“Paige! You look just the same!” I don’t add, but even fatter. “How are the children?”
She tells me, at length, about Harrison, who’s ten now and has taken up drumming, and Edie, eight, who wants to be an actress like Auntie Tilda, and Frankie, five, who has learning difficulties but is doing brilliantly in his new school. She prattles on and on, explaining that Robbie was sad he couldn’t come to the wedding, but that it’s his sister’s thirtieth birthday today, and that she—Paige—was totally amazed that Tilda invited her to the wedding, but she was sad there were no bridesmaids, she would have loved to have been asked, and she was disappointed that she doesn’t see much of Tilda these days, and she is so very, very pleased that Tilda is settling down, she had wondered whether she was the type, “If you understand me . . .”
“Not sure. . . .”
She makes her voice go breathy and excited. “Well! I wouldn’t have been surprised if she’d ended up with another girl. . . .”
I glare at her, and splutter, realizing that it’s this sort of nonsense that made Tilda drop Paige.
“What in hell’s name makes you think that?”
“Oh I don’t know.” She looks up at the sky, for inspiration. “Maybe just the way we used to be when we were in the Whisper Sisters, she was so touchy and strokey and kissy.”
“But she was in love with Liam back then.”
“I know! And he led her down the aisle too. What do you make of that? I thought—that just shows she wasn’t really in love with him, that it was all a show, or maybe she was in love with the idea of him—the heroic doctor and all that.”
“It was real, Paige. You should have seen her after she was dumped. She went into psychological meltdown.”
“Oh, I’m probably wrong—I usually am. Probably it was just us adoring her that I’m remembering.”
I can’t stand any more of her idiocy, and I make an excuse, saying I’m going to find Tilda now—but really I’m looking for Liam. There’s so much I want to ask him—how are his dreams working out? Does he like being a doctor? I look around, but I can’t see him amongst our group. I realize that I want him to be the person to tell me that Tilda is fine, that she’s made a good choice in Felix. The Liam I used to know had such good sense, good instincts. I think too that Tilda has probably confided in Liam, was straight in a way that she never is with me.
I spot him on the terrace, speaking to Tilda, and I’m struck once again by the way they seem so comfortable together. I go over, and Liam says, “I’m afraid I have to leave, Callie, but it was so good to see you. I’m sorry I can’t stay longer.”
“Liam has to work.”
“Do you work at a hospital? Is that why you have to work on a Saturday?”
“That’s right.” He kisses us both before leaving.
“My God, Tilda, I haven’t seen him in so long. Is he a surgeon or something?”
“He’s a psychiatrist.” She widens her eyes in a silent How about that!
“I would have loved to have talked to him.”
And that’s all I can think about for the rest of the day—at the dinner, and the dancing and the waving off of the bride and groom—I would love to talk to Liam Brookes.
25
Tilda and Felix are in Santorini and, for once, Tilda is in touch, sending me texts that read Blissfully, contentedly chilling, or F made us walk four miles today, to the lagoon. She even emailed a photo—Felix and her sitting on the side of a turquoise infinity pool, their legs dangling in the water, a yellow shawl draped over Tilda’s arms, her head resting on Felix’s chest; it’s a position that, for me, represents her submission, her unnatural placidity. Behind the happy couple, everything is beautiful; the cloudless sky, the azure blue of the Aegean Sea.
The picture should look serene, but I find it unsettling; maybe that’s because, all the time now, Scarlet is bombarding me with horror stories: Grace and William Starling are found dead in their ￡3 million Surrey home; police are not looking for anyone else in connection with the case. I stare at a photograph of their wedding day. Can you tell that something’s wrong? Grace looks into the camera lens, her eyes soft, her cheeks dimpled, and handsome William gazes at her—a gentle conscientious lover’s gaze. Nothing to suggest the cocktail of hurt and resentment and suspicion that leads to a killing. Three days later and Jordan Freeman sends his nineteen-year-old girlfriend, Kelly Wallis, a text: luv u babe and this is my promise—I aint going to hit u ever again. were the best babe. But that night he breaks into Kelly’s family home and strangles her with a length of wire cable. Two days after that Darren Lott texts his twenty-two-year-old girlfriend Samantha McFadden explaining that he’s going to Scotland for the weekend, but he never leaves Liverpool. Instead, on Saturday evening he waits outside Samantha’s flat until she leaves for work at a local bar, and he stabs her seventeen times before dragging her body into the boot of his car and driving off. It’s practically every day, an endless catalog of women killed by men they know.
I’m in the bookshop, reading up on all this, when the news comes in that, in York, Chloey Percival has died. For some reason I’d thought she would pull through, and even become a spokeswoman against domestic violence. But now I’m heavy inside, thinking that her death, after all, came with a sickening inevitability, and I feel brought down by the constant litany of hate—by Chloey’s death and Belle’s death. I switch off my laptop—I can’t bear to read all the venom and outrage that will be on Controlling Men.
At the other end of the shop Daphne, who is back from Denmark, is sprawled at her desk, and she calls across the empty space: “So I went on an internet date last night, nice guy—had a beard though, sixtyish, shortish, and he did all the talking, bit intense, but keen . . .”
“What does he do, like for a job?” I’m doing my best to sound interested.
“He went on and on about it. Works in marketing at a pharmaceutical company . . .”
“With a beard?”
“I know. . . . But, get this, he had read two of my books in preparation for the date . . . and had googled me in massive detail, looking up stuff about Saskatchewan.”
“Be careful, he might be obsessive. Men like that can be dangerous.”
“Callie, stop worrying. You mustn’t let your friend’s death make you paranoid. Most people are decent and good, you know . . . the bad apples are rare exceptions. It’s important to trust people, otherwise you turn cynical and unhappy.”
“Daphne! You need to listen to me . . . I know more about this than you do!”
Then, I can’t help it, I start to cry—large, heavy tears like raindrops sliding down my cheek, my nose running, my shoulders heaving, and I can’t stop. Daphne sprints over, saying, “Sweetness, sweetness—what is it? What’s the matter? Here, let me find some tissues.”