Deception (2 page)

Boy, was he tall. As tall as Jonti, maybe even taller. This guy must’ve been about 6ft 1” or 2”, and he was powerful looking, too. A bit of a beef cake, as my mother’s generation would’ve said. Now I could see him close up, he looked more like an action style movie star than a London taxi driver. I felt tiny and even fragile beside him.

“Okay, so, let’s make with the feet, shall we?” he said encouragingly, using a slight pressure on my arm to make himself understood. I moved my legs obediently in time with his and like a pair of elderly lovers we slowly ascended the steps, and then traversed along a short pathway until we reached the main door leading to the ground floor flats. It was always open, there was no concierge. Tradesmen came and went.

“My brother and sister-in-law live at this one,” I whispered as we arrived at the first door on the right.

The cab driver inclined his head gravely. “Okay,” he said in acknowledgement, and dropped his hand from my arm to ring the doorbell for me.

After a while Jonti came to the door, took one look at my face, and instantly drew me inside. The driver remained standing on the doorstep. Jonti looked up at the taller man, looking slightly quizzical, and then rested his gaze on me.Quickly I explained who the guy was and that I’d come out without enough money on me to pay the driver. My brother immediately whipped out his wallet and paid the man the fare, giving him a big tip.

I got the strangest feeling that the driver didn’t want to accept the money, but I sensed he realised that it might have looked odd otherwise. There was just a brief moment when we looked at one another, and I thought he was going to say something, but then he just smiled, gave a little salute, half mocking, then he was gone and
Jonti closed the door behind him.

Chapter 2

As I entered the flat I was greeted by a lovely, warm welcoming smell of something appetising cooking but though my stomach was rumbling, since I hadn’t eaten since lunch, when I’d grabbed a sandwich at work, I still had to fully recount what had happened and the reason I was there. I steadied myself and pulled off my shoes. Then I began talking.

My brother’s reaction to my unhappy news almost had me believing that our family had Mafia connections. His eyes darkened, and his jaw seemed to get squarer.

He said peremptorily, “So give me your keys to the flat, Bailey. I’ll go teach the son of a bitch a lesson he’ll never forget.”

“
Jonti, I began apologetically, but he wasn’t listening to me, being too caught up in his own fantasies.

“I’ll take a chap with me who I met at the pub the other day,” he raced on, his eyes still bright with fervour. “Interesting sort of fellow, Bailey. You’d like him, I’m sure. Most unusual looking. Lots of tattoos and piercings, as
bald as an egg. Rings on each finger. I’ve an inkling he might be rather useful at this sort of thing…”

“…This sort of thing?”

“Sure. We’ll go break the bastard’s legs. Or maybe his fingers. That way he won’t be able to hold a paint brush again for a while. Just say the word.”

He’d spoken with such chilling, thrilling menace in his tone, holding out his hand for the key to the flat and looking so commanding that, despite my involuntary shudder, I’d been quite impressed. But still I shook my head.

“No, honey. That’s a really tempting, even appealing proposal,” I replied, “but I really can’t let you do that”. My brother looked at me, baffled and, unsurprisingly, somewhat confused.

“Why the hell not, Bay?” he growled. “The bastard deserves a good beating.”

“I quite agree.”

“So what’s with the reluctance?”
Jonti said sharply. His eyes narrowed accusingly, piercing into mine. “Don’t tell me you still hanker after the guy? Not after what he’s done, with Kristie…”

He stared down into my upturned face. He was almost a half foot taller than me, so we rarely saw things eye to eye, and not for the first time did I wonder how two siblings could be so dissimilar. Neither of our parents was particularly tall, and
Jonti was just over six foot. I looked away from his quizzing eyes, not sure myself how I felt about Freddie, despite everything and, as if he could read my mind, Jonti ground his teeth together.

“Bloody hell, I don’t believe it,” he snorted. “Not after all you’ve just said and been through! After that miserable, cheating, deceiving, lying son of a…”

I placed my hand over his mouth. “…Jonti, darling, I really appreciate it but will you please shut up for a moment!”

I couldn’t help the sigh from escaping my lips.

“You can’t go to the flat and duff him up because I can’t give you the keys to the flat. And I can’t give you the keys to the flat because I haven’t
got
my keys to the flat anymore.” I paused, sniffing, and happened to glance at the wall mirror hanging behind the hall table. My reflection confirmed that I did indeed look like a Panda. I tried to rub the smudged mascara from beneath my eyes with the sleeve of my blouse. “Freddie took them off me,” I added lamely.

Jonti’s
jaw clenched and he grabbed my shoulders, bringing his face closer to mine. His jaw worked. “Forcibly?” he hissed. “Did he hurt you?”

I pried
Jonti’s fingers away from my shoulders. I said, “Don’t be daft; he’s not the violent type. Come on, you’ve met Freddie. If anything he’s a real pussy. Normally he hates any sort of confrontation. No.
I
chucked them at him.” I paused, remembering. “Actually, I was aiming them at his face. I missed. Hit the wall instead.”

Jonti
rolled his eyes, and his tone grew disparaging. “Typical. You were never a very good thrower. Even when we were kids you were crap with a ball. Absolutely rubbish at bowling, if I remember rightly.”

“I should’ve remembered that when I hurled my set of keys at him, shouldn’t I? A mistake, I realise that now, of course. Now I have absolutely no leverage at all.”I gave a deep, despondent sigh and
Jonti tried to put a reassuring arm around my shoulder.

“
Sshh. It’s okay.”

I pulled away, frowning. I said, “How can it be okay? I’ve lost my man to a girl who I work with and once thought of as a friend, and I’m homeless. So how is any of that okay?”

“You’ve still got me. And Miranda.”

But his soothing words did little to assuage the indignation that suddenly burned through me.

“You know something?” I hissed. “It’s all that Kristie Gillingham’s fault. She threw herself at him, that red-headed little strumpet. I blame her, not him.”

“The guy was hardly a saint, Bailey,”
Jonti put in sagely. “You knew that, even when you first started dating the bloke. He’s been round the block a few times. Admitted it as much himself. He always had an eye for a pretty woman.”

“Well, he would have, wouldn’t he, since he’s a portrait painter – but I never suspected him of being quite so hands on.”

“You always were rather gullible and foolhardy, but you wouldn’t be told.”

I could feel myself growing indignant. I said, “Oh, thanks. So it’s all my fault, is it, for being so naïve and trusting?

“I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to. I know what you think. What you always thought about him,
us
, but were too polite and civilised to say to my face.”

He didn’t say anything.

I rushed on. “But my point is, I don’t think Freddie’s entirely to blame.”

“So he’s no gigolo but a weak man whose head was turned by a pretty young thing.”

“Exactly. Basically he’s a very loving, decent person.”

Jonti
looked thoughtful. “Maybe he was just clever at being deceitful.”

I huffed indignantly. “Oh, for God’s sake, bro, I’ve not been playing at make believe for the past few years. I wanted a serious relationship.”

“Maybe that’s what
you
wanted.”

I turned away. The Freddie I’d known and loved just didn’t fit in with the Freddie who’d just chucked me out of my home. I could hear my voice tremble slightly when I spoke again. “Trouble is, I can’t get my head around the fact that if he didn’t want me, why didn’t he just come right out and tell me so? What was I going to do to him?” I looked up at my brother’s face. He was looking at me pityingly, but I couldn’t stop myself from asking: “If he didn’t want me anymore, and he wanted Kristie, why couldn’t he simply have the guts to admit it? Why did he have to let me find out in such a horrible way?”

Jonti shrugged. “Why don’t you ask him?”

I turned away. “You must be joking,” I muttered. “I wouldn’t stoop so low to show him I cared.”

“Even though it’s obvious you’re trying to make excuses for the guy because you think you still love him?”

I didn’t reply.

“I remember meeting her once,” Jonti went on reflectively. “Attractive, with flowing titian hair and eyes the colour of cooking apples.”

I stared up at my kid brother crossly. “I see she made a bit of an impression on you, too.”

“You think it was just a one off thing?” mused Jonti, obviously thinking aloud.

I shrugged. Didn’t reply, didn’t know, since as far as I was concerned the outcome was the same.

Jonti tugged at his chin. “It’s going to be a trifle difficult for you to continue going to the bank every day with her working there too,” he said.

I didn’t answer. I’d already considered that and for sure I didn’t relish the idea of being in the same office with her day after day. It would be unbearable.

I shrugged out of my sodden jacket and hung it up in the cloakroom, then ran a hand through my long brown hair which only now was drying into the natural curls that hung down my back reaching almost to my waist. I slipped into the bathroom and grabbed a hand towel to help it along in the drying process.

When I came back out of the bathroom, still rubbing at my hair with the towel,
Jonti was standing where I’d left him in the hall. When he saw me he slid his mobile phone back into his pocket, and I figured he must’ve been trying to reach Miranda. Maybe to tell her the good news that his sister had come to stay for a while. I grabbed a fresh Kleenex from a box on the hall table and peered once again at my reflection before trying once more to repair the damage to my face.

Wanting to change the subject, I said, “So where’s Miranda? Gone off and left you to your own devices while she’s out dancing the night away?”

Jonti leaned back against the wall, crossed his arms and watched in evident fascination as I went about returning my face to some semblance of normality. I remembered that, even as a little boy, he’d loved watching his big sister playing around with makeup and new hair styles at her dressing table.

For a while I’d been slightly worried that he was into girlie stuff rather too much, but all turned out well when he met his future wife at
Uni and they decided they were made for one another. After they’d graduated, they had both found good jobs, then going about things the proper way, got a mortgage, found themselves a nice home, and gotten married.

I’d been a bridesmaid at their wedding. I’d stood at the altar in purple silk, standing along two tiny tots barely reaching my ankles, apparently children of Miranda’s many relatives. The smile on my face hadn’t reached my heart. Inside I’d felt sorrowful. Happy of course that my darling young brother was getting married, yet sad for myself that I wasn’t. I didn’t
particularly care to be an object of any finger pointing, only I hadn’t seen how I could get out of it without offending anyone, particularly my future sister-in-law, with whom I was always quite careful not to rub up the wrong way as she could be quite a sensitive creature and didn’t take kindly to sarcasm or cutting remarks about her intended husband.

Now
Jonti said lightly, “None of your snide remarks about my pregnant wife, please, Bay. In fact, you should be grateful I was here at all.” He looked at me with some disapproval, and I got the feeling it was genuine.

He said, “I could’ve gone out after work for drinks with some mates, which was what I’d actually intended doing before I changed my mind and came home instead. So you’re fortunate I was here to answer the door. I mean, what would you have done otherwise? Gone round to one of your girlfriends for the night?”

“Maybe I’d just have driven around all night with the handsome taxi driver who came to my aid like some knight on a black charger.”

“However romantic you like to think that sounds, he’s just a cabbie who presumably doesn’t work for nothing.”

I bit back a retort. “You’re right, and I’m truly thankful I’ve got you,” I said penitently.

“Don’t thank me, thank Miranda.”

“I will, when I see her. Did you speak to her?”

“Not yet.”

“She’ll find out soon enough. I wonder what her reaction will be?”

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

I asked again, “So where is she then?”

“If you must know, she went round to her parents’ house for some prime quality roast beef and some equally prime quality time in the bosom of her family.”

“D’you think she’ll mind?”

“That I didn’t go with her to share the roast beef?

“Idiot.”

“Ah, well, if you mean about what’s happened to you, of course she’ll be upset as I know she hoped that, despite the age gap, you and Freddie would make a go of it.”

I said with slow deliberation, “I meant, Jonti, would she mind about me coming to stay with you guys?”

He rubbed his chin, and for the first time I sensed his slight discomfort. “Ah. That. Well, I’m sure she’ll be cool about it.”

I wasn’t so sure. Pregnant first time mums-to-be with high blood pressure, swollen ankles and a need to go to the loo every thirty minutes during the night aren’t generally known to take everything in their stride. It was going to take some schmoozing and sweetness on my part to get her to accept the situation. Suddenly I stopped thinking about myself, and sniffed. I could smell burning.

Jonti
was watching me. “What?”

My smile was rueful. I said, “Your sense of smell is about as good as my aim.”

He straightened up, scowling. “Bloody hell. My dinner! And I spent ages preparing it.”

I felt real remorse as he strode off towards the kitchen. “Sorry, bro. Blame me. It’s all my fault for turning up unannounced and distracting you.”

Jonti made a sort of harrumphing noise at the back of his throat that could’ve meant anything.

I called out after him in as sweet a sisterly fashion as I could manage. “Want some help?”

He called back over his shoulder. “God, no. I know what you’re like in the kitchen. You’ll want to take over everything, and change everything around and it drives Miranda mad. Go and watch TV or something.”