Love And Devotion Part 37

He nodded. 'Felicity knew everything about me. It's why I miss her so much. As Victor Hugo put it so well, the supreme happiness of life is the conviction of being loved for yourself, or more correctly, of being loved of yourself.' He put an arm around Harriet and drew her to him. 'But now I have you.' He kissed her forehead. 'Oh, Hat, it feels good being able to talk to you. Hey, you know what we should do, we should get married. We could bring up Carrie and Joel together. We wouldn't be the best or the most orthodox of parents, but we'd be better than the majority of idiots who attempt it.'

She laughed nervously. It was difficult to know when he was joking sometimes. 'I think you need to go outside and get some fresh air. You're talking crazy now.'

He tilted his head back and looked deep into her eyes. At once his close proximity aroused in Harriet a dangerous mix of emotions - love, hate, admiration, affection, fear, but most of all confusion. She tried to keep her face from betraying her; she couldn't stand for him to know the effect he had on her.

'Actually, I'm being serious,' he said. 'You could come and live in Cambridge. You'd easily get work there.'

'And what kind of marriage would we have?'

'An unconventional one. They're usually the best sort.'

'Mm ... so while you were off having s.e.x with the entire male population of Cambridge, I'd be doing what exactly?'

He grinned. 'I'd leave that to your imagination. You do have one of those, don't you?'

He was mocking her now, and knowing they were back on safer and more familiar ground, she said, 'Believe me, Dominic, there's nothing wrong with my imagination.'

January 'The Mermaid'

A mermaid found a swimming lad,

Picked him for her own,

Pressed her body to his body,

Laughed; and plunging down

Forgot in cruel happiness

That even lovers drown.

W.B. Yeats

Chapter Fifty-Six.

It was New Year's Day, the day of the McKendricks' drinks party. Upstairs the children, having minutes earlier pulled back the curtains, were going crazy with excitement. Overnight, a heavy fall of snow had covered the garden, and as Bob stared out of the kitchen window he could see that not a breath of wind stirred. The sky was leaden with the threat of further snow showers. The weather forecasters had said they were in for a big freeze. Bob filled the kettle and plugged it in, hoping the weather wouldn't delay Harriet's move. Her moving out with the children heralded the start of their lives getting back to normal. Or rather, a life that resembled some kind of unreal normality, for he knew that nothing would ever feel truly normal again. Jennifer had told him that his life had been changed irrevocably and that he had to accept that. But how? How did one go about that? Accepting it seemed a wounding insult to Felicity's memory, as brutal as it had been to witness Carrie and Joel enjoying Christmas without their mother. He could not bring himself to do it. Never. Others were all too willing to consign Felicity to the past - and how he hated them for it - but he would not betray her.

After Harriet had fulfilled her promise to help the children build a snowman and they were thawing out in the kitchen drinking mugs of hot chocolate, she told her father - her mother was resting in bed after a sleepless night - she wanted to sort through some of Felicity's things in the garage. He looked up sharply from polis.h.i.+ng his shoes ready for the McKendricks' party. Knowing that he couldn't handle the idea of any of Felicity's things being thrown away, she said, 'I don't want to move with anything that will just lie around in the attic or garage. I won't have the luxury of s.p.a.ce you have here,' she added reasonably.

'You haven't got much time,' he muttered, glancing at the clock above the fridge. 'We're expected at Harvey and Freda's in two hours.'

'The sooner I get started, the sooner I'll be finished,' she said, and before he could invent another reason why she shouldn't touch Felicity's things, she slipped out of the kitchen.

There was a gas heater in the garage, which her father used on cold days when he was tinkering at his workbench, but given the densely packed state of the place, Harriet thought better of using it. Quite apart from the worry of reducing Felicity's furniture and possessions to a heap of ash, there was her asthma to take into account. The combination of the damp cold, a dusty environment and gas fumes could very likely bring on an attack. Her last attack had been with Will, in his shop; it felt like a long time ago. Reminded of Will and the kindness he'd shown her that afternoon, she then recalled the illogical feeling she'd had during the drive to Kings Melford, when she'd imagined Felicity in the car with her and had a chilling sense that she'd failed her sister.

That day when she and the children had had lunch with Dominic, she'd tried to share this feeling with him, but he hadn't shown the slightest interest. Instead he'd wanted to know more about her and Will. 'You really like him, don't you?' he'd said.

'Yes,' she'd answered, without a second's hesitation. 'Will's a hundred times the man you are, or will ever be.'

'My, but you have it bad for him. Isn't he the lucky one?'

'Lucky is not the word I'd use. His eldest daughter is dead and his world's just ground to a halt.'

He'd looked at her with a bemused expression. 'You're angry. Why?'

'Perhaps I'm tired of the perverse games you play. Like suggesting you and I should get married. It's practically the sickest thing I've ever heard.'

'I think you expect too much of me. But as I've said before, your stubborn one-track brain allows you to see things only in black and white. One day you'll realise there are myriad shades of grey in between.'

Putting Dominic and Will from her thoughts, Harriet got on with the job she'd come out here to do. She regretted not doing it sooner; there was so little time left before the move. She cleared a s.p.a.ce in front of her father's workbench, deciding to create a pile there of anything she didn't want to keep. Her father could then go through it for anything he thought he couldn't live without.

An hour later, knowing she ought to go and change, she opened one last box. It was one she remembered packing herself and it contained a selection of photograph alb.u.ms as well as several bundles of snaps clumsily held together with rubber bands. At the time, she hadn't had the courage to look at any of the photographs; she had simply boxed them up as quickly as she could to get the job done. One of the alb.u.ms had a discoloured photograph stuck on the front of it. Harriet recognised herself in the picture, along with Felicity and Dominic. Why was Miles absent? Then she remembered; he had been behind the camera, taking the photo. They had been walking by the river in Durham. It was a freezing cold day and Miles and his brother had come to stay with them. It was before Jeff had arrived on the scene. Dominic was threatening to pull his trousers down if Miles didn't get a move on and take the picture. How young they looked, Harriet thought as she opened the alb.u.m to revisit those days. Arrogant too, she thought with a wry smile as she turned the pages. We thought we knew it all. How wrong we were.

She turned another page and out fluttered a single photograph; it landed on the dusty floor at her feet. She stooped to pick it up and flipped it over to see the picture, then did a double take. Her initial reaction was to turn it over again, to pretend she'd never seen it. But her eye was drawn to it. Holding her breath, she took in the naked bodies, the absorbed intimacy of the act. It must have been taken using the camera's timer device and it was graphically explicit, yet at the same time wholly erotic. The two people in the photograph were doing nothing she hadn't recently done with Will, yet Harriet could hardly bring herself to look at it. It wasn't what they were doing that chilled her, it was the knowledge that this represented so much more than just an affair. Putting the photograph face down in the palm of her trembling hand, she saw that Felicity had written on the back of it - 'Soul and body have no bounds.' Underneath was a date; it was February of this year.

Harriet felt sick. How could she have been so stupid?

From his sitting-room window, Will watched another carload of guests arriving for the McKendricks' drinks party. An invitation had been slipped through his letterbox, but he'd thrown it in the bin. They couldn't honestly think he'd show up.

He stayed by the window, absently watching the road until a car he recognised appeared and turned cautiously into his drive, which he'd cleared earlier. He'd half expected - half hoped - the snow would have put Maxine off and that she would have phoned to cancel. But she hadn't. She was here. It was too late now for him to wimp out.

He had no idea how his words would be received, but he owed it to Suzie to give it his best shot. He'd decided that if he and Maxine could put the past behind them, the future might not seem so pointless.

He opened the door to Maxine and surprised her with a kiss. She looked startled, as if he'd pinched her. 'What's that for?' she asked.

'Happy New Year,' he said, ignoring her question and offering to take her coat. It was fur. Real fur; the colour of b.u.t.terscotch.

'I'll keep it on for now,' she said with an exaggerated s.h.i.+ver. 'It's freezing.'

Suspecting that the real reason she didn't want to part with her coat was because she had no intention of stopping for long, he said, 'I'll make us some coffee. Fresh coffee,' he added before she refused it on the grounds of never drinking instant.

'I'm not really thirsty,' she said, prowling uneasily round the small kitchen.

'I'll make some anyway.'

He was just filling the cafetiere when Maxine cleared her throat and said, 'Okay, Will, let's make this easier on each other. What was it you wanted to say?'

He stopped what he was doing, took a deep breath, and turned to face her. Courage, he told himself. Besides, what did he have to lose? 'Maxine, I know this is going to be hard for you to believe but I want us to be friends.' His words came out in a nervous rush. Then more slowly, he said, 'I want to feel comfortable around you and I want you to be comfortable around me.' He forced himself to meet her gaze. 'At the very least I want you to feel that you can take your coat off when you're in my house.'

'Why? Why should any of that be important to you?'

'Because the love we once had for each other should still mean something.'

'What if it doesn't?

'Then I'm b.u.g.g.e.red.' He leaned back against the worktop and dragged his hands over his face. 'It might sound crazy, but by being emotionally close to you again I think I'll feel closer to Suzie. To put it bluntly, I'm terrified I won't survive this mess unless you help me.'

'Nothing will bring her back, Will. Don't delude yourself.'

'I'm not. I just know that she was a part of you and me and that by bringing the two of us together - ' But his nerve failed him and he hung his head. Moments pa.s.sed and then: 'Look, Maxine, I'll admit it, I'm desperate, I can't do this alone.'

'You are only talking about being friends, aren't you?' she said more gently. 'You're not suggesting we get back together again?'

He looked up. 'I think that would be a challenge too far, don't you?'

For the first time since she'd arrived, her expression softened. 'You're right. And Steve might have something to say on the matter too.'

'I know I'm repeating myself, but he really is one of the good guys. I envy you having such a supportive partner right now.'

'What about the girl you were seeing? What happened to her?'

'She reached the conclusion that an older man wasn't appropriate.'

'What was the age gap? Gemma implied she wasn't much older than ... Suzie.'

'I think that was Gemma wanting to stir things up. Harriet's thirty-three.'

He watched her mentally do the sums. 'That's not so bad,' she said. 'It's not much more than the gap between Steve and me.' She then shrugged off her coat and put it over the back of a chair. 'Is that offer of coffee still on?'

He swallowed his relief that his plea for help hadn't been met with an outright rejection. 'I've lit a fire in the sitting room; why don't you go and sit down in the warm?'

She did as he said and minutes later, he joined her with the tray of coffee things. He found her standing by the desk where he kept his collection of framed photographs. She was holding one up to the light: it was of Suzie and Gemma as toddlers; all blonde hair and best party frocks. He put the tray down and went and stood next to her. 'I never meant to be such a bad mother,' she murmured.

He put a hand on her shoulder. 'You haven't been a bad mother, Maxine. Don't ever say that about yourself.'

She put the photograph back with the others. 'What I regret most is that she never knew how much I loved her. I never took the time to tell her. I never once showed her what she really meant to me. I ... I was always too busy.

Too busy trying to be the person I thought my father wanted me to be.' Her voice caught in her throat and she put a hand to her mouth.

'Come and sit down,' he said.

'I idolised him, Will,' she said, making no attempt to move. 'But then you always knew that, didn't you?' Her voice was tight with emotion.

He nodded.

'As a child I thought he was better than Superman. I was utterly devoted to him. I wanted to be just like he was; all-powerful and utterly invincible.' Tears filled her eyes. 'I sacrificed everything for him. The silly teenage dreams I'd had for myself. You. And now Suzie. If I hadn't been so obsessed with following in his footsteps, to prove myself to him, Suzie would still be alive. It's all my fault. I know it is.' The tears really flowed now and Will took her gently in his arms. He tried to soothe her but she wouldn't listen, just went on berating herself. With tears filling his own eyes, he let her cry it out.

He'd only ever seen her cry once before, and that was when her father died.

Half an hour into its stride, the McKendricks' sherry fest had looked as though it would be as tedious as it always was. The usual suspects had been circling the buffet table and Harriet had been doing her usual act of trying to appear sociable while totally ignoring everyone.

She'd had no intention of causing such an almighty scene, but when it happened - when Dora and Derek offered to find the children some orange juice in the kitchen, and she found herself alone with Miles and Dominic - the red mist came down and she gave in to it all too readily. By now she'd had sufficient time to figure things out, and was more than ready for a confrontation.

'There's something I want to discuss with you two,' she said. 'Let's go outside where no one will hear us.'

'Harriet, are you quite mad? It's about minus six out there!'

'Dominic, trust me, I'm in no mood to argue with you. Now get outside. You too, Miles. Unless you'd both prefer for your parents to hear what I've got to say.' Her voice had risen and people were staring, but she didn't care. She took hold of Dominic's elbow. 'Move it,' she snapped. 'Now!'

She slammed the front door shut after them. 'Right,' she said. 'I'll start with you, Miles. How long had you been having an affair with my sister before she died? To the nearest month will do.'

Chapter Fifty-Seven.

Miles stared back at her in horror, just as Harriet had expected him to. 'Don't be shy, Miles,' she said. 'After all, it's not the big secret you think it is. Your brother had it all worked out ages ago. Isn't that right, Dominic?'

Dominic looked at her warily, his eyes slightly narrowed, his composure jolted imperceptibly out of line. He didn't answer her, though.

'Lost for words, are you?' she said nastily. 'Wow, that must be a first.'

'Look, will somebody tell me what the h.e.l.l's going on here?' Miles said.

Switching her gaze between the two brothers, Harriet said, 'Now that's what I call a seriously good question. Dominic? Do you have an answer for your brother? You usually have an answer for most things.'