‘The one that disappeared while you were housesitting?’ asked Martha.
Willow nodded.
‘But how did it end up buried in the garden?’ This was from Tom. ‘And how do they know for sure that it is Cedric?’
‘Because they took the body to the vet who’d put the identity chip in, and that confirmed it was Cedric,’ answered Willow. ‘And anyway, it’s obviously him, you can see his collar around his poor little neck in the photo. It’s decorated with diamanté, so there’s no mistaking it.’ She wiped away the tears that had now spilled over from her eyes. ‘And his fur is still visible and—’
‘Enough!’ interrupted Rick, snapping forward in his seat. ‘No more, Willow. This has gone on quite enough. You’re working yourself up into an unnecessary state. Lucy was totally out of order sending you that picture. I’ve a good mind to ring her back and tell her so. Give me your phone.’ He held out his hand, but the normally compliant Willow shook her head.
‘Lucy sent the photo because she thinks we lied about Cedric wandering off,’ Willow said. ‘She thinks we killed him and buried him at the end of the garden behind the shed and then lied to her and Simon.’
Rick’s chin took on a dogged tilt. ‘And why the hell would we do that?’ he demanded.
‘I … I don’t know,’ faltered Willow. ‘It doesn’t make sense. Unless—’
‘Unless what?’
She stared at him, his expression etched like stone in the candlelight. ‘Unless you did it. Did you, Rick?’ Her voice was no more than a whisper.
‘Me?’
‘Yes. I know I didn’t do it, and nobody else could have had access in or out of the house or garden, because I always kept the doors shut. And the only time a door was left open was when you told me you’d accidentally forgotten to close the front door when you went out to the car.And that was the day Cedric went missing.’
When Willow went quiet, each and every one of them looked at Rick and waited for his response. If Ellis had felt awkward earlier watching Rick play with Willow’s hair, he now felt excruciatingly uncomfortable. It was quite an allegation Willow had just made, and all the more potent because she didn’t seem to be the sort of girl who went around accusing people of … well, frankly, of secretly burying cats.
‘Well?’ pressed Martha as the ominous silence lengthened.
Rick swivelled his head from Willow to Martha and looked at her with unnerving coolness before returning his attention to Willow.
‘Look, sweetheart,’ he said, reaching for her hand. ‘It sounds worse than it really is. You have to believe me when I say I was only trying to protect you from any distress. I know what you’re like, the slightest thing sets you off. All that happened was that the blasted cat slipped out through the open door and before I could do anything, a passing car ran over him. The driver of the car didn’t even stop. He probably didn’t know what he’d done. I knew you’d be beside yourself if you knew, so I dug a hole behind the shed and buried the cat. I thought I was doing the right thing in protecting you. You do believe that, don’t you? I meant no harm.’
‘But you let me search for poor Cedric for all those days. I was frantic with worry. You even helped. Or you pretended to look for him. When all the time you knew where he was, he was buried in the garden!’
Rick held on tightly to her hand as she tried to remove it from his grasp.‘I should have been honest with you, I know. I made a stupid mistake. I’m really sorry. Can you forgive me, please?’
He slowly cast his gaze around the table. ‘Wouldn’t you all have done the same to shield Willow from any needless pain? Wouldn’t you?’
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Sunday morning and Tom was doing one of his favourite things; he was riding round the garden on his sit-on mower. With just a few more stripes to add to the lawn he thought how one day he’d be doing this with his daughter on his lap. Just as he and his sister had taken turns to do the same thing with their father when they’d been little.
It was now the second week of September and the air had a distinct hint of freshness to it that was reminiscent of so many back-to-school days from his childhood. It was funny how one never lost that feeling, or the memory of washing one’s hair of a Sunday evening and hastily doing the homework that had been left to the last minute. With a wry smile, he thought that it wouldn’t be long before he and Martha would be seeing their daughter off to school for her first day.
Having been firmly of the opinion that neither of them wanted to know the sex of their Little Beanie in advance, they had undergone an unexpected change of heart the night before going for the scan. Their original thinking had been that they didn’t want to tempt fate by knowing too much, or become any more attached to their unborn child than they already were … just in case. To perform such an uncharacteristic U-turn for two staunchly rational people had taken them both by surprise.But then as Naomi had said when they spent the Bank Holiday weekend with her, they had better prepare themselves for plenty more surprises when it came to being parents.
‘Parenthood makes fools of us all,’ she had said with a laugh. ‘What you believe makes perfect sense one day will seem quite ridiculous another.’
In the days since ‘Catgate’ – as Martha referred to that weekend a fortnight ago – Tom was surprised by yet another turnaround in thinking, that of his wife’s opinion of Rick. Whenever his name came up in conversation, a glint would appear in her eye and she’d say, ‘Who? Oh, you mean Rick-the-Cat-Killer?’
If Tom didn’t know better, he would say that Martha was enjoying Rick’s fall from grace, as she saw it. Which was odd, given how keen she had been on him when Willow first introduced Rick to the family. To say they were all taken aback by this new boyfriend, who turned up with Willow in a 5-series BMW and a Ralph Lauren shirt and Armani jeans, was a colossal understatement. Had he still been alive, Colin would have clapped Rick on the back and hailed him as the best thing to come his youngest daughter’s way.
Tom had never been entirely convinced by Rick’s ideal boyfriend credentials. But for the sake of family harmony, and because Willow did seem to be happy, he had not queried his suitability. But that day at Anchor House when Naomi had taken the girls shopping, Tom had found himself ill-disposed towards Rick. It was something about the churlish way he had waved Willow off as she’d happily climbed into the back seat of Naomi’s car. It had been obvious that he hadn’t wanted Willow to go, that he had wanted her to remain with him. For the rest of the day everything about Rick’s manner had been grudging,as though he didn’t want to be there. In turn, Tom’s mood had been affected and, he was afraid to say, he probably hadn’t been good company for Ellis, who had tried to make the best of a bad job.
Then in the evening during dinner, they’d had that extraordinary scene which had left them sitting in stunned silence. Since then, Tom had wondered what he would have done if he’d been in Rick’s shoes. Would he have gone to similar lengths to protect Martha’s feelings over something he knew would upset her? Probably, yes, he would. Husbands, wives, partners, they all did strange things at times. Nobody was immune from doing something out of character. Or doing something that was just plain bloody weird, like secretly burying a dead cat behind a garden shed and inventing a story that was nothing but a tissue of lies.
To have kept up the pretence must have taken some doing on Rick’s part. Tom would have caved in and come clean with Martha. Maybe that was because his wife was not one to leave a stone unturned when it came to her rooting out the truth or getting to the bottom of something. Moreover, she was invariably right to do so. Was she right in this instance to regard Rick the way she did, with such apparent disdain?
The grass cut and the mower put away, Tom washed his hands in the small utility room before pushing open the kitchen door. Martha was sitting at the table working on her laptop. He had left her there more than an hour ago. She was determined not to be accused of slacking because she was pregnant, so was working harder than ever. Some of her colleagues had guessed she was pregnant and with the news out, she had officially informed HR of the situation.
