Every Little Secret Page 14

  ‘Good point. So, it must be someone who knows you, or Adam.’ Julie moves the tray from her knees to the coffee table. ‘Or more likely, it’s just a dodgy line.’

  Alison stares at the screen. She’s not so sure. ‘Whoever it was, they were listening, waiting for me to react.’

  * * *

  That night, as soon as her eyes shut, she can hear the faint sound of the clock ticking every long drawn out second. She can’t stop thinking about the phone calls, all the possibilities of who it could be. Is Adam trying to frighten her with all these weird things going on around the house? Why would he do that though, he’s not a cruel person. Her eyes flick open. There’s a scurrying sound above. She sits up, shivering at the thought of stiff long tails and twitching whiskers. Grabbing the duvet, she bundles into the spare room and wraps herself in the puffy material. Only her face is poking out, like a butterfly waiting to emerge. Whoever it was trying to phone, she has a feeling they’ll call again.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Max: April 2017

  Max spotted Ali as soon as he pushed his way into the cafe. The hum of voices and clang of cups seemed to drain into the background. Her hair was different, straightened with a reddish colour streaked across the crown. Butterflies rose in his stomach. He slipped his wedding ring into his pocket.

  She raised her hand as if it was possible for anyone not to have seen her. His grin widened as he went over. All rational thoughts fell away, along with his life as Max Saunders, discarded like a mask.

  ‘Good to see you, Adam.’ She stood up from a plump sofa and pecked him on both cheeks. He breathed in her perfume; the same one she always wore. She was older, of course, but well, the same only more grown up. Dressed casually in a denim skirt, ankle boots, and ruffle blouse. Sexier than ever.

  ‘You too.’

  She’d called him a week after his accident but had been undecided about meeting up after all this time. In the end she probably felt sorry for him, especially when he’d told her what had happened to his face.

  ‘Can I get you anything?’ He took a handful of coins out of his jeans pocket.

  ‘I’m fine, thanks.’ She sat down again while he went to join the queue.

  He fingered his wedding ring at the bottom of his pocket. What was he doing? Maddy would be in the garden with the girls and here he was, watching Ali peer at herself in a mirror, touching up her make-up. He’d had to change his whole life because of her and here she was, as if it was nothing. He needed to find out what had really happened but that was it, he couldn’t jeopardise the life he had built up with Maddy and the girls.

  He carried his coffee to the table.

  ‘So how have you been?’ She sipped her drink, leaving red lipstick around the rim.

  He leaned across the table and opened his mouth to speak, but she continued.

  ‘Jaz says you’re a painter and decorator. That’s nice.’

  ‘Yeah, papering over the cracks.’ He sat back. ‘You look like you’re doing all right.’

  ‘I’m manager of a charity shop.’

  ‘How respectable. Didn’t join the family business then?’ He blew on his coffee before taking a sip.

  ‘It’s a job.’ She shrugged. ‘I like it.’

  ‘Didn’t think to contact me at all?’ He stretched his arm across the back of the chair next to him.

  ‘How could I?’

  ‘I stuck around for you, why didn’t you tell me what you were going to do?’ He jabbed a finger at her.

  ‘Dad made me. He sent me away. It would have been too dangerous to come back.’

  ‘Yeah, well they beat the living shit out of me.’

  ‘I didn’t know, I’m sorry.’ She moved back in her seat.

  ‘Do me a favour.’ He rubbed his forehead.

  ‘Honestly. They told me you’d done a runner. I had no choice once he found out we were seeing each other, that I was pregnant.’ Her hand spread open on the table. Each of her delicate fingers full of gold rings.

  ‘Ah, dear old Dad lied to both of us, eh?’ Max gave a half-laugh. ‘To think I looked up to him once, thought he was like a dad to me.’

  ‘I’d never seen him so angry.’ Her face was suddenly flushed and shining.

  ‘But how could you… get rid of it… and not tell me?’ He smacked his hand flat on the table. The sound silenced the coffee shop for a moment. Max felt all eyes turn to them, but he stayed focused on Ali. He’d wanted to ask her that question for so long.

  ‘He made me. I was really scared.’ She looked like she was about to cry.

  ‘We could have sorted it out ourselves,’ he said, softer now. He reached for her hand. ‘It was our baby.’ He stroked her palm.

  ‘I didn’t know what to do.’

  ‘We could have run away together.’

  She moved her hand and sat back. ‘Dad wouldn’t let me contact you, then he packed me off to my aunt’s. Cut me off completely.’

  Max sat up straight, his eyes darted around the cafe. ‘How do you know he’s not here now?’

  Ali smiled. ‘Because he died of a heart attack two years ago.’

  Max spluttered a laugh. ‘Wow, I can’t say I’m sorry.’

  ‘I know, I know,’ she said, lowering her gaze, ‘but he was still my dad.’

  ‘Can we go somewhere else?’ Maddy, Emily and Chloe seemed distant now, another life entirely.

  They stood up. For a moment they stared at each other and the years fell away. Max stroked Ali’s arm. She’d been torn away from him when he loved her. Did he still?

  At a park a short walk away, they sat on the grass in the shade of a laburnum tree.

  ‘Remember when we used to meet at the coffee shop near my flat?’ He grinned at the memory of them sitting in a booth huddled together. A woman stopped at their table one day and said what a gorgeous couple they were.

  ‘Yeah, we used to talk for hours, didn’t we?’

  ‘We had so many plans to travel and develop properties and have loads and loads of kids in a massive house.’

  ‘And dogs and chickens and a goat, don’t forget.’

  ‘Oh yeah, you were always going on about having a frigging goat.’ He shook his head in mock disbelief and they both laughed.

  ‘It ended so suddenly. I was really upset that you didn’t come and find me,’ she said, kicking off her sandals.

  ‘I had no idea where you’d gone.’

  ‘Dad sent me to my aunt’s place in Cornwall.’

  ‘And that’s where you got rid of it?’

  Ali was silent.

  ‘I should have had a say.’ He pressed his knuckles into the grass.

  ‘I didn’t have a choice either. You know what Dad was like.’ She played with her keys. Her warm perfume wafted towards him churning up memories.

  ‘Well I’m here now.’

  ‘It’s too late, Adam, I’m with someone else.’

  Max hung his head. He should tell her about Maddy and the girls, but he couldn’t bring himself to. Part of him still didn’t want to believe it was over. It felt like unfinished business. They’d been separated against their will. But it was in the past and Maddy made him happy. They were good together. Did he really want to chase a life that was never meant to be? His heart snagged imagining how it would have been, Ali, the baby and him together. But he couldn’t imagine life without Maddy and his wonderful daughters.

  ‘Is it serious, you and this bloke?’ He looked up at the white puffy cloud above their heads, reminding him of one of Chloe’s drawings.

  ‘He looks after me.’

  The words pinched.

  ‘We were good together, Ali,’ he said. ‘It was special, you can’t deny it.’ What was he doing? He mustn’t fall under her spell.

  She didn’t reply. The keys tumbled onto the grass. Max picked them up. He turned them over in his hand and gave them back to her.

  ‘I’ve tried so hard to forget you, to move on.’ He pressed his forehead.

  ‘You should have.’ S
he stretched her slim legs out in front of her.

  ‘Have you? Honestly?’ He looked for her reaction. ‘Is that why you’re here? Because you couldn’t?’

  ‘I wanted to find out from you what happened back then. I was curious to see how you were. Why you never tried to find me.’ She fiddled with the key fob, sliding the plastic frame back and forth a fraction. ‘Where do we go from here?’ She dropped the keys back in her bag.

  ‘Wherever you want us to.’ He reached for her hands, soft and delicate.

  She let him hug her and a lifting sensation filled his chest.

  ‘I don’t know, Adam. It’s been so long. We’re different people now.’

  ‘Just stay in touch. That’s all I ask.’

  ‘I need to get back.’ She slipped on her sandals.

  ‘Let me see you again.’ He knelt in front of her. He must have lost his mind, but he couldn’t stop himself.

  Ali turned away. ‘I don’t think my boyfriend would be too pleased.’

  ‘Take my number, here.’ He scribbled it on the lid of his cigarette packet and tore it off. ‘If you change your mind. If you need to talk…’

  ‘I already have your number, remember?’ She took out a mirror and checked her hair. ‘I’ve managed without you for six years, Adam.’

  ‘Are you saying you feel nothing for me, none of the old spark?’

  ‘Drive me home, Adam, please.’

  Outside her maisonette he pushed a hundred quid in rolled-up twenties into her hand. ‘Here, treat yourself, buy something nice.’

  She took it and went inside without looking back.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Max: April 2017

  Max’s drive back to Uxbridge took over two hours because of heavy traffic. He arrived home just before 8 p.m. He could hear movement upstairs and the low-pitch sound of Maddy’s voice. The television was on in the empty living room, silenced, the screen flickering in the dark. The curtains were drawn and a circle of lamplight showed the sag in the sofa where Maddy had been sitting, her knitting abandoned on the footstool. The dogs dragged themselves out of their basket, wagging their tails and sniffing his hands.

  In the kitchen, he took the bottle of whiskey down from the shelf, poured a shot and knocked it back, then another. He kicked off his shoes, put on his slippers and plodded upstairs.

  Chloe’s bedroom door was open, Maddy kneeling by her bed. She glanced up at him. ‘She’s been having night terrors again,’ she whispered, sweeping her hand across Chloe’s forehead. ‘You reek of whiskey, Max,’ she said, drawing back from him.

  ‘Are you all right, my angel?’ He crouched down and Chloe snuggled into the crook of his arm. He stroked her damp hair.

  ‘Back to sleep time,’ Maddy said.

  ‘I want Daddy.’

  Maddy half smiled and kissed Chloe on the forehead.

  ‘Can we read, My Dad?’ Chloe pulled the book from her shelf.

  ‘Go on then.’ He was too tired to argue. They read the book together until the last lines, about how much Dad loves her and always will, which as usual he lets Chloe recite on her own.

  ‘I certainly will. I love you to the moon and back.’ He gave her a cuddle. He couldn’t help wishing he’d been a dad to his first child too. He sighed and put the book back on the shelf.

  ‘Dad?’

  He glanced over his shoulder.

  ‘Let’s tuck you in.’ He pressed the back of his hand to his nose and mouth to halt the threat of tears.

  ‘You look sad, Daddy.’

  ‘I’m okay. Good night, my angel.’ He blew her a kiss.

  Max crept into Emily’s room. She was awake, reading Harry Potter.

  ‘Daddy!’ She reached up to hug him.

  ‘How’s my big girl today?’ He sat on the bed.

  ‘Miss Ryan gave me three cool class tokens for reading and spelling.’

  ‘Three? That’s fantastic, aren’t you clever?’

  ‘So, as I’ve been good, can I go on your phone?’

  He pulled a funny face and Emily laughed.

  ‘Please… Daddy.’

  ‘All right, just for a little while.’ He took his phone out of his pocket and unlocked it. She snuggled into his chest and opened Snapchat. They took turns holding the screen up and watching their faces changing, from devil horns and red eyes to cat’s ears and whiskers. Emily’s favourite was Max becoming Mr Fox but with his own human eyes and teeth. When he spoke and moved his mouth around Emily rolled about laughing.

  ‘Time for sleep now.’ He kissed her forehead and switched the phone off. He sat by her side and waited until her eyes shut. He liked to watch her breathing while she slept. Deep steady breaths. He picked up her favourite teddy, the one with a cushioned heart sewn onto its paws, the stuffing bursting out of a seam. Old but loved.

  He must be crazy to want to stay in touch with Ali when she still possessed this power over him, like the moon’s invisible strings pulling the tide. He stood at the window entranced by the fat silvery ball in the sky, ridiculously bright. Ali was the only girl he’d ever loved before Maddy. He should be over her by now, so why did she make his heart sing just thinking about her? He’d moved on, was happily married and had two wonderful kids. How was it possible to feel this way about someone else? It felt like his own body and heart were betraying him.

  In their bathroom, he stripped off and stepped under the shower. He’d call Ali tomorrow, tell her he couldn’t see her again.

  Back in the bedroom, Maddy slipped into bed naked. A shower late at night usually meant they had sex.

  ‘You look tired.’ Maddy stroked his forehead as he climbed in next to her.

  ‘It’s been a long day, things on my mind,’ he said, wrapping his arms around her ample body. But when he shut his eyes, all he saw was Ali.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Maddy: October 2019

  Maddy wraps the screwdriver in a plastic bag to take to Alison’s house. She’s always on the lookout for obstacles such as nosy neighbours. In the last few days she’s taken to wearing a professional-looking tabard and carrying a plastic holder full of cleaning products and cloths so that if any were to question her, she can tell them she is Ms Wood’s cleaner.

  For a moment she stops and stares in disbelief at the bag on the kitchen counter. What is happening to her? Why is she doing this when she longs to stay at home, curl up under the duvet and sob her heart out for her little girl? But her obsession with this woman and compulsion to punish her is too overwhelming. She picks the bag up and grips it so tightly that her hand hurts. Her teeth clench together. The humiliation and betrayal cuts deep. It destroyed her mother but she won’t let it destroy her.

  Sarah catches her as she is going out the door. She props up her bicycle against the wall after her morning ride. Maddy stops dead and cups her bump with both hands. ‘Ooh, feel that, the baby’s kicking well today.’

  Sarah smiles and reaches out.

  ‘Can you feel it?’

  Sarah moves her hand around over Maddy’s coat. ‘I think it’s stopped, I’ve missed it.’

  ‘Ah, that’s a shame.’

  Maddy tells her about her new job.

  ‘Really? Cleaning? You never said.’ Sarah sounds incredulous. Thinks she knows everything. Mother was right, don’t trust anyone.

  Sarah takes a piece of paper with a phone number written on it out of her pocket. ‘I thought you might want to enquire about opening up a cafe in the high street?’ She carried on. ‘Mr and Mrs Blake are retiring at the end of March.’

  ‘But this job is important. It needs to be completed before the baby comes.’

  ‘Completed? What are you cleaning, Woburn Abbey?’

  ‘I can’t tell you any more about it.’ She’d never understand in any case.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because if it’s not done before the baby arrives, it will be a disaster.’

  ‘What do you mean, a disaster?’

  ‘Everything, just everything. This bab
y is the most important thing.’

  ‘Of course.’ Sarah stands there frowning. ‘You don’t seem yourself. Are you sure you’re feeling all right?’

  ‘I’m fine, really fine. Just let me get on with this, please.’

  * * *

  Maddy doesn’t recall the journey to Huntingdon. One moment she was closing her car door outside her own house and the next she is parking in Lawn End. Poppy is there to greet her as usual and she takes a few moments to stroke him and give him some biscuits. She lets him into the garden and refills the water bowl, which always seems to be empty. When he comes back in, she combs his hair with a brush she found at the back of a drawer. His ears are full of knots and he’s clearly not been walked for at least a week because the lead is in exactly the same place in the under-stairs cupboard.

  She checks the calendar for any change to routines and appointments for the coming week. Nails, hair, work, dentist. Sandra is back from a long weekend away next week. Maddy has decided not to come at all on Tuesdays because it clashes with the time she is there. Lately, Sandra has been calling in to pick up the ironing like clockwork at 11 a.m. and drops it back at 3 p.m. The same on Saturdays too. How they can afford it is anyone’s guess. Got money for pampering herself and the chores she can’t be bothered to do, but leaves the poor dog on his own all day? Self-centred bitch.

  She starts on the under-sink cupboard door that has already worked itself loose. She unscrews it so it’s barely hanging on its hinges. As she’s going upstairs, she hears the squeal of car brakes on the drive. Ice shoots through her veins. She runs up to the main bedroom and peeps through the curtains. Alison is getting out of her car, and she swings the door closed making sure it doesn’t slam. Seconds later, the front door opens. Again, it’s shut quietly, but still with a clear click. Poppy’s nametag jangles. Shit. Did she lock the back door after she let him out? Thank God she brought her tray of cleaning products up with her. But did she leave anything on the kitchen counter? At least she hadn’t boiled the kettle yet.

  Maddy stands in the en-suite shower room, straining to hear, but there is no sound coming from downstairs. Alison must be creeping around trying to catch ‘Adam’ out. According to her Facebook page, she’s convinced it’s him coming back when she’s not here. Her mother’s plan to break the trust between them is working. She’s rather enjoying making her suffer. Any second she expects her to barge in, but she’s ready, cloth in hand and a story about Adam employing her as their cleaner in his absence.