A Perfect Cornish Escape

by Phillipa Ashley

  Tiff persisted gently but firmly. ‘This woman who messaged you in the first place. Does she now know exactly who Nate really is?’

  ‘I think she’s worked it out quite a bit and she’ll definitely find out for certain once the South African police contact her. She’ll have a shock too.’ Marina lifted her eyes and the desolation in her face almost made Tiff burst into tears. ‘Please tell me this can’t be real. This morning, I thought he was dead. Now, I’m finding he has a partner, a mistress. I can’t even comprehend it.’

  ‘No wonder. It’s horrendous. I can’t comprehend it either.’ Tiff rested her hand on Marina’s shoulder before continuing gently. ‘So, what happens now? What about the presumption of death and the dissolution that was going through the court? Have you had chance to speak to your solicitor yet?’

  ‘No, but I’ll have to very soon. We’ll have to stop the process. God knows, I don’t want Nate to have died,’ Marina said. ‘I loved him, but now I know he’s done this to me, I’m so angry with him. I feel as if he’s a stranger who’s come into my life and destroyed it.’

  ‘Of course you’re angry with him, my love. That’s perfectly understandable. I’ll do anything I can to help you …’ An idea was already forming in Tiff’s mind and it wasn’t a pleasant one and now was definitely not the time to broach it with Marina. ‘You call your lawyer and then let’s try to make a plan, or at least think of a way of trying to cope with what might happen next. I presume Lachlan wants to help?’

  ‘Yes. That’s the other thing about this whole horrendous mess. He’d do anything to help but I feel that things can’t be the same between us ever again. However much I try to tell myself I had to know and that it’s better that I do, I can’t help blaming Lachlan for bringing this trouble back into my life. I can try to ignore it or deny it, but nothing can change the fact that I’m still Nate’s wife.’

  Marina’s solicitor came out urgently on the Sunday afternoon to offer advice, the situation being so serious. Tiff was invited to listen in and, although she didn’t want to intrude, she hoped she could help Marina by being fully informed of the facts.

  Tiff took on the job of phoning Marina’s parents with the news. Hearing them gasp in shock and Marina’s mum burst into tears, she almost wept herself. After they’d had a few minutes to take it in, she then handed over the phone so Marina could talk to them herself. They arranged to come over the next day.

  After an exhausting day, Marina finally fell asleep in her clothes, on the sofa. Tiff covered her with a throw, deciding it was better to let her sleep while she could. Tiff went to bed herself but lay awake long into the night, dreading the conversation she needed to have in the morning, but knowing it had to be confronted for Marina’s sake.

  Still rubbing sleep from her eyes, she wandered into the kitchen as dawn broke. Marina was sitting at the table, a cup of black coffee in front of her. It was barely light outside and the wind was howling off the sea.

  Marina’s eyes were red and puffy. ‘I won’t ask how you are, but did you get much sleep?’ Tiff asked.

  ‘Some. Thanks for staying with me and covering me up last night. I woke around five and knew I’d never drop off again so I decided to get up. There’s coffee in the machine. I’m trying to wake my brain up.’

  ‘Me too.’ Tiff poured herself a cup of coffee and sat down at the table.

  Marina cradled her mug. ‘It’s a good job it’s still the holidays and I don’t have to go into work.’

  ‘You’d have to phone in sick, anyway, my love.’

  ‘What would I say to them? My dead husband isn’t dead any more so I won’t be in today? I’m sure my boss has heard some wacky excuses for being off work but even she’d struggle with that one.’

  Sensing her opportunity, Tiff steeled herself for the news she had to deliver with a good glug of her coffee. ‘She’ll have to believe it. Let’s face it, you are going to have to tell people that Nate’s alive.’

  ‘How can I do that when I can’t even accept it myself? What do I say when they tell me I must be overjoyed? How do I tell them what I feel when I don’t know myself?’

  ‘You’ll work it out. We’ll work it out.’

  ‘Not that it’s any of their business,’ Marina declared.

  ‘In an ideal world, no. It’s no one’s concern but yours and Nate’s, and your close family and whoever else he’s misled and cheated … but this isn’t an ideal world. It’s a shitty world, where for every good, kind person with your interests at heart, there will be one who wants to use the situation to their advantage.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘That this news is bound to find its way into the open sooner or later.’ Tiff sighed. ‘Much sooner, probably.’

  Marina’s hand flew to her mouth. Tiff felt as if she was dealing one cruel blow on top of another. Yet she had to step in now, for Marina’s sake.

  ‘This isn’t going to help, but I have to say it. The press are going to have a field day with this story.’

  ‘It’s not a story. It’s happening to me.’

  ‘I know, my love …’ she said, more soothingly. ‘But the South African police and various contacts of Lachlan’s have already been alerted. The police can’t keep a lid on it for long and even if they did, Nate’s connections in South Africa will find out and start to talk.’

  ‘Oh God. Do you think they’d go to the press?’

  ‘I’d love to be wrong but I can’t lie to you. If this woman has been deceived and fleeced by Nate, then she’s not going to baulk at selling her story, is she? And I’m sure he has other friends, business associates, enemies … even if Porthmellow rallies around and refuses to talk to the media, these strangers have no loyalty to you. They’ll be angry and they’ll see no reason why they shouldn’t make a quick buck. And I promise you, the news outlets will be queuing up to offer the cheque.’ Tiff stopped, not adding her biggest fear: that Nate himself might sell his story.

  ‘How bad will it be? Will it fizzle out?’

  ‘Eventually, but for a few days it’ll be pretty huge and it’ll rear its head again if he comes back here. You can imagine the headlines: “Kayak man comes back to life”. I’m afraid it’s going to be on the front pages of every newspaper, on the telly and all over the Internet and social media. People will have their opinions and I advise you now to avoid them like the plague. I’m so sorry, my lovely, but you’re going to need to brace yourself and be very, very strong over the next few months.’

  Marina’s expression of utter bewilderment was heartbreaking but Tiff had to be strong herself to help her cousin in any way she could. On this occasion, it might mean going against every instinct and doing the very thing that seemed harshest.

  ‘I hadn’t thought about all the media attention,’ Marina murmured. ‘I’ve been so bound up in taking in the fact he’s still alive … the media coverage was bad enough when he went missing … although then, I was grateful that people were looking for him. But this, this is horrendous.’

  ‘I’ll deal with the media, when it comes to it. I’ll write the story. I know that sounds callous and hard, but if I don’t do it, someone else will. Give me the exclusive and I’ll do my best to put forward your side of things. I can’t stop other people from writing what they want, but at least you know you can trust me.’

  ‘I want to go back to not knowing. I wish Lachlan had never looked for Nate. I’m relieved he’s not dead or hurt … but why did I have to know?’

  Tiff rubbed Marina’s hand. ‘You’ll get through this, I promise you.’ She sighed. ‘I suppose you could look at it another way. If he’d kept it to himself, how would you have felt?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Maybe you think that now, but you won’t always. Come here.’

  Tiff leaned forward and hugged her. Marina had been a rock to her in her darkest hour and now she owed it to her cousin to be the same.

  Her auntie and uncle arrived shortly afterwards and Tiff spent the rest of the day han
ding out tissues, making tea and finding out as much as she could, always aware of the clock ticking.

  Marina needed time to let her initial shock and anger abate before they told the authorities and all hell broke loose.

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Marina didn’t know how she would have coped if Tiff hadn’t gone with her to the police station to report that Nate had been found. As she wasn’t reporting him for committing a crime, the police could do nothing but take enough details to alert the South African police to conduct a welfare check on the person suspected of being Nate. They confirmed he was perfectly within his rights to go off and live his life elsewhere, so long as he wasn’t doing it to commit a crime.

  On the journey home from the police station, familiar sights like St Michael’s Mount seemed alien. She felt as if she couldn’t even take a rock or a stone for granted, and every time she looked, she feared it might not be there. She knew she was still in shock and tried to tell herself that it was OK to feel this sense of total disorientation. No one could help because no one had ever been through a remotely similar experience.

  Back at the cottage, Tiff put a mug of tea in front of her that she didn’t really want. ‘This is the hardest part,’ she said. ‘I’ll not say it’s going to get easier but you’ve taken the first step. How are you doing?’

  ‘Part of me wants to pretend he’s still dead. I spent so many days, months and years wishing he’d come back and now he could, I don’t want him to. I need to know why but I don’t want to know why.’

  ‘That’s understandable, my love.’

  ‘I also can’t stop thinking about Lachlan. I know it isn’t his fault. I can understand and forgive him for checking out the message, and I realise now that even if he hadn’t, one day there might have been a slip-up or Nate might have decided to come back anyway … But I can’t cope with a new relationship at the moment. I feel as if I’ve crawled to the top of a mountain and been knocked back down again. This time, not because Nate’s dead, but because he’s been found.’

  Tiff patted her hand. ‘No wonder you’re at sixes and sevens after such a betrayal.’

  ‘Yes. And I know Lachlan’s a good man, but I’m not sure I can believe in anyone ever again.’

  ‘You will,’ she said firmly.

  ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘One day …’ Tiff murmured. ‘Give yourself time.’

  A short time later, Tiff left her to her thoughts while she popped down to her office in town. Life had to go on, Marina realised, but alone in the cottage, with all its associations, many of them now tainted, she felt the walls were closing in on her. Even the waves crashing on the beach below and the gulls’ cries added to her melancholy, rather than soothing her as they usually did.

  She had to get out of the house, so she walked along the coastal path. Even though it was a sunny day, she pulled the hood of her sweatshirt up, feeling like a fugitive herself. She rested on the cliff a little way below the lookout station, a few hundred yards away on one of the narrow paths that had been formed by walkers exploring a collapse of the cliff from years before. It was now thick with gorse and bracken, but no amount of warning signs prevented people from using it to reach the beach below.

  The watchers on shift – Trevor and Doreen – could probably see her. In fact, if they were doing their job correctly, they would see her, but they were good people and they’d take her excuse that she had personal reasons for not going on shift at face value.

  She kept walking and then sat for a while at a bench above the station, and the cove, looking down at the place where she’d last seen Nate. She’d watched him launch on that Saturday morning and had then gone home to do the washing, clean the cottage and do some marking.

  She’d expected him home after lunch and he’d never come back.

  It was still almost impossible to believe that he was now thousands of miles away living a different life.

  By now he’d know that she knew he was alive. He must do, the South African police would surely have been in touch?

  Was he shocked when they called him? Would he try to deny it? Who would he tell? His partner already knew or had guessed … what about any friends he had?

  Did he have any conscience at all about it? A shred of guilt? Would he try to contact her by phone or email – or even return to the UK? She presumed he was within his rights to return.

  At least she didn’t have to tell his cousins and uncle. The local police had said they’d do that.

  So now she had this brief window before the news got out, as it surely would. Tiff had been cruel to be kind in warning her and she’d discussed it with Lachlan too. The calls from the press, the reporters and cameras would land at any moment.

  She’d had to tell her boss at work, in case they hounded her colleagues, and she knew she’d also have to tell her fellow Wave Watchers, the neighbours, Dirk, Troy and Evie … all of whom she could rely on. Beyond that close circle, she realised that her most private, personal agony was about to become public property and she couldn’t do a thing about it.

  She got home to find Tiff back and waiting in the window, watching for her. She had the door open before Marina reached the step and practically hauled her inside. ‘Brace yourself,’ she said. ‘I’m afraid it’s started.’

  Tiff had warned her it would be bad, but she must have sugared the pill, because Marina was horrified at the intense interest in her life over the next week or so. Her own story was soon due to appear in the Post, but before it did, there was a piece from Nate’s girlfriend. She was bemoaning how he’d lied to her and betrayed her and insisting she’d no idea that Marina existed.

  Reporters knocked on neighbours’ doors – though no one told them anything – waited outside for her and took photos of the cottage, of Lachlan and of Tiff. The press delved into everything, raking it over endlessly. It trended on social media, made the local news, the national radio and was even discussed on a lunchtime talk show. Marina tried to keep away from the Internet as much as she could but it was impossible to avoid all the coverage.

  Tiff had brokered a deal with the Post, a rival newspaper to her previous employer, and managed to negotiate an increase in the fee.

  ‘I don’t want a fee,’ Marina protested, but Tiff had insisted.

  ‘You’re having one, you should take it. I’ll have mine and I’ll give it to the Wave Watchers. And Porthmellow Lifeboat Station,’ she added with a wry smile.

  ‘I never thought of that. We need the station roof repairing before winter sets in.’

  ‘Then use it,’ Tiff said firmly. ‘If you can extract even the smallest bit of good out of this horrendous experience, you should take it. Now is the time to play dirty, my love, even if it goes against every scrap of your nature.’

  Marina no longer knew what her ‘nature’ truly was. She’d been through so many emotions lately, some of them involving a lot of hate and anger, and that had scared her. ‘Has Nate said anything about me publicly in the press?’ she asked.

  ‘Not yet, but he must be under enormous pressure to give his story,’ Tiff said. ‘Unless his lawyers have told him to keep his mouth shut while he’s still under investigation by the police …’ She peered at Marina. ‘Do you want to speak to him?’

  ‘No! I never want to hear from him again. I don’t know what I’d say if I did.’ There was a knock on the door. ‘Will they ever stop?’

  ‘Eventually. You’d better hope for some major political turmoil.’

  ‘That’s not likely to happen, is it?’ Marina said, dragging up a scrap of grim humour from the depths.

  Tiff patted her arm. ‘That’s the spirit. The attention will fizzle out, I promise. Now all you need to do is decide if you want to contact Nate …’

  ‘Easy then,’ Marina murmured, wondering if the nightmare would ever end.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  With a huge sigh, Tiff flopped onto Dirk’s sofa.

  She closed her eyes and breathed deeply, trying to ease the te
nsion in her shoulders and neck. It was Sunday, and she’d hardly slept so her eyes were propped up on matchsticks after writing and rewriting Marina’s story dozens of times. She’d filed it earlier that morning and it was due to appear later in the week.

  Marina had gone to stay with her parents and Tiff was glad her cousin had got out of the cauldron of Porthmellow for a while.

  She’d taken no pleasure in writing the feature, which had been the most difficult she’d ever done. She’d lain awake most of the night, hoping she’d got the balance between giving her perspective and writing a story that would pass muster with the editor. She’d even shown it to Marina, something she’d never done before, and done her best to incorporate her amendments. Writing it was horrendous but she took a certain grim satisfaction in using her skills to shine a shaft of light on the darkest situation.

  She knew Marina would be asked time and again if she was pleased that Nate had been found, and for a while, her every nuance of emotion would be picked over by the vultures like herself, and the millions on the Internet.

  She opened her eyes to find Dirk putting two gin and tonics on the table. The simple pleasure of him making her a drink brought tears to her eyes. It was probably only due to her lack of sleep, but she was definitely teetering on the edge. She could get used to this kind of treatment: the everyday little kindnesses, someone to share the highs and lows of life with, to feel loved by and love in return.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said, taking the glass and trying to get a grip on her emotions. Ironically, she felt Marina’s troubles had brought her closer to Dirk.

  He sat at one end of the sofa and she swung her feet up into his lap. He inclined his glass towards a newspaper on the coffee table. ‘I’ve seen the crap they’re digging up about Nate in the papers. Poor Marina.’

  ‘Yes … and you ought to know, that there’s another big story about to appear. The Post will be publishing an exclusive interview, giving Marina’s side of the story.’

  ‘Did you write it?’