Careless in Red (Inspector Lynley, #15)(34)

She reached for a cookbook. She had a collection of them, all kept in a stand on the work top, the product of cookery classes she’d taken. One of the Kernes had to learn how to plan nutritious, inexpensive, and tasty meals for the large groups who’d book into Adventures Unlimited. The Kernes would hire a cook, of course, but they’d save money by having the meals planned out by someone other than an executive chef. Kerra had volunteered for the job. She wasn’t interested in anything having to do with a kitchen, but she knew they couldn’t rely on Santo, and relying on Dellen would have been ridiculous. The former was a passable cook on a small scale, but easily distracted by everything, from a piece of music on the radio to the sight of a gannet flying in the direction of Sawsneck Down. As for the latter, everything about Dellen could alter in a second, including her willingness to participate in matters familial.

Kerra flipped open the book she’d chosen at random. She began leafing through pages to find something complicated, something requiring every bit of her attention. The list of ingredients needed to be impressive, and what they didn’t have in the kitchen, she would send Alan out to purchase at Blue Star Grocery. If he refused, she would go herself. In either case, she would be busy, and busy was what she wanted to be.

Alan said, “Kerra.”

She ignored him. She decided on jambalaya with dirty rice and green beans, along with bread pudding. It would take hours, and that was fine with her. Chicken, sausage, prawns, green peppers, clam juice…The list stretched on and on. She’d make enough for a week, she decided. The practice would be good, and they could all dip into it and reheat it in the microwave whenever they chose. And weren’t microwaves marvelous? Hadn’t they simplified life? God, wouldn’t it be the answer to a young girl’s prayers to have an appliance like a microwave into which people could be deposited as well? Not to heat them up, but just to make them different to what they were. Whom would she have shoved in first? she wondered. Her mother? Her father? Santo? Alan?

Santo, of course. It was always Santo. In you go, brother. Let me set the timer and twirl the dial and wait for someone new to emerge.

No need for that now. Santo was decidedly altered now. No more will-o’-the-wisp, no more tripping without a care in the world along the paths that opened up before him, no more thoughtless chase of if-it-feels-good-do-it. There’s more to life than that and I suppose you know it now, Santo. You knew it in the final moment. You had to know it. You crashed towards the rocks without a last-minute miracle in sight and in the precise instant before you struck bottom, you finally knew that there were actually other people in your world and that you were answerable for the pain you caused them. It was too late then to amend yourself, but it was always better late than never when it came to self-knowledge, wasn’t it.

Kerra felt as if bubbles were rising inside her. They were hot, like the bubbles of water boiling, and just like boiling water they burned to get out. She hardened herself against letting them escape, and she grabbed a litre of olive oil from another cupboard, above the work top. She turned to scoop up measuring spoons, thinking, How much oil…? and the bottle slipped from her fingers. It hit the floor just right?as it naturally would?and broke in two neat pieces. The oil pooled out in a viscous mess. It splashed the cooker, the cupboards, and her clothes. She leapt to one side, but she didn’t escape.

She cried, “Damn!” and she finally felt the threat of tears. She said to Alan, “Would you just please leave?” She snatched up a roll of kitchen towels and began to unspool them into the oil. Completely unequal to the task at hand, they were soaked to mush the instant they touched the liquid.

Alan said, “Let me, Kerra. Sit down. Let me.”

She said, “No! I made the mess. I’ll clean it up.”

“Kerra?”

“No. I said no. I don’t need your help. I don’t want your help. I want you to leave. Go.”

On a stand near the door a dozen or more copies of the Watchman had been piled. Alan reached for this. He put Casvelyn’s newspaper to good use. Kerra watched the oil soak into the newsprint. Alan did the same. They stood at opposite sides of the pool. She considered it a chasm but he, she knew, saw it as a momentary inconvenience.

He said, “You don’t need to feel guilty because you were angry at Santo. You had a right to anger. He may have thought it was irrational, even stupid of you to care about something that seemed silly to him. But you had a reason for what you felt and you had a right. You always have a right to whatever you feel, if it comes down to it. That’s how it is.”

“I asked you not to work here.” Her voice was expressionless; her emotion was spent.

He looked puzzled. It was a remark, she realised, coming from out of nowhere as far as he knew, but at the moment it summed up everything she was feeling but could not say.

“Kerra, jobs aren’t falling from the sky. I’m good at what I do. I’m getting this place noticed. The Mail on Sunday? There’re bookings coming in every day as a result of that piece. It’s tough out here, and if we mean to make a life in Cornwall?”

“We don’t,” she said. “We can’t. Not now.”

“Because of Santo?”

“Oh come on, Alan.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“I’m not afraid. I’m never afraid.”

“Bollocks. You’re angry because you’re afraid. Anger is easier. It makes more sense.”