‘I’ll pick them up,’ Caz snaps.
‘Look, why don’t you take a day or two for yourself?’ Andrew adds. ‘Get yourself sorted out. The kids can stay here in Brighton with Caz. We were taking Friday off anyway, for your mother’s party, so it’s not a problem. We can talk again then.’
‘Get myself sorted out?’ I repeat. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
He doesn’t meet my eye. ‘Maybe it’d be better if Tolly and Bella spent some time with us. Just till you’re on an even keel again. I know you’ve had a lot going on, and maybe it’s all been a bit too much.’
‘We don’t want you backsliding,’ Caz adds bitchily. ‘Getting overwrought like you did with Roger Lewison. I hear last time was awful.’
I suddenly feel as if all the air has been sucked out of my lungs. She’s going after my children. It’s the last card she has left to play. That’s why she set me up with the police; a drink-drive conviction would be a huge black mark against me if Andrew ever contested custody. She wants to take my children from me.
‘Dad, I’ve got to get to school,’ Bella urges from the car. ‘I’m super late already.’
Andrew can’t even look at me as he gets in the car. I watch him drive away, trembling with suppressed rage. How could he tell her about Roger? That was private, personal information! It cost me a great deal even to tell him, and I only did that because I wanted to be totally honest with him before we got married. How many times does he have to let me down before I wise up? Just hours ago, this man was in my bed, telling me he’d never stopped loving me. Now, he’s using the most intimate details of my past to suggest I’m so unstable my own children aren’t safe with me. I don’t think I’ve ever hated him before, but I do right now.
I pull up the camera roll on my phone, and scroll to the one I want. My secrets are out in the open. It’s about time Caz’s were, too.
Chapter 36
Caz
I can’t even bear to breathe the same air as Andy as we drive the children to their schools from the police station. Overnight, my pain and betrayal have hardened into cold, unrelenting anger. I have no idea where we go from here. The thought of sharing my bed with him makes my skin crawl. But the idea of life without Andy opens a yawning pit in my soul. I hate myself for it, but I still love him. How do I reconcile two such warring impulses? How do I fight for him when my first impulse is to throw him into the street and bar the door?
Maybe if he’d stood up for me when this vendetta with Louise kicked off a few weeks ago, things would never have got so out of hand. That woman feeds off his weakness. She’d never have dared do half the things she’s done if he’d planted his flag firmly in my corner, instead of trying to please both of us. My bitterness is so thick I can taste it. I’m never going to be free of her. Andy’s not going to fight for me, no matter what she does. He’s never fought for me yet.
He insists on walking Bella into school, and I watch as they stop outside the gates, talking intently. Something else is going on with Andy that I still don’t know about; something apart from his nostalgic fuck with Louise last night. If he wasn’t with her yesterday when he was supposed to be working, then where the hell was he? I don’t buy his bullshit about Deep Throat anonymous sources for a moment. He’s up to something.
‘Bella says that policeman was waiting for Louise,’ he says abruptly, as soon as he gets back into the car. ‘She seems to think it was a farmer with a grudge who tipped them off, but I’m not so sure. You wouldn’t know anything about it, would you?’
I say nothing as Andy pulls the car back onto the main road. He was drunk when he came home last night, and by his own admission, Louise was even worse for wear. I was just doing my civic duty, reporting a drunk driver. A mother on her way to school, no less; just one of many up and down the country who hits wine o’clock at six p.m. and keeps on going, never even considering she might still be drunk the next morning. But I should have known Louise would find a way to skate out from under it. Somehow, that woman always comes up smelling of roses. She could shoot someone in Oxford Street, and Andy would praise her for her marksmanship.
‘She got away with it this time,’ I say. ‘But you can’t ignore this, Andy. You’re going to have to do something about her.’
He sighs irritably. ‘Come on, Caz. She was under the limit.’
‘This time,’ I repeat. ‘The kids were in the car with her. What if she’d crashed? They’re not safe with her anymore.’
He looks sideways at me. ‘You really think you can take Bella and Tolly on full-time?’ he says sceptically. ‘We have trouble managing one child, never mind three. You’re not exactly the maternal type.’
‘You think I couldn’t handle it?’
‘I think you wouldn’t want to,’ he says shortly.
What I want has nothing to do with it. But if I can remove the one legitimate reason Louise has to be constantly in our lives by taking the children from her, it’ll pull the rug out from under her feet. She’ll still have visitation rights, of course, unless we can prove she’s certifiable again, which is entirely possible; but if the kids are living with us, the ball will be very much in our court. She’ll have to play by our rules if she wants access to them. Andy won’t be at her beck and call anymore. We’ll have leverage.
My phone beeps suddenly with a text notification from Louise. It’s some kind of image. I open it up, and an icy chill sweeps through me as I see the photograph of the peeling sign: Starr Farm Senior Care Centre.
She knows.
I drop the phone on the floor of the car, my heart pounding. Louise knows about my mother. She’s been to see her. How the hell did she even find her? The only person who knows Ruth exists is Angie, and she’d never breathe a word to anyone. What has Louise discovered? And what is she going to do about it?
My hands are actually shaking as I scrabble for the phone. My mother is a senile old woman; no one will take her lunatic ravings seriously. But what will Andy say if he finds out she’s not living in a beautiful Victorian building with a concierge in the heart of Chelsea, as I’ve told him, but a care home in Essex? He’d never have willingly exchanged the prestige and class Louise brought him for Carol from Dagenham. As far as he’s concerned, my father is dead, my mother a wealthy recluse from whom I’m estranged. If he finds out I’m no better than he is, it could be precisely the excuse he needs to run straight back into Louise’s well-bred arms.
‘Are you OK?’ Andy asks, as he parks the car in a side street near our house. ‘You seem very quiet.’
I make a quick decision. My battle with Louise over the children can wait. I need to deal with my mother first. ‘I’m going back to London after all,’ I say abruptly. ‘Tell Louise the kids can stay with her for now. I’m sure they’ll be fine.’
He looks visibly relieved. ‘I think that’s a good idea.’
We barely speak on the train back to Victoria. As soon as we reach London, Andy heads off to the taxi rank to go into work, and I take the tube home. I’m not going into Whitefish today; I’m not sure I’ve even got a job to go back to. I let myself into our empty flat, feeling sick and hollowed out. Stepping over the heap of mail on the doormat without bothering to pick it up, I go straight upstairs, peel off my clothes and pad into the bathroom, turning on the shower and stepping into water as hot as I can bear. As the steam rises around me, I close my eyes and turn my face into the scalding spray. Louise, Andy, AJ, Whitefish, my mother … I just want to wash it all away.