Jason blocked out the rest of the evening, obliterating it entirely with the emergency wrap he’d got tucked in the lining of his coat. When his parents had gone to bed, he retraced his steps up the drive, past Claire’s house with lamps shining behind the curtains. She didn’t even know he’d been home. The kitchen blinds were open, so he stopped for a moment and watched the scene inside. Callum was sipping on a drink, tapping his phone, while Claire stood at the sink. She’d worn the same expression since Lenni had gone missing – tight, expectant, sad. Not quite her. As if she’d been holding her breath all this time.
Jason pulled up his coat collar, shoved his hands deep in his pockets. He walked on. Hitching got him to the station by 3 a.m. and he slept on a bench until the first train back to London. The squat was freezing but filled with familiar faces, familiar smells and the familiar filth of a life he didn’t want any more. He stood in the wrecked kitchen watching the other no-hopers and addicts. Then he turned and left, heading for the homeless shelter. He didn’t care how he got it, but there would be change in his life.
In the Fulham café, a tear trickled down Shona’s cheek. This was why she didn’t come to visit him very often, Jason supposed. Like Patrick, it had become easier not to face the truth.
‘Dad doesn’t understand about drugs any more than he understands about you asking for help. Seeing you like that, it felt as though he’d lost another child, as if the boy he once knew and loved had gone to the same place as Lenni.’ Shona pulled a tissue from her handbag. ‘What he didn’t realise is that you were the one with a chance of coming back.’
* * *
Jason wrapped the towel around his waist and went into the bedroom. Greta was already showered and changed, looking beautiful, if anything even larger, as she waited for him to dress. She was lying on her side on the unmade bed reading the newspaper. It was difficult to tell where her pale-blue tunic ended and the pastel duvet cover began. For all he knew, she might have been wearing all of it.
‘Are they asleep?’ he asked, stroking her belly.
‘Thankfully, yes. I hardly dare move.’ He didn’t think it would be long before she had to take maternity leave, though knowing Greta she’d try to keep working until the end.
He sat on the corner of the bed, cradling his head in his hands. He knew she’d want to go up to the farmhouse soon. She was enjoying the break from London and he didn’t want to spoil things for her. ‘I’m not sure I can face seeing Dad again today,’ he said. His thoughts in the shower had unsettled him. ‘I’ll walk you up to the farm, but I won’t stay. I’ll maybe do some job hunting online.’ It also meant he wouldn’t have to face Claire. He’d promised he’d call the police about the message she’d received, but since this morning the police had been on his mind for other reasons.
Greta sat up. ‘I was hopeful things were going OK between you and your dad.’
‘Only because he’s forgotten much of what’s happened, not because he wants to make up.’ He reached out and squeezed Greta’s leg. ‘Which only makes it harder.’
‘I was also hoping you’d be able to see a way around this. He’s your father, Jase. It’s a relationship that deserves healing.’ She moved closer. ‘Can I be honest? Really honest?’
Jason nodded, bracing himself.
‘I think you’re being a complete arse. I think you’re being selfish and self-indulgent, and not acting like the man I fell in love with.’ She swung her feet off the bed and slipped them into a pair of leather loafers that she hated wearing. Greta spent most of her life in heels. ‘Your dad’s ill, most likely unable to make the first move even if he wanted to. Perhaps your perception of him is really a reflection of yourself, Jason – stubborn, proud and stuck in the past.’ She sighed, followed by a big inhalation. ‘But I still love you to bits.’ She stood up. ‘I’m off up to the farmhouse to help out. No need to walk me up, but I do hope you come.’ She planted a kiss on her husband’s head and went downstairs, leaving Jason turning his phone over and over in his hand, more confused than ever.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
‘So, when’s the big opening?’ Claire was scraping seaweed and barnacles off what felt like a never-ending supply of mussels.
‘All being well, mid-September.’ Nick glanced across at her, his stomach churning at the thought. Things in his life were actually far from being well. ‘I’m banking on some pre-opening trade reviews before Christmas. And I’ve already got a couple of corporate parties booked for December.’
‘That’s really great, Nick,’ Claire said, catching his eye. ‘Remember how we used to play restaurants when we were kids? You cooked all kinds of weird stuff over a campfire. I’m not sure all of it was edible.’ She sluiced off another batch of mussels. ‘Who’d have thought that you’d end up with your own restaurant for real?’
‘My speciality was worm and leaf soup with a side of boiled garden snails, wasn’t it?’
‘You actually used to try to make us eat it.’ Claire laughed, looking over at him again. ‘Ouch!’ She flinched, dropping the knife into the sink.
‘Let me see that.’ Nick took Claire’s hand, gently holding her forefinger under the tap. ‘Amy, do you know where Grandma keeps the plasters?’ he said over his shoulder.
‘Are you a doctor like Daddy?’ Amy asked, running up with a little box. She wrinkled her nose at the sight of blood.
‘No, I’m not like Daddy,’ Nick replied, not taking his eyes off Claire. He dabbed lightly at the wound with kitchen paper, telling her to hold it tightly in place while he unwrapped the plaster. Amy ran off again as he peeled it around the wound.
‘Thanks, Nick,’ Claire said, but he didn’t let go of her finger. When she looked at her hand again, it was enveloped by his. She quickly pulled away. ‘I’ll… I’ll set the table then, seeing as I’ve made myself useless at the sink.’
The kitchen was suddenly filled with noise and chatter, and Claire was grateful for the reprieve. Shona and Patrick came inside following their evening stroll around the garden, but Patrick was making noises about checking the paddock gates again, wanting to make sure there were no more intruders.
‘It’s all secure, Pat. There’s no need.’ Shona didn’t want him wandering off again.
Greta arrived next, offering to help with the meal. ‘I can’t guarantee I won’t be more of hindrance, though,’ she said, rubbing her bump. ‘I’ve been getting Braxton Hicks contractions all day.’
‘You just sit down and relax. It’s all under control,’ Claire said, but her father thought she was talking to him and he mumbled something about not being a child, about not being mollycoddled.
‘I’ve just had a worrying time with Dad again,’ Shona confided to Claire when he was out of the room. ‘He got really confused in the garden. He was certain we were out searching for…’ She made an expression that Claire knew only too well. She thought back to when he really had been scouring the woods and fields, when they’d all filled those early days with frantic and fruitless searches.
Without fail for the first six months, Patrick set off at dawn, taking a pack of supplies with him, tirelessly going over and over old ground. The familiar landscape of the wood, their fields and those of the surrounding farms eventually transformed into a harsh terrain that no one apart from Patrick wanted to set foot on – the land that had taken Lenni, seemingly swallowing her up. Eventually, his searches dwindled to once every couple of days, then maybe only a couple of times a week. Sometimes he’d be out looking when the sun had set, as if Lenni might only reveal herself after dark.
Patrick came back into the kitchen, staring at Greta as if he had no idea who she was. ‘You’re pregnant,’ he said.
‘Yes, I am,’ Greta replied in her charming way. She smoothed her hands over her bump. ‘We’re having twins. They’ll be born within the next month.’
‘We?’ Patrick’s eyes sparkled with the puzzle, his mind forcing together pieces that wouldn’t quite fit. ‘One word of advice for you, then. Don’t give birth while you’re in this house.’
‘I’ll try not to,’ she said with a laugh. ‘They’re not due just yet.’
‘It’s not a lucky house for children.’
Greta was about to reply but the back door burst open and Maggie blustered in. ‘Has anyone seen Rain?’ She was breathless and pink-cheeked. ‘Is she with Marcus?’