Reversing Over Liberace (16 page)

“Take me to the showroom.” I was emboldened by our lovemaking. “I've never even been there.”

“It's an old building site. Honestly, nothing to see.” Luke propped himself up against the wall where we'd planned our bed would go. “Bulldozers and holes in the ground.”

“There must be a bit of a building though, if you're living there. Go on, show me. Take me over there now.”

“Now?” He looked a bit flustered. “But, really, Willow, there isn't anything interesting going on.”

“I still want to see. After all,” I played my minor trump card, “if I'm putting money into the business, I at least want to see where it's going to be.”

“Weeellll, okay. But it's a bit late now, isn't it? Won't you be wanting to get back and find out how your sister is getting on?”

“Oh, sod, yes, I'd better.” I thought of OC, up at five this morning, walking the dogs in the park. Her misery and confusion had translated into furious overactivity. I worried she'd do herself some kind of homemaking mischief.

This time the Morgan was back in evidence, and Luke left me soundly kissed on the doorstep. I felt seven stone lighter than I had when I'd gone out. Relief made me bountiful, understanding, blissed out—capable, even, of dealing with Ash.

“Hello, everyone, I'm home!” I trilled like the bird of happiness soaring over the pink pastures of pleasure. “How are we all?”

Ash, who was the only visible recipient of my delight, just grunted and carried on reading, sprawled skankily on the leather sofa.

“How's OC?” I lowered my voice to ask.

“Cleaning Clay's bathroom, last I heard.”

“Do you think we should let her do all this? I mean, it might be bad for her, or the baby.”

Ash raised his head and made a sweep of the living room with one hand. It was immaculately tidy. Even a pile of old newspapers I'd been meaning to take to the recycling bin for the last few weeks was gone. “Look,” he drawled, “the carpet has a pattern. Who'd have thought?”

“All right, point taken.”

“So, we ought to make her rest more, but just let her finish cleaning the place first, yeah?” Ash moved his feet to let me sit down. “Besides, you know what she's like for jumping up and down over bits and pieces. Oh, and Cal was asking how your laptop's been performing since he had his wicked way with it.”

“It's been fine.”

“Give him a call, will you? He's driving me crazy. I think he gets off on thinking about you.” A pleasant, warm feeling crept through my stomach, like a delayed-action vodka. All right, I was spoken for in the firmest way possible. But even so, it was encouraging to know that men still found me attractive. “But then,” Ash went on, “he doesn't get much action. He'd fancy anything that talks to him nicely. Even a scraggy bitch like you.”

The bird of happiness mutated into the vulture of viciousness. “Yeah, and I notice
you've
been home a lot more since you came back from Prague. Waiting for the antibiotics to start working, are you?”

“Cunt.”

“Prick.”

“Ah, the joy of family life,” Clay remarked, walking in on our bickering session carrying a huge stack of files. “I'll bet OC decides to stick at one child.”

“Well, Paddy's not going to help her out if she decides she wants another, is he?” I rummaged around in my bag for my mobile, then put it down on the table in order to have another rummage for Cal's number.

“No, thank God,” Ash said. “If this one turns out to be anything like him, can we stuff it back in again?”

“Excuse me, you are not stuffing my child back in anywhere.” OC came into the room on the tail end of Ash's remark, with her hair tied up and wearing a neat
circa
1950 apron tied around the bulge at her front. I hoped she hadn't heard my observation about Paddy. “Will, could you give me a hand to untie this please?” She turned and presented the strings of the apron. “I can't reach around the back.”

As I scrabbled at the too-tight knot, Clay dumped his pile of files onto the table. “Let me do it.”

“Clay.” I looked up.

“What?”

“Have you put all that stuff down on top of my phone?”

“Um. Whoo, sorry, Will.” A tentative sideways movement of the files, like clearing the rubble from an earthquake victim. “Oh dear.” The cracked casing revealed the battery and we all peered through the gap at it. “Can you tape it up?”

“I'll tape
you
up.” I sighed. There would be no more saucy nighttime texts to or from Luke. “I'm going to bed.”

“I'm going to give the dogs their last walk.” OC stretched her back. “Either of you two coming?”

Ash just sniffed flamboyantly and spread himself farther along the sofa. “I'll come,” Clay said. “If we can go up to the allotment.”

I left them quarrelling quietly about how far two elderly spaniels should be expected to walk in a day, and hastened upstairs. This was my best opportunity to get an undisturbed bath, and I intended to make the most of it.

Chapter Eighteen

“That's it. So, what do you think?”

Luke had parked on the deserted tarmac and was pointing over at a large warehouse undergoing beautification. Scaffolding surrounded it. Huge plate windows gleamed between poles and girders. The whole thing was contained behind a rigid chain link fence which drooped in places like a slut's fishnets.

“Gosh. It's huge.” I got out of the car, Luke hesitantly following. An enormous digger stood framed on the skyline, arrested by nightfall in the act of scooping a bucket of gravel. A mini-crane and two cement mixers hugged the shadows. “It's like a
Twilight Zone
episode of
Bob the Builder
.”

“You can't go on site.” Luke stopped me climbing the fence by grasping my hand. “Health and Safety.”

“But it's
your
site. You own it.”

“It means I get sued if you fall down a hole. Come on, we can walk round outside the fence. This is the back. Round the front is where all the cars will be parked, and where the offices will be.”

I skipped to keep up with his fast walk. “Why are you allowed to stay here then?”

“Who's going to get sued if
I
fall down a hole? I just have to take my chances. Besides, I know where all the holes are.” He pointed again. “Over there, where the roof's on, that's where I've got my meagre bedroll, my microwave and my kettle.”

We arrived around the front of the building, which must have covered at least the floor area of a football pitch, not counting the space outside, which was hard standing for the cars. “Oh.”

“What?”

“Well.” I indicated the sign, newly painted and erected, still with the chains attached which had been used to lift it into position. “Why the name?”

“Sampsons? What's wrong with that?”

“I thought it'd be called after you.”

Luke laughed. “If I put up an enormous sign saying Fry's, I'd be inundated with people wanting to buy chips. Sampsons is the name of the place in Boston. We decided to keep it for this one, too. Sort of a tradition, I suppose.”

“Oh, I see.” I shivered to myself. The night was chilly under clear skies. Although it wasn't late, the streets were already empty of cars and this hulk of a building was atmospherically scary. I felt better for having seen it at last. Concrete proof, ha ha, of how my money was being spent. Enough proof to shut Katie and Jazz up anyway. Enough to stop them moaning on about how much investment, physical, emotional and financial, I was putting into my relationship with Luke. In reality they were just pissed off that our drinking sessions had dwindled and I hadn't rehearsed with the band for weeks. Katie was also annoyed that I'd turned down an invitation to spend this evening at her place whilst Dan was out of town, so that I could go and stand around outside what she called “a garage”.

Luke put his arm around me and started leading me back towards the car. “Come on, let's get out of here. I told you there was nothing to see.”

“Ah, but now I've seen for myself.” I smiled up at him. He was extraordinarily good-looking tonight. A new razored haircut gave him an edge of bad-boy glamour, the stubbled I-don't-careness mitigated by a soft blue sweater which made his eyes look purple. I hoped he'd wear blue for the wedding.

“Your brother's got one of those old allotments, hasn't he?” The Morgan roared away from the pavement and out into the curiously traffic-free street. “Out along Sowerby Road?”

“Yes. He wanders down there most days with his pencil and sketchbook. Bless.”

“Does he know that they're up for sale as building land?” My eyes went news-to-me wide. “Yeah, apparently there's only a couple still in use, so the council's selling them off. Worth a bit, I should think.”

“I'll mention it to Clay.”

“Good idea. He might be able to drive the price up.”

“I don't think Clay will be bothered about that, but he might get worked up about losing his allotment.”

We'd reached my front door, and the Morgan was idling throatily. I could feel the eyes of my siblings boring through the brickwork. Upstairs, a curtain twitched. “Well, thanks then, Luke. See you tomorrow?”

“Of course.”

I think Luke was a bit disconcerted by the abrupt way I pecked him on the cheek before I got out of the car, but I couldn't bear the thought of one of our more involved kisses being witnessed. Particularly by Ash, who would then spend the next ten days criticising my technique. To mitigate any annoyance, I stood and waved until Luke was out of sight at the road junction, before I turned to put my key in the front door. It opened before I had chance.

“Good. Glad you're back.” Clay stood inside, like the father of a post-curfew teenager.

“Why? What have I done now?” As I stepped over the threshold, I became aware that both OC and Ash were sitting on the living room couch.

“You might want to sit down,” Clay went on.

I sat beside OC, who flashed me a completely unreadable look.

“Right. I've asked the others, now I'll ask you. Do you know anything”—a dramatic pause—“about
this
?”

An outstretched hand proved to contain a crumpled-up ball of paper which had obviously been flattened out and screwed up again. The original “you don't deserve it” letter.

“Oh.”

“Fuck.” Ash turned to me. “Is it me or did it just get all
Amityville Horror
in here?”

I explained about receiving the letters, about how I'd been shocked and hurt at first, but since nothing seemed to come of it, and the letters had stopped arriving a few days ago, I'd decided the whole thing had been a mistake.

“Thing is, Will,” Clay said awkwardly, “the letters
didn't
stop coming. I've had a couple. So has Ash.”

“I picked one up this morning,” OC added helpfully.

“We all thought we were the one they were aimed at, you see.”

“Why?” I was suddenly prurient. “What have you done?”

Clay shuffled his feet. “Speaking for myself.” The room hushed. Even the birds singing outside sounded as though they were listening in. “I can't think of anything exactly
specific
, but there's a few people with a bit of a grudge. Some of my co-workers out in China might have taken offence at the way I terminated my contract and left them with higher caseloads.”

“Wow, crime of the century,” Ash said dryly. “I can think of at least half a dozen people who'd be happy to see my bollocks on a plate. 'Sides, Clay, these were delivered in person. Surely no one's
that
destroyed about you leaving that they'd follow you over?”

“I thought,” OC spoke quietly, “that it might be from Paddy. The one I got this morning. That he might be meaning the baby. Maybe he's decided to go for custody once it's born.”

“So we've all been picking up these letters and thinking they were meant for us?” I started to giggle. “How egocentric can you get?”

“Balance of probability though, Will.” Ash stood up. “You've lived here while we've all been elsewhere. They're gonna be aimed at you. Oh, and can you
please
ring Cal. Guy's been on my case all evening, something about a
goat
?”

“Why would anybody want to send you anonymous letters, Will?” OC asked. “You don't have any enemies, do you?”

“Could it be anything to do with this Luke guy?” Clay looked slightly ashamed of himself for asking.

“What do you mean? Luke wouldn't do anything like this.”

“I didn't mean that he'd write the letters, but might he have some pissed off ex in the background? Or some business rival?”

“They'd go for Luke then, surely, not me.”

“Since they aren't exactly threatening, I vote that we bin them as they arrive and say nothing.” OC shifted her weight onto her other hip. “It will only gratify the sender if they think that their target is getting upset.”

I left them to their discussion and took the phone upstairs. “Hey, Cal.”

“Ah. It is you, my fair, goat-moving maiden. How're you doing?”

The wine-scent of his breath, the firm touch of his lips on mine… “Just a sec.” Not even time to make the bathroom. My stomach lurched and dived without warning, as though I stood on the deck of a temperamental ship, bucking and kicking its way through a force ten. I glanced around in dismay and finally
in extremis
seized on my red dress, emptying the best part of an evening's entertainment into its skirts.

“You okay?”

Horrified, I realised that I'd been holding the telephone to my ear during the performance and that Cal had been treated to a virtuoso rendition of Retching, in E Minor.

“Better now. It was something I ate.”

“If you say so. Anyway, to business. Do you fancy a bit more livestock-wrangling? Winnie's run away.”