The Light Over London(18)

The sponge slipped from her fingers, splashing into the water and sending a soapy spray into her face. She wiped her cheek, the last traces of the day’s makeup coming off on her fingertips, and sighed. Life was better without Simon than with him. That afternoon’s phone call was evidence enough. After everything that had happened, all of his promises that he was getting better, he was still patronizing and self-important. Talking to him had left her feeling drained and sad at the thought of how long she’d lived in denial of the problems that were right in front of her. She’d focused on working twice as hard to try to keep their bank accounts from slipping into overdraft because it was easier than admitting that her seemingly brilliant husband wasn’t who she thought he was—a truth that pressed hard on the tenderness in her heart.

But it was the lying that had hurt the most. An application for a second mortgage on the house he’d tried to convince her to sign without reading it through. Credit cards taken out in both their names that she hadn’t known about. The gambling debts. He’d been sinking for years, and when it became obvious that he was drowning them both, he’d refused to change.

Her eyes drifted up out the kitchen window. It looked out into a narrow side return the last tenant, a talented gardener, had done her best to spruce up with pots of sculptural bay trees. Cara had brought the worn wooden bench that had stood outside of her kitchen in Chiswick and arranged her pots of herbs on it. In several weeks, she’d have to bring the tender plants inside to protect them from the first frost, but for now she liked being able to look at them as she cleaned.

Across the brick wall, she could see the top of a window in Liam’s house. She wondered how he was spending his first evening on Elm Road. The lights were on downstairs, and she could hear the faint strains of guitar and drums drifting through the air.

She should’ve been friendlier, taking up his sister’s suggestion that they have dinner together. He was just a neighbor, nothing to be fearful of, but her scars still tugged uncomfortably.

The doorbell sounded, startling her.

She shut the faucet off and dried her hands on the tea towel as she walked barefoot to the front door. The bell sounded again.

“Coming!” she shouted. When she opened the door, her breath caught in her throat. “Oh! Liam.”

He smiled, warm and open. “I’m sorry to bother you, it’s just that I think you dropped this.”

He held up her phone in its purple-and-teal flowered case.

“Thank you,” she said, taking it from him. “It must’ve fallen out of my bag.”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “I apologize again. Rufus is a constant cause of embarrassment in my life, but I love him.”

“As you should.”

“Is that an Elkes tin?” he asked.

She followed his gaze to the biscuit tin sitting innocently on the sideboard where she’d dropped her keys and her bag.

“Huntley and Palmers.” She picked it up and tilted it to show him the name painted on the top.

The corner of his mouth hitched up. “Is it meant to look like a bookshelf?” he asked, leaning closer but not stepping forward—almost as though he knew the cottage was her sanctuary.

“Yes, it is.”

“Extraordinary. When do you think it’s from?”

“Probably the forties or fifties, but I haven’t authenticated it yet,” she said.

“Authenticated it?”

“I work for an antiques dealer. I found it when I was clearing out an estate today.”

“Extraordinary,” he said again as he rocked back on his heels. “I had no idea we shared a common interest. I’m a lecturer of history at Barlow University.”

So that was what his sister had meant about absentminded professors.

“What’s your area of specialty?” she asked. Maybe he could help her figure out who the author was.

“I’m a medievalist.”

Not his era then.

“Well, I should finish cleaning up,” she said.

“Yes,” he said, sniffing the air. “Whatever was for dinner smells delicious.”

The opportunity to invite him in hung in the air. She could easily pull the leftover tart out of the fridge and pour him a glass of wine. He’d just moved. He might want company.

Next time, she promised herself. A day when Simon hadn’t called and her muscles weren’t aching in places she’d forgotten she had. A day when talking to Liam didn’t make her feel quite so thrown off-axis.

“Thanks again for returning my phone.”

“Of course, of course. Anytime.”

As he walked out of her yard, she shut the door before she could see whether he’d turned to wave again.

She carried the tin back to the kitchen table and pried it open. She’d left it in the hall because she hadn’t wanted to risk the possibility of something spilling and destroying the diary before she’d even had the chance to read it. First, she pulled out the photograph of the woman. A corner of it had been bent at some point and folded back into place, and she smoothed her thumb over it now.

“?‘L.K. on the Embankment,’?” she mused as she pulled out the diary and flipped open the front cover. There was no name or initials or address. That would simply be too straightforward an end to this mystery. She would have to figure out who the diarist was the hard way.