Last Resort

by Susan Lewis

  ‘What the hell’s it got to do with you?’ Stirling snorted when she asked.

  ‘Just curious,’ she responded with a sultry smile.

  Stirling eyed her nastily. He knew only too well what was going on in that pretty little head of hers, but she was rowing the wrong boat, ’cos if he was going to tell anyone what Gabriella Villers had been doing here it would be Penny the Moon, not Marielle Descourts. He’d been toying with the idea for a couple of days now of paying Penny the Moon a visit before he left; but, on reflection, he didn’t think he would. Gabriella Villers wasn’t a woman to be relied on, so whatever information he gave Penny the Moon now was likely to be out of date by the time he got there, so what was the point? Sure, he might be able to put her mind at rest on a couple of things, but Villers hadn’t asked him to, so why get involved? Well, hell, maybe he would, but not right now, ’cos whichever way any of them looked at this, David was going down, and he, Stirling, didn’t want to do anything that might tip that wife of his over the edge at this stage of the game. Five years was the best David could hope for now, out in two, maybe three, but it was going to be a whole lot longer if Mrs Villers chose it to be.

  Marielle was still looking at him and as he caught the gleam in her eye he started to grin. This woman just didn’t know when she was beat – and, hell, why deprive himself of a little last-minute fun? ‘You want to reconsider about that blow job?’ he said.

  Marielle’s eyebrows went up.

  Five minutes later she was back on her feet and Stirling was zipping up his fly.

  ‘Ah! That’ll be my cab,’ Stirling said, looking at his watch as a car horn sounded on the jetty outside.

  ‘Robert,’ she said, drawing out his name as he snapped the locks on his suitcase, ‘I’m still curious to know what Gabriella Villers was doing here in France.’

  Stirling grinned. ‘Then I guess you’re just gonna have to stay that way, Marielle,’ he said, and picking up his case, he gave her a quick pat on the bottom and left her life.

  Chapter 27

  FOR THE SECOND time Penny picked up the glass of wine in front of her, then, unable to face it, put it back on the table. She’d arrived at the Delaneys’ a while ago now, but though Wally obviously knew she was waiting for news of David he seemed to be enjoying keeping her in suspense. As he chuntered on about the new stock he’d picked up in London for his antique shop Penny could see the malicious gleam in his eyes and the very sight of his gapped teeth and the ginger bristle on his chin caused her to swallow hard on the bile in her throat.

  It was now Wednesday evening. Esther had said she would call the minute Wally walked in, but she hadn’t, because when Penny had called just before leaving the office she’d discovered that Wally had been back more than two hours.

  ‘How are you feeling now, dear?’ Esther said, as Wally took a break from his inanities and began stuffing his new pipe.

  ‘Much better, thank you,’ Penny lied. She’d been to the doctor’s again that morning to get the results of her blood tests. There was nothing wrong with her that a few days in bed wouldn’t cure, he had told her.

  Esther’s expression was unreadable.

  ‘You know, the last thing David told me before he got on that plane,’ Wally said in his grating bark, as though continuing a conversation that had been going for some time, ‘was that I had to tell you everything you wanted to know. I wasn’t to hold back about anything.’

  Penny looked at him and felt such hatred well up in her that it was all she could do to stop herself smashing a fist in his loathsome face. She hadn’t realized until now that the antipathy between them had built to such a pitch that she could hardly bear to look at him, never mind listen to him. ‘Do you know where he is now?’ she said, a razor edge to her voice.

  Wally shrugged. ‘Being debriefed, no doubt. That’s what happens when they go in, you know. Haven’t heard anything since he left, though.’ He paused. ‘At least, not much.’

  He looked so insufferably smug and was so clearly savouring the power he had over her that Penny took the decision there and then not to play his game. Yes, she wanted to know what had been going on these past two weeks, but since she now knew that Gabriella had been there she could guess at most of it; and since she’d far rather hear the details from David, even if it did mean waiting until he could get in touch again, that was what she would do.

  ‘Well,’ she said, forcing a brightness she was very far from feeling, ‘I guess I’d better be heading home.’

  Wally’s disgruntlement was a small, but none the less rewarding, pleasure. ‘Thought you wanted to know what happened,’ he said irritably.

  ‘You can tell me if you like,’ Penny responded, ‘but if you think you can toss it out in little morsels and expect me to grovel in gratitude for each one, then quite frankly, Wally, you can forget it.’

  As his face flushed with anger she saw Esther’s eyes grow wide with something akin to admiration.

  ‘Told you before all this started,’ Wally said peevishly, ‘that I didn’t approve. Not my fault. No good crying to me.’

  ‘I’m not crying,’ Penny said coldly. ‘Neither am I here by choice. It’s only because you were with David before he went—’

  ‘No good getting angry with me about that,’ Wally told her. ‘Fact of life now.’

  ‘You’re quite right, Wally,’ she answered, picking up her bag and getting to her feet. ‘It is a fact of life, but I don’t think for one minute that David would have charged you with telling me anything at all if he thought you were going to treat me like this.’

  ‘How am I treating you? I’m about to tell you, aren’t I?’ he grunted testily.

  ‘Are you?’ she said, actually not wanting him to go any further now for fear of what he might say about Gabriella – which, in turn, was the only reason she wasn’t letting rip with what she really thought of him.

  He looked at his watch. ‘Got to go to Antibes,’ he said. ‘Tell you when I get back.’

  ‘I won’t be here when you get back,’ she said, taking her coat from the back of the chair.

  ‘OK. I’ll come over in the morning,’ he said, seeming for some inexplicable reason to like the idea.

  ‘Suit yourself, Wally,’ she responded.

  Esther walked her to the door. ‘There’s something I can tell you now, dear,’ she said in a whisper. ‘David asked him to give you a message before he got on the plane. He said to tell you he loves you.’

  Penny’s heart churned. ‘Thanks,’ she said, looking out at the inky-black night and knowing that Esther was probably making it up in order to make her feel better. ‘Will you be coming over with Wally tomorrow?’ she asked.

  ‘Probably,’ Esther answered. ‘Actually, I can come with you now, if you like, if you want to talk about him.’

  The offer was tempting, for in truth Penny had started to dread being alone lately, but she didn’t want to get into another situation with Esther and her frustrated motherhood, or even grandmotherhood, when Penny felt confused enough as it was. ‘No, it’s OK,’ she said, smiling. ‘I’m feeling pretty tired and—’

  ‘Did you get the results of your blood tests?’ Esther interrupted.

  ‘Yes,’ Penny answered.

  ‘And did they test you for pregnancy?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so,’ Penny said, and, suddenly wanting to get away, she started towards her car without even saying goodbye. To her intense frustration it wouldn’t start, and since Esther wouldn’t hear of her getting a taxi she had no choice then but to let Esther run her home. And of course, once they were there, Esther just had to pop in to use the toilet and almost before Penny knew it a bottle of wine was open and Esther appeared happily ensconced for the evening.

  ‘No, not for me, thanks,’ Penny said, when Esther held up the bottle to offer her some wine.

  Outside, the rain was drumming a lulling beat on the kitchen windows while, inside, the Aga was giving out a sleepy, comforting warmth that was filling the air with t
he nostalgia of Christmas. Only ten days to go, but the thought of how David was going to spend the festive season had taken all the joy out of it for Penny. She’d been toying with the idea of flying out there to surprise him on Christmas Day, but until she discovered exactly where he was or if she would even be allowed to see him she could do nothing.

  Surprisingly she and Esther fell into easy conversation, though Esther was doing most of the talking as Penny listened to the tranquillizing rhythm of her voice that was strangely nothing like the jerky, nervous voice she had come to know. She was talking about David, of course, telling Penny how right they were for each other and how very much he loved her. Whether David had ever voiced these sentiments about her to Esther Penny somehow doubted, but since he’d told her often enough how much he loved her what was the harm in listening? And before long, without even really thinking about what was happening, she was allowing Esther to lead her back into the cosy fantasy of having his baby, something Esther was so sure he would want. Through the floating drowsiness in her mind Penny felt as though this was something she was reading in a book or watching on a screen. Esther told the story so beautifully, made it all sound so possible and preordained that Penny, feeling that same remoteness creeping over her as she’d felt so often these past few days, allowed herself to be drawn into the sublime unreality of it. She was thinking of all the many ways she could break the news to David and each one felt as tragically romantic as the next. She found it so easy to envisage all the scenarios Esther conjured that it wasn’t until Esther finally got up to go that she realized what a fool she had been. Slipping out of reality like that and allowing herself to imagine those kind of things was surely the road to madness.

  Wally didn’t come the next day and when Penny, against her better judgement yet somehow unable to stop herself, called to speak to Esther, Jacqueline, the cleaner, told her that Esther was out. Penny left a message, but Esther didn’t call back. She called again in the evening, only to be told by Wally that Esther was in bed with the flu. Penny’s frustration at the way she seemed to be losing control of herself, as well as the way she was allowing the Delaneys to get to her, was building to such a pitch that, were it not for the fact they had her car and she was so sick she didn’t dare to leave the house anyway, she’d have gone over there and done something she’d have probably lived to regret. Her insides ached, she had cried so much, and she so desperately wanted to get hold of Sammy that the impossibility of it was crushing her with such loneliness and despair that she wondered if she would ever feel healthy or happy again.

  On Friday morning, knowing she couldn’t go on like this, she got her own cleaner to drive her to the pharmacie. When they returned they found her car at the gates with a brief note on the windscreen from Wally telling her he’d had her battery recharged and taken the car for a drive so it was ready to use. Not even wanting to analyse this spurious piece of kindness, for she had too much else on her mind, she drove the car up to the house, then went upstairs to her bathroom and took out the pregnancy-testing kit she had just bought.

  Three minutes later she had her answer. The shock was so profound that all she could do was stare down at the two narrow blue lines. Why she should feel so shocked when she’d suspected it for days didn’t make any sense, but as the fantasy pregnancy began to establish itself as a reality she could feel the true horror of it totally eclipsing the falsified joy.

  She didn’t know if the baby was David’s and, if it wasn’t, she didn’t want it. But how was she ever going to know? Even if there was a way of telling and it turned out to be his, she had to be out of her mind to think he would be happy about it. Didn’t he have enough to be dealing with? Wouldn’t he already be suffering for what he was going to miss of his sons’ lives, without having this thrown at him too? And knowing the circumstances surrounding the birth of his second son, how could she even contemplate putting him through this new torment when she didn’t even know if the child was his or Christian’s?

  She lifted her eyes to the mirror and stared back at her ashen reflection. The very idea that Christian might have dealt him this final blow made her feel faint from the sheer brutality of a fate that could do this. How would she ever tell him? But no, she wouldn’t, he would never have to know. She’d just go quietly into hospital one morning and come out again in the afternoon without anyone ever having to know.

  She was about to turn away, when her eye was caught by the test, which she’d set down on the bidet. She picked it up and stared at it again. There was no question it was positive, for the blue line couldn’t have been more pronounced. It was a baby. She was carrying a baby. Then, lifting her face back to the mirror, she started to shake her head. This child wasn’t Christian’s, it couldn’t be. She had been ovulating at the time she and David made love and they hadn’t used any contraception at all, whereas she and Christian had never made love without it. So the baby had to be David’s.

  Without giving any thought to what she was doing, she flung open the bathroom door and raced to the phone.

  ‘Esther,’ she said breathlessly when Esther answered. ‘Can I come and see you?’

  ‘Of course you can, dear,’ Esther answered. ‘You come whenever you like.’

  It took Penny less than ten minutes to get there. Wally was in the garden, fiddling about with the roses, and barely looked up as Penny sailed past with a quick thank you for seeing to her car.

  Esther was in the kitchen, wearing a shocking-pink dress with a black fur trim on the pockets and collar. Fleetingly, as excitement tripped through her heart, it crossed Penny’s mind that if Esther was going to become a grandmother she might just start dressing the part – a thought that alone should have told her she was not, at this very minute, of sound mind.

  ‘I did a test,’ Penny told her, hardly able to contain her joy, ‘and it was positive.’

  Esther looked at her unblinkingly.

  ‘Didn’t you hear me?’ Penny said, her smile beginning to falter.

  Esther’s face twitched as she turned it towards the window. ‘Congratulations, my dear,’ she mumbled.

  Penny stared at her in disbelief.

  Esther didn’t move.

  ‘What do you think David will say?’ Penny asked, so confused she barely knew what she was saying.

  Esther’s narrow shoulders gave a shrug. Then, turning back to Penny, she said, ‘What are you going to do?’

  Penny was so stunned she didn’t know how to respond. ‘Um, uh,’ she said, putting a hand to her head, ‘I don’t know. I mean, I suppose I should tell David, but I don’t know how to get hold of him.’

  At that moment Wally came into the house.

  ‘I’m going to have a baby,’ Penny blurted out before she could stop herself.

  Wally paused a moment in his stride, then kept on going across the kitchen. ‘Hmmph,’ he said.

  ‘Penny would like to know how she can get hold of David,’ Esther said tonelessly. ‘Maybe, with the contacts we have—’

  ‘Esther, you know the situation,’ Wally interrupted.

  ‘Yes, yes, of course,’ Esther responded, her head going down.

  Penny looked from one to the other and felt herself start to tremble with rage. But whatever the situation was she’d be damned if she was going to ask them. ‘It’s OK,’ she said, her fists clenching at her side, ‘I’m perfectly capable of finding out where David is, so please don’t put yourself to the trouble. I’m leaving right now and maybe you’d like to forget I ever came.’

  As she walked across the kitchen and out into the garden Esther came running after her. ‘Go and see a doctor,’ Esther said under her breath. ‘You’ll need to do that. And, I promise, it’ll be all right.’

  Penny shook her off.

  ‘I’ll call you as soon as I can,’ Esther said as Penny slammed her car door. She said something else too, but by then Penny had already put her foot down and was speeding through the gates. The crazy, awful and unbearable part of it was that she hadn’t realized
until now just how much she had allowed Esther to get to her with all her perfectly painted scenarios of a pregnancy that in reality was nothing short of a nightmare.

  By seven that evening Penny was sitting alone in her kitchen. She had seen the doctor and was waiting now for him to contact her to let her know the earliest date she could have her pregnancy terminated. She didn’t know if she was doing the right thing, wasn’t even sure that she had really come to a decision at all. She felt so traumatized by everything and so desperate to speak to Sammy that she barely knew what was in her mind.

  As her eyes darted nervously about the room she was wondering if there was a way she could get a message to David, if only to wish, him a Happy Christmas and let him know she was thinking of him. Pierre had disappeared at the same time as David and Penny guessed that he was probably over there in the States too, maybe facing charges of his own. To call Sylvia was out of the question when she was still recovering from her operation and, short of calling the DEA to try to get hold of Stirling, there was no one else. She looked at the clock and swiftly calculated the time difference between France and Miami. Maybe, she thought, she would at least try to find Stirling’s number.

  However, before she could pick up the phone the bell in the hall sounded, announcing someone’s arrival at the gates.

  ‘Hello,’ Penny said into the entryphone.

  ‘Penny, dear, it’s Esther. Can I come in?’

  Penny so badly wanted to say no, but right now even Esther’s company was better than sitting here alone putting herself through this misery so she pushed the button to release the gates.