Three Women (22 page)

‘I’m sorry too,’ she said, lifting her handbag. She didn’t shake his hand or anything; she walked back out to the reception desk, grabbed her weekend bag and headed back down in the lift. Johnny Devlin had been very honest with her and she had to accept it.

Back out in the street she stood for a few minutes trying to compose herself. She wanted to get as far away from here as possible and found herself hopping on a tube to the city centre. Luke wouldn’t be home for hours and she had no key for the apartment, so she would just have to hang around until he finished work.

ERIN GOT OFF
the tube down near bridgeport road, where Luke and Ronan had found an apartment. It was an older area and there were lots of local shops, bars and restaurants. She spotted what looked like a tea room with cakes and biscuits displayed in the window and went inside and sat down. It was quiet, with a few older women sitting talking together over cakes and coffee, and an old man ensconced near the window reading the
Financial Times
with a large slice of chocolate cake in front of him.

Erin felt sick, but she ordered a large cappuccino. She still couldn’t believe the reaction she had got from Johnny Devlin. He had been direct and honest with her, even if it hurt knowing the truth. Perhaps she had been expecting too much, but he had disappointed her. She couldn’t get around the fact that he had fathered her and not only walked away from Kate when she really needed him but even now, when she was an adult and wasn’t making any demands on him, he was only interested in himself.

He was a selfish man, not capable of being a proper father.
Maybe
she was lucky that Johnny Devlin hadn’t been a part of her life, and now never would be.

Sitting there, she gradually began to calm down and relax. Okay, it was sad, so sad – but it didn’t change anything. She had satisfied her curiosity and deep-felt need to know about her natural father, and, okay, it had not turned out the way she had planned, but at least she could just get on with her life and forget about him.

As she sat there she suddenly got the urge to phone her dad and called his number.

‘Hi, Erin.’ He sounded surprised. ‘I thought you were going to London today?’

‘I am, Dad. I just arrived and I phoned to see how you are.’

‘I’m down at the boat,’ he laughed. ‘I’m trying to fix this yoke of a rudder of mine; it keeps sticking. Is everything okay?’ he asked, unable to keep his concern for her out of his voice.

‘Fine, Dad,’ she lied, trying not to cry. ‘I’ll be meeting Luke in a while.’

‘Tell him I said hello. When will you be home?’

‘Late on Sunday.’

‘The weather is meant to hold till next Wednesday. I haven’t been out in her much lately, been a bit preoccupied with things; but do you fancy a bit of sailing after work on Monday or Tuesday evening?’

‘That would be lovely, Dad! I’ll call you when I get home, okay?’

She sat for a while, comforted by his voice – her real father’s voice. At five o’clock Luke phoned and they arranged to meet an hour later.

* * *

Luke had suggested she made her way to the wine bar that was situated near his apartment building. It was already beginning to fill up with a post-work crowd, but Erin managed to nab an outside table where she could at least watch the world go by and chill until Luke appeared. The waitress passed her an impressive wine list and she ordered a glass of one of her favourites, a lovely chilled rosé, and the waitress put a small bowl of complimentary olives on the table. It was a lovely evening and she urged herself to relax. She had decided to make no mention of her meeting with Johnny to Luke. She was gutted, but she wasn’t going to have her useless father ruin her weekend.

She was on her second glass of wine when Luke arrived. She had forgotten how good he looked in a suit and tie, and she could see lots of envious glances from girls around her as he joined her and ordered more wine. They stayed there for ages, laughing and chatting, until he finally agreed to letting her go home and change in the apartment before they headed out to dinner.

‘Luke, maybe we could stay home in the apartment and get a takeaway?’ she pleaded, tiredness and the few glasses of wine hitting her.

‘No way! You are glamming up, and I am taking you to the best Argentinian restaurant ever! It’s only about a ten-minute walk from where I live,’ he laughed, taking her hand.

The street where he lived was just one big row of tall, modern apartment buildings, all glass and concrete stacked together like angled dominoes around a central plaza. His building was Number Four, and the apartment was on the eighth floor with a balcony and great views. It was smaller than she had expected, with a living room and neat galley kitchen with very little space
for
cooking. The living room was
über
-modern, with black-and-grey leather couches, a massive plasma TV and a small glass dining table with four chairs.

Luke was right, because if you went out on the balcony you had a massive view over that part of the city. Erin struggled to get her bearings as Luke pointed out various city landmarks to her.

She dumped her case in his bedroom and giggled as he pulled her into the shower while he changed out of his own work clothes. She really had missed him and would have been so happy to spend the time here with him.

‘Maybe the restaurant can deliver?’ she pleaded, wrapped in a towel.

‘Tempting as it is to stay in, we are going out,’ he insisted. ‘I work bloody hard all week and the least I can do is go out on a Friday and have a good time. Crashing at home is not an option!’

Half an hour later, as she ordered from the Argentinian menu and sipped a mojito, she had to agree with him. The place was hopping with lots of people determined to enjoy themselves, but by midnight Erin found herself yawning, the stress of meeting Johnny Devlin catching up on her. After a few drinks she felt pretty wrecked and emotional and needed to sleep.

‘Luke, let’s head back to the apartment,’ she pleaded over the music.

‘Don’t be such a granny!’ he teased, showing utterly no interest in leaving the place. Then some of his friends from the office appeared and Luke insisted they join them. It was two a.m. before they finally made it home.

* * *

Saturday morning they both slept in and only the sound of Ronan banging around the place woke them up. Ronan was watching Sky Sports and they spent the next two hours glued to a match Erin had zero interest in.

In the afternoon Luke brought her to view three apartments in a new complex nearer his office. Each was much bigger than the one he was sharing, but two of them had only one bedroom and very little storage space. The rents were outrageous.

‘Luke, there is no way I could afford that! Absolutely no way I could even earn that!’

‘Everyone has to pay out here for rent,’ he cajoled. ‘People work hard! Play hard! And when you are our age you want to stay in the centre – nobody wants to be doing a big commute after working till eight or nine, or even later, most nights. So you just have to pay up! In a year or so I think I’ll probably buy a place. It will be a good investment, as I can rent it out later.’

Erin could see he had it all planned out, but she wasn’t sure that his plan was the same as hers.

Dinner and a night club were organized for Saturday night and Ronan joined them.

‘Has Michelle been over yet?’ she asked.

‘Nah, she’s got lectures on a Saturday morning for the next few weeks and it’s not really worth my while going over, as I’d have to head home on Sunday afternoon.’ He didn’t sound too disappointed, and judging by the attention he was getting from one of the girls he was chatting to up at the bar while they waited for a table, it wasn’t bothering him too much.

The night was great fun and Erin drank far too much, trying to block out yesterday’s fiasco with the man who was
her
so-called father. What was it Claire called fathers like that?
Sperm donors
!

Luke paid her lots of attention and they danced and drank and danced again before eventually heading back to the apartment.

There was no sign of Ronan the next day, so they just chilled together over breakfast. Then things began to sour as Luke started to go on and on at her about moving to London.

‘When are you coming over?’ he demanded tetchily. ‘Erin, I don’t think that you are making any effort to get a job here. Why aren’t you putting things in motion to make the move?’

‘It’s not that easy, Luke,’ she tried to explain. ‘You were transferred with your job, but my job in Dublin is going okay at the moment and I really like what I’m doing. Declan has been great to me and let me do all the design work for the CD and publicity pack for Lia, this great new singer. I wouldn’t probably get that opportunity over here.’

‘You don’t know that,’ he countered. ‘Anyway, I thought that the reason for moving is for us to be together, that you wanted to be with me.’

‘I do. Why do you think I’m here?’ she teased, trying to placate him. ‘But Luke, you know I’ve only just started to connect with my birth mother … It’s early days, but we are friends and I do want to try to get to know her better and build on it a bit.’

‘She’s not important in your life!’

‘You don’t know that!’ she remonstrated.

‘We need to build lives here, careers here,’ he pressed. ‘Erin, the world doesn’t revolve around Dublin or Ireland, you know.’

‘That’s where my family are,’ she reminded him, ‘and your family too. Mum and Dad are already all
angsty
about Jack
going
to Australia for the year with Pixie. If I move they’ll have no one at home.’

‘Thank God for Mr O’Leary and his cheap flights!’ he laughed.

‘I’m serious, Luke,’ said Erin. ‘If I do move over here it would only ever be temporary, for a year or two. But then I would plan eventually, when I have a family, kids, to move back home.’

‘I’m not sure moving back to Ireland is part of the plan. Let’s face it, I’m here working in the London office in a dream job – it’s where I want to be. Maybe you need to think about that,’ he said, getting up and going and getting a glass of juice in the kitchen.

Erin didn’t know what to say. She’d had a wonderful weekend with Luke, but living day to day like this … she wasn’t sure. He worked mad hours; they’d hardly see each other.

‘Luke, you need to give me more time,’ she said, following him into the kitchen and kissing him.

‘Sure,’ he laughed, pulling her close. ‘But just don’t take for ever.’

‘Will you come home next weekend?’ she asked.

‘Don’t think that’s an option. One of the guys in work in my section is having his stag on Saturday night.’ He shrugged. ‘So I’m not going to miss that.’

‘Well then, the following weekend?’

‘There’s a big barbecue in Marcus Stephens’ home. He’s one of the senior partners. It’s a big thing to get invited,’ he explained, ‘so there’s no way I can say no. But girlfriends are welcome. You should come over!’

‘I’ll see about the flights,’ she said as she zipped up her bag and checked that she had everything.

This was the part she hated, saying goodbye to Luke. He walked her to the station where she could get the Heathrow Express. She hated leaving him like this; it might be weeks before they saw each other again. This whole long-distance thing was shit! Luke was right – she was going to have to make up her mind.

KATE WASN’T SURPRISED
when erin phoned her and told her what had happened in London with Johnny.

‘I tried to warn you,’ she said, wishing that he hadn’t hurt her daughter so much. Johnny’s ex-wife was right: he did not deserve to be a father.

Kate couldn’t help it, but lately she found herself thinking more and more of Erin as her elder daughter and wanting to protect her. She was so glad that they had found each other and she knew that she would never let Erin out of her life again. They were bit by bit becoming friends; sometimes she felt more like Erin’s big sister, but she guessed that was okay too. She looked forward to meeting her, chatting on the phone, to being a part of her life.

She was at home on Wednesday, about to go out to dinner with Paddy, when he arrived home and handed her an invitation card.

‘I got an advance copy of the invitation for our anniversary party to check before we get it printed,’ he said proudly, passing the white-and-silver card to her. ‘I think it looks great and
Liam
said he can do them tomorrow. Then we can start posting them out to people to give them proper notice about it.’

Kate took the expensive card with its silver writing and studied it.

Paddy and Kate Cassidy

invite . . . . . . . . . . . . . to join them
to celebrate 25 years of marriage
at their Silver Wedding Anniversary Party
8 p.m. on Saturday 20 September
at 125 Bayview Park, Sutton, Co Dublin

R.S.V.P. 5 September

Kate held the invitation. It was beautiful, so classic and perfect. Paddy always did everything right, organized everything so well.

Twenty-five years of marriage … She was such a fraud to deceive someone as honest as him. To have lied to him, pretended to him, to have kept so much hidden!

‘Hurry on, Kate, we’ll be late,’ he urged. ‘We can talk about it over dinner and try to agree our numbers.’

She sat on the bed, touching the writing on the card.

‘Paddy, I need to talk to you.’ She gestured for him to sit beside her.

He looked puzzled. ‘Are you all right? Are you sick? I’ll phone them and cancel it.’

‘Please, just sit down. I have something to tell you,’ she said, barely able to speak. What if he hated her, never wanted to speak to her again or see her? But she couldn’t keep up the lie any longer.

He sat down beside her and she could see the worry and concern for her in his eyes.

‘What is it?’ he said, reaching for her, wanting to comfort her.

She took a breath, the sigh so big that she felt she might never breathe again.