The Back Road (5 page)

7

A radio was playing quietly in the kitchen. Nobody was listening - it was there for background noise and to drown out the silence that pervaded the house.

A half empty glass of warm vodka sat on the table. It didn’t matter that it wasn’t cold - it was fulfilling its purpose. It was numbing the pain without leaving any trace.

The music stopped, and the six o’clock news began. More of the same, of course. The economy, the Middle East, back to the economy. The same as every other day. Who cared, really?

“And in local news, we have a report on a hit and run accident in the quiet village of Little Melham. A young girl was knocked down on the B522 and the driver failed to stop. This road - locally known as the back road - connects the A564 and the A5194 but according to the police is normally only used by locals. The girl, who has not been named yet, is said to be in a critical condition. The accident took place in the early hours of this morning, and the police are asking anybody who was out in the area last night to…”

An angry hand reached out and switched the radio off.

Why did she reject me? Why was she scared? Why did she run?

All that planning, months and months of it, blown away by an impulsive action – an opportunity that seemed too good to miss. Abbie was all alone – abandoned - and nobody was missing her. It was so very easy.

Abbie – I just wanted you to love me. Our little secret.

But those eyes – the stark black terror in their depths when she learned the truth.
Why?

And then she ran.

What if she’d made it back to the village? What if that driver had been paying attention, driving more slowly, and picked her up instead of knocking her down? It didn’t bear thinking about.

My life would be over. Everything I’ve worked so hard for would be destroyed. Again. By Abbie.

But now Abbie couldn’t speak. She would probably die.

That was never my intention, Abbie – but you shouldn’t have rejected me. I wouldn’t have hurt you if you’d been nice to me. You’re dead to me anyway, now.

But there was another problem.

The driver saw me, standing in the woods, watching but doing nothing.

And that was a danger. Safe for now, but if the police identified the car, the driver would be sure to tell them.

A cry of frustrated misery pierced the silence, and the now empty glass was hurled into the sink where it shattered on impact.

* * *

‘I need a drink,’ a weary Ellie muttered as she plonked herself down on the bed.

What a day! She could have done without going into work, but in view of the circumstances she’d had little choice. There had been no chance to catch up with Leo, and she’d barely seen the twins. And after last night…

No. She mustn’t think about that. It was too terrible. Too awful. For tonight, at least, she had to push it all to the back of her mind.

She had somehow managed to go through the motions of preparing everything for tonight’s dinner - all she had to do was drum up the enthusiasm to get herself ready. The babysitter had arrived - a ridiculous extravagance in Max’s mind, given that they weren’t actually going out - but at least the twins were occupied and all she had to worry about was the food.

Staring disconsolately at her wardrobe and hoping it would provide some magical solution to what she should wear, she heard the bathroom door opening. She could see Max’s reflection in the large mirror that hung over their dressing table, and couldn’t resist watching him as he rubbed his thick dark hair on a towel, another one draped around his middle. Not an inch of fat on him, she could see the muscles in his stomach from where she sat, despite the thin covering of dark hair. He’s so hot, she thought. Was she really losing him?

She sighed.

‘What’s up, my lovely Ellie Jelly Belly’

‘Don’t call me that - you know I hate it,’ Ellie said, scowling at his reflection.

Max laughed.

‘I’ve been calling you that since you were seventeen, and you loved it then.’

‘Of course I did - principally because it wasn’t true. Now it is, so think of something nice to say or don’t say anything.’

A brief tap came on the door, and it was nudged open to reveal Leo, dressed in nothing more than a black T-shirt that just about reached the top of her thighs and clung to her slim hips. Her slender legs were enviably long and lightly tanned.

‘Leo - do you
have
to wander in here naked - or as near as, damn it?’ Ellie said.

As Leo opened the door fully, Ellie saw her glance sideways at Max.

‘Sorry Max. I didn’t know you were here. I thought you were with the twins. And I’m perfectly decent, Ellie. People walk around the centre of Manchester in fewer clothes than this. I came to see if I could borrow your straighteners. I forgot mine, and my hair looks a complete mess if I leave it curly.’

‘Max could have been naked himself, but I don’t suppose either of you would have been bothered.’

Ellie wasn’t surprised to see a look of puzzlement pass between Leo and Max. She knew she was being a grump, but seeing her svelte sister made her feel more frumpy than ever, and she was sure Max couldn’t fail to make a comparison. Leo had always been tall and slender; even as a child she had been taller than her older sister. But with her long dark hair and her preference for wearing black - when she was dressed, that is - with her lips painted a bright crimson, she had a vamp like appearance that was at odds with her personality.

Max had been quiet to this point, but in an obvious attempt to lighten the atmosphere, he started to sing the well known opening notes of “The Stripper”, throwing the towel that he had been drying his hair with to one side in a flourish. To Ellie’s dismay he started to tease open the towel around his waist. She knew what he was going to do, and she had no way of stopping him. He had never had the slightest of inhibitions about his body - and why would he? But she wanted him all to herself. He wasn’t to be shared - she couldn’t bear it.

Before she could utter a word of protest, Max ripped the towel from round his waist, to reveal a pair of tight black shorts which in many ways were even more sexy than if he’d been naked.

Leo gave a slightly derisive snort at Max’s antics, pinched the straighteners from the dressing table, and made a swift exit.

* * *

Max watched Ellie carefully in the mirror for a few seconds. Her head had dropped back down and she was gazing at the floor as if transfixed by the pile of the pale cream carpet. He could see she wasn’t impressed by his little performance. Normally she would have shrugged off his silliness, or laughed with him. But not any more. A pang of guilt struck him hard in the chest. He knew what he’d been doing to her for the past couple of months, but he couldn’t help himself. Every morning he gave himself a good talking to, and every night he acknowledged that he had failed once again to stick to his resolutions.

Max walked over to the bed and sat down beside Ellie. Fully recovered from his earlier hangover he was now looking forward to tonight, and he could see that Ellie was tired and very down. This was so out of character for her, and he had to blame himself. He put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a squeeze.

‘What’s up, Ellie? Why are you so down tonight? You were looking forward to showing off the new house to everybody. But it doesn’t seem to be giving you the pleasure that you expected. What is it, sweetheart?’

Ellie bit her bottom lip.

‘Work was pretty awful today. A young kid - it nearly broke my heart.’

‘Ellie, your patients nearly break your heart every day of the week. So it has to be more than that. Come on. Tell me.’

‘I’ve got nothing to wear, I haven’t got time to straighten my hair, and couldn’t now because Leo has pinched the straighteners, and that all sounds so pathetic and self-indulgent in relation to other people’s problems.’

Max rubbed her shoulder and gave her another squeeze.

‘Sometimes it’s the little things that get to you, because you don’t want to think about the big things, so let’s deal with those points in order, shall we?’ he said. ‘Why haven’t you got anything to wear, hmm? You’ve spent money on everything else, why not yourself?’

‘You know why not.’

‘No, I don’t know why not.’

Ellie’s head dropped even further onto her chest, and she mumbled her response under her breath.

‘Because I was waiting until I was thinner to buy new stuff. You know that. I’ve been waiting for three years and that’s why I never buy any clothes.’

Max did, of course, know this. They’d had this conversation so many times, and it never got any easier to convince her. But he would try again. Anything to get that lovely smile back.

‘Sweetheart, you know I think you’re beautiful just as you are, so why not go with the flow? You are what you are, and to me that’s voluptuous and sexy.’

He put his other arm round her and hugged her tight. She pushed his arm away.

‘Bollocks, Max. You don’t think that, or you wouldn’t always be trying to make me exercise. You want me to be thinner.’

He swallowed a sigh, knowing that it wouldn’t help.

‘No, I don’t want you to be thinner, I want you to be fitter, because then you would be healthier. I don’t care about your size. And you’re not fat. You’re not a stick insect, but thank God for that I say.’

‘We all know that nowadays men only find skinny girls attractive - girls like Leo and that PE teacher at your school.’

Max paused. He needed to get this right, and the best bet would probably be to ignore the last part of that comment.

‘Now you really are talking rubbish. Look at Nigella Lawson - arse the size of a small bungalow, but men still think she’s sexy. And you’re about a third of the size.’

‘She’s lost a load of weight, actually - so obviously even she didn’t think it was very attractive.’

Realising that once more he wasn’t going to win this argument, Max got up from the bed and made his way to the wardrobe.

‘What about this black dress. You look sexy in that.’

‘I wear that every single time we go anywhere, and that cow Mimi is bound to comment. What is Pat doing with her, Max? He must be mental, leaving Georgia for her.’

Max couldn’t fail to agree, but this was another discussion they’d had several times in the last couple of months, without resolution.

‘Look, why don’t you go and have a lovely long shower - leave your hair curly, because it suits you better like that, and I’ll go downstairs and bring up a bottle of ice cold bubbly which we can drink while you’re getting ready. Wash away the trauma of your day. Nobody will be here for a couple of hours, so there’s loads of time.’

Ellie pulled an apologetic face.

‘Ah. I forgot to tell you. I asked Fiona and Charles to come early. I wanted somebody else to be here when Pat and Mimi arrive, so we’ve got about an hour. Sorry.’

Max groaned, not relishing the idea of being landed with bloody Charles for an hour while the women nattered in the kitchen. But he put a brave face on it. Anything to see his wife’s beautiful smile.

‘Fine - well we can still have a couple of glasses, courtesy of The Old Witch. What do you say?’

Max was pleased to see a flicker of a smile as he closed the bedroom door.

8

Grabbing a silk dressing gown from the bed, Leo thrust her arms into the sleeves. What on earth was wrong with Ellie? It wasn’t like her to be so tetchy. It felt like a bad omen for the evening ahead, and Leo couldn’t help thinking that in some way it was her fault. She had been so sure of her welcome here, but maybe it had been wrong to act on impulse.

Plugging the straighteners in to warm up, she walked over to the open window and leant her elbows on the sill. The view calmed her; it hadn’t changed in all these years. The flat green fields stretched for miles behind the house but she could just glimpse the dark hills in the distance. Her bedroom hadn’t had a window - it was more of a cupboard really - so whenever she had been able to sneak in here she had always stood gazing at the scenery, thinking about other places, other times, and other lives.

Without warning, her mind was assaulted with a memory so vivid that she gasped. She recalled standing in this very position gazing out of the window, and she remembered the day clearly. She must have been about fourteen, and she’d been sent home from school because of agonising stomach pains. She hadn’t wanted anybody to know because there would be no sympathy, so she had sneaked into the house unobserved. She’d never said that she had started her periods, and her stepmother hadn’t bothered to ask. Leo had to take everything she needed from Ellie, or sometimes Ellie would hand over some of her pocket money. Leo didn’t get pocket money, of course.

She remembered that she had sneaked upstairs and come into Ellie’s room to raid her top drawer. It had been a day much like today, and the window had been open. Nobody knew she was there. She had no idea why her father was home that day, but he was unenthusiastically hoeing the flowerbed below the window - probably the last time the garden was touched until Ellie and Max had taken it over. She had moved back, afraid to be seen, but the voices still invaded the room, and their bitterness and hatred seemed to be tainting every surface they touched.

The first voice was her stepmother’s.

‘You can’t hide from me out here. I haven’t finished with you yet. I’ve always known you lack moral fibre, but I thought you’d finally learned your lesson. I suppose that would be too much to ask, wouldn’t it?’

‘Shut up Denise. You don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘Hah! You’d like to believe that wouldn’t you? But I know you. And I know what you’re up to when you’re not here. I didn’t know about your brat, but do you think I didn’t know about her mother? Your whore?’

‘She wasn’t a whore. She was my wife. And she’s dead - more’s the pity. She at least made me smile.’

‘I’m
your wife. Me. Maybe I should tell the police, have you done for bigamy. As it is, I can’t show my face in the fucking village. Since SHE came, your little bastard, everybody’s talking.’

‘Your language is a disgrace, Denise. And Sandra was more of a wife to me than you will ever be. If you wonder why I have to look elsewhere, take a good look at yourself.’

‘Looking’s one thing. Touching’s another. I don’t care about those sad cows that find you irresistible. But what about those that don’t, eh? What about the clever ones who are not taken in by your slimy charms? What do you do to them? As if I didn’t know. But you don’t like it when they say no, do you? And they’re getting progressively younger, aren’t they?’

‘I’ll say it again - you don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re making things up. And for Christ’s sake, woman, keep your voice down.’

‘Or what? I’ve told you - I know you. I’m not stupid. The latest one’s gone now, poor little bitch, but I know what you did. So who’s next, hmm?’

‘Just get out of my sight.’

‘Oh no. This time I’m not backing down. I want you gone. Do you hear me? Gone. You were lucky this time. But you’re not going to shame me again.’

Shaking herself back into the present, Leo pushed herself away from the window. She didn’t want to remember any more. It was years ago - maybe she hadn’t recalled it correctly. The venom in her stepmother’s voice was accurate, as was the contempt in her father’s. But the conversation? She couldn’t be sure, but it had seemed so clear as the words leapt into her head. She remembered the pain of listening to them discussing her mother, but the rest hadn’t meant so much at the time. It was just like every other row. But if her memory was accurate, what did it mean?

Leo had known from the day she arrived in Little Melham that her stepmother despised her, and she had stopped caring about that long ago. But her own mother had been special. So much fun. Hearing her described like this brought back the pain she’d been burying for years. She had been sure that her father had loved her mother, because she made him laugh and he had looked happy when they were together. She’d never seen that expression on his face again after her mother had died. But then she had avoided looking at him after the day he brought her here. He had never comforted her as she cried. Only Ellie had tried - and Leo had shunned her sister’s affection.

She bent down to her holdall, pulled out her laptop and searched for a file marked ‘father’. Whether those words had actually been spoken or not, she was going to add them to her notes. Ellie’s mother had never told them the truth about their father’s disappearance, Leo was positive of that. And Ellie had never been able to accept that he was dead, and still lived in hope that one day soon he would walk back through the front door. Why else would she have chosen to live in a house that brought back so many bleak memories?

For her sister’s sake, Leo needed to find out where their father had gone, and more to the point, why he’d never come back.