Meet Me at Beachcomber Bay

by Jill Mansell

  Belle said, ‘It goes both ways. She’s been responsible for her fair share.’

  ‘Like the time I tried to throw an empty Coke can over that tree in our garden and I didn’t know you were sunbathing on the other side.’ As Clemency said it, Meryl emerged from the stockroom behind the newsagent’s shop.

  ‘I was lying there minding my own business,’ Belle told Verity, ‘listening to music on my iPod, when a Coke can landed on my forehead.’

  ‘An empty Coke can.’ Clemency shrugged. ‘I’m not a monster.’

  ‘It still left a bump and a bruise. And I had a date that night with Miles Mason-Carter.’ Belle sighed at the memory. ‘He kept calling me Rhino.’

  Amused, Meryl rested a hand on Verity’s shoulder. ‘You did something like that too, remember? The time you tripped over Malcolm, lost your balance and ended up jabbing your stiletto into David’s foot? Three days before his triathlon!’

  ‘Oh God, don’t remind me.’ Verity cringed. ‘He wasn’t happy.’

  ‘You can hardly blame him. All those months of training, only to end up with a cracked metatarsal and his foot in plaster.’

  ‘Who’s David?’ said Belle.

  Meryl reached over to pinch a cherry tomato from the salad bowl. ‘Oh, David was Verity’s husband.’

  Husband. Belle looked at Verity. ‘I didn’t know you’d been married.’

  Verity shrugged. ‘We’re divorced now.’

  ‘He was a lovely man,’ said Meryl.

  ‘And who was Malcolm?’ Clemency chimed in. ‘The one you tripped over?’

  ‘Are you picturing some old drunk guy passed out on the ground?’ Verity laughed. ‘Malcolm was our bulldog. He was lovely too.’

  ‘OK, I need to get over to Castle Street for my viewing. That was fantastic.’ Swallowing her last mouthful of frittata, Clemency patted Verity’s tanned shoulder. ‘Thanks for letting me gatecrash your lunch. And for the first aid.’

  ‘My pleasure.’ Verity smiled up at her. ‘You’re welcome any time.’

  Clemency gave Belle a playful nudge. ‘Who knows? Keep up all this exercise and you could find yourself doing a triathlon next.’

  Irritated, because this was a prime example of Clemency having a dig and trying to make fun of her in front of other people, Belle replied, ‘Maybe I will.’

  ‘Seriously, though, it’s doing her the world of good.’ Clemency turned to Verity and Meryl. ‘Belle’s always had these mad fads and they never last. I know she’s doing this to impress Sam, but she wouldn’t have stuck to it if it hadn’t been for you. It makes such a difference, doesn’t it, having someone to run with. So much easier than going out on your own.’ She paused. ‘In fact, what time do you two go for your morning jog? Maybe I’ll join you.’

  Oh for crying out loud …

  Belle bit her tongue, because this was another annoying habit of Clemency’s: blithely inviting herself along to anything that took her fancy, regardless of whether or not she was wanted.

  Verity, obliged unlike some people to be polite, said, ‘Of course you can join us. The more the merrier. That’d be great!’

  Which meant they were now beaming at each other as if it were all arranged. Seriously, this was so unfair. Squaring her shoulders and out-beaming both of them, Belle said to Clemency, ‘I’m warning you now, though, we run pretty fast. You probably won’t be able to keep up.’

  Chapter 28

  On Kate’s daily delivery round, there were always some people she didn’t particularly enjoy spending time with. When Joseph Miller opened the front door to take delighted delivery of his latest eBay purchase, he invariably managed to spray her with a mixture of toast crumbs and saliva. There was angry Mr Arundel, who always wanted to engage her in furious political debate. And poor lonely Mrs Barker, who owned at least twenty cats and whose lime-green bungalow smelt so strongly of cat wee and fish it made Kate’s eyes water.

  At the other end of the scale were her favourites. Old Bill Berenson, for example, who owned two adorable King Charles spaniels and every morning offered her a chocolate digestive. The Trainer family, whose three-year-old twins loved to wave to her from the living-room window as excitedly as if she were Father Christmas. And Georgina Harman, a now-retired opera singer who still liked to sing to herself as she dusted and polished the many china ornaments in her tiny whitewashed cottage on Hobbler’s Lane. Now in her seventies, she was chatty and friendly, and wore fabulous hand-painted silk kaftans. The sound of her singing and the sight of her round smiling face always made Kate’s day.

  Except she wouldn’t be seeing her this morning, because Georgina had told her yesterday that she’d be setting off early to catch the train up to Cheltenham, where she was booked to sing at a wedding.

  Now, turning into Hobbler’s Lane, Kate dug into her bag for the next handful of post to be popped through letter boxes. There was nothing exciting for Georgina, just a bank statement and a couple of circulars. Reaching the white-walled cottage, she paused to tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear and—

  What was that?

  Kate froze, one hand on the fractionally opened letter box. After several seconds she heard it again, the sound of footsteps on parquet flooring.

  But these were shoe-wearing footsteps, and Georgina never wore shoes inside her house, only ballet slippers.

  Kate hesitated. Unless she was all dressed up for the wedding and about to leave for Cheltenham.

  She rang the doorbell. Nothing.

  ‘Georgina,’ she called through the letter box. ‘Is that you?’

  Moments later she heard the creak of a floorboard on the staircase. OK, whoever was in there was heading upstairs. And it certainly wasn’t Georgina. Stuffing the post back into her bag, Kate reached into her shirt pocket for her phone. As she looked up, she glimpsed an unfamiliar face at the bedroom window before it ducked out of sight.

  Then came the sound of faster footsteps, followed by a noise at the side of the cottage. Kate raced round just as a downstairs side window was flung open.

  ‘Stay where you are!’ she yelled. ‘I’ve called the police and they’re on their way!’

  The boy had a scarf wrapped around the lower half of his face. He launched himself out of the window and tried to push past her in the narrow passage between the high fence and the outside of the cottage. Kate stood her ground, shoved him back and ripped the scarf from his face.

  ‘Fuck off, bitch.’ The boy was younger than her, probably only twenty, and he spat the words with venom. Luckily, she was used to being sprayed with saliva by Joseph Miller. She grabbed hold of the boy’s jacket and grappled with him, refusing to let go whilst he twisted like an eel. Oh God, where were the police? Why hadn’t they turned up yet? Belatedly she remembered she hadn’t called them, and there was no one else in sight.

  She took a deep breath and yelled at the top of her voice, ‘HELP, HELP! CALL NINE NINE NINE, I NEED THE POLICE— OWWW …’

  ‘You stupid bitch.’ The boy snarled like an animal, slamming her hard against the wall and attempting to prise her fingers off his jacket. ‘Will you stop doing that and just fucking let go?’

  Ronan had just left a valuation in South Street and was making his way back on foot to the office when he heard the shouts for help. Torn between calling 999 and racing in the direction of the voice, he met the gaze of an elderly white-haired woman deadheading roses in her front garden.

  ‘I’ll call the police.’ Like an undercover agent, the woman threw down her secateurs and whipped a mobile phone out of her bra. ‘You go.’

  As he ran down South Street, turning right at the bottom into Hobbler’s Lane, Ronan wondered if the voice he’d heard did in fact belong to someone he knew, because the thud in his chest was telling him he definitely recognised it.

  Moments later, as he rounded the bend in the lane, he saw a dirty white van accelerating away in a cloud of dust and heard the same voice say furiously, ‘Oh you evil bastard.’

  It was her, it was Kate, sprawled
on the ground in her uniform with her hair dishevelled and her delivery bag lying nearby. Her shirt sleeve was torn, her shorts were dusty and her tanned knees were grazed. She was clutching a handful of jewellery in one hand.

  ‘Jesus, what happened? Stay still,’ Ronan instructed. ‘Are you hurt?’

  Please don’t let her be hurt.

  Kate was practically vibrating with anger and a surfeit of adrenalin. ‘He’d broken into the house. I heard him inside and told him I’d called the police. Which was completely stupid of me, because I should have just gone ahead and done it. So he jumped out of the window and tried to run off, which meant I had to stop him.’ She paused, still catching her breath, and turned her head experimentally from side to side. ‘I did my best, it felt like we were fighting for ages, but he got away in the end. Dammit.’

  ‘Did he hurt you?’ repeated Ronan, because she’d been too outraged to reply.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are you sure? You just said you were fighting for ages.’

  ‘I’m fine. I got this off him.’ She held up the gold jewellery. ‘It was in his pocket, little toad. Oh look …’ Sitting up and studying the tangle of bracelets and chains more closely, she paused at an open heart-shaped locket containing two photos, one on each side. ‘How gorgeous is this? It must be Georgina when she was young.’ Her finger moved to the second photograph. ‘Gosh, does he look familiar to you? He’s like a young Luciano Pavarotti.’

  The police arrived within minutes, and Ronan marvelled at Kate’s powers of recall. Fury had given way to calm as she related the story of how she had realised a burglary was in progress and attempted to prevent the burglar’s escape.

  ‘Five foot ten, skinny build, grey eyes, short fair hair, scar across his right eyebrow and a mole on his left cheek. Oh, and he had a tattoo that said NAN on his wrist. Really badly done, though. Actually, if you give me a piece of paper, I’ll draw him for you.’

  Within a few minutes, in the back of the police car, she’d borrowed the officer’s notebook and sketched the face of the young burglar. As an afterthought, she wrote down the make, colour and registration number of the van in which he’d escaped.

  ‘Blimey.’ The police officer was equally impressed. ‘Our job would be a whole lot easier if there were more people like you. Is that definitely the registration?’

  ‘Of course it is,’ said Kate. ‘Otherwise I wouldn’t have written it down.’

  The SOCOs had by this time arrived to check out the house and were currently dusting the window frame for prints. The police officer finished taking down Kate’s witness statement and contact details. He said, ‘I think we ought to get you checked out at the hospital, let them give you a quick once-over.’

  ‘Oh there’s no need,’ Kate protested, but the officer was firm. ‘Just to be on the safe side. We can take you over there ourselves, or …’

  ‘Can I do it?’ said Ronan, because the officer had glanced across at him. ‘Take her, I mean. Not give her a once-over.’ Damn, it was happening again; why did he always blurt out stupid things when he was with Kate? He shook his head. ‘I can drive her to the hospital and make sure she’s seen by the medics.’

  ‘That would be really helpful.’ The police officer was clearly relieved to be spared another task.

  ‘What about work?’ Kate looked worried.

  ‘No appointments this afternoon.’ Ronan smiled at her. ‘I’m free.’

  When they arrived at A&E, the triage nurse on duty recognised Ronan from his previous visit.

  ‘Hello! How are you? What are you doing back here again?’

  ‘I’m good. It’s not me this time.’ He indicated Kate beside him, and the nurse said, ‘Oh, is this your girlfriend?’

  ‘No,’ Kate said hastily. ‘We’re just … friends.’ She blushed and fiddled with her hair. ‘Nothing else. He gave me a lift here, that’s all.’

  ‘Oh, I see. Whoops, my mistake.’ The nurse pulled a comical face. ‘That’s how rumours get started!’

  Another nurse, who’d been washing her hands at the sink just outside their cubicle, popped her head around the curtain. ‘Marjorie, remember Lizzie Billingham? Married to Baz Billingham, moved over to Spain a few years back? Had a daughter called Clemency? Well, Clemency is Ronan’s girlfriend. They work together at Barton and Byrne, the estate agency in St Carys.’

  ‘Oh, right! I remember Clemency. Lovely girl,’ exclaimed the triage nurse. ‘Sorry I got it wrong, but that’s so nice to hear. Well done!’

  The other nurse said, ‘The last time I saw Clemency, she hadn’t had a boyfriend for ages, so we were all thrilled when we heard you two were a couple.’ She beamed at Ronan. ‘I can really see you being perfect together. Clemency’s great!’

  Which left Ronan with no alternative other than to say, ‘I know.’

  By some miracle, they’d arrived during a quiet period. Within an hour Kate had been seen by a doctor, checked over and given the all-clear. Her shoulder was a bit sore, but no serious damage had been done.

  ‘Except next time,’ the doctor told her, ‘maybe call the police first and leave the apprehending to them.’

  ‘That doctor was right, you know,’ said Ronan as he drove her back to St Carys. ‘It was a crazy thing to do. What if he’d had a knife? You could have been seriously hurt.’ Each time he thought of it, the possibilities seemed more horrendous. ‘You could have been killed.’

  ‘But he didn’t,’ Kate said easily, ‘and I’m fine.’

  ‘Luckily for you.’

  ‘Ah well, if we stopped to think about things before we did them, the chances are we’d never do anything. Sometimes you just have to act on instinct and go for it …’ Her voice faltered and trailed away as they both realised that whilst she’d been talking about the burglary, it could equally well apply to last year’s ill-fated one-night stand. Hastily Kate said, ‘Anyway, let’s hope the police catch him. What’s the time now? OK, when we get to St Carys, could you drop me back at work? I need to make up for offloading the rest of my round. And then I’ll have a quiet night. How about you, are you and Clemency doing something nice this evening?’ She flushed. ‘I mean, going out anywhere special?’

  He was seeing Marina at six o’clock. Ronan wished with all his heart that he could confide in Kate that he was meeting up with his biological mother so they could discuss how he might most painlessly break the news to Josephine.

  He wished it almost as much as he longed to tell Kate there was nothing going on between him and Clemency. He’d been yearning to confide in her since before today’s chance encounter, if he was being honest, simply because he knew she would understand.

  But he mustn’t, he just mustn’t. And why would Kate be even remotely interested anyway? It was nothing to do with her.

  They were approaching St Carys now. Ronan said, ‘Nothing exciting. No plans at all.’

  At that moment the traffic lights ahead changed to red and his phone pinged to announce the arrival of a text. Having stopped the car and glanced at it, Ronan said drily, ‘Up until now,’ and indicated that Kate was free to read the message on the screen.

  Aaaargh, Belle’s just invited us over for dinner at 8 p.m. and I said yes. She’s cooking! Sorry!!

  Kate looked over at him. ‘Looks like you have a plan now. Why’s Clem saying sorry?’

  Ronan smiled slightly. ‘From what I hear, Belle can’t cook.’

  Chapter 29

  The scallops had been overcooked, the garlic burnt and the bacon had tasted weirdly of treacle. And that was just the starter.

  There was now a lot of crashing and clattering going on in the kitchen. Clemency called out, ‘Everything OK in there?’

  ‘Everything’s fine.’ There was a note of suppressed hysteria in Belle’s voice. ‘It’s all completely under control.’

  Clannnggggg went something metallic as it hit the sink.

  ‘Are you sure? If you need a hand, just say.’

  ‘I don’t need a hand, thank you!’

&
nbsp; Clemency couldn’t help feeling sorry for Belle, but a tiny part of her was also quite enjoying the fact that the evening was turning out to be harder work than her sister had envisaged. They were Belle’s guinea pigs, she now realised. Yesterday, having watched a Channel 4 documentary about perfect wives living enviable lives and throwing flawless dinner parties, Belle had promptly decided this was something she needed to be able to do. Or at least to say she’d done.

  Because they might not be married yet, but she was desperate for Sam to know what an accomplished and impressive wife she would make, when the time arrived.

  The table was set beautifully, with silver and fine white china, matching crystal glasses and an actual linen tablecloth.

  Clemency had already spilt a couple of drops of red wine on it – would she ever learn? – but her side plate was now covering them up.

  ‘Oh for crying out loud.’ They heard Belle let out a muffled shriek as something ceramic, possibly a small saucepan, clattered to the marble floor.

  ‘Please don’t think it was my idea. I promise you, I didn’t ask her to do this.’ Sam refilled their glasses. ‘I didn’t want her to do this. And I’d have been happy to share the cooking, but she was determined to do it all herself.’

  The main course was taking ages to appear. Luckily Sam and Ronan got on well and found it easy to chat to each other. Clemency, watching them together, wondered if she should have invented some plausible reason why she and Ronan couldn’t make it tonight. But the truth was, she found it almost impossible to turn down any opportunity to see Sam. Just being able to look at his face, hear his voice and reach out and touch him was like a drug she couldn’t resist.

  OK, reaching out and touching him wasn’t actually on the cards, but she was still allowed to imagine it.

  Even if it did make the whole impossible situation that much harder to bear.

  ‘Right!’ The kitchen door burst open and Belle appeared, carrying two dinner plates and with her previously immaculate topknot now leaning precariously to one side. ‘Sorry about the delay. Here we are … no, sit down,’ she shouted as Clemency jumped up to help her carry everything through. ‘I want you all to relax and enjoy yourselves.’