After the meal is over, Theo insists on staying to put Dylan to bed. While they’re upstairs, I turn the volume down on the TV and listen to the low murmur of Theo’s voice reading Dylan a bedtime story. It feels like going back in time to a golden era, before Theo left me, before Charlie was murdered – to a time when we were just a normal, happy family. There’s a part of me that wants to go back there, to wallow in this warm feeling of security. But Theo betrayed me and destroyed our family, I remind myself. And after that, there can be no going back. ‘Once a cheater always a cheater.’ That’s what Gaby says. And I know she’s right.
I turn up the volume on the TV again, so that I can no longer hear Theo, and force myself to remember how I felt when he told me about Harper. How I knew as soon as he returned from the school trip to CERN in Switzerland that there was something different about him, something off-key.
‘It just sort of happened,’ was his lame explanation. ‘Harper and me . . .’
I’m not quite sure how they managed to conduct a steamy affair with a bunch of thirty teenagers in tow, and I certainly didn’t want to know details.
‘Do you love her?’ I asked, feeling strangely detached as my life crashed around me.
And he frowned. ‘I don’t know. She needs me . . .’ he said hopelessly. And I calmly climbed the stairs, neatly packed a selection of his clothes into a suitcase and dumped it by the front door. Within a month of me kicking him out, Theo and Harper had moved into a flat together and the rest, as they say, is history.
‘Out like a light,’ Theo grins, as he comes down the stairs.
‘Yes, his first day at school must have tired him out,’ I say. I can barely look at him; the memories have made me so angry. ‘Well, you’d better be going, I suppose,’ I add coldly as he sits down on my sofa.
‘Uh, yes,’ he looks at his watch, bouncing up as if he’s sat on a bed of spikes. ‘I suppose I’d better. He heads to the door. ‘Let me know if you need anything. I’m sure Duncan could help you if you need a lawyer.’
Duncan – a man who openly leers at other women in front of his wife and who once sang, ‘I like big butts . . .’ to me on my birthday – is not my favourite of Theo’s friends.
‘Thanks,’ I say sarcastically. ‘I’ll bear that in mind. Because Duncan always makes everything so much better.’
‘I know you don’t like him,’ Theo sighs, ‘but he’s a good lawyer. Think about it, Cat.’
I open the front door, nodding slightly. ‘Okay,’ I say, just to get him out of the house. I think I’d rather go to prison for life than have Duncan defending me in a court of law.
Seven
It’s getting dark and the house suddenly feels empty and quiet after Theo has gone. Something rustles in the bushes outside – a cat, no doubt. But it sets my nerves on edge and I can’t shake an odd sensation that there’s someone out there, looking in, watching me. Hastily, I draw all the curtains and lock and bolt the doors. Then I go and check on Dylan who is still fast asleep, breathing gently. I gaze at him for a while, marvelling at how a relationship as flawed as Theo’s and mine could have created something so perfect and precious. Whatever else has happened, however much he’s hurt me, I can’t ever regret marrying Theo, because out of our marriage came this miracle – this little person who means more to me than anything else in the world.
‘Sleep tight,’ I whisper.
And Dylan mumbles and shifts a little in his sleep. I kiss his flushed cheek and then, careful not to wake him, switch off his night light and tiptoe out of the room. Downstairs, in the living room, I turn on my laptop and start typing the next chapter of the Embers sequel. Though writing can sometimes feel like work, tonight it feels more like a lifeline – a way to escape from a present that seems increasingly frightening and out of control. I plunge eagerly into the simple world I’ve created – a world where I pull the strings, where people do what I decide and ultimately, all is forgiven.
‘Molly dropped her umbrella,’ I type.
. . . and stared horrified at the doorway. Just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse, they did. From one of the rooms downstairs another revenant had appeared and was sliding across the hallway towards her . . .
I type without stopping. The words flow easily, and when I next look at the clock, I’ve been working for more than an hour. I’m reading through what I’ve written, deleting a few lines here and there and changing the odd word, when a sudden rumble of thunder jolts me back into reality.
I open the curtains and stare out through the dark window at the rain that has started lashing against the pane and the lightning flaring in the sky. It’s no good, I think. Writing has only served to delay the inevitable. This whole thing with the photofit and the police is not going to go away by itself. I’m going to have to face up to it at some point.
I try to reassure myself, remembering that I’ve got an alibi. Luke is my alibi. The police will find him, he’ll confirm my story and then they’ll leave me alone. But when I think about the way DI Littlewood looked when I was talking about Luke,
