Chapter 74
SEVENTY-FOUR
‘Evie,’ I go after her as she scrambles off the bed, ‘what about his family?’
‘Nothing,’ she mumbles, heading for the bathroom. ‘They didn’t get on, that’s all.’
Confounded, I stop on the landing as she slams the bathroom door almost in my face. What was that all about? There’s something she’s reluctant to tell me. Something Natalia was trying to tell me, and which Jack clearly hasn’t.
Attempting to get my chaotic thoughts in some sort of order, I go back to the stairs, then stop as my baby kicks heartily, reminding me where my priorities should lie.
This is my family, or so I’d thought. I have to protect my child, especially now as he battles the toxins that have been pumped through his tiny veins.
In this moment, I feel I would kill to do that.
Steeling my resolve, I continue on down.
Jack isn’t in the lounge. Assuming he’s in the kitchen, I head that way.
Wary trepidation creeps through me when I find him sitting at the table still in his jacket and nursing a whisky, followed swiftly by almost uncontainable anger.
Is this another just one drink he’s having because quite frankly, he needs it?
To take the edge off his pain? Is he going to disappear off to his office again if the conversation gets too uncomfortable for him?
Pausing, I watch him for a moment, wondering whether I know this man at all, or whether I’ve just done a good job of convincing myself I did because I wanted him to be everything I needed, someone caring who could fill the aching void in my life.
I’d hesitated to tell him about my pregnancy.
It was unplanned… for him. I’d felt bad for deceiving him, but I’d been so desperate to feel the warmth of a small body close to mine again.
I was nervous about sharing my news, but when he’d been so thrilled at the prospect of having another child, I’d thought that perhaps fate had decreed it anyway and dismissed my guilt.
Can I really have been so wrong about him?
Sensing me watching him, he snaps his gaze up and gets to his feet. ‘I heard you talking to Evie. How is she?’ he asks cautiously. ‘Should I go up and talk to her?’
‘She’s taking a bath,’ I lie. I don’t want Evie alerting him to what she and I discussed about his family.
‘Did she talk to you about anything?’ he asks, concern sweeping his features. Concern for Evie? I wonder. Or for himself?
‘A little. Mostly about Natalia,’ I reply, scrutinising him carefully.
Nodding shortly, he picks up his glass and takes a swig from it. ‘She’ll be in shock, confused by all that’s happened, I imagine,’ he says, grimacing as he swallows it back.
‘Not making much sense.’ I nod in sympathetic agreement. Is he trying to dismiss anything she might have said that doesn’t correspond with his story?
‘As if she wasn’t confused enough before all of this,’ he mutters, an agitated tic playing at his cheek.
I take a breath. ‘She seemed surprised,’ I say. ‘Actually, Natalia did, too.’
He frowns, takes another sip from his glass. ‘About?’ he asks, his eyes guarded as he looks back at me.
‘Your family.’
‘Oh?’ The furrow in his forehead deepens. ‘How so?’
‘Natalia seemed to think that you told me they died in a house fire in order to manipulate my feelings in some way.’ I pause, my chest thudding.
He pinches the bridge of his nose. ‘I see,’ he says, a flicker of anger crossing his face. ‘And I suppose now you’re wondering whether I might have. Meaning she’s manipulated you, which was exactly what she was trying to do.’
As he stares at me as if I’ve somehow betrayed him, I feel any hope that he would allay my fears slipping away.
‘It took a lot for me to tell you about that, Kara,’ he goes on emotionally. ‘It’s not something I find easy to talk about.’
‘No. It wouldn’t be.’ I look suitably understanding. ‘So why did you?’
‘Because I felt I could trust you.’ He looks at me as if he doesn’t understand why I don’t get it. ‘Because I wanted you to know that I felt I could.’
‘Of course. It’s just…’ I hesitate. But then, wondering whether that’s exactly how he wants me to feel – hesitant, constantly uncertain – I push on. ‘She was trying to tell me something about your parents when she died, and I can’t quite work out what it was.’
‘More bullshit,’ Jack mutters irritably. He picks up his glass and knocks back the remnants of his drink.
I brace myself. ‘Are they dead, Jack?’ I ask him outright. ‘Or is it you who’s full of bullshit?’
‘What?’ He looks up at me. ‘Are you saying you think I was making the whole thing up?’ he asks, his expression somewhere between incredulous and furious. ‘For Christ’s sake, why would I?’
I don’t answer, waiting instead to see where he takes it.
‘Right.’ He bangs his glass down. ‘Well I’ll go and fetch the death certificates, shall I, since you obviously do prefer to believe her over me.’
‘I didn’t say that.’ I almost backtrack as he strides angrily past me. ‘I was just trying to clarify—’ I stop, my gaze shooting to the kitchen door as the front door slams.
‘Shit! Well done, Kara,’ Jack mutters, racing to the hall and yanking the door open. ‘Evie?’ he calls, stepping out. ‘Evie!’
Picking up the scrawled note left on the hall table, I breathe a sigh of relief. ‘She’s gone for a walk, that’s all.’ I show it to him, trying to reassure him.
He scans it, then snatches it from me and balls it in his fist. ‘To get away from the toxic atmosphere,’ he grates. ‘Again.’
‘Jack, wait.’ I follow him back inside, then falter, my heart jarring as I hear him muttering to himself as he strides across the lounge.
‘Tell me about it,’ he growls. ‘A bloke can’t bloody win no matter how hard he tries. I don’t know why you bother.’
‘Jack, where are you going?’ I stop at the foot of the stairs as he bounds up them.
‘Now she’s concerned,’ he answers, still talking to himself. Frighteningly. ‘To find the certificates,’ he shouts from the landing. ‘You obviously need proof I’m not the manipulative bully she says I am.’
Said, Jack. Said. She’s dead. My heart booms out a warning.
‘And a liar and a cheat,’ he goes on. ‘Don’t forget murderer. Yep, that too. For fuck’s sake, you can’t win, mate.’
My stomach constricts. Is he doing this deliberately, trying to scare me?
I hear him bang into the bedroom. Seconds later, he’s crashing around, opening drawers and cupboards, slamming them shut.
I’m frozen with indecision for a second, and then I go up after him.
I can’t let him do this. I won’t. I’m growing terrified in my own home.
Bracing myself, I go into the bedroom and freeze as my gaze falls on Kai’s shoebox upturned on the floor, his Jellycat Louie Lion lying face-down next to it, just as it was before.
I notice some of the drawers are still open, clothes hanging from them, and it hits me like a gut punch.
It was Jack who’d come up here while I was sleeping.
Why? I look towards where he stands at his wardrobe, his things strewn at his feet.
His clothes, the old PC, paperwork from an expanding file he keeps in there.
He spins around as I step towards him. ‘They’re not here,’ he says, dumping more stuff on the floor.
‘Did she come up here? That insane cow I was married to, did she come up here?’ He shoots me a look I can’t quite read.
Disillusionment? Contempt? My stomach roils.
My blood pumps, thrumming hotly through my veins, as I begin to realise that Natalia might possibly have been saner than he is.
‘No. She only came as far as the landing before she fell,’ I answer him, careful to keep my voice calm, though fear permeates every cell in my body.
It’s then that I spot something on the bed close to the jacket he’s torn off and tossed there, and the pieces begin to fall sickeningly into place.
I move carefully towards it, freezing as he casts a scathing glance at me before returning to his theatricals.
I wait a beat, then quickly scoop up the item that confirms my worst fears.
It hadn’t been here before. It could only have come from his jacket pocket.
He must have realised she’d lost it. Been frantically searching for it the last time he’d done this, desperate for me not to find it.
Breathing in deeply, I take a step back.
‘It was you who ransacked the bedroom, wasn’t it?’ I ask, making an accusation from which I know there will be no turning back.
He faces me, looking at me askance, as if he now thinks I’m the one who has ‘issues’.
‘Is this what you were looking for?’ Holding out my hand, I unfurl my fingers to reveal one of Imogen’s bumblebee and moonstone earrings.