The Therapist(26)

He sits there, waiting for my answer, the fine lines around his eyes deeper than before. But I can’t give him one. I want everything he suggested and none of what he suggested. I don’t want to stay – but I don’t want to go. I want him to leave – but if I’m going to stay here in the house, at least tonight, I don’t want to be alone. The only thing I’m sure about is that, for the moment, I don’t want to be anywhere near him. Or anywhere near the room upstairs.

I move towards the door. ‘I don’t know what I want,’ I say, my voice tight. ‘And until I do, I’ll be sleeping in my study.’

It’s only when I’m making up the sofa bed that I realise I didn’t ask him why he wanted the house so much.





Thirteen


‘Why did you want this house so much?’ I ask Leo the next morning. We’re standing in the kitchen. It’s spotless, because neither of us bothered to eat last night and the early morning light is bouncing off the pale marble surfaces.

‘Sorry?’ He looks tired, but not as tired as I do.

‘Yesterday, you said that the reason you didn’t tell me about the murder before moving in was because you knew I’d refuse to live here and you really wanted this house. I’m asking you why you really wanted this house. It’s a nice house but not so nice that anyone with a conscience would overlook a murder.’ I know I’m being harsh but I barely slept and fatigue is dragging me down.

He walks over to the black and chrome coffee machine.

‘Coffee?’

I’m dying for one. ‘No thanks.’

He makes his coffee before answering my question, as if he’s hoping I’ll tire of waiting. But I’m prepared to give him as much time as it takes.

‘I wanted this house because it’s in a secure environment,’ he says eventually. ‘I like that nobody can get in unless they live here, or they’re let in by someone who lives here. It makes it safer. And because I could afford it. I’d never have been able to afford it if it didn’t have a past.’

‘Since when have you become security conscious?’

‘Since I started getting harassed by clients.’

‘I wasn’t aware you’d been harassed by clients.’

He glances at me. ‘That’s because I chose not to tell you.’

‘I know you had unwanted calls,’ I say, remembering the times he answered his phone only to hang up straightaway, and the way he sometimes stared at the screen before deciding not to answer, then telling me it was a wrong number. ‘I didn’t realise they were from clients. But nobody actually came to the door, did they?’ I pause as a memory resurfaces. ‘Except that woman, the blond one, in Harlestone. I asked you about her at the time and you told me she wanted to know what it was like to live in the village. Was she one of your clients?’

‘No,’ he says. ‘The point is, if a client had wanted to find out where I was, they could have. I’ve never given anybody your address but if somebody had turned up in Harlestone looking for me, every single person in the village would have taken them right to your front door and on the way, told them what I’d had for dinner the previous evening.’

There’s something about his reasoning that doesn’t ring quite true. He’s not telling me everything – but what is it that he’s holding back?

‘But this – The Circle – is a small community in the same way that Harlestone is,’ I say, perplexed.

He gives a tired sigh. ‘That’s exactly why I chose it. I would have preferred an anonymous block of flats with a built-in security system, something like I had before. But you made it clear you weren’t going to live somewhere like that so I looked for a way to keep both of us happy. Here we have the intimate set-up that you prefer and the security that I need. It’s a compromise, Alice, another damn compromise.’

‘Isn’t that what relationships are about?’ I say, stung. ‘Compromise?’

He takes his cup from the machine. ‘I’ll let you have your breakfast in peace. If you want to talk, I’ll be in my study.’

Tears sting my eyes. I’d lain awake most of the night and I still don’t know what to do. I’m tempted to go back to Harlestone but if I do, I’ll have to ask Debbie if I can stay with her for the next few months, because I can’t move my tenants out without notice. But where will that leave me and Leo? He’s right, we’d have to go back to how we’d managed before, only seeing each other at weekends when the whole point of moving to London was so that we could spend more time together. And I can’t get what he said about making new memories for the house out of my mind. It’s created a feeling of obligation that I resent, because if I don’t take up the challenge, I’ll feel as if I’m turning my back, not just on Nina Maxwell, who I feel bound to in some inexplicable way, but also my sister.

‘I meant to ask.’ His voice comes from behind me and turning, I see him standing in the doorway. ‘You said a neighbour told you about the murder. Was it Eve?’

‘No.’

‘Who was it, then?’

I have no choice. I have to tell him what I told Eve.

‘It wasn’t a neighbour, it was a reporter,’ I say, horribly aware that there are too many lies creeping into our relationship.