The Spark - Jules Wake Page 0,122

and I did feel sorry that Mum had missed out on that.

I wasn’t sure how I was going to broach it with her that I’d been to see Dad and had accepted Alicia and the boys into my life. I realised that I needed to reassure her that despite everything that had happened, I loved her and she was my mum. Spending a little more time with her was definitely one way of moving forward. Hopefully lunch with Douglas was the start of something for her. I really hoped so.

I also realised that I had to do something about Victoria. Spending the time with Dad and Alicia had further helped me realise that I wasn’t responsible for her unhappiness and that she had to take responsibility for her own grief, and not blame me. Today I was going into battle, and although I’d dressed to impress, that was only for one particular person. Everyone else could think what they liked.

Slowly I took the stairs up to the first floor of the cricket club, to the bar area, girding my loins and every other bit of me. Sam’s team were out on the pitch at the moment, but I knew that they had to come in for tea at some stage. I could wait, but it was Victoria I wanted to see first.

It didn’t take me long to spot her. She was dressed in a navy spotted coat dress with a flowing skirt and matching navy heels; the ensemble would have taken her straight into one of the Queen’s garden parties. She was holding court with a couple of other girls, some of whom I recognised from the pub that night, and photos. I think she caught sight of me quite early but she didn’t let on for a moment, and then milked it for all she was worth. Like some 1940s starlet, she suddenly looked up and gripped her throat.

Everything about her seemed so fake and artificial, but I knew she must be hurting, and this was a confrontation I didn’t relish.

‘I don’t believe it.’ Her clear, cultured tones carried to where I stood. ‘Just look what the cat dragged in.’

I smiled even though inside I didn’t feel the least bit like smiling. I was here to deliver some cold hard truths, and it looked as if I was going to have to do it front of an audience, which seemed even worse.

‘Hello, Victoria,’ I said, nodding at the other girls with a friendly smile. I wasn’t here to make enemies or trouble. ‘Do you think we could have a word?’

Although her smile was patronising, I did catch a glimpse of unease in her eyes. ‘You want to talk to me?’

Beneath the bravado there was a touch of anxiety and I realised that perhaps she wasn’t as tough as she liked to appear.

‘Yes.’

‘I can’t imagine what you have to say to me.’

I glanced at the other women avidly watching. ‘I’d rather do it in private.’

With a toss of her long brown hair she laughed. ‘I have no secrets.’

‘I do. One of which you put out there. Where I work. Have you any idea the damage you could have done?’

‘You do know that my vlog has been taken down.’

‘Good,’ I said. Holly had texted me on my first day away to say that George’s shit-hot lawyer had managed to get it removed, and as no one had identified the house in the comments, the fuss had died down. My job, thankfully, was still mine.

‘I don’t know what the fuss was about, but somebody’s lawyers got very aggressive.’ She eyed me suspiciously. ‘I’ll find out what you’re up to.’

‘It’s not my secret,’ I said levelly, biting back my fury at her shallow curiosity, pricked by sheer vanity. She was used to being Queen Bee and knowing what she wanted to know. I looked deliberately at Victoria’s gang. ‘I work in a women’s refuge,’ I paused, letting the words sink in, ‘helping women who have nowhere else to go when their partners have turned on them.’ Raising my voice, I met the gaze of each of them as I carefully enunciated each word. ‘Women who turn up in their slippers, in their nightwear, usually with nothing but their tired, frightened children.’ Turning back to Victoria I saw that she was listening with horrified fascination. ‘Women with broken hands, black eyes and nothing to their names.’ I paused again to allow them to absorb the full horror of what these women had been through.