The Sister-In-Law(61)

I picked up my phone, unable to concentrate on anything, feeling the remnants of Violet’s resentment, Ella’s eyes watching me, her protective voice to Violet, calling her ‘babe’, like they were besties – and I looked up to see she was smirking at the other side of the pool.



* * *



Later that day, I was in the kitchen, making cold drinks for the children, when Ella walked in. She was wearing a small bikini. She seemed so tiny, her body childlike, apart from the full breasts I suspected might not be the ones nature gave her. She took an apple from the fruit bowl. She didn’t speak, just stood against the kitchen units, taking aggressive bites from the apple and chewing slowly. She didn’t take her eyes off me.

I just tried to pretend she wasn’t there and busied myself with the drinks.

‘Clare—’ she suddenly said, throwing the remainder of her apple at the bin, missing and just leaving it on the floor.

I looked at her and she stared back.

‘Are you going to leave that there?’ I asked, unsmiling.

‘Probably.’ A defiant teenager to me as the frazzled mother.

She wanted attention and she’d get it any way she could.

‘Clare, what is your problem with me?’

‘I don’t have a problem,’ I replied.

She sighed theatrically. ‘Yes you do. All that shit last night about the earrings, then coming over to apologise, thinking I’ll just say “it’s okay, you called me a thief, but I forgive you”.’

‘Actually, I wasn’t apologising for the accusation—’ I started, but she talked over me.

‘You tried to badmouth me to Jamie, you disrespect my sister and I know you don’t like me being around your kids.’

‘I didn’t disrespect your sister, I didn’t know about her. I just wanted a quiet holiday with my family and I feel like Jamie just introduced you, forced us all together and assumed everyone would get on.’ I couldn’t say any more. I had to stay on the right side of her – she knew too much.

‘Am I so hard to like?’ She put her head to one side, and I wondered if she was toying with me.

I didn’t answer.



‘Look, Clare, we were thrown together, you’re right. I didn’t choose to spend my holiday – my honeymoon – with you either, but if I want to be with Jamie I have to… It’s our honeymoon.’ She stopped talking. ‘I saw you wince at that. Does it hurt, Clare?’

I shook my head. ‘Please don’t try and deflect from what you did. You took those earrings, I saw you. And you might think you’ve got away with it, but the truth will out. You’re nothing but a thief, and I will prove it… As for what happened at the pool – I just thought it was a little over the top.’

‘I didn’t realise there was etiquette involved in drowning,’ she said, repeating what Dan had said to me earlier. My stomach twisted. Good old Dan, as loyal as ever, he’d obviously made this remark to her. ‘This viciousness of yours is just because you’re in a stale marriage with a bored man you won’t let go,’ she sighed.

‘He can go any time he likes,’ I said, feigning disinterest. She’d really hit a nerve and as much as I tried to ignore what she’d said, it hurt.

‘Oh no he can’t, because you won’t let him. Doesn’t matter if he finds someone else who he really loves, you’re there with your kids and your handcuffs dragging him back. Women like you make me sick,’ she spat.

‘You’ve got it all wrong, you’ve heard half a story from Jamie via Joy and you think you know my life, my marriage.’

But Ella wasn’t interested in my life, she’d rather talk about hers.

‘I bet you wish you were on your honeymoon like me, don’t you, Clare?’

‘No, I don’t want your life thank you.’



‘Wow. Jealous much?’

‘Not at all. I might be in a stale marriage, but your life is non-existent. It’s whatever you put on Instagram. It isn’t real, Ella.’

‘Online or offline, it’s better than yours with your flirty husband and flabby thighs.’

Her true colours were really coming to the fore now. Once again she’d worked it so that no one else was around to witness her vitriol, her venom – but I wasn’t going to take it.

‘You aren’t what you pretend to be. The pious little Insta queen who fights the good fight and empowers women body-shaming her sister-in-law. Nice – it shows just who you really are, a lying little thief.’

‘Oh, Clare, how many times do I have to tell you,’ she sighed, like she was so bored of it all. ‘I have my own diamonds, hun, I don’t need anyone else’s.’

‘Doesn’t mean you didn’t take them.’

‘But why would I when I’ve got my own, way bigger than those weeny things?’

‘I’ve seen your Instagram – I bet those Arab princes pay you for your “talents”, in diamonds?’

‘Yeah, and wouldn’t you like a little taste of that ice, Clare? Something dangerous on a yacht, a sizzle of spice in the Middle East? You’re so bored, you’d sell your kids for ten minutes of my life. So you can stop with the sanctimonious shit.’