“I’m just messing. Have you spoken to Adam?”
“No, I’ve left a couple of messages on his mobile but he was probably working over the weekend. Why do you ask?”
“Oh, no reason. I saw him - not to talk to - on Friday night and I just wondered if he’d said.”
“What would he be saying, Anna?” Rachel said, rolling her eyes at Gudrun who was watching the road but smiling as she listened to Rachel’s side of the conversation. “Did he see you getting loved up with someone, finally? Oh, is it that bloke from the bar we went to?”
“No, I don’t think he saw me.”
“Okay, you’ve lost me. So, what could he have told me then?”
Anna was silent for a second.
“Anna? Are you there?”
“Oh God, Rach. I saw him but I was hoping he might have said something…”
Rachel had never known Anna to be reticent about anything. Normally she was quite the opposite, so something was going on.
“Bloody hell, Anna! Just spit it out. What?”
“I saw him with a woman. I don’t know Rach, maybe she was a client and he was just sucking up to her…”
“Were they kissing or something? What do you mean?”
“They were stood together at this cocktail bar…they looked intimate.”
“Do you mean they were kissing?” Rachel asked again, feeling slightly sick. Despite Anna planting the seed about it before she left London, Rachel hadn’t seriously imagined Adam would do anything like that in a million years. She’d thought she was being paranoid. Some women were constantly looking over their shoulder, jealous of any attention their partner paid to someone else. Rachel wasn’t like that but now she wondered if she had just been oblivious. He barely had time for her, let alone anyone else. Unless that waswhyhe had no time for her…
“Anna, were they?” Even as she was asking Anna yet again, Rachel had no idea why the idea of him kissing someone else was the thing she needed to get to the bottom of. She knew well enough after Friday night that it could have been a spur of the moment thing that meant nothing. A kiss was not incontrovertible evidence.
“No, they didn’t kiss, at least not when I was there but Rach, they lookedtogether.The way they were looking at each other and they were touching each other quite… possessively. I just thought he might have mentioned he was going out with a colleague or client or something?”
“He went out with Jim but that was last week. Were they on their own?”
“I think so, I don’t know, Rach. I’m sorry. I feel like an idiot for telling you. It’s hardly like I caught them snogging or anything…I just thought you would want to know…or that you’d know who it was or something.”
When she hung up, Rachel sat in silence for a few minutes. Maybe she was a client. That was the most likely explanation. Or a potential client. Rachel hated to think that Adam would try and win clients by flirting or anything like that but he was very driven.
“Is everything alright?” asked Gudrun.
“Not really, my friend thinks she saw my boyfriend with another woman.” Saying it out loud sounded so ridiculous that Rachel started laughing. “Oh my God! He was out with anotherwoman!” She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes and when she took them away, she was crying. “I just can’t believe it. It’s so unlike him.” Wiping her eyes on a tissue she found in her bag, she composed herself. “Sorry, Gudrun. I don’t normally cry when I’m at work.”
“It’s fine, Rachel.” Then a few seconds later, “Do you think it is true?”
“I don’t know. Until a couple of weeks ago it had never crossed my mind that Adam would ever cheat on me and now I’m unravelling the last two years in my head wondering whether I’ve been a complete fool.”
“You need to talk to him. There could be a very innocent explanation. Were they kissing?”
Rachel wondered if the kissing part was even relevant. Anna had said they looked ‘together’ – a kiss or not hardly mattered.
“I’m so sorry, it’s none of my business,” said Gudrun, misreading Rachel’s silence as her being offended.
“I’ve just had minor hysterics in your car and unless I call Anna back and drive her mad when she feels bad enough already, I need someone else to talk to.”
“Fantastic. Talk away. Sorry, I don’t mean -”
“Gudrun, really if you’re happy to hear it, I’m happy to tell you.”
