Fragile Minds Page 0,74

he’d found his mother-in-law in Lana’s bedroom, so he’d taken the spare. Actually he was glad to avoid sleeping in the room he and his ex-wife had once shared. However relieved he was that they were no longer tearing each other apart, he still found memories of their relationship deeply painful. As they’d stumbled through the divorce process, Silver found it hard to believe that they had once been so close; shared everything from jokes and body fluids to long painful labours and his swift ascent up the career ladder. Somewhere, buried deep, was the knowledge that his job had taken precedence over everything else, that he had sacrificed his wife and marriage for the adrenaline that was chasing down criminals and bringing them to justice. That he started to pour himself ever-larger whiskies each night because of the stress, because that was what he’d learnt from his own father. Lana had followed suit because she had nothing else apart from interminable days alone with three young kids to keep her sane, and a husband who loved those kids but wasn’t interested in hands-on fathering most of the time. Silver held this knowledge inside, and every now and then he would retrieve it momentarily to increase his guilt, before burying it again swiftly.

He’d showered and was about to shave when Anne opened the bathroom door, catching him with only a small towel slung round his waist.

‘Oh, I’m sorry.’ Her neck immediately flushed a deep and mottled red as she slammed the door in her haste to get away. Silver grinned at himself in the mirror. God only knew when Anne had last seen a semi-naked man. He knew he wasn’t a bad specimen for his age; the gym and squash court having replaced the pub and all-night lock-ins he used to indulge in, his old beer-gut replaced by not quite a six-pack, but something a little leaner. He must do something about the bloody stupid tattoo on his shoulder that read Lana though.

Five minutes later, there was a tentative knock at the door.

‘Lana’s on the phone. She wants to talk to you.’

He took the receiver that his mother-in-law thrust round the door, trying not to cover it in the shaving foam that swathed half his face. ‘Where the hell are you?’ he snapped.

‘If you’re going to be rude, Joe, I’ll hang up.’

‘Don’t, please,’ he interjected quickly. ‘Just tell me where you are. Do you want me to come and get you? We’ve been worried sick.’

‘Really,’ she said, but it wasn’t a question.

‘Yes, really.’ He felt his toes curl. No one inspired anger in him more dramatically than his ex-wife. ‘The kids are distraught.’

The kids were sprawled downstairs on the sofa with the Wii, rather less than distraught right now, but she didn’t deserve to hear that. Anne was hovering like a worried poodle in the background, back and forth she went, back and forth.

‘I want to talk,’ Lana said.

‘OK, good.’ He hated ‘talking’ with a passion. ‘Come home, and we can talk as much as you like.’

‘I’m not coming home.’

‘What?’

‘I’ll meet you at the Tea Rooms in Skipton in an hour. On your own. I’m not coming back, not yet.’ She sighed, long and hard. ‘Kiss the kids from me.’

‘Right.’

She’d already hung up.

It took him half an hour to calm Anne down enough to get out of the house. Fortunately Molly was going riding with her best friend Shona so she was distracted, and the boys were playing football that afternoon. He’d hear what Lana had to say and then he’d persuade her home where she belonged. And then he’d go on to see the Malverns.

Within ten minutes of sitting down with his ex-wife, Silver was wondering why he was so daft as to think he’d ever be able to control anything she did, and when he’d ever learn that nothing would ever go to plan when they were together.

Lana had lost weight since he last saw her at Easter, and it didn’t suit her. She’d had such good bone structure, but now her jaw looked thin and overly tense, her neck slightly scrawny, and for the first time ever he could see the older woman she would be in a few years. It shocked him in the way middle age constantly did, sneaking up to surprise him. Her hair was a whiter blonde than normal and it seemed too harsh for her face, which was not as tanned or made-up as usual.

She kept piling sugar into her coffee and