The Accidental Family (22 page)

Sophie sat back on her heels and shook her head.

“I wanted his daughters to be happy because I love them, and they are happy now. And I love him, so yes I’d like to help him and you get through this and work out what to do, if you’ll let me.”

Seth put his empty cup of coffee down on one of Mrs. Alexander’s lace doilies that she had told Sophie were there for decoration and were under no circumstances ever to be used. He sat up, and picked up one of her hands as she knelt before him.

“I like you,” he said, looking into her eyes. “I’d like you to help me.”

“Really?” Sophie was relieved and disconcerted at the same time. “That’s great. Just say what you want me to do and I’ll …oh.”

Before she knew what was happening, Seth’s fingers were in her hair, drawing her lips to his, and he was kissing her.

For a second, perhaps five, Sophie did not resist; the shock of what was happening disabled her fight-or-flight impulse momentarily. But it was also the heat of the vodka-soaked kiss that pinned her to the spot; it was a very good kiss. Perhaps it was five seconds, maybe ten, that she let Seth kiss her, but in any case it was several seconds too long because she was still a fraction of a second from pushing him away when Cal and Carmen came through the door.

“Oh my giddy aunt!” Carmen exclaimed as Sophie finally broke away. She pointed. “That’s not Louis!”

“And when I told you to embrace Louis’s baggage, this is not what I meant,” Cal added.

Seth sprang out of his seat, still a little unsteady on his feet, and swayed out of the room, crashing into furniture as he lurched toward the door.

“Seth, wait,” Sophie called after him. “What about the room?”

“The room?” Carmen repeated, scandalized. “The
room
?”

But Seth didn’t speak, he simply found the front door and slammed it behind him, loud enough to dangerously rattle the Doulton figurines on the mantelpiece.

“Oh bloody hell!” Sophie said, sitting on the sofa and burying her face in her hands. “Bloody bloody hell—how did that happen?”

“What exactly
did
happen?” Carmen asked her. “Were you drunk and confused?”

“We were just talking and then he lunged; there was nothing I
could do about it,” Sophie attempted to explain, trying very hard to get the memory of Seth’s fingers in her hair out of her mind.

“It didn’t exactly look like there was anything you wanted to do about it,” Carmen said.

“That’s not true, he took me by surprise, that’s all.” Sophie looked at Cal, who was looking at her and shaking his head.

“Go on,” she said wearily. “Say it.”

“Only you,” Cal said. “Only you could snog your dead best friend’s husband’s secret love child. Now what are you going to do?”

Eleven

Sophie had never been unfaithful to anyone in her life and she wasn’t quite sure how to handle it. Technically, a kiss lasting only a few seconds, even if it was several seconds longer than it should have lasted, wasn’t the worst crime one could commit against a loved one. But as Cal insisted on pointing out to her on several occasions, when that kiss was with your fiancé’s son, it put a whole new spin on things.

She had run out after Seth, who had barged past Carmen and Cal and hailed a cab that was passing at the bottom of the street; before she could reach him, the car had pulled away, taking him god knew where. Wearily Sophie had turned on her heel, taking a deep breath of chilled sea air, before she slowly walked back to face her friends and try to explain to them what they had seen.

It had taken a lot of explaining. The three of them had sat up for what was left of the night, Cal and Carmen drinking Mrs. Alexander’s Christmas sherry while Sophie made herself hot chocolate
after hot chocolate, hoping the sugar rush would help her work out the best thing to do.

At just after 3:00
A.M
., Mrs. Alexander came in and found them all in the sitting room, lounging on her best cushions, scattered on the floor, like teenagers who had been discovered having a party when they thought their parents were away.

“Still up?” she said, pressing her lips into a thin line, which meant that she had clocked the coffee ring on her best lace doily.

“Catching up, you know—you don’t mind, do you?” Sophie asked her. “We thought it would be better down here than in one of our rooms. We don’t want to disturb any other guests. We’re being quiet and I’ll replace the sherry and wash the …doily.”

Mrs. Alexander nodded once, which was the nearest Sophie was going to get to an assent. “Well, Louis got back home about twenty minutes ago if you’re interested.”

Sophie was interested. In the midst of everything that had been happening, she’d forgotten that Mrs. Alexander wouldn’t be coming back until Louis got home. He’d been at Wendy’s by four thirty that afternoon, and she’d met Seth in the club just before eleven and left shortly afterward. Carmen and Cal had come in at two, and now it was after three. Louis had been on his own with Wendy for the best part of twelve hours. Why had he stayed there so long? Why hadn’t he answered her phone call or at least called her back and asked her to relieve Mrs. Alexander? If he’d called her back, if he’d come and helped her with Seth, then her life would be a lot simpler at this point.

“Is he okay?” Sophie asked Mrs. Alexander.

“He was quiet,” Mrs. Alexander replied. “Looked drained. Perhaps you should go over and see how he is.”

“I’ve had too much to drink,” Sophie lied, nodding at the sherry she hadn’t touched. “I’ll go in the morning.”

“Right then,” Mrs. Alexander said, looking disapprovingly at
Carmen and Cal, as if she suspected they might be guilty of a lot more than staying up late and drinking her sherry. “Clear up after yourselves.”

“That’s going to be harder to do than she knows,” Cal said as they heard Mrs. Alexander go up the stairs.

“Just don’t ever, ever tell anyone what happened,” Carmen said. “It’s simple.”

“But what if Seth tells someone, what then?” Sophie said. “I’ll look like a cradle snatcher, that’s what.”

“Deny it, deny everything forever,” Carmen added. “It’ll be your word against his. Besides, I’m the only cradle-snatching woman round here, I don’t want you elbowing your way into my territory.”

“Look, it won’t come to that,” Cal said. “The kid was really drunk, there’s a good chance he won’t even remember what happened, and even if he does, he’s going to be so embarrassed he snogged an old bat like you he’s never going to want anyone to know.”

“Excuse me, but I think kissing an older woman is probably quite impressive,” Sophie protested.

“And so does my James,” Carmen added with a nod.

“It depends on the older woman, love,” Cal said. “Anyway, in the great scheme of things, even though kissing your fiancé’s son is potentially the worst thing you could have done, it’s not that important. Just go home to Louis in a few hours and act like nothing’s happened.”

“Like I didn’t have Seth here at all?” Sophie asked him.

“Probably for the best,” Carmen agreed. “Think of it all as a nightmare …or maybe a dream, talking of which—how was that kiss, you looked like you were enjoying it.”

“How many times do I have to say this! I was in shock, that’s why I didn’t pull away immediately.” Sophie’s voice rose sufficiently
to cause her friends to shush her. “And anyway, you’re not supposed to lie to your fiancé. If it was okay to lie to your fiancé, then I would never have told Louis about Seth in the first place.”

“You do still want to be engaged to him,” Cal said, “don’t you?”

“Of course I do!” Sophie said. “I love him.”

“Then go round later, act like nothing has happened, don’t say anything, and play it by ear.” Cal cocked one eyebrow. “And try not to snog any other of his relatives on the way.”

Sophie paused outside Louis’s front door, just as she had six months ago when she’d decided to come down here from London and see if she could make things with him work.

She had hesitated then, unsure of what her reception would be, unsure of how he felt about her. It was strange, given all that had happened and the ring on her finger, that she felt exactly the same way now, six months later.

Taking a breath, she slid her key into the lock and let herself in.

It was early, barely five
A.M
., and the house was dark and quiet.

Sophie had tried to stay at the B & B until later, to act as if this morning was a perfectly normal Saturday morning and that nothing untoward had happened last night, but she couldn’t. After trying to fall asleep for over an hour and failing, spending several minutes instead tossing and turning and looking at the darkness where her ceiling ought to be, Sophie had got up and stood in the tiny shower in her bathroom, her forehead pressed to the textured tiles, the warm water running in rivulets over her shoulders and buttocks. When that didn’t seem to calm her, she tried reading a book, even watching what little TV she could find on in the early hours of the morning for a bit, but nothing calmed her, she felt restless and anxious and desperate to see Louis. So she’d woken up Cal and told him where she was going.

“You didn’t have to wake me up too,” he complained, shoving his head under his pillow.

“I did just in case you wanted to talk me out of it,” Sophie whispered to the pillow.

“Okay, don’t go now. It’s far too early, it will look weird, and anyway, I thought you weren’t supposed to be there when the girls woke up until after you’re married.”

“No, I have to go,” Sophie said. “I have to see him, I just have to. Everything is wrong and all pulled apart. If I wait until the sun comes up and it’s officially another day, then everything that happened tonight will seem like a dream. It will seem unreal, only it is real. I need to be with him now. I need to be able to touch him and put my arms around him and hear his heart beating and know that we are still just as close as we’ve always been. I’ll get up before the girls do, like I did the other morning. I have to go, Cal, I have …Cal?”

“Whatever,” Cal mumbled. “Just please let me sleep.”

Carefully Sophie set her bag and keys down on the hall table and crept up the stairs. Ever so carefully she pushed open Bella’s bedroom door and peeped round to check on her. All she could see was a fluff of dark hair above the duvet, her small body curled up beneath it.

In Izzy’s room all was quiet too, although Izzy had flung her covers off and lay there with her arms above her head, knees bent up, one toe pointed, as if she had fallen asleep mid dance step, which, knowing Izzy, was entirely possible.

Then ever so slowly Sophie crept into Louis’s room. The room that would one day be their room. He was lying facedown. His clothes were strewn around the foot of the bed as if he had just climbed into bed and fallen right to sleep. Sophie watched him for a second or two in the half-light, sorting out his features from his son’s. As she looked at him, her heart in her mouth for fear that
he’d wake up and find her there, Sophie realized that the two men actually looked quite different.

Louis’s jawline was square, his cheekbones were a little more pronounced, and he had a bump on the bridge of his nose that Sophie loved to run her forefinger over, tracing a path to his beautifully shaped mouth. Seth’s face, in comparison, was soft, not yet fully formed, his face more heart shaped, like Wendy’s, his nose straight and narrow. He did have his father’s coloring though, and his father’s beautifully shaped mouth. Sophie took a breath, running her hands through her hair, unsure of what to do next. Should she wake Louis up and try to talk to him? Explain what had happened with Seth? Or perhaps Cal was right. Perhaps she should just turn around and go back to the B & B and wait to see what the dawn would bring.

Then Louis moaned a little in his sleep, the flicker of a smile briefly lighting his face, and he rolled onto his back, exposing his torso. Sophie found she did not want to leave.

Slowly, quietly, she slipped out of her jeans and pulled her T-shirt over her head, shaking her hair out over her shoulders. After a second she unhooked her bra and slipped off her knickers.

In all the times she had been with Louis in this house she had only gotten into this bed with him once, although he’d begged her to join him several times. Sophie had always told herself and Louis that she was waiting for them to be married, waiting for the children to get used to the idea, but as she stood naked on the verge of getting into his bed, she realized that it had been about more than that. This place was a symbol, a final sign of commitment. And recently, when she should have been feeling so close to him and yet felt so far away, it was the only place where she knew how to reach him.

Sophie held her breath, uncertain of how he’d react, and then slowly, gingerly, as if there might be monsters lurking beneath the
covers, she eased her way under the duvet, lying on her back next to him, the smooth sheet feeling cool against the heat of her body. Slowly she turned her head to look at his sleeping face, half obscured by the pillow. Wherever he was now he was probably far from the son who didn’t want to know him and she wasn’t sure he would thank her for taking him back to that world. Sophie bit her lip and looked at the ceiling. She’d never done this sort of thing before, woken a man up for sex. She wasn’t exactly sure of the etiquette or procedure. Should she give him a quick prod, she wondered, and then pounce? The shock might give him a heart attack. Should she whisper sweet nothings in his ear until he opened his eyes and smiled at her? Except that despite her lack of experience in spending the whole night with him, Sophie knew that when Louis was out, he was out for the count. Once Bella and Izzy had treated him to an early morning serenade with their Barbie guitars and a set of drums made out of a tin that Bella had found in the garden shed. Louis hadn’t turned a hair. He had snored through the whole of their hard-rock rendition of “Love in an Elevator.” It had fallen to Bella to fill the toothbrush mug with cold water and tip it over her father’s head in a bid to get her audience’s attention.

The first thing Bella had said, Louis told her later, when he’d finally stemmed the shocked stream of expletives that had burst out of his mouth, was “Daddy, you are not supposed to swear in front of us.”