‘I imagine it was because he knew the best man was going to win. Youweregoing to choose Josh, weren’t you?’
It felt as though she’d reached into my chest and hauled out my heart. The pain felt real, because I was right back there again, loving two men in completely different ways and knowing someone’s heart was going to break, and it wasn’t just going to be mine.
‘Josh made sure you weren’t left with any lingering doubts about your decision –that’swhy he engineered an argument so ugly it would sever every strand of your friendship before he walked away.’
The inexplicably bitter row that had haunted me for years, which had been so out of character and had never made any sense, finally did.
‘My brother stepped aside, because he was the bigger man, the better man, the man who wanted you to have your fairy tale. Yourhappy-ever-after. Shit, he even started to make you a sodding crib for the baby he thought you were going to have.’
My eyes widened until the skin around them felt stretched paper-thin. ‘An oak crib with woodland creatures carved on it?’
This time it was Claire’s turn to looked startled.
‘Yes. He was halfway through making it when he saw some photos of you and Adam on Facebook taken on a beach someplace. It was obvious from them that you weren’t pregnant.’
I shook my head as the pieces began falling into place with horrible clarity.
‘Josh thought you’d lost the baby. He nearly went back on his word and reached out to you. Thank God he didn’t. He felt a big enough idiot as it was.’
‘But when did he find out the truth?’
‘When your husband contacted him.’
There was suddenly too much saliva in my mouth. It made speech almost impossible.
‘Josh told me he never replied when Adam got in touch with him.’
Claire’s face was eloquent. ‘Well, it looks like he’s almost as good a liar as your husband was. Because theydefinitelyspoke. I guess Adam knew he wasn’t going to make it and was trying to put things right before he died.’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘But some things can never be fixed, and your husband should have known that.’
So, there it was. The secret had finally been revealed. The mystery was gone. And soon, hopefully, Claire would be too. She got to her feet, slipping her arms into her coat as she appeared to wrestle with her thoughts.
‘There’s no point trying to rewrite history. You and I can’t suddenly pretend we’re friends.’
I looked up, certain I was still wearing my rabbit-in-the-headlights stunned expression.
‘No, we can’t,’ I said quietly, before adding almost on a whisper. ‘Although I never quite understood why that was.’
Claire shook her head slowly. ‘Like I said, for an intelligent woman, you definitely aren’t that smart.’
I let the insult lie, like I’d done so many times before.
‘You knew Josh first, you and he already had this really tight bond, and then he became part of my family ... part of my life ... and yet the pull of you was always so ridiculously strong, it drew him away from spending time with me, over and over again. Even when he went away travelling, it was always you he visited first whenever he came back. Everyone else got squeezed in afterwards.’
She gave a shrug, like it was water so far beneath the bridge it scarcely mattered anymore, but I could see in her eyes that it still did.
‘Perhaps your Adam felt the same way as I did about you and Josh. Like whatever he did, he could never match the connection the two of you had. Who knows, if I’d been clever enough years ago, maybeI’dhave done something similar to what your husband did.’
She looked pointedly towards the door, and I realised she was probably waiting to see if I was ever going to get to my feet, but my legs still felt incapable of holding me up.
‘I’ll let myself out then, shall I?’
I nodded dully.
Claire paused just once at the doorway, with a surprising parting remark.
‘You need to fix this, Lily. Like it or not I have to accept that one way or another you’re probably going to feature in Josh’s life for the foreseeable, and for his sake it might be time to finally bury the hatchet.’
It was the closest to reasonable I’d ever known Claire to be, but right now it was lost on me. All I could think, see and taste was a feeling of confusion and betrayal.
