The Guilty Couple(47)
I hover, unsure whether I should wait for him to come back out or make my own way to the garden room, then I hear something that makes my heart miss a beat.
‘Fifty-seven Oakfield Road,’ George says from the kitchen, ‘that’s right. You’ve found new tenants, already? That’s fantastic news. Hang on a moment.’
He pushes the door shut.
Fifty-seven Oakfield Road is my old house in Crouch End, where Dominic and Grace still live. Are they moving? I don’t suppose anyone would think to tell me. I hurry away, before George discovers me listening, only to find that Esther is already in the garden room, sitting in a circular red velvet chair by the French doors, with a newspaper in her hands. She peers at me from above her reading glasses.
‘You’ve got an hour,’ she says. ‘I will be here the whole time and there’s to be no running off. Do you hear that, Grace?’
From behind the yellow sofa I hear a soft ‘Urgh.’
‘Thank you, Esther,’ I say tightly and make my way across the room. Grace doesn’t so much as glance at me from her supine position on the sofa. Her headphones are in her ears and a Nintendo Switch is inches from her face.
‘Hi sweetheart.’ I crouch on the floor beside her.
She continues to ignore me.
‘Grace.’ I touch her on the forearm. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Don’t touch me.’ She snatches her arm away and twists over to face the back of the sofa. There’s a snort of amusement from Esther that makes my teeth clench.
‘I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch for a few days but when your dad took your phone off you I had no way of—’
‘Just leave me alone.’
‘What’s happened? Talk to me, please.’
‘No. Go away.’
‘Grace. Just let me see your face.’
I don’t understand what’s happened. She was upset the last time I spoke to her but I managed to calm her down. She seemed quite hopeful about the future in the texts we exchanged before Dominic took her phone.
‘Grace,’ I drop my voice so Esther can’t hear and dig around in my bag. I press the smartphone I bought into one of her hands. ‘I bought you this. It’s only cheap but I couldn’t afford a better one. Hide it from Dad so we can stay in touch.’
My daughter flips over to look at me, her Switch abandoned, her fingers wrapped around the mobile. She mouths something I can’t make out.
‘Text me.’ I gesture towards the phone. ‘Wait,’ I add before she can do anything. ‘Don’t send it. Show it to me then delete it.’
As Grace starts tapping at the phone Esther clears her throat. We’ve gone quiet and she’s noticed. She’s wondering what’s going on.
‘I had a text from Lee earlier,’ I say, to fill the silence. ‘Do you remember Lee, my friend from uni who owned the gallery with me?’
Grace looks at me, puzzled, and I gesture for her to continue typing.
‘He wants to meet up tomorrow. To go to a new gallery in Shoreditch. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen him but friends are so important. Don’t you think?’
‘I guess so.’
‘I’m really looking forward to when we can do things like that together. Maybe not an art gallery but the cinema, shopping, maybe a spa or to get our nails done. Would you like that, sweetheart?’
‘Uh-huh.’ Grace holds her phone out to me.
I found something, she’s typed. Right before Dad took my phone off me.
As I watch she logs into her Google account and navigates to her photos. She clicks on an image and hands me the phone. It’s a photograph of two printouts, one in Grace’s name, one in Dom’s. I frown, unsure what I’m seeing. They’re British Airways boarding passes. Is Dom taking Grace abroad? Can he even do that without my permission? The destination is DXB. That’s Dubai. Why would Dominic take her there? He always used to call it a cultural wasteland, a soulless, sandy preening ground for reality TV stars, and a tax haven for thieves.
Grace types something else into the phone.
When I asked Dad about the tickets he said we’re going on holiday but I’m not to tell anyone. Not Granny, not Grandad, not even my school friends. Is it because I’ll be missing school?
I try not to show the horror I’m feeling on my face as I slide the phone out of her hands, take another look at the boarding pass photo and then tap out my reply: I don’t know sweetheart, but I’ll find out.
The flight is on Thursday at 3.15 p.m. That’s in three days’ time.
Chapter 32
OLIVIA
Tooby Davies and Partners solicitors are based on Kilburn High Street, in a poky office squeezed between a kebab shop and a grocers. Unlike the law firm that represented me at court there are no glass partitions and expensive artworks on the wall but they’re cheap and they were able to see me quickly and that’s what matters most. I’ve arranged to meet Lee afterwards and I’m praying to god that it’ll be a celebratory bottle of wine that we share, and not me crying with despair.
Yesterday, I was straight on my phone within minutes of leaving Esther and George’s. I found 57 Oakfield Road on the third residential lettings website I checked. There was Grace’s bedroom, Dominic’s study, the living room, the kitchen. Fear flooded my body as I continued to scroll and I had to shove the phone back into my pocket to stop myself from hyperventilating.