Love-40 (29 page)

‘There was nothing to blow.'

‘Explain.' She knew she was cornering him, but she was concerned. Both Liam and Estelle looked wrecked. And Suzi couldn't accept that it wasn't true – that what they both needed was not simply one another.

‘Suzi, I know you were only trying to help…'

‘The concert?' And she'd had such high hopes.

Liam nodded. ‘But I did everything I could that night – and more. She freaked, Suze, when she saw that window smashed. I don't know what else I could have done.' Hand through hair once more.

Suzi frowned, looked round the Bear and Bottle, which was quiet tonight. Perhaps she should have confided in Liam before. ‘It's not the first thing that's happened…' And as Michael returned with the drinks, she proceeded to tell them both the whole story – about the puncture, the ‘For Sale' sign on Estelle's car, the visits from Stan and Terry, and finally the hate mail.

‘Bloody hell,' said Michael. His long legs were stretched out in front of him, as though – now that he played here – this had become his territory. Suzi hoped that this was the case. She wanted Michael to feel good about something.

Liam rose to his feet. He looked furious. ‘Why didn't you call the police?'

‘And say what? We don't have a shred of evidence that all this is anything to do with The Bargain Basement. It could be just kids mucking around, a bit of vandalism, nothing to worry about. That's what everyone thinks.'

‘Until you piece it all together.' Michael said what they were probably all thinking.

‘So if you can't prove anything –' Liam began.

‘And if you don't want to go to the police…' Michael added.

Suzi saw the look that passed between the two men. ‘We should give up Secrets?' she demanded. ‘Let them win without even putting up a fight?' She might have expected such an attitude from Michael, who was so laid back she sometimes wondered if he'd have the energy to save his own soul from the devil. But not from Liam – Liam who would fight for any cause he believed in.

‘I'm thinking of your safety,' Liam urged, as if reading her mind. ‘Yours and Estelle's.'

‘Try telling Estelle that.' Suzi glared at him – her brother, champion of the underdog. Where was that hero when you needed him?

Liam sighed. ‘I don't think I'll be telling Estelle anything in the near future.'

‘So you're just going to give up on her?' Suzi persisted. God, she was sick of self-pity, fed up with trying to make the two of them see sense. They'd just seen
Romeo and Juliet
for heaven's sake, and Suzi had seen the expression on Estelle's face when she looked at Liam. Nothing had changed. Nothing should have changed. What was wrong with the two of them? What did she have to do?

‘You'll be seeing her at the American tournament,' Michael said into his beer, ‘And at the dance.'

The other two glanced at him.

‘Bloody hell,' said Liam, probably thinking of Estelle and Amanda. ‘But before that, I've got the under-15s tournament and Nick bloody Rossi to contend with.'

‘Rather you than me,' said Suzi. ‘And now, if you'll excuse me, I need the ladies room.'

*   *   *

Suzi walked into the public bar, and was already half-way through the door of the ladies, when she heard a familiar laugh. More of a growl really. No. She jumped, let go of the door handle, took a step back, peered round the pillar and spotted Josh's big figure. Unmistakable. He was sitting at a table with two men. There was a basket of dried flowers on the window-ledge above. All three had pints of beer on the table in front of them.

‘Josh,' she whispered, feeling herself almost pulled towards him, wanting to go over, to say hi, to apologise maybe for being such a moron after the roadshow. He might, after all, merely have mentioned their problems to Terry in passing. He would have no idea, she was sure, of what was going on. And she could hardly blame him for not phoning her when she had been such a miserable cow.

Excuses, excuses. She never stopped making excuses for the guy. Suzi sighed. What was the matter with her? Why did she want to talk to him, even be near him so much? How had she got so pathetic, without her even noticing?

She wavered, frowned at the two men sitting with their backs to her, one fair, one dark. Retreated quick as a ferret when she recognised who they were.

Josh Willis drinking in the pub with the enemy, with Stan and Terry, friendly as you like. She let this sink in. How much evidence did she need? Josh Willis who had seemed to be on their side. Josh Willis who she had hoped might become … what? A friend? More than a friend? No way.

She should, she realised, as she slipped into the loo, have trusted her first instincts about the man. And her second ones. And now? She would, for sure, have nothing more to do with him. She wouldn't give him a sandwich if he were starving. And she sure as hell wouldn't be giving him her last Rolo.

Josh Willis was involved in the plan to get them out of Secrets In The Attic. He had to be.

And what had she done?

Yep. She had helped him every step of the way …

Chapter 22

Estelle was aware that something was going down in the shop next door. She wasn't sure – yet – what it was, but Stan and Terry were very much in evidence – tight-lipped, closet-faced, striding outside, marching back in again. She could hear the drag of heavy furniture being moved around the floor, the occasional curse, and the slam of the shop door.

When she went outside to her car, she was confronted by both of them. Stan shot her a look of such weaselly venom that she recoiled, shocked, and hurried back inside. Terry didn't even look at her – which was unusual in itself.

Pretending she was unperturbed and deciding to ignore the early morning July shower, Estelle flung open the door of Secrets In The Attic so that the wind-chimes sang and the dream-catchers quivered. She felt compelled to make a statement. Bugger them all.
COME IN AND LOOK AROUND OUR ATTIC
, the sign on the door read.

Come on then, she thought, let's be having you. Perhaps if Stan and Terry witnessed a flow of customers to the shop, they might give up their little campaign.

She decided to re-arrange the jewellery while she was waiting. If she had her way, she would get rid of all the furniture (and not replace it) and fill the shop with jewellery instead – antique, modern, from local designers, silversmiths and craftspeople. There was so much talent in the area. Besides, she was fed up with dusty old furniture.

She glared at an old wash-stand that had not made it to Germany and was equally unwanted here in Pridehaven. When, she wondered, would Josh Willis be heading off again? Perhaps he'd take a job lot – including the wash-stand? – if she could get Suzi to agree. Only, Suzi tended to have a collapse of reason when that man was around.

When Lorraine Johnson appeared on the street outside and began flapping around on the pavement, screeching and casting killer looks towards Secrets In The Attic, Estelle moved away from the window and tried to fight the rising panic. Her throat was dry and her hands were shaking. ‘Up the workers,' she told herself unconvincingly, realising she sounded like Liam on a bad day. ‘Don't let the bastards grind you down.'

She brought her fist down on the counter a little harder than she'd intended. She would not give in. No customers as yet but that was perfectly normal. Stan and Terry and their blousy wives couldn't hurt her – not in broad daylight anyway. And she wouldn't phone Suzi or Liam – especially not Liam – she could handle this alone.

As she arranged her amber collection inside one of the showcases, Estelle cringed mentally. That was what had hurt the most about that night with Liam. A brick had been chucked through the window, yes, but no one had been hurt, and nothing stolen. So why had she succumbed to a panic attack of the screaming habdabs? Why, when everything was going so well, had she collapsed into Liam's arms as if he were a cross between Superman and Flash Gordon? It was pathetic, it was laughable. She was so angry with herself. What had happened to her hard-won independence? What had happened to managing alone? It had all disintegrated into dismal failure, that's what. She had behaved like some Victorian spinster with the vapours.

As for her feelings for Liam – well, for a moment there she had forgotten about Amanda Lake, and it was a good thing the girl herself had put in an appearance after the play, to remind her. They were seeing each other. They were an item. And yet Liam had kissed her. Liam had seemed to still care. Liam … For heaven's sake …

She closed the case with a satisfying click. Didn't Liam know that Estelle still had her pride at least?

*   *   *

Five minutes later, she peered outside once more, to see that the flapping Lorraine Johnson had been joined by a teenage girl dressed in jeans, a denim jacket and trainers.

Estelle frowned, tried to place her, eventually put mental flowers in her hair and a long grey dress over the jeans and came up with Liam's Juliet.

The body language between the two women (Lorraine's wagging finger, Juliet's hands on hips and everyone can go hang) indicated clearly that they were mother and daughter.

As she watched, Lorraine and Juliet were joined by Stan. ‘One day…' Lorraine screeched at him. ‘One day, you'll expect me to follow you and I won't be around.'

‘Promises, promises,' said Stan.

‘Don't think I haven't had offers,' Lorraine said darkly. ‘Don't think you're the only fish in the sea.'

Stan seemed remarkably unperturbed by this. Probably heard it a hundred times before, Estelle thought.

But wasn't it a small world? She turned her attention to Shelagh Rossi's pearls. She was taking them to auction this afternoon – this was the last time she could finger their voluptuous whiteness, place the globes of cream around her neck and … well, pretend.

She recalled the hunted expression on Liam's face as he'd run from the Bear and Bottle all those weeks ago, Lorraine Johnson not far behind. Coincidence? She doubted it very much.

*   *   *

‘Real kids versus clones,' Liam muttered to himself as he and Nick Rossi prowled around the clubhouse casting evil looks towards one another and getting their respective groups together for the under-15s tournament. Predictably, Nick's lot were dressed in tennis whites and armed with an expensive array of lightweight rackets and blinding yellow balls. Liam's group were, well, more individual.

He and Nick had finally agreed on playing four boys' singles, two girls' singles, plus one doubles from boys, girls and mixed. It was impossible to tell, Liam thought, who was up for it. Nick's group – from the tennis club itself – looked the part, and of course he'd seen most of them playing here before, but they also looked bored stiff. His lot were dressed in their usual weekend clothes and scuffed trainers, chewing gum, drinking coke, talking or texting on their mobiles. The only encouraging thing was that the clones looked a bit thin on the ground.

Sure enough, when two o'clock came, Nick said that they weren't quite ready, so Liam magnanimously agreed to a fifteen-minute delay, and went to find Erica Raddle. He knew she was around, having heard her megaphone-voice proclaiming the weekend itinerary to someone – probably Deirdre Piston.

He found them both in the common room, a name that so offended Erica's sense of dignity that she insisted on referring to it as the club lounge and was currently campaigning to have the plaque removed from the door.

Liam was unable to stop his body language bordering on aggressive as soon as he entered the room. Erica, who was also standing, always had this effect on him. She was wearing a white Aertex shirt, as if she'd just walked off a tennis court – though these days she never did – a cream pleated skirt that reached just below the knee and whiter than white old-fashioned tennis shoes.

‘Liam.' She acknowledged him, but scowled, baring her teeth in what for her was probably a smile.

Deirdre, wearing her usual nondescript mixture of fawn, beige and tan, was seated at the only table in the room. The rest of the furniture consisted of a couple of settees, several upholstered chairs and (much abhorred by Erica) a table football machine. Deirdre's thin legs were pressed close together, as she made notes in one of her interminable files. What a double act. When, Liam wondered, would CG's enter the new millennium instead of being run like a Women's Institute?

‘Could I interrupt for a moment?' he asked with careful politeness. And when Erica seemed to hesitate, ‘Only I particularly wanted to know what was decided at that meeting I missed.'

‘Meeting?' Erica glanced down at Deirdre as if she were likely to explain what Liam was talking about. ‘What meeting?'

‘The meeting that coincided with the parents' evening at the school.' Liam tried to remain calm. ‘The meeting to discuss the sponsorship of the tournaments and the re-surfacing of certain courts.' Suzi too had been unable to attend, and as for Amanda – well, she had promised to go and then discovered a more pressing engagement (probably supper with Fenella Trenton-Smythe or a missed episode of
Casualty,
Liam thought privately).

‘Ah. That meeting.' Erica folded her arms.

‘Yes.' Liam wondered if, in a previous lifetime, Erica had been a games mistress at a girls' boarding school. He could see her with a hockey stick chasing girls round the field to punish them for refusing to get in the shower, for not tying their hair back, or just for not being sufficiently sporty perhaps.

‘Deirdre can put a copy of the minutes in the post to you.'

‘In the post…' Deirdre hastily wrote herself a note to this effect.

‘Perhaps Deirdre should have already put a copy of the minutes in the post to anyone who was absent from the meeting,' Liam suggested cheerfully. ‘I rather thought that was the idea.' He was well aware of how Erica hated to be criticised on matters of form, so couldn't allow himself to miss the opportunity. ‘And as I never received one…'