life.
Amber walks slowly back to the house. Her fingers are as cold as crab sticks and the tip of her nose is frozen. As she puts the key in the front door, another shiver runs through her. It’s as if Mabel’s abductor is standing there now, watching her from the shadows of the trees. She hears a sound like fabric rustling, and turns around quickly, peering into the gloom.
‘Who are you?’ she says. But it’s only the lilac ribbons, flapping in the breeze.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Day Eight without Mabel
Ruby stops at the red lights on the brow of the hill, panting for breath. She’s been cycling around for hours in an attempt to burn off her anger, but it hasn’t worked. Her insides are still bubbling like a witch’s cauldron – eye of jealousy, toe of humiliation … The intensity of her emotion is disturbing; she’s never experienced anything like it before.
The lights change to green and she sets off again, finding it hard to concentrate on the road. Her head is crowded with sickening images: Lewis and Amber’s naked bodies entwined in a mocking embrace; having hot, steamy sex in her bed, up against the wardrobe, on the sitting room rug, under the shower, sprawled over the kitchen table …
Her vision blurs with tears. This is no good. She needs to slow down and pay attention to the traffic before she has an accident.
Just as the images repeat, so do the internal arguments. It makes no difference to her that the pair of them were wasted, or that Amber allegedly threw herself at Lewis. She doesn’t buy the excuse that his sexual hardwiring entangled him and he was too weak to break free. The man’s a grown-up, in his thirties. It wasn’t as if he was drugged and raped; he was a willing participant.
She cycles on. Her leg muscles ache with effort, yet she can’t stop. He must have been attracted to her, she thinks – surprising because she and Amber are physically so unalike – although knowing Lewis, it was probably the violation of a taboo that really got him fired up. And he would have seen it as a way of getting one over on George, whom he despises. It’s true, her brother-in-law is a bit of a tosser, but he didn’t deserve that kind of treatment.
As for what was going on in Amber’s head … Ruby just doesn’t understand. It’s so out of character. Her sister is conventional to the point of dull, and a dedicated law-abider with high moral values. She’s usually the first to throw the stone of disapproval at people who cheat on their partners. What’s more, she’s been besotted with George since she was a teenager and has never shown the slightest interest in anyone else. She couldn’t wait to get married and be Mrs Walker. Ruby always assumed that George was Amber’s one and only love, but clearly that’s not true. Maybe she’s been putting it about for years. Ruby would be the first to say that she and Amber aren’t close, but now she realises she doesn’t know her sister at all. She might as well be a stranger. That discovery in itself makes her feel very alone.
The lack of care and love that’s been shown to her – by both of them – is shocking. And the fact that sweet, beautiful Mabel is the product of such a disgustingly selfish act twists the knife in deep.
As Ruby weaves in and out of the light Sunday-morning traffic, she starts to feel panicky. No wonder the police suspect her – casting her in the role of betrayed lover and vengeful sister. Now it makes sense. What if Mabel was killed? If they find her body, Ruby’s DNA will be all over it. She had the opportunity and the motive – she could be convicted of murder. She starts to shake and the bike wobbles, almost sending her into a parked car. She pulls up sharply and stands for a few moments with one foot on the kerb, breathless and furious and scared.
To her surprise, her surroundings look familiar. She thought she was cycling with no sense of a destination, taking random turns, even going round in circles. But now she sees – like a homing pigeon – that she’s been gradually heading towards Mum’s place, the house where she grew up. Has she ridden here by instinct, looking for refuge and comfort, a shoulder to cry on? It seems unlikely. Normally Ruby would