6. Chapter 6
6
B arnsford was a small town nestled in the Gloucestershire countryside. The narrow old streets were lined with Tudor and Georgian buildings, some of the oldest wooden-beamed, black and white buildings pitching at alarming angles over the pavements. One-way traffic crawled through the town on this warm afternoon. A smattering of tourists strolled around, cameras out, photographing the crooked old houses and taking selfies beside blue plaques that listed the famous people or events that had taken place there some three or four hundred years before.
Tom had chosen a small brasserie for them to meet at on a cobbled street off the high street. Leaf & Hops served food all day, and it was as easy to get a coffee as it was to get a decent wine or beer. He had no idea if she’d want caffeine, alcohol, or neither, so he had picked somewhere that offered every kind of legal pick-me-up.
The brasserie was dark and moody, even on a late sunny afternoon like this, the narrow restaurant room disappearing under narrow beams into smaller rooms towards the back of the building. The light that found its way in through the ancient leaded windows was soon lost, unable to penetrate beyond the first few feet. Dim wall lights and faint chandeliers lit the further reaches of the restaurant, little tea lights flickering away on the tables. Old blues music murmured away in the background, men singing about broken hearts, love, betrayal, and the hangman.
Tom had selected a spot a little way into the brasserie, wanting to avoid windows and the risk of anyone he knew—Melissa—walking past and seeing him sitting there. He brooded into his beer and watched the flame slowly sputter on an old tea light in a jar in front of him.
On any other occasion, a place like this would have been romantic, though he had never gone there with Melissa. She preferred bright lights and crowded places. Restaurants with industrial aesthetics and extensive cocktail menus who serve their meals on wooden boards rather than plates. He hadn’t wanted to meet somewhere that reminded him of her.
The front door swung open, and his head sprang up. An older couple walked in, the man standing back to let the woman walk through.
Not Katie.
He wondered, not for the first time, what he hoped this meeting would achieve for either of them. A chance to join the dots? To talk about when they had first suspected, the signs they had seen, what they must have missed? To commiserate? Did any of that matter now? Maybe she wouldn’t show.
The door swung open again, a blast of warm summer air with the faint smell of traffic and something like sun cream and bergamot. Tom watched as a tiny river of condensation trickled down the outside of his glass.
‘Tom?’
He started at his name and looked up. There was Katie, standing in front of him, the little table between them. Looking fierce and entirely unlike the first time he had met her.
Her auburn hair hung in waves about her shoulders. She wore an oversized pink and red zebra striped blazer over a bright blue sun dress and silver ankle cowboy boots. She had dark glasses on despite the gloom inside and scarlet lipstick that was bright against her pale skin. A smattering of honey-coloured freckles trailed over her cheeks and nose.
He pushed back his chair, stood up, and reached out a hand. ‘Katie, hi. Thanks for coming.’
She took his hand, her grip firm, and nodded. ‘Hi.’
Relief flooded through him and he realised he was glad she had come. He gestured to the chair opposite him across the little wooden table. As they took their seats, the small candle flickered between them and he wished he had thought to blow it out before she had arrived. The hint of romance it suggested felt all wrong.
He felt suddenly nervous.
‘You look well,’ he said, for want of anything else to say. He had seen on her social media how pretty she was, but he felt oddly tongue-tied.
Katie pulled down her dark glasses and appraised him from across the table. She looked apprehensive, and blue-grey shadows under her eyes were not quite hidden by makeup.
‘You mean for someone who just found out her boyfriend is a cheating bastard?’
Tom blinked and said calmly. ‘I mean by any standards. You look great.’
Katie relaxed a little and shrugged off her jacket. ‘Thanks,’ she said in a quiet voice. She looked him up and down. ‘How are you?’
Tom grinned, feeling himself start to relax. ‘Oh, you know. A bit heartbroken and also furious and faintly homicidal.’
Katie smiled back, and her shoulders inched down away from her ears. ‘Me too. I veer wildly between feeling like I could cry for an hour and then remembering what he did and who he really is and wanting to key his car.’
Tom laughed. ‘Have you done it yet?’
She furrowed her brows. ‘As soon as I work out how to do it without getting caught, I just might…. But I have taken the fuse out of the plug in his smoothie maker. He has no idea about DIY, so he’ll assume it’s broken and go out and buy a new one.’ She gave a little shrug. ‘Petty, I know, but it feels good.’
She pulled out her purse. Tom put his hand out.
‘Please, let me get you a drink. After all,’ he stood, ‘my ex-girlfriend did sleep with your ex-boyfriend.’
Katie stared at him, her mouth falling open. Oh god. Maybe it was too soon for jokes.
Then she burst out laughing, her head tipping back. ‘Well, when you put it like that, you’d better make it a large gin and tonic.’
‘Did you know Melissa?’ Tom asked a few minutes later, cold drinks now sitting on the table between them.
Katie tipped her head from side to side.
‘Sort of. I knew of her because Ryan had told me they had someone new starting back when she joined the company, which I guess was maybe a year or so ago. Ryan talked about work a lot, so I knew a fair bit about most of his colleagues. And I met her a couple of times, once at an Estate Agent awards dinner,’ she rolled her eyes, ‘which is as bad as it sounds, and once when Ryan and I stopped by her place to drop off some files from the office one day. That’s how I knew where she lived. The pink door made it easy to remember which house.’ She sipped her drink, watching him from under dark lashes. ‘Did you know Ryan at all?’
Tom shook his head. ‘No, Melissa didn’t talk about her colleagues much.’ He grimaced. ‘In fact, the way she talked about work, you’d have thought she ran the agency single-handed.’
‘What do you do for work? Oh god.’ Her hand flew to her mouth. ‘Are you an estate agent too? I didn’t mean it about the dinner event being awful.’
He could see she was trying not to smile behind her fingers.
‘It’s okay.’ He grinned at her. ‘I’m not an estate agent—’
‘Thank fuck.’ Katie exhaled. ‘I’ve had about enough of them.’
Tom burst out laughing. ‘Yeah, I know what you mean.’
‘So? What do you do? When you’re not stalking someone?’
‘Asks the woman who was decked out in a wig, trench coat, and glasses last time I saw her. Do you actually need glasses, or were they part of the disguise, too?’
Katie, who was taking a sip of her gin, nearly spat it back into her glass. Tom watched as she pinched her mouth closed and tried hard to swallow.
‘Ahahaha,’ she spluttered. ‘I forgot about my disguise!’ She wiped a finger under her eyes. ‘I took the sleuthing all very seriously. No, I don’t wear glasses. They were part of the spy mission.’
Tom nodded. ‘That was one of the worst wigs I’ve ever seen.’
‘Seen a lot of wigs, have you?’ she threw back.
‘Oh yes. I actually run a costume and wig hire company.’
Katie’s mouth fell open. ‘No, you don’t!’
‘Nope,’ he admitted. ‘But it would be funny if I did.’
Katie let out a hoot of laughter. She laughed with her whole body, her head falling back, a hand resting on her stomach. There was an authenticity and a freedom to it.
Tom was enjoying himself despite it all. He had expected tears or thinly veiled anger from one or both of them, but instead, here they were, poking fun through the pain.
Katie wriggled in her seat and sat up straight. ‘Okay, so you’re not really a wig seller—’
‘Wig hirer,’ Tom corrected her.
She grinned and rolled her eyes. ‘Are you a wannabe stand-up comedian or something?’
‘No.’ He took a swig of his beer. ‘I’m an accountant.’
She paused, seeming unsure. ‘Is that another joke?’
‘When has anyone ever joked about being an accountant?’
‘True.’ Katie nodded. ‘It’s hard to joke about it when it’s your job. Now I,’ she leaned back a bit in her chair, the blue dress tightening across her chest, ‘on the other hand, can make plenty of jokes,’ she spread her palms wide, ‘about you being an accountant.’
Tom set down his drink and folded his arms. ‘You want to try to make a joke about accountants that I haven’t already heard?’
She looked momentarily put out, then tipped her chin up and said with a smile, ‘Okay then, tell me a good one.’
‘This is my favourite,’ Tom said, clearing his throat.
He leaned forward, his voice low so only she could hear him, and she moved in towards him. He could smell sunscreen and bergamot again. ‘Why do accountants make good lovers?’
He looked at Katie, her eyes wide. She laughed and obligingly replied, ‘I don’t know. Why do accountants make good lovers?’
‘Because they’re great with figures.’
Katie groaned and rolled her eyes before breaking into a laugh. ‘Ugh, of course. That’s such a dad-style joke.’
‘Hey,’ Tom held his hands out, ‘those are the best ones. My colleague Brian has a sign in his office that reads, Welcome to Franklin-Smith and Co, Chartered Accountants where everybody counts. He didn’t even think of it. Apparently, someone in HR made the pun years ago, and Brian thought it was hilarious, couldn’t get over it, and had a sign made. He still looks at it and laughs as if seeing it for the first time.’ Tom shook his head.
‘I like the sound of Brian,’ Katie said. ‘He sounds like he manages to just enjoy life.’
Tom looked at her, surprised. ‘Yes,’ he said after a moment, ‘I suppose you’re right.’
‘So,’ he prompted. ‘You know what I do when I’m not stalking my now ex-girlfriend to get my heart broken. What do you do when you’re not on a stakeout in a car?’
‘Oh.’ Katie looked down into her drink and poked at the melting ice cubes in her gin with her straw. ‘It’s not something people really know about or understand. You wouldn’t have heard of it.’
‘Try me,’ Tom said, folding his arms on the table and leaning in.
She glanced up, and hazel eyes flecked with specks of amber stared steadily back at him. He saw a flicker of hesitation before she answered.
‘It’s the geekiest of geeky jobs,’ Katie said, blushing.
Tom tilted his head to one side. ‘Katie, please,’ he said. ‘You’re talking to an accountant here.’
She laughed, and her head tipped back again, revealing the long smooth skin of her throat. She wore a slender gold chain around her throat with a small round locket on it.
‘Shit,’ she was saying. ‘Of course, I can relax and bare all.’
Tom swallowed and cleared his throat.
‘Sure. Go ahead.’
‘Well.’ Katie glanced at the table then back up at his face. ‘I am a technical writer.’
Tom nodded, not understanding at all but wanting her to continue. She blinked back at him.
‘See? No one ever knows what it is.’
‘So come on then, tell me.’
She sighed and pushed back in her chair as if preparing to give a well-rehearsed and oft-given speech.
‘A technical writer,’ she was watching his face, ‘takes technical jargon about products and turns it into user-friendly customer-facing literature.’
Tom nodded again, not really seeing.
Katie sighed. ‘I write user manuals that tell people how to use things like their vacuum, their phone, or their air fryer.’
She took a long drag on her gin through the straw.
Tom paused and then laughed. ‘Hang on—you’re making jokes about me being an accountant but you write user manuals for vacuums?’
‘No, not just vacuums,’ Katie retorted. ‘All sorts of things. Electric blankets, kettles, apps for your phone, heated gilets, even board games.’
‘So,’ his lips twitched, ‘would I have read any of your work?’
Katie looked like she might douse him in her gin.
‘It’s not an easy job,’ she said, glaring at him. ‘I am the interface between the creators and the engineers, and the end user. I have to translate the information they give me into a more useable document and work with lots of partners to get things signed off.’
Tom couldn’t stop grinning and nodding. ‘I’m used to being the geekiest guy in the room. I am delighted that you’ve beaten me.’
‘It’s actually a creative and interesting job!’ she said, half smiling now. ‘I’m freelance, so I work for lots of different companies. I get to find out about all sorts of products in terrifying detail. My head,’ she tapped her temple, ‘is full of useless information about a strange and wonderful array of products. And yes, I write user manuals, but I also write documents for sales teams, blogs, internal communications - you name it. I take something complicated and make it so simple…even you could understand it.’
Her eyes flashed at him.
‘You must be a riot at parties.’
‘About as much fun as an accountant,’ she retorted.
‘So, we’re just two geeks together,’ Tom said, grinning at her.
‘Yes. Two newly single, sad and angry geeks.’
Katie shrugged, then shook her head.
‘You know, I suppose I came today out of curiosity,’ she said, twirling the straw in her gin, watching the ice spin. ‘You were right. We are the only two other people caught up in this mess who know what we’re going through at this exact moment. And that, to me, seems like the problem. Why should we be the ones to suffer? We did nothing wrong.’
Tom nodded. ‘We were just loving and faithful partners.’
‘That’s right. Our only crime was to be a pair of trusting idiots.’
Tom grimaced and raised his glass. ‘To being trusting idiots!’
They clinked their glasses noisily.
‘The bit that tipped me over the edge to come and meet you today was the prospect of being…difficult. Not revenge exactly,’ she said, ‘I don’t want them calling the police on me. But why should we let them just wash their hands of us, like nothing happened?’
Tom’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Really? You want to get your own back? Are you starting by keying the car?’
‘No. I started by giving his delicate hand-wash jumpers to my friend Ellie. She used them as beds for the night for her three cats, and then I popped them back in the bag of Ryan’s stuff. He’s allergic, so that will be fun.’
Tom burst out laughing. ‘Wow, that’s creative!’
‘Yes, and untraceable, I like to think. He’ll pop one of those on and won’t be able to understand why he can’t stop sneezing and why his eyes are all red and itchy.’
She grinned and looked really alive, then the smile faded as she continued.
‘Ryan and I were together for years. I’m close to his parents, his sister, and her fiancé and….’ She hesitated and fiddled with a cardboard coaster. ‘It feels like I haven’t just broken up with him. I’ve broken up with all of them, too. His mum has been in touch every day about their ruby wedding party, wanting to know if I am still going. I was going to just say no. It would be too painful and awkward. But then,’ her eyes narrowed, and she gripped the stem of her glass, ‘I thought - why should it be awkward for me? I wasn’t the one caught playing hide the sausage with someone else.’
Tom, his glass to his mouth about to take a sip, quickly set it down and smothered a snort of laughter. He looked at her, cheeks pink, eyes alight, a determined set to her mouth.
‘It’d be great if you’d be my partner in crime in this,’ she said, watching him. ‘But if you’d rather take the high road and move on, like my friend Jess suggests I do, I get it.’
Tom nodded and studied the beer in his glass, watching the soapy suds run down the inside. ‘Yes,’ he mused, raising his head to meet her gaze. Her eyes really were remarkable, hazel with flecks of orangey-gold. ‘The high road sounds like the right thing to do, Katie.’
Katie’s face fell a little, and she stopped stirring her gin.
‘But it also sounds really boring.’ Those remarkable eyes leapt up to meet his. ‘What did you have in mind?’