Page 41 of The Lie
He gave an apologetic grin. ‘Sorry, m’lud. Badgering the witness. But –’
‘I said I don’t know,’ she interrupted. ‘I like him a lot, but we haven’t known each other all that long.’
Silence again. Romy was aware of the Circle Line thundering under the building. It was something she’d barely noticed when she lived in the flat.
She watched him as he picked up his iPad, lowered his head. He wasn’t the man she’d married. Neither was he the man she’d left. This was – as Michael himself had told her – a whole new person she faced. And she wasn’t sure how to relate to his uncustomary desire to emote, to apologize, to self-deprecate. His new-found appreciation of her was disturbing, to say the least. Disturbing, because she couldn’t help but feel something tugging around her heart when he had claimed to miss so much about the life they had once shared.
Then swiftly on the heels of these thoughts came the words – involuntary and unwelcome – she would never forget: …forcing me back … so I was pinned under him, whichno nostalgia – however genuine – was powerful enough to obliterate.
But through all this mental turmoil, one thing had become crystal clear:I can’t stay here with Michael any longer, Romy decided.I must talk to Daniel.
27
Finch was sweating by the time he’d finished washing the kitchen floor. He’d been on a mission since early morning: scrubbing the toilet and shower, polishing the chrome on the taps until it shone, twitching the freshly washed duvet on Grace’s bed until there wasn’t a single crease, opening all the windows so that the mustiness of a man living alone was completely banished. Finch had been in the army too long to tolerate mess – the house was always in good order – but now he took it to another level. A jug of pink roses from the garden in her bedroom, an enticing pile of fruit in the bowl in the kitchen, surfaces wiped, cooker gleaming, cushions plumped – he wanted it to be perfect.
Grace had rung first thing to say that Sam wouldn’t be able to make it till tomorrow. Finch was secretly pleased. He liked Sam – a mild-mannered surveyor with a neat auburn beard whom she’d been with for nearly four years now, married for two – but it was a treat, these days, to have time alone with his stepdaughter. It would give him a chance to tell her about Romy in private, gauge her reaction without an audience. And if it turned out Grace wasn’t ready to meet Romy yet, then so be it.
She was due at six, but knowing Grace’s slightly chaotic modus vivendi – and the Friday-night traffic – shemight be much later. It was nearly six now, but he decided he had time to give Romy a quick ring and check she was still coming down.
‘Definitely. I should be there by twelve at the latest.’ She sounded, Finch thought, the most cheerful she had been since Michael’s stroke. ‘I’ve just been talking to Daniel. He says he’s quite happy now to manage without me. Isn’t that great?’
Finch laughed with pleasure. ‘It certainly is.’
‘Michael’s really not going to like me deserting him, but still … this means I can pop in once a week or something, line somebody up for when Daniel has his days off and Leo can’t make it … and I’m free.’
He felt his heart lift. ‘That’s brilliant news, Romy. I’m so happy for you.’And for me too.
She laughed, sounding almost drunk. ‘OK. I’ll text when I’m home.’
The lights of a car flashed through the sitting-room window. ‘Better go,’ Finch said, getting up. ‘I think that’s Grace.’ As he closed his phone and went to greet his stepdaughter, he felt a glow of optimism.
It was so good to see her. They had a delightful supper together: Finch cooked sausages, butter beans and baked tomatoes, added a green salad – Grace’s go-to comfort meal from long before Finch had met her and Nell. It was warm enough to eat outside, and he brushed off the slatted wooden garden table, dug out the faded turquoise cushions for the chairs and lit three fat candles. It was not since Nell was alive that he’d had supper in the garden by candlelight.
Grace was in a buoyant mood. Nell had always worried about her, saying she was too neurotic to be happy and never settled at anything long enough to find out if it would make her so. But Finch had seen a change in recent years. Sam, he thought, was a steadying influence. Living with him had stopped her drinking so much – which Nell had worried about too – and given her a solid, loving base from which she could fly.
‘To Mum,’ Grace said, lifting her glass to chink against Finch’s. Supper was finished, cherry stones lay on a saucer amid crumpled paper napkins, an empty dark-chocolate-bar wrapper and the remains of a bottle of Pinot.
‘To Mum,’ Finch echoed. And for a moment they sat in silence and remembered the woman they had loved so much. He smiled at Grace, thinking how beautiful she looked in the candlelight, with her thick corn-blonde waves tucked behind her ears and her mother’s huge grey eyes. She was not like her mother in physique. Nell had been slight and fine-boned, while Grace was tall and strongly built, with long limbs and square swimmer’s shoulders – her father’s, he presumed, although he’d never met the man. Grace had had no contact with him since she was about ten – he just wasn’t interested.
Finch had begun the evening nervously. He kept looking for a gap in the conversation – which wasn’t easy, because Grace barely drew breath – where he could slip in his announcement about Romy. But gradually he relaxed and just enjoyed his stepdaughter’s company as he listened to all the things that had been happening in her life since they’d last properly caught up.
‘So how did the bathroom tiles work out?’
Grace pulled a face. ‘Hmm. Not our greatest success. Sort of shed-work standard? But it’ll have to do for now.’
‘You won’t notice after a while.’
Grace’s eyes sparkled in the candlelight as she eyed him with a sudden directness. ‘You seem in good form, Finch. Do I detect a bit of a glow about the cheeks?’
The perfect opportunity, plopping into his lap. Yet still he hesitated. Nell’s presence was very strong this evening, with her daughter back in residence, but he couldn’t let that put him off.
‘Well,’ he began, taking a steadying breath, ‘funny you should say that …’
Grace leant forward eagerly. ‘Go on.’
‘There is someone …’This is so difficult, he thought. But Grace was staring expectantly at him. ‘I’ve seen her around the village for a while, but then I met her properly for the first time when I did that charity 10K in March … and over the last few months, well, things have got a bit more involved …’
Grace’s face was hard to read and he stopped, his worst fears coming to the fore.
