You Can Trust Me (35 page)

“About Hannah?”

“And about us.”

“Okay,” I say. “Later. Tonight.”

I feel sick to my stomach at the prospect of the conversation we are likely to have.

I call Mum next, reassuring her that Hannah is fine. She sounds a bit shaky, but she holds back from crying though I can hear she's close to it. Her tone becomes more distant as she talks. I know she's thinking about Kara, but she doesn't say so out loud and neither do I. As we skirt around the memories that fill both our minds, I think of Damian's phrase again:

Your life isn't small—you've just got too used to living at the edges of it.

Maybe that's a way of life I learned from Mum. It's certainly how the two of us behave when we're together.

After a minute or two, Zack takes the phone. He, unlike Mum, is openly weepy and saying he wants to come home. I speak to Mum again, apologizing for disrupting our time together with the kids. Mum brushes this off as unimportant under the circumstances. I tell her that either Will or I will drive over soon to pick up Zack, then phone Will.

He offers to go for Zack immediately after his conference call. I agree, saying I'll wait in for Hannah.

“We'll all be at home for supper,” I say, trying to sound cheerful.

“Yeah, happy bloody families,” Will says with a sigh.

He sounds so miserable. A sob rises inside me. Maybe it's good Will and I are falling apart like this. Maybe we need things to come to a head so that they can be resolved once and for all. Because—and I have to face this—it's impossible for me to trust him, ever again.

My thoughts stray to Damian. I wonder how he's doing. I think about calling him, just to try to put all the pieces we've discovered in some kind of context. But before I do, I want a cup of tea—Paul pouring me that scotch was a nice idea, for a couple of sips, but I can't take hard liquor at this time of day—and the only milk in the fridge is going bad. Plus, there's no food for supper. I don't have my purse and cards, of course, and I can find very little cash in the house, so I rummage around for an old bank card from a sole account in my maiden name that I hardly ever use. Then I get dressed quickly in jeans and a long-sleeved top. It's much cooler than it was earlier; the rain that fell when Damian and I left the cathedral seems to have cleared the air.

I drive to Sainsbury's. I have only another twenty minutes before Hannah will be back, so I'm scuttling past the stacks of pet food, heading to the dairy section, when a familiar figure turns the corner just in front of me.

“Leo, hi.” Will's boss is the last person I am expecting—or wanting—to see, but I force a smile on my face as I greet him. “What are you doing here? I thought you were in the office with Will?”

“Just left!” he booms. “Popped in here on the way home.” Leo's eyes express genuine warmth. He's dressed in corduroy slacks and an open-neck shirt. Tufts of gray chest hair poke out from the carefully ironed cotton. “Will told me about Hannah. Thank
God
she's okay.” He shakes his head. “Kids … honestly. Poor Will, I couldn't believe he managed to remember any of his German this afternoon, but he did. He's an asset, a brilliant asset.”

I can feel my cheeks burning at this show of admiration for Will. Desperate to change the subject, I find myself saying that it seems weird to have bumped into Leo in a supermarket. Leo looks slightly confused, but points out that I shouldn't be
that
surprised to see him, as he and Martha live just ten minutes away, albeit in the opposite direction from my own house.

“It's not that,” I confess, blushing slightly. “It's more that I've never imagined you doing any food shopping.”

Leo laughs, a rich belly laugh. “Well, Martha's still away, so I'm fending for myself this weekend. I was out last night.” He lowers his voice, his tone confiding, though he is still speaking much more loudly than I am. “Had
far
too much to drink. Paul's coming over later to watch the football and grab some takeout.” He holds up his basket in which nestles some tins of cat food, a box of tea, and a bag of salad. He points to the lettuce leaves. “Health kick.”

“Right, yes, Paul said he was going to see you later.” I explain how Paul came round to give me some moral support.

“Good lad,” Leo says approvingly. “He's very loyal to his friends. Always has been.”

Loyal, unlike Will.

I can see Leo clocking the shadow that must pass over my expression. At once, his own face falls. “Sod it, Livy, I can't leave without talking about this,” he says suddenly. “I'm sorry Martha told you about … about what happened in Geneva.”

I stare at him. He knows? Martha was adamant she wasn't going to tell him she'd spoken to me.

“I guessed she told you,” Leo says with a grimace. “You can't be married to someone for fifteen years without knowing when they're keeping something from you.”

“Right.” I smile at the irony of this remark. “I hope you weren't too hard on Martha—she was just trying to be a friend.”

“To be honest, I'm more concerned about you.” Leo pauses. “When my first wife and I broke up, my world fell apart. I was devastated. Didn't see Paul for ages.” He shakes his head. “I know there's no comparison, but I do understand the hurt.”

Tears spring to my eyes at his kindness. I turn away, humiliated and touched. “Don't be nice to me,” I whisper. “You'll make me cry.”

“Oh, Livy.” Leo shakes his head sadly. “Will's a fool. I wish I hadn't seen what I saw.…” He trails off, and I remember what Martha told me again: Will and Catrina, kissing good-bye as Will left her hotel room.

I close my eyes against the image. I feel so stupid. So unbearably stupid. And in that moment, I know that I have to leave Will. I can't give him another chance and retain any self-respect. It won't be good for the children, but neither will a browbeaten, desperately unhappy mother. Maybe I
have
gotten too used to living at the edges of my life. Well, as of today, I'm walking right back into the center of it, changing the way I look at everything, including my family.

You go, girl,
I can hear Julia drawl.
Just remember you can't teach an old dogma new tricks.

“What are you going to do?” Leo's forehead is creased with a deep frown. His expression is so kind and fatherly that a tear escapes my eye and trickles down my cheek. If only Dad were here. It's years since he died, but at times like this, when I really need his solid, commonsense affection, I miss him as much as ever. Across the aisle, a man struts self-consciously toward a stack of speciality teas. As I watch him, I think of Will's easy, laidback stroll, and my heart seems to shrivel in my chest.

“I don't know,” I whisper. “I just don't know.”

Suddenly everything Damian and I have been doing, trying to find out what really happened to Julia, seems utterly pointless. Nothing we find out will bring her back. Nothing can turn back the clock.

Nothing can make Will and me whole again.

Leo pats my arm; his hand is large and heavy. “Give me and Martha a call if there's anything we can do.” He leans over, pecks me on the cheek, then leaves.

His kindness is touching—yet my overwhelming feeling is one of humiliation.

And loss.

I make it to the dairy counter before I break down. I stand, pretending to examine the ice cream boxes in the freezer. Tears stream down my face. The pain fills my entire body. I hold myself together, resisting the desire to collapse onto the floor and wail and howl. How can Will have done this? Images of him and Catrina fill my head. I can't bear it. I see them kissing, her taking her clothes off for him, his eyes full of hunger and lust. I feel like I'm going mad. That I
will
go mad.

“Stop it.” I say the words out loud, willing the images away. I force myself to focus on the ice cream tubs below me. Zack likes strawberry. Hannah prefers chocolate. I'm about to take one of each when I spot the Neapolitan. That's good. Will and I can eat the vanilla section.

One last supper, I think, before I tell him to leave the house for good.

*   *   *

Hannah puts her knife and fork together and pushes her plate away. For once, she has eaten everything—I made stew and mashed potatoes—and sat meekly throughout the meal. However, despite the peace, I'm not at all sure her behavior is a good sign. She didn't talk back when Will arrived home with Zack and told her, stern and unsmiling, that she was grounded for a week and must never run off without telling us where she is going again. I think he handled her well, not coming down too hard but setting solid boundaries. Hannah kept her head bowed throughout, then scuttled off to her room. She looks preoccupied and miserable now. I resolve that when Will and I talk later, we must do so in the garage, where neither child will overhear us.

Zack is still eating, sauce stains all around his mouth. I reach over and wipe his lips with a piece of kitchen towel. He glances at me and beams, his eyes shining with happiness from under long, black lashes. I gaze at his round, fresh face and wish that I could keep him like this forever. The knowledge that, in a few more years, he will be a grunting, lanky, pimpled teenager is almost impossible to accept.

I look up. Will is watching me, his expression one of frustration. I frown, not understanding. Then Will picks up his plate and Hannah's and takes them to the counter above the dishwasher.

“I bought ice cream for dessert,” I say.

“No thanks,” Hannah says, getting up.

“Not for me.” Will turns and leaves the room.

I glance back at Zack. He swallows his stew in a huge gulp.

“Is it strawberry?” he asks hopefully.

I fetch his ice cream and make myself a cup of tea. I can hear Hannah padding upstairs to her room. Will has switched on the TV in the living room. So much for our family dinner. Ten minutes of a shared meal, then we each fall back into our default groove. I chew on my lip. Maybe Will and me splitting up will have some positive—as well as negative—effects. It should certainly change these ruts and routines.

I load the dishwasher, wondering resentfully how I have let a situation build where I both cook and wash up. Is it really my own fault? Sure, Will and I agreed when I gave up work that I would run the home while he focused on his career, but why does that mean he doesn't even help clean up? Yes, of course, I could always ask him to help—Hannah and Zack too—but why should I have to? Will should
see
I need a hand in the kitchen. He should
offer.

I resentfully shove a plate into the dishwasher. Zack is swallowing his final spoonful of ice cream, the mess around his mouth now various shades of pink.

“Bathtime in twenty minutes,” I say.

“Can I play
Temple Run
?”

“Sure.”

He scampers off and I scrape the leftover stew into a Tupperware container and leave it on the counter, ready to put in the freezer.

The next hour creeps by. Will doesn't emerge from the living room, while I maneuver Zack into first his bath and then his pajamas. He falls asleep within seconds of me turning off the light.

I wander next door into Hannah's room and stand in the doorway. Hannah looks up from her bed, where she's sitting cross-legged and listening to music on her headphones. She switches off the music.

“Everything okay, Hanabana?” I ask.

This is Will's name for her, and as I speak, I'm braced, ready for Hannah to tell me not to call her that or to scowl and demand for the thousandth time that I leave her room. But Hannah does neither of those things. She simply nods and goes back to her music.

As I hear the faint hiss and slap of the beat behind me, I know that it's time for Will and me to talk. I go into the living room.

“Shall we?” I say.

Will looks at me, then switches off the TV without a word.

My heart thuds as he follows me out to the garage. It is cool, but bright under the artificial light out here. There's a smell of wood and gasoline. I stare at Will's stash of old bike mags, then down at the place where I found Julia's ring. It feels like my life, as I know it, is over. That after this conversation, everything will change forever.

 

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Will and I stand in the middle of the garage, facing each other. There's nowhere to sit, but that is a good thing. We shouldn't be too comfortable for this.

“So?” Will says.

“Catrina.” The one word, hard and bright as glass. It sticks in my throat.

Will looks at me, his expression both angry and wary. “I already told you, Liv, I didn't sleep with her,” Will says.

I stare at him, hate and humiliation welling in my guts. How can he look me in the eye and lie like that? “You were seen,” I say. “In Geneva.”

“What?” Will frowns. “What are you talking about? Seen where? Doing what? We
weren't
doing anything!”

“You left her hotel room in the middle of the night. You … you kissed her at the door.” The image of Will and Catrina, locked together in the afterglow of their adultery cuts through me.

“Who told you that?” Will's frown deepens.

I say nothing, still reluctant to give up Martha and Leo as my sources.

Will shakes his head. “You're not making any sense. The first night, I only saw Catrina on the airplane and in the car to the hotel. She checked in before me and went up to her room. I don't even know
which
room. The second night, she was still in the bar when I went to bed. That was the night after Julia died. I was worried about you. About the kids having, you know, seen her. I was upset I wasn't home, for God's sake. I wasn't even—”

“Leo saw you.” My voice shakes as I speak. “Outside Catrina's room at about five
A.M
.”