Chapter 40
CHAPTER FORTY
Everyone left the kitchen, until it was just me, Maddie, and Frank at the table. Aunty Bev had wanted to stay but Maddie urged her to look after an emotional Grandpa.
Maddie, with Humphrey at her feet, was sat next to me, and we both faced Frank’s stoney expression.
The power had come back on in a twist of fate shortly after Maddie appeared. We had the lights on in the kitchen as it was almost dark outside.
Underneath the table Maddie held my hand and every so often gave it a little squeeze.
‘Your sister invited Vanessa to this circus of hers,’ snapped Frank. ‘Of all the people she could have invited.’ He massaged his tanned forehead. ‘I can’t believe what I walked in on earlier. You swore to me your sister would be “good as gold.”’
‘Leave it, Frank,’ Maddie said.
‘Seeing Vanessa again after everything that’s happened was too much,’ he said, running a hand through his grey hair.
It was time to put my cards on the table and tell Maddie about Frank’s affair. ‘Maddie,’ I said, ‘I know about him and her…’
She shook her head and looked at me. I noticed she didn’t have those sad, glassy blue eyes anymore. They were shining. ‘No, you don’t know everything, Rachel.’ She smiled at me. ‘You did something amazing today by cooking everyone Christmas lunch. I overheard some of the locals as I came in and they were all raving about what you’d done. I would have done the same.’
‘She put on a bloody circus,’ raged Frank. ‘My beautiful house has been ruined.’
Maddie stared at him. ‘You’ve hated this house ever since we moved in, Frank. Don’t make out it’s something precious to you.’
He muttered something under his breath and loosened his shirt collar. ‘Not only did she invite Vanessa, but she also had your whacky aunt staying here. I am surprised I came home to the house still standing. Beverly is a liability.’
Maddie turned to me. ‘Rachel, you need to know that Frank and I broke up back when we were in California last year.’
My eyes widened and my jaws dropped in shock. I stared at her. ‘What?’
She took out a hair clip from her pocket and pinned up her blonde curls. ‘I wanted to come home when we were in California. I’d realised I didn’t love Frank and that I had made a terrible mistake. Josh was the man I loved and wanted to spend my life with. However, Frank had this big film company deal on the horizon and he’s worked hard to turn around his image. He’s no longer seen as the ex-actor with the tumultuous past but as the family-orientated CEO of a successful media company.’
Judging from what I’d seen of Frank earlier when he first arrived back home, I felt like he had more to do on his image clean up.
Maddie continued. ‘Frank and I came to an arrangement.’
‘An arrangement – what do you mean?’ Underneath mine, my sister’s hand was trembling.
‘Do we have to go through all this?’ Frank snapped whilst tapping something into his phone.
Maddie ignored him and took a deep breath. ‘I would pretend to still be married to him and he would do the same. We would show the world that Frank Baxter had changed. He was married and ready to start a family.’
Frank rubbed his face. ‘This is excruciating to listen to Maddie. I need a whisky.’ He turned around. ‘Where’s the cleaner? She could pour me a drink. Layla – come here please.’
Maddie tapped him on the arm. ‘Frank, go and get yourself a drink. Layla is a cleaner not your waitress.’
He glared at Maddie. ‘She’s an employee and I need a drink.’
‘She’s my employee now, Frank.’ My sister’s tone was assertive and steel-like. Frank growled and shook his head.
Layla appeared at the door. ‘Yes, Mr Baxter – you called?’
Frank opened his mouth, but Maddie beat him to it. ‘We don’t need anything, Layla, thank you.’
Maddie carried on. ‘Once he bought this film company, he would be the face of these heart-warming films with good family values. We came to an agreement.’ She paused. I could tell this was hard for her to share with me. ‘I would give him a child and once they were born, we would quietly separate. We would co-parent and split the child’s homes between the UK and America.’
‘You mean – all this has been fake?’
‘Your sister couldn’t go through with her part of the bargain,’ snapped Frank, causing Maddie to glare at him.
I looked at Maddie. ‘Tell me.’
She hung her head. ‘Frank was not the only one seeing someone else.’
‘You were seeing Josh?’
She nodded. ‘It was part of the arrangement. To the public Frank and I were husband and wife who were madly in love with each other. In private we led separate lives. I know it’s a shock, but Frank tells me this is common. Frank and I agreed our side affairs wouldn’t become an issue. They wouldn’t threaten our public image.’
I looked at Frank who was scrolling on his phone. ‘Vanessa became an issue – didn’t she, Frank?’
He nodded. ‘That woman threatened to destroy everything at a key time with this film company deal. We were days away from closing the deal and Vanessa started playing dirty. She realised I was never going to commit to her or stay with her. I had to take action.’
Maddie squeezed my hand to get my attention back. ‘I couldn’t give Frank a baby because…’ My eyes flicked to her other hand which was rubbing her tummy. ‘I was already carrying Josh’s baby.’
‘What?’
She nodded. ‘I’m pregnant.’
Frank muttered something under his breath before looking away.
My mouth hit the floor and my heart ground to an abrupt halt. ‘Does Josh know?’
Maddie smiled. ‘He knew I was pregnant before I did a test.’ She rested her head on my shoulder. ‘I’m sorry to tell you this today.’
‘When did you find out?’
‘The day before you arrived in Harp Brook.’
‘And I flew her to Malibu,’ snapped Frank. ‘What a waste of time and money.’
I stared at her. ‘I knew something was wrong, but you wouldn’t tell me.’
Frank was staring at me. ‘She told me when we were in Malibu. I was ready to conceive a child. A clinic was lined up, and this happened.’
Maddie laid her hand on the table to get his attention. ‘I don’t think I could have gone through with it, Frank. The thought of having a baby as part of a business transaction felt wrong. I’d been thinking it through for weeks.’
He let out a heavy sigh. ‘My PA has got me a hotel in London. I’ll be back tomorrow.’ He rose and walked towards his driver who was busy cramming in a mouthful of buffet food. ‘We’re leaving.’
I turned to Maddie and pulled her into my arms. ‘Oh, Maddie, my lovely, sweet sister.’
She began to sob. ‘It’s a mess, Rachel. I have caused Frank so much heartbreak and I am so sorry to break the news to you like this. I wanted to tell you before I went but I was an emotional mess.’
‘So, when did Josh come back into your life?’
She lifted her face and wiped her cheeks. ‘You know I had multiple hen-dos – right?’
I nodded.
‘Well, one was back in Oxford. In the day, me and all my uni friends went horse riding. Josh was working on the farm where the stables were. It was fate. Nothing happened between Josh and me on that day. We swapped email addresses and phone numbers. There was something between us. I ended up emailing him from a bar later that evening. My uni friends got so drunk they didn’t see me sneak out and meet Josh.’ My sister had a dreamy smile on her face. ‘It was like old times. He took me to a night café, and we talked for hours. A week later, on my wedding day, I realised I had made a terrible mistake. I didn’t love Frank. He dazzled me with a lot of money, and he made Mum happy by letting her live in one of his villas in Tenerife.’
‘Aunty Bev said he bought her a villa.’
Maddie shook her head. ‘Frank has many properties. That’s one of them. She rents it at a very good rate.’
Maddie sighed. ‘I thought California would change me. I stopped emailing Josh and I tried to make myself love Frank. I went to therapy. Frank paid for the best therapist in California. Deep down I knew I had made the wrong decision. Josh flew to California, and I slept with him. I was the one who destroyed my marriage.’
I gulped in shock.
‘I came clean and told Frank I wanted to separate. He suggested this agreement. We bought this house and Josh moved down to Harp Brook Farm. Frank started seeing Vanessa soon after he’d been introduced to her.’
Maddie laughed. ‘It didn’t take Frank long at all. For the first few months it worked. We both stayed in the house in the day and at night we would go see our respective partners.’ She fiddled with a strand of her golden hair. ‘It was okay until Vanessa wanted him to divorce me. She put pressure on him and then said she would do a “kiss and tell” to a tabloid newspaper. Frank had this deal going through, so he had to find a way to end it.’
I said, ‘He tricked her into signing the NDA.’
Maddie nodded. ‘I didn’t know about all that until afterwards. That’s when Vanessa started a war against us.’
‘Tell me about Josh.’
Maddie’s whole face lit up in a way that made tears rush to my eyes. I had not seen her this happy in a long time.
‘Josh is amazing, and I love him, Rachel. He’s going to make a wonderful dad.’ She smiled. ‘He’s not a millionaire like Frank, he doesn’t have a villa in Tenerife for Mum to rent and he doesn’t have eye-watering investments, a chauffeur, and a beautiful lifestyle. Josh is kind, he makes me laugh and he’s normal. You don’t know how long I have craved normality. Frank’s world is not for me. Mum will have a breakdown when she hears all this, but I don’t care. All I have ever wanted is to be free and live my life the way I want to live it.’
I pulled her into a hug. ‘I love you, Maddie, and I can’t wait to meet my niece or nephew.’
‘You will need to teach them to cook as both Josh and I are dreadful.’ We both laughed.
‘So, you came home two days early?’
She nodded. ‘I rang you, but I was too emotional to say everything. I have been with Josh on the farm. Bob and his wife Marjorie are adorable. Josh told me about The Duck House. I didn’t want to make an appearance as I wanted some time with Josh to make sense of everything. Malibu was awful. Not the place, I mean. It’s stunning but everything with Frank fell apart. He was so angry at me when I told him I was pregnant. I was alone and scared in a strange place. In the end I managed to buy a plane ticket and I ran away.’
‘You ran away from Frank?’
She nodded. ‘He’s got a lot of issues.’
‘I would never have guessed,’ I said, with a wry smile.
Maddie stroked Humphrey underneath the table. ‘His mother didn’t show him any affection when he was growing up. He had a negative image of himself when he was a child and that’s why he has always wanted to feel superior and special as an adult. He’s not proud of his past when he was an actor and is desperate to show everyone he’s different.’
We both went silent. My brain was frantically trying to process everything. For years our mother had painted Maddie in an angelic, almost perfect light. Maddie would have the idyllic life with her ex-film star and business tycoon husband while the rest of us mere mortals spent our time squabbling on WhatsApp, gossiping about Aunty Bev, and doing whatever the family wanted us to do.
She turned to me. ‘I love the short hair, Rachel. It suits you. I know this is a huge shock, but I was with Frank for all the wrong reasons. It’s weird to say but with Josh I feel more like myself than I have ever done.’