I Am Watching You(36)

She leaves her finger poised over the send button, her heart pounding. For a moment she is not sure that she can do it. She doesn’t know whether she has the courage to finally pull the pin from the grenade. She puts both hands up to her mouth momentarily.

And then she lets out a huff of breath and presses send.





CHAPTER 22


THE PRIVATE INVESTIGATOR

‘You seriously need to stop looking at me like that.’ Matthew’s wife is grinning at him, their new daughter sucking happily at her left breast. The baby, impossibly tiny but with an impressive mop of dark hair, has been gently lain on a pillow to shield Sally’s stomach after the caesarean.

Matthew cannot help it. His mouth is gaping, his eyes wide. It’s still all so . . .

‘I’m sorry. I just can’t take it in.’

‘I know. It’s a miracle, as you keep telling me, Matt. And I love that you’re like this, I really do. But you have to stop looking at me with that face.’

‘What face?’

‘The worship face. As if I’m suddenly some kind of goddess. It’s spooking me. Even more than your sex face.’

‘There is nothing wrong with my sex face.’ He pokes out his tongue.

Matthew is not about to admit that he actually checked out his sex face – in the bathroom mirror – in a fit of pique and paranoia, after his wife mentioned in the early days of their relationship that it was quite interesting. No one had ever mentioned it before. On reflection – namely the bathroom mirror’s – it was quite, not exactly alarming, but . . . intense.

‘Did I mention that I think you’re amazing?’ Matthew reaches out his hand to brush his wife’s arm and then stroke his daughter’s dark hair.

Daughter. He turns the word over in his head and takes a deep breath.

‘So, what are your plans for today then, Daddy?’

This question throws him. ‘What do you mean? I’m going to sit here with my two beautiful girls. What else?’

‘All day?’

‘Why not?’

‘Because if you sit there with that face all day, I will get no sleep, your beautiful daughter will get no sleep and you will die of boredom.’

‘This isn’t boring. This is . . .’

‘A miracle. I know, honey.’

Now they are both laughing.

Matthew turns to glance around the room, and then stands and walks over to the bag on the spare chair containing all the baby’s things. Soft and impossibly pretty things in white and lemon, because they did not want to know the sex of the child in advance.

They have the privacy of this bright, single room on account of the emergency caesarean. Matthew keeps his face turned away from his wife as he thinks again of the awfulness of it all. Eight hours of the torture they call labour, and then the horror of being told that the child was both in the wrong position and in distress and that a caesarean was essential. It was not at all what Sal had wanted, and he will never forget the look of fear and distress and shock on his wife’s face as they wheeled her along to the operating theatre, Matthew clutching her hand and trying to reassure her.

It is probably the reason for this sheer elation. This worship face. The overwhelming tidal wave of relief.

‘Look – my suggestion would be for you to go home now for a few hours. Get a shower and some kip. You can pick up my list of things and come back tonight. My mum’s calling back again this afternoon, and to be honest, I’m exhausted, Matthew. I could do with just sleeping.’

He turns and moves to sit alongside her on the bed. ‘You sure? Doesn’t feel right to leave you yet.’

‘You’ve been here hours and hours, darling.’

‘Nothing compared to what you’ve been through.’

She tightens her lips, and Matthew fancies he sees a glistening in her eyes.

‘Scary, wasn’t it?’

He just nods, afraid that his voice will crack if he speaks again too soon, coughing just to be sure.

‘Look, Matthew. I’m stuck here for days now, which we didn’t expect. So how about you work on your case a bit until I’m home.’

‘I wasn’t thinking about work.’ A lie.

His wife tilts her head. She knows him so well.

‘OK. Maybe just a little bit. But only because you see everything differently once this happens.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Oh, nothing.’ He wishes he had not said this out loud; he doesn’t want to link his beautiful little girl with work, with the new haunting in his head. Doesn’t want his wife to make the link either. But the truth is that he cannot help thinking of so many things differently now. The image of Anna from her Facebook page, used in all the media coverage over the past year. Her mother, Barbara. Ella, too. He is thinking about all of it differently. There is a twist in his stomach and he finds himself swinging his right leg to and fro.

‘Well, I think it makes sense for you to get some work done in between visiting me, and then you can pamper me when I’m allowed home.’

Matthew bites his bottom lip. Sal had planned to campaign to be allowed home as soon as possible. He was hoping to wind work right down during the first couple of weeks. But the caesarean and the compulsory stay in hospital have thrown everything out.

‘OK. You’re right. I’ll go home, get your washing done, catch up on some work while I can and come back this evening. If you’re absolutely sure?’