The French Girl(16)

I’m still staring at him. He turns his head and takes in my expression. “Kate,” he says gently. “It’s going to be fine. I just wanted to bring you up to speed. It will all be fine.”

He smiles in what’s meant to be a reassuring manner. But I can’t see his eyes behind those sunglasses.



* * *



—

Lunch is a pleasure, or should be a pleasure, but I can’t shake a sense of unease. It flows beneath every conversation and fills every silence. Tom’s parents don’t notice—his mother is glowing to have her son at home again, however temporarily, and his dad’s gruff welcome belied the delight in his eyes—but Tom’s gaze rests on me frequently. I can’t read what his eyes hold, which only adds to my unease. Tom’s dad has a heavy hand with the wine; by dessert I’m surreptitiously drinking as much water as possible in mitigation.

“How is your mum, Kate?” asks Tom’s mother kindly. “Do you get up north to see her much?”

“She’s well, thanks.” Tom’s mum has her head cocked on one side, listening to me sympathetically. I can see Tom in her. It makes me more open than I might otherwise be; that, or the wine. “She seems happy. She remarried last year. I guess I don’t go up now as much as I used to.”

“You don’t get on with her new husband?”

I shake my head. “No, he’s fine.” I hear my words and correct them. “He’s nice, actually. Dad’s been gone a long time.” Almost ten years. I got the news only weeks after Seb and I broke up. “It’s great to think that she’s not on her own anymore. But it’s just . . . different, I guess.”

Both Tom and his mother are looking at me. I duck my head and take a swallow of wine.

After lunch, Tom’s parents won’t hear of us helping with the clearing up; instead they shoo us out to walk off our overindulgence on the estate grounds. We climb a small ridge and are suddenly presented with an uninterrupted view across a lawn to the main house. Seb’s house. Well, his father’s house.

“You would think—” I say, stopping to stare at the enormous white-painted building. It’s from the Regency era, I seem to recall. There are columns and wings and more windows than I could reliably count. I start again. “You would think I would’ve been here.” I look at Tom. He isn’t meeting my eye. “Don’t you think?” I challenge him. “Wouldn’t you think that if you went out with someone for a year, you might see where they live when they’re not at college?” Tom doesn’t answer. I persist. “Wouldn’t you think that?”

“I don’t think it was intentional,” Tom hedges. “He didn’t deliberately not invite you.”

“Maybe.” I find a large rock to sit on. I’ve had too much to drink. I think of Caro, in France. Of course, you’ve met Lord Harcourt, haven’t you? Such a dear. Her sharp eyes watching me, birdlike, readying to swoop in on any tidbits I give away. You haven’t? Really? “Then again, maybe not.”

Tom runs a hand through his hair and sighs. “Look, Seb’s relationship with his father is—complicated. I’m sure the lack of invitation had nothing to do with you and everything to do with that.”

“Maybe,” I repeat. I lean down to pick up some earth and watch it dribble through my fingers. “Maybe not.”

“It’s been ten years, Kate,” Tom says. The hard note in his voice snaps my head up to look at him. “When are you going to get over it?”

I look away; I can’t speak. We don’t do this, Tom and I; we don’t bring up this particular elephant in the room. We can be friends provided we skirt round the edges. I must be drunk to have violated that. I don’t think he has the same excuse given he’s driving.

Suddenly Tom is hunkered down in front of me. “Kate, I’m sorry.” He reaches out a hand to turn my face to him. His eyes are unhappy and his mouth is twisted in remorse. “Oh Christ, please don’t cry, I didn’t mean . . . It’s just . . . I’m sorry.”

I take a shaky breath, then meet his eyes briefly and attempt a smile. “Me, too. I think I’m what’s known as tired and emotional.”

“Come on, you.” He stands up and pulls me gently to my feet. “Let’s get you home.” My face feels cold where his hand has been. He threads my arm through his and we walk back to the cottage in companionable silence.

In the car on the way home I can’t fight the thrum of the engine and the alcohol in my system: I fall asleep. I wake slowly with a memory or a dream of someone stroking my cheek. Tom is grinning at me affectionately. The day of sunshine has brought out some of his freckles. “Wakey wakey, sleeping beauty,” he says. For a moment I’m displaced; the world hasn’t yet dropped into position around me. For a moment Tom is just Tom and I’m just Kate, without any past or future. Without any context.

Then everything rushes back.





CHAPTER FIVE


On Monday morning, Gordon Farrow’s secretary calls to resurrect our lunch, for two days hence. I would crow over Paul except I’ve lost all faith. In any case, Paul looks like he can’t take another cycle of hope-raising and -dashing. A small contract he was counting on—that we were both counting on—has fallen through. His trenchant defeatism curls around him like a fog; being near him brings a chill. I haven’t known him long enough to estimate how long this will last; at this rate I may not keep him long enough to find out. I return again and again to the financial spreadsheet that holds my future in its tiny white cells. The entries don’t change.