Her horse, the admirably straightforward Crikey O’Riley, was in his third competitive season and, although he was never going to set the world alight, was a super-safe conveyance whom the Beauchamps planned to get to advanced level and sell as a schoolmaster, or to even encourage James to buy for his stepdaughter.
‘We should pull her out,’ Tash said after Beccy had tried too hard and over-ridden both the dressage and the show-jumping, winding up the usually brain-dead Riley.
‘She’ll be fine,’ Hugo dismissed vaguely, with half an eye on Lough. It seemed there was no way Hugo could possibly catch him in the league tables now, but he certainly wasn’t going to let him near his wife.
Tash was happy to steer clear. She had too much on her mind to crowd it with Lough. As well as worrying about Beccy and her own rides she’d noticed that Hugo had been texting furtively all morning. She couldn’t get near his phone as he kept it stashed in his pocket at all times these days.
‘Gus is just the same.’ Penny, standing alongside Tash, sighed as she watched Hugo pull up in the far corner of the warm-up arena and begin messaging surreptitiously, using his black jacket to shadow the screen. ‘He’s permanently attached to that bloody phone of his, panting like a schoolboy every time his mistress fondles his inbox. They think we don’t know.’
Tash turned to her anxiously, wondering what she had heard, but at that moment Penny spotted a familiar face nearby and leaped towards it. ‘Gin! Haven’t seen you and Tony for bloody ages! You got a horse running here?’
Tall, iron-haired Gin Seaton jumped, looking as though she’d just been caught shoplifting. ‘Oh, no we – er – have no horses these days. We like to come to Barbury. Such a super event.’
Beside her, her big lantern-jawed husband Tony, who was upholstered from head to foot in tweeds like Mr Toad, was eyeing Tash appreciatively. ‘You’ve lost weight, Mrs Beauchamp.’ He then sidled
up to her and whispered, ‘Hear you’ve taken a lover; always good for the figure, eh?’ He’d always been odious.
Tash would have liked to catch up with Gin, who’d been a good friend over the years and who had been so odd with her at Badminton, but Hugo had pocketed his phone now and was riding up to her wanting Sir Galahad’s bandages removed.
‘Who was that you were texting?’ she asked.
‘What?’ He was in no mood for an inquisition, glaring at Lough as he rode out of the dressage arena to enthusiastic applause and jumped off to hand his horse to Lemon. A pair of teenagers then came up to him, giggling furiously, and asked for his autograph. Hugo narrowed his eyes. ‘He thinks he’s a bloody rock star.’
As soon as Hugo was in the dressage arena performing his three star-test on Sir Galahad, Lough brushed past Tash, muttering ‘Talk to me now.’
She ignored him, her pulse electrified.
He did an about turn and brushed past her again. ‘I have to talk to you. I have news.’
There was no privacy at Barbury. Everything was just too visible.
In the end she followed him at a safe distance to one of the only secluded spots on the course: up the ramp in the back of his lorry, tucked out of sight behind one of the partitions that separated the horses in transit.
‘My father’s turned up in Auckland.’
‘Alive?’ She gasped before she could think what she was saying.
‘Of course alive,’ he said crossly. ‘Turns out he took the money I bunged him that night and blew the lot on a holiday of a lifetime on the Gold Coast. Won a small fortune on the tables the first night there, then went out celebrating with a croupier called Darlene before taking her on a road trip around Oz for six months. Now the money’s run out, they’ve both just turned up in Auckland announcing they’re expecting a baby.’
‘That’s great,’ Tash nodded. ‘You must be so relieved.’
He looked at her oddly.
‘You didn’t kill him after all,’ she said encouragingly.
‘Are you okay?’
‘I’m fine.’ Tash, desperate to get away, couldn’t look at him; she was terrified of drowning in his sympathetic eyes again. Married life might be hell, but extra-marital life would be a whole lot worse.
His deep voice was hoarse with emotion. ‘I want to help, Tash.’
‘Well you can’t.’
‘Anything.’
‘Okay.’ She laughed hollowly. ‘Find out who Hugo’s having an affair with.’
There was a long pause, and Tash risked looking up at him. ‘You already know, don’t you?’
His eyes were molten.
Look away now. Don’t drown. Don’t drown.
She started to drown.
He shook his head and it was his turn to look away and break the spell, his cheek muscles quilting with tension. ‘I heard something.’
‘What?’
‘It’s nothing. Just a rumour.’
‘
What?
’
‘Something that happened on New Year’s Eve – at the party we went to.’
Tash took a sharp breath, frantically thinking back and feeling a stab of terror as she remembered who had singled Hugo out for attention there. It was the evening she’d cried on Zoe’s shoulder in the Lime Tree Farm larder, her marriage already fractured. And Sylva Frost had been all over Hugo. She’d dropped Tash as a friend almost immediately afterwards.
‘What happened, Lough? Tell me!’
He shook his head again and turned away. ‘It’s not for me to say.’
‘You have to!’
They both looked round in shock as Lemon appeared on the ramp behind them, breathless from running.
‘Accident!’ he panted, clutching his knees with his hands and looking up at them through the pain of a stitch. ‘There’s been an accident!’
‘Oh no, not Hugo!’ Tash cried, rushing out past him.
‘No – Beccy,’ he gasped, but she had already gone. He straightened up and looked at Lough. They could both hear the air ambulance overhead.
As Lough made for the ramp Lemon stepped forward to bar his way.
‘She leaving Hugo or not?’
‘Not now, Lem!’
‘But you were telling her about Hugo and Beccy, right?’
Lough looked away, kicked with remorse. He should have said nothing; he knew the messenger always got shot. Now poor Beccy was in God knows what state. He shook his head, pushing Lemon aside.
‘Hey, don’t mind me! I’m only the groom,’ Lemon recovered his balance and kicked the ramp angrily. ‘I just get to do your dirty work for you.’
Over the Tannoy, the commentator announced an indefinite hold on the course.
Beccy had been showing off for Lough when she fell, unaware that he was far from sight.
Unwatched, unmarked and kicking on for all she was worth because she was frightened and fear always made her want to run faster like the horses she loved, she and Riley had hurtled at one of the most straightforward fences on the course on a complete loser of a stride. There was simply never going to be a take-off point, but such was their velocity there was no stopping point either. A pair of big-hearted, galloping optimists, they prayed right up until the last few metres when Riley took off far too early and paddled down into the fence, falling backwards on to Beccy.
Her lower body took the full force of his haunches crashing down, a hock jammed against her hip. The horse scrambled to his feet, but she couldn’t move her legs at all.
Having just finished his dressage test, Hugo galloped directly from the arena to Beccy, leaving his horse with a bemused steward while he stepped into help, trying not to get in the paramedics’ way. Beccy wouldn’t stop screaming, which at least reassured them that she was fully conscious.
‘Where the fuck have you been?’ he demanded when Tash made it to the scene.
Saying nothing, she spoke briefly to the paramedics and then climbed into the helicopter.
Tash paced around the hospital corridors for hours, still in her riding boots and spurs, which made her footfalls sound like a clanking ghost. Eventually the nursing staff had to ask her to stay put in the relatives’ room.
The diagnosis, when it finally came, was better than worst fears, but still bleak. Beccy had badly fractured her pelvis. There was no internal bleeding, but it was a complicated and very painful injury that would take many weeks to mend and then an even longer rehabilitation.
It was past eleven that night by the time Hugo arrived at the hospital to collect Tash. He found her reading a battered old copy of
Cheers!
magazine, the cover of which boasted an exclusive interview with Sylva Frost about her engagement to Dillon Rafferty.
‘You don’t want to believe a word of that manufactured pap,’ he told her.
‘You know that personally, do you?’ she muttered, throwing it down.
Hugo stepped back in surprise, but Tash was too exhausted to pick fights.
‘Let me just say goodbye to Beccy.’ She rubbed the back of her stiff neck and stood up. ‘She was awake last time I looked. Come with me. She’ll appreciate that. She’s pretty out of it on painkillers but your name crops up quite a lot.’
‘Probably wants to sue me.’
‘It was my fault,’ Tash said shakily. ‘I should have made her withdraw after the show-jumping.’
‘It was nobody’s fault,’ he insisted. ‘It was an accident. Is her mother flying back?’
‘They’re at the airport trying to get cancelled seats. Em’s driving down from London first thing.’
Beccy had a single room, which was in near darkness with just the lights from her various remote-controlled drips, drivers and monitors like fireflies around her.
She swivelled her head as Tash and Hugo came in, her eyes softened by analgesia.
‘Bad luck, Beccy,’ Hugo said a little too glibly as he stooped down to kiss her cheek. ‘Hear you’ve smashed your pelvis. Ruins your sex life for a bit, but you’ll make up for it when you’re winning Badminton.’
The eyes focussed briefly, tears welling.
‘I wish I still fancied you,’ she told him groggily, the drugs robbing her of any self control. ‘You are so handsome.’
‘Thanks.’ He cleared his throat awkwardly and glanced at Tash,
who looked curiously compassionate, having suspected her stepsister’s crush for years.
Beccy had closed her eyes, smiling now. ‘I’m glad we had our moment. I’ll treasure that.’
‘What moment?’ Tash asked in a small voice.
But Beccy turned her head away. ‘I think I might sleep now. Thanks for looking after me. I love you so much.’ It wasn’t clear who she was addressing, but she fell asleep with a very contented sigh, like Cora after her favourite bedtime story.
‘I have
no
idea what she’s talking about,’ Hugo insisted as he marched around a deserted multi-story car park trying to find where he’d left his car, Tash hot on his heels. ‘You know what a fantasist she is. She’s totally spaced out. It could mean anything.’
‘Okay, okay, let’s leave it for now,’ Tash pacified him as they finally found the Land Rover tucked behind a pillar. She didn’t trust him to drive safely if they were arguing. He could kill them both in this mood, and bad luck happened in threes. First Rory, now Beccy. She didn’t want to risk Cora and Amery being orphaned tonight.
They drove out of Swindon in stony silence, boy racers revving past them on the bypass in souped-up Corsas with tinted windows, vast spoilers and booming stereos. She was reminded of that awful night in Germany when he’d dumped her at Düsseldorf airport. Every time a bubble of anger shot up her throat demanding to be popped with questions about what happened with Sylva on New Year’s Eve, what Beccy was talking about, who he’d been texting all day, she fought it back down. Hugo was already well over the speed limit.
‘How’s Riley?’ she asked eventually.
‘Dead.’
‘What?’
‘Massive crack in his stifle. Had to be destroyed.’
‘Oh God.’ Tash put her face in her hands. ‘Poor Riley. Beccy will be devastated.’
They travelled ten more miles in stony silence before it occurred to Tash to ask after Hugo’s main ride of the day.
‘I won the Barbury Plate,’ he reported matter-of-factly.
But neither of them was in the mood to take any pleasure from the victory.
When they arrived home the big lorry was already packed up on the arrivals yard ready to travel to Upton horse trials the following morning, where the Beauchamps had six horses to run over two days.
‘I’ll stay behind,’ Tash volunteered. ‘Beccy needs me.’
But Hugo insisted she must still come. ‘She’s got the rest of the family rallying round. If you scratch now we have to pull out all the horses. This is our livelihood.’
With nobody else to help on the ground Tash reluctantly conceded the point, phoning the older of her two stepsisters to explain that she’d be away for a few days.
‘Well, I suppose you have to do what you think best,’ Em said archly; she was sounding more and more like Henrietta these days. ‘Mummy and I will look after her. She needs her family around her now, after all.’ The implication was clear, and Tash felt as though she was letting Beccy down more than ever.
When Em arrived at the hospital, she found a visitor already at her sister’s bedside, and quickly identified the yellow Mohican from Beccy’s descriptions. She was surprised to see him there, having also been told that the split was far from amicable.
But Lemon was the picture of concerned friend, fresh flowers on his lap, a hand covering Beccy’s limp one, his face tight with worry. He smelled strongly of horses and there was straw in his yellow hair, so he’d clearly come straight from mucking out on his yard.
Beccy, eyes closed, looked incredibly pretty, a cloud of blonde hair framing her pale face like spun gold around a pearl. Having not seen her since Christmas, Em was struck by how much healthier she was looking, her face rounder, her hair longer, her complexion clear and skin dusted with light freckles. Ironic, given she was lying in a hospital bed.
‘She’s asleep.’ Lemon pointed out the obvious. ‘They’re pumping her full of opiates, lucky girl. Let’s have a coffee and I’ll fill you in, yeah? I spotted a canteen earlier.’
Em wasn’t sure she wanted to be ‘filled in’ by her sister’s ex, but Lemon was already bounding along the corridor like Willy Wonka giving a guided tour of the Chocolate Factory, telling Em all about the horrors of the accident, the ambulance landing at Barbury, the on-course rumour that Beccy was dead.