‘Who’re you?’ she snaps.
‘I was married to your daughter’s husband,’ I say baldly.
Her gaze sharpens suddenly. She nods to herself a couple of times, then abruptly swings her wheelchair away from the window. ‘What do you want with me?’
‘I’d like to talk to you, if you can spare a few minutes.’
‘It’s not like I’ve got anywhere else to be,’ she says acidly.
I glance around the room as I sit down in the only chair available, opposite her. There are no personal photographs anywhere: no pictures of Ruth holding Caz as a baby, or Ruth herself on her wedding day. The room is as bland and sterile as if she’d just moved in this morning, though I know she washed up here more than seven years ago. It doesn’t take a trained psychologist to see that leaving your mother to rot in a loveless cell like this is not the sign of a healthy relationship.
‘So what d’you want to know?’ Ruth asks.
‘All of it,’ I say.
Chapter 27
Caz
Andy leans across the kitchen counter to kiss Kit, holding his tie to the side so it doesn’t dip into his cereal. I try not to notice that just a few weeks ago, he’d have come around the island and kissed me too. ‘Don’t forget, the kids will be here this weekend,’ he says, straightening up. ‘You need to clear all that shit out of Bella’s room. You can’t just use her bed as a dumping ground.’
I want to point out that until a week ago, that room was my study. But now that the kids are coming up to London for their weekends, Andy has decreed that Bella needs her own space, so that she can have friends stay over.
It’s not all bad. Giving up my office has earned me lots of Brownie points with Bella, which will drive Louise crazy.
‘By the way,’ Andy calls, as he opens the front door. ‘We’re going down to Devon next week on Friday morning, now, not Saturday, so you’ll need to take the day off work. Celia’s invited us to a family dinner at the hotel on Friday night, and it makes sense to be there the day before the party, so we’re not in a rush.’
I chase him down the hall. ‘We’re not still going to the party?’ I demand incredulously. ‘After what Louise did?’
‘Of course we’re still going,’ he says shortly. ‘Nothing’s changed. I’m not ruining Celia’s big day because you and Louise had a bit of a tiff.’
‘A bit of a tiff?’
‘Caz, I don’t know what’s going on between you two, but you need to sort it out. This weekend will be a chance for you both to put it behind you and make peace.’ He glances in the hall mirror, and straightens his tie. ‘I have to go, or I’ll be late for the morning briefing. We can discuss this later.’
‘She turned up at our house with a dead cat!’ I exclaim, catching his arm. ‘I’m not letting our son within a half-mile radius of her!’
He shakes me off. ‘I’m going to the party, and so is Kit. It’s up to you if you want to stay home and sulk.’ His expression hardens. ‘And he’s my son too, remember.’
‘Andy—’
He’s gone. I go back into the house, my entire body trembling. I feel sick and slightly dizzy. I don’t know what’s happening to us. Andy has never spoken to me the way he did just now, dismissing me as if I don’t matter. I’ve never seen him look at me like that, distant and unreachable. In all the years we’ve been together, there has always been fire and heat and feeling between us, even when we’ve fought. But for the past week, ever since the police came round, he’s been clipped and cold and surgically angry, almost precise in his dislike. I wonder if this is what he was like with Louise, in the dying days of their marriage.
Four years ago, when Andy finally left her, I thought I’d beaten her. But my victory was Pyrrhic from the start. Andy didn’t leave Louise for me. I won him by default. He turned up on my doorstep, incandescent with rage and misery, not because he’d finally realised he couldn’t live without me, but because he’d discovered Louise had cheated on him.
It’s been a cancer at the heart of our relationship, slow-growing but always there. He didn’t choose me. He never chooses me.
I sink onto the bottom stair, the same place I sat last week to protect our son from his ex-wife’s lunacy, and bury my face in my hands. Most couples start their relationships in a cocoon of intimacy, but for Andy and me, that precious, irrecoverable time was marred by constant running battles with Louise. Somehow, we survived and made it into clear waters. She’s never gone away, a permanent thorn in my side, and Andy and I have often rowed about her, but she’s never driven a wedge between us like this. A month ago, I wouldn’t have thought it possible we’d end up here, more bitterly divided than we’ve ever been. We’re teetering on the brink of something from which I’m not sure we’ll be able to return.
Somehow, I pull myself together, and finish getting ready for work. I drop Kit at his nursery, and head towards the tube, grabbing a latte to go and trying to clear my head so I can concentrate on the day ahead of me. Patrick has stemmed the haemorrhage of clients after the Vine debacle, but I’m well aware I have a lot of ground to make up. I can’t afford another missed step now.
My phone pings with an incoming text from AJ as I climb the stairs to the platform at Parsons Green. Patrick wants to see me first thing.
I step out of the way of the tide of commuters, and put my coffee cup on the ground between my feet so I can text him back. Did he say why?
No. But Sheila will be there.
Shit. There’s only one reason Patrick would have someone from Human Resources sit in on a meeting. He’s going to give AJ a bollocking, and he’s covering his arse so AJ can’t play the homophobic card if things suddenly go south. Don’t panic. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Keep me posted.
I hope to God Patrick’s not going to take AJ off the Univest account, because that’ll leave me super-exposed with Tina Murdoch. But he’s been punishing everyone involved in the Vine fuck-up, taking us off prestige accounts and cutting back on travel perks. AJ’s only my acting deputy. Until Vine, he was on course to have the promotion made permanent, but Patrick can always throw him back in the pool with the other PAs.
I squeeze my way onto the tube, trying not to spill my latte as the crowd presses in behind me. AJ is more than my right hand: he’s my eyes and ears at Whitefish. He’s neurotic and occasionally daft, but he’s also intensely loyal, hard-working and that rarest of creatures: a gossip who knows when to keep his mouth shut. Losing him from the Univest account would leave me both short-staffed and politically vulnerable. He’s virtually the only person in my life I wholly trust. In many ways, he’s a better friend to me than Andy himself.
I change at Earl’s Court, and my mobile lights up with a flurry of emails as I come above ground. I scroll quickly through them as I walk down the platform. Four messages from Tina, a couple of cc’d emails from Patrick and Sheila – an ominous sign – and another from Nolan, plus a terse reminder from Andy to pick Bella and Tolly up from the station tomorrow. And it’s not even eight-thirty in the morning yet.