Chapter 29
BBC Cornwall were five minutes into the midnight show as Sabri got into her car, and the first voice she heard as she pulled out of the car park was her husband’s.
‘Yeah, so I spoke to the solicitors this morning when I was driving the kids to school,’ Jason was saying. ‘You know what kids are like, they were giving me no peace. I’m not allowed to give out any details, confidential and all that, but it’s all very exciting.’
Sabri’s body began to squeeze in on itself. So, he had made the phone call. She’d been hoping Mel had got it wrong. Well, now she knew why her husband had been refusing to take her calls all day. He’d known she’d go ape shit.
‘I can imagine,’ the reporter replied. ‘So, tell me, Jason, what did you think when you first saw the letter? What was going through your head?’
‘Well, we were all pretty floored, I can tell you. I mean, we don’t know Logan Quick. The wife thought it was a scam. She’d have put it in the bin if I’d let her. And then where would we be?’
‘Where indeed? And what are your plans to spend the money?’
Jason laughed. ‘Blimey, give us a chance, mate. The bloke’s not dead yet.’
‘That was Jason Carter, speaking to our reporter earlier today. A very lucky man, if it turns out to be genuine. What do I think? I think we should wait and see.’
Travelling at nearly fifty miles an hour, Sabri closed her eyes. Did Jason realise what a dick he’d sounded? And how could he? He’d known she would hate it.
She switched off the radio and drove home far too fast, jumping more than one amber light. To find a Tesla parked in their driveway.
Something inside her, something that felt like a tightly strung wire, snapped.
She couldn’t bring herself to park behind it – what the hell had he done with his own car? – and so she pulled over in the street. How was it possible? What idiot would sell Jason a car that expensive? He didn’t even have enough for a deposit and God only knew what the monthly repayments would be.
She got out and walked towards the house on legs that didn’t feel like her own.
It was a grey saloon, quite modest-looking, given how expensive it must be.
It was a classy car, a beautiful car, and she wanted to take a brick to the windscreen, to kick dents in the paintwork, to run her keys down its length, because nothing else right now would give an outlet to the rage she was feeling.
With an effort, she controlled herself, walking quickly past it to the front door.
A decade and a half of controlling her fury so as not to scare the kids helped her hold it together as she let herself in and made her way upstairs.
Jason was pretending to be asleep; there was no fucking way he was really asleep, not with a Tesla in the driveway.
She closed the bedroom door softly and stayed by it.
‘Have you lost your fucking mind?’
Her voice seemed to have dropped an octave. It always did when she was trying not to scream.
He let a couple of seconds go by, then, ‘What? You back? What time is it?’
‘Cut the crap, Jase, I can tell when you’re asleep. It was bad enough hearing you be a complete dickhead on the radio. And now a Tesla? I ask again, have you lost your fucking mind?’
He sat up and reached for the bedside light. ‘It’s on test drive. Chill out, babe. I’ve got to take it back tomorrow.’
Oh, thank God. Thank God for that. Even so.
‘What the hell are you doing taking a Tesla for a test drive? We can’t begin to afford one. We can barely afford to get mine through its MOT next month. And you phoned those solicitors. What the actual fuck, Jase?’
‘Keep your voice down, you’ll wake the kids.’
‘The kids are going to be broken-hearted when they find out this is all a scam. And you’ll have done it to them. Not that stupid con trick of a letter. You. Their dad.’
‘Sab, it’s real. It’s not a con. It’s real. I spoke to them.’
There was a wall inside Sabri’s head, she realised. Stone built. Dense, solid, impenetrable; one that refused to let through the possibility of good news. No, he was not doing this to her. He was not going to let her hope.
‘They said they couldn’t talk to me, that they can only talk to the recipient of the letter. That’s you. But they said it’s absolutely genuine and that you could make an appointment to see them at any time.’
‘They’re not real solicitors, Jason. They’re a bunch of con artists. Probably somewhere in Taiwan.’
‘They’re registered with the Law Society. I checked.’
‘It’s not possible.’
‘It’ll cost us one hundred and fifty pounds for a half-hour appointment and they’ll explain everything.’
Exhaustion washed through Sabri. For a moment there …
‘And there it is,’ she spat at him. ‘They’ve sent out thousands of the things. We pay our one hundred and fifty pounds and when we get there, it’s an empty flat about a pizza shop.’
‘We don’t have to hand any money over in advance. We pay the one hundred and fifty pounds at the appointment. I checked that too. I’m not an idiot, Sab.’
‘We don’t have a one hundred and fifty pounds, Jason. We have exactly forty-six pounds in the account to last to the end of the month. How can you not know this?’
The bedroom door nudged Sabri’s back. She stepped forward and turned to watch the door opening slowly, tentatively. In the light from the landing she saw her three children, in night clothes, standing in the doorway.
‘It’s OK, Mum.’ Maddy reached out a hand towards Sabri’s arm. ‘We’ve sorted it. You can take the money from our bank accounts. All three of us.’
‘Fifty quid each,’ Darren added.
‘Then pay us back later,’ Bethany chipped in. ‘You have to pay us back when we have the man’s money. Obviously, we want it back.’
Knowing she had to get her children back to bed, that they’d barely be able to function in the morning, Sabri crossed the room and climbed into her own bed, still wearing the jeans and sweater she’d driven home in. She had nothing left. Exhaustion was sweeping through her.
As though acting on instinct, all three children followed her, the girls climbing into the bed on Sabri’s side, forcing her up against Jason. Darren squeezed in beside his dad. For several seconds no one spoke. Then:
‘Things are going to be very different from now on, aren’t they?’ said Maddy.