Читать книгу The Wife’s Secret: A dark psychological thriller with a stunning twist - Caroline England, Caroline England - Страница 8

‘I think it’s Monday so I’m coming over for a coffee,’ Sophie says, sounding groggy. ‘Put the kettle on.’

It’s what Sophie always says when she phones. Not, ‘Are you in, are you busy, is it all right?’ She expects Antonia to be in whenever she chooses to turn up.

It slightly irritated Antonia at one time, but it doesn’t bother her now. After all, she’s invariably in, alone in her huge home in the Cheshire countryside, going through the motions of being a housewife, whatever that is. Though she supposes cleaning and cooking pretty much cover it now the builders and plumbers and decorators have left. There’s the highlight of the supermarket, of course, but she and David shop for clothes and the house most weekends, so she’s content to stay in and order food online.

‘For God’s sake, what’s David bought you now?’ Sophie often jibes, pulling a face at the latest rug or vase or item of clothing.

‘It’s expensive,’ she replies, feeling the inevitable and disappointing stab of Sophie’s disapproval.

‘That doesn’t make it tasteful, darling.’

‘Well, I think it’s nice of him,’ she says, leaving the sentence hanging. And Antonia does think it’s nice. She thinks her home and its contents are really lovely. It’s just that it’s all a little too much. David’s a little too much.

‘I do love you very much, my beautiful girl,’ he said as he left the house for work this morning, his grey pinstripe suit looking slightly tight.

‘I know,’ she replied, laughing. ‘I think you might have mentioned it once or twice this weekend. Get to work, you big softie.’

Once, long ago, Antonia counted the number of times David declared his love in just one carefree night and she wrote the number in her diary to record it forever. Exhilarating and exciting, she never expected to be loved so much. But now she worries why he repeats the words. She knows he adores the person she’s created, the one she sees in her reflection. But not her mother’s ‘Little Chinue’. He’s never met her.

Making for the stairs, she catches her face in the mirror. ‘Where’s the trophy wife, then?’ They were Olivia Turner’s words, whispered to her husband Mike at the first dinner party she and David hosted. She hadn’t heard the expression before, and as she hung back in the shadows of the hallway, she didn’t twig that Olivia meant her.

‘I’m sorry,’ Olivia said, her pale face colouring when Antonia emerged with a hesitant smile. ‘You must be Antonia. I’ve heard you’re very beautiful and you are.’

But in Antonia’s mind, the word beautiful has never stuck.

She turns away from the mirror, hoping Olivia likes her better now. She seemed tense at the last dinner party. ‘Well, being the bloody office heartthrob …’ she said pointedly to Mike several times. It seemed a strange thing to say. He looked embarrassed and perplexed. But perhaps they were all a little too drunk, Sophie in particular, who turned up with two bottles. Still, the party went well. Of course Helen said the usual, ‘For goodness sake, Antonia, sit here and talk. I won’t bite,’ but lovely Charlie was there with his genial wink, ‘Oh, but she does and it’s ferocious. I wouldn’t risk it.’

She’s still brushing her long hair when Sophie arrives at White Gables, so doesn’t have time to straighten it completely.

‘You look gorgeous, darling,’ Sophie says as she wafts past her and into the large bright kitchen. ‘But then you always do.’

She turns and studies Antonia. ‘Why don’t you do me a favour, just for once, and have a slob-out day? Just one day when you don’t brush your hair or apply any make-up. Don’t even clean your teeth or change your underwear. Twenty-four hours of not being perfect. Would you do that, just for me?’

Sophie’s startling green eyes are on hers just a little too long before she breaks the gaze. ‘But then you’d still look gorgeous and smell of lily of the valley on freshly baked wholegrain, wouldn’t you?’ She picks up a magazine from a low glass table and starts to flick the pages. ‘The curl’s coming back in your hair, Toni. Why don’t you leave it this time? I like it curly.’

Antonia turns away as the telephone starts to ring. They have the hair conversation too often and she isn’t in the mood for Sophie’s amateur psychoanalysis today. Sophie has always been there for her since childhood, good times and bad, but sometimes her familiarity can be claustrophobic. She rubs the back of her neck. Her strained weekend with an unusually quiet David has left her tense.

‘Aren’t you going to answer the telephone?’ Sophie asks. ‘If you won’t, I will.’

‘No, Sophie, leave it. It’ll be a call centre. I don’t want to encourage them.’

‘Then unplug the bloody thing.’

The telephone stops ringing and Antonia lets out her breath. Perhaps she should unplug it. But what about her mum?

Sophie flings the magazine on to the white leather sofa, following it herself with a huge sigh. ‘Sami says I broke every taboo at dinner with the Henleys on Saturday.’

‘Let me guess, you asked them how much they earned as well as how much their house was worth?’

‘Well, I always ask that! But apparently I talked about sex rather a lot and I asked Tim whether he’d ever been unfaithful.’

‘Ouch!’

Sophie laughs. ‘I didn’t think anyone else could hear and we’re all gagging to know if the rumours are true. But I didn’t talk about religion or politics.’

‘That’s all right then.’

‘At least I don’t think so. I drank far, far too much.’

Antonia fills the kettle from the tap at the centre of the gleaming granite-topped island and then perches on a chrome and leather bar stool before swivelling to examine her only real friend. Sophie does look pretty rough today, older than her thirty-one years. Her skin is blotchy, there are dark circles under her eyes, she’s wearing no make-up and her auburn hair is chaotically tied with an elastic band at the nape of her neck. She looks remarkably like Norma, her mum, but Antonia knows better than to say so.

‘I look terrible, don’t I?’

‘Well …’ Antonia laughs. Sophie doesn’t look her best, but with Sophie looks don’t matter. Sometimes she looks plain, at other times dazzling, but however she appears, her personality shines through her brilliant eyes, entrancing all who come within her range.

‘Well, what?’ Sophie snaps.

‘I was thinking about your butterfly and moth theory.’

‘Bloody hell, you don’t forget anything, do you? It wasn’t meant as an insult. We were a winning team, Toni. You would attract the men with your butterfly beauty and I would keep them spellbound like moths around a light. Or something like that. Most people would prefer to be the butterfly!’

‘I know. You ugly old moth, you.’

‘Hmm. I guess some men prefer an easy win, while others prefer a bit of a challenge.’

Like Sami, Antonia thinks, still gazing at Sophie, and for a moment she drifts. Perhaps she is an easy win, but easy win or not, Sami wanted her first. It was her he wanted the night they all met. It was her he begged to go out with him, but she gave him to Sophie because Sophie wanted him so much.

‘Antonia! My coffee. I’m waiting!’

Sophie is staring, her green eyes sharp. ‘What are you smiling about? You really must stop that weird on another planet stuff you do. And turn off the radio, it’s hurting my bloody head.’

‘Our former lives,’ Antonia replies, turning away and opening the white, high-gloss cupboards to take out a single pink-dotted teapot with a cup on top and a large mug with Sophie’s cappuccino written on it. She arranges Belgian rolled wafers on a long ceramic dish. ‘Life before marriage, life before you decided we should go more upmarket.’

‘Yup, we bagged a surveyor and a solicitor. Didn’t we do well!’ Sophie replies, throwing her head back and laughing her deep guttural laugh.

Antonia studies her for a moment before taking the lid off the teapot, giving it a stir and breathing in the smell of peppermint. ‘Do you really think so?’ she says as she offers Sophie the wafers.

‘Sami said David had a skinful on Friday. “Unbelievably rat arsed” were his precise words. He wanted to have a fight over some harmless comment Sami made about you, apparently, which was pretty stupid when he could hardly walk,’ Sophie says, ignoring Antonia’s question. ‘What was that all about then?’

‘No idea. You probably know more than me.’

Antonia sweeps the crumbs into the sink as she contemplates last Friday night. She had been sound asleep and was awoken suddenly, the accusatory sound of the doorbell in the dead of night throwing her back to a time she tries hard to erase. She padded from her bedroom and down the limestone stairs, the sound of her heart loud in her ears, and there was Mike Turner peering through the peep hole while doing his best to hold David upright.

‘Sorry, Antonia,’ Mike said, and for a moment she gazed at him, her new name taking her by surprise, even after all these years. But then she rallied, shaking herself back to the dark cold night and the state of her husband.

Mike’s eyes seemed watchful; she found she couldn’t meet them. ‘I know it’s late but he’s had a bit too much,’ he said after a moment. ‘And he couldn’t find his keys. So I thought I’d better— Do you want me to help him upstairs?’

‘I can get myself up my own fucking stairs.’ David pulled himself upright and pushed Mike away. ‘I could’ve found my way home too. Fuck off home and polish your halo, you fucking sanctimonious Irish prick.’

‘Sorry, Mike,’ she said, not knowing what else to say. Her heartbeat started to slow, but she felt panicky, that familiar metallic taste in her mouth.

Mike stood for a moment, looking unsteady on his feet and raking his hand through his dark messy hair. He opened his mouth, as though looking for the right words, but then turned away and lifted his hand. ‘No problem, he won’t remember in the morning. Taxi waiting. Night, Antonia. Take care.’

Antonia fleetingly wondered about David’s surprising behaviour before climbing into bed beside his unconscious bulk. He could drink enormous quantities of booze, but was rarely drunk. She closed her eyes, hoping sleep would overcome the unsought memories jabbing at her mind. But just as she was finally drifting off, David woke up with a jerk. He stared at her face for what seemed like an age before starting to cry, loud, wretched sobs.

‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, please forgive me,’ he wept, pushing his face against her breast like a small helpless child. But then he fell back to sleep as swiftly as he’d woken. Antonia lay there, her silk nightdress stuck to her chest from the tears and saliva, feeling nothing but a queer blankness, tinged with memories of disgust.

‘You’re doing it again, Toni. Stop!’

Sophie’s words bring Antonia back to the muggy September Monday and to the scrutinising eyes of her friend. She feels the tightness in her stomach, the burn of her cheeks and that mild taste of panic. ‘Ready for a top-up?’ she asks, turning away.

‘Less coffee and more cream this time. And different biscuits,’ Sophie replies, picking up the television remote control, pointing it at the huge flatscreen on the wall and flicking through the shopping channels. Then, after a few moments, ‘You know you’ll tell me eventually.’