The Love of Her Life (28 page)

She pushed him away. ‘I can’t,’ she said. ‘I really can’t.’

He held her head in his hands. ‘Come on, Kate,’ he said. ‘It’s one night. You’re going back in a week.’

‘But last time …’

‘I’m over it,’ he said. He brought her hand to his mouth, kissed her fingers gently. ‘Aren’t you over it? Come on. Haven’t you been working hard, don’t you deserve this?’

‘Not if it’s going to …’ she began, but he kissed her again.

‘I want you,’ he said. His breath was hot on her eyes, her lips. ‘And you want me. Don’t worry about the rest, Kate. It’s all in the past.’

Just to know that at the end of the cab journey was her front door, her hallway, where he would push her against the wall and press himself against her, so that she clung to him in the darkness, her arms wrapped around his neck, to stop herself falling down. Just to think that beyond the hall was her bedroom, where she would see him naked again, feel his body on top of her, pushing inside her, and then wrapped around her at the end of the night so that she might wake up in the early hours of the morning and turn
gently to see him asleep, the harsh lines that criss-crossed his face wiped away.

One more night with him. Never mind the realization that how much she missed him would be almost more pain than the pleasure that lay ahead of her now. Just once more, as they kissed in the cab, making its way silently and sedately through the moonlit streets of town.

Sue’s words, the day before, rang in her ears. Do something wild. Stop behaving like an old lady. But for the first time, since she’d come back to London, Kate had that feeling she’d had so long ago: of standing at the edge of a precipice, about to jump off, bringing destruction with her as she fell. The idea that Mac was with her was extraordinary – Mac, with whom she shared a secret history that only the two of them knew about, that they kept from their friends, it wasn’t over.

‘OK,’ she said, and she kissed him back. They were nearly home. Yes, she told herself, as his hands moved over her, as he kissed her more insistently, as she desperately wished they were alone. Just enjoy this one night. Don’t think about the past. Don’t think about that last lie, the last betrayal.

london
Summer 2006
‘Kate?’

She was sitting at a table in a pretty French café just north of Grosvenor Square, pushing the padded tissue coaster around with the tips of her fingers. The quiet Mayfair bustle of a summer’s afternoon, fading into evening, was soporific. Kate stared at her arms, thinking how brown they’d become, which was strange when she was outdoors so little these days. The bangles on her hand jangled as she shook more sugar into her cup of tea. She breathed in, the smell of rich heat rising from the ground, tarmac, cars and sweet, harsh, pollen, hitting her.

The US Embassy was closed: of course it was. July Fourth, why hadn’t she realized? So stupid of her; a sinking, metallic feeling of dread had assailed her as she’d drawn closer to the square and looked for the line of people that usually ran down the side of the unlovely, humourless building.

‘Come back tomorrow, miss,’ the scary guard had told her, clutching his AK 47, his face expressionless.

‘But –’ Kate began. ‘I’m only here for two days, I’ve come specially to get my visa renewed. I’ve got to get back to the
States. They promised they’d stamp my visa again and I could come straight home again.’

‘Miss, you’ll have to come back tomorrow. I’m gonna have to ask you to step away now.’

Kate was used to the humourless precision of American security now, after twenty-two months there, nearly two years, she knew it exactly. But here, on this beautiful English summer’s evening, the trees dipping and whistling around the long, elegant square, it seemed totally incongruous, and she had smiled at him, without really knowing why, and stepped away, as requested.

One more day, she told herself as she trailed up towards Oxford Street. One more day here, and you can get back, and no one will know you’re here. Her mother and Oscar were up in the Hamptons for two weeks, they would never realize she’d gone. Luckily Perry and Co was closed not just for July 4th but for a week, most unusually, while Bruce escorted their cash cow, Anne Graves, back to Ohio, to receive an honorary degree from the university and to spend some time at her cabin there. Bruce had closed the office as a reward to his loyal co-workers, he had told them all, not because he was a control freak who hated not being there if others were there. Kate wondered what he thought he’d be missing if he left them all to it for four days; more of Doris’s interesting stories about her husband, Mikey? Nancy the book-keeper’s weekly complaint about her book club’s choices? The tension wrought by Perry and Co’s temperamental aircon unit?

One more day here, she said, as she sat down for a coffee, gratefully resting her tired limbs. No one knew she was here, except Betty, who had driven her to JFK, told her she was crazy, but was going to pick her up in two days’ time, when this visa mess was sorted out. In, out, clean, precise, and no one need know she was here.

No one.

‘
Kate
? Is that you?’

She heard the voice again, but still she didn’t move. She looked down. It couldn’t be him, surely. Perhaps he’d just walk on, leave her here, alone, unseen, perhaps she could still get away with it …

‘Kate.’ A tall figure, looking down at her. ‘My god. It really
is
you.’

She glanced up, shielding her eyes against the sun, knowing what she would see.

It was him. It was Mac. Shock ran through her, instantaneous; her heart started thumping. She put her hand to her collarbone, pushing her chair away from him, at the same time astonished at her own visceral response to the sight of him. He laid a cool hand on her arm.

‘Don’t go.’

‘I – I –’ Kate swallowed, mastering herself again. ‘My god.’

She stood up, awkwardly, facing him. He was so tall, she’d forgotten that. Everything about him was so familiar, like opening a locked door stuffed full of memories, all bursting to come out. She didn’t know what to say.

He stretched his arms out, briefly, as if he was going to hug her, and as she took another step back, almost frightened, he shook his head and folded his hands under his armpits, defensively. She saw he didn’t realize he was doing it.

‘It’s been a long time,’ he said, softly. ‘Kate, where did you go?’

Kate cleared her throat, wanting to speak, but nothing came out. She looked round at her fellow patrons, who were watching with ill-concealed interest. How different from New York, where she and Betty had last month had a loud,
drunken shouting match in the Village about Betty’s useless boyfriend Troy, and no one had appeared to see them, let along notice them.

‘Sit down,’ he said, his voice gentle. He touched her shoulder with one finger, and she sank gratefully back down into her seat. Mac was looking at her, his eyes searching her, as if he couldn’t quite believe she was really there. Kate blinked slowly, terrified of what he could say to her, not knowing what to say herself, and he followed her, pulling up a chair.

She stirred the teaspoon around her empty coffee cup. ‘So – so you’re down here now?’

‘I moved back, got a residency at St John’s. To be closer to Zoe. You know.’

‘Yep.’ Kate nodded, staring without seeing at the ground.

‘Why are you here?’

‘Visa,’ she said. ‘I had to leave and come back. I’m only in town for a day.’

He flashed a glance at her. ‘Right.’

He ordered a coffee; they sat in silence for a while. Then he said,

‘You stopped answering my emails,’ he said.

‘You stopped sending them,’ Kate said.

Mac rubbed his palms together. ‘I didn’t think you wanted to hear any more. I don’t blame you. You’re Kate, though.

You just pushed it all away instead.’ He said this without emotion.

‘I didn’t,’ said Kate hotly, though he was telling the truth, she knew it. ‘I didn’t know what else to do. I couldn’t stay.’

‘Why not?’

Zoe’s words still echoed in her head.
Please. Kate, you need
to leave me alone for a while. Please
.

‘I just couldn’t,’ she said. She said, honestly, ‘I was to
blame. I still think I was. And I know Zoe did too then. I had to get away. I didn’t know what I was thinking then, really.’

‘You were too –’ He shook his head. ‘Oh, Kate. So you left and never contacted her again,’ Mac said, drumming his fingers on the aluminium table, looking at the ground. She noticed the grey collecting at the temples of his sandy brown hair. ‘Or me. I just don’t understand how you found that easy to do.’

She looked up at him swiftly, tendrils of hair falling about her face. ‘Don’t say that,’ she said, her voice sharp. ‘That’s a ridiculous thing to say.’

‘Couldn’t you have talked to someone else then?’ Mac said, his voice low. He put his hand in her lap, steadying her writhing fingers. ‘Talked to someone, without running away like that.’

There was a pause, a break which spooled into a silence between them, so long that Kate could hear sirens in the background, roaring down Park Lane, the sound of sirens that she’d probably never forget. She took a breath, trying to explain, and then slumped down into her seat again. Her eyes were stinging, and she was so tired.

‘What?’ he said.

‘There wasn’t anyone, was there?’ Kate said. ‘No one, really. Well, Francesca – but she was so upset about Steve, she couldn’t help me. And it wasn’t fair to put all of that on her.’

‘Come on,’ said Mac, slightly impatiently. ‘Your father?’

‘Dad,’ said Kate. ‘Yep, right.’ She tried to imagine what would have happened had she really tried to talk to her dad about it all, in those ghastly, endless days after Steve died and Sean left. Somehow, being with them, her father’s new family, highlighted how dreadfully alone she was, and she’d realized after several awkward, disjointed conversations and offers of help, half-hearted offers of accommodation, that
she’d rather face up to it by herself than blanket it in the new, neutral, perfect house in Notting Hill into which they were about to move. Except it wasn’t facing up to it, it was running away, but again, fight or flight: she had chosen flight.

‘Excuse. Miss.’

Someone was tugging at her sleeve; she looked around, at a Japanese tourist, with glasses and sunhat wedged firmly onto his head, his wife standing next to him, opening and shutting a guide book in Japanese.

‘Diana palace nearby?’ said the husband. Kate looked at Mac, who shook his head impatiently, not understanding.

‘Oh,’ Kate said, recognition dawning. ‘Diana’s palace. Where Princess Diana lived?’

They nodded. ‘Please.’ The wife jabbed her fingers at the guidebook.

‘It’s called Kensington Palace, and you need to get on a bus, or a tube, and go to …’ she trailed off, realizing they had no idea what she was talking about. The people at the next table stared at her. Mac stared at her, amusement crossing his usually unreadable features.

Kate gave him a sharp look. It occurred to her that she was a tourist, just like them, after all. She took the guidebook out of the woman’s hands and the woman tensed, looking nervous, as if she thought Kate might steal it. She found a map at the back of the book.

‘Here,’ she said, and she took a pen off the table and drew a cross by where Kensington Palace was. ‘Bus. Top of road.’ She pointed in the direction of Oxford Street. ‘Numbers? You know numbers?’

‘Bus,’ said the husband, nodding enthusiastically. ‘Bus, yes.’

‘Ten,’ Kate said, pointing again. ‘Ten. Bus number ten.’ She was almost shouting.

‘She was a beautiful lady,’ said the wife, carefully.

‘Diana, yes,’ said Kate, nodding. Mac looked alarmed.

The woman’s face lit up. ‘Beautiful lady. Queen of Hea—’

‘Yes, she was, thanks,’ said Mac, impatiently, patting the husband, to whom he was nearest, on the arm. ‘Good luck!’

They moved away, saying thanks as they left, and Mac turned back to look at Kate, shaking his head.

‘I’d forgotten that about you,’ he said.

‘What?’ she said, smiling.

‘You’re like a girl guide. A grown-up girl guide.’

‘Charming,’ said Kate. ‘That’s not very sexy.’

‘Oh it is,’ said Mac, raising his eyebrows, and laughing. She joined in, shaking her head, but then he said, suddenly serious, ‘So, you were about to tell me why you ran off. Did a bunk.’

There was a cool breeze blowing down the street, refreshing and calm. Kate let it wash over her, calming her down, and she looked at Mac.

‘Look, I had to go. That’s the truth. Don’t bother hating me for it. You couldn’t hate me more than I hate myself.’

He was silent for a long time, looking at her, and still he held his hand in her lap. It was so comforting, the kind of solid, kind comfort that Kate hadn’t really felt for months and months. She knew Mac must despise her, blame her, loathe her, but somehow still, there at the table, her hand in his, in the shade of tall Mayfair red brick, she felt safe.

‘You poor thing,’ he said after a while. ‘You poor bloody thing.’

‘We’ll just walk, then,’ he said, checking back to make sure they’d left nothing behind. She liked that about him, his precision in everything, the way he managed to do it without fussing. It was a process, part of a process, like giving an
anaesthetic or removing a tumour or mending a tear or scrubbing up.

‘Don’t you have to –’ she asked.

‘I don’t have to be anywhere,’ he said. ‘Neither do you, so why don’t we just walk for a bit? Where are you staying?’

‘Hotel in Bayswater,’ she said.

‘You’re not staying with your dad?’

‘He’s away.’ She was lying, she didn’t know why. ‘No one knows I’m here. Mac, I don’t want –’

‘Sure, sure,’ he said, softly. ‘It’s fine. I think you need to tire yourself out if you’re going to sleep tonight, anyway. Let’s just – walk, shall we?’

‘OK,’ said Kate. ‘Where shall we go?’

‘The park,’ he said. ‘Let’s go to the park.’

‘So tell me, what you’ve been up to, then,’ he said, as they walked into Hyde Park, and Kate saw the vistas of paths open up before them, of trees and buildings far in the background.

‘It’s a pretty short story,’ said Kate. ‘A boring story.’

‘OK,’ he said, easily, and he shot a look at her, and then carried on walking. She could hear the shouts from Speaker’s Corner. There were the people just out of the office, relaxing in the evening sun, resting their heads on their backpacks, reading papers and books. There was the long, yellowy green meadow grass, never built-upon, never constructed and moulded into a park out of rock like Central Park. This was the parkland that Henry VIII had hunted on, that Lady Emma Hamilton had ridden over, where sandbags had been laid in the First World War. She smiled, thinking what a very tacky, touristy thing to think that was.

It was just she knew it, she knew that over there was the Serpentine, with boats floating on the still surface, and the Albert Hall, and the Albert Memorial, spun out of gold and
marble, ridiculously over-shiny, and she knew that over
there
were the formal gardens, and Kensington Palace, and the spot where Tyburn stood. She knew all this, because she’d grown up here, and it was her home, and she missed it, she missed it so much it hurt, and she missed
this
– walking along with someone, just chatting. About things that mattered.

‘Tell me how Zoe is instead,’ said Kate. ‘And Flora. How’s Flora?’

Zoe and Steve’s daughter was now eighteen months old. Mac smiled. ‘Beautiful. Looks just like her mother. She likes things with mud,’ said Mac, as they walked down towards Park Lane.

‘Mud?’ said Kate.

‘Yes, eating mud. Harry keeps striding out to the garden and trying to shove handfuls of earth into her mouth. Zoe’s in despair, she doesn’t know what to do. She ate a worm last week.’ She turned towards him. His green eyes were full of laughter, though his expression was as serious as ever. ‘Flora ate a worm, I mean.’

‘Obviously.’

‘Does Harry remember –’ Kate trailed off.

‘About his father?’ Mac said, gazing into the distance, where a group of friends were playing a noisy and erratic game of frisbee. ‘Harry remembers him. He asks where Steve is.’