I go to the call section, where all calls in and out are listed. I’m looking for the one where Martha rang me late the other night. Again, there are no calls from her or any showing the calls I made.
‘I don’t understand,’ I say. ‘I had a phone call and text messages warning me off and now they’ve just disappeared. Has anyone else had access to my phone?’
‘First of all you think that Alice isn’t your sister, then you think I’m shagging her, then someone’s sending you messages and photos that now can’t be found, so someone must have tampered with your phone. None of which you have any proof of, I might add.’ He paces the room with his hands behind his head. ‘You’re going mad, I’m telling you.’
‘I am not going mad!’
Luke spins on this heel and strides over to the bed, his jaw set hard and a vein in his temple bulges ever so slightly, the way it does when he is really mad at something. He clenches his hands and pushes them onto the mattress as he leans into me, his face inches from mine. I shrink back in the pillow. His eyes narrow and I can hear his breath streaming through his nostrils as he is clearly fighting to keep his cool. ‘You need to get yourself sorted out,’ he says, his words are ice-cold. ‘I don’t want you around the kids right now. It’s not healthy for them.’
I sit bolt upright, almost head-butting Luke as I do. He doesn’t flinch. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I’m going to take the girls away for a couple of days. Away from all this tension and your crazy ideas.’
‘You can’t do that!’
‘I can. I’m their father and you’re not in a good place, mentally, right now. I don’t want to do this, but you’re leaving me no choice.’ He stands up and looks down at me. ‘It’s just for a few days.’
‘No! I won’t let you.’ I feel panicked and desperate. I feel helpless. ‘Where are you going? Have you been planning this all along – you and Alice? Were you always going to leave me? I expect her ending up in hospital has ruined your plans, hasn’t it?’ The words pour out of me unchecked, but the look on Luke’s face stops me in my tracks and the words dry in my mouth. He looks at me for a long second and I see so much on his face in that one moment. There’s anger, sadness, exasperation and contempt. He hates me, I’m sure of it.
‘I’ll tell you what’s going to happen.’ he says, sadly. ‘I’m going to take the girls to my mum and dad’s for a few days. You’re going get your head straight and sort things out with your mum and, hopefully, your sister. You know, the one currently in intensive care.’
‘Don’t leave me … please,’ I sound pathetic and I hate myself for it, but I can’t bear the thought of being separated from Luke and the girls like this. Memories of Alice being taken away flood back to me. ‘Please don’t take the girls away.’
Luke’s expression softens and this time I see compassion in his eyes. ‘I’m not leaving you and I’m not taking the girls away. Not the way you’re thinking. I’m not your father. I’ll be back in a few days, I promise, and when I am, me and you, we’ll sit down and try to work out a way to salvage what’s left of our marriage.’
I watch Luke leave, aware that I’m on the brink of tears yet again.
My life is crumbling away around me and only I can put a stop to it. I look down at my phone. I know I didn’t imagine those messages, stressed and jet-lagged or not. Someone is conspiring against me. Someone has tampered with my phone and for once I can’t blame Martha.
I tip the contents of my bag out onto the bed and check to see if anything is missing. If someone has been to the trouble of deleting messages from my phone, then they may have got rid of other evidence too.
My bed resembles the aftermath of a festival in a park as the contents litter the sheet. Shopping receipts, which were once tucked neatly into my card wallet, mostly for the food and drink I bought in America, a car-hire ticket, my coin purse, a lipstick – my favourite pink one, which reminds me of the colour Mum wears – passport, packet of tissues, the clear-plastic toiletry bag I took on board in my hand luggage, a couple of pens and a map of Amelia Island, along with my notebook. I flick through the pages and all the pages with my notes on regarding Alice have been ripped out. The lens box is also missing. The email printout with the picture of Alice and Martha is crumpled up – once neatly folded it is now looking rather tatty. None of this really matters, compared to the brown envelope of photographs, which is nowhere to be seen. The photographs Roma gave me of Alice have disappeared too.