‘I have no idea what she’s talking about,’ says Rose. ‘It doesn’t even make sense. None of what she said makes any sense.’
Kate’s head is in her hands as she contemplates what just happened, knowing that if she says the wrong thing or asks the wrong question, she won’t ever be able to retract it.
‘Mum, could it be . . .?’ starts Lauren, looking to Rose, who turns to her with a face like thunder.
Kate looks to her mother and sister, their expressions mirroring each other’s; their eyes wide with fear and confusion, their lips pinched tight as if they’re biting down on the words that are threatening to spill from their mouths.
‘Could it be what?’ asks Kate.
‘Nothing,’ snaps Rose. ‘The girl’s got her wires crossed. It’s as simple as that. There’s no other explanation.’
Kate doesn’t know whether her mother is speaking about Lauren or the young woman who’s just turned up claiming to be her father’s daughter. Her father’s daughter. Just hearing those words in her head makes Kate’s throat clench as it battles the tears that are teetering behind her eyes.
For once in her life, she agrees with her mother – it’s just not possible. Harry was devoted to his family and devoted to her. She was Daddy’s little girl and they were like two peas in a pod, in every way, except for their looks. Where Kate had inherited her mother’s auburn hair and fair skin, that freckled whenever she so much as looked at the sun, Harry could be seen in Lauren’s wide-set eyes, straight narrow nose and one-sided dimple. The blonde hair that they’d once shared had grown more ashen on Harry in his later years, but he’d always looked distinguished – like the man she knew him to be. But what if he wasn’t? What if he was distinguished in an entirely different way? Conspicuously marked with the stigma of another family; a family he had kept secret from the rest of the world.
Her mind races back to the time when Jess would have been born. She looked young – early twenties maybe? Which would have made Kate barely a teenager. Those were the years when, during the school holidays, she used to accompany her father to his office, where he worked as a lawyer. She was adamant she’d follow in his footsteps, convinced she wanted to right people’s wrongs.
‘You’re a real-life superhero,’ she’d once said, watching in awe as he spent the morning fighting for a mother’s custody and the afternoon negotiating a fair divorce deal for a husband who had been cheated on.
He’d smiled modestly at her through crinkled eyes, but she knew her words mattered to him. As did everybody else’s whose lives he touched. He wasn’t how lawyers are so often cast; the epitome of a vulture preying on the vulnerable. He was an upstanding citizen who treated each and every one of his clients like a good friend. He had always been a superhero in Kate’s eyes.
Yet now, she dares to contemplate the possibility that he might have been the very opposite.
‘Why didn’t you tell her he was dead?’ asks Lauren, almost accusingly.
It takes a while for Kate to realize that she’s talking to her.
‘Because it’s none of her goddamn business,’ Kate snaps. ‘Though I suppose if it were up to you, you’d sit her down, make her a cup of tea and tell her the whole story.’
‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ says Lauren.
‘It means that this would suit you, wouldn’t it?’ Kate glares at Lauren. ‘You’d love nothing more than to have Dad’s memory tarnished.’
‘Why would I want that?’ asks Lauren, fixing her sister with a cold hard stare.
‘Because then you’d feel justified for treating him with such contempt for all these years.’
‘Girls, girls, please,’ says Rose, who’s still visibly shaking and wringing her hands in her lap. ‘None of this is helping.’
‘So, what are we going to do?’ asks Lauren.
‘Nothing,’ says Kate.
‘Don’t you think she deserves to be heard?’ asks Lauren incredulously. ‘You can’t just dismiss what she said and ignore her.’
‘That’s exactly what we’re going to do,’ says Rose icily as she stares at her daughters.
4
Lauren
‘Well, what d’ya know?’ Simon smirks, as soon as Lauren has strapped all the children into the back seat of the car and gets into the front. She exhales, letting out the breath she feels she’s been holding in for an eternity. She doesn’t want to talk about it, but she doubts her husband will give her the choice. ‘Do you think there’s something to it?’ he asks.
Lauren turns to look out the window, watching the pavement fall away as Simon pulls off. Jess’s sudden appearance is hard enough for her to get her head around. She hasn’t got the energy to face an interrogation from her husband.
‘Who knows?’ she says quietly.
‘Who would have thought it?’ Simon says, chuckling to himself. ‘The man who spent his life dealing with everyone else’s infidelities was up to no good himself.’
‘It might not be all that it seems,’ she says. ‘We shouldn’t jump to conclusions until we know the facts.’
Simon snorts, and she knows he’s about to do exactly that. He’ll enjoy flying in the face of controversy, especially if it will give him a ringside seat.
‘All those times he spoke to me like I was a piece of dirt on the bottom of his shoe. All those times he tried to make me feel as if you were too good for me . . .’
Lauren bites down on her lip, to stop herself from saying, I am.
‘And all the while he was up there, in his ivory tower, he had a secret lovechild.’
Lauren takes a deep breath. It’s all very well having her own thoughts and feelings about her nearest and dearest, but she can’t bear to hear Simon saying them out loud. She’d never dream of airing her opinions on his own dysfunctional family, so she doesn’t expect, or want, to hear his views on hers. But she can sense he’s looking for a row, and she just doesn’t have the strength for another evening of arguments and sleeping on the sofa.
Although, if the truth be known, sleeping alone, even if it is on a second-hand couch, where no matter how she lies a spring sticks into her ribcage, is preferable to lying beside her husband right now. The admission saddens her, but these past few months it’s felt like every night has been a war zone which she’s had to navigate her way through, judiciously avoiding the grenades that Simon throws at her.
‘What is it you do all day exactly?’ he had tactlessly said when he came in from work the other night to find Lego on the living room floor and a pile of dirty laundry on the landing.
She used to wonder that herself, especially when she’d only had one baby to get up, change, feed and put back to sleep again. Some days, she’d not had time to shower, or even get dinner ready for when Simon got home.
But ironically, the more children they’d had, the more efficient Lauren had become with her time and Simon’s money, as she learnt to stretch both to their full capacity. She’d mastered multi-tasking, and had become a wise shopper, searching out the best deals on meat and vegetables and eking the most out of every meal.