Bring Me Back (B.A. Paris)(29)

‘No. She was there, Ruby, I know she was.’ Something must show on my face, maybe the frustration I feel at having arrived too late to see Layla, because she lays a hand on my arm.

‘I think you’d better start at the beginning,’ she says, giving me the benefit of the doubt.

So I tell her everything, even what I’ve never told her before, the truth behind the holiday in France when it all went so drastically wrong, right up to the letter I left for Layla asking her to marry me, the letter that has now gone.

‘If what you say is true,’ she says slowly when I get to the end, ‘it’s horribly creepy.’

It isn’t the reaction I expected and I open my mouth to defend Layla, then realise that Ruby’s right. Just because Layla is behind the trail of Russian dolls, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t something sinister about it.

‘I think the Russian dolls were a way of getting my attention,’ I say, making excuses for her anyway. ‘Now that she’s got it, I don’t think I’ll be finding any more. What I’m trying to do is piece everything together. What made her come back now, what prompted her to leave that first Russian doll? What prompted her to start sending emails, luring me to St Mary’s?’

She thinks for a moment. ‘Because of the timing, I’d say she – if it is Layla – isn’t happy about you marrying Ellen. Maybe she saw the wedding announcement.’ She pauses, calculating backwards. ‘She started to leave the Russian dolls not long after it appeared in the newspaper, didn’t she? If she’s been keeping tabs on you all these years from wherever she’s been hiding, she must have been pretty shocked to learn that you were with Ellen. Maybe, at first, she thought the only reason you were with Ellen was because she’s her sister, that you were trying to find her – Layla – in Ellen. But to go as far as marrying her means something different altogether. It means you love Ellen for who she is, not because she reminds you of Layla. I know, because that’s how I felt.’ She looks at me ruefully. ‘I thought your relationship with Ellen was because you needed to get Layla out of your system and that once she was, you’d come back to me. It was quite a shock when I heard you were going to marry her. So I kind of get where Layla is coming from.’

‘But I was free for years! She could have come back anytime! Why didn’t she?’

‘Maybe she was scared of you – you know, after that night.’

‘But to stay away for twelve years?’

‘Maybe she couldn’t come back before.’

‘Why not? I doubt she was being kept prisoner. I used to think that she was, I used to torture myself imagining that she was being kept against her will. But I don’t think that now.’

Ruby shrugs. ‘Maybe she was ill.’

‘For twelve years? So what does she think will happen now? What is she expecting?’

‘Maybe she isn’t expecting anything.’ She pauses. ‘On the other hand—’

‘What?’

‘You said that the letter had gone from the cottage, and only recently.’

‘That’s right.’

‘And that in it you told her to come and find you, that you would always love her. Isn’t that what you told me you wrote?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, maybe, in her mind, she thinks it still holds true.’

‘What – that if she comes back, I’ll fall in love with her all over again?’

‘Perhaps.’

‘And leave Ellen?’ I pick up on something she said. ‘What did you mean, “in her mind”?’

‘She’s disturbed, Finn.’

‘Disturbed?’

‘Fragile. And maybe a little unbalanced.’ I stare at her. ‘Balanced people do not go round leaving little Russian dolls for people to find,’ she goes on.

I sigh, knowing she’s right. ‘What am I going to do?’

‘I think you’re going to have to be cruel to be kind. Send her an email, refer to the letter if you want, but tell her that twelve years is a very long time and that you’ve moved on.’

‘With her sister.’

‘She probably knows that already. The thing is, are you going to tell Ellen?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You should. You can’t keep something like this from her. If I were Ellen, I’d want to know.’

‘I’d want to know what?’ Turning, I see Ellen standing in the doorway behind me. She’s smiling, but there’s worry in her eyes.

‘Where he’s planning on taking you for your honeymoon,’ Ruby says, without missing a beat, while, with as much casualness as I can muster, I sweep the little Russian doll that I’d left standing on the counter into my pocket. ‘He’s planning to surprise you, but I was saying that in your place, I would want to know. I mean, how’s a girl to know what sort of clothes to take with her?’ Ellen laughs at this. ‘Are you coming in for coffee?’ Ruby goes on.

I pull out the stool beside me. ‘Come on, come and rescue me from Ruby. She keeps telling me I’m doing everything wrong. Would you really prefer to know where I’m taking you?’

‘Well, I’d like to know if we’re going somewhere hot or cold,’ Ellen says, sitting down. ‘And whether it’s a lying on the beach type of honeymoon or a sightseeing one.’