“It’s just some nut. Don’t worry about it.”
“Yeah, but—”
“I kept it because it’s funny, that’s all. I’ve got a pretty good idea who it’s from, and it’s just some little worm from back in the day trying to get to me. A crank.”
“Yeah, but cranks aren’t always funny. Sometimes they’re dangerous.”
“Not this one.”
“?‘You’re a liar and you’ll pay for it’?” he reads. “Sounds pretty dangerous. When did you get this?”
“I don’t know, like the other day sometime. The London office forwarded it on. They didn’t realize what it was. Obviously,” she says tersely.
“So it didn’t come to you directly? They don’t know where you are? Where we are?”
“Ah, now I get it, Steve. You’re worried it’s some loony Working Wife fan, yeah? Well, don’t worry, no one ever gets obsessed with the drummer. You’re safe.” Steve appeared pained but didn’t bite. He put the letter down and started to look on the floor for his discarded clothes.
“Are you going to come back to bed and fuck me,” she said, “or are you going to fuck off to your own room, then?”
He pulled his boxers and T-shirt on, scooped his jeans up in his hands and walked toward the door barefoot.
“I’ll see you at the studio.”
FORTY-FIVE
ROBIN|PRESENT DAY
Robin cracks open another bottle of beer, holds its cold body to her head to help her think clearly. Too much today, too many shocks to think straight. She listens out in the hall—nothing. Sarah is sound asleep. Pregnant women get very tired, Robin reasons. Robin’s tired too, but a couple of questions have just fused together in her head and she has to find out the answers before she can decide what to do next.
Robin goes to the recent-call list on Sarah’s phone and presses Jim’s name. It rings only three times.
“What now?” he says when he answers.
“I’m so sorry,” Robin says, “but there’s something else I really need to know. Then I promise I’ll leave you alone.”
“Go on,” he says, sounding a hundred years tired.
Robin takes a deep breath. “Jim, how did your wife die?”
“That’s none of your business. I don’t know you from Adam.”
“I know, but please. It’s very important,” Robin whispers. She can almost hear him thinking, deciding whether to share this private pain with a stranger on a telephone late at night.
He takes a breath, says quietly, “She fell down the stairs while she was on her own with Violet. Violet was a few months old and asleep in her cot at the time. For obvious reasons I don’t like to talk about it.”
“I’m so sorry,” Robin says, a grim stillness settling on her shoulders.
“That doesn’t help,” he replies. “I have to go now. Just keep your sister away from my family, and I won’t go to the police.”
“I will, I promise, but I just need to know one more thing. Did you sleep with Sarah?” Robin asks. Jim doesn’t reply, not even in outrage. That tells her enough. Robin says, “It was a few months ago, maybe a bit more. Yes?”
“Oh shit.”
“Oh shit’s right.”
“It was just once. We had too much wine and it got out of hand. But it was just one time, a mistake that I apologized for profusely.”
“That’s all it takes.”
“What are you saying? Are you suggesting she’s pregnant?”
“Well, yeah, what did you think I was suggesting?”
“That I’d made things worse. Which I did.” Jim paused. “But she can’t be pregnant.”
“Why?”
“Because I can’t have any more children.”
“How come?” Robin had blurted it out before she could stop herself. “I mean, I’m sorry, but are you sure? One hundred percent?”
“Yes, I’m deadly sure. I’d always wanted two children but it would be impossible for me to have any more. And Violet was conceived with a lot of help.”
“Does Sarah know that?”
“Of course not, why would she? I wouldn’t tell my nanny something that private. Is she seriously claiming she’s pregnant with my child?”
“Yes,” Robin says. “That’s exactly what she’s claiming.”
“Well, I don’t care what she’s told you. That’s physically impossible. So if she’s pregnant, it’s got nothing to do with me.”
Robin rubs her hand through her hair, pulls on the curls and presses her forehead to the wall. If Jim’s not the father, who is? How many more people are holding secrets about Robin’s sister? How many more secrets is Sarah holding?
“What are you going to do now?” Jims asks. Robin wasn’t sure if it was simple curiosity, genuine concern or seeking reassurance that someone would do something to keep Sarah away from his family.
“Honestly, I don’t know. But she needs my help, especially if she’s got a baby on the way. And I really don’t believe she would ever hurt a child.”
“Believe that all you want, but if she ever comes near Violet—”
“I know, I’m sorry.”
Robin ends the call, turns to lean on the sink and splashes her face with water.
All this time apart and she’d thought she was the one in the biggest pit. Her sister, her poor fucked-up sister. Lying upstairs with God knows whose baby growing inside her. But a baby she could actually give birth to, could raise, with help. A baby she deserved to have a chance to mother, finally.
Robin didn’t know if her sister even knew she was lying anymore; that was the problem. And that bastard Drew Granger. That vile pervert. The whole thing was far worse than she’d ever realized.
Robin leaves her beer, creeps into the hall and takes off her trainers. She starts up the stairs. It’s dark, after midnight now. She would have to crawl under the other bed and try to sleep some sense into this. She reaches the first landing, still holding Sarah’s phone in her hand. As her feet feel their way onto the larger expanse of carpet, she feels Sarah’s breath on her neck.
“You called Jim,” she says.
SARAH|PRESENT DAY
I stand in the dark, shoulder to head with my sister. My interfering sister.
“I came to you for help,” I say.
“I was trying to help,” she says. All the usual bluster is gone. “I was trying to make things better for you.”
“You’ve made everything worse. Just like you always did. I don’t know why I thought you could help me.”
I can’t see her properly; it’s dark and I don’t know where the light switch is. I’ve been nervous at the top of stairs for years, but alien stairs in the dark is pretty much the worst place for me to be. I feel sick.
“Sarah.” Robin’s voice is as thin and croaky as when I first arrived this morning. “You’re pregnant. You need to calm down and come away from the top of the stairs. I’m worried about you.”
“Ah, yes,” I say spikily, before I can stop myself. “I forgot that it took a pregnancy to get your attention.”
“That’s not fair. I was interested in you before…” She pauses. “Before and after your pregnancy. I just didn’t know how to handle it. I was eighteen.”
I step back from the top of the stairs. “I was eighteen too, Robin, and I lost everything. Including you.”
She reaches out. I feel her fingertips and start to make out her shape in the dark.