Private Lives

70



Dressed and ready for the day in a pale blue YSL suit, Helen sat in her kitchen looking out of the French windows, her fingers curled around a mug of coffee. She listened to the early morning birdsong, wondering what they were saying to each other. She’d been up since four, watching the night sky fade and turn a muted shade of lavender, rising up over the horizon like a peacock unfolding its tail. The weather was going to be glorious; she didn’t need to watch the weather forecast to know that much: warm and balmy, a beautiful late summer’s day. How ironic, she thought, checking her watch, knowing it was time to leave for Chelsea.

She turned as she heard footsteps. Graham walked in, yawning and ineffectually smoothing down his bedhead hair.

‘Are you going?’

She nodded.

‘Soon.’

Her eyes strayed to the documents sitting on the breakfast bar.

‘Just sign them,’ said Graham quietly.

‘I can’t,’ she replied, closing her eyes, feeling utterly helpless. This was everything she’d ever worked for, and now she was supposed to just sign it all away, surrender her livelihood and her reputation with one sweep of a pen. And yet Larry had made the alternatives very clear indeed. Being struck off the solicitor’s roll, perhaps a spell in an open prison somewhere, spending her days reminiscing with all the other unlucky lags who had pushed the boat out too far.

Graham walked over and handed her the pen, then put his steady hands on her shoulders and waited as she scratched out a signature. First on the letter of resignation from the partnership, then on the transfer of her equity share to Larry.

She dropped the pen on the oak top and turned into his arms, burying her face in his shoulder.

She had told Graham everything, of course. Well, almost everything. Not the real reason why Simon Cooper had been so persuasive in getting Helen to help him bury the Amy Hart story, although she suspected that he had known of their affair all along. He stroked her hair gently.

‘Just let it go,’ he soothed. ‘Everything will be all right. Just the two of us. It’s only a setback. You’re down, darling, but you’re never out. You’re a brilliant woman who can turn her hand to anything. And truthfully, you were always bigger than Donovan Pierce anyway.’

For a moment she almost believed him. For years she had been so disparaging of anything that came out of her husband’s mouth, and yet now his words of reassurance were the only thing she wanted to hear.

She breathed him in, the soft smell of his pyjamas, and knew she could never leave him.

‘You’re right,’ she said, looking out into the sunshine again. ‘It’s not over, not by a long chalk. In fact, I’ve got a feeling this is just the beginning.’