The Dangers of Family Secrets: From the bestselling author of The Ex-Wife’s Survival Guide

by Debby Holt

  There was something terrible about watching Patrick unravel in front of her. It was as if he were tearing at his skin, revealing his raw, naked heart and she was sure he would later regret it. ‘Patrick,’ she said, ‘I’m so sorry. Does she want to leave you? Does she want to go off with Matthew?’

  Patrick gave a laugh. ‘No. She knows I’d get Lola. She’s terrified of losing her.’

  ‘Then in that case you can work things out. I totally understand why you’re angry but…’

  ‘You don’t understand. I don’t want Fizz to stay. She’s like some alien being. I don’t know who she is. I don’t recognise her. She revolts me. And that means I’m free. Now do you understand?’

  ‘No,’ Anna said. ‘I’m not sure I do.’

  ‘Way back in May, when you came up to me in that maternity ward, you introduced yourself and it felt like I’d got my oldest friend back. And then you were so good with Lola and she liked you, which means a lot with Lola. What I’m saying is: you and I are meant to be together. I really believe that. And now we can be. I want you to help me start again. We’d be so good. You know we would. Can’t you see us together?’

  For almost a moment, Anna could see. She could see her and Patrick playing with Lola in the playground, smiling at each other over Lola’s head. They’d all live together in that nice clean mansion block and on Sundays they’d go to lunch with Patrick’s parents who had always liked her apart from that one last time when his mother had treated her like Delilah about to cut Samson’s hair off. And in the evenings she’d come back from a hard day at hospital and Patrick would be waiting with a tomato and basil tart and afterwards they’d sit hand in hand watching a bit of television before going to bed.

  Patrick’s phone went. He glanced at it and said, ‘I’d better take this,’ and his voice was hard as steel. ‘What is it?… I’m with Anna… because right now I need to see a sympathetic face and Anna is sympathetic… I have no idea… You must see you’ve forfeited any rights to ask a question like that and I’m sure as hell not going to answer it.’ He switched off his phone and put it in his pocket. He came over to the sofa and sat down beside Anna. ‘Do you know what I want to do now?’

  ‘I have a pretty good idea.’

  He leant forward and kissed her and when she pulled away, he gave her a quizzical glance. ‘Don’t you want me?’

  Anna took hold of his hands and held them hard. ‘Patrick, why did you answer Fizz’s call just now? You could easily have left it.’

  ‘I knew she’d be worried. She wanted to know where I was. I stormed out of the flat in rather a hurry.’

  ‘But you more or less told me you don’t care about her any more so why should you worry if she’s worried? You answered her call because you wanted her to know you were here. You wanted her to know you were here with me. You don’t want to have sex with me because you love me or even because you fancy me, you want to have sex so you can get back at her.’

  ‘You’ve got it all wrong. I told you I’ve been crazy about you for months.’

  ‘Oh Patrick!’ Anna released his hands. ‘You fancied me. And you knew I fancied you. You’re angry and bitter and at the moment you hate your wife. I’d probably be the same. Except, I’m not sure if you can afford to be very angry. You invited me to supper and we both know what would have happened if Lola hadn’t woken up. Neither of us is in a position to cast stones at Fizz.’

  ‘That’s totally different. Fizz has been lying to me for months. You and I got carried away on one single evening…’

  ‘Patrick, you know that’s not true. You didn’t invite me over to discuss Felicity Eggins’ second marriage. You wanted to have sex. So did I.’

  ‘But that’s what I’m saying. This time there’s no Lola and there’s no guilt…’

  ‘It doesn’t work like that though. I wanted you then and afterwards I felt guilty. Patrick, I hate feeling guilty. You and Fizz produced Lola who’s confident and happy and has single-handedly converted me to the idea of having children sometime in the future. The two of you have made her what she is. I’m not sure you have the right to indulge your very natural wish for revenge by… by wilfully dismantling your family. At the very least, you need to count to ten, or maybe one million, before you decide to cast Fizz into the wilderness.’

  Patrick had been sitting forward with his hands gripped together. Now he sprang to his feet and started pacing round the room again, like a lion in a cage. ‘She put herself there! She wants to be with Matthew!’

  ‘It doesn’t sound like that to me. There may be all sorts of reasons why Fizz had an affair with Matthew but I bet you love isn’t one of them. If she loved Matthew she wouldn’t be so desperate to stay with you, however much she adores Lola. Perhaps she was flattered – he’s a partner in her firm, isn’t he? Perhaps she did resent the fact that you are the primary parent and I know that’s not fair but I’ve noticed that fairness doesn’t seem to count for a lot in these cases. So go home, rage at Fizz – but do it quietly in case you wake Lola – and talk to her and go on talking until you fix things.’

  ‘How can I trust her after this?’

  ‘If she knew about you and me she’d probably say the same. Go home and talk to your wife. You’re a brilliant father. Do you want to undo all the great work you’ve done and break up Lola’s world? Fizz has been an idiot but at least it sounds like she knows she’s been an idiot.’ Anna stood up and went across to him. ‘You need your family.’ She kissed his cheek. ‘Go home.’

  Patrick pushed his fingers through his hair. ‘I don’t want to go home.’

  ‘Well, tough.’ Anna strove to keep her rising impatience out of her voice. ‘We all have to do things we don’t want to do.’

  ‘All right. I’ll go.’ Patrick threw up his hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘Thank you for your diagnosis, Doctor Cameron.’

  ‘It’s a pleasure.’ She gave him a push towards the door. ‘Go on, Patrick. Go back to your wife.’

  ‘What about you and me? Are we still friends?’

  ‘Of course we are. But perhaps we won’t see each other for a while.’

  ‘Perhaps we won’t. I’ll see myself out.’

  After he’d gone, Anna went over to the offending blind. Patrick was right, she thought, it was very unsightly, she really must mend it. She would like to believe she had been very noble in renouncing Patrick. In fact, it was easy to turn down a man who only wanted to sleep with her in order to get back at his wife. It helped that she no longer found him so desperately attractive. She’d realised that as soon as he started talking about the sacrifices he’d made. She didn’t blame him of course, but there was something very unattractive about self-pity.

  There was also the William factor. She’d left a message last week on his phone: ‘Hi, William, Tess asked me to ask you for the phone number of your friend Marnie, so here I am. Get back to me. I’d love to see you. Any time…’ She wouldn’t ring again. He’d responded with a text comprising a phone number and nothing else.

  It was neither fair nor rational to blame Patrick for the end of her friendship with William but she couldn’t help herself. Irrational feelings were invariably more powerful than rational ones.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  It was touching to see how much trouble Anna had taken. There were clean sheets on Olivia’s bed and flowers on the dressing table. There were fillets of salmon and a splendid salad for supper along with a bottle of cold white wine. As they sat talking about Anna’s morning set-to with her terrifying consultant, Tess felt her own dramas of the afternoon loosen their hold on her and when Anna asked her what she’d done today, she was surprised to discover that she actually wanted to tell her.

  ‘I had a Skype audition,’ she said. ‘It’s all down to Jamie. He’d told them I was a natural in front of the camera so of course I was terrified.’

  ‘Of course you were. What did you talk about?’

  ‘Who else but Sir Walter? I spent a few minutes describing the traditional view
of him as a committed old Tory Unionist and then I brought out my copy of Waverley – I have it in my bag, I’ll lend it to you. Waverley’s a hero who keeps changing sides. He can’t decide whether he’s a Hanoverian or a Jacobite. It’s almost as if Scott can’t make up his own mind. Anyway, that’s what I talked about.’

  ‘And how did it go? Did you get any feedback?’

  ‘That’s why I was late coming over. Geraldine rang me back at six.’

  ‘And you’ve let me rabbit on about Miss Diamond! What did she say?’

  ‘She liked me.’

  ‘Tess, that’s brilliant! We should be drinking champagne.’

  ‘Yes,’ Tess said. ‘Yes, it’s good. She thinks Martha and I would make a good team. We both have the same hair apparently. I don’t know why that’s so important.’

  ‘Have you told me about Martha? Who is she?’

  ‘Well,’ Tess said, ‘she’s an expert on Borders history.’ She hesitated. ‘She’s a friend of Jamie.’

  ‘This is all quite brilliant. Why do you look so very unexcited?’

  ‘I suppose… I suppose I’m a little jealous of Martha.’

  It was only now she said it she knew it was true. Anna looked as surprised as she was.

  ‘When you were thirteen,’ Anna said, ‘you had a crush on Xander Bullen. Since then… I’ve always assumed you didn’t really care for men.’

  ‘So did I. I miss Jamie, that’s all. I’ll get over it.’

  ‘Why should you? If you want to see him again, you should do so. You don’t need to tell Dad.’

  ‘I couldn’t do that.’ Already, Tess regretted her admission. She tried to smile. ‘I do feel sorry for Mum sometimes. She named her daughters after the most romantic heroines she could find and look how we’ve turned out!’

  ‘Speak for yourself! I’ve always found Mum’s choice of names for us rather sinister. She once tried to convince me there was some sound feminist reason, but look at the facts! She called her daughters after Anna Karenina and Tess of the D’Urbervilles: two women who comprehensively messed up their lives. A psychoanalyst would have a field day with that one.’

  ‘You’ve always been hard on her.’

  ‘She’s taking us out to supper tomorrow. I said we’d meet her at half six.’

  ‘Oh Anna, I can’t. I’m meeting someone. I can’t get out of it.’

  ‘That’s all right. I’d like to have Mum to myself for a bit. I have a lot to say to her.’

  ‘Do you?’ Tess eyed her warily.

  ‘I think I know why Dad left her. Do you remember the week before we moved to Darrowbridge? Dad came back late with a black eye. He said he’d been mugged and had put up a fight. I think he’d confronted Xander Bullen.’

  Xander Bullen. Tess reached for the bottle and filled her glass. ‘Do you want some?’

  ‘Oh, go on then,’ Anna said. ‘Can you finish the salad?’

  ‘No, that was lovely.’

  ‘The thing is,’ Anna said, ‘I know you always liked Xander but… I’ve never told you this before… Xander told me once that… He didn’t actually tell me but he implied that he and Mum were very close. I think that’s why Dad moved us all to Somerset. He knew they were having an affair.’

  It was too much to take in. The full enormity of Anna’s conclusions hit Tess like a tidal wave. She sat, aware some response was expected. All she could manage was to mutter feebly that she thought Anna was wrong. She reached for her wine and hoped it would dull her sensibilities before the tidal wave submerged her.

  Anna was the first to arrive which pleased Freya. It was ridiculous to sulk about ill-timed remarks she’d made nearly a month ago. Ill-timed remarks were part of Anna, and a good mother should embrace the bad along with the good. Far better to forget past unpleasantness and concentrate on the here and now. She couldn’t wait to tell the girls her news.

  ‘Anna,’ she said, ‘how lovely to see you. I’ve ordered wine and olives.’

  ‘Great,’ Anna said, taking off her leather jacket to reveal a low-cut black top that Freya would have coveted even five years ago. ‘It’s good to be here.’

  ‘Rory promised me we’d love this place. To be exact, his words were, “cheap but good”. I told him that was my sort of restaurant!’

  The waiter arrived with her order and invited Freya to try the wine which she assured him was unnecessary. Now Anna was here, she couldn’t wait for Tess to arrive. What would they say? What would they think?

  Anna reached for an olive. ‘Do you remember Xander Bullen?’

  ‘Of course I do! He’s got a gardening book out. Did you know that?’

  ‘A friend of Olivia works for a TV production company. He and his boss are going to see him on Friday. They want to give him his own gardening programme.’

  ‘Do they? How extraordinary. But of course he’ll be perfect for television. He’s so good-looking and he has such charm. I’m glad he’s doing well.’

  Anna reached for her glass and took a gulp. ‘You were very mysterious on the phone. You said you had some news.’

  ‘I do but I’ll tell you when Tess comes.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I meant to tell you. She sends her love. She can’t make it. She’s meeting someone.’

  ‘Really? Do you know who the someone is?’

  Anna gave Freya one of those appraising glances that had accompanied most of her teenage years. ‘Mum,’ she said, ‘you do know she’s in love with Jamie Lockhart?’

  Freya shook her head. ‘No,’ she said, ‘she isn’t. I asked Tess most particularly about him. She assured me she had no feelings for him.’

  ‘I can see why you’d want to believe that.’

  This was what always happened when she and Anna were alone together. Why had she thought it would be different this time? Anna would make some gnomic utterance designed to make her feel smaller than an atom and so on it would go. Freya pressed her hands tightly together. ‘I think that’s a little unfair. You weren’t at the party in Kensington. Tess had no idea Jamie would be there. I could see he was keen on her but she looked rather irritated to see him.’

  ‘I imagine she felt a little uncomfortable given that you were standing next to her. She spent the whole summer getting to know him. Then you meet his father and in a matter of minutes you fall into his arms. Last week Tess told Jamie she couldn’t see him again. She said it wasn’t fair on Dad.’

  ‘I don’t see what your father has to do with any of this.’

  ‘Well, funnily enough, he’s not too keen on the Lockhart family.’

  ‘I see.’ Freya took a sip of her wine and then folded her arms. ‘And of course this is my fault. Can I just remind you that it’s your father who wants a divorce? Felix has no right to have any thoughts about the Lockharts. He made it very clear he didn’t give a damn what I did with my life as long as he wasn’t involved in it.’

  ‘Dad’s always loved you. I’m pretty sure he still does. I think he’s spent fourteen years trying to cope with what happened and in the end he just couldn’t.’

  ‘Anna,’ Freya said, ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Xander Bullen,’ Anna said. ‘I’m talking about Xander Bullen.’

  Freya stared at her daughter. ‘What does Xander have to do with this?’

  ‘Mum,’ Anna said, ‘Xander told me.’

  ‘Xander told you? Xander told you what?’

  ‘He told me you loved each other. And I think he told Dad. I think that’s why Dad came home with a black eye the week before we moved. I’ve always known that Xander was the reason we moved to Darrowbridge. Dad wanted to get you away from him. So we had to leave Wimbledon.’

  For a few moments Freya sat staring blankly at Anna, trying to work out what she was saying. It was crazy, it was incomprehensible, but what was important was that Anna was convinced of its truth and in fact there was a horrible twisted logic to it. Freya shook her head, too stunned to refute any of it. Even if she tried, Anna wouldn’t believe her. ‘So I�
�m the villain in all this,’ she said. ‘How you must hate me.’

  ‘Mum, of course I don’t hate you. I’m simply trying to work out why Dad, of all people, would want to break up his marriage.’

  ‘If you knew how hard I have tried, year in, year out, to be calm and understanding and make excuses for your moods and your nasty little barbs and your cold, polite phone calls and all the time you felt these things and you never said. Why didn’t you say anything?’

  ‘I don’t know… I should have done… I wasn’t sure and…’

  ‘I’ll tell you what I think. I think you didn’t want to find out you might be wrong. I think it suited you very well to make me responsible for everything wrong in your life. You’re a very good hater, Anna. You know that phrase “passive aggression”? It could have been made for you.’

  ‘That’s not fair…’

  ‘You know that it is. I can see it in your face. I am so fed up with being patient and careful with you and with Felix. I’ve had enough, Anna. I don’t care any more. I give up on you both.’ She bit her bottom lip hard and reached down for her bag.

  ‘Mum, what are you doing? You wanted me to talk to you and now when I do talk, you won’t listen. You can’t just walk away every time we disagree.’

  ‘Watch me.’ Freya threw a note down on the table. ‘That’s for the wine. I won’t pay for your meal this time. It’s impossible for the two of us to be alone together. I can’t stay here. I don’t know you, I don’t know my husband, I don’t know anyone.’ She pushed her chair back, stood up and then glared at Anna as she tried to do the same. ‘Sit down! Don’t you dare try to follow me! I have nothing to say to you.’