A Wife On Paper

by Liz Fielding

  ‘Is that it?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s little enough,’ Tom said. ‘Unfortunately, as you know, Steven surrendered his life assurance to raise some capital last year.’

  ‘He did?’ The shocked words slipped out before she could contain them. ‘Yes. Of course. He discussed it with me,’ she continued, swiftly covering her slip.

  That had been the other condition. The life policy. So much for his best intentions.

  ‘When I asked if that was it, I just meant, can I go now? I want to go to the office, make a start on sorting things out.’

  She was incredible, he thought. She’d just received a monumental blow but she’d absorbed it and, but for those two words, no one would believe it was anything other than what she’d expected to hear.

  ‘Not quite all,’ Tom said, clearly relieved that he hadn’t had to deal with hysterics. ‘I just need your signature on here so that I can set about organising a valuation of the estate. It shouldn’t take too long.’

  ‘Valuation?’ She looked up from the document he’d placed in front of her.

  ‘Of the company. For tax purposes.’ She looked blank. ‘Inheritance tax?’ he elaborated. ‘I did warn Steven of the situation when he originally signed the will. At that time there was no urgency, of course, but I did suggest he talk it over with you. Maybe consider going through the motions. Just a ten minute job at the local Register Office would do.’ Guy could see that Tom was beginning to founder in the face of Francesca’s incomprehension. Clearly she had never had that conversation with Steven, and he wondered just how many more shocks she could take. ‘Just to satisfy the legalities,’ Tom ploughed on. ‘Perhaps after the baby was born…’

  ‘Inheritance tax?’ she repeated, ignoring the waffle.

  ‘Is the company likely to exceed the inheritance tax threshold?’ Guy asked, giving Tom a moment to catch up. Work out for himself exactly how much in the dark she was.

  ‘I have no idea,’ the lawyer said.

  They both looked at Francesca for an answer, but she dismissed their query with an impatient little gesture.

  ‘Tell me about inheritance tax,’ she said rather more sharply.

  ‘I don’t imagine it will be too much of a problem, unless the company is doing substantially better than it was at the last audit,’ Tom Palmer said, clearly unsure which would be preferable. ‘However, since you weren’t married to Steven any legacy will be subject to inheritance tax.’

  She sat and digested this for a moment, then said, ‘So if we’d been married I wouldn’t have to pay inheritance tax?’

  ‘No, but as I said—’

  ‘And because we didn’t go through some totally meaningless ceremony I will? Have to pay it?’

  ‘Well, yes. That’s the present situation, I’m afraid.’

  ‘But that’s outrageous! We’ve lived together for nearly three years. We have a child…’

  ‘If you’d lived together for twenty-three years and had ten children it would make no difference, I’m afraid.’

  After the brief stunned silence she asked, ‘What’s the liability threshold?’

  ‘£250,000. After that forty percent of the estate goes to the Inland Revenue.’

  ‘But…’ Guy had thought she looked pale. He had been wrong. Colour leached from her skin, leaving her ashen. ‘But surely the house alone is worth ten times that?’

  ‘You don’t have to worry about the house, Fran.’

  ‘You mean the house is free of inheritance tax?’ Francesca asked.

  ‘I mean that Steven did not own the house.’

  She shook her head. ‘No. That’s not right. Steven bought it from Guy. Three years ago.’ She turned to him. Looked up at him. ‘We’ve lived there for three years. Tell him.’

  ‘There seems to be some confusion, Francesca. I don’t know what Steve told you, but he didn’t buy the house from me. It was sold to a property company about ten years ago, along with a lot of other property.’

  ‘But he said—you said…’ He saw her trying to recall the conversation in the restaurant that night. ‘He was going to come and see you. To talk about it. He asked you. That night…’

  ‘He asked me for help with a deposit for the house, that’s all. I didn’t know until yesterday that you thought I had owned it. And I had no idea he hadn’t gone ahead and bought it.’

  ‘But why would he need to borrow from you? He had money…’ She stopped. ‘How much?’

  He didn’t want to go there.

  ‘How much did you give him?’ she demanded.

  ‘Two hundred and fifty thousand pounds.’

  ‘But he didn’t buy it?’ This to Tom Palmer.

  The lawyer shook his head. ‘As far as I know it wasn’t even on the market at the time. He has been renting it on a yearly lease.’

  ‘But it’s our home,’ she said. ‘Toby’s home. Matty spent thousands of pounds on the studio extension, converting the place into a flat she could use. If I’d known we only had a lease I’d never have encouraged her to do that.’ She caught her breath. ‘They don’t know about that, do they? The people who own the house?’

  ‘I would think it’s highly unlikely,’ Guy said gently.

  To say that she looked stunned, confused, was an understatement. It was hardly surprising. He felt as if he’d taken a body blow, but she had been under the impression that she’d inherited a house worth upwards of two million pounds. Even taking into account the taxman, that would have meant she could sell up and have a million plus change to set up home somewhere else. Suddenly she owned nothing except a company that no one seemed wildly optimistic about and a short-term lease that might not be renewed. That she probably couldn’t afford to renew…

  Fran discovered that reaction was beyond her. It was as if she was under water, sinking very slowly, and she was completely paralysed, unable to do anything to stop herself from drowning.

  One moment it had seemed as if she could relax, shake off the nagging sense of impending disaster. Now—

  ‘There is one other thing.’

  ‘There’s more?’ She turned and looked at Tom Palmer. Until now he had been wearing the grave expression of the average family lawyer. Now he looked positively uneasy.

  How much worse could it get?

  ‘The last time I saw Steven he asked me to add a codicil to his will. I had to tell him that it was a bequest I was not prepared to add to that document. We came to a compromise. He dictated his wishes to me and I promised to read them out at this point.’

  ‘You mean after you’ve told me that my son and I are homeless and penniless?’

  ‘Francesca—’

  She glared at Guy, daring him to say another word.

  ‘I’ll read it now then, shall I?’ Tom waited briefly, but neither of them said a word and he took a letter from the file in front of him.

  ‘Before I start I want to say that there is nothing in this document that is binding,’ he said, clearly unhappy about something. ‘These are no more than Steven’s…’ He stopped.

  ‘Last wishes?’ she finished for him.

  ‘Just read it,’ Guy said.

  ‘Very well.’ Tom cleared his throat. ‘Well, Guy, here we are again. It’s in his own words, just as he said it,’ he explained.

  ‘Tom!’

  ‘Sorry. Right…

  Well, Guy, here we are again. Me messing up and you doing your big brother bit and saving my hide. Except this time my hide is well beyond saving. It’s Fran and Toby who need you now.

  ‘Not this side of hell,’ she muttered.

  ‘First the confession. Well, you’ll have worked this out for yourself by now, but I used your money for the lease on the house for some diamond earrings for Fran—since she didn’t want a ring. Oh, and to pay the bill at that fancy private maternity hospital. Nothing but the best for mine. Something I learned from you. I just didn’t have the cash to pay for it. But you never let me down.’

  ‘He didn’t have to do that!’ Fran protested. ‘
I wanted to go to the local hospital. I could have lived without diamonds or any of the other stuff…’

  Tom waited patiently for her to finish, but she ground to a halt, consumed with shame that Steven had taken money from his brother to give her everything her heart desired. Consumed with guilt that she had taken it without a thought. But that was Steven. He’d said money was something to be enjoyed. Spent it as if he never had to think about where it was going to come from. Maybe he never had. Maybe Guy had always been there…

  Tom and Guy were looking at her and she lifted a hand, a silent gesture that he should go on.

  ‘Okay, Guy, here’s what I want you to do. Just about the last thing I did, before I stopped being able to do anything for myself, was to book a surprise wedding for Fran and me. A beach job in the Caribbean. It seems I was over-optimistic about my prognosis and I’m not going to be able to make it, but Toby is going to need a father and Fran will need someone to help her take care of her waifs and strays and, as always, you are it.

  Tom says I can’t make a codicil to the will leaving Fran and Toby to you as a bequest, but I know you won’t let me down. He’s got the tickets, all you have to do is turn up and say ‘I do’. It shouldn’t be a problem for either of you.

  Steve’

  CHAPTER THREE

  THERE was a long, still moment after Tom stopped speaking when it seemed that everyone had forgotten to breathe.

  Then Guy said, ‘Is that right, Tom? You have the tickets?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  He held out his hand and the lawyer reluctantly passed the travel folder to him. Fran watched in disbelief as he calmly opened it and checked the documents before turning to her.

  ‘It’s next week, Francesca. Is that convenient for you?’ he asked. As if he was talking about dinner or a seat at the theatre and with about as much emotion. His face might have been hewn from wood for all the expression in it. His eyes chiselled from cold steel.

  Confronted with so little feeling, something hot and painful clenched inside her and she recognised it for what it was.

  Fear.

  ‘This is a joke.’ She looked to the lawyer for backup. ‘This is Steven’s idea of a practical joke…’ If she’d hoped they would both laugh and admit it, she was disappointed. Tom looked down at his desk as if he wished he was anywhere else. Guy continued to look at her, waiting for her answer.

  ‘Let me see.’

  He surrendered the folder and its contents to her and she looked at them. Tickets, honeymoon suite, wedding ceremony. Everything was in order. Except that the name on the documents was Guy Dymoke.

  ‘This is unbelievable.’

  ‘It’s a formality, Francesca. A paper marriage. Breathing space for you to sort yourself out.’

  ‘I don’t need breathing space. I certainly don’t need you. I just need somewhere to live.’

  ‘You and Toby, Matty and Connie need somewhere to live,’ he corrected.

  ‘Okay! Renew the lease if it makes you feel better.’

  ‘I suspect that I’m going to have to do a little more than that.’

  ‘You’ve done quite enough, Guy.’ And she tore up the tickets. Once, twice, three times. Then she dropped the resulting confetti on the floor.

  His head went back as if she’d struck him. Good. She wanted him to feel the heat of her anger. Wanted him to share the pain. Wanted him to feel…something.

  How dared Steven leave her to his brother in his will as if she was his property?

  How dared he accept the bequest as if it was his…his duty? Without an ounce of emotion. Everything locked down. Passionless. That was what Steven had said about him. That his brother never showed any emotion. Kept it all buttoned up. She wanted to grab him by the shoulders and shake him…

  ‘Tell me what Steve meant when he said a marriage of convenience wouldn’t be a problem for you,’ he asked, ‘Since you weren’t prepared to marry Steve for love. Or maybe he was the one who didn’t want to marry you?’

  ‘What?’

  Guy was so attuned to her, so aware of every nuance of expression, the slightest movement, that he saw the faintest start. Guy remembered the conversation he’d had with Steve that night he’d come and asked for the money. It had been such an odd thing to say; not about him—Steve had known how he felt and was having his own private game with him—but about her.

  It was what he’d said… ‘I’ve got everything you ever wanted, Guy. And I don’t even have to marry her…’ Once the cheque had been safely in his pocket. It was the only time in his life Guy had ever lost control, punched his brother in the mouth.

  Francesca turned on him furiously.

  ‘Don’t you dare blame Steven when he isn’t here to defend himself! This is all my fault. When he discovered I was pregnant he wanted to marry me, begged me to marry him, but—’ She stopped abruptly and glanced nervously at Tom Palmer.

  ‘But?’ Guy prompted, demanding her attention. And when she didn’t answer, ‘You wouldn’t renege on your principles, is that it?’ he persisted. His tone couldn’t have made it plainer that he didn’t believe her.

  She looked trapped. Hunted.

  ‘Can we talk?’ she said, her voice snagging in her throat.

  He recognised the turning point, the point when she stopped attacking and went on to the defence, realising that she had more to lose than gain. With anyone else he’d have gone for the kill. But he couldn’t do it to her.

  ‘I thought we were talking.’

  ‘Guy…’ Her expression softened to nervous pleading. In any other woman he’d have said it was an act. ‘Please…’

  Oh, hell…

  ‘Tom? Do you need us for anything else today?’

  ‘There are some papers I need you both to sign, but next week will do. You are going to be around for a week or two?’ He glanced at Francesca, not voicing the question that was in his eyes.

  ‘No more,’ Guy replied.

  Francesca turned to say goodbye to Tom, but Guy wasn’t in the mood for such pleasantries. As she offered her hand, he grasped her arm and, taking her firmly by the elbow, he headed for the door, not speaking or letting go until they were out of the building and he had his car door open.

  ‘Get in, Francesca.’

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Somewhere quiet,’ he said, ‘where you can tell me exactly what isn’t Steve’s fault.’

  Guy hadn’t had the first clue where he was going when he pulled out of the car park, only that he had to get away from the claustrophobic atmosphere of Tom’s office.

  ‘The park,’ he said. ‘I need some fresh air. To see something green that isn’t soaking wet. To stretch my legs.’ He glanced at her and instantly regretted his bullying tactics. ‘It takes me a while to get used to being in a city,’ he said.

  ‘The sudden change must be difficult,’ she said, quickly seizing the chance to move out of dangerous waters. ‘Do you enjoy working out in the field?’

  ‘Enjoy might be putting it a little strong,’ he said, letting her get away with it. ‘It’s a challenge.’

  ‘What’d you do? I have this image of you scrambling over rock faces knocking lumps of them with a hammer. I imagine there must be more to it than that?’

  He could imagine her at a dinner party, talking to some tongue-tied man, trying to draw him into the conversation…

  She was being polite. But she didn’t actually give a damn and he’d have given a lot to be high up on some rock face, with the wind tasting of nothing more than the ocean it had crossed, instead of snarled up in the fume laden air of London traffic.

  ‘It is a bit more technical than that these days. But, with all the satellite pictures in the world, you still need people on the ground.’

  ‘So who’s doing your job while you’re here?’

  She sounded as if she rather hoped he might have to rush right back. The sooner the better. Maybe taking off like that had been a mistake. The longer she had to think about her plea to ‘talk’,
the more likely she was to regret the impulse.

  ‘No one. Which is why time is in short supply.’

  ‘It must be wonderful to have a real career.’ A wistful note had crept into her voice. ‘Be respected.’

  ‘Being a good mother is the most important job there is.’ It occurred to him that maybe she hadn’t made the choice. That Steve would have needed a woman who would always put him first, last… ‘What did you want to do? Before you met Steve?’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know. The same as anyone with a degree in Business Studies, I suppose. To find the next big thing.’ She shrugged, as if faintly embarrassed by her ambition. Then, gaining confidence, ‘Be the Amaryllis Jones of my generation,’ she said, referring to the legendary founder of a chain of aromatherapy outlets, who’d just received an award in the Queen’s birthday honours list. ‘Have my picture on the front page of the Financial Times.’

  ‘Then you met Steve.’

  ‘Then I met Steven and got pregnant,’ she said. ‘Not much of a reference for someone who wants to impress the world with her organisational efficiency.’

  The driver of the car behind them hooted impatiently.

  ‘Doesn’t Amaryllis Jones have children?’

  ‘The traffic appears to be moving,’ she replied, evading an answer.

  He eased the car forward. ‘Doesn’t she?’

  ‘Four, I believe. Look, you want to walk and I have to get to Steven’s office. If you dropped me here I could take the Underground. It would be much quicker—’

  She looked at her wristwatch, as if to emphasise the immediacy of her need to be there. She was definitely regretting her impulsive appeal to get what was bothering her off her chest. He had somehow backed her into a corner and she’d momentarily panicked. Now she’d had a few minutes to gather herself the last thing she wanted to do was ‘talk’.

  ‘You’re going to step into Steve’s shoes and run the company?’ he asked, ignoring her suggestion.