Past Secrets Read online

  ‘Really, you don’t look like fifty at all,’ Ana teased, and Christie threw back her head and laughed her rich, deep laugh. It felt lovely to be with her sister, someone who appreciated and loved her.

  When she looked back at Ana, a man was standing beside her, and Christie felt something she didn’t think she’d ever experienced before: a spark of tinder and a sensation that this was a person she’d known all her life.

  Carey Wolensky wasn’t any oil painting himself, Christie thought drily, but the same passion and vivacity that inhabited his work inhabited his person too. She was tall but he was at least six inches taller and lean, with rather wild dark hair and deep-set eyes that stared bird-of-prey-like at her over a broken boxer’s nose, taking in every detail. He was around her age, maybe older, and looked as if he wanted to taste every emotion, touch every second of life, in case he missed anything. There were many people crowded around and yet Carey Wolensky had that rare ability to be the person every eye was drawn towards.

  ‘Pleased to meet you,’ said James, who seemed to be enjoying himself now he had relaxed with a couple of drinks.

  Carey nodded and smiled, and the bleakness left his face.

  More people gathered round him to say how much they admired his paintings, and Ana’s friend Chloe announced that the gallery owner was having a huge party in his house, ‘a mansion on Haddington Road, with a swimming pool in the basement!’ and they were all invited.

  ‘We’re going out to dinner,’ said Christie loudly. ‘We can’t come.’ She didn’t know why but she knew that staying here was a mistake.

  ‘A party’s exactly what we need,’ James said, ‘a wild, music-filled night to get you over the misery of being thirty-five.’

  ‘I’m not miserable,’ insisted Christie. ‘I just don’t want to go.’

  ‘If Christie does not want to go, she does not have to go,’ said a voice. It was the first time Carey had spoken and she thought his accent was like Lenkya’s, the deep purr of drawn-out syllables. It was a voice used to the harsh rasp of Polish consonants and it growled over the softness of her language, making it a language of love.

  They stared at each other, oblivious to everyone else. Christie could have drawn his face instantly, she knew it so well. He watched her as if he would touch the contours of her face, then move down to her body, unhooking the halter-neck dress to caress the skin beneath…

  ‘Isn’t he wonderful?’ sighed Ana, taking Christie’s arm. ‘I think he’s the one,’ she whispered for Christie alone. ‘Well, I hope he is. He says he’s too old for me and that’s sexy, isn’t it? Reverse psychology. It makes me want him even more now.’

  Carey still locked gazes with Christie and she knew she’d have to look away or it would be obvious to everyone around them, obvious that Carey Wolensky and Christie Devlin were experiencing a physical attraction hot enough to send the whole room up in flames.

  ‘Wolensky, marvellous show.’ A well-dressed and well-padded man with a cigar broke the spell by standing between them.

  A rich collector, Christie surmised, exactly the sort of person to take Wolensky’s attention. Only the greenest artist didn’t know that the official language of art was hard currency.

  Christie stood back and breathed deeply. She was married. This was her sister’s boyfriend, her beloved Ana’s man. There would be, could be, no electricity between them.

  ‘Shall I take you round the exhibition?’ asked Ana.

  ‘Yes, take me round,’ Christie said.

  With James at one side and Ana at the other, they toured the pictures, Ana explaining what each canvas was called and James standing back and raising his eyebrows occasionally. Normally, Christie would have teased him every time he did this, whispering that he was a philistine and the only picture he’d really adored was the one of the tennis player scratching her knickerless bum. Which would make James grin and say no, he liked the poster of the dogs playing poker best.

  This time, James’s lack of comprehension irritated Christie. Couldn’t he see how amazing these paintings were, the energy and fire that burned out at the audience?

  By the time Lenkya arrived at the gallery, Christie and James weren’t talking to each other.

  ‘Argument?’ asked Lenkya, kissing Christie twice, European-style.

  ‘Yes,’ sighed Christie. ‘What’s new?’

  Lenkya was with her partner, a sculptor, and they toured the exhibition quickly.

  ‘We’re going to dinner,’ Lenkya said, putting an arm round her friend. ‘You are sad, you should come with us. You and James will never make up your differences here in this noisy place.’

  ‘No,’ said Christie firmly, ‘we’re staying a little longer.’ Another thing she regretted. For if she and James had left then, it might never have happened.

  As the crowds milled around, Christie could feel Wolensky watching her, feel the intensity of his mind turned towards hers. She did all those things you did when you were being watched: stood up straighter, held herself even more gracefully, smiled more, wanting to look more beautiful in his eyes even though, as she did it, she knew it was wrong.

  They went to the party on Haddington Road.

  ‘It’ll be a bit of craic,’ James said. ‘We said we’d be home by twelve and it’s only half nine now. We can phone Fiona on the way to say we won’t be in the restaurant but we won’t be late, either.’

  Fiona, who was babysitting, was a college student who lived on Summer Street with her parents. Her mother was a nurse, which gave Christie peace of mind that if anything did happen—please God it wouldn’t—Fiona’s mother would be at number 34 in a flash with the full breadth of her medical training.

  ‘I don’t know…’ Christie began, feeling strangely edgy.

  ‘Stop being a martyr!’ exploded James. ‘You’re furious I didn’t arrange a big birthday evening for you, and now we have a chance of a party where we’ll have some fun, and you don’t know if you want to do that either! You don’t know what you want to do.’

  Perhaps if they hadn’t had the argument, perhaps if Christie hadn’t felt so lonely and neglected for so long, perhaps if Ana hadn’t started flirting with a young man with merry eyes, and perhaps if Christie hadn’t felt pure admiration at Wolensky’s stunning paintings, then none of it might have happened.

  The house on Haddington Road was a large Victorian mansion with pale floorboards and walls, perfect for displaying art, and utterly unsuitable for a wildly boozy party. Christie felt old surrounded by Ana’s friends, who’d soon located a stereo and a stack of records to organise an impromptu disco. Ana and a group of her girlfriends began to dance. The young man with the merry eyes joined in, and Christie watched as Ana laughingly held his hands, clearly not caring whether her supposed artist boyfriend saw them or not. He was nothing compared to Wolensky, Christie thought, mystified.

  James was still barely talking to her and was ensconced on a deep window seat with a man who turned out to be one of his brother’s old friends.

  Christie felt alone and miserable, until a hand took hers and led her out of the kitchen, into a small hallway and up three flights of stairs to a huge attic room hung with paintings.

  ‘This is where he keeps the good stuff,’ Carey said, not letting go of her hand. ‘The paintings that are valuable. He has two of mine, see.’

  They were alone, standing hip to hip, and even though her head told her it was wrong, her heart screamed that it was right.

  She adored Ana, and she adored James. This should not be happening, she had to get out of there. Yet she felt as if she’d die if Carey didn’t swing round and haul her into his arms, sinking into her soul and her body.

  ‘You feel it too,’ Carey said softly. He was looking down at her hand now, examining it, touching the palm as if he could see her whole life through the lines on her hand. ‘What is between us. You feel it, I know.’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ she lied. ‘I’m married.’ As if that was a talisman she could hold up like a crucifix
to Dracula.

  ‘So,’ he said, still looking down at where her hand was trapped by both of his. ‘Marriage severs the mind from the body, yes?’

  ‘It does for Catholics,’ Christie replied in an attempt at levity. ‘It’s in the ceremony. Forsaking all others.’ She couldn’t remember the rest of the vows, to her shame.

  ‘Men who are not allowed to have women make up those rules,’ Carey murmured. ‘They cannot be expected to understand that such rules cannot always be followed.’

  ‘I believe in those rules,’ Christie said. ‘And I love my husband.’ This was true, utterly true. But she felt shaken still. For if she absolutely loved James, how could she feel so wildly attracted to this man? If he made just one move towards her, she’d offer herself to him, here on the floor with scores of people beneath them.

  ‘Ah.’

  He let go of her hand and Christie felt bereft. She hadn’t been teasing. She’d meant every word she said, but having him touch her had been so tender.

  ‘I will let you go,’ he added, ‘but can I touch your face, first, to remember?’

  Her eyes, shining with excitement, must have said yes, because Carey stood inches away from her and with both hands cradled her face, rubbing his thumbs over the high planes of her cheekbones, down to the sweep of her jaw, and over the softness of her mouth.

  When his thumb massaged her lower lip, slipping into the cavern of her mouth, she couldn’t stop herself biting gently.

  Watch out, said every instinct inside her. This is not a game.

  ‘Not a unicorn after all but a lioness,’ he said as her bite eased.

  She made herself pull back from his touch.

  ‘Married lioness,’ she reminded him. ‘And you’re supposed to be going out with my sister.’

  He shrugged. ‘She is happy tonight,’ he remarked. ‘She has found the sort of young man she should be with. I told her so. I prefer’—he paused, looking at her—‘more complicated women.’

  ‘I’ve got to go,’ Christie said. ‘Nice meeting you, Mr Wolensky.’

  ‘Is that it?’ he called as she almost ran down the stairs.

  ‘That’s it,’ she replied over her shoulder.

  In the kitchen, she filled a glass of cool water and drained it quickly, hoping it might douse the heat on her face and neck.

  Back in the main part of the house, she searched for James. They had to go. He was still sitting on the window ledge laughing. Christie watched the man she curled up beside in bed, the man who’d held her hand through the births of two children, the man she loved. Despite his current obsession with work, James was a good man. He was being blind, not seeing how he was hurting her, that was all. If she told him, sat down and said she was on the verge of walking out because of his behaviour, he’d be shocked and she knew he’d change in an instant.

  And yet the image of James in her head was being crowded out by the dark brooding face of Carey Wolensky, who was all the things she’d ever dreamed of when she was young, and who’d come into her life when it was already full. Too late.

  In the taxi on the way home, she held James’s hand tightly. She would force Carey Wolensky out of her head. This was the man she loved, the father of her children.

  James was exhausted and went to bed after politely walking Fiona, the babysitter, home. Christie stayed up and scrubbed the kitchen tiles with the small scrubbing brush. She made James’s favourite apple cake, diligently and carefully, where normally, she flung ingredients in at high speed. She would push Carey out of her mind.

  Ethan and Shane’s little trousers hung on the clothes horse and she ironed them. Normally, she folded carefully, not bothering ironing garments that would be on and off within an hour.

  She couldn’t stop it: more than anything, she yearned to have Carey holding her in his arms, taking off her clothes, touching her breasts, lowering his head to kiss them, to feel his body covering hers, against hers, in hers.

  Like the magic that came into her head unbidden and told her of the future, this longing was too powerful to push away.

  Christie could no more resist Carey Wolensky than she could stop her mind from seeing what might happen.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Faye and Maggie sat in Faye’s garden listening to the exquisite tones of Julie London on full blast telling everyone about how she’d cried a river and now it was his turn.

  They had a bottle of rosé between them and a giant box of Ferrero Rocher half gone, with scrunched-up gold foil wrappers littering the table. Christie had said she’d drop in but hadn’t turned up.

  It was four days since Amber had left and, the following day, Faye was going to the States to find Amber and she couldn’t wait to be off.

  At least if she was travelling, trying to find Amber, she’d be doing something. And that was preferable to being at home in the silent misery of number 18. Without Amber, the house was grave-like. Faye jumped every time the phone rang in case it was Amber; she checked her answering machine by remote access ten times a day, and in the morning, she ran to the letterbox when the postman came just in case there was a card, a letter, anything saying that Amber was all right.

  ‘Should I turn the music down,’ asked Maggie, ‘in case the neighbours go mad?’

  Faye’s next-door neighbour was an irascible man who had no animals, no wife, no children and no sense of humour—or at least, that’s what Amber had always said. Faye used to hush her when she said this. ‘He might hear!’

  ‘Screw the neighbours,’ Faye muttered. ‘If Mr Dork next door has a problem, he can come in here and tell me face to face.’

  ‘Fine by me,’ said Maggie, who knew a woman gunning for a fight when she saw one.

  Since Amber had gone, Faye had appeared defeated and sad. Today, something had clearly changed inside her and she was filled with fierce energy and rage.

  Maggie suspected she was going through the phases of grief: she’d done disbelief, and hopelessness, and now was on to anger.

  Maggie had been through that herself.

  ‘Exercise helps me,’ she volunteered. ‘I do Pilates when…sorry,’ she added. ‘It’s very boring to have people giving you advice all the time, isn’t it?’ She wished Christie were here. She felt singularly incapable of saying anything useful. Her boyfriend had been cheating on her for years and she hadn’t had a clue about it, so both her skills of observation and her credentials as agony aunt were questionable.

  Faye shot her a genuine, warm smile. ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I appreciate that. Everyone else wants to tell me what to do.’ Everyone else was Grace, whom she’d told about Amber’s disappearance, and who was full of suggestions about what action Faye should take next.

  ‘Grace at work has my head wrecked saying she’s there if I need her and after all, Amber was going to leave eventually and all families fight, don’t they? She’s trying to help but she doesn’t understand. She doesn’t have kids…Well, perhaps that’s not fair,’ Faye amended. ‘You don’t need to have children to understand and I’ve only told her half the story. Me and my secrets. Perhaps I should have brazened it out and told her the truth years ago. We’ve been through a lot together professionally, so in many ways we know each other well. But at first I was too ashamed, I thought she’d look down on me. Grace is so together, I couldn’t imagine her doing anything she was ashamed of. And then, too much time had passed for me to suddenly say: hey, Grace, I’m not really a widow after all. I just say I am.’

  ‘When you’re ashamed, it’s easy to build it up into a huge secret you dare not trust anyone with,’ Maggie reflected, thinking of her own past.

  Faye looked interested now, so Maggie had to go on.

  ‘My problem was that when things went wrong for me, I felt I couldn’t confide in my parents,’ she said, amazed at her courage now. She’d never said that to anyone before.

  ‘About Grey?’ Faye was puzzled. Maggie had said her parents knew about her break-up, though not about Grey cheating on her.

  ‘No,
before that.’

  ‘What…?’ began Faye, and stopped.

  Maggie’s eyes had filled with tears. Whatever her big secret was, it was too painful to touch.

  ‘So, back to this cheating man of yours,’ Faye said firmly, switching subjects. ‘What has your dad threatened to do to him lately?’

  Despite herself, Maggie laughed. ‘They don’t have a surgical name for it yet.’

  ‘But it’s performed without an anaesthetic?’

  ‘With two bricks and a rusty razor blade,’ said Maggie. Then sighed. ‘Poor Dad has got it into his head that I left Grey because there was no sign of us getting married. He calls Grey “that bastard who felt he was too good to put a ring on my daughter’s finger after five years”.’

  ‘That is a very dad thing to say,’ Faye agreed. ‘Luckily for Amber’s father my poor old dad wasn’t around by the time I started getting into trouble with men. But what happened to you was pretty rough.’

  ‘You don’t seem that shocked actually,’ Maggie said, surprised. ‘Not that I’ve been broadcasting the information but so far, everyone I’ve told about what Grey did has been stunned.’

  ‘They all live sheltered lives, I guess.’ Faye grinned. ‘I’ve heard of guys doing much worse and he did say sorry afterwards, although I know that’s not the point. You were living together, he was your partner and it was way out of line. You’re not taking him back, I hope.’

  ‘I wanted to,’ Maggie said. ‘Isn’t that pathetic? I thought he was right for me. I loved him and our life together.’

  Faye interrupted: ‘You just don’t love coming home and seeing him bonking some blonde babe on your bed.’

  ‘No,’ agreed Maggie, ‘that does sort of ruin things.’

  ‘So you’ve got to dump him and start again.’

  ‘I’m going to dump him all right.’ Since Shona had told her about Grey’s other women, she’d thought of practically nothing else. She felt so humiliated by the news. To think how he’d looked her straight in the eye and lied to her.

  It’s never happened before.