Page 45 of My Husband's Wife
In the kitchen, she notices that the wedding ring is gone from the fruit bowl. After placing Emily in the baby seat by the kitchen table, she begins searching for it. She rummages through the drawers, in the cupboards and even checks the floor. Maybe it fell under the table. On her hands and knees, she feels around and looks for it, but all she comes face-to-face with is Buster’s wet nose. The bin – she runs to the bin and begins sifting through the empty wrappers and potato peelings from the night before, until she reaches the bottom of the bag and touches the smooth round piece of metal. She pulls the ring out and washes it under a cold tap until it shines again. Why would Theo throw something so precious away?
‘Shall we go for a little walk, Emily?’
She picks her little one up in the carrier and heads to the cabin, where she opens the door and places Emily down by Theo’s desk. Buster jumps onto the couch and begins to dig up the cushions. She nudges the mouse, hoping that the computer is on but it isn’t. Theo’s tablet sits next to the keyboard. She knows how to get into that. He doesn’t do anything confidential on that device and Madison knows his password is his birthday. With slightly trembling fingers, she types in the six numbers and unlocks the device. Her heart skips a beat and her stomach rolls. Spying on Theo doesn’t feel right. She’s always trusted him, but she has this niggle she can’t let go of. She opens up his Instagram and it lands on Eva’s profile. There are so many photos of Eva’s old house in Malvern, and her new house in Combe Martin. It’s a stunning house, everything Madison would love for her family. Madison also knows that house; she remembers it coming up for sale. It’s not creepy at all and it has an amazing view of the sea. Everything is in good taste; Eva has a designer’s eye, from her wedding to the way her little boy is dressed. Her dog is unbelievably sweet too. After going back three years, Madison stops scrolling on a photo of Eva looking solemn next to a candle that she’s lit in memory of her dead husband, Hugo. Madison’s gaze turns to the photo of Hugo next to the candle, and a shiver runs through her.
Madison gasps. Theo looks almost identical to Hugo. That’s why Eva was taken aback. That’s why she behaved strangely during the meeting. She zooms in and looks closer at Hugo. His eyes are a different colour and his hairstyle isn’t like Theo’s. Hugo is slimmer than Theo and he doesn’t wear glasses. They are not the same person, but she can see why Eva might think they are. It’s like Theo has a doppelgänger.
As for the phone calls and messages – has Eva been making them? Maybe Theo was being stalked by a woman who is hell-bent on seeing her dead husband in him. She sits on the couch next to Buster and spots something else out of place – a thin pile of photos she’s never seen. She picks them up and scrunches her brow while looking at several photos of two babies. They’re such tiny dots. Theo has never shown her any photos of his family. He never had any, he’d said, because everything, including his family, had been destroyed in the fire. She feels a lump in her throat as she thinks about how terrifying that would have been for his parents and his baby sister, and then she spares a thought for Theo growing up in the care system.
‘Madison.’ Theo hurries in.
‘What are you doing here?’
His eyes are wide. ‘I could ask you the same. This is my office. I have confidential client records in here, you know that.’
It’s not like she’s going through his work files. He’s overreacting. If she did look through his work, she’d have no idea what any of it was. She’s taken aback by his abruptness, and she’s extra disappointed in Buster for not alerting her to his presence. At least the light on his tablet has gone off, so he won’t know she’d been looking at his Instagram.
‘I need some envelopes.’ Really, was that the best she could come up with?
He stares like he doesn’t believe her, but she’ll say that until she’s blue in the face so he’s going to have to let it go. Reaching over his desk, he opens a drawer and pulls out some envelopes before dropping them next to her.
‘Why are you back so soon?’
‘She cancelled. Family emergency.’ He glances at the photos in her hand. ‘What are you doing with those?’ He snatches them from her and pops them on the filing cabinet.
‘I err… I found them on the table. I was just looking.’ She pauses to give him a moment. ‘Theo, what is it? You know you can talk to me.’
He sits next to her and his eyes begin to water. ‘That’s me and Emily when we were born. She died in the fire, and that tiny pile of photos is all I have.’
‘I’m so sorry.’ She places a hand over his. He never mentioned having photos of his sister before.
‘I feel like a piece of me is missing.’
‘Losing your parents and sister would do that to a person.’ She can’t begin to imagine how much that would hurt. For a moment, she tries to picture what her life would be like without her family, especially Camille, and she can’t.
‘There’s something I haven’t told you.’
Her heart begins to bang again. This is happening a lot lately. Was it something to do with Eva? ‘What?’ She strokes his hand.
‘My mum didn’t die in the fire. We’ve been in touch recently.’
‘I thought you said she died.’ How could he keep something so big from her, when they had a baby and were about to marry? She thinks back to her last marriage. It ended because of his lies. Not being able to have a baby together didn’t help, but the lies surrounding his affair had been the final straw for their relationship as they knew it. Theo’s secrecy is bringing all those insecure feelings back.
‘I think I was burying the trauma. I’ve been talking to my therapist about it and it led me to wanting to find her, which I’ve done.’
‘Why didn’t you tell me, Theo?’
‘It’s something I had to do on my own. I’m sorry I shut you out.’ He pauses. ‘My mother had a breakdown after the accident, and I was told that she’d been hospitalised. She didn’t want to lose me but she also knew she had no chance of getting me back after what happened. She fell asleep with a cigarette in her mouth and the settee went up in flames… My sister used to cry a lot and I was the quiet one, which is why we were in separate rooms at such a young age.’ He wipes the corner of his eye. ‘Dad was asleep in his chair. They’d drank a lot. Anyway, Mum woke up when the fire was already spreading downstairs. She managed to call the fire brigade before running upstairs for us. The fire followed her quickly.’ He swallows. ‘The flames split the landing in half, which meant she couldn’t get to Emily. My mum and me were rescued…’ He puts his head in his hands and begins to sob.
She’s never seen Theo sob like this, and it’s the first time she’s heard his story properly. Survivor’s guilt is what she suspects he’s suffering from but she isn’t a therapist. Without hesitation, she throws her arms around him and vows to support him through this. ‘I love you and everything’s going to be okay.’
‘I keep thinking, what if? I went to all those homes and had so many different foster families. All the abuse, and Mum just let it happen. She could have come back for me. She could have fought to keep me.’
‘You have us now. Emily and I love you more than anything.’ She knows she owes him this fresh start in Loch Ness, away from the prison he’s cocooned himself in. It’ll be different there, though she can’t help thinking about the time he abandoned her that night when they were on holiday. Things are different now. He’s opened up. The therapy is helping and she hopes his mum turns out to be good for him. ‘Maybe your mum would like to come to the wedding?’
He pulls away and stares. ‘That was unfair of me to judge her like that. My mum left me because she had to. She wasn’t in the right place. People deserve forgiveness, don’t they?’
She nods. ‘Of course they do.’
