Letting You Go (9 page)

T
ed’s back was aching. Hunkering over car engines wasn’t a job for the over sixties, not even for spritely and dashing senior citizens like him, Blythe had teased. ‘A man with André Rieu’s hairline and the jaw of Michael Douglas shouldn’t always be caked in grease. Ted should allow himself more down time, he could learn to enjoy the garden with her, they could take trips away, go spend time with the girls. What Blythe had meant was that he couldn’t keep on slugging it out alone in the garage as the arthritis slowly advanced.

Ted swirled the mug of coffee in his hand and repositioned himself against the flaking blue doorframe so the twinge in his muscles didn’t bite too deeply. It felt good to get out of that godforsaken hospital. It had been Alexandra’s idea. She’d turned into a mother hen yesterday, clucking around devising a plan of action they could all work with. It was good to hear her with a bit more life inside her. Not like her mother.

Ted cleared his throat. Alex was right, it did make sense for the girls to stay at the hospital in the daytime. He needed
to keep the garage ticking over, keep the money coming in.
Keep out of everyone’s way.
Then the girls could go back to the farmhouse and Ted could go to see Blythe then. The evenings would be just for the two of them.

And what about the long term? What if she needs help?
Well he wasn’t having a stranger to care for her. No chance in hell was that going to happen. Maybe it was time he started winding things down here. Stop putting it off and just accept it. It wasn’t going to be like when his old man hung up his wrench and handed it all over, the responsibility and the good family name. There was no-one Ted could pass the baton to. All those generations of Foster men who’d lived and grafted here in the Falls and now they were at the end of the line.

Maybe Dillon wouldn’t have wanted to be a grease monkey anyway; the world worked differently these days. Sons didn’t always follow their fathers.

Ted looked at the backs of his hands, veined and battered from years of work in the cold, a sixty-three year old man not knowing what it had all been for. To sell to some snot-nosed developer who’d knock the place down and stick something else for the tourists on here.
Souvenirs of Ragnarok
, or some other nonsense. He’d spent his whole life here, he’d fought for this place, this family business. This was the yard he’d unwittingly sent a young mother and her child from in a death-trap. The same yard he’d held on to by his blackened fingernails one desperate job at a time after the papers had used words like
negligent
and
sloppy
and people had stopped coming.
Never again.
Never again would he hire help after what Susannah Finn’s scumbag husband did.
Now I’ve got to watch your goddamn son coming and going across the street.

Over the road, Torben’s shop door swung open. Finn stepped out with another pot of paint and climbed the ladders back up to the new sign there. Finn had grown into a man, something Dillon would never do. Now here he was back again, strolling about the Falls without a care in the world while Dill lay perpetually sleeping in St Cuthbert’s. And why?
Because that little bastard was pawing at my daughter in the nettles while her brother was fighting for his
— Ted stopped himself. He’d promised Jem he’d try to keep a handle on his blood pressure after losing his temper with Malcolm Sinclair in the hospital. He could already feel it rising like mercury in his veins.

Ted rubbed a rough hand over his bristles, annoyed at himself for inviting the mayor’s boy back into his thoughts. He let his grievances with Finn slip away while the more pressing issue crashed back into his mind. Did Malcolm know? After all this time? Ted had lain awake nearly half the night thinking about it.
He knows all right, the whole sordid tale
. Ted had seen it in Malcolm’s eyes at the hospital. He hadn’t meant to be so hostile towards Malcolm but it was a knee-jerk reaction. The urge to protect his girls from this dirty little secret, instantly there again.

Ted rummaged through his pockets, but he’d promised her. He felt the packet of tobacco in his breast pocket but
left it there.
We don’t need any more secrets between us right now, Blythe.

Over at the hardware store, Finn was painting out the lettering on Torben’s old sign. Ted began bothering at the rough skin on his thumb. Three goddamn days he’d spent up that ladder with his little artsy brushes, flashing that grin on the women as they stopped to admire his work. How had Alexandra ever fallen for all that, with his little pencils and pads, acting like some virtuoso? Ted scratched the back of his head.
Stop winding yourself up, you old fool.
He pushed himself off the doorframe and lobbed the last dregs of his drink onto the yard floor before heading back inside and down into the refuge of the garage pit.

A familiar motor was pulling into the yard when Ted resurfaced for more coffee.

Holy shit and damnation.
The sharks were already circling. Ted waited for the silver Aston to find its spot.

‘Goddamn woman,’ he muttered.

The petite elfin blonde pushed open her door and swung her knees out from the car as if she was Princess Stephanie of goddamn Monaco. Louisa Sinclair had smelled blood already. Ted looked away while she gathered her bag and gloves and sauntered through the blue doors careful not to brush her expensive clothes against anything that might soil her.

‘Hello, Edward.’

Ted’s blood ran cool over the back of his neck. The backgammon boys down at the Cavern were all wild for the
Mayor’s widow. Ted had thought her beautiful once, stunning even, now all he saw was a woman aged with bitterness and venom. All the lipstick and pearls in the world weren’t gonna save that.

Ted snuggled his hands up into his armpits. ‘Louisa,’ he replied tentatively.

‘How are you, poor thing?’ Louisa drawled. Louisa Sinclair formed her words as if they were each a perfect little package, like those fancy canapés she used to have served at her awful dinner parties.

‘Something wrong with the Aston, Louisa?’

‘Oh no,’ she laughed, a small breathy sound, sharp and sickly like a puff of cheap perfume. Louisa wouldn’t bring her car here anyway.

Ted sighed. ‘Well shall we cut to it then? Some of us have to work for a living.’

‘Oh don’t be like that, Edward. I’m only calling in on you to say how sorry I am to hear of Blythe’s ill health, poor thing. You must be worried sick.’

Ted clenched his teeth. So little officer Malcolm had saved the day then reported back to his mother. Now Ted had to stand here and listen to Blythe’s name spoken in perfect, sickly sweet formation.

‘Blythe is going to be just fine,’ Ted replied mechanically, taking the rag from his pocket and wiping the oil from his hands, ‘thank you for asking. Is there anything else I can help you with, Louisa?’

Louisa reached out to touch his hand but Ted drew it
away before she could make contact. ‘Edward. I do believe you are being ungracious. I’m merely extending a courtesy to an old friend. Much in the same way I would expect you and Blythe to do. Which reminds me, we didn’t see you at Alfred’s funeral in January.’

‘Sorry for your loss,’ Ted remarked coolly, but they both knew Ted was glad Sinclair was good and dead. Louisa’s eyes hardened. ‘We were sick. Didn’t want to spread it around, Louisa. No-one would have thanked us for it. Anyway, Jem went, in our place.’ Blythe had said she felt sick, Ted had just played along.

‘Yes. I saw her. I have to admit, Ted, I didn’t recognise her at first glance. Jem looks quite the picture of femininity, now that she’s started dressing … appropriately.’

Ted shifted. Dancing around with a snake wasn’t going to stop it biting. ‘Wind your goddamn neck in, Louisa.’

Louisa’s lips narrowed. ‘I was merely saying, Jem looks less the little tomboy now and—’

‘I couldn’t care less what you think, Louisa, of
any
of my children.’

‘
Any
of them? How many is that again, Ted? Such an ambiguous number, the amount of offspring a person has. So hard to keep an accurate tally in some families, no? I suppose Blythe knows
exactly
—’

‘Stop right there, you poisonous piece of work,’ Ted growled, closing the distance between them. ‘Just to be clear, Louisa, whatever you might think, Blythe is more the
lady you’ve ever been.
My girls
are more the ladies you’ll ever
be
.’

Louisa’s face held but Ted knew he’d hit home. She smiled anyway, it was her last stand. ‘Ah yes. It’s so sad, isn’t it? Tragic, really,’ Louisa said lightly crossing her arms over her handbag. ‘Am I ever going to stack up against a Foster woman? No apparently, by unanimous decision.’ Ted had heard this lilt in Louisa’s voice before, the thinly veiled anticipation before she delivered a sharp piercing wound with surgical precision.

‘Leave us alone, Louisa. And keep your boy away from my wife and girls.’

‘My
boy
probably saved your wife’s bacon, Ted. None of this is Malcolm’s fault.’ It was the first time she’d sounded genuine. Louisa was right. It wasn’t Malcolm’s fault, it had never been Malcolm’s fault – any of it. He was just another kid,
another one
, caught up in their mess. Ted felt sorry for Malcolm then, but that didn’t change the fact that he couldn’t have Malcolm shouting his mouth off around Blythe and his girls.

‘Just keep him away, Louisa.’

‘Malcolm’s a police officer of this town. I can’t tell him where he can and can’t go!’ Louisa mocked. ‘I’m his mother! It’s just my job to steer him, as best I can.’

Ted’s heart was trying to thud its way free of his chest. He’d never hurt a woman, but the notion of knocking her into the concrete pit beneath the car behind him did a round in his mind. He stepped back from her. ‘Then you steer him
well away from anywhere he might go upsetting anyone, Louisa, or so help me …’

‘Gladly,’ she spat. ‘But just so you know, Ted. Call it the curse of strong Viking genes but the characteristics of
certain
bloodlines in this town run strong. Have you seen my grandson lately?’

Ted knew Malcolm and Millie Fairbanks had a child now; Helen Fairbanks was forever coming up to the house with new photos of the boy for Blythe to admire. Helen had never stopped coming up to the house, she’d taken Millie up there too while she was still in her wheelchair so the town knew Bill and Helen didn’t hold Ted responsible for her faulty brakes. ‘No, Louisa. I haven’t seen your grandson.’

‘It’s uncanny. Beautiful almond eyes; that flop of blond hair. You of all people should know that family secrets don’t stay secret forever, Edward. Blythe and her genealogical talents for tracing back family trees should’ve told you that much.’

‘I warned you before, if you open your mouth I’ll make damned sure you go down too, Louisa.’

Louisa held her hands up but she wasn’t the surrendering type. She wasn’t the mayor’s wife any longer, she was his widow. There were no more public engagements, no dinner parties up in that tacky house of theirs. Louisa didn’t have as much face to lose as she had back then. When it had happened. Before Ted could stop it. Ted felt his back stiffen. He was a fool, a damned fool to have ever let it happen.

‘I won’t have you upsetting my wife, Louisa.’ But Louisa didn’t care for Blythe.

‘Really, Ted, I have no desire being the talk of the town, but Malcolm’s going to put two and two together eventually. And when he does ask me, I’m not going to lie to him like you have to yourself all these years. My son deserves to know the truth about his father.’

T
he horrendous suited jaywalker who’d so warmly welcomed Alex back into town the other day was standing two places behind her now in the queue at Freya’s Deli. Different suit, same showy four-by-four double parked right outside like he owned the place. There was a delicate hint of cigarettes fighting the smell of freshly baked croissants in the air around the countertop. Alex had only popped in to get her dad a nice sandwich for lunch, something on wholegrain with three food groups to keep his strength up. He wasn’t eating properly. He needed to eat, he worked too hard, he worried too much. He needed to eat.

‘Anything else?’

‘Yep, can I get one of those vanilla bean shakes please?’ Alex asked, trying to keep her face angled so that unpleasant man didn’t spot her. Not that he would necessarily recognise her. She’d actually bothered to sort her hair out this morning, borrow a touch of Jem’s makeup so she didn’t look like an extra from
Night of the Living Dead
every day. Times had changed; it used to be Jem nicking Alex’s stuff. Alex hoped Jem still loved vanilla shakes.
Guess we’ll find out when I
get to the hospital.
‘And, um, a bottle of the fresh-pressed apple, thanks.’ A small commotion broke out in the queue as Alex fished for change in her back pocket. She kept facing forwards, she didn’t want to look at that foul man again particularly.

‘Sorry, do I know you? You look kind of familiar.’ The young girl behind the counter couldn’t have been older than sixteen.

A small child cried out from somewhere in the queue. ‘Wasp!’

The girl behind the counter glanced over and swatted at something over the croissants.

‘I don’t think so. Sorry.’ Alex smiled.

‘It’s Alexandra, right? I think you used to babysit for me.’ She pointed both index fingers at herself but all Alex could see was several rows of stud earrings and lots and lots of eyeliner. ‘It’s Darcy. Hopkins.’

‘Oh my goodness, Darcy? I didn’t recognise you! I’m stunned you recognised me, actually.’

Darcy transformed from autonomous server into a bubbly teenager.

‘No way, you were like, my favourite babysitter! I was bummed when you stopped coming over. Mum had Carrie Logan instead, do you know her? I think she was in your sister’s year. She was
not
cool.’

Alex smiled. She’d babysat for Darcy for two lucrative years before Darcy’s mum had called Alex and said that they were cutting back on nights out, that they’d call if circumstances
changed. They never had. Carrie didn’t need to be cool, she just needed to be trustworthy around children.

‘I’m only working here for the summer holiday, I’m starting my A-levels in September. I’m going into performing arts, hopefully.’

‘Mum,
WASP
!’

‘It’s not a wasp, it’s a bee. It won’t hurt you.’ The woman waiting behind Alex was getting restless.

Alex nodded approvingly and handed over a tenner. Darcy must be about sixteen now. Alex had been the same at her age, full of confidence and all set for the world. Alex took her change and crossed her fingers for Darcy that nothing horrendous would happen in her life and mess it all up. ‘Take care, Darcy. Good luck with everything.’ Alex smiled and shuffled her way back outside past the hands flailing at an insect she couldn’t see herself and several people chanting, ‘If you don’t bother it, it won’t bother you.’

Alex took a left out of the deli and caught a brief shot at the hand-tied posies in buckets out front of Wallflowers. She stopped automatically to look them over, inside Carrie Logan was savagely deadheading something. The world had advanced its hair straightening technology since Alex had last seen Carrie, Carrie’s corkscrew blonde curls all ironed out now and pulled back into a sleek ponytail running just past the collar of her gilet. Alex casually crouched for a better look at the flower display. Her mum loved flowers. Jem didn’t have to know they were from here. More bees congregated over the lavender bushes either side of the shop door.
Ooh, her mum
loved
lavender, Alex could put some fresh in the kitchen for when Blythe came home.

Something dive-bombed Alex’s ear. ‘Shoo, bee.’ One of the little blighters had got a whiff of Jem’s shake. ‘Shoo.’ Alex took a sidestep. Then another. It wasn’t easy deterring a plucky insect with hands full of takeout. Alex tried to do one of those casual
I’m-not-panicking-about-a-bug-in-my-face
strolls that people did when they started to panic about bugs in their faces.

‘Shoo!
Shooo!
’

Alex scanned the road for a break between the cars where she could cross for the garage.
Where did all these cars come from?
Viking Fest wasn’t starting until the bank holiday weekend. They weren’t all here for a stroll up to the plunge pools, surely?

Something buzzed, right beside Alex’s ear. No! It was going to go in her bloody ear!
Bugger off, bee!
She began shaking her head, a little at first so she didn’t upset the food she had balanced precariously in her arms. The bee buzzed. She skipped a couple of paces along the kerb and cranked her head back in one motion.
Oh tits, Alex, you’ve angered it!

Alex turned on her heel, whichever direction – she didn’t care – and launched herself chest-first into a pedestrian. A cold explosion of vanilla bean milkshake compressed between her and a blue t-shirt.

‘Sorry!’ she yipped.

At first, she thought it might’ve been the man from the
deli too. The body she’d just thumped into had hardly moved under her clumsy force, like a padded wall. Alex got a glimpse of a set of ladders and a hammer, half covered in milkshake, embroidered into the breast of the blue t-shirt.

‘I thought you said you weren’t a runner?’ he said. Alex heard the smile in his voice before she looked for it on his lips. No mud this time. This time Finn had Jem’s shake spattered over him instead.

‘Oh my goodness … I am, so, sorry. I wasn’t looking where I was going. Really … I’m sorry.’

Vanilla flavoured milk tracked down one of Finn’s arms, a large creamy area of t-shirt was already clinging to his stomach. Alex knew that stomach by heart, she’d committed it to memory after just one, single, perfect November night.

She was about to apologise again but she felt something tickle her scalp. Alex began shaking her head as if she was in her youth moshing to Nirvana again, something which incidentally she’d only ever done in Finn’s room.

‘Whoa, there, girl.’ Finn laughed. ‘It’s only …
milkshake
?’

Alex slowly straightened up. She saw the yellow drip come into view from where it had tickled her and watched it run off the end of her hair.

‘Oh, hang on. You have a stowaway.’ Finn smiled. Alex froze. ‘Hold still.’ He came in closer, vanilla filling Alex’s nose. She held her breath while he carefully parted her hair. ‘Come on, little fella. Come get some shake.’ Alex saw the
edge of his smile, a broad run of lovely teeth uniform as the new railings he’d put in around St Cuthbert’s.

‘It was the bee’s fault,’ Alex said sourly. ‘It wanted Jem’s shake.’

Finn teased the insect from Alex’s hair.

‘Guess the bee won.’

‘What happened to
don’t bother them and they won’t bother you
?’ Fat chance. The world did not work that way.

Finn held his hand out. The small invader sat inconspicuously on his palm, behaving itself.

‘See. He’s not bothering anyone now.’

‘Trust me, I didn’t start it. I was trying my best to keep my distance, the thing just kept gravitating towards me anyway.’

On Finn’s palm, the culprit appeared to be recovering from the calming effects of its new host. A small motion and it was on its way again. Alex watched it fly off. She realised Finn was still watching her. ‘Maybe it couldn’t help itself.’

Alex felt a flush rise in her cheeks. Someone in dainty heels skipped over the pavement behind them.

‘Hi, Finn. I just saw! Do you need anything? I’ve brought you some paper towels. Oh my God, Alexandra Foster!’ Carrie stood a little off side. ‘Finn and Alex! Together again, in Eilidh Falls. I heard about your mum, Alex. Hope she’s OK. Jem home too, I take it?’

Carrie looked Alex over, her eyes hovering on Alex’s grubby Converse pumps. She smiled one of those smiles
super-groomed women reserved for other, less-up-to-scratch women. GHDs weren’t going to straighten that kink out of her. Alex followed her shadow from her battered pumps over the pavement. Her shadow was touching Finn’s shadow. Did her shadow not know the rules? ‘Hello, Carrie. Yep, Jem’s home.’

Carrie watched Finn trying to get some of the excess off his front. He wasn’t really achieving much.

‘I think you’re going to need to whip that off, Finn.’ Carrie sighed. Alex rolled her eyes before she could stop herself, but Finn saw it. He gave her a smile before Carrie could see.
Time to go, Alex.
She decided to think up lines to politely get away, before Carrie insisted Finn whip off anything else.

‘Jem come back alone has she? No husband, or … partner in tow? I look out for her from time to time on Facebook, but no sign. Any ideas?’

‘Any ideas about?’ Alex could taste vanilla. Finn was so covered, she was finding it hard to concentrate on what Carrie was saying.

‘Why Jem isn’t on Facebook. Everyone is on Facebook, it’s where we all convince one another how perfectly our lives have all worked out.’ Carrie laughed as if she only thought that was what everyone
else
did on Facebook.

‘Er, I don’t know. Maybe Jem’s life isn’t perfect enough yet.’ She shrugged.

Finn had given up with the paper towels. Alex looked an apology at him. A car horn beeped twice across the road.
Alex turned, an Aston Martin was just pulling from her dad’s yard. Alex saw him walking back into the garage and wished she’d timed her collision with Finn better.

‘I’m really sorry about the mess I’ve made. I have to go.’

‘Off already? Tell your mum and dad I said
hi
, Alex.’ Carrie smiled. ‘Jem too!’

‘Bye.’ Alex said.

She turned to cross the street before Finn spoke behind her. ‘Thanks for the shake, Foster.’

Louisa hadn’t noticed the small drama unfolding across the street behind her. She was too busy watching the colour drain from Ted’s face. Ted looked absently out through the yard gates towards the florist’s. He didn’t recognise the girl at first, his eyes only picking Susannah’s lad out. He looked like he’d an accident with some of his paint. Louisa turned to follow the direction Ted was staring off into. It made Ted pay more attention to what they were both looking at.

The girl turned and Ted recognised the same profile he used to look in on, soundly sleeping in her room, on his way to bed. The face he’d given a thousand goodnight kisses to before she’d gotten all grown up and he’d forgotten how to just plant one on her cheek without waiting for invitation.

Did he just touch her hair?
Ted felt himself turn to stone.

‘Well, well. He is nothing if not persistent, that one,’ Louisa cooed. ‘Some people, hey, Ted? No shame.’

Ted could feel his hands beginning to shake at his sides.
Alexandra had been back a matter of days and he was already bothering at her like a bee around a honey pot.
Son of a bitch.

‘It’s like I said, Edward. They’re all grown up. I can’t control my Malcolm any more than you can control your little Alexandra. Do tell Blythe I said hello.’