She carried on riding him faster and faster, great waves of water tumbling over the side of the bath.
They came together a few moments later.
“God. God. Oh God,” he moaned.
Because her eyes were closed, Rachel assumed he was crying out in ecstasy.
Without opening her eyes she lay herself down on top of him and began kissing his cheek. Matt carried on Oh God-ing.
“Well, I’ve no need to ask if that was good for you,” she whispered dreamily. She started smiling to herself as a thought occurred to her. “Have you ever wondered,” she said thoughtfully, between kisses, “what atheists shout when they reach orgasm? I mean it wouldn’t sound quite right, yelling: ‘Oh random, oh, chance, oh, casual fortuitousness.’ ”
“Rachel, I hate to disappoint you, but this isn’t ecstasy I’m experiencing. It’s pain.”
Her eyes shot open and she saw his hand was clamped to his forehead.
“I bashed it on the mixer tap.”
“Oh no,” she gasped, sitting up. “Here, let me have a look.” She gently pulled his hand away. The skin wasn’t broken, but a shiny cherry tomato lump was already forming.
“What’s it look like?” he said.
“It’s going to be sore, but it’s not too bad. I’ll bathe it in some cold water.” Very gingerly she climbed out of the bath. Then she wrapped herself in a towel and took a bag of cotton balls from the cupboard under the basin.
“I dunno,” she said, shaking her head as she wet a cotton ball under the cold tap. “Your head, my ankle. What do we look like, the pair of us? Jack and bloody Jill.”
She knelt down on the floor beside the bath and began bathing the shiny, cherry tomato lump. He winced as she touched it. “Oh, stop being such a baby,” she chided, punching him playfully on the top of his arm. “It’s a tiny bump.” She tried to carry on dabbing at it, but he grabbed her wrist and smiled a sexy smile.
“Come here,” he said softly, pulling her toward him and starting to kiss her.
After they pulled away, she stayed there, gazing into his eyes. It was only now, as she knelt beside the bath, dabbing at the lump on Matt’s head, that she was finally able to admit to herself that she did have feelings for him. Deep, powerful feelings.
CHAPTER 14
“So I take it we’re talking the L word here,” Shelley said, picking up her spoon and stabbing at the lemon in her hot water and lemon.
Rachel shrugged. “I dunno. Yes. No. Maybe. All I know is that as I knelt there dabbing his head, I could hear this voice telling me it would be wrong to walk away.”
“So, did you tell him how you felt?”
“Course I didn’t. I mean how could I sit there and say, ‘Oh, by the way, I think I might be falling in love with you. Just one teensy problem, though—I’m planning to marry somebody else.’ ”
Shelley nodded sympathetically.
“I dunno, why isn’t Adam enough for me?” Rachel fretted. “He’s attractive, successful. He cares about me.” Her voice trailed off. “Shelley,” she said, doing her best to sound casual, “do you think Adam’s capable of having an affair?”
“What?” Shelley burst out laughing. “Don’t be daft. He’d only have to think about cheating on you and he’d get one of his nosebleeds.”
Rachel told her about the women in Adam’s hotel room. Shelley considered for a few moments.
“Well, I suppose it is possible he’s got someone,” she said slowly.
“I’m pretty certain he has.”
Shelley asked her how she felt about it.
“Well, even though I’ve been seeing Matt I still can’t help feeling hurt. But it’s not the overwhelming desperate hurt I always imagined I’d feel if Adam cheated on me. Do you know the emotion I’m feeling most of all?”
Shelley shook her head.
“Relief.” She picked up Shelley’s spoon and began prodding at the sugar in the bowl. “At least if he’s seeing somebody I can stop feeling guilty about Matt.”
Just then the intercom buzzer rang.
Rachel looked up. “That’ll be my parents on the way to Aunty Jessie’s funeral.”
“Stay where you are,” Shelley said. “I’ll get it.” She disappeared, returned thirty seconds later and nodded. “Your mum’s on her way up. Your dad’s gone off to park the car. I’ve left the door open.”
“Oh God,” Rachel sighed, “it was bad enough on the phone last night. How do I handle my mum? After that spectacle in Selfridges, how can I just sit here and carry on as if nothing’s happened?”
“You just do—OK?” Shelley said simply. “For the last time, Rache, their marriage is not your problem. I know, it’s hard, but you really don’t have any choice.”
Rachel nodded. “Oh, and by the way,” she warned her friend, “don’t say anything to my mum about how you thought you were in labor the other day—not unless you fancy hearing a gasp by Last Rites account of her seventy-two-hour labor with me, the climax of which is a gruesomely detailed description of her inside-out placenta and her postpartum perineum that swelled to the size, shape and color of a frankfurter.”
Shelley screwed up her face. “Eeuuch.”
“Just don’t mention the word
labor
and you’ll be fine. Promise.”
“Don’t worry,” Shelley promised. “I won’t.”
* * * * *
Faye walked into the kitchen, mobile phone pressed to her ear. “No, listen Coral . . . you’ll be fine. If the nurse said it was nothing, then it’s nothing. Just go home and take it easy for a bit. Look, I’m at Rachel’s now. I gotta go. OK, bye. Speak to you later. Love to Ivan.”
She put her mobile in her bag and turned to Rachel. “I dunno, if anybody else got tired and thirsty shopping at Brent Cross two weeks before Christmas, what would they do? They’d sit down and have a drink. Not Coral. She gets on the phone to NHS Direct to check she’s not diabetic.”
“Hi, Mum.” Rachel smiled.
“Oh, my poor baby,” Faye gasped, seeing Rachel sitting at the kitchen table with her foot resting on a chair. She rushed over, threw her arms round Rachel’s neck and kissed her. “Sweetie, how do you feel? Is it painful? Can you walk on it? Are you sure we shouldn’t get it X-rayed? I dunno, maybe you should take off the bandage—it restricts the blood flow, you know. Look, let me take it off.” She bent down.
“Mum, please leave it alone. It’s fine, really.”
“OK, but just let me take a look at it.”
“Mum, it’s much better today. It doesn’t need looking at.”
“Well, if you’re sure.”
“I’m sure.”
“Hi, Mrs. K,” Shelley said perkily.
Faye swung round. “Oh, Shelley, darling. Sorry, I didn’t see you standing over there.” Faye went over and kissed her hello. “So, not long to the big day,” she said excitedly, taking off her coat. “How’s it all going?”
“Fine,” Shelley beamed. “Couldn’t be better.”
Faye hung her coat over the back of a kitchen chair and then waved her hand in front of her. “Huh, you may be fine now, but you wait until you go into labor. You should have seen me—seventy-two hours it took me to get Rachel out. Excruciating it was. I tell you, afterward did I swell up down there. . . . It looked like a . . .”
“Thank you, Mum, but I don’t think Shelley really wants to know how your undercarriage assumed the size and shape of a frankfurter.”
“Frankfurter?” Faye exclaimed. “Frankfurter? It felt a damned sight bigger than a frankfurter. I tell you, Shelley, for three weeks after I had Rachel, it was like trying to walk with a giant eggplant between my legs.”
“I’ll put the kettle on,” Shelley said, by way of changing the subject.
Just then Jack appeared carrying two bulging carrier bags. He put them down on the kitchen table, greeted Shelley with a kiss and went across to do the same to Rachel. “Hi, sweetie. How’s the ankle?” he said, taking off his coat and hanging it on top of Faye’s.
“Bit easier today. Doesn’t hurt quite so much when I walk.”
“So, there’s nothing broken. Thank the Lord for that.”
“How are things with you, Dad? Any—you know—movement?”
“Nothing for two days,” he said morosely. “Not a dickie bird.” He began rubbing his hands together. “It’s bitter out there. I don’t think the sun’ll even attempt to come out today.”
“Who can blame it?” Faye said. “Would you come out on a day like this? Right, Jack,” she continued briskly. “Let’s unload this shopping . . . Rachel, Daddy and I stopped off at the Shalom in Gants Hill on the way over. There’s two dozen bagels, a couple of pounds of smoked salmon, two tubs of cream cheese, some pickled cukes and a big bag of Danish . . . enough to keep you going for a day or so. . . .”
“But Mum, that’s masses. I’ll never get through it. You’ll have to take some home.”
“Don’t be silly. Of course you’ll eat it,” she said, taking the cheese and salmon over to the fridge. “I daren’t give your father the Danish or the cream cheese—he’s actually dropped two or three pounds in the last week.”
“Yeah,” Jack said dolefully, as he put the Danish and bagels into Shelley’s bread bin, “I’m starving myself to death so that I can live a little longer.”
“You know, Rachel,” Faye said. “This fridge really could do with a clean-out. There’s mold growing on the sides. Look, why don’t I get a bucket of Flash and . . .”
“Mum, please,” Rachel said far more loudly than she intended. “Just leave it, eh? I’ll get round to it, eventually.”
“All right, darling,” Faye said, looking hurt. “I was only trying to help.”
Shelley handed out mugs of tea and they all joined Rachel at the table.
“Shelley,” Jack whispered, giving her a wink. “Fetch the Danish—there’s a good girl.”
Giving him a conspiratorial smile, Shelley went over to the bread bin and brought back the bag of pastries. He put his hand inside, took one out and put it to his lips.
“Jack,” Faye snapped, “what are you doing? You’ve lost three pounds this week.”
“Yeah, and if I go on at that rate, in eighteen months I’ll have disappeared completely. Tell me, is that what you want?” He popped the pastry into his mouth.
“OK, eat then. See if I care,” Faye said, turning to Rachel. “So,” she went on, “I’ve been having a few more thoughts about the wedding reception.”
Rachel winced. She and Shelley exchanged glances.
“I’ve done a rough seating plan, which I’ll show you when we’ve got more time to go over it. But not only that—I’ve had this fabulous idea.” She paused for effect. “I thought,” she continued, “it would be a hoot—seeing as Adam’s a dentist—to name each of the tables after teeth.” Another pause.
“So,” she said, positively brimming over with excitement now, “you could have Incisor, Molar, Wisdom—the old people could sit at that one. I thought it was such an original idea. What do you reckon?”
Rachel closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Mum, quite frankly, along with the idea of Sam wearing a page boy suit, I think it’s the most—”
“Well, I think it’s a great idea, Mrs. K,” Shelley leaped in, clearly trying to keep the peace. “Really witty.”
“You do? Wonderful. And what do you think, Rachel?”
Rachel looked at Shelley, whose eyebrows were raised in an arc of expectation. “Very humorous,” she said flatly.
“There you go, Jack,” Faye said, elbowing him in the ribs, “I told you people would like it.”
Jack shrugged. “OK,” he said, “just so long as your cousin Avril doesn’t completely lower the tone by standing up after dinner and telling that joke of hers about how she used to go out with a dentist and the first time they had sex, she didn’t feel a thing.”
“What’s wrong with that?” Faye came back at him. “It’s funny.”
“No, it isn’t. It’s crude.”
Faye said it was only crude because it was a member of her family telling it and that if it were somebody from his side, it would be hysterical.
“That’s ridiculous.”
“Is it?” Faye said heatedly. “I don’t think so.”
Her parents’ bickering was, of course, no worse than usual, but for Rachel it was yet more evidence—not that more was required—that their marriage was over. Suddenly deciding to ignore Shelley’s advice about not interfering, she took a deep breath and opened her mouth to speak.
Seeing this, Shelley shot Rachel a glance and cleared her throat noisily. “So, er, Mrs. K, how did Aunty Jessie pass away? Old age, was it?”
“Well, she was pretty ancient,” Faye agreed, “but actually it was more complicated than that. Turns out she’d had pneumonia and had been at death’s door for ages. Apparently it was only machines and tubes keeping her going. Then one morning, the hospital cleaner comes in and unplugs her life support to use the Hoover. Five minutes later poor Jessie’s gone. Terrible tragedy.”
Rachel started laughing first and pretty soon they were all howling. After a couple of minutes, Faye said if she didn’t get to the loo she was going to wet herself.
* * * * *
“So, Shelley,” Jack said after Faye had disappeared and the laughter had died down, “you going in for this natural childbirth thing then?”
“Yes, I’m hoping to give birth in a pool.”
“Oh, I’ve read about that. I can see it must be great for you and the baby, but don’t the rest of the people find it all a bit unpleasant?”
Shelley looked puzzled, not knowing whether she was meant to laugh or take him seriously.
“It’s OK, Shelley,” Rachel explained, straight-faced. “It’s just one of his jokes.”
“Oh right,” Shelley said, giving a polite giggle.
Just then Faye returned from the loo. “Look, Rachel,” she said, “we’d better get going, we’re due at Bushey in forty minutes. And you know how slow your dad drives. Plus he’s got no sense of direction.”
“Faye, don’t start. I’ve had to replace the clutch on the car twice this year. Whose fault is that, do you mind telling me?”
“Don’t look at me,” she said indignantly. “I don’t use the clutch.”
Rachel could still hear them squabbling as they went down the stairs.
* * * * *
“All right, all right,” Faye said to Jack, once they were in the car. “I didn’t mean to criticize your driving. I’m sorry. Forgive me?”
“When have I ever not forgiven you?” he said, putting his hand on her thigh and grinning at her.
She leaned across, put her arms round him and kissed him on the cheek. “You know, Jack,” she said afterward. “I’m worried.”
“Worried? What about?”
“There’s something going on there,” she said, looking out of the car window toward Rachel’s flat.
“What do you mean?” Jack said, starting up the engine. “What sort of something?”
“I found a watch in the bathroom.”
“So?”
“It was a man’s watch.”
“So?”
“So . . . don’t you think it’s odd? Adam’s away and there’s a man’s watch in the bathroom?”
“Why is it odd? Maybe she had a plumber in to do a repair and he took his watch off.”
“She’d have mentioned it if she’d had a workman in. It’s the kind of stuff we talk about. No, she’s seeing somebody. She’s cheating on Adam. I just know it. How could she do this, Jack? How could she do it? She’ll break poor Adam’s heart. Not to mention Sam’s . . . Oh God, Jack, what’ll I tell Hylda? Her special offer finishes on the fifth of January. She wants a deposit for the reception.”
“Sod bloody Hylda. You’ll just have to stall her. If Rachel’s having second thoughts about Adam, don’t you start pressuring her about wedding receptions.”
“Jack,” Faye said, taking mild offense. “As if I’d do that.”
“And what’s more, don’t say anything to her about the watch.”
“But I have to,” she shot back. “I’m her mother. I can’t just sit back and let her end it with Adam and ruin her life. I have to say something.”
Jack turned off the engine and took his wife’s hand. “Faye, listen to me,” he said gravely. “Just remember what we’re involved in at the moment. How would you feel if Rachel found out about it and started interfering? I mean, she’d be bloody furious if she knew. She wouldn’t give us a moment’s peace. By the same token, she won’t welcome you interfering in her relationship with Adam. Leave it, Faye. Her love life is her business. We have no right to interfere.”