‘Abigail.’
‘I did. She’s extremely apologetic. I believe she may come round later and apologise in person.’
‘Was there anyone with her?’
‘Her dog,’ Raff said neutrally and Mrs Fryer sighed in exasperation.
‘No, dummy. I mean a man. Is there anyone else?’
‘I believe the crime was the dog’s own work,’ Raff said, and turned and left before Mrs Fryer could slap him.
No. Only him. She’d tossed Philip’s ring back at him because she loved…
The words echoed over and over in his head. Where did a man go with that?
Without thinking, he found himself driving past his little farm, further up the mountain, up near Isaac’s place, to the road where one night ten years ago his world had been blasted to bits.
How long did a man suffer for one moment’s stupidity?
He’d stopped suffering. Almost. He’d almost found peace. Until Abby had said…
He couldn’t afford to let her words rip him apart. He had his life to get on with and she had hers.
It might be a good idea if she did go to China.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ON SUNDAY afternoon Abby decided that she did need to speak to Philip. It was only fair. What followed was a very stilted phone call. Philip sounded appalled and angry and confused. She crept back under her duvet and hugged Kleppy and decided she didn’t need milk or bread; she could live on baked beans for a while.
The whole town was judging her.
On Monday she decided she couldn’t hide under her duvet for ever. She had to pull herself together. She was not a whimpering mess. She was not hiding a millionaire under her bed. She needed to get on with her life.
That meant getting out of bed, dressing as she always dressed, smart and corporate for the last time. Today she’d wind up this court case with Philip and then she’d resign. She’d talk reasonably to her parents. She’d start sending gifts back and then figure, slowly and sensibly, where she wanted to take her life from here.
She did need to be sensible. She no longer wanted to be a lawyer, but that didn’t mean stranding Philip or stranding her clients without reasonable notice. That was the sort of thing an hysterical ex-bride would do-the sort of woman who’d throw Philip over for some crazy, unreasonable love.
She wasn’t that woman. She’d ended an unsuitable engagement for totally sensible reasons and she was totally in control. She entered court with her head held high. She sat in court and concentrated on looking…normal.
She was aware that the courthouse held more people than it had on Friday. That’d be because people were looking at her. The woman who ditched Philip Dexter.
No matter. She was in control. Kleppy was safely locked up. She looked neat and respectable, and her court notes were beautifully filed in her lovely Italian briefcase in the order they were needed.
As the morning stretched on, she decided she hated her briefcase. She’d give it back to Philip, she thought. That was sensible. He might find a use for a matching pair.
Back home, her wedding dress was packed in tissue, waiting for someone to make another sensible decision.
What to do with two thousand beads?
Decisions, decisions, decisions.
She concentrated on taking notes for Philip, handing him the papers he needed, keeping on her sensible face- but it was really hard, and when Raff entered the courtroom she thought her face might crack. Quite soon.
Philip had called Raff back on a point of law. Just clarifying the prosecution case. Just decimating the case Raff had put together with such care.
Raff wasn’t a lawyer and he had no help. The Crown Prosecutor was hopeless. She wanted to cross the room and shake him, but Malcolm was eighty and he looked like if she shook him his teeth would fall out or he’d die of a coronary.
Wallace Baxter would get off. She could hear it in Philip’s voice.
Philip might not have had a very good weekend-yes, his fiancee had jilted him-but there was nothing of the destroyed lover in his bearing. As the morning wore on he started sounding smug.
He was winning.
He sat down beside her after pulling the last of Raff’s evidence apart and he gave her a conspiratorial smile.
He didn’t mind, she thought incredulously. He didn’t mind that she’d thrown back his ring-or not so much that it stopped him enjoying winning.
Her sensible face was slipping.
‘This is brilliant,’ Wallace hissed beside her. ‘Philip’s great. The stuff he’s done to get me off… But what’s this I hear about your engagement being off? You’d be a fool to walk away from a guy this great.’
She felt sick.
She stared around to the back of the court where Bert and Gwen Mackervale looked close to tears. Because of Wallace Baxter’s deception they’d had to sell their house. They were living in their daughter’s spare bedroom.
She thought of Lionel, a lovely, gentle man who’d live in a rooming house for ever. Because of Wallace.
And because of Philip’s skill in defending him.
She looked at Wallace and Philip and the smile between them was almost conspiratorial. The vague suspicions she’d been having about this case cemented into a tight knot of certainty.
She was lawyer for the defence. Sensible defence lawyers did not question their own cases.
She’d stopped being sensible on Saturday afternoon. Or she thought she had. Maybe there was more
She looked at Wallace-a guy who’d systematically cheated for all his life. She looked at Philip, smug and sure.
She looked at Raff, who’d lost control of a car one dark night when he was nineteen years old.
Forgive?
‘It’s nailed,’ Philip said. ‘Let’s see Finn get out of this.’
But she looked at Philip and she knew he hadn’t made a mistake. Morality didn’t come into it. Raff was on the other side, therefore Raff had to be defeated.
How could she ever have thought she could marry Philip? How could her life have ended up here?
Her head was spinning. Define sensible? Sitting in a Banksia Bay courtroom defending Wallace Baxter?
Wallace and Philip…smug. Winning.
Wallace and Philip…
Her thoughts were racing, suspicions surfacing everywhere. She didn’t know for sure, but in Philip’s briefcase… The briefcase that matched hers…
What was she thinking?
Raff was leaving now, his evidence finished. She could see by the set of his shoulders that he knew exactly what would happen.
He’d done his best for the town-for a town that judged him.
Wallace was smiling. Philip was smiling. There were only a couple of minor defence witnesses to go and then summing up. Unless…unless…
She couldn’t bear it.
