Chapter 31
Present
It came out of nowhere on the morning of their eighteenth wedding anniversary.
A dull ache that eased across Kip’s heart.
At first, he wondered if perhaps his heart was finally going to give out – so many of his teammates had stents in and all sorts of things going on in the last few years.
But no. It wasn’t that. He turned over to look at Blythe, sleeping, unaware of him, of the day’s significance on any level.
He was not sure he knew who she was anymore.
It was all about Siggy.
Well, it always had been, for both of them, all about Siggy.
But, stupidly, he’d believed that they had something much stronger beyond sharing a daughter.
He had worshipped Blythe for as long as he could remember.
Alright, he’d never expected their relationship to be equal exactly, he’d been more than happy to let her make the big decisions around the guest house.
Blythe knew everything there was to know about the hotel business, he was content to carry on taking care of the place.
The fact was, that whether she realised it or not, Blythe had done more for him over the years than he could ever put into words.
He was no carpenter, painter, plumber or electrician.
But, he’d become all four, thanks mainly to her absolute belief in the fact that he could do anything he set his mind to.
And to live up to her expectations, he’d taught himself every skill needed to bring the guest house up to her very high standards.
Sometimes, he walked past the old staircase and rubbed his hand along the balustrade.
No one would ever imagine that this was his work – he’d replaced the original badly-worn and flimsy rail with a beautifully carved and smoothed substitute that guests commented on over the years.
Blythe never made them any the wiser and Kip never expected her to.
It was the same in every bathroom in the house.
He’d never tiled or grouted or put in strip lighting in his life, but then, he rose to the occasion; magnificently, Blythe said each time.
Only he knew, it was because Blythe believed in him.
And this had changed everything for Kip.
At a time when he expected to end up on the scrap heap, suddenly he was immersed in a whole new world.
It was a world with endless possibilities where, against all the odds, he seemed to be once more on the winning team.
This time, instead of playing in the backs, he felt like the winger.
They’d never have gotten off the ground if they had to pay to get the place up and running at the start and as time went on, they fell into their own roles, easily, comfortably.
And then, just as Blythe turned over and pulled the quilt higher around her shoulders, he had his second epiphany. Did she even love him anymore?
The fact was, he knew they were on different pages now.
Whether they were on completely different roads, he knew how trajectories worked, less than a degree could make a million miles in the difference eventually.
Somewhere, along the way, he hadn’t noticed, they’d gone off course, in ever so slightly different directions, but now the gap was widening. Soon, she would be too far to reach.
He knew that Siggy had fallen in love.
Well, he knew that she had a boyfriend – Danial.
And instead of being able to come home and tell Blythe, what had he done?
He’d bitten down his excitement for his daughter and watched a game of rugby on repeat with a sullen expression.
He’d sat there for a whole evening while Blythe scrolled through Facebook or Instagram or some other social media app and he’d festered in this growing awareness that he could not tell her.
He lay there, for a while, trying to put aside that niggling feeling. It frightened him, Kip couldn’t imagine life without Blythe.
There were so many things keeping them together, habit, those vows, money, Siggy and maybe on his part, more than anything else, the promise he’d made to his own mother all those years ago.
He would not be his father’s son; he would be a good and steadfast husband.
That, and the memory of the day he’d come back and found his mother, inconsolable, bloody-nosed and broken on their kitchen floor.
What had happened to them?
Instantly, he thought, Blythe had changed.
But if Blythe changed, wasn’t that completely and absolutely his fault?
He should have known back then, when Jack Scott sat him down in the hotel snug – he should have known then, that just because he never needed the hotel, didn’t mean the same went for Blythe.
Did losing that hotel break her heart? Kip, for all his bravery, never had the courage to tell his wife about that conversation with Jack.
Later, he could see, he should have fought for her.
She was going to be his wife. He should have stood up to Jack Scott and told him he wouldn’t stand for anything that would make Blythe unhappy.
Had he read the whole situation wrong? Probably – too many knocks to the head as a rugby player, he was never quite sure that he was getting the full picture of anything.
He thought – at the time, he thought that old Jack was testing the waters – trying to figure if Kip was marrying Blythe for her money or because he really loved her.
Bugger.
He had to get up – he couldn’t lie here next to Blythe with these thoughts racing around his mind for a moment longer.
He knew where they went, round and round until he wanted to kick himself for being so stupid back then.
He would try and talk himself round. They’d had a good life, a great adventure building up the business.
They had a beautiful daughter. He felt that twist of anger within him again.
He couldn’t stand aside and allow Blythe to steer their daughter’s life as if it was her own, he just couldn’t.
He shrugged into his clothes, as quietly as possible. He had things to do, Fiona Dixon was pressing down on him to help some other poor case who had arrived in the village a few weeks earlier.
He owed Fiona. Well, maybe not owed exactly, but they’d grown up next door to each other – she was Fiona McLaverty then, her family every bit as poor as the Carneys. Old Nellie McLaverty, Fiona’s grandmother, had been the first to arrive once the word got out that his father had done a runner.
She’d arrived at the back door of their house, mostly unseen by any of them, with various small bits and pieces from the vegetable patch she tended in their small back garden.
There was never a word said, and maybe Kip would have been none the wiser, but he caught her, early one morning leaving a fresh baked loaf of brown bread and a brace of scallions, lettuces and a bunch of wildflowers for his mother.
Even though he was twelve years old, Kip thought he’d never loved anyone more than old Mrs McLaverty that morning.
Fiona was the same, even though she was a lot younger than Kip. No one dared say a word to any of the Carneys when Fiona was about – she was mostly like that annoying younger sister, until push came to shove and they needed her, she was always on their side.
Time was a funny thing.
Fiona was unrecognisable now from that skinny kid. These days she drove around town in a huge white Mercedes. She paraded around done-up as if she was a Christmas tree, in Kip’s opinion. Blythe said she was always immaculately put-together; Kip reckoned she didn’t so much as lift a finger at home.
But she still had, unknown to most people in the village, a kindness in her heart – some things are ingrained in you, probably.
Despite all appearances, she never forgot where she came from, even if she’d never admit that to the likes of Blythe who, by comparison to both Kip and Fiona, had grown up with a silver spoon in her mouth.
Fiona had called him the previous evening, looking to meet up.
‘I think Blythe is…’ she said when she’d barely sat into his van.
She’d never been one to tittle-tattle, not to make trouble for him and Blythe at least. Oh, he knew well enough she loved to gossip with the rest of the women in the village, but she’d always looked out for the people who meant something to her.
‘Blythe is her own woman,’ Kip said.
‘Listen.’ Fiona had a way of saying things sometimes, so you knew there was something you needed to hear. ‘It’s that boy, Danial.’
‘Ah, the Vals,’ Kip had really warmed to Melissa Val, he’d only called to her because Fiona said she needed some help.
The woman had arrived from the other side of the world, on her own, to a cottage that hadn’t been lived in for over a year, it was the least he could do as a welcome to the island.
After hanging some shelves, he’d returned and painted the scraggy old back door for her.
Lovely woman, she’d made him a spicy stew for dinner and talked to him about her life before she came to Muffeen Mòr.
She was good company, easy to talk to; there had been seconds of the stew and pudding to finish.
‘Blythe is telling people that Danial is behind the break-ins,’ Fiona said.
‘Danial, no, he’s a good kid.’ Kip knew a good kid when he saw one and it was shining out of that boy.
‘I’m not sure she fully believes it either, but I think…’
‘Go on.’ Kip felt a thin film of sweat break out along his spine.
‘I think that Danial and Siggy might have a bit of a thing going…’
‘Ah, I see now, what you’re getting at…’
‘Exactly.’ She rooted in her huge handbag and fished out a pair of reading glasses, handed them to him. ‘Look.’ She opened her phone and pointed towards the screen with her crimson nails.
‘What’s this?’
‘It’s our book club group. She’s all but said she’s seen him jump through the windows with the loot under his arm…’
‘Oh, Blythe.’ And Kip felt his heart turn over in his chest with disappointment in his wife. ‘Please, Fiona, don’t…’
‘Do you think I’m mad? I’m not going to call her out on it, but Kip, you know how things are on the island, let the wrong crowd in on a rumour and it can become a witch hunt before dinner time.’
‘And you think…’
‘Well, apparently, she has Mae English in her ear more often than any of our usual gang.’
‘Mae English? What in God’s name is she doing hanging about with that bitter old crow?’
‘Your guess is as good as mine. There may be nothing to it, but if she goes saying that to Mae, well, it’s only a matter of time until there’s a lynch mob after Danial and his grandmother.’
‘She doesn’t mean anything by it, you know that yourself.’ Kip looked at Fiona now, but she didn’t agree or make any sort of nod to say he was right, which only added to his worries.
‘You needed to know. If she’s not careful, this sort of stuff could lead to big trouble.’
‘Bloody hell.’
‘I’m so sorry,’ Fiona said. ‘I just had to tell you, I couldn’t not…’
‘I know.’ He understood, he’d have done the same for her.
Kip watched as Fiona got out of his van and into her own Mercedes with a heavy heart. What was he to do?
This wasn’t a physical thing he could pick up and move aside. This was something far beyond his area of expertise, which would always be more practical than cerebral.
Oh, Blythe, he thought, what have you become? And suddenly, he felt as if they’d spun so far away from each other, there may as well have been the Grand Canyon separating them.