Authors: Catherine Hunt
There was nothing on the websites that she hadn’t seen already, so she checked his Facebook page. It was still closed to her but she looked anyway, just to see his face.
There was an update. A dreadful, one-line update that everyone was allowed to see. It said that he was married. It said that the name of the woman who had become his wife was Laura Maxwell.
For a while she was too paralysed to move. Her eyes stared, unbelieving, at the screen. Then, hardly aware of what she was doing, Anna typed in Laura’s name and there, in the Law Society Gazette under the title ‘Heading South’, was the information that high-powered divorce lawyer Laura Maxwell was leaving her post at Lloyd Wingate to join the firm of Morrison Kemp in Brighton. There was a brief résumé of her career highlights but Anna didn’t see them. She could see nothing through the white-hot anguish in her brain.
It was beyond belief; surely, beyond endurance.
The shock had been tremendous and Anna’s hands shook as she forced herself to read about Laura Maxwell. There were articles charting the progress of Laura’s illustrious career. In 2006, she had been named as one of the ten ‘most-promising lawyers under thirty’, in 2007, she joined the prestigious London office of Lloyd Wingate; always, Laura was a rising star.
Laura’s divorce clients got ever more important, and if she’d carried on the way she was going, it wouldn’t have been too long before she represented the very rich and famous. As it was, there were no celebrities or princesses and her name didn’t make the front pages but it did occasionally appear in the middle pages linked with cases involving ground-breaking settlements or topical points of law.
Laura had made a point of doing pro bono work for ‘deserving’ clients who couldn’t afford her firm’s fees; no doubt, Anna thought sourly, so that she could get extra points in the league table of promising lawyers. Having a social conscience, or appearing to have one, always ticked a useful box.
It was one of those cases that blew up in her face. Laura Maxwell had been representing Georgina Morgan for free, and she had done an excellent job. But when the distraught father, who suffered from bipolar disorder, took the law into his own hands, some of the press coverage questioned whether the system put those with mental health problems at a disadvantage. She had operated that system and the whole thing had left a nasty taste behind it. For once, and once only, Anna enjoyed the coverage.
Now Laura Maxwell had married Joe. It was grotesque. But Anna had learned to control her mind and any thought that she had lost him was ruthlessly banished. There would be no negatives. They made a fool of you, made you vulnerable, made you a victim. Instead, she decided to find a way to meet him and the decision both excited and terrified her. All day, every day, she plotted how to do it, made a hundred plans to make it happen.
She was a good-looking woman, she knew that, probably very good-looking, and she knew how to attract men. The ugly girl had grown naturally into her large body, morphing into a tall, striking, curvaceous woman. Anna had helped the transformation along. Ever since her late teens, when she had come out of the psychiatric hospital determined to turn her life around, she had focused on improving her looks. Her mousy brown hair became blonde, her diet was merciless, she worked out rigorously at the gym, spent money on stylish clothes and beauty treatments. She had worked on her mind, too, with yoga and meditation classes to give her self-control. And she had worked on learning how to make people like her.
She could be charming, lovable, demure, exciting; independent or hanging on their every word; a chameleon, ready to fit whatever she judged was wanted. She could adapt, could give people what they were looking for; tell them what they wanted to hear. And so she had travelled a million miles from the ugly, introverted teenager that Joe had once spoken a few words to on the beach.
Joe was living just a few miles away, had come right back into the centre of her life, smack into it. The thought that he was here, and so close, made her tremble with excitement. The thought that he was here with Laura Maxwell made her tremble too, but with a different emotion.
In the end, meeting him had been ludicrously easy. Deliciously so. The trick with the nursing home had worked like a dream.
She had found out where he lived by waiting outside Morrison Kemp for Laura to appear, and then following her home. The sight of her, even from a distance, had made Anna’s stomach churn. If she had felt jealousy at seeing a photo of Laura on the Internet, that was nothing to what she felt at seeing her in real life.
She was brutally honest with herself. The woman was attractive, she had a petite prettiness, and her milky skin and high cheekbones gave her a stylish look that was also very natural. Her black hair was tied back and she was wearing a pair of thick spectacles, but in an odd way, that all added to her air of elegance. It was a brief, awful glimpse, and it detonated an explosion inside her. Laura had driven off in her white Audi and Anna had followed in her own car, her knuckles white on the steering wheel, the palms of her hands sweaty from adrenaline.
She tracked them both for months weighing up her best chance. To start with she focused on Joe’s workplace – the Greene House Hotel in Hove – it should be easy to meet him there. But she worried he would be busy and distracted by other things. She needed a place where she could have time with him, where she could make a good impression. On Thursday mornings he usually visited his mother at her nursing home out on the cliffs near Rottingdean. She followed him there and waited for her chance.
It came on a crisp sunny day, which brought the year’s first touch of spring and the first real opportunity for the nursing home residents to enjoy sitting out in the fresh air after a long winter. The home had large, leafy grounds overlooking the sea. She was standing among a group of conifers, half hidden from view, when she spotted Joe come out of the double doors pushing his mother’s wheelchair.
There was a lot of activity. Those without visitors to assist were being taken out by the staff. She watched as one old man was wheeled towards her. The nurse stopped the chair close by, spoke to the man in a loud voice and Anna guessed he must have trouble hearing. The nurse pointed out the sunlight sparkling on the sea, the yachts below working hard to catch the light breeze. It would make a good painting, Anna heard her say. The old man didn’t reply, just stared ahead with an anxious look on his face.
Anna moved out from the trees towards the wheelchair, an idea forming in her mind. She caught the nurse’s eye.
‘Good morning,’ she said, ‘fantastic spot, isn’t it? I’m looking round for a nursing home for my father. He’s a keen artist and I think he might like it here.’
‘Perfect for him.’ The nurse nodded towards the old man. ‘This gentleman, he used to paint, but sadly not since his stroke. I’m afraid he can’t speak anymore so he can’t talk about it but I’m sure he still loves the views.’
Anna said something sympathetic, felt excitement inside her. The nurse patted the man’s arm, told him she would leave him to enjoy the beautiful day and be back in half an hour.
She waited until the nurse was out of sight then seized the wheelchair. She smiled at the old man but got no response.
‘Would you like a tour of the grounds?’ she asked, to test him.
No reply. No change in his anxious expression. She decided to take a chance.
She wheeled him away towards Joe and his mother. They had reached the edge of the grounds and he was standing beside his mother’s chair as they both looked at the view. Anna took a parallel route and then turned right down a slight incline, which joined the path Joe was on.
Anna heard them coming before she saw them. Joe’s mother was speaking. She had a loud, bossy voice, one that had clearly been used to giving orders. She was telling her son about a famous guest who had regularly stayed at one of the Greene hotels. Joe was making interested noises but Anna had the idea he’d heard the story before.
As they came level she pushed the old man’s wheelchair forward, letting it run gently into the side of Helen Greene’s. She was hugely apologetic. How stupid of her. Were they all right? She fussed over the occupants of both wheelchairs.
Joe had been attracted to her at once, it was written all over his face, and she was thrilled to the bone to see it. He gazed at her and seconds ticked by, then he asked the old man if he was OK. Anna played safe, just in case, and explained that he was unlikely to answer; he rarely spoke and when he did he said strange things. He suffered from delusions.
They sat down together, she and Joe on a bench with a wheelchair on either side. It had been heaven. The sweetest moment of her whole life. She was with her saviour, beside him, talking to him. And it was for real.
His presence next to her made her legs tremble, her throat dry, and her head dizzy. She had to concentrate hard to take in what he was saying. But she didn’t fall apart; the lessons in self-discipline paid off, the centre of her stayed cool and calculating. She was in control, for she had information that would help her. She knew his likes and his dislikes, his hobbies, his birthday, his middle name. She knew these things and many more and she would use them.
She had taken an instant dislike to his mother but nevertheless took good care to talk to her because she could tell that it pleased him. She soon discovered that she needed to say very little because the woman never stopped talking about the family’s hotel business. All she needed was an audience. Irritating though she was, Anna thought, there were advantages – her constant babble meant the old man was largely ignored, there were no tricky questions about him, plus she gave Anna the opportunity to look kind and considerate in front of Joe. She was a distraction, which lessened the pressure, for Anna was nervous; it was a make or break meeting; she would not get another shot.
So she laughed in all the right places, was impressed by all the right things and always, every blessed second, she was aware of Joe’s eyes upon her, and it was paradise. Now, at last, she had his attention. She wanted to savour it, glory in it, live in it forever. But time was ticking by and she knew it couldn’t be long before the old man’s nurse returned. Casually, she glanced around and looked for her.
Helen Greene had begun a rambling tale about some politicians who’d been hotel guests during a Labour Party conference in Brighton. She kept going off at tangents from the main story to give her listeners the benefit of her very definite views about politics and politicians. Anna thought, with growing alarm, that this could last all day.
Hard as it was to part from Joe, it had to be done. She looked at her watch, exclaimed, and interrupted his mother’s monologue. She was so sorry but she had to go. She stood up and as she did so, saw the nurse arrive at the place where the old man should be; her hand was slanted against her forehead screening out the sun, scanning the grounds for him.
Anna Pelham grabbed hold of the wheelchair and Joe stood up beside her.
‘I’ll walk back with you. Make sure you don’t have any more collisions with that chair,’ he teased her. ‘All right with you, Mum? I shan’t be long.’
Her mind raced. He was planning to ask to see her again, she guessed, but if he walked back with her he would find out about the old man and the affair would end before it had begun.
‘No, dear, please,’ his mother complained, ‘I’m getting cold here, there’s rather a wind, can you take me over there,’ she pointed with an imperious finger in the opposite direction.
Anna Pelham could have hugged the old bag.
‘Lovely to have met you both,’ she said, and then, because she knew he would like her for it, bent down and kissed Helen Greene on the cheek.
She set off at speed with the old man and at once heard Joe running up behind. She had known he would chase and it filled her with joy and triumph. She was glad of her sunglasses; he would not see it in her eyes. He caught up with her, put his hand on top of one of hers to slow down the wheelchair and her heart jolted as if she’d touched a live wire. He asked to meet her again and she agreed. He blew her a kiss as he walked back to his mother.
The nurse was huffy but, luckily, had not got round to raising an alarm. Anna turned on the charm, said she’d thought the old boy would appreciate a trip round the gardens, apologized if she’d done the wrong thing, reminded the nurse that she had an elderly father and could be a potential customer.
‘I do think he really enjoyed it,’ she gave the nurse a broad smile.
The old man looked on, fearful as ever.
Joe had been her lover for eight months now and Anna was more besotted with him than ever. But the happier he made her, the more she feared losing him. It was like an addiction. She needed him body and soul. Forever. She wanted to see, stretching before her, thousands of wonderful days like this one; days full of commonplace detail and closeness which would carry the two of them, high on happiness, into a shared and enchanted old age. Was that too much to ask?
Although he had told her countless times that he loved her, she could not totally believe it, and even if it was true, she could not believe it would stay that way. It was that little bit of loser still left in her, she thought, that strand of weakness, lack of faith in herself, which she had been unable to root out. She knew she was beautiful and desirable but could not let herself rely on it. Men changed, grew cooler. She needed certainty, complete control.
That was why she had chosen Laura Maxwell to represent her; it was a way to bring her closer to those things, a kind of insurance policy. Once her affair with Joe had begun she had to leave Harry Pelham, she would go mad otherwise. What better way to get shot of him, what better way to get the best deal for herself, and what better way to keep an eye on her rival. It had been a bold idea and she had grabbed on to it at once.
On Easter Day she manufactured a furious row with her husband during which she walked out, taking Martha with her. Two days later she instructed Laura Maxwell to act in her divorce.