‘What is it that you don’t want me to see?’ My voice is sort of distant and unsteady, my thoughts matching. ‘What can be worse than what I’m feeling today? Yesterday? This whole year?’ I realise my words aren’t a reflection of what’s going through my head—they aren’t loud and angry but rather plaintive. ‘I mean, I lost my husband, my home, most of my friends. My place in the world, and for more than a few weeks, my will to live. What else could there be left to hurt me?’
‘I wanted to tell you, but not yet. I didn’t think you were ready, not after yesterday’s conversation. We decided we’d wait until after your birthday at least, but Raya—’
‘Said I was making him a saint. That I needed to sacrifice his memory on the altar of my self-respect. Who says that kind of stuff?’ I huff a half-laugh because I know the answer.Soraya the ball buster. Soraya the harsh. Soraya the woman who got me out of the country after Marcus died, risking prison herself.
‘What is it she thinks I need to see? That you don’t?’
‘Yet.’ Ivy walks further into the kitchen and begins to shuffle the prunes and papers on the table. ‘I don’t—didn’t think you were ready. She means well, but she doesn’t know that there are still days where you cry yourself awake.’
Shame blooms in my chest.
‘You didn’t think I could hear you?’ she asks a little sadly.
Pursing my lips, I shake my head.
‘I just don’t know if this is going to make things better or worse.’ Her words are despondent as she pulls out a document wallet concealed under a pile. ‘I was hoping we could keep this quiet until you were back on your feet. Feeling stronger, maybe.’ Her words trail off, her next sentence sounding much the same. ‘Raya foundout some stuff... recently.’
She hands me the branded package.Fed-Ex.
My hands tremble as I pull it from hers. ‘What is it?’ I hold the box so still it’s like it’s explosive.
Ivy looks uncomfortable, yet her gaze doesn’t waver from mine. Which tells me this parcel is an explosive of another kind.Hers is the kind of look meant to reassure, though not in theit’s going to be okayway. It’s more likeI’ve got your back.The kind of look that feels like a cold finger dragging down my spine.
‘I don’t know exactly. I just know, well, I know what it means.’ Her expression is more worrying than the package in my hands. ‘I just want you to know it wasn’t my intention to hide this from you. I’d have happily... well, not happily, but Raya was packing some of your belongings she’d managed to grab from your house. She was boxing them up to ship, only she found...’ She gestures to the package lying in my hands. ‘Those.’
I tear the cardboard strip and pull out the contents, spreading them out on the table, picking up a folded credit card statement addressed to Marcus and a bill branded Agent Provocateur. Nothing shocking there, other than their prices.
‘It was for nightwear,’ I say, picking it up. ‘He—he bought me these on his last business trip.’ Tiny froufrou bits of silver lace and satin, more for the purpose of being peeledoff in the bedroom, rather than to beput onto sleep in. As it happens, they were used for neither. I hadn’t even removed the tags. I’d been shocked when I’d found the gift box in the closet as we hadn’t had any kind of intimacy in quite some time. ‘Wonder what happened to them?’ I ask absently, suffering a fleeting, yet ridiculous vision, of George, the gardener of our house in Dubai—the last place we’d lived—wearing the sheer chemise and midnight lace robe while mowing the lawn in the searing heat.
‘Expect it’s all in a box somewhere. Maybe amongst the stuff that Raya managed to pack?’ A look of panic flits across her face before she ducks her head, her eyes now glued to the table.
I pick up another bill; it’s from the same store, dated the following day. Each bill is charged with the same items and the exact same amount.
‘There must be some mistake. Is this credit card fraud?’
‘I wished it was,’ Ivy almost whispers, her fingers touching my forearm as I empty a smaller envelope. A series of photographs fall to the table and I gasp.
These are photographs of my husband’s P.A. in the very same chemise and lace robe.
The fat bitch.
