by Dani Atkins
‘Are you a member of the gym on Barrack Road?’ I asked, all on a rush.
‘I am,’ he answered, leaning back against the wall of the carriage, still clearly believing he was being flirted with.
‘I see,’ I said falteringly. I took a deep breath and just decided to go for it. I held out my hand – might as well make the formal British thing a total cliché. ‘I’m “The Bride”.’
He looked momentarily confused, before placing his own huge hand in mine and shaking it warmly. ‘And I’m the groom?’ he said hesitantly, as though we were playing some sort of intriguing word association dating game.
I shook my head. ‘No. I’m “The Bride”. As in, I’m Darrell’s fiancée. I believe you left something for me on my car?’
The smile was growing weaker. Well, I suppose that wasn’t unexpected. He had the look of a man who has just realised the woman he’s stuck in a small metal box with might possibly not be in full possession of her marbles.
‘I’m sorry, love. I’m not getting you.’
‘Darrell Kingston. Flat 5b. We’re getting married in two weeks.’
His smile was practically non-existent and unsure now. ‘Er… congratulations?’ he said, hoping he’d somehow plucked the right response. He hadn’t.
‘Darrell. Tall. Chestnut-coloured hair. Fairly well-built. He goes to the Barrack Street gym.’
‘It’s a good gym,’ my Antipodean companion agreed.
‘You and Darrell are friends? You hang out together at the gym?’
The man was shaking his head and looked immensely grateful when the lift pinged softly to announce we were now at ground level.
‘I’m sorry, love. I don’t know anyone called Darrell.’
He must have seen the confusion, doubt and God only knows what else on my face, for he added consolingly: ‘But I’m sure he’s a great guy.’
Only a short while ago it would have been very easy to agree with him on that one. Now I wasn’t so sure.
Clearly anxious to make his getaway – and who could blame him – my Australian lift companion strode into the underground car park. He pulled his car keys from the pocket of his shorts, which probably triggered his next question.
‘What else was that you asked? Something about leaving something on your boyfriend’s car?’
I shook my head sadly. ‘No. Not his car. My car. But don’t worry. I must have been mistaken.’
*
‘You’ve travelled a fair bit, haven’t you?’
Paul dropped a cluster of manila envelopes into a wire tray, and neatly manoeuvred his mail cart into a gap beside my desk. I’d been back at work for just fifteen minutes, and I’d spent most of those waiting for the eleven o’clock postal collection. There were at least half a dozen phone messages, scribbled on Post-it notes, decorating my computer screen like misshapen bunting at a fete. I should have peeled them off, turned on my computer and at least pretended to be working, but I was still processing everything I’d discovered in the five hours since I’d been woken up by Darrell’s hidden mobile.
‘I suppose you could say that,’ Paul answered, giving a slow, lazy grin that made his single status a complete mystery. ‘Why? Are you in need of travel advice? Where is it you’re going for your honeymoon, anyway?’
‘I have no idea. It’s a surprise,’ I said, not sounding in the least bit excited. That’s what happens when you’ve accidentally overdosed on mystery and secrets.
‘Oh,’ Paul replied, managing to inject quite a lot of meaning into such a small two-letter word.
‘During your travels, have you ever heard of anyone holding multiple passports for the same country?’
It was easy to see that I’d piqued his interest. He leant back against a filing cabinet, resting one elbow upon it, causing his T-shirt to separate from the waistband of his jeans. At any other time I’m sure that thin sliver of tanned torso would have been a major distraction, but this morning… not so much.
‘Yeah, several people,’ Paul answered easily. He lifted one hand and began counting names on his fingers: ‘Jason Bourne, James Bond, Ethan Hunt—’
‘How about real people?’ I interrupted, storing away his choice of books and films as interesting trivia.
‘Not unless they’re involved in espionage,’ he said, still not realising I was serious. ‘Are they?’
‘Darrell has two UK passports,’ I said flatly. ‘Well, two that I know about. Who knows how many more there are.’
Paul looked momentarily floored. ‘Why?’
‘Good question. I have absolutely no idea.’
‘Well, what did he say when you asked him?’ It was the most logical question in the world, and I felt pretty stupid when I had to admit that, actually, I hadn’t done so yet. ‘There was no time. He was running to catch a plane.’
‘Presumably using one of his many passports,’ said Paul lightly, surprisingly coaxing a smile from me. I really hadn’t expected to find any of this amusing.
‘I guess so. Just ignore me, I’m probably overreacting. It’s just been a weird morning. There’ve been lots of things that haven’t added up.’
‘That has to be an accountant’s worst nightmare,’ he teased, which managed to draw out a second smile. He paused for a moment, looking quietly pleased, before continuing. ‘As far as the passport thing goes, are you absolutely sure your fiancé doesn’t work for the intelligence service?’
I laughed, but there was a brittleness to the sound. ‘I don’t think I’m sure about anything today.’
He nodded slowly, as though carefully considering the best path to walk through a minefield. ‘Have you checked on the internet about owning more than one passport?’
I didn’t actually slap my forehead at my own stupidity, but I certainly felt like doing so. I leant forward to switch on my computer, peeling off the collection of Post-its while I waited for it to fire up. Paul moved to stand behind my chair, placing me in the downdraught of whatever gel or soap he’d used in the executive bathroom. Darrell favoured the type with heavy spice overtones, but Paul smelled of the ocean, conjuring up images of breaking surf and long sandy beaches.
I clicked impatiently on the mouse, suddenly regretting inviting Paul to join in my search for answers. Having him stand this close and feeling his breath fan my hair as he spoke was promoting an inexplicably dangerous reaction within me. Thankfully, he seemed totally oblivious of this.
‘There you go,’ he announced, reading from the screen. ‘It’s called a “concurrent passport” and it’s common among frequent business travellers.’
‘Darrell certainly travels a lot,’ I agreed.
‘Mystery solved then,’ Paul said happily, moving back to his mail cart once more. I wanted to ask him to stay; I wanted to tell him about all the other things that were suddenly bothering me. But it wasn’t his job to be my sounding board, it wasn’t his job to sort out my confusion, or help me figure out why everything suddenly felt as though it was riddled with cracks and could shatter or implode at any moment. None of that was his job. It wasn’t even his job to be my friend and confidant, except I seemed to have appointed him to that role. I wondered if he even knew.
*
‘He looks thin, don’t you think?’
I lifted my head and my eyes followed the retreating figure of my father as he headed for the Gents’ cloakroom.
‘Actually, I think he looks pretty good. He’s lost some weight, but it suits him. He looks really healthy.’
My mother lifted her gin and tonic and took a slow, careful sip. ‘I suppose he told you all about the scare he had last year?’
‘No. What sort of a scare?’ I sat up straighter, instantly alarmed.
My mother rarely made a gaffe. Faux pas didn’t seem to plague her the way they did me. I was forever putting my foot in my mouth. So it was both unusual and unsettling to see her momentarily discomforted.
‘He probably didn’t want to worry you.’
‘Perhaps not, but you’ve just done
that for him,’ I said, sounding genuinely concerned. ‘What kind of scare?’
‘A heart attack,’ she said succinctly. Her lips were tight, as though she was clamping them shut in case they betrayed any further secrets. ‘Only a small one – or so he said.’
I shook my head in disbelief. ‘And you knew about this and never told me?’
She looked shocked at the sharpness in my voice. ‘Of course not. He only told me at lunch yesterday, and now I’m telling you. Full disclosure all round.’
I leant back against the red velvet of the restaurant chair. The surprises kept coming, like repeated blows in a boxing round. ‘You and Dad had lunch yesterday? Without me? Without even telling me?’
Perhaps that came out a little more plaintive and forlorn than it had sounded in my head, for my mother’s eyebrows rose elegantly. ‘You were at work,’ she reasoned. ‘And I thought it best for your father and me to clear the air in private before all the frenzy of the wedding truly begins. Also, I needed to see just how badly I still wanted to kill him.’
She delivered the last without so much as a glimmer of a smile. Some people didn’t ‘get’ her sense of humour. Fortunately, I wasn’t one of them.
‘And did your thoughts turn murderous?’
‘Surprisingly, no, they didn’t.’ She turned to look out of a nearby window, effectively hiding her very expressive eyes from me. ‘He’s changed.’
The object of our discussion pulled out his chair and rejoined the table.
‘Mum said you had a heart attack,’ I accused, jumping straight in before he even had a chance to settle in his seat. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
He gave me an ‘it was nothing’ shrug, and my mother a sharp glare. ‘It was more of a wake-up call than anything major,’ he replied, reaching for his glass of soda water and ice. That was another surprise; apparently, he was no longer drinking. But the biggest shock of all, the one that was still making my head spin like that girl in The Exorcist, was that my parents were doing a very passable impression of an extremely civilised divorced couple.
‘But are you all right now? Are you fully recovered? Do you have to take things easy? Oh God, perhaps I shouldn’t have asked you to come over for the wedding. It’s too much stress.’
‘I’m not stressed,’ he replied calmly, and it was true, he certainly didn’t appear to be. ‘Except perhaps with your mother, who doesn’t know how to keep a secret.’
‘There are more than enough of those flying around as it is,’ I said unthinkingly. ‘We certainly don’t need any more.’
As if they’d practised it, they turned to look at me with perfect synchronicity. I hadn’t been the subject of that degree of combined parental scrutiny for more years than I could remember.
‘Is something wrong?’
‘What’s happened now?’
I wasn’t used to them being on the same page about anything. Hell, I wasn’t used to them even reading the same book, so this felt really weird and unfamiliar. I almost crumbled under the combined weight of their concern. But whatever I said next was going to paint Darrell in an unfavourable light, and their opinion of him was already unfairly discoloured, so this close to the wedding was definitely not the right time to bring it up.
‘Has this got something to do with his deranged ex-girlfriend persecuting you?’ questioned my mother.
I turned to my father, who had dropped his eyes to the menu, as though hoping to escape my anger by losing himself somewhere between the starters and the mains.
‘Now who can’t keep anything to themselves?’ I said, not sure if the situation was better or worse now the cat was well and truly out of the bag.
‘Well, I’m very glad he told me,’ my mother cut in smoothly. ‘Frankly, Suzanne, I’m more than a little disappointed that you didn’t trust me enough to do so yourself.’
‘It wasn’t that,’ I said, feeling guilty in a way I hadn’t done for years, probably not since all those disappointing English exam results. ‘Darrell and I decided that the best course of action was not to react. Whoever is doing this obviously wants to see us upset and irate, and so ignoring it is probably annoying the hell out of them.’
‘And that seems wise to you, does it? Pissing off a potential psychopath? Great plan, if you don’t mind me saying.’
‘It’s easy to see who’s the author with the overactive imagination in this family,’ I said wryly. ‘You went straight from minor prankster to Fatal Attraction bunny-boiler in just one leap.’
‘Your mother is absolutely right,’ said my father, laying down his menu beside his plate. They were words I truly don’t think I’d ever heard – or had expected to hear – from him, and I took a moment to savour them. From the look in my mum’s eyes, so did she.
‘Don’t underestimate the potential seriousness of this. I can’t understand why that fiancé of yours is so bloody calm about the whole thing. If someone was threatening the woman I loved, there’d be hell to pay.’ There was an awkward little moment when he looked across at my mother and their eyes met and held. I blinked in total disbelief as a small flush coloured my mother’s perfectly powdered cheeks.
‘You know, it might not be the worst idea in the world to consider postponing the wedding for a while, just until all this unpleasantness has died down.’
I turned to my father angrily. ‘No one is postponing anything. Everything is booked, the guests are coming, my dress is waiting to be delivered. We are all systems go.’ I took a slow, cleansing breath and softened my tone. ‘I know you’re only saying this because you’re worried about me, but honestly we have everything under control and the wedding is most definitely going ahead. Cancelling isn’t even a consideration.’
There was a long moment of silence, where no one met anyone else’s eyes. I’d thought my role here today would be to act as referee between my two warring parents. What I’d never expected was for them to be suddenly and crazily united in their opposition to the marriage of their only daughter.
Hot tears distorted my vision as I grabbed the menu, totally incapable of reading the rows of blurred and dancing words. ‘I know neither of you particularly like Darrell,’ I said quietly.
We went through the requisite awkward silence, which eventually my mother broke. ‘It’s more that I feel there’s so much about him I still don’t know. Even you have to admit there are aspects about him that are puzzling. Not to mention that it is extremely odd, never having met his family.’
I opened my mouth to explain, yet again, about the estrangement with his parents, but Mum just held up one perfectly manicured hand. ‘Yes, I know. They don’t talk to each other and they won’t be at the wedding. Perhaps if we knew why that was, we might understand it a little better.’
‘I’ve always considered myself a pretty good judge of character – you have to be when you run a bar like mine,’ said my father. ‘You develop an eye for trouble before it even starts; you sniff out the punters who’re going to get lairy and ruin the evening for everyone else. Sometimes you hear more by what someone doesn’t say than what they do.’
My voice was tight as I ran my fingers below my eyes. The lashes felt wet and spiky. ‘I’m afraid this time your senses are all way off the mark, Dad. I’m sorry that neither of you approve of my choice, but that’s what Darrell is: my choice. And now you’re both just going to have to trust me enough to know I’ve made the right one.’
It was five days until our wedding.
6
It was my last morning at work before the wedding, and I was frantically trying to clear all my outstanding jobs so I could go off on honeymoon without worrying. Between tasks I eyed the phone on my desk warily, jumping each time it rang. There’d been calls in the middle of the night on the last three evenings. The kind of calls that when you 1471’d them, all it said was ‘The caller withheld their number’. But of course they had. They’d also withheld from speaking. It made no difference whether I remained silent, or repeatedly asked ‘Who is this?’ into the rece
iver. They never said a word. My landline wasn’t ex-directory. But as soon as we came back from our honeymoon it would be, and the number would be changed.
Darrell had snatched the phone from my hand the last time, swinging his legs out of bed and muttering into the receiver, ‘Catherine?’ The hairs on the back of my neck had risen. He’d never mentioned her name to me. He’d told me she was his past and had no place in our lives; that was the reason he’d never identified her.
‘It’s more likely he doesn’t want you tracking her down on Facebook and confronting her,’ guessed Karen. It was hard to argue with her, especially when she was one hundred per cent right. ‘You know, instead of wasting all your time trying to find Darrell’s parents, you should have been trying to track down his psychotic ex. Then we could go round and… and…’
‘And what?’ I’d asked. ‘Threaten her? Bully her? Intimidate her? Kind of like she’s been doing to me, you mean?’
‘Point taken,’ grumbled Karen. ‘How are you getting on with tracking down his family, then? Have you found anything yet?’
‘Not a damn thing. What started out as a great idea for a surprise wedding gift has so far turned into a wild goose chase. Every lead I follow up is just another dead end, both in the UK and Australia. It’s like they disappeared, or something.’
I knew the line I was crossing by digging into Darrell’s past was smudged and thin, and I was straddling it as cautiously as a nervous tightrope walker in slippery shoes. But I was doing it with the best of intentions. And it was only going to be a short-term secret. Eventually I’d come clean, and he would thank me for doing this. Wouldn’t he?
In my head I could see it so clearly, playing out like a movie on the Lifetime channel. Darrell would arrive at the wedding, and there would be his parents, waiting. He’d be shocked at first, maybe even a little angry. But then someone’s arms would open, and someone else would start crying. And then there’d be apologies and explanations, followed by forgiveness and tears…
Only it didn’t look as if it was going to work out like that. I stared at the picture of Darrell on my desk. What happened between you and your parents? What was so terrible that you don’t even know which country they now live in? Even if by some miracle I did manage to find Darrell’s missing parents, there wasn’t enough time left now to fly them back for the wedding – even assuming they were willing to come.
