to the husband who deserved it. The words of the text flash in her mind and it hits her again, hard, that he doesn’t.
‘It’s funny,’ she says, watching his reaction carefully, ‘but this time yesterday, I was so excited about this project.’
His brow furrows. ‘And now?’
‘Now, I don’t feel like I want to do it.’
‘But what’s changed in that time?’
Everything, she wants to say. ‘Nothing,’ she says instead. ‘I just don’t want to do it.’
Nathan sits back in his chair and laughs. ‘Well, it’s a bit late to change your mind.’
‘Is it?’ she asks, tilting her head to one side. ‘What if I wanted to pull out?’
He runs a hand through his hair. ‘Well, you can’t . . . we’ve exchanged. We’d lose the hundred grand deposit.’
‘But losing one hundred thousand would surely be better than losing a million?’ she says.
He picks up her hand and holds it to his lips. Any notion of his mistress being in the room evaporates. ‘I understand why you’re nervous, it’s only natural, but it will be okay.’
‘I just don’t know if it’s the right thing to do,’ says Alice. ‘I don’t know if I’m prepared to risk AT’s money . . . Tom’s money.’ She thought she’d throw that one in there, just to remind Nathan whose money they were playing with. She doesn’t care if it makes him flinch a little. And ironically, she no longer cares what Tom may or may not think about what she’s doing. He’d lost that right.
‘We can’t back out now,’ says Nathan. ‘We’re too far in.’
Alice reclaims her hand. ‘But there’s not really a “we” in it, is there? This is all on my shoulders. It’s my money, my reputation and my responsibility if it all goes wrong.’
‘But it won’t,’ says Nathan. ‘This is going to be the best thing that’s ever happened to us and I’m going to be with you every step of the way.’
She smiles sweetly, but she doesn’t believe a word he says anymore.
35
‘Is Nathan not with you?’ asks Alice’s mum, Linda, as she greets her at her own front door with a hug.
‘No, he took the train straight to the office from the airport,’ says Alice. Not because that’s where she believes he is, but because that’s where he told her he was going. ‘How have the girls been?’
‘Livvy has been a dream.’
‘And Sophia?’
Linda rolls her eyes. ‘Like you were twenty years ago,’ she says.
Alice smiles, but she can’t help but think that actually, she and Sophia are nothing alike. Whilst Alice went through her teens as a troublesome bundle of hormones, not yet privy to knowing she’d grow out of it, Sophia is in a whole other world of hurt. In a place where sometimes Alice can’t reach her.
But who can blame her? She’s endured the horror of having her father walk out one morning and never come back, and for someone so young, it’s no surprise that those feelings of abandonment and paranoia are still so near to the surface. Scratch at Alice just a few weeks ago, and you would have found the same emotions, but she’s not sure they’d be there now.
‘I’d rather six Olivias than one surly teenager,’ says Linda. ‘But Sophia has been through a lot. She’s a good girl – she just needs a bit of time to find her place in the world.’
‘I know,’ says Alice, but she can’t help but wonder if there was any more she could have, should have done.
‘Just be honest,’ her mother had said, when they were told it was no longer viable for Tom to be found alive. ‘It’s all that you can do.’
Alice hadn’t had a minute to process her own grief, yet she was expected to impart the worst possible news to her seven-year-old daughter.
‘Would you like me to do it?’ her mother had asked gently, as the three of them huddled on the sofa together.
Alice had shaken her head, but a pool of nausea swirled in her stomach.
‘Sophia, I’ve got something to tell you,’ she’d said, her trembling hands holding her daughter’s.
‘Is Daddy coming home today?’ Sophia had squealed in delight, as she sat bouncing up and down excitedly.
Alice shook her head as her eyes filled with tears.
‘Shall we make some cookies?’ Sophia had asked, oblivious. ‘To give to him, when he gets here.’
Alice had pulled her close and breathed her in, squeezing her eyes shut and wishing with all her might that they could rewind a week, to a time when their worlds