by J. L. Butler
‘Then why are you here? And why’s Donna got two barristers?’
I glanced at David Gilbert and shifted uncomfortably in my chair.
‘Games,’ I said with as much authority as I could muster. ‘Two barristers at a First Appointment is the legal equivalent of a military show of might. The Russians parading their weapons. But it’s pointless, unnecessary and expensive. I’m all for a bit of posturing, but within reason. Robert Pascale, on the other hand, is an expert at spending other people’s money.’
‘But perhaps that’s why he’s so successful. Spend to earn.’
‘Martin. You have to trust us.’
Our eyes locked and I saw a softening apology in his expression. I knew I had to take everything less personally, but it set my resolve to do whatever I could for him.
‘It’s almost ten,’ I said, scooping up my files. ‘We should go.’
We walked in silence to chambers, one of the small courtrooms used for more informal proceedings.
The judge was already in the room at the head of the long conference table. Jeremy Mann and his junior were also sitting down. Robert was standing in the corner of the room checking his messages. I could not see Donna Joy anywhere.
I took a seat opposite Mann and arranged my papers and collected my thoughts. I put my pen horizontally above my file, pointing to the left. A mechanical pencil and a block of Post-it notes were put to the left and right like a knife and fork.
Soft murmurs rippled around the room, otherwise all we could hear was the ticking of the clock on the wall.
It was now a few minutes after ten o’clock and still there was no sign of Mrs Joy. I glanced towards District Judge Barnaby and caught his eye. He was a judge of the old school, on the verge of retirement, irascible but efficient, and I could tell by the arch of his brow that he was anxious to get on with another day at the coal-face of the breakdown of human relationships.
‘Are we ready?’ asked District Judge Barnaby finally.
Robert Pascale looked unhappy.
‘We’re just waiting for my client,’ he explained.
Barnaby tapped his pen lightly against the table.
‘And are we expecting her soon?’ he said pointedly.
‘Any minute,’ Pascale said glancing at his watch. ‘I’ll just go and wait outside for her. She might have got lost.’
I didn’t dare look at Martin, who had started muttering to David in such a low voice that I couldn’t hear what he was saying.
Robert left the room for what seemed like a very long time. When I heard the door open again, I couldn’t resist turning round, expecting to see her, immaculate and unflustered despite her late arrival, but instead it was Pascale, looking unusually agitated.
‘No sign,’ he said.
‘Have you called her?’ asked Jeremy Mann pompously.
‘I’ve tried, but it’s going straight to message. I spoke to her yesterday, and she was all set for today.’
‘Maybe there’s bad traffic.’ Martin said it as if he didn’t believe it.
‘Five more minutes,’ said Barnaby witheringly. ‘I have a very busy court list.’
‘I suggest that we start without Mrs Joy,’ said David, looking at me for approval. I knew what he was about to ask without him saying anything.
Robert objected but District Judge Barnaby raised a hand.
‘Fine,’ he said, looking seriously unimpressed.
‘Well, that was embarrassing,’ spat Martin as we left chambers forty minutes later.
‘Her presence really wasn’t necessary,’ reassured David.
We watched Robert and his team disappear down the corridor.
Martin was still shaking his head.
‘Are you going to speak to her?’ I asked.
He gave a light snort. ‘I don’t think anything I say will have any impact on her behaviour.’
‘Behaviour?’
‘It’s just so bloody typical of her.’
David looked sympathetic. ‘It’s not the first time a client hasn’t turned up to court. Happens more often than you might think. And perhaps Robert had implied that it was just a fairly rudimentary hearing . . .’
I tried to catch Martin’s eye, tried to work out what he was thinking but he looked unhappy and distracted.
‘What happens now?’ He focused his entire attention on David. I felt a heavy thump of disappointment.
‘As you saw in there, we set out a timetable for events. Now we need to gather information, liaise with Robert, wait for a date for the FDR.’
‘Which should be when?’
‘Six to eight weeks, with a bit of luck. If the forensic accounting doesn’t hold us up.’
‘Let me know. I’m off to Switzerland tomorrow; it’s been booked for a while and I don’t want to cancel, but it’s only for a week.’
I knew this information already. It had been mentioned in passing at the Spitalfields loft and at the time I wondered if he had been gearing up to fob me off.
‘Will do,’ said David, shaking his hand.
Martin turned to me to repeat the gesture.
He took my palm and held it a moment longer than necessary. As his fingers curled against mine, I thought about them inside me. Where they had been on Tuesday night. Where I wanted them to be right now.
‘See you next time,’ I said finally.
He nodded, and turned to leave without another word. I watched his form retreat into the distance and I was so transfixed I didn’t even stop to wonder if David Gilbert had noticed any spark or awkwardness between me and our client.
‘One day people with money will find themselves some manners,’ said David when he was out of earshot.
‘Martin?’ I asked with panic.
‘The wife. It’s so bloody disrespectful.’
‘Maybe she’s ill. Or got the wrong day.’
‘Maybe,’ said David cynically.
‘I think we should consider a researcher,’ he added after a pause.
‘What for?’
‘I handled a divorce recently. It was pretty unremarkable from a legal point of view, but it was a soap opera of a story. That wife didn’t turn up to her First Appointment either. We thought she was just being cavalier until I found out that she’d moved to LA without telling her husband. Hooked up with some multimillionaire record producer out there, all the while trying to screw my client for fifty per cent of his business.’
‘So you don’t trust Donna Joy either.’ I was aware of the glee in my own voice.
‘I just want to know what we are dealing with at her end,’ said my instructing solicitor. ‘If we can prove she is seeing someone . . . a rich new someone . . . that might help our cause.’
‘I know just the person who can help us,’ I replied.
There was little left to say to David. His thoughts had already turned to his next meeting, another client. We said our goodbyes and I stood in the lobby wondering how to kill time before a prohibited steps application that was listed for noon. There was no point returning to chambers so I went to Starbucks for a coffee, and read through my notes.
Sitting by the window, I pulled out my iPad and used it to surf the net. Usually I checked the headlines or the weather, but today I found myself typing in Donna Joy. The first three pages of search results yielded nothing I hadn’t read before, but as I dug deeper, I found the name of the studio from which she worked, a gallery that had exhibited her work, a party she had been to the previous summer. Most revealing of all was her Instagram account – endless stills of exotic locations, glamorous friends and smiling selfies, a window into a gilded world that made my own life seem lonely and colourless.
I stuffed the tablet back in my bag, put some red lipstick on in the loo and returned to court for my prohibited steps. I fed my coat and bag through the scanners and said hello to an acquaintance from law school who had also just arrived. The instructing solicitor for my next case had already texted to say that she was running late, so I hung around the foyer and rea
d the court list.
I first noticed her out of the corner of my eye. It was her coat that grabbed my attention – hot pink and expensive-looking, the sort of item I would not wear myself on account of its colour, but could nonetheless admire.
I looked closer, and knew it was her. She was smaller than I expected, in the same way that the only two celebrities I have ever met were pocket-sized. Her hair was darker, more a rich toffee than a dark blonde. Her bag was large and exotic-looking – a textured skin I did not recognize. Lizard, alligator? I wondered if he had bought it for her.
‘Can I help you?’ I asked.
She turned to face me and I tried to absorb every detail of her face. Thin lips, strong brows, surprisingly little make-up on her pale, creamy skin, a long swan-like neck, around which hung a delicate gold necklace with the initial ‘D’.
She muttered under her breath with undisguised annoyance. ‘Not unless you can turn back time.’
I wanted to tell her that she was one hour fifty-two minutes late. That her solicitor would now be back at his office and that the wheels were in motion for her divorce. I wanted to ask her why she was so late. Was it a blow-dry to impress her husband, I wondered, looking at the smooth waves that fell over her shoulders. Or had she simply not bothered to write down the details of that morning’s application in her undoubtedly stuffed diary?
I stood motionless for a moment, my heart beating hard, wondering if I should introduce myself. But I knew she would find it strange and coincidental that the barrister she had met at the court lists was her husband’s own lawyer.
‘I’m afraid I can’t help you there,’ I replied, gripping my leather bag tighter.
Her face softened as she smiled at me, and I knew exactly what Martin Joy had seen in her. The collar of my shirt felt tight against my neck, and I headed straight for the exit, desperate to get some fresh air.
Chapter 7
I wasn’t the one who suggested meeting in Islington. Martin texted me from Switzerland asking me to dinner and when I said yes, he had a table booked at Ottolenghi within minutes.
I took this as a good sign. Ottolenghi was not in Soho or Chelsea. It was on Upper Street, a stone’s throw away from my flat, a short stagger back and I knew I had to – wanted to – prepare for that eventuality. Years of self-imposed singledom don’t make for the highest levels of grooming, and slinky underwear had been replaced by over-washed comfort across the board: something had to give. Most Saturday mornings I’d be at the Toynbee Hall free legal advice centre in Stepney, where I’ve done volunteer work for years, but that week I decided to skip it and instead spend the morning at a little Korean beauty spa on Holloway Road so that I would at least be waxed and smooth. I then went to my favourite deli, La Fromagerie, and bought creamy brie and fragolino grapes to stock the fridge and I put fresh linen on the bed, even spraying them with lavender scent in a bid to make them smell like those starchy sheets you find in expensive hotels. I wanted to make my flat a delicious haven he would never want to leave. Which, I was starting to realize, was exactly what I wanted.
I chose a black dress and hot pink heels and deliberately left five minutes late. I was useless at playing games, always had been, but it was my one concession at ‘playing hard to get’.
As I walked along Upper Street, passing the early evening crowds, groups of four or five, loud, laughing, I breathed in hard, wanted to feel some of that energy, some of that abandon, the sense that anything could happen tonight. A smile crept on to my mouth. Anything.
I crossed the road, my heels clacking on the tarmac, my coat flying. Would he be there already, waiting for me? Or would I find an empty bar and a message on my phone, some excuse about work or delayed flights? I had never been convinced Martin Joy would contact me again after the First Directions hearing, but once we had arranged a date, I had naively assumed that he would turn up. Now I wasn’t so sure. Should I call him to ask if he was on his way? Think positively, I told myself. Good things can happen. Even to you.
And there he was: my heart skipped as I saw him through the glass. Facing away from the street, lounging against the bar, his broad back moving, his strong hands carving through the air. He was talking to someone. The smile on my face slipped; no, he was with someone. A couple. I paused for a step, my hand hovering above the door handle, fighting disappointment. Had I misread the situation? Wasn’t this a date-date? But I couldn’t stand there wavering: the door was glass and anyway, Martin had turned and seen me.
‘Fran,’ he said warmly, as I pushed inside. He reached for my hand, guiding me towards him. A crackle of static passed between us as our skin touched, but he didn’t flinch, just smiled and whispered one word into my ear, low enough that only I could hear it: ‘Sexy.’
‘Francine,’ he said, turning to the others, ‘this is Alex, my business partner, and this is Sophie, his wife.’
‘Just his wife,’ she said with a conspiratorial wink, stepping across to shake my hand. ‘No one important.’
But she was impressive: blonde, tall, a little bit horsey, like the captain of a lacrosse team. When she stood up off her stool, she was at least six inches taller than me. Even in my heels I was barely five feet five, but I had never felt smaller than I did right then.
Though Alex laughed along, I sensed more reserve in him. Thin, upright, not a wrinkle in his grey suit. Maybe I wasn’t the first woman Martin had introduced to his friends since the divorce, or perhaps Alex was still loyal to Donna – friends did that, didn’t they? They took sides.
There was a brief, awkward pause and then Martin filled the space.
‘You did get my text?’
‘Which text?’
‘About Alex and Sophie joining us for dinner.’
I shook my head.
‘We won’t be staying long and I promise that Alex will be on his best behaviour,’ said Sophie, flashing me a conciliatory look.
Martin inspected his phone as his friends went ahead to the table.
‘It didn’t send. Text failed.’
He touched my fingers, a gesture of apology, and I felt his heat against my skin.
‘It’s fine. I want to meet your friends,’ I said, wondering how convincing that sounded.
We were shown to our table and Martin ordered two bottles of orange wine and a selection of starters. Everything was so well chosen, I knew he had been here many times before.
‘So you were skiing?’ I said, aware that I should chip in with some small talk from the get-go. I had no idea what Sophie and Alex knew about our relationship, such as it was, but until I had some sort of signal from Martin that this was a date, that Sophie and Alex knew it was a date, I decided to proceed with caution, keeping conversation to the vague and unrevealing.
‘Heli-skiing.’ Martin nodded.
‘Spitalfields’ very own Milk Tray Man,’ joked Alex.
‘It’s great. Have you tried it?’ asked Sophie, with the confidence of someone who had spent her life on skis.
‘I’m happier with a hot chocolate and viennoiserie down at the bottom,’ I said, not wanting to admit that the only time I’d spent rushing down snowy slopes was tobogganing in the park as a child. It took a strength of will not to grill him further, desperate to know who he had been in Switzerland with – no one went heli-skiing alone, surely? – but knowing it looked needy to ask.
‘So you work alongside Martin?’ I asked as we sat down at a table tucked away at the back of the restaurant.
Alex nodded, but Sophie pursed her lips and gave a tight shake of the head. ‘Not me. Not any more. I’m sure you know better than most people that working together does not always make for a happy home life. We tried it in the early days, but ended up wanting to strangle each other, so I’ve stepped aside and taken on a more’ – she sucked her teeth – ‘advisory role.’
‘Meaning she tells us both what to do,’ smiled Martin.
‘He likes to make it sound like I’m some sort of nag,’ said Sophie. ‘But without a woman’s eye fo
r detail, I dare say the lights would have been turned off years ago.’
Alex took her hand and kissed it.
‘There – your reward, darling.’
She tapped his cheek playfully and I felt a pang of jealousy. They’d probably been married, what? . . . at least a decade, and she obviously still adored her husband.
I slowly began to relax and enjoy myself as the three joked and teased each other the way only old friends can do. Martin held forth about his recent trip, ‘coming out of the powder looking like Frosty the Snowman’, while Sophie told me about a disastrous skiing holiday she and Alex had been on to Courcheval, where a complete lack of snowfall had turned the resort into ‘the seventh ring of hell’ where there was nothing to do for the Russian tourists but show off. ‘The only place I’ve seen more fur was in San Diego Zoo!’ she laughed.
‘So where did you all meet?’ I asked, envious of their tight bond.
‘University,’ said Alex.
‘Economics Society.’
‘It was that trip to New York, wasn’t it? To Wall Street. We were room-mates in that crappy hotel in the East Village.’
‘I like to think of myself as a matchmaker,’ said Sophie. ‘I knew they’d get on, so I fixed it.’
‘I thought she became president of Econ Soc to get on, but really she just liked playing Cilla Black.’
‘Guilty as charged,’ she said, raising a hand.
Conversation flowed on with the wine, some delicious orange-scented white that filled my head, and I began to feel glad that Martin had invited his friends along on our date. The modern, chichi restaurant, Alex’s easy intelligence, Sophie’s knowing asides: it was a heady mix of the chic and metropolitan, and I ached to be part of this. I could see the admiring glances we were getting from couples at other tables; we were the beautiful people, sophisticated and urbane, and for once I was one of them, right at the beating heart of London.
‘So you haven’t really told us about you,’ said Sophie, when she’d finished telling the waitress what she wanted for dessert. ‘In another life, I’d like to have been a divorce lawyer. I got wooed by a few commercial firms on the milk round, but it seemed way too dull. Family law, on the other hand, must be fascinating.’
