‘I could take her?’ I said.
‘You aren’t insured, and you’ve never driven abroad. To be honest, I’m not sure she’d want you to take her anyway.’
I went cold. ‘Me?’ I laughed.
‘Yeah. Like you’d have something to hide.’ He shrugged, not believing for a minute that dependable old Clare had ever done anything he didn’t know about.
‘Yes, she’s quite the drama queen, isn’t she?’ I said and called the kids for lunch.
* * *
‘Darling, do you have a minute?’ Joy asked, as the children and I ate lunch in the kitchen. My heart sank – what did she know?
‘Okay,’ I said, finishing my sandwich.
‘I’ll be in the sitting room,’ she answered.
I couldn’t tell from her demeanour if meeting her in the sitting room was a bad thing, or a gin thing. Either way, I wanted to know what she had to say, so, leaving Violet in charge, I went into the next room, where Joy sat in her 1950s-style beachwear.
‘I had to get you on your own, dear,’ she said, beckoning me in and making a movement with her hand that told me to shut the door.
‘What is it?’ I sat down in one of the velvet armchairs.
‘It’s about Ella. And I don’t know… what I mean is, I don’t know if this is a thing—’ Joy braced herself. ‘Look, I don’t want you to overreact when I tell you this, I want you to be calm…’
‘Okay.’ All I could think was, What the hell is she about to tell me? Could I take any more?
I was glad I was sitting down because by now my legs would have buckled under me.
‘When I saw Ella and Dan talking in the garden, I was confused, and intrigued, as you can imagine,’ she started. ‘And I overheard them talking. Clare, I think she’s accusing Dan of something… not very nice.’
I might have known Joy would pick up on this. What could I say? Probably better to hear it from me than Ella, so I told her what Dan had told me about Ella’s accusations of impropriety.
‘Oh, Clare, Dan wouldn’t… I mean that’s not our Dan.’
‘No,’ I said, ‘these things are hard to prove – and disprove. I don’t think she’ll take it further, she’s just trying to scare him.’ I wasn’t surprised at Joy’s inability to see any fault in Dan despite his past record, but surely Joy would now see Ella’s true colours?
‘Oh dear, it looks like you were right all along about her, Clare.’
‘I knew, I knew when I saw her taking your earrings,’ I said, feeling stronger now Joy was with me and could see Ella for what she was.
‘Yes, she’s evil – evil.’ Joy was understandably quite distressed by all this. ‘What has Jamie got himself into? Blackmail and these terrible accusations!’
‘She’s just stirring it all up, Joy. It’s all lies, don’t let it upset you,’ I said, putting my arm around her. She felt quite frail and seemed on the verge of tears.
‘She’s said things to me, Clare, and now they make sense.’
‘What things?’
‘She said to me a couple of days ago that one of my sons has betrayed the other – in the worst way was what she said.’ Joy looked at me. ‘I think it’s this – all this about Dan touching her – disgusting, how could anyone say that?’
I shook my head and covered up my chest with the cushion.
‘She said, “Ask Clare,” like you’d know.’
I shook my head again and tried to look puzzled, but I knew my neck was probably turning blotchy and giving me away. I stood up and went to get us both a drink from the sideboard, mainly to give me time to think about my response and hide the redness that was no doubt creeping up my décolletage. ‘I… I really don’t think – I don’t know what she’s talking about. You can’t trust anything she says, Joy,’ I said, and poured us both a very large gin. ‘We just have to get through today, I think she’s getting a flight home tomorrow,’ I said, handing her the drink.
‘Ahh, good. I popped upstairs to see Jamie last night, check if he really had sunstroke – he’s been all over the world and never had sunstroke. So while she was in the kitchen, I went to see him. He seemed upset, said she was talking about joining a reality show or something?’
The reminder of my own hand in all this felt rather uncomfortable.
‘Something like that,’ I sighed. ‘I think she’d have gone anyway – if it wasn’t some vague promise of fame, it would have been something else. Ella thought we were super-rich, she thought you and Bob owned this villa and that the “family business” was just a quaint way of describing some global architectural firm. She fell for Jamie, got caught up in the idea of eloping to Italy and knew it would make a great story for her Instagram. It’s what she lives for,’ I added. ‘You have to ask why someone would spend their life trying to lose themselves in foreign places where no one knows her, where she doesn’t have to explain. And, from what she told me, I think she’s earned her money the hard way, if you know what I mean.’
‘Oh, God, a prostitute and a blackmailer—’
‘I don’t think she was a prostitute,’ I said, ‘more a romantic tourist. She just finds someone to be “in love with” for a while, lives off them, gets embroiled in their lives for a season and moves on.’
‘But she married Jamie, why do that if she only saw him as a summer romance?’ She looked horrified, and I felt bad for her.
‘Men are a career for someone like Ella,’ I said. ‘She doesn’t need money, they’re rich, buy her gifts, feed and clothe her and provide somewhere to stay for a while.’
‘Oh dear, I knew she wasn’t right for him. I never thought it would last. I never said anything to Jamie, but I wasn’t very keen, Clare.’ The words tumbled out like she’d been holding them in too long. This was the Joy I knew, gossipy and open – willing to trash anyone just for the fun of it over a glass of gin with ice and a slice. ‘I’ve been nice for Jamie’s sake,’ she continued, ‘but have you seen the way she pulls her bikini bottoms up? Disgusting,’ she hissed.
‘Yes, it’s how they’re wearing them these days though, Joy,’ I said, bonding afresh. She’d finally realised, and I also felt like I’d finally been forgiven for calling her bossy.
‘If the ladies at the golf club ever saw her bottom like that I would die.’
In the great scheme of things, Ella’s bottom was the least of our problems, and in spite of everything, I almost smiled at this.
Chapter Thirty-Two
That evening, Jamie and Ella said they wouldn’t be joining us for dinner, they were going into the village to dine.
‘Ella’s flying back tomorrow,’ Jamie told us sadly. ‘She has a great offer of work and we’re just taking a step back, working out if we both want the same thing.’
It was clearly his way of telling everyone they were parting. She’d stuck with the story of the reality show, and he’d believed it. I felt sorry for him, but Ella wasn’t who he’d thought she was, and in the long-term, she’d have only brought him more pain. I understood them wanting to spend their last night together without the family, but Ella didn’t even come into the sitting room to say goodbye. She waited in the hall, then I saw her fleetingly through the window as she and Jamie got into a taxi. All I felt was relief that we didn’t have to all sit round pretending everything was fine, with Joy making small talk and Ella making vicious remarks under her breath.