelief. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘Don’t lie to me, Hugh, you’ll just make yourself look stupid.’
His face hardened. An accusation of stupidity was his Achilles heel.
He’d told her that once as they lay naked in bed, in a rare moment of vulnerability.
His father had been convinced Hugh was stupid, a fact confirmed when he missed out on law at Sydney by a couple of marks.
According to his father, nowhere else was good enough for a Thorburn.
He’d pulled some strings and after a year of engineering, Hugh had been offered a place in a Bachelor of Laws and a room at St Paul’s College.
But his father had never let him forget that he didn’t get the marks to get in.
Issy couldn’t read his face. At first, she thought he was about to cry, but then the set of his jaw tightened.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he said again.
She slid the enormous solitaire off her ring finger and placed it on the coffee table.
He looked from her face to the diamond, then back again. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘I want you to leave.’
‘What? Issy, I don’t know what’s happened, I don’t know why you’re doing this. I love you!’
‘No, you don’t. You love Isobel Ashworth.’
‘You are Isobel Ashworth! What the hell are you talking about?’ Any softness in his eyes was gone now. She could feel the fury coursing through his body. He stretched his fingers, open and closed, making a fist. ‘What the actual hell are you talking about? I’m too tired for this crap—’
‘You can stay at the hotel until you’ve found somewhere else to live. I’ll let Jeffrey know to expect you.’
‘Please, Issy, please.’ Tears spilled down his cheeks now.
She felt a twinge of embarrassment at seeing him like this. He reached out to touch her leg, but she flinched.
‘Don’t touch me.’ Her voice sounded cold, even to her own ears. He pulled his hand away and stood up, simmering with rage. As he walked past the door, he slammed his fist into the mirror, glass fragments smashing across the floor.