Unconscious fantasies. I think of the words until they blur inside my head. Until all I can see is Bluebeard chasing us with his deadlight. His blood coughing out of his ruined skull, seeping black into the Satisfaction’s gun deck.
Ross gets up from the chesterfield, smiles cautiously.
‘Are you okay?’
‘Yes.’
His eyes dart quick around the room. ‘Say if this is too much.’
‘No. No, it’s fine.’ But I can’t seem to come any farther into the room. I can’t seem to make myself do anything.
‘Are you sure you’re okay?’ The deep frown line between Ross’s brows is back. I want to press the pad of my thumb against it, smooth it flat.
‘Yes.’ I make myself move towards the couch, towards him.
‘Sit, please,’ he says, briefly reaching out to squeeze my cold hand before moving past me to the bar.
I sit. Watch him. The silhouette of his narrow waist and broad shoulders in the flickering, twinkling light, the thick curl of his hair against his neck. My fingers move to the pocket of my jeans, where El’s letter sits inside its ziplocked bag. Its presence both comforts and terrifies me. I see the sherries sitting on the turquoise tiles of the Poirot. Gold inside carved crystal. Two instead of four. El really did tell him everything.
‘Aperitif,’ Ross says, setting them down on a candlelit coffee table, reminding me of that special romantic occasion corner in the Italian restaurant. When he sits next to me, I can feel the heat of him against my thigh. I can smell the piney, musky familiarity of him. I can hear my heartbeat, heavy and too loud.
‘Cheers,’ he says and solemnly enough that I finally drop my frozen smile. The low, long ringing of our glasses outlives my sherry. I feel its wonderful burn all the way to my stomach. I should ask him about his day, I know. What happened when he went into work. How he’s feeling, coping. I’m doing a very poor impression of normal. Ross thinks so too. He reaches for my chilly fingers, wraps them inside his own.
‘It’ll be okay, Cat,’ he whispers. ‘At least we have each other.’
And I close my eyes against the warm press of his lips against my temple.
CHAPTER 26
I sit at the kitchen table, while Ross stands in front of Mum’s Kitchener. The rain batters against the window; the wind howls, trapped inside the garden’s high stone walls. The kitchen is hot and wet, yet still somehow cold. I’m shivering.
I pick up the Shiraz that Ross poured for me. Put it back down without drinking. The smell of minced beef turns my stomach. My head aches, feels thick and boggy, and I’m too jumpy, too nervy. Every few minutes, my heart skips one beat and then overcompensates with too many. Maybe it’s grief, shock: too many ground-shifting tremors in too short a space of time. El dying. Marie’s confession. Vik’s ‘Mouse’. El’s letter. Everything that’s ever happened in this house. I need to ask Ross about what I found in Bluebeard’s Room. I need to ask him about Marie and that text. About what Vik said. And I really need to ask him about everything that El has accused him of. But I can’t.
Ross sets a lid over the chilli pot and comes back to the table, sits close enough to me that I can see those silver flecks inside his irises.
‘There’s something I need to talk to you about. Jesus, you’re freezing.’
I look down at my hands inside his. I hadn’t even felt him take them.
‘I’m okay,’ I say, but he starts to rub my fingers, blows warm breath against my palms.
‘I know it probably isn’t the right time to say this, but … I’m going to sell up.’
‘What?’
‘As soon as I can, I mean.’ His voice is gentle, like I’m a skittish horse. ‘It’ll be a while. El didn’t have a will, and then there’s all that registering-the-death stuff.’ When I try to take back my hands, he only holds them tighter. I wonder how he knows that El didn’t have a will. ‘I know how this all sounds, Cat. I know how hard it is. I know …’ He falters, bites down on his lip.
‘It’s okay.’ It’s ridiculous how much I still want – need – to comfort him. Smooth away that line between his eyes, rub my thumbs against his skin, its dark, tired shadows.
‘Stay with me.’
‘What?’
He stares at me so closely, so minutely, I can’t bring myself to even blink. ‘Stay with me. Be with me. I know it’s not the right time for this either, but I love you, Cat. Not the same way that I loved El. Different, it’s different.’ He closes his eyes as if he’s in pain. ‘Better.’
I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what to feel.
‘I know we’ll be judged. But, Cat, I’ll put up with it if you will. We can stay here until the house is sold. Or we can leave, go somewhere, anywhere else. It’s up to you. Everything is up to you. I love you. I need you.’ He lets go of my hands to cup my face, stroke my cheek. His fingers are shaking, his eyes are shining. ‘And El loved us both. She’d want us to be happy.’
I don’t know if the drain plug is the drain plug. And the hole saw could just be a hole saw. I need to go to Logan and Rafiq. Show them everything. Let them run traces, forensic tests. Because it’s Ross. And neither my shame nor my grief can erase the memory of
