How bad do I feel? He shouldn’t have had to prompt me – I should’ve been raving about his lovely wife’s book from the moment I got here.
‘Ireallyloved it.’ I’m trying to make up for my gaffe, and for the next few minutes it’s all I can talk about.
In Nicole’s novel, the heroine, Kit, is a travel writer who falls in love with two men at the same time: Morris, a laidback surfer-turned-entrepreneur from right here in Cornwall, and Timo, a sexy Finnish rock climber who is based in Thailand. At the end of the first book, Kit goes to Thailand to break up with Timo because Morris – her first love – has proposed to her. But, before she can come clean, Timo asks her to marry him, too. And she says yes.
I know! WTF, right?
‘I detest cheating with a passion, so I shouldn’t have liked this book on principle,’ I tell Charlie, arguably too honestly. ‘But somehow Nicole made it… I don’t know. It’s so believable. She wrote in such a heart-wrenching way that I couldn’t help but be swept up in the story. I felt like I was inside Kit’s mind, feeling every emotion she was feeling and somehow understanding the crazy decisions she was making. It was…’ I shake my head, finally, yes,finallylost for words.
I think I’ve said all the right things from the look on his face.
‘Do you know what was going to happen in the sequel?’ I ask. ‘Do you know who Kit was going to end up with?’
He shakes his head. ‘I’m not sure even Nicki knew.’
I feel a surge of disappointment. Charlie leans back to put his empty mug down on the windowsill behind him. ‘But, if she did, the answer will be in her notes. She made lots of them. Let me show you her office.’
April seems to be content sitting in her bouncer for the moment, so Charlie turns the sound back up on the television and leads me upstairs. He walks straight ahead, pushing open the door to a small room that looks out over the messy back garden. Any view of the estuary would be from the other side of the house. A large desk fills the area under the window, and there are bookshelves and filing cabinets lining the walls. A slick Apple computer takes pride of place in the centre of the desk. The room is tidy, but I can see from here that the computer screen is dusty from underuse.
Charlie pulls open the top left desk drawer to reveal a series of notebooks crammed inside.
‘Nicki was always writing in these,’ he says.
He closes that drawer and opens the next to expose more notebooks.
‘I haven’t gone through them.’ From the tightening of his voice, I take it he hasn’t wanted to. ‘But all of her research is in here.’ He opens another drawer. ‘She also used to keep diaries when she was younger. Her dad moved to Thailand for work and she’d visit when she could. A lot of what she wrote about back then made it intoSecret. I think you’ll find clues as to where she planned to go with the sequel.’
I look up at the crowded bookshelves and notice several Post-it notes sticking out of the tops of some of the books. What pages did she mark? Were they significant?
Nicole did a couple of interviews around the timeSecretwas published last October, so I already knew that her father is a French chef called Alain Dupré, and that she wrote under her maiden name. But, as she died just two weeks after her book was released, before the sales had taken off, her readers and I don’t know much more about her – it’s very surreal to be standing here in her office.
‘Did she leave notes on her computer, too?’ My mind boggles.Where would I start?
Charlie hesitates almost imperceptibly before reaching behind the screen and feeling for theONbutton. The computer fires up with a louddong.
‘I would’ve thought so,’ he says.
His back is to me, his posture tense. I stare at his frame and out of the blue think of Elliot. It’s been almost six months since we’ve seen each other and, on the whole, I’m coping. But suddenly I miss him intensely.
April lets out a cry downstairs, making Charlie start. ‘Take a seat and have a look,’ he mumbles, leaving me to it.
Is he sure he doesn’t mind? Uncertainly, I pull out the chair and sit down. The screen in front of me lights up and then I’m looking at a small photograph of Nicole, under which is a request for her password.
She’s laughing and her slim, oval face is basked in warmth from the sunshine. She has dark hair that brushes her shoulders and her eyes are sky-blue. Across her head is a familiar yellow bandana headband that doesn’t quite obscure her fringe, and a sprinkling of freckles dusts her nose. She looks happy. I find myself wishing that I had known her. The posed black-and-white publicity shot on the inside cover of her book doesn’t do her justice.
‘It’sThailand.’
I almost jump out of my skin at the sound of Charlie’s voice from behind me.
‘The password isThailand. Uppercase T.’
‘Oh!’ I type it in. I pressENTERand Nicole’s desktop swings into view.
I hear Charlie inhale sharply and know better than to turn around.
An image of him holding a newborn baby has filled the screen. His hair is shorter and he’s gazing with love at the tiny bundle in his arms.
‘I’ve barely been in here since we lost her,’ he says softly.
