The Consequences (4 page)

CHAPTER 6

C
onversation had dried up.

Stephanie drifted in and out of troubled sleep, and Joan concentrated desperately on holding the old van on the road. It started snowing: huge silent flakes that quickly coated everything in a festive blanket. But both women knew how dangerous the snowfall could be. There was a very real danger that they could get caught on the highway and be forced to spend Christmas in a sleazy motel or, worse still, become trapped on one of the minor roads and run the risk of freezing to death in the car.

Stephanie wondered how Robert would react if he read about it in the newspapers. How would he feel? Relief that “the Stephanie Burroughs problem” had gone away? Would he feel even vaguely guilty that it was his fault she was driving through a snowstorm on Christmas Eve in a gasping van that sounded like it was about to conk out at any moment? However, since he rarely read a newspaper and she doubted that the deaths of two women in a snowstorm would make the
Boston Herald,
he'd probably never know.

Maybe she could haunt him.

The heater in the van suddenly decided to work and now pumped over-hot and vaguely acrid air into the van. The combination of the heat and exhaustion drove Stephanie into a light, uncomfortable doze in which ominous thoughts of Robert and Kathy were never far away.

The crunch of gravel and grit under the tires brought her awake. They had turned off the freeway and onto a narrow country blacktop. As she struggled to straighten and sit up, Joan said, “Nearly there.”

Stephanie rubbed her sleeve against the side window and peered out into the night. It had snowed here recently, and the world had lost all shape and definition. The streets were deserted, but in the majority of the Craftsman and bungalow houses, set well back from the road, she could see a Christmas tree winking in the gloom. Some of the houses had been decorated with thousands—tens of thousands—of lights, but most of the lights had been turned off now, and the displays of Santas and reindeer, snowmen, and Christmas trees seemed rather forlorn.

It was close to midnight as they turned onto Lake Mendota Drive where a single house was ablaze with sparkling lights. Stephanie craned forward to look. This was the home of their childhood. The wan lights of the van washed across the front of the pale yellow house. An enormous Christmas tree dominated the living room's bay window, and Stephanie knew it would be festooned with the same balls and trinkets it had always been decorated with. She knew she would find the silver-foil and pipe-cleaner angel she had made in first grade; she knew that the crown her eldest brother Billy had worn when he'd played a wise man in the Christmas pageant in kindergarten would adorn the top of the tree. She'd once found such traditions rather petty and almost embarrassing, but as she got older she'd come to realize that there was something comforting in them, and the trinkets on the tree symbolized simpler times, happier times.

Climbing out of the car, she was surprised to discover that there were tears on her cheeks, and she tried, unsuccessfully, to convince herself that it was just the chill wind on her face.

The front door opened wide, and the long shadows thrown by the sisters' parents danced across the snow. The two women grabbed their bags and hurried out of the icy night air.

 

At fifty-nine, Toni Burroughs was a tiny woman, standing an inch under five foot.

To Stephanie's eyes, Toni looked the same as she had when Stephanie was growing up. Her features were all planes and angles: a pointed chin, sharp nose, prominent cheekbones, and skin that looked almost unnaturally smooth. Stephanie doubted that her mother used Botox and knew that a face-lift was simply out of the question, so she put her mother's perpetual youthfulness down to good genes and hoped that she would look as good as her mother when she was her age.

Toni met Stephanie on the step and reached up to wrap her arms around her daughter. “I can't begin to tell you how happy you've made me,” she breathed in Stephanie's ear.

“I'm happy to be home,” Stephanie said. And in that moment, she meant it.

“What made you change your mind?”

“Maybe I just wanted to be home with my family for Christmas,” Stephanie murmured.

“Maybe,” Toni said in that tone of voice that suggested that she didn't believe a word of it.

Matt Burroughs released Joan and gathered Stephanie into his arms. “Now this is the best Christmas present an old man could have.”

“Dad . . .” Stephanie could feel tears prickling at the back of her eyes, and her throat felt unaccountably tight.

“Come inside now. You both must be freezing.”

Matt Burroughs looked every inch the college professor. Tall, potbellied, and now beginning to stoop a little, he still possessed the thick mane of jet-black hair that, even now in his seventieth year, was showing remarkably little gray. But Stephanie noticed the extra lines around his eyes, the creases in his brow, the more pronounced stoop when he walked. He'd aged since she'd last seen him.

Matt ushered his daughters into the hall and closed the door. The small, cramped hallway was made even smaller by the addition of the second Christmas tree—the kid's tree—that was put up every year for the grandchildren to showcase their handmade decorations. This year the greenery was almost lost beneath a confection of silver and crepe paper, pipe-cleaner stars, and papier-mâché balls.

After the chilly drive, the house was luxuriously warm, rich with the smells of Christmas cooking, scented Yankee Candles, and pine. In the surprisingly deserted living room, a log fire was burning down to embers.

“Where is everyone?” Stephanie wondered. She'd been expecting to find the entire clan still up.

“Gone to bed,” her mother announced, with just a hint of disapproval in her voice. “I thought they'd wait up for you.”

“They'll be up early with the children,” Matt said softly. He nodded toward the pile of brightly wrapped boxes piled haphazardly around the enormous tree that filled the window. “This is the first time in I don't know how many years when the entire family will be home for Christmas,” he said with a smile. He reached out and squeezed his daughter's arm. “I'm so glad you could make it.”

“So am I, Dad.”

Toni caught hold of Joan's arm and pulled her out to the kitchen, leaving Stephanie alone with her father.

“No doubt your mother is pumping Joan for information right now,” Matt said with a grin. He opened the antique rolltop drinks cabinet. “I know you don't really drink hard liquor,” he said, opening a bottle of Maker's Mark with its distinctive red wax top, “but I think you might need this.” He poured a double and handed it to Stephanie. “You look like you need it.”

“Usually I don't, and normally I wouldn't, but tonight . . .” She tilted her head and threw back half the bitter liquor in one gulp. She felt it sear the back of her throat and then explode, warm and soothing, into the pit of her stomach. “It's been a really long day.”

Matt poured himself a tiny drop into a cut-glass goblet that was older than he was, swirled it in the bottom of the glass, and breathed in the sweet aroma. Placing the goblet on top of the mantelpiece, he poked at the crumbling remains of the blackened log with a fire iron, watching red-black and yellow-white sparks spiral up into the chimney.

“You were lucky to get a flight,” he said, without turning around. “It must have been very last-minute.”

“It was. I didn't book flights until this afternoon . . . well, afternoon East Coast time.”

Matt retrieved his glass and turned to face his daughter. Concentrating on the liquor, he asked, “Didn't you have Christmas plans?”

“I had,” Stephanie said softly, but refused to elaborate.

For a moment it looked as if Matt were about to push for an answer, then he simply raised his glass to his daughter. “Welcome home!”

“Thanks, Dad.”

“Stef . . . you're not in any sort of trouble, are you?”

“Dad!” she exclaimed, immediately reverting to her fourteen-year-old self. “What sort of trouble?” she asked, curious as to what he was thinking.

“Oh, I don't know. Job trouble.”

“No, Dad, I'm not in any sort of job trouble.”

“Man trouble?”

“There's no man in my life right now,” she said quickly, determined not to lie to her father, and equally determined not to tell him what had happened. Her parents were devout Catholics. She wasn't sure how they'd react if they discovered that their daughter had been having an affair with a married man. “There's no secret, no big mystery, I promise you. I made a last-minute decision to be with my family for Christmas. The alternative was staying at home alone in Boston. I think I made the right choice.”

“I know you did,” Toni Burroughs announced from the doorway, where she was standing with a tray laden with a tea-cosy-wrapped pot and a huge plate of sandwiches. Joan hovered behind her. Without the heavy coat and concealing hat, the resemblance of her sister to her mother was remarkable. “Now eat up—you must be starving—then you can head up to bed. I've given you your old room; I thought it might bring back memories of childhood Christmases. Joan, you've got the spare room.” She stopped, looked up, and tilted her head to one side, listening.

The room fell silent.

In the distance, a church bell had begun to toll midnight, the sound crisp and brittle, lost and lonely on the night air. Stephanie Burroughs blinked away tears; she was home for Christmas. When she'd awakened this morning, she'd had no idea this was how the day was going to end.

CHAPTER 7

Wednesday, 25th December
Christmas Day

 

 

I
t was almost two in the morning when she finally gave in and realized that she wasn't going to sleep.

Stephanie sat up in bed, pulled the heavy embroidered quilt up to her chin, and looked around the tiny room: a surreal piece of déjà vu. This was the room she slept in through her entire childhood. It was more or less identical to the room she left fifteen years earlier, and it looked as if her mother had deliberately set out to keep it that way. Costumed dolls from every country in the world faced her from the deep shelf across the room. She'd never really collected them, but every birthday and most Christmases her mother or an aunt would give her another blank-faced doll dressed in an intricate homemade, hand-stitched ethnic costume. They were always too delicate, too “special” to be played with, and Stephanie quickly grew to loathe the dolls. Below them were two shelves of books and, even in the gloom, she knew she would find
Little Women, Anne of Green Gables, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
and Dr. Seuss, alongside about three generations of ink-splotched schoolbooks and a collection of
Mad
magazines. As with the dolls, she had never really liked the magazines, but her father used to buy them for her every month, and she hadn't the heart to disappoint him. In the corner, just as scary as she remembered it, was the rocking horse that her grandfather had hand-carved from a solid piece of elm. He had then lovingly painted the horse, and Stephanie knew if she climbed out of bed and examined its belly, she would see her name scratched into the wood. Really the only things missing were the intricate and ornate doll's house—given away to one of her nieces—and the posters that had once adorned the walls.

The house was a decent size, but with so many siblings, Stephanie was always surprised that she had gotten her own room. The basement had been converted into an enormous, almost dorm-like room that her two oldest brothers Billy and Little Matt had shared. Now, it was called the grandkids' quarters—where anyone under the age of adulthood slept and played. Growing up, Joan and CJ shared the room down the hall from Stephanie, across from their parents, and Jack and Christopher shared the large attic.

Stephanie swung her legs out of bed. The floorboards were warm and smooth beneath her bare feet. Taking the quilt with her as she got off the bed, she padded over to the window and rubbed her hand on the glass to peer out into the night. It was snowing: huge silent flakes that reminded her of her childhood and, for a moment, made her feel safe.

She wondered—fleetingly—what it must be like in Boston.

She pulled the quilt protectively around her shoulders and wandered out into the hall. She needed some water. She'd had a headache and stomach cramps ever since she'd gotten off the plane, and although the cramps had eased, the headache had never quite gone away. She could feel it pulsing now, throbbing dully behind her eyes.

The house lights were still on, but turned to dim, in case any of her nephews or nieces needed to go upstairs to the bathroom in the middle of the night. Her entire family was home for Christmas: her four brothers, Billy, Little Matt, Jack, and Chris, and her two sisters, CJ and Joan. With the exception of herself and Joan, everyone had arrived with partners, and her brothers had brought their children.

She reckoned that tomorrow—no, today, Christmas Day—was going to be that special nightmare that is a family Christmas.

She wandered downstairs, suddenly feeling incredibly guilty. She became the six-year-old girl sneaking downstairs in the middle of the night to see if Santa Claus had come. She remembered being devastated when she had discovered the truth about Santa. That was the moment when her innocence was shattered, and she began to look at the world through a more pragmatic lens. She paused at the door to the living room and looked in. The only light came from the fat wax candle burning in the window and the glowing red and gray ash from the fire, with the occasional spark spiraling upward. It looked almost magical. And Stephanie was suddenly glad circumstances had forced her to come home. While her mother looked exactly the same, her father was definitely aging, and with that thought came the realization that time was slipping by and every Christmas could be their last one.

The door to her father's study was partially open, and she peered inside. It was a room she'd always loved. One of her earliest memories as a very young girl was of standing at the doorway, staring into the dark cavern of the room, awed by the books that lined every wall, from floor to ceiling. Now there were piles of newspapers scattered around the floor; despite the advent of the Internet, Matt liked to read articles in newspapers before cutting them out and putting them in innumerable folders he'd store in the closet. Regardless of Toni's constant complaining that her husband was a hoarder and his room was a fire hazard, Matt took no notice. He had published several academic books and was considered one of the leading scholars in his field. He was happy with his “system” and refused to cave to technology. He used the computer to communicate with his students, to Skype his grandchildren, and to do research, but he refused to read articles online and even regifted the Kindle that Jack had bought him the previous year.

The room was dominated by a spectacularly ugly slab of a desk, carved by the same Grandfather Burroughs who had created the rocking horse. Behind the desk stood her father's high-backed leather armchair. The red leather was cracked in places now, some of the studs were missing, and the two arms were polished smooth by years of use. When Stephanie was growing up, she used to find comfort in the clicking keys of her father's old, battered Smith Corona; however, ten years earlier it had been replaced by an iMac. The computer was still on. A vibrant aquarium screensaver was active, colorful tropical fish swimming lazily through coral reefs.

On impulse, Stephanie slipped into the room and closed the door behind her. She purposely hadn't checked her e-mail for hours and, although she very much doubted she'd have anything other than junk mail, she decided she'd grab the opportunity just in case anything important had come in.

And was that the only reason? Ignoring the thought, she curled up in her father's leather chair, tucked her feet under her body, and settled the quilt around her. Then she tapped the space bar, and the screensaver dissolved.

She quickly logged into her company mail through the mail server. There were half a dozen virtual Christmas cards sent by people too lazy to send the real thing, and a couple of “see you next year” e-mails from colleagues.

Next, she logged into her personal mail. There were fifty-two messages.

The spam filters had caught most—but not all—of the special offers, the free money, the Viagra substitutes, and the Genie Bras. Stephanie scrolled down the screen, quickly deleting the remaining e-mails without opening them, and then rolled on to the next screen.

New e-mail from robert.walker@R&KProductions.com.

Stephanie was unsurprised.

Sitting in the chair, she stared at the e-mail for a long time. There was no subject, and it had been sent at 2:43 a.m., but that was his local time, Eastern Standard Time. Stephanie glanced at the clock. About fifteen minutes ago.

She could delete it. It would be so easy. Just highlight it. Click Delete, and it would be gone. She clicked once on the e-mail, and then she rested her hand on the keyboard, index finger brushing the Delete key.

There was nothing Robert could say to her, nothing she wanted to hear from him. . . .

But she was also curious. What had happened when he and Kathy got home? Had they argued, reconciled? . . . How had that terrible Christmas Eve finished?

She hit Enter, and the e-mail opened.

“Oh shit!”

Stephanie's first reaction was one of anger—how dare he attempt to contact her, how dare he invade her home in the middle of the night, how dare he rummage through her closets, how dare he even think about contacting Charles Flintoff, her boss! And how dare he say that he loved her!

There was a tightness in her chest; she could feel her heart pounding hard enough to make her body shake. Her stomach clenched and boiled and, for a moment, she thought she was going to vomit.

Why couldn't he just accept that they were finished? That their affair was over?

When she had stood at her door earlier that day and watched Robert and Kathy climb into their cars, she never expected to see or communicate with Robert again.

Obviously, she'd been wrong.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, an alarm bell was ringing furiously. Barely a few hours after they broke up, not only had Robert attempted to contact her, he'd been inside her home.

A sudden smile curled the corners of her lips.

It was brought on by the thought of Robert's desperately attempting to get in touch, failing, then rushing to the condo to find it abandoned. All her clothes, her shoes, even her computer were still there. He'd no idea where she was; and he obviously imagined the worse. Was he arrogant enough to believe that she'd been so upset by the course of events that she'd done something stupid like thrown herself into the Charles? A lovelorn suicide. She realized—not for the first time either—that he didn't really know her at all.

She read the e-mail again, and the smile faded. The last thing she needed was for Robert to talk to her boss or to the police.

She'd have to talk to him.

A sudden thought struck her, and she checked the time of the message again. Maybe he was still online. She could IM him in Google Chat. Stephanie glanced at her father's desktop and laughed. Like most people his generation, Stephanie's father subscribed to AOL. She smiled at the distinctive yellow walking-man icon at the bottom of the screen and clicked on the Safari icon next to it. She logged into Google and waited while her personal contacts loaded into the address book. She knew the chances of finding Robert logged in on Christmas morning were probably slim indeed. . . .

Online: robertwalker.

Stephanie moved her mouse over the name, but didn't click on it.

Online for nineteen minutes.

Well that, if nothing else, told her something about the state of affairs in the Walker household. She grinned at the unfortunate phrase. What was he doing on his computer so early on Christmas morning?

Stephanie double-clicked on the name, and the message box popped up. It was divided into two halves: Outgoing messages were written in the bottom half, while the response appeared in the top half of the screen. She hesitated, looking at her name glowing on the screen: stephanieburroughs, then her fingers moved lightly across the keyboard, four characters:

Yes?

Almost instantly, she saw a note appear on the bottom of the screen: robertwalker is typing. A moment later, Robert's text appeared on her screen.

Thank God. Are you all right? I was worried sick.

I'm fine.

But where are you?

I'm fine.

Are you not going to tell me where you are?

No.

Tell me you're all right?

I'm all right.

Stephanie, please talk to me. We have a lot to talk about.

We've nothing to talk about. I want my key back. Don't go near the house again. Stay away from my boss. I don't want to see you again.

It doesn't have to be this way.

Actually, it does.

Please. I need to talk to you. About today. About the future.

We have no future together. Go back to your wife, Robert Walker.

Stephanie hit the button that signed her out of Google Chat. She knew Robert would get a message on the other end, saying that stephanieburroughs was offline. Jesus, the arrogance! The sheer, breathtaking arrogance of the man.