Читать книгу Prime Deception - Carys Jones - Страница 11

Chapter Three

And these wounds won’t seem to heal

Charles awoke as he always did, hot and panting, staring sightlessly in to the empty darkness of his bedroom. The sheets around him were soaked from his sweat.

With his heart pounding frantically in his chest, he tried to remind himself that it was all just a nightmare, that everything was fine. But in his dreams he saw her, falling away from him and no matter how hard he tried, how far he stretched, he couldn’t catch her.

Six months had passed since Lorna’s tragic death. Charles Lloyd had watched the seasons change twice over with an indifferent eye. He felt detached from the world around him, lost. Not that anyone could notice; outwardly he appeared his usual charismatic self, smiling for the cameras, shaking hands and continuing to represent his country as best he could. Internally, he was a mess.

Physically, Lorna was gone, but she haunted Charles’ dreams as she had done since he decided to end their affair. However, she now plagued his sleep with more ferocity, meaning that Charles was robbed of the little rest he managed to get. The moment he closed his eyes and felt blissfully transported from the reality where he felt constant pain, she would come to him through the darkness. It was always the same dream; Charles forever trapped in the moment when she kissed him goodbye on the cheek in a hotel room. However, in his dream she then doubles over in pain and collapses to the floor, dying right before his eyes. Unable to witness her demise, he tries to force himself to wake. Just before Lorna gasps her last breath he awakens in his bed, the sheets sodden from his sweat.

Elaine had grown so tired of his ‘night terrors’ that she had relocated him to the spare bedroom, which suited Charles just fine. He felt like a fraud around his wife, mourning for another woman and struggling to even look her in the eye when they talked.

Charles assumed that his nightmares were just his way of exorcising any guilt he was harbouring about Lorna’s suicide. Surreptitiously, he had gotten hold of the police report from Lorna’s crash. She had driven her car into a tree and died immediately on impact. Charles wanted to believe that it was an accident, but the words were there for him to see in stark black and white, cold and devoid of emotion in their summary of the situation; verdict, death by deliberate means. Suicide. As Deputy Prime Minister, Charles wielded certain powers; he could alter the law, distribute the national budget as he and his Cabinet deemed fit, but he lacked the power he truly needed – the ability to turn back time. He wanted to return to that moment in the hotel room and not hide behind his cowardice. He wished he’d had the strength to be truthful with Lorna and to tell her that he loved her.

What troubled Charles more than Lorna’s passing was the fact that he had never uttered those three immortal words to her. Their love for one another was assumed but never vocalised and regret hung heavy around the Deputy Prime Minister’s neck. He felt as though he wore the missed opportunity like a scarlet letter and Lorna continued to visit him at night, reminding him, tormenting him, about what could have been.

‘Another bad night?’ Elaine asked over breakfast one typical Sunday morning. Despite the early hour, her hair was already tidied into a bun, a fresh coating of lipstick on her lips. Her question was delivered tersely from behind her artificially crimson lips.

‘Yes,’ Charles said wearily, rubbing his eyes with his hand.

‘We really need to do something about it, it simply can’t go on. Look at you, you look a fright! You need to be projecting a certain image and haggard isn’t it!’ Elaine berated him as she would a naughty child; there was no concern in her voice.

‘Perhaps I’ll call in a doctor.’ Charles didn’t even look up as he spoke, instead stabbing half-heartedly at the boiled egg his wife had prepared for him.

‘That sounds like a good idea; I’ll call and arrange for them to visit you first thing tomorrow.’

Charles’ relationship with Elaine reminded him of his relationship with Faye. Both were formal and restricted. His conversations with Elaine resembled those he had with his assistant at work, detailing things that needed to be done, events which required his attendance. They didn’t discuss their feelings as though it were forbidden to do so. Both Charles and Elaine came from families who frowned upon displays of affection as ‘frivolous’. To them, a marriage was very much a business partnership and should be approached as such. You did not marry for love, you married to better yourself, or so Charles had always been led to believe.

For many years, he assumed that love existed only in Hollywood movies. When an actor would declare to his on-screen love that he couldn’t live without her, Charles would look on, bemused by such passionate feelings. He had never felt like that towards Elaine. He cared for her, certainly, but not to such extremes that his very existence would end if she were to leave him. He had a platonic marriage, as his father and his father before him had. It was considered normal and Charles had never questioned it. Until Lorna.

‘Charles!’ Elaine exclaimed in shock when her husband suddenly smashed the egg upon his plate with his fist.

Charles looked at her, his face contorted with anger and droplets of yellow yolk falling from his hand which was still clenched in a fist.

‘I’m sorry darling,’ he suddenly shook his head as if clearing away the demon which had briefly consumed him, and began wiping his hand clean with a nearby napkin. He went through the motions, apologising, claiming that he didn’t know what had come over him, attributing it to his lack of sleep. But Charles knew what was wrong.

Charles Lloyd was angry. He was angry and he was hurt. The great love of his life was gone. Like the Shakespearian tragedies which existed in his school books, he had found true love and it had ended in tragedy. Left alone in a world without Lorna, he felt trapped and disillusioned.

‘Look at the mess,’ Elaine berated her husband and his sudden impulse to destroy his breakfast. ‘Honestly, Charles, these past few months I don’t know what has come over you but I do not like it.’

‘I’m sorry, darling, really I am. The stresses of the job, they can be most trying.’

‘I’m aware that with great power comes great responsibility. You forget that I was bred from a family where all the women marry great men. Though none as great as mine,’ Elaine smiled fondly at her husband, who, even with bags hanging beneath his eyes, was still handsome. She loved how when she hung on his arm at events she was the envy of most women and she enjoyed gloating to anyone who would listen about his job and all the trappings that came with it. His job became her calling card, to the point where most of her sentences began with, ‘Oh my husband, the Deputy Prime Minister.’ It was with a mixture of pride and arrogance that she so often divulged information about his position. But she hid behind his job, as did Charles.

‘No, we don’t have time for children,’ she would tell family and friends. ‘Charles is simply too busy, he’s the Deputy Prime Minister after all. And when he’s done ruling the country it will be too late to start a family of our own. It’s a price I’ve had to pay for being married to a man at the top.’ People would roll their eyes, not knowing that Elaine was actually barren and could not bare children. The revelation had nearly destroyed her at the start of her marriage to Charles. But, ever the gentleman, he told her that they would be enough for each other, that children did not matter. And they didn’t. Elaine was more than happy to be the godmother, the aunt, but she had a constant niggling feeling at the back of her mind which rose up every time she drank or spent too many moments alone that she had failed Charles. Her end of the bargain was to give him children whilst he went out into the world and made the money. Beside her famous husband Elaine felt like dead weight. Charles and his career were all she had.

‘I’ll be fine, I’m sure. Perhaps I’ll try those sleeping pills again,’ Charles said as he rose from the table.

‘Whatever is troubling you, I’m sure that we will get to the bottom of it,’ Elaine smiled reassuringly.

‘Indeed, dear.’ Charles took his plate and the remains of his egg into the kitchen and Elaine sat contemplating her husband’s odd behaviour, as she had taken to doing most mornings. Whatever the matter was with him, she vowed to discover the cause of his distress and solve the problem. She mentally ran through a list of people she knew who might help, from sleep therapists to tarot card readers. Elaine couldn’t stand seeing her husband so miserable. If sleep was what he needed, that it was her job to ensure that he slept. She would do anything she could to help him.

It was a myth that time healed all wounds. Half a dozen months had passed since Lorna’s suicide and Charles’ pain had only intensified. Everywhere he went he was reminded of her, bar his home, which was off limits because he was struggling to face Elaine, sure that she could see through his work façade and knew deep down of his deceit towards her.

But his work offered some solace. He threw himself in to his role as Deputy Prime Minister with more gusto than ever. He accepted every invitation, attended every meeting. His face had never been more seen by the people of Britain. Little did they know that behind the beaming smile lay a cracked and broken heart.

As he undertook his sacred morning ritual, Charles would pause and regard himself in the mirror and pull his face into the Cheshire cat grin he wore for the media. Whilst his smile appeared warm and friendly, his eyes belied his inner turmoil. They sat lifeless in his head, without their former sparkle. A few of the tabloid papers had commented, attributing his saddened eyes to his inability to cope with current political issues such as the potential collapse of the National Health Service. But Charles was dealing with those issues easily – they were nothing compared to the battle he faced each and every day when he had to sit in his office, alone, his palms on his desk, unable to think of nothing but Lorna’s naked body writhing upon it.

‘Remember you have that press conference at ten,’ Elaine poked her head around the bathroom door, ever the eager assistant. She perused his appearance with interest before entering the room and realigning the blue tie he had just been securing into place. Charles stood, lifeless and submissive, and let his wife alter his collar and tie.

‘There – much better,’ Elaine declared triumphantly, patting down the collar with her freshly painted nails.

‘Come on now, dear, try and look less tired. What did the doctor say?’

‘More tablets,’ Charles said absently. He had tried every medicine known to mankind in his attempt to sleep through the night but Lorna’s ghost was persistent, being able to penetrate through the thickest drug-induced fog to find him and torment him; forever placing her last kiss upon his cheek before collapsing to her untimely death.

‘What are your plans for today?’ Charles asked, wanting to divert the conversation away from his ongoing fatigue, wary that his wife might continue to pry. He would have enough awkward questions to answer at the press conference; he did not wish to answer them in his own home.

‘Today,’ Elaine said with a hint of grandeur, clearly excited by her impending plans, ‘today I shall be choosing colours for the dining room as we are redecorating it, remember?’

‘Didn’t we decorate the dining room last summer?’

‘And then I’ve been asked to chair a book club somewhere over in Mayfair, which is exciting,’ Elaine continued, ignoring Charles’ question.

‘You do love your books.’

‘Oh yes, today we are discussing Wuthering Heights. Ah, I used to love that book as a girl. It’s all so turbulent and dark. I hate how Heathcliff ends up being haunted by Catherine’s ghost. I remember reading that bit as a young girl and being terrified!’

‘I can imagine.’

‘Well, writers love to dramatise things, don’t they. Love, in most cases, is simple. Look at us. It’s when you don’t go for your own kind, which is what happened in the book, that you end up in trouble.’

Charles frowned at the implications of his wife’s comment, but she had left the room, calling to him as she left about various shades of beige. He pondered on what she had said. Was he possibly now being punished for loving someone he shouldn’t have? Did all those who commit adultery suffer similarly?

‘Good morning, sir,’ Faye handed Charles his messages as he strode past her, heading for his office.

‘Good morning,’ he managed to smile at his assistant before thankfully entering the solitude of his office. For a brief moment, he would enjoy the quiet, but then the memories of Lorna would begin to surface and he would long to be released from what had started to feel more like a prison than a retreat.

Charles tried to occupy his mind with the papers left on his desk but everything in them felt superfluous to him. He tried to engage himself in the news stories but it was hopeless. His mind was already sinking into the pit of despair it did every morning. Clearly, the papers were not a strong enough distraction, so he turned his attention to his handful of messages.

There was nothing of note; a few calls he had to return, nothing more. As he was about to return to the papers he noticed the final note Faye had wrote down for him in her tidy, cursive hand and his heart sunk. In his eagerness to be more proactive at work in an attempt to place a plaster over the wound Lorna’s death had left upon him, he had agreed to a meet and greet session with the latest intake of interns.

The Prime Minister was always far too busy for such meetings and so in his role as Deputy he had the responsibility of being the face of the ruling political party, to be available for hospital openings, charity balls and any other relevant events.

As he sat behind the desk, which had once nearly been burnt to the ground by the fires of his own passion, he knew that he could not do it. Not enough time had elapsed. He was not strong enough to face a room full of interns, because any of them could be Lorna, young and eager to make their mark upon the world, and he did not want any further reminders of the one woman he had loved and lost.

He considered cancelling the meeting, but Charles knew that Faye would be aware of his reasoning which made him feel ashamed. The meeting was not until three that afternoon; hopefully something would come up before then relieving him of his requirement to attend. Until then, he needed to focus on his press conference, which meant, more than anything, perfecting his smile. He didn’t want the people to look at him and his tired, sad eyes and believe that it was because their country was beyond hope. In reality, everything was fine, more than fine. He had some very clever men in his Cabinet that had reduced benefits to the unemployed to the bare minimum, which meant that there would be additional funding for the health service, leaving the country in an even greater position than it had been for many years. But Charles knew that he needed to represent these positive changes in himself. People would not believe his good words if he delivered them from a haggard face.

‘Heavy is the head which wears the crown,’ his mother had said to him warningly when he had told her of his decision to accept the position of Deputy Prime Minister. It was a rare moment when she had spoken her mind to him. Usually, she kept herself in the background when it came to these sorts of decisions, leaving the men to plan out the future of the family.

‘I’m not trying to be king, mother,’ Charles had joked.

‘You know what I mean,’ she had said stubbornly, her always quiet voice still barely above a whisper. ‘I just don’t want you to end up unhappy.’

‘What, like you?’ Charles’ comment was cruel and it was the adolescent who still dwelled in him who did not prevent it being vocalised. His mother physically shuddered from the infliction of his words and she wrapped her arms protectively around her tiny, frail frame.

‘Yes, like me,’ she said bitterly, pools of tears forming in her grey eyes. ‘Your father is not always right. If you continue to let him make all your choices, you will never be happy.’

‘Then why do you let him dictate to you the way he does?’

‘The same reason you do, Charles. Because for some sadistic reason we want nothing more than to please him, and in doing so, sacrifice so much of ourselves.’

‘But I want to be Deputy Prime Minister, I want to make a change in this country,’ Charles said, still filled with the optimistic hope which only the young possess.

‘Okay, my son. I have no doubt that you will be a wonderful Deputy Prime Minister. But just be careful, as it can be lonely at the top.’ The ice between them had thawed. She had embraced Charles and he remembered thinking how she felt like a skeleton in his arms. The cancer had taken her before he had been appointed, so she never lived to see him become the Deputy Prime Minister and it bothered Charles to know that deep down she disapproved of his decision, because it was born of his father’s agenda.

Charles practiced his smile once more, his facial muscles already aching. He was lonely at the top, but with Lorna in his life, he had not been. Like the literary character Heathcliff, he was tormented by the loss of the woman he loved and trapped in an empty marriage. Sighing, Charles read through his speech for the press conference, determined to instil hope in the people of Britain even though all hope within him had died with Lorna.

The morning sped by in a blur of questions faster than Charles would have liked. It was soon afternoon and his meet and greet with the interns was creeping ever closer. All Charles wanted to do was hide in his office. He could not bear to face his past mistakes; not yet, not like this with Lorna gone.

Alone in his office, Charles contemplated plausible excuses he could use; he could feign illness or pretend there was a sudden crisis at home. Yet his own reluctance to attend made him feel wracked with guilt. He did not like to let people down, even those who were strangers to him. It was this sense of commitment which made him so capable within his role of Deputy Prime Minister. His innate need to please others, no doubt born out of his childhood struggle to seek his father’s approval, meant that he worked every hour that he could to do the best job possible. His efforts, though in vain, instilled in him an incessant need for praise. He didn’t like to think of the interns being disappointed when he failed to materialize at the meeting, but then, he did not want to present a fractured image of himself. He wanted them to see the warm and smiling Charles Lloyd which they knew from the television, not the broken man he was behind closed doors.

‘Sir?’ Faye knocked lightly and entered the office, having sensed her employer’s apprehension about the impending meeting.

‘Yes, Faye?’ Charles asked, pleased for her presence as it offered a distraction from his ever-darkening thoughts.

‘I thought perhaps you might want to run through the agenda for the meet and greet?’

‘No, it’s alright,’ Charles said, aware that he visibly tensed at the mention of the interns.

‘I think it would be a good idea …’

‘I’m fine, thank you.’ It was unlike Charles to interrupt her but his anxiety was making him tense and impatient.

Faye turned to leave and hesitated. She had silently judged him throughout the affair, assuming he was another middle-aged man preying on a younger, weaker woman. She had found herself in a similar situation whilst a student at university with one of her professors, and it had ended badly for her. She had fallen in lov – he had chosen his wife. It was the age-old tale of silly young girl being used by older, bored man. But then Faye knew Charles, or at least she thought she did, and he wasn’t that malicious or calculating. And then he had been so crushed by the news of Lorna’s death. It had been months and yet still he appeared to mourn her. Faye did not believe that he deserved to suffer like this.

‘It’s not your fault,’ she said quietly. Charles looked at her in surprise, confused as to what she might be referring to.

‘Lorna,’ Faye explained softly, referring to the giant elephant which had taken up permanent residence in the office. ‘Her dying was not your fault.’

Taken aback, Charles could not find any words to form a response. The pain he carried from Lorna’s death was a burden he hauled alone. He had never talked to anyone about her passing, or about how it made him feel, and it felt surreal to have someone else refer to her. In his mind he had an entire world which had existed with Lorna which felt cut off from anything else, but hearing Faye speak of her reminded him that his reality and Lorna had once been interlinked.

‘I’m not comfortable …’ Charles did not want to talk about Lorna. Thinking about her was hard enough, talking would just be too much. He couldn’t finish his sentence; his throat was beginning to choke up as he struggled to discreetly suppress a sob.

‘I think that it will do you good to go and address the interns,’ Faye said sternly, feeling equally uncomfortable to see her boss crumble before her like a house made from paper.

‘How?’ Charles demanded.

‘Because she is dead and you are not. The dead die whilst we must go on living. You are not to blame. She killed herself. You cannot punish others, who are so eager to meet you, for your mistakes. You are better than that.’ Faye’s tone softened with fondness at the end. ‘I am sorry to speak out of turn like this, but for months I have watched you mope around and you are clearly beating yourself up about it all when you shouldn’t be.’

Again, Charles was lost for words, surprised to have been given a dressing down by his own assistant. It was unnerving just how similar Elaine and Faye’s behaviour towards him was; loving yet berating at the same time, a complete juxtaposition of emotions.

‘Faye, you are quite right, thank you. I shall prepare myself for the meeting,’ Charles suddenly came to his senses. Here, in his office, he was the Deputy Prime Minister. At home he could once more become Charles Lloyd and dwell on the loss of Lorna, but whilst at work he had to maintain the image he had worked so hard to build. ‘I appreciate the offer of some … perspective,’ Charles said a little uneasily.

‘Anytime, sir.’ Faye smiled and left the office. The moment had passed and she had succeeded in her quest to raise the Deputy Prime Minister’s mood, but knew better than to linger and risk pushing the boundaries between them further. She had already spoken to him inappropriately; she had no desire to make a habit of it.

Charles again practiced his smile and tried to completely banish Lorna from his mind. Obligingly, her memory retreated to the shadows of his thoughts, allowing him to resume his role of Deputy Prime Minister, if only temporarily. He knew she would return again that night as soon as he dared to close his eyes and lose himself to the darkness. She was always there waiting in his dreams, refusing to let him forget.

The main meeting room within Downing Street was the venue for the meet and greet with the interns. This suited Charles as it meant that his office, which had become his bolthole, was close by.

He gave a brief speech to the room full of fresh, eager faces, without lingering on any of them for too long, preferring to speak into empty space. Charles gave them the usual spiel of what a great opportunity this was and how it would hold them in good stead for their future career, and his ethos of work hard if you want to succeed. That was probably the best quality his own father had succeeded in instilling in him – his work ethic. Charles had been a devoutly conscientious student and was even more dedicated when he entered the working world. Arguably, it was born of his desire to please, but it was still an admirable quality which had earned him the respect of his peers.

Charles drew his speech to a close, willing the meeting to end, although he had to admit that it had been easier than he had thought it would be. When Faye suggested he take twenty minutes to mingle with some of the interns, he agreed – his old, social self beginning to resurface.

The interns who he spoke to were polite and hung on his every word, which always made Charles a little uncomfortable. Quiet awe he could tolerate but sycophants he could not. He was beginning to find the banter almost bearable. An intern would introduce themselves and he would show a cursory interest in them, asking where they were from and so forth.

He was mid-way through a conversation with a young man with short dark hair and trendy rimless glasses when he spotted a halo of blonde hair bobbing amongst the sea of interns just beyond his eye line.

Instantly his heart skipped a beat, his thoughts instinctively thinking of Lorna.

Discreetly, Charles glanced past the man he was engaged in conversation with. There again, he caught a glimpse of blonde hair which belonged to a petite young woman but her back was to him. Charles chastised himself for being ridiculous. Lorna was creeping back into his thoughts and playing tricks with his mind. There are millions of women with long blonde hair and small, slender frames, he thought to himself; he needed to gain some perspective.

But Charles could not tear his attention away from the blonde who was now talking to another intern on the other side of the room. If only she would turn around – if he could see her face, he could relax. Charles could feel his heart rate quickening with anticipation, the girl turned and … it was some nameless stranger. Charles felt his spirit sink but then realised just how foolish he was being. Lorna was gone, he needed to accept that.

Yet, from behind, there was every chance that she could have been Lorna. It was impossible, but like a child clinging to the myth of Santa Claus, he had willed it to be true with all his heart.

He dutifully continued his lap around the room, showing interest in each of the interns he spoke to. This was the part of his job that he enjoyed; meeting people and getting to know them. He liked it when he got to be out in the community, speaking with people about their lives and how he, in his position, could help to improve them. Some people were more polite than others. In the past, some women had been downright crude to him, commenting on how attractive he was in person and what they would like to do to him in the privacy of their own bedrooms. That sort of talk made Charles most uncomfortable and he struggled to identify with women of the ‘ladette’ persuasion. Perhaps he was old-fashioned in his views, but he liked women to be, well, women; well turned out, polite and feminine. So many women were trying to push those boundaries and he never understood why.

Charles was ready to leave the interns when he saw her, and this time he was not mistaken. His body trembled as he realised that there was a ghost in his midst. He looked on in disbelief, his mouth agape, as Lorna appeared and walked across to the other side of the room. It was utterly impossible. It couldn’t be! Yet there was no denying it was her – the blonde hair, the delicate features, and her gentle, almost dance-like gait.

Charles’ entire body went cold as though he had suddenly been plunged in to ice. It could not be Lorna, it was impossible. But he had just seen her, he was certain of it.

Vomit threatened to escape from Charles’ mouth as he absorbed the shock. Everything seemed to be running in slow motion as he contemplated what he should do; fear making his actions erratic and clumsy. He hastily made his excuses and almost ran back to his office, terror gripping him as he moved.

‘Impossible, impossible,’ he muttered to himself as he hurried past Faye’s desk and gratefully closed his office door behind him.

‘Impossible,’ he said again, breathless from his frantic rush through the building. There was no logical reason why he could have seen Lorna but he did not doubt his senses. She had been there, amongst the interns. Charles tried to will himself to think rationally, to try and make sense of the senseless. Looking down at his hands he realised that they were shaking.

Why was Lorna there? Was she haunting him, punishing him for her death? Or had he gone mad, his mind completely lost beyond salvation and driven to the brink of insanity?

Charles feared that it was the latter. He sat at his desk and tried to calm down but his heart continued to thump like a crazed drum within his chest. He wanted to believe that he had imagined her; that he missed her so terribly that he had started to hallucinate that she was there. But she had seemed so real, moving amongst the interns as though she belonged there.

Charles let his head fall into his heads. Clearly, he was more disturbed than he had originally thought. And if it wasn’t that and if Lorna’s spirit was haunting him, he wasn’t sure if he even believed in all that. Charles was an atheist – the notion of an afterlife was ludicrous to him. But Lorna had haunted his dreams for all these months. What if she had now leapt out into his life?

‘Lorna’s dead.’ Charles said the words aloud, knowing that he no longer believed them.